Chapter 078

At dawn, they finally spotted a fishing boat from Pritz Harbour, and managed to get back onto land. Having constantly expended their powers all night to propel the boat, they all were exhausted. They found an inn, and went straight to sleep.

But Frederick kept himself awake. He went into Clyde's room, and took the Self Mirror. He then woke him up, and taking advantage of his exhausted spirituality, hypnotised him with the mirror.

When Clyde had given the mirror to Victor, he told him how to use it. Frederick had found an opportunity to learn this from Victor on the way.

Frederick was shocked at what he had learnt. According to Clyde, only those with the surname of Red were actual descendants of Medici. The others, with the surname of Gray, White, Black, and Brown were the descendants of former servants of the actual descendants of the Red Angel. The elders concealed the fact, as the population was really low, and they did not want to risk any kind of fighting. Saying that they were all from the same family drastically reduced infighting and discouraged killings.

Furthermore, when they reached Backlund, only Clyde would be a hero for completing the mission. The other three were more like supplements to the sealed Red Angel!

Frederick then completely made up his mind to go rogue. He didn't try to kill him, as he was unlikely to die in one blow like Richard, and instead lose control and cause problems. He brought a rock of the same size, replaced the red box with it, and hypnotised Clyde into believing that that was the actual red box.

He left a note for Victor, who had saved his life by alerting him to the abnormality, and then fled.

Frederick then lived freely in the northern continent. He never settled down, and instead elected to keep moving around. He took part in various conspiracies and fights all across the continent, and not only digested the Conspirer potion, but also managed to kill a Reaper, and used his extraordinary characteristics to concoct a potion, complete the ritual, and advance himself.

He had opened and entered Red Castle, and has discovered its amazing functions. He used some of it to its fullest advantage, while completely ignoring the others. But he was always careful to avoid getting into conflict with the churches, so he was still relatively unknown.

Even though he tried his best, he still couldn't get the formula for Sequence 4 of his pathway. But after a little digging, he did find out about the ritual to advance. While continuing his search for the actual formula, he actively started collecting all kinds of Hunter pathway ingredients in preparation for the time he would eventually be able to advance.

One day, as he was reading the newspaper to keep up to date with the latest happenings, he suddenly felt the urge to take a trip.

After a while, he started his sightseeing travel around the Northern Continent. He kept wandering around, sighseeing, when he suddenly froze with fear. Up ahead of him was Clyde. But the reason he felt fearful wasn't Clyde, but the figure next to Clyde. A red wraith-like entity, that sent shivers down his spine. And next to him in the distance, he could see Victor also coming in this direction.

"Without the red box, I had no way to sense his presence. It took him a while to finally locate me. So it is only now that I have found out what you have done" said the Spectre.

"There was actually a psychological cue planted upon all of you back in the realm, whereupon seeing a certain news story, you would randomly come to this location. This is a hidden backup plan thought of by me. Pretty cool eh?" asked the Spectre again.

"No it wasn't you, it was me!" came two different voices from the Spectre, after which all three voices started squabbling and claiming credit for the idea.

Frederick wondered if this was an opportunity, and slowly backed away. The Spectre suddenly shot a look at him and waved his hands. A concentrated burst of fire came out, and burned his physical body completely. As a Reaper, he could still live with a spectre form, but it had too many weaknesses and disadvantages.

After the three voices squabbled for a while, the first voice asked the spectre Frederick, "Say, I am pretty sure that our conspiracy was perfect. You definitely shouldn't have spotted the abnormality and deviated from the plan within 5 days. Especially since you were completely concealed from the eyes of external Angels and Gods. What gives?"

Frederick did not know how to answer, but Victor, who was silently standing next to him did.

"Well" said Victor. "That is easily answerable. You did conceal the group from the outside. But you neglected the inside" he continued, while wearing a monocle on his right eye.

The spectre froze with shock, and went a small distance back. It then asked with rage, "Were you responsible for the seal?"

"Of course not. Why would I do such a thing? The seal was already up when I got there. I just found some loopholes and sent an avatar to see if I could spoil someone's day. And what do you know, just 1500 years later, here we are!" said Victor.

"What do you want?" asked the spectre.

"I have the same message from the same person. It's not yet time" said Victor.

He then snatched the Sword of Dominance from the ground and said, "How about this, this key will turn up someplace. When it does reach your hands, you can do whatever you want"

The spectre nodded in frustration. It then turned around and left, with Clyde following closely behind.

Victor took a look at the heavily injured Frederick without a physical body and said, "It was great fun watching you run around. I look forward to seeing what you do next" and left.

Frederick realised that he still had a connection to the Red Castle. The sword was just the key, and a Beyonder was the one in control.

But while the attack by the Red Angel did not affect his Beyonder Characteristics or spirit body, he was still heavily injured and had to recuperate. So he started making plans for his comeback, as he picked up the red box and glided away.