Chapter 32: A Contradicting Prophecy
Hegemonia, who was completely unaware of Sung-Woon’s intentions, asked, “So you want to decide who's the winner with a different method, right?”
“Yes. It seems clear what we both want.”
“Automation and Humans.”
The two players silently looked at each other and tried to read each other’s faces. But there was no way to really do that with their distorted appearances.
Hegemonia asked, “A Contradicting Prophecy then?”
“That would be the best way to go.”
Hegemonia nodded in agreement.
Prophecy was a skill obtained when a player’s Divinity reached level six.
[Skill: Prophecy]
[Read more:
A king received a divine message from a blind prophet saying that the king’s son would kill the king and sleep with the king's wife to make the kingdom fall. The king was afraid of this prophecy, but couldn’t bear killing his own son with his own hands, so he ordered one of his subordinates to kill his son instead. However, the subordinate couldn’t find the courage to kill a baby, so the subordinate left the baby in a field, and the baby was found by a shepherd.
As the baby grew into a young man, he heard a rumor saying that the parents he had now weren't his biological parents. He went to the prophet to find out the truth. The prophet said that as the price of telling him the truth, he would sleep with his biological mother and kill his biological father.
Even though the young man still loved his current parents, they weren’t his biological parents, and he left his hometown.
He went on an adventure. While riding his wagon on the road, he fought and defeated a king that wouldn’t get out of his way, and he even fought a monster threatening the kingdom, which had the head of a human and the body of a lion. As a reward for killing the monster, he married a queen, who had lost her husband, and became a king.
Several years later, he found out that the prophecy he had tried to avoid had already been fulfilled. The king he had met and killed on the road was his biological father, and the king’s wife, who he got married with, was his biological mother. The queen, who was his wife and biological mother, hung herself, and the king dug out his own eyes and walked out of the palace. The kingdom eventually fell.
…This is Prophecy.]
Unlike the confusing example, the skill was rather simple. A player would set a quest for themself and their species to predict what would happen in the future, and if the prophecy was fulfilled, they would receive the Faith points they spent to give a divine message to their tribe, as well as a reward depending on the difficulty of fulfilling the prophecy.
‘For example, I predict that Lakrak would kill an Abomination, and if I help Lakrak fulfill the prophecy, I would get a good amount of XP.’
However, players of The Lost World didn’t use this skill as much.
‘...Because there’s a penalty if the prophecy isn’t fulfilled.’
If lots of Faith points were used to make a big prophecy, the penalty when it wasn’t fulfilled would be that much more extreme. The Faith points used would definitely go to waste, XP could decrease, causing the player’s level to go down, and if the player was unlucky, their characters that were involved could be cursed as a penalty, or they would encounter an unexpected negative event.
‘If the creator, God, can’t even control their own destiny, it means that they aren't qualified to be a god.’
Therefore, no matter how simple the prophecy was, players would commit to fulfilling them. Prophecies that were too simple weren’t used too often either because the amount of Faith points returned would be less than the original amount used.
‘But it’s still used when necessary. If the player is confident.’
In Sung-Woon’s opinion, the best time to use Prophecy was now.
A Contradicting Prophecy was when two players made prophecies that contradicted each other’s.
‘For example, player A and player B would make a prophecy about individual C. Player A would predict that C would die within three days, and player B would predict that C would still be alive after three days.’
Player A would try their best to kill C in the next three days, and player B would use every means to protect C from dying. That way, only one of player A or player B would fulfill their prophecy, and the other would fail. Thus one would get a reward, while the other would receive a penalty.
‘This kind of bet is also possible without making prophecies, but Contradicting Prophecy is directly supported by the game system, so there’s no loophole, and the loser would for sure receive a penalty.’
Unlike making a bet with words, with a Contradictory Prophecy set up, the loser would still be penalized even if they found the game disagreeable.
Therefore, it would be a much more advantageous situation to win. No, regardless of the possibility of his opponent disagreeing with the outcome of the bet, Sung-Woon simply wanted to see a clear benefit if he won.
‘However, that wouldn’t happen unless one was a fool. Even if it were me, I would have Lakrak pull back. Hegemonia’s Ears Cut Tribe have settled down quite far away, so it seems that Hegemonia had Contradicting Prophecy in mind to begin with.’
Then Hegemonia asked, “So what prophecy should we decide on?”
“You must know that the lord of Automation is deciding on his successor, right?” replied Sung-Woon.
“Are you playing tricks with me? To see how much I know about Automation?”
“Well, that too. I thought it would be convenient to set a Contradicting Prophecy based on that.”
Hegemonia nodded and said, “Automation chooses its owner on a regular basis. And that person would become the lord of Automation. Apparently, the period the lord can remain in power is different every time, and only the lord of Automation at that time knows how long their term is.”
“If I am to share some information, I think that’s why Hwee-Seo, the lord of Automation, has been acting as the lord while hiding his identity,” said Sung-Woon. “Because if people find out when the next successor needs to be chosen, many would seek the position of lord of Automation.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“Well, you could always say that after you’ve heard it.”
Sung-Woon could see on the screen that Hegemonia was repeatedly clenching and unclenching their gauntlet-covered fist.
Sung-Woon ignored it and said, “Anyways, what’s important is that the time to decide the next successor is almost here. And the current lord wants to give his spot to one of his children.”
“Then there would be five potential successors.”
Sung-Woon nodded.
“I think we should each pick one of the five children and predict which son or daughter is going to be the next successor. Since there’s only going to be one, the prophecies would inevitably contradict each other. And if both of us foolishly guess wrong…then we just accept that as is.”
