Chapter 194 - The Charlatan's Charity

Vern's fingers stopped, and his mind exploded with conjectures. Hide from the gods? Why? Is he paranoid that people like Rupert are always spying on him? But didn't I already solve that particular case?

Soon, however, he refuted that conjecture, No. He is asking about hiding his nature as an observer, not his mind itself. While there wasn't much difference between these two things, the latter was bound to be more complicated than the former.

So he wants to pretend he's an average human, huh? Vern lampooned. The real problem here was that he wanted to avoid the scrutiny of gods, not some ordinary observer

Heh, he chuckled. If I knew how to do that, I'd have used it myself already to enter the world of Third Rune. A method like that would've allowed him to avoid the gaze of that gigantic eye and experiment with visions without risking instant death.

Vern sighed. He'd been sailing far too smoothly until now, but his first roadblock was finally here. Time to play pretend, I guess.

He couldn't let one trick question ruin the whole act. It was going good.

He made to send Miss Witness his decision when—

Wait! Miss Witness—no, no—Lady Sylphina. Isn't she under precisely the same circumstances? From what he understood, Lady Sylphina's presence was not known by anyone except himself. This included gods.

He'd once come to the conclusion that she was hiding like that to avoid the catastrophe that befell the First Observer. Then, if she wasn't found out by a being who singlehandedly brought about Duskfall of Sorrows, then other gods were completely out of the question.

Soon, however, he smiled wryly. Well, I don't think Mr. Bad Fashion here can copy her eminence's methods.

Well, that didn't matter. What mattered was the fact that he had a real answer. And boy, is it valuable.

He waved his hand, and chains rattled behind him as the shadow of the looming scale began its descent in one direction.

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Kaneki waited in the oppressive silence, his heart racing in anticipation and distress. Was it not foolish to ask one god how to hide from his kind? What if Lord Axiom misconstrued this question as wanting to hide from him?

Yet, he couldn't not ask it. This was an infinitely rare chance that he would've regretted squandering for the rest of his life. The folks in Zenith all believed that the Awakened ones were called beyond the ceiling so they could go dine with the gods and serve them personally.

Well, the people on the other side of the old parchment believed that to be untrue. And it would be a lie to say he hadn't felt it himself ever since he'd awakened or enlightened or whatever it was.

He felt it. There was something beyond the edge of Zenith. Something that watched all of them. Not specifically him, fortunately. At least not yet.

And it terrified him.

What if, one day, it figured out that he was hiding his awakening? No one had done such a thing in Zenith before because why would anyone not want to ascend to the gods' palace after awakening? Yet, he'd done it, and he knew far too much to stop now.

It was the right thing to do—the Lorendales had warned him strongly against it. But now, even they were gone. The old parchment never came alight, and all he had left was their words and pictures—most of which he didn't understand.

So why would he not take this chance to secure his life? Except, he didn't know if such a thing as hiding from gods was even possible. He'd asked the people of old parchment–the Lorendales—about this long ago, but even they didn't have a solution. So there was no guarantee—

Clank!

The cosmic plates of the gigantic scale began shifting as an ethereal weight appeared on one side, pulling it down. Wait! he snapped his head back up. Does that mean Lord Axiom really has a solution!?

His eyes widened as he stared at the shifting scale in awe, an electric feeling coursing through him.

Whirr!

However, seconds passed, but the rattling of chains didn't stop, and the scale continued to adjust at a fast pace, one of its gigantic plates dropping without any hint of stopping. Kaneki blinked to ensure he wasn't hallucinating. Up until now, the scale only ever tipped by a bit, but this…?

"Oh, lady above, he's done it!" snickered the burly man. "He's asked something even Lord Axiom considers to be a big deal. That's almost a hundred times more expensive than my question by the looks of it!"

Finally, right when the plate fell to the height of Mr. Axiom himself, it stopped—a terrifying bundle of cosmic pulsations weighing it down.

A grim realization dawned on Kaneki, and his expression turned bitter. By my ancestors, he muttered with a hint of dejection, I messed up.

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The old man standing to the side took off his top hat and pressed it to his chest as if in condolence. He shook his head, "You've overestimated your capabilities, son."

Kaneki bit his lips. The old man was right. They could throw him off the Zenith's edge ten times over, but he still won't be able to find an equivalent for this.

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.

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But it is right there! he screamed internally. The solution to his predicament. The Solution to avoiding the gaze of whatever was observing the Zenith. The solution to continue living peacefully in his lonesome without becoming a plaything of the gods!

"Anyone wants to bet how much our little boy here can tip the scales?" grinned the burly man, schadenfreude written all over his face as he rubbed his hands together. "My money's on him not even being able to counter a tenth of this."

Kaneki didn't know how to respond. It was so much more fun the last time he was here. He'd blissfully assumed it all to be a dream and said whatever the heck came to his mind—no matter who they were. But now?

