The Villain Saint is my secondary account

The warden, his face flushed, turned his gaze to the stench emanating from the pot he had just sat on…

That seemed to be his only salvation.

Chapter Fifty-One: Synchronized Fates

Once the magic seal was lifted, Ye Xiao's return to his cell was simple. He went to the kitchen, grabbed a few more small wooden spoons, and then swaggered away from the watchtower.

With the help of the assassin skills passed down from Artoria, returning to the top floor of the circular prison, changing back into prison clothes, and climbing down the wall was basically effortless.

After returning to his cell, Ye Xiao broke off the silver needles on his neck handcuffs and put them back on his neck to create a simple disguise. Then he used a stone to knock the rivets into the window frame so that everything would look like nothing had happened.

The round trip took thirty minutes. After he finished installing the iron bars on the windows and sat back down on the floor against the wall, not long after, the second shift of jailers carrying torches walked to the door, clutching their stomachs.

It was clear that the jailers' stomachs were still lingering from the effects of the diarrhea medication.

"Strange... I clearly heard some sound." The patrolling jailer looked at the two people dozing against the wall in the cell, somewhat puzzled.

Just then, the alarm blared, its piercing sound almost piercing everyone's eardrums.

While others might find it confusing, Ye Xiao understood that it must be because when the guards on duty on the rooftop were changing shifts, they finally discovered that one of the sentries who was originally on duty there was missing.

Sure enough, a group of jailers rushed anxiously into the circular cell, banging on the iron bars of the cells one by one, waking the drowsy prisoners, and then shouting as they drove them out with sticks and whips.

Ye Xiao and Dean, who were pretending to be resting, were naturally caught as well. When Ye Xiao came out, he glanced at the open space next to the surveillance tower and saw the prison guard captain pacing back and forth, but he did not see the warden.

That's strange, has the diarrhea lasted this long?

As Ye Xiao understood it, the diarrhea-inducing essence had been diluted considerably, and a few bouts of diarrhea would mostly resolve it. Although the door was locked from the inside, there would definitely be guards responsible for notifying the warden if something happened in the prison.

While Ye Xiao was still wondering, he heard two prison guards next to the line whispering, "...The warden hasn't come yet?"

"...Don't even mention it. I just went with a few brothers to inform the warden, and we found that his cell door was broken and he's trapped inside."

"Wow, the worker who was in charge of repairing the door is probably in big trouble."

"That wasn't the scariest part. The guy in front opened the door... by the light of God... and the warden just rushed out and pinned him to the ground..."

"Press them to the ground? Why are you pressing them to the ground?"

“He was covered in that stuff, so oily and slippery that even a group of people couldn’t hold him back. I was so scared that I ran away... Oh no, I can’t go on. I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m having this image all over my head. After I finish these last two days, I need to go to the city to see a doctor. I think I’m having a mental breakdown.”

"What are you talking about..." The other guard still didn't quite understand.

Ye Xiao, who was standing next to him, was also completely confused, but he guessed that the warden's absence might be related to this.

Once the prisoners had all gathered in the open space downstairs, the prison captain roared and ordered the guards to start counting the number of prisoners.

However, after a thorough count, not a single prisoner was missing.

“Strange,” the prison captain said, puzzled. He had clearly seen a colleague knocked unconscious, but there were no fewer prisoners and no signs of invasion of the outer city. Where did the attackers come from?

His gaze swept over the prisoners, and he began to wonder if someone had escaped and then hidden back in. If so, they must be dirtier and more disheveled than the other prisoners after all this commotion. There was no water in the cell, so they couldn't possibly have washed the filth off their bodies.

But when the prison captain observed the prisoners' clothing, he found that many of them were filthy and even had blood on them.

The prison captain cursed under his breath, thinking of the chaos that afternoon; this was no coincidence.

Before he could figure it out, a commotion broke out in the crowd.

A group of prisoners got into a fight for no apparent reason. The already irritated prison captain immediately led his men over. At this point, anyone who dared to cause trouble under his nose was truly fearless.

The jailers with wooden sticks quickly subdued the rioting prisoners, and the captain of the jailers soon spotted a familiar face beating another prisoner.

