novelraw Chapter 418: The Loyal Minister
Chapter 418: The Loyal Minister
"Loyal subject? Hah..."
Su Zhan let out a laugh dripping with utter contempt. "Qin Bai, put away this self-indulgent performance. Do you truly believe you're some loyal general concerned for the nation and its people?"
"For your case clearance rate, for your steady climb to power within the Aberrant Purge Division, how many times have you abused your authority, extracted confessions through torture, forced admissions under duress? How many innocents have you falsely accused, left to suffer endless torment in pitch-black prison cells, just so you could pad the cold, hard numbers on your merit ledger? And how many more, simply because they disagreed with you or inadvertently crossed your interests, had crimes fabricated against them, thrown into prison, vanishing without a trace?"
"Is it only Aberrant blood that stains your hands? The blood of your own people, wrongfully dead under your torture and schemes—does their blood not count as blood!?"
"You paved your path to promotion with the bones of your own kind, dyed your official cap and peacock feathers red with the blood of the innocent. Someone like you, daring to label yourself a loyal subject? Daring to talk about acting for Daxia? You're nothing but... a butcher cloaked in loyalty, practicing the ways of a cruel official, selfish and self-serving, stopping at nothing for power and reputation! Don't you dare sully the words 'loyal subject' here!"
Su Zhan didn't stop. He took a step forward, standing face to face with Qin Bai.
"As for what you did to me... Qin Bai, every single incident, every detail, I remember it all clearly, etched into my bones. You led your men, crashing into my life just as I had achieved a bit of success and was filled with hope for the future, casting me into the abyss. In that interrogation room, your certain gaze had already pronounced me guilty. You laid out an inescapable net, driving me like a stray dog with no home to return to, forcing me to flee into the Mist World where survival was one in ten."
"Do you have any idea what I experienced in there? How many times I almost became a pile of dry bones? And now... it's time for reckoning. Qin Bai, debts owed must be repaid."
"I remember, in your Aberrant Purge Division's torture chambers, there are methods that make a person wish for death but not get it, techniques that won't kill immediately... Tell me... how interesting would it be to experience those exact same methods used on yourself? Would it let you taste the final despair of those you tortured to death?"
Qin Bai abruptly closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. "Heh... The victor becomes king, the loser a bandit. The strong prey on the weak... It has always been so since ancient times. I, Qin Bai... accept it. There's nothing more to say. Methods? Process? It doesn't matter... In the end, it's just death. Su Zhan, you've won. Completely and utterly won. Whether to kill or slice me, do as you please. Give me... a clean death."Qin Bai had already foreseen himself dying miserably under endless torment.
The violent killing intent in Su Zhan's eyes receded slightly. "I don't plan to give you a clean death."
Qin Bai's heart sank again.
"But..." Su Zhan's voice clearly reached his ears. "I'll give you a chance."
A chance?
Qin Bai's head snapped up, a glimmer of disbelief flashing in his ashen eyes.
Su Zhan looked at him. "You, Qin Bai, are, after all, a genius with an SSS-grade Life Soul, a powerhouse at the first tier of the Ocean Realm. Looking across all of Daxia, you're high-end combat strength. Dying like a stray dog in internal power struggles and personal grudges... don't you think it's too wasteful, too humiliating?"
Qin Bai's body shuddered, his pupils contracting slightly.
Su Zhan's voice carried a seductive quality. "Think about it. Ocean Realm powerhouses—which one shouldn't be dominating the battlefield, clashing with powerful enemies, ultimately wrapped in horsehide, dying on the battlefield defending home and country? That is a warrior's true end! Are you willing... to die so ignobly on this path of power you chose for yourself?"
Qin Bai's mind was violently shaken.
Once upon a time, when he first embarked on the cultivation path, hadn't he also been filled with passionate blood, wanting to expand humanity's territory, to slay powerful foes?
Su Zhan presented the final condition, earth-shattering. "I'll give you a chance! A one-on-one duel with me, Su Zhan! Right now! Win, and I'll let you go. Everything you did to me before, all grievances wiped clean. I will not pursue it. You can leave, change your name and live in obscurity, or... use the life you have left to go to the battlefield where you belong."
"Lose... then leave your life here! Die honorably, in combat! What do you say?"
Qin Bai was completely stunned, staring dumbfounded at Su Zhan.
Hope ignited Qin Bai's originally dead heart.
He didn't care what Su Zhan's motives were. Pity, humiliation, or simply wanting to defeat him personally in battle! He only knew this was his only chance. A dignified death befitting his status as a powerhouse, or... a slim chance of survival!
"I..." Qin Bai roared with all his strength, his voice low. "Then let's fight!"
The hot blood in his veins began to flow again.
Even knowing the odds of victory were slim, he would fight for this sliver of hope. Dying in a duel was far more honorable than being tortured to death or executed like a criminal!
Standing in the corner, Situ Hong and Shangguan Xue couldn't help but exchange a look of surprise.
They hadn't expected Su Zhan to propose this method of resolution either.
But both tacitly refrained from interfering.
This was Su Zhan's decision. They only needed to ensure the "fairness" of this duel, and that... no unexpected incidents occurred.
Mercy?
Su Zhan sneered inwardly.
No, absolutely not.
He, Su Zhan, was never some saint who repaid evil with kindness. The humiliation of those years spent hiding and fleeing from pursuit, the torment of dancing with death in the Mist, the frustration of being forced to live under an assumed name, unable to even possess his true identity... The hatred brewed from all this had long seeped into his marrow. How could simple death offset it?
What he wanted was complete crushing! Total overwhelming superiority, from body to soul, from strength to belief!
Hadn't Qin Bai always prided himself as a powerhouse, a guardian of order, looking down on him from on high? Fine. Then in the field he was most proud of—strength—Su Zhan would openly and honorably trample him underfoot! Let him personally experience what a despair-inducing power gap felt like! Let his SSS-grade Life Soul and Ocean Realm cultivation become a laughable joke before Su Zhan!
This was the most thorough blow for someone as proud to the bone as Qin Bai. Far more effective at destroying his will than simply killing him.
And... directly killing someone who had already accepted his fate was letting him off too easy. That would only let him indulge in a sense of tragic self-satisfaction as a "loyal subject at his end."
True torment was giving hope. Then... when he was closest to that hope, thinking it was within reach, personally snuffing it out completely. This psychological plunge of plummeting from the clouds to the abyss in an instant... was far more bone-deep than physical torture!
This was the art of revenge.
So, he proposed the duel.
This wasn't forgiveness. It was a more sophisticated form of retribution.