Chapter 1779: Truth
"I trust you will win, but this is still dangerous," Ning said in a whisper.
"But we have to fight anyway. These people are in trouble. They need my help. Any help."
Ning took a deep breath and nodded. "You’ll still have to be careful. They are Reapers, and they have had a long time to prepare for this. So you can only rely on your fighting skills."
Shara nodded. "I will do well."
She was ready to fight, but she wasn’t trusting of the prince and the others just yet.
She turned toward the prince and asked, "How do I trust that your men will follow what you have said? How do I trust that you won’t get help from outside or try to weasel out of this agreement when you are close to dying?"
The prince appeared to have been waiting for someone to say as much and had thought through how to deal with that as well.
"Ole, have someone fetch your scroll," the prince said.
Oleander thought for a moment and nodded. He turned to the side, quickly whispering to someone who ran off. They all waited for a while, at which point the person returned with a golden rod in his hand.
Oleander took it and walked up front.
"This is an artifact that can tell whether you are lying or you are telling the truth," Oleander said. "We will vow on this artifact to fight this battle until we die. We will see through this just whether you are planning to run away during the end."
Oleander pulled on the side of the rod, bringing out a long piece of paper. One could only see now why it was a scroll.
"My name is Oleander Wes-Gauss," the man said, and the paper suddenly glowed a bright green.
"It is raining at the moment," the man said, and the paper glowed red.
"We four shall fight to the death with no outside assistance. Whoever survives in our upcoming battle, man or woman, they shall be the next Emperor of the Onyx Empire."
It was not a fact, but a truth the man believed, so the scroll glowed green.
Ning listened to his words, trying to see if he had hidden a lie in that truth. However, since the scroll had glowed green, at least those words by themselves were a truth.
Oleander rolled up the scroll again and had someone take it to Shara. "You may test it if you wish. Then you must speak the truth on the scroll."
Ning stepped forward and took the scroll before Shara could. Just in case there was poison or hidden thorns in the scroll, he had to test it first. He didn’t find anything of that sort, so he pulled on the paper.
"My name is Ning," he said out loud and saw the scroll glow green.
"I am married."
The scroll glowed green again.
His words caused the people around him to look at him differently. Shara especially was confused. What was going on exactly?
"That doesn’t work," Mari said. "You’re not married."
Ning looked up, giving a faint smile. That smile was enough for the people to realize the truth.
They could not imagine how he had managed to keep that part of his life secret from them despite the fact that they had been on the road together for so many months.
Ning looked down on the scroll and nodded slightly. The scroll didn’t search from this world, but rather searched the truth in him.
Ning thought for a bit and came up with a lie.
"I do not have a wife."
It was a half-lie, since he wanted to see how the scroll would deal with a situation where he believed that he did not have his wife with him right at that moment.
He wanted to see if in the dissonance between inner thought and outer words, which one the scroll would choose.
The scroll glowed red.
’I see,’ he thought. ’So it takes our words and not our thoughts. But it somehow knows that our words are true as well.’
"I don’t have a wife," he said again, this time fully trying to believe that he had no wife. He hadn’t married anyone. He was a bachelor.
It didn’t work. The scroll glowed red.
Even if Ning tried to believe something else, the scroll knew his deepest thoughts, which was the fact that he was indeed married and had a wife.
Seeing as there wasn’t any easy way to bypass the scroll’s ability to discern truth and lies, Ning was much more comfortable accepting the other man’s truth now.
He handed it over to Shara, who tested it quickly and then consulted with Matthew before speaking her oath as well.
"I will fight to the death against the other 3 candidates, with no outside help, in order to become the Empress of this empire."
The scroll glowed green, showing her conviction.
She tossed the scroll back toward the man who was waiting, and the man brought it back to the others.
Jema took the scroll next.
"I shall fight to the death against all candidates with no outside assistance to become the Empress," the woman said. Her scroll glowed green as well.
Finally, she handed it to the prince.
The prince grabbed the scroll and slowly pulled it. He paused for a moment, seemingly thinking his words. That only made everyone more concerned how he was going to cheat.
However, the prince’s words were the most straightforward they could be.
"I shall receive no outside assistance in my fight against you 3, and I alone shall be the sole survivor."
This wasn’t a truth that the prince spoke. It was a promise.
And the green glow that came from the scroll made it so that everyone knew that this was a promise he was going to keep no matter what.
Having spoken as much, the prince tossed the scroll to the side.
"We shall reconvene right here in an hour. Make all the preparations you can."