Chapter 199: A Responsibility, Two Tragedies

Inside the Illusionary Realm.

“Do you understand now? From the very beginning, you had no chance of becoming a God, even if Tiyelu hadn’t swapped the positions of the Source of Magic’s split and its main body. The true essence of a God is far more complex than you can imagine.”

The Priestess smiled slightly.

“Let’s not even discuss anything else. The moment you all decided to rely on that so-called God Symbol to take shortcuts, you were already being tricked. What do you think the essence of a God is? A Divine Spark, a Divine Position?”

“Wrong. Setting aside the first two tests, I can guess you haven’t even made it through the 999,999 steps of the Divine Ladder, right? Otherwise, you wouldn’t be absorbing power this quickly, but… that’s not the Demon trying to deliberately make things difficult for the inheritors.”

“Ancient sayings go, ‘When Heaven is about to bestow a great responsibility, it must first torment the person’s will and labor their muscles and bones.’ Unless you personally tread those 999,999 long steps, you will never grasp the true meaning of ‘Infinite Magic’ and establish a Divine Nation. That God Symbol you mentioned is likely a trap left behind by the Demon, specifically for guys like you who want to take shortcuts and leap straight to the top.”

At this point, Miss Vilyric couldn’t help but curve her lips into a smile.

“Did you think I was splitting that Divine Spark to do evil? Wrong. I was saving you! Seriously, think about it. When a vessel’s qualifications are insufficient to contain its internal power, what happens?”

“Also, did you ever wonder why Tiyelu, after defending the Illusionary Realm for a thousand years, and with so many strong ones in this realm, why none of your ancestors reached for the Demon’s Divine Position?”

At this, Vilyric sighed, shaking her head in regret, summarizing.

“Young man, being a God isn’t so easy. If you want to fly high and turn into a phoenix, be careful not to smash yourself into pieces.”

“…”

Sylvester fell silent. After a while, he finally forced a bitter smile and removed the mask from his face.

“It seems… I have lost. Lost thoroughly. After all my planning and scheming for years, I still underestimated the true strong ones and this world. How ridiculous… The clown is actually me.”

As he spoke, his tone quickly changed from a low murmur to a clear and pleasant one, and his body underwent visible changes—his chest beneath the robe gradually swelled, his waist shrank inward, and his face even underwent slight adjustments.

“May I know your name?”

“I’m called Vilyric… wait, you’re a woman?”

As soon as she announced her name, the Priestess instinctively blinked in surprise.

“Wait, why did you go out of your way to disguise yourself as a man? Is there some special significance to that?”

This world has no traditions favoring males over females; where Vilyric walked, the focus was almost exclusively on ability rather than gender. So she genuinely didn’t understand the other’s behavior.

As if already acknowledging her defeat, Sylvester raised the mask in his hand, humorously smiling.

“This object is called ‘Heavenly Deceit.’ I acquired it with great cost from the ‘Dusk Council,’ as the name suggests, it can deceive the judgments of the laws of the world—half-demons are quite a peculiar race. Perhaps because we only have half the bloodline of demons, among us, women cannot possess magic or combat ability.”

“My mother and I are no exception. So if we want to do anything, we need to use this object to deceive the world and gain the power to achieve our goals, ha… what a curse.”

“Half-demon… huh?”

Upon hearing this, Vilyric couldn’t help but ponder.

If Sylvester is a descendant of the transmigrator Min Chen, then her situation should relate to some settings within the game.

First of all, among the initial selectable races for players in the ‘Illusionary World,’ there isn’t a female half-demon race, meaning you can only choose to create a male half-demon account.

The official explanation for this situation is quite scarce, but compared to typical races in games like humans, beastmen, undead, celestial, or spirits, this characteristic of half-demons has indeed been mocked and discussed by many players.

Could it be… because of this?

Since the other seemed to have already lost the will to fight, and Vilyric herself had no intention of killing Sylvester here, she temporarily set down her weapon, adopting a seemingly relaxed yet ready-for-anything posture to actively engage.

“There should still be some time, Sylvester. Can you tell me… your story? Frankly, I’m a little curious.”

Having returned to her original form—a tall figure with gray hair, looking barely over twenty, with a slightly toughened yet exquisite beauty that bore at least a 70% resemblance to Min Chen, Sylvester silently nodded, then shook her head.

“My real name is Sylvania. Although I don’t know where you heard that from, Sylvester Burwell is a false name I created using ‘Heavenly Deceit.’ As someone who has defeated me with honor, a respected strong person, I won’t deceive you.”

Before Vilyric could speak, she continued.

“You guessed it right. My mother is Min Chen’s daughter, and I am his granddaughter. Min Chen and half-demons do not belong to this world. As outsiders, although we have inherited this bloodline from another realm, due to our gender defects, we could not inherit his great power.”

“When my mother was young, that bastard suddenly vanished without a trace. Later, for some uncontrollable reason, my grandmother soon left her too, entrusting my mother to a friend and returning to the Holy Empire.”

“However, misfortune struck. The one responsible for looking after my mother tragically died in an accident. The enemies quickly came knocking. Fortunately, my mother managed to hide in time and escaped.”

“Afterward, she dared not stay any longer, fled alone, and due to my grandmother’s admonition, couldn’t go to the Holy Empire to find her. Thus, with no power and no shelter, my mother began to wander in the United Kingdom, struggling to survive. After a long time, suffering greatly, she finally relied on a sum of wealth left by my grandmother to find a small village to stabilize her life, forming a family with the local villagers and eventually having me.”

“However, my mother’s life was destined for misfortune. When I was twelve, a plague broke out in the United Kingdom, and coincidentally, the region my mother lived in was the epicenter of this disaster. That terrible plague lasted a whole year, taking the lives of millions, and my ordinary, mundane father was one of them.”

“Misfortunes don’t come singly. Not long after that, my mother unfortunately got infected while voluntarily participating in medical work. Half-demons have stronger resistance than humans, but once infected, it’s extremely hard to cure.”

“You surely know about the situation in the United Kingdom. We as a foreign race didn’t dare to let priests or doctors perform thorough treatments and checks, for if they discovered anything… the outcome would be extremely tragic.”

Sylvania raised her right hand, adorned with a single ring, which seemed well-maintained but was slightly old, clearly a magical item.

“Though I did my best, my mother… ultimately passed away. In her last moments, she called me to her bedside, holding this ring with great reverence, telling me that it was a precious gift from my grandfather, named Min Chen. Inside it held her life savings and the wealth left by my grandmother, but more importantly, it was the only thing that contained her memories of the past.”

“This most important treasure, she passed down to me.”

As if having worn the mask for too long, or perhaps because a woman’s heart is softer and more easily hurt, once removed, all the accumulated pain and hatred erupted like a mountain flood. Sylvania spoke to herself while trying to wipe the falling traces from her eyes.

“My mother… held my hand, sharing countless stories of the past, all those beautiful memories of a complete family when her parents were still around. She described how tall and great my grandfather was, reliable, humorous, and handsome. Standing by him felt like standing in front of an insurmountable mountain, filled with a sense of security.”

“She said those were the happiest and sweetest times of her life, even happier than when she was with my father.”

“As she cried and laughed, it seemed her nearly withered life shone with new light again. She repeatedly told me that she didn’t hate her parents for abandoning her. They were truly great people, and they loved her deeply, but the heavy and great mission required their departure. She felt proud to be their daughter.”

As she kept speaking, Sylvania’s voice seemed to choke a bit, but she still persevered, perhaps not wanting to show a weak side in front of others.

“My mother… talked for a long, long time, until her eyes could barely open. In her final moments of life, all she dwelled upon were those sweet memories, but I knew she was about to die.”

“In the end… my mother closed her eyes. Her chest no longer rose and fell, and I thought this was the end. Heartbroken, I stepped forward to arrange her remains. Who would have thought when I leaned down, I would hear her gently whispering in my ear as if squeezing out the last bit of her strength, like a farewell, expressing her deep-seated unwillingness and loneliness.”

“Sylvester… even like this, I really want to see father once more…”

   

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