“Okay. I like that.”
Sung-Woon realized something after seeing Hegemonia so willingly accept the challenge.
‘Have they also prepared in advance?’
However, Sung-Woon thought Hegemonia wouldn’t have prepared as much as he had. Sung-Woon knew a long time ago that something like this would happen.
“Hwee-Seo has five potential successors. Do you want me to introduce them to you if you don’t know?” asked Hegemonia.
“Really? I would be grateful if you did so.”
Sung-Woon knew very well about the lord’s children, but was curious about Hegemonia’s perspective.
“The first child, Dan, is a man in his early thirties. He has a strong physique and is trusted by Hwee-Seo. I think he’s also pretty smart. Two out of the four royal families support him, and he is the most likely to become lord.”
“Well…let’s decide that later.”
Hegemonia cleared their throat and continued to say, “The second child, Jun, is a man in his late twenties. He has a different mother from the first child. He is considered weak and doesn’t really show himself to others. There are rumors saying he’s not interested in becoming successor. Though there is a family that supports him. His mother’s family.”
“Hm. Who’s next?”
“The third child, Jin, is a woman in her late twenties. She has the same mother as the first child and tends to go out a lot. She is hiding her identity, but she gets along well with hunters and ruffians. She’s supported by the remaining family of the four.”
“Hunters, I see. And?”
“The fourth child, Kyung, a woman in her early twenties. She has a different mother from the first and second child. I think her mother has already passed away, and Kyung was cursed. There’s something unusual about her, so she’s alienated by the lord and the other family members.”
“And finally the last?”
“The fifth child, Min, is a girl in her mid-teens. People say she has extraordinary intelligence and is talented in many ways. The lord had the youngest at his old age, so it seems that she is adored by him.”
Hegemonia then asked in return, “So what do you think? Should we choose right away? Or do you need time to take in the information…”
“No. Let’s decide now.”
If Sung-Woon took time, that would also be giving time to Hegemonia. And that was an unnecessary thing to do.
Sung-Woon continued to say, “Why don’t we each write and check our predictions on the Contradiction Prophecy window. If we predict the same thing, the Contradicting Prophecy won’t go through anyways, and we can just click No. And if we choose a different successor, we can click Yes and start. What do you think?”
“Sure.”
Sung-Woon operated the system window.
[Contradicting Prophecy]
[Would you like to set a Contradicting Prophecy with the player Hegemonia?]
[Yes/No]
[Warning: If you fail to fulfill your prophecy, you will suffer great damage. Please confirm one more time if you would like to proceed.]
[Player Hegemonia’s Prophecy:
“Hwee-Seo’s second child, Hwee-Jun, will become the next successor of Automation.”]
[Player Nebula’s Prophecy:
“Hwee-Seo’s fourth child, Hwee-Kyung, will become the next successor of Automation.”]
Sung-Woon checked Hegemonia’s face. As expected, he couldn’t tell what they were thinking.
However…
‘They’re surprised. Their finger froze.’
Sung-Woon then said, “It’s different. Good. I just clicked ‘Yes.’”
“Uh… Yeah. Good… Let’s start.”
Hegemonia recovered their confidence and hit the system message with their gauntlet-covered hand.
The two prophecies began to spread among Automation from an unknown source.
***
The lord of Automation, Hwee-Seo, tried to ignore the prophecies at first.
‘The families must have done something again. They’re rumors that’ll die down over time.’
However, the prophecies did not die down.
‘Why is it Jun and Kyung? And why are both of them listed?’
Contrary to what the other family members thought, Hwee-Seo wasn’t going to select his first son, Dan, as his successor. However, people had been talking among themselves that either Dan, the first child, or Jin, the third child, would become the successor, so the rumors spreading about the prophecies were somewhat suspicious.
‘I’m sure someone started the rumors.’
Hwee-Seo eventually hired someone to find the source of the prophecies. It took quite a while, and Hwee-Seo had to look into it a few times himself. But the source couldn’t be found.
‘How can this be?’
It seemed impossible to Hwee-Seo. Both the children and the families were confused, as they knew the time to select the successor was approaching soon. Hwee-Seo succeeded in getting rid of the rumors within the Automation castle, but this time, something came from the outside. The four families heard news that the Ears Cut Tribe and Black-Scaled Lizardmen were approaching the castle, and Gnolls and Lizardmen, who seemed to be peddlers or vagrants, began to take longer to pass by the rampart.
‘I knew they would come some day. But coming at times like this means…’
The worst case scenario would be the two tribes forming an alliance and attacking Automation, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Hwee-Seo got people to get information on both tribes, and he found out that both tribes believed in different gods. The two tribes didn’t hate each other, but they were still hostile towards the other tribe and considered them rivals they would one day fight.
‘Both are huge tribes that I can’t trifle with. They probably think that the wilderness is too small for both to live in, and that only one tribe should have it. While we’re barely surviving in this Automation castle.’
Hwee-Seo knew that he had to do his best in fulfilling his last duty as lord of Automation and decided to risk his life for it.
‘There’s definitely a connection between the movement of those two tribes and the successor and rumors.’
Hwee-Seo was confident.
‘If I don’t die after meeting both tribal chiefs…’
But it was confidence that he was hopeless.
‘...I’ll know that I’m nothing but a stone on the board.’
***
And like that, Hwee-Seo confirmed his hopelessness.
New novel 𝓬hapters are published on (f)reeweb(n)ovel.com