He kept his head down and brainstormed what to offer in exchange to balance the despair-inducing scale of Lord Axiom's judgment. He'd asked the only question that mattered, but now he was paying for it—or, to be exact, unable to pay for it.

Was anything he knew really worth this much? He looked back up at the masked figure, who waited patiently without hurrying him. For some reason, that helped. There was no personal judgment here, just an exchange of cosmic relevance, as Lord Axiom put it.

"Actually," came a melodious voice off from the side, "I'll take you up on that offer. I say he'll pass the halfway mark."

Kaneki, sweating hard and trying to come up with something that actually had a shot of balancing the scale, snapped his head toward this voice. What!? Why would anyone think that when I'm not even sure myself?

He wanted to see just who it was, but his eyes froze up when he realized it was her—the beautiful and intimidating lady. Ever since the start of this meeting, she'd always had that air to herself.

An air of knowing.

She understood things that he didn't. Saw things he didn’t. On top of that, she was sharp and effective with her words.

Just who is she? he wondered, finding his gaze lingering on her. She was…gorgeous. Women in Zenith never wore something so aesthetically pleasing. Heck, the men were just as unfashionable. He was one of the most well-dressed of them all.

Not like it mattered, though. After all, romance and marriage were simply another set of mandated ceremonies, and mating was the worst of them all. He still didn’t understand why humans participated in such gross rituals.

Just to rub their bodies together? Or maybe so their children could one day go serve the gods above?

Pathetic!

Still, he couldn't help but appreciate how this lady brought out the best of her dress—she had all the curves in the right places. Add to that her domineering aura and overflowing sense of superiority, and she was like one of those fairies from the tales of the shamans.

And such a lady was rooting for him! She said he could offer something that was at least half as valuable as Mr. Axiom's solution. Kaneki couldn't help but be pumped as he closed his eyes and searched himself raw.

What do I exchange? There was a bunch of stuff in the old parchment when he first found it. Maybe it had something of comparable value?

His memory of the words and symbols on it was crystal clear, but the understanding was a completely different game. Forget him; even the Lorendales, who'd asked him to send them the older writings on the parchment couldn't understand what most of it meant.

That's when he remembered something of note, "Wait! Lord Axiom is related to the Institute."

He was still gobsmacked by how a being such as Lord Axiom could emerge from an organization with such a mundane name, but if his logic was anything to go by, something related to it was bound to be just as majestic.

Institute. Institute. Institute… he muttered to himself, pressuring his memory to find the relevant tidbits.

Soon, his eyes lit up, and he knew what to say.

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With interest, Vern watched the conversation between the pretender lady and the burly man. He wasn't worried about this set of question and answer anymore.

He was already going to falsely assign a high price to the answer, but with the new realization about Lady Sylphina's method of avoiding observation, such a high value was more than justified.

No insight that this guy could give him would top the knowledge about Lady Sylphina's hiding methods. So, essentially, Vern had no plans of answering. It was scummy, but what else was he supposed to do here?

He didn't have a practical solution. He was even of the mind that the method used by her Eminence might be the only true way of hiding from gods. Everything else would have strict limitations that won't fulfill the original request.

Still, he was curious how the poorly dressed fellow would try to equate this. He doubted the man would give up so easily—desperation was clear in his eyes.

Whatever his reasons, he really wanted to hide his enlightenment from the gods. Vern chuckled, As if they give a fuck.

It seemed the guy didn't know just how apathetic these so-called gods were. What gods was he even talking about? Vern had heard of a couple of names here and there, but he didn't have a definitive list of them—assuming there was one.

Was Cthonos a god, too? What about the Seraphine? It's undoubtedly not the being I saw in the echoes of Archivist's Insights. That objective entity was the hallowed angel Midra, not Seraphine.

A couple others he'd heard of were, Visandra and the Eternal One, which people in the Ironhart district believed in. There were more, but he couldn't remember for sure.

Bah, he shook away these thoughts and focused on the present, Yeah, there's indeed a possibility he knows something that can make me tip over the scales at least halfway. In that, he agreed with the pretender lady's judgment.

He was getting quite sick of calling them with such absurd monikers, but he hadn't yet found the right opportunity to ask for their names. Unfortunately, he never got far along enough in the echoes he snooped on to see them signing away their notes.

Blinking, he turned his gaze towards the threadbare guy who suddenly looked up, a sharp look in his eyes.

"Lord Axiom, I—I got it! But…uhm, ah, I can only share this insight with you."

Vern raised his eyebrows and nodded as Miss Witness adapted to his thoughts instantly. A barrier emerged around the horridly dressed guy who nodded to himself repeatedly, hope shining bright in his eyes.

"Hehahe, you're seeing this, woman?" guffawed the burly man, "He's decided to be a coward and speak up his cheap insight by himself to avoid embarrassment. You should accept your loss already."

Vern shifted his gaze to the pretender lady for a moment, but she simply smiled without a word.

Whwip.

At that moment, the isolation was complete. After nervously breathing for a few seconds, the guy began, "Lord Axiom…"

"I read that the Institute…"