On the warship's highest platform, surrounded by glass screens that played fast passing scenes of clouds covering wild terrains, the princess and her minister were working out the details of their budding partnership. Under the platform, soldiers and operators were busy guiding the ship safely to their destination. Almost all of them doubtfully glanced at the platform from time to time, and exchanged varied opinions among themselves in hushed whispers.

Bai Longxia's keen senses caught it all, but she let the doubt foster.

How can faith be tempered if doubts do not form? How can the subjects trust their ruler if they aren’t allowed to question the ruler's deeds?

If there was one lesson she took from her father's reign, it was the method of fortifying people's belief in their ruler.

“Your highness, is there any method that'd reveal whether or not my physique has been subjected to tempering through law spirits?" Shiyuan's voice cut into her thoughts, marked with an insistent edge that was continuously testing her patience.

“How can I find out my true age?”

His dogged pursuit of the topic annoyed Bai Longxia to no end. Why was he concerned about such trivial issues? Did it matter whether he was twenty-two or ninety-nine? Especially for an amnesiac like him, what significance did some forgotten years bear?

“I have the resources to verify whether law spirits were involved or not. But there are quite a few darker, obscure methods to accomplish the slowdown of the aging process. So it doesn’t really matter what the results turn out to be. We'll never be fully certain of the truth. But you can come to the correct conclusion after a few years have passed. If your appearance changes, then you never were subjected to any such methods. Otherwise..."

She left the speculations up to him to shut him up for some time, taking the opportunity to finish her cold meal. The taste of fogfallen beast meat only got worse with each minute. If the battle one hour ago hadn't left her body in need of a speedy recovery, she'd not have tortured her tongue with this horrific taste.

“Your highness, you never clarified the matter of my grading as an oracle. Can you explain what being a first grade oracle entails?" Shiyuan spoke again, oblivious to her plight.

“I'll get you some books to read once we're home. You can learn the details from there. Those concepts aren't something anyone can teach in a casual conversation," Bai Longxia answered curtly. Shiyuan finally noticed the grim look on her face, but that didn’t stop him from pressing her nerves further.

“Even the simplest classification of the grading system would do.”

Bai Longxia had to exert a lot of effort to restrain herself from shoving down a fistful of the meat into his gob. Did this guy not know how to shut up?

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Then she recalled that he had just been rescued from an island after at least months of no social interaction. It would be a little harsh to blame him for wanting to prolong a conversation.

“When you hear the word ‘prophecy', what concept do you picture in your mind? Is it an oracle peering into the future and telling you what is about to happen?” She asked. Shiyuan nodded thoughtfully.

“This is actually a common misconception. There is no fixed future to peer into,” she said, enjoying the shock blooming on his face.

“There are only possibilities, numerous alternative futures to our ongoing reality, and each of them varies in detail, so much so that you can only look for what you want to see. Do you want victory in a battle? As an oracle, you can only look for some realities where you become victorious on the battlefield. Do you want to know which close ally will betray you? You can only peer into some of the futures where your allies are betraying you. So, the grading system is centered around this factor."

She held up five fingers.

“The primary grading system is simple. We divide oracles into five grades, with simple numeric titles. It's based on the number of futures an oracle can see centered around the same subject matter. A first grade oracle can only see one path ahead, and a fifth grade oracle can discover five different paths or more."

“Five prophecies on the same subject?” Shiyuan looked flabbergasted. “How do you determine which one is more likely to come true? So-mmph!"

His question was abruptly cut short. Bai Longxia's patience had failed her. She had leaned over and smacked a large chunk of meat into his open mouth.

“Let me finish. The number has nothing to do with the quality of the prophecies. So the primary grading doesn't really matter when it comes to serious issues. Even a fifth grade oracle who can predict five futures of one war cannot measure up to a first grade oracle whose only prophecy has a higher likelihood of coming true. This is where the second grading system, the one concerned with the quality of a prophecy, comes in."

Shiyuan didn’t dare to chew the food in his mouth. The aggrieved eyes with which he stared at her gave Bai Longxia a deep sense of satisfaction.

Want to talk again? Swallow what's in your mouth first!

“Because of the innumerable variations of the future possibilities, we categorize the quality of prophecies under a broad outline—how far each of them diverges from the current flow of events, in simpler terms—how unlikely to happen your predicted future is.

“As an example, let's say that you predict someone's death under a thunderstorm. But the region he lives in has never been visited by a thunderstorm, and the weather at the time also wouldn't support one. This makes your prophecy bear such a low potential to turn real that some unusual incidents need to happen before it can have a chance. If those bridging incidents don't happen, your prophecy will just be the warning of an alternate reality.

“However, someone can just kidnap the man and send him to a distant mountain where thunder strikes frequently. His action will bridge the diverging realities and turn your prophesied reality into the truth!"

Seeing the utterly baffled look on Shiyuan's face, Bai Longxia realized that she was doing more harm than good by trying to build his foundation with her inexperienced hands. As an oracle himself, he'd surely form his own outlook on such concepts in the near future. Her explanations might just influence his comprehension negatively.

Worried, she hurried to conclude the answer in a softer tone.

“And this is the criteria for judging the quality of a prophecy. The more unusual or unlikely the predicted future is, the higher its divergence rate. An inexperienced oracle rarely has enough information or wisdom about the subject of his prophecy and the ongoing reality to find a convenient alternative future. Most of the time, the solution they end up finding for a problem has a very high divergence rate, which makes it nearly impossible for one to turn the prophecy into the truth.

“But experienced oracles are terrifyingly quick and efficient in looking for low-diverging outcomes that serve their interests. By the time they stand in front of you, chances are that you've already lost in numerous possible futures. Surrendering will be your only option!"

Some fairly unpleasant shards of memory surfaced in Bai Longxia's mind even as she ended her answer on an encouraging note. The feeling of powerlessness in front of an experienced oracle was something she had witnessed herself very closely. The despair she had felt back then shaped who she was today.