"It's you again, number 221! You want to die? Fine! Lock him in the torture chamber!" Seeing Ye Xiao's bruised and swollen face, the prison captain was furious. Thinking that the commotion in the afternoon was also related to this guy, he didn't hesitate for a moment. Before Ye Xiao, whose face was covered in blood, could even argue, he ordered the surrounding prison guards to hold down this troublemaker and drag him directly towards the tower.

Several prison guards escorted Ye Xiao to a dark room deep underground in the surveillance tower. As soon as the door opened, a bone-chilling cold rushed out.

This is the torture chamber the prison captain mentioned. It is built directly below a cold storage room constructed with a crystal array. With the cold air emanating from the array and the darkness of the cave, this place is the most unbearable torture for prisoners who are only wearing a thin linen prison uniform.

Moreover, it was a cold winter night, and the cold air from behind the door made even the heavily dressed jailer shiver.

Ye Xiao was pushed into the freezing cold cave without much struggle, but as the door of the torture chamber slammed shut, taking away the last light, he smiled and took out two pieces of potato and a few wooden spoons from under his clothes.

Without a staff, Ye Xiao couldn't unleash the Fluorescent Spell due to his light attribute affinity. In the darkness, he quietly used his fingers to feel the key-like patterns pressed into the potato, and then slowly used a stone shard he broke off from the wall to carve a wooden spoon following the patterns.

The frustrating working environment made it easy for mistakes to happen, so Ye Xiao specially borrowed several spoons as spares.

Ye Xiao had initially considered trying to break through the surveillance tower after removing the neck handcuffs.

However, he didn't have a staff to unleash those powerful contract spells. Seizing a sword wasn't difficult, but taking down the hundreds of jailers in the tower while ensuring Dean's neck shackles wouldn't explode was extremely difficult, not to mention the heavily armored black-armored soldiers stationed outside the city.

Since its construction, the Dead Sea Prison has only ever been attacked from the outside, with no precedent for an internal escape. Therefore, the real elite troops and main combat forces are all on the outer city wall. Once they arrive, Ye Xiao will have virtually no chance of winning against a well-organized army.

Therefore, he needed more manpower to break into the prison from the inside, which is why he wanted to forge a key instead of simply stealing it from the warden to unlock Dean's key so he could break out despite the alarms.

Ye Xiao focused intently on grinding the wood, taking his time to do a good job. Anyway, he had plenty of time, and if nothing unexpected happened, the prison captain would punish him by making him stay here for the whole night.

Feeling that the first wooden key in his hand was almost taking shape, and that the stone shard in Ye Xiao's hand was getting a bit dull from scraping, he thought about carving another one from the wall.

However, this time, he accidentally pried an entire brick off the wall.

Strange, why is the wall so poorly constructed? Ye Xiao wondered, as he groped around in the hole that had been torn open in the wall, and unexpectedly discovered a cavity inside.

Is there something else hidden in this godforsaken place?

Ye Xiao reached inside to search and actually found something that looked like a small twig.

No, it wasn't a twig, it was a finger, its cold surface slightly elastic, as if it had just been cut off a few days ago.

For no apparent reason, Ye Xiao suddenly felt that this strange scene had a strange sense of déjà vu.

Chapter Fifty-Two: The Old King

It doesn't make sense.

Ye Xiao pinched those fingers, her brows furrowing slightly.

Of all those bricks, he just happened to pry open the one that concealed his finger, a coincidence that seemed to suggest everything was meant to be that way.

"Meow—" A strange meow suddenly rang out in the darkness. Ye Xiao's heart skipped a beat. He followed the sound to find its source, but suddenly felt something furry brush against the back of his hand.

Where did this cat come from in this godforsaken place?

Ye Xiao immediately withdrew his hand, but the fluffy thing acted as if it were an old friend and jumped directly into Ye Xiao's arms.

"Hey!" Ye Xiao was afraid that this strange thing would damage the wooden key he had painstakingly carved, but fortunately, the other party did not seem to be so naughty. It lay on Ye Xiao's lap and stopped moving.

A warm current seemