The Young Master in the Shadows

“All Kneel for the Fate Lord!” the chamberlain, a tall white-haired old man, announced, making all the neatly dressed men and women in the courtroom kneel down as a completely naked young man with long flowing blond hair reaching his butt, entered with a long golden lance in his hand.

He slowly made his way on the crimson carpet then climbed two steps reaching the golden throne in the center of the room and sat on it, crossing his legs.

“You may raise your heads!” he said as he struck his lance to the ground, allowing everyone to stand up and look up as two guards in white armor closed the gate.

The room shimmered with a strange light as the isolation formation activated.

“Welcome back my lord… “ the chamberlain said nervously. “You humble servants, thank you for all the work you are doing!” he added as he bowed down.

“Stop with the nonsense... I'm already dead tired of killing fucking demons for 25 years consecutively…” the fate lord replied dismissively. “Now, report how the collapse is going?” he asked, noticing the uneasy atmosphere around the room. What did those idiots do now?

No one replied as everyone in the court began to look at each other nervously…

“What?” the lord, who was in a cheery mood after gaining quite a few Authority points in the last few years, lost it at once. “What happened?” he asked.

“Phantom! ” the chamberlain called loudly, making a tall skinny court lady shoot him a glare of hate then step forward and bow. He was clearly making her the scapegoat but she didn’t dare complain in front of the lord.

“An incident?” he asked.

“Ah… Ehm… “ she hesitated. “...Yes…”

“WHAT IS IT? SPEAK!”

“My lord… We ask for your forgiveness…” she said as she fell to her knees, all in the hall did, making the lord grow a little fearful.

“Don’t make me repeat my words…” he asked coldly. “What happened?”

“The… The Fate thread in the temple…” she paused. “They were burnt…”

“...”

“...”

“What?” he asked in an unbelieving tone. “WHAT DID YOU FUCKING SAY?” he asked again as he sprung to his feet and he opened his eyes wide. Everyone looked away…

“7 months ago, the fate threads… The ones in the temple… They were all burnt…” she repeated nervously.

“I FUCKING HEARD YOU THE FIRST TIME!” he flared in shock. “WHAT DID YOU MEAN BURNT?” he still couldn’t believe what he heard.

“Ah… Burnt as if completely turned into charcoal…” Phantom said nervously. “After we noticed the smoke, we hurried to open the vault, but due to all of the protection around it, we could only do that after an entire hour! By that time, the fire that started from one of the talismans tied around a thread belonging to one of them had already spread everywhere and destroyed everything!”

“...”

“....”

“AH…”

“...”

“AHHHHHHHHHHHH! SHIT! FUCK! DAMN IT! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I HAD TO PAY IN ORDER MATERIALIZE THESE FATE THREADS? DAMN IT! HOW ARE WE GOING TO CONTAIN THOSE FATED EMPERORS NOW?” He yelled. "DAMN IT! NOW WE WILL HAVE TO REALLY FIGHT FOR THE DAMN IMPERIAL LAGACY!”

“....” No one dared to answer that. They had no idea. Oops... This may be bigger than they anticipated….

“FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! A BUNCH OF USELESS GERMS! IS THIS WHAT I GET FOR ENTRUSTING YOU WITH ONE SIMPLE TASK!”

“....” Everyone was pondering that they should’ve called in sick today.

“DAMN YOU! DAMN YOUR ENTIRE OFFSPRING, A BUNCH OF SHIT-EATING VERMIN… DO YOU WANT ALL MY WORK FOR THE LAST 500 YEARS TO GO TO WASTE? WHY THE HELL AM I KEEPING YOU HERE…” He slowly lifted his lance “YOU ALL GERMANS…” he spat as a white flame appeared atop the lance’s blade.

SHIT… Everyone didn’t know what to do. They didn’t dare to take a step back, but they really needed to run…

“Calm your anger, my lord….” The chamberlain finally decided to risk it and intervene. He had no idea that his lord would be this angry.

“FUCK YOU AND FUCK MY ANGER…. WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING IN MY ABSENCE?” the lord flared. “DAMN IT!”

“My lord … Ever since the incident, all our agents had been investigating the reason behind the fire in addition to trying to figure out the reason behind the divergences we started to observe…” the chamberlain clarified.

“WAIT? WHAT? DIVERGENCES” he asked as he lowered his lance a bit and frowned. “YOU MEAN FROM THE PROPHECY?”

“Yes, My lord…. Let me explain…” Phantom hurried to speak. “Ever since the incident, the events from the world began diverting from those we had in the prophecy!” she explained. “According to our analysis, this could only be from the interference of those Cursed Fate Thread owners or the one who set the fire!… That’s why we had been investigating them, hoping to patch things up!” she said.

“Oh… It seems like you are not that stupid after all…” the lord paused. It might not be all lost. “How much divergence is there?” he asked as he lowered his lance and the flames completely faded.

“Since the fire, we have already deviated 32% from the prophecy compared to the usual 1.21%!“

“I see… WAIT…. FUCK WHAT? 32%” he gasped. This was a big number even for him, the one who had power over Fates. No… This couldn’t be the result of a mistake… Someone was definitely behind this…. Another lord?

“Yea, my lord. This can’t be natural!” Phantom said as if reading her master’s mind.

“Um… “ he said as he calmed down a bit, his mind thinking of who could have done it. “Did you find anything?”

“...”

“What?”

“Sorry, my lord… Other than a few dead ends we couldn’t find anything of substance… We had very little info to locate the Fated Emperors, and it is as if whoever was behind managed to hide from all our artifacts! We were awaiting your return to decide on our next course of action! ”

“Dead ends? Hidden?” the Fate Lord said as he frowned, someone came to mind.

“Ah… My lord, how about we explain our investigations first?”

“Do so…” he said as he slowly returned to his throne and sat on it. “Explain from the beginning!” he said.

“Yes, my lord….” Phantom said, then swallowed and cleared her throat. “I will start with the first discovered divergence after the accident, it was about 714 line in the prophecy… ‘THE WORLD’S SON SHALL RISE IN THE LAND OF THE VEIN, AND THE WILL OF THE PURPLE DRAGONS HE SHALL CHALLENGE!’” she said, reading from the book at hand. “According to your command, after we figured out the event’s date and location using the Akashic calendar calculating method, we should have been able to find the said Scion and save him from their attacker to gain his favor.”

“Should have?” the lord asked.

“Yes… It was supposed to happen about 7 months ago in a Vein city in Wiren principality, one of the main Von Weise areas of influence. And although there was some turmoil there at that point of time, we failed to identify any signs of the said Scion in that incident… “

“What was the turmoil about?” he said, squinting his eyes.

“One Von Weise elite heir who was freshly transferred there was accused of killing his brother but it was revealed that he was being framed... We believe that the guy involved, named Victor Von Weise, was being used as a honey trap by Ann. The Von Weise family's matriarch. She seemed to have been using him to divert attention from other hairs!”

“Oh… Is he important to our subject at hand?” the lord asked.

“Yes, he is one of our dead ends. At first. We only kept an eye on him by accident… Right Mirage?” she said, turning to a girl in the back.

“Right!” Mirage stepped forward and bowed.

“You are the one responsible for that area?” the lord asked.

“Yes, my lord, My name is Mirage…”

“What did you find?”

“Ah...Sorry my lord, My results would not make sense in this contest, and Victor might not be a dead end as we first suspected. So I ask thee to make Phantom explain the other divergence first…” Mirage said politely.

“Oh…” the Fate lord raised one eyebrow, those two women didn’t like each other. “Ok then… What other divergences did you discover?”

“Ah… Yes right away… “Phantom shot Mirage a glare. “The second divergence was an incident in the Thunder Sect, according to the prophecy, that ruin should have stayed dormant for the next 50 years, but it suddenly had a break! Although it was contained, it was not before it caused a public sensation and many people began to suspect things, again diverting from the line, THE HIDDEN SECRET SHALL STAY HIDDEN!” she said.

“That line is not about the existence of players!” the lord corrected her, “What else?”

“It is about the families… The line… THE GOLDEN CYCLOPS SHALL PERISH AND HIS TRIBE WILL SCATTER…. We believed that it was concerning the death of the Von Geldstadt family's patriarch as there were some reports of him being severely poisoned, but he is still alive… In fact, he just finished a restructuring process in the family, getting rid of many spies, and they are better than ever.”

“Oh… Then what about Von Weise on the next line?”

“Their prophecy was only 50% correct… THE PURPLE DRAGONS SHALL FIGHT EACH OTHER IN THE DARK, AND POISONOUS ONE SHALL SIT ON THE THRONE….” she explained. “The fight did happen, but it was not hidden, but a big mess… And the Matriarch, Ann, who seemed to have also been cured, managed to not only kill the traitors, but she is now in the process of consolidating power in the family,” she said.

“Oh… Did they survive that? Did that poisonous bastard make an appearance? ” he frowned.

“Sorry My lord, we don’t have the info!” Phantom replied. He was the one who told them to stay away from that shit.

“Whatever… What about the other families?” he frowned.

“Ah… Right…the line, THE SUMMONERS SHALL SUMMON THE ANCIENT HORROR FROM THE ABYSS AND THEIR END SHALL BE GRIMM, seemed to have happened a month ago, way ahead of time calculated for it.” Phantom said.

“A speed-up of events?” the lord frowned.

“Yes, Since the method of their demise had not changed, we believe that this event was not a direct effect, but a mere reflection of some other unnoticed interference. Since we don’t know the cause of the original incident, we can’t tell how it happened faster…”

“True… Did they encounter anything out of the ordinary lately?”

“Not as far as we know of!” she replied, shaking her head.

“What else then?”

“Some minor families had some trouble, but since the prophecy does not directly mention any by name we can’t tell if it was a part of the original intended destiny! Though there was a divergence that connected to many of them…”

“What?”

“The line about the red moon… ONCE THE SECRET OF THE MOON WAS REVEALED, THE SHEEP WILL GO IN AND THE WOLVES WOULD GO OUT!” she said. “As your lord told us before, This line is about the demons using that dungeon as a trap to haunt players…”

“Yes, what happened, didn’t we have plans to locate and monitor all who returned?” he asked. This was important for his grand plan to make use of demons.

“Most of the players returned without turning to demons… A player inside who calls himself the Emperor managed to defeat the demons and free everyone! We don’t know the details though…”

“WHAT? The Emperor?” the lord stood up again making everyone look away. “ANY INFO ABOUT HIM?” he asked directly. That world was a taboo for him.

“Sorry my Lord, no… He hid his identity perfectly, making everyone sign a contract to not say a thing!”

“Keep investigating! And find me one of those contractors….”

“Yes my Lord…”

“Um… And the sects? Anything wrong about them?” he asked.

“The line, BLOOD SHALL BE SHED IN THE SWORD SECT event didn’t happen, their young master who was probably the cause seemed to have managed to finally level up, but we don’t know the details why,” Phantom said. “The Frozen sect head seemed to have opened its door for disciples ahead of time also after getting a new very gifted personal disciple… The Heavenly sect saw no change, Prince Caspian there had an incident, but other than that…”

“Caspian had an incident?” the lord raised one eyebrow as he interrupted. Nothing should happen to that stupid demon until his role was done!

“Yes, a minor one… Don’t worry my lord, he is fine!” Mirage was the one who intervened. “One of the four demonesses in the prophecy whom we believe was Nova Von Astrom was about to be wed to a Von Weise… That guy Victor, Caspian went there and grabbed her, thankfully this went up without causing a major problem!” she said. “It is just that he was cursed afterward, but the sect master easily dispelled it for him… It was probably The von Weise taking revenge for the mess he caused, but there was no proof!“

“Oh… That guy Victor again?” the lord sighed.

“Yes, milord…“Mirage said, “The first time I investigated him I found him very fishy. The Von Weise family was clearly using this guy as bait to get the other families to attack him so the trouble next to him was to be expected. Back then he was going to hold a grand wedding to marry a girl from each of the families…”

“Oh… Harem weddings are the best… They still do those?” the lord asked.

“Not really… I was a sensation, that’s why I thought that this was the best chance for trouble so I cast a misfortune curse and waited to scan every suspicious or weird-acting person I could locate!” she said.

“You guys must have ruined a lot of people’s future to use that old thing… “ he smirked. whoever makes a curse, always has to pay an appropriate price, and this misfortune curse was no exception, to activate it over a city, 1000000 people had to willingly sacrifice their luck for the next 10 years.

“People are willing to sell a lot of things that they don’t realize are important, my lord!” Mirage said.

“True, hopefully it didn’t go all to waste…” he said. Making a lot of people unlucky at once, muddied the destiny of the world, but after the incident, this was a necessity.

“Well… We did find a few interesting leads… Victor ended up being a false one… I have four things to report…” Mirage said.

“Enough with the suspense… Speak damn it!” the lord said. He hated cliffhangers. Maybe this was the effect of him being an all-knowing fate lord or something.

“Yes, My Lord! The first thing is that due to us using the misfortune curse, a demon might have managed to escape a dungeon… Since he was calling himself The Nutcracker, we think he is a high-ranking one!” she explained. Low-ranking demons rarely had names. “We know he was traveling west a few months ago, but we lost contact with him ever since…”

“Oh… The world didn’t destroy him?” the Lord frowned.

“No… We believe he has some kind of X-ranked hiding artifact as we are not the only one trying to locate him to no avail… He might also be connected to our targets!”

“Unlikely, but do keep an eye on him… All info about him shall be sent directly to my desk!” he said with some greed in his eyes.

“Yes My Lord… The second thing I want to report is that there was a connection between Victor and the Thunder sect, he seemed to be in a… Ehm. Relationship with the Thunder sect’s old patriarch’s son… That guy is a dark scion… Too bad he was killed by Caspian before I could investigate further!” she said.

“Killed by Caspian? Why?’ the Lord frowned.

“He was impersonating Nova who ran away from the wedding… He found out when the real thing appeared to stop the farce!”

“Oh… Typical dark scion drama…” the lord sighed. Although killing those guys was hard, it was doable if it was done by a full-fledged Scion who could negate the other protective fate power.

“Wait… Is that Victor guy gay or straight?” this guy was having a harem wedding, but he had to add a guy?

“... Unknown my lord…” Mirage said, wondering if this question was really that important.

“I see… What else then?” the lord asked.

“The third thing is that I found one of the Destined Gate Guardian Scions you told us to search for…” she said smirking at Phantom, she didn’t report that to her. “Her name is Zoe, she is a Von Weise! She is the destined Fire Gate Guardian!”

“Really? FINALLY SOME GOOD NEWS!” The lord’s mood improved a little hearing her. “Did you contact her?”

“Not yet my lord… I think this is something you wanted to oversee by yourself…” Mirage bowed.

“TRUE! There can’t be any mistakes here… I will send one of my disciples to charm her, I will make him go see you in a few days, tell him what he needs to know… Now what is the fourth thing you found?”

Mirage slowly took out a storage ring.

“MIRAGE? WHAT IS THAT?” Phantom who was clearly not informed about this said.

“It was with the priest at the wedding… I followed after him after he left the hotel, and discovered that not only was he working for the Von Zwei family and was instructed to ruin the wedding and kill Victor with his wives, but that he didn’t do it on purpose. He turned out to be the agent for another unknown power, who was trying to use the wedding to pass some kind of unknown agenda!” she said nervously.

“Oh…” the lord frowned. That dark chamber rebellious pests? “Do you know who they are?” he asked.

“He said that his boss was someone he called his majesty The Supreme Ruler!” Mirage added, making the room grow silent. The taboo words!

“Again?” the lord asked with clear annoyance. “The same guy?”

“Unknown, I was discovered by him before I could get more info. He wanted to kill me and pin it on the Von Zwei family, but thankfully he seemed to have been poisoned by someone, probably Theodore Von Weise. The poison activated and he died in front of me. ” she said. “Still, I managed to get his ring… Too bad I couldn't open it!” she said as she presented the ring to the lord.

“Let me see!” the lord said as the ring floated toward him. He grabbed it and inspected it. It was an ancient high-quality storage ring!

Interesting…

Slowly, using his Authority, he performed the ownership-changing ritual to break the original owner’s rights on it….

What?

The lord tried again.

He secretly made a drop of his blood seep through his skin and then touch the ring.

WTF?

“Are you sure this ring belonged to the priest?” he asked nervously.

“Ah…I am not sure, but he could use it freely….” Mirage said.

“Ah… Um… Rings can belong to others while granting the usage rights…” the fate lord said as he put the ring away, acting as normally as possible as his mind raced. WHO WAS IT?

“My Lord… Was there anything interesting in it?” Phantom asked.

“NOT YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS!” the lord flared as he stood up, making her fall to her knees. He just thought of a crazy possibility. “We will continue your reports later… I need to check on a few things!” he spat as he stormed out of the hall.

Everyone looked at each other with a frown as soon as they were sure he was no longer there. Although they didn’t dare to say it, all of them knew what that look in their lord’s eyes was.

It was the look of fear. A certain body part of his clearly got shorter too, but no one dared to look...

Anyways!

What was the thing someone who had power over Fate and Destiny feared most?

Simple, it was the Unknown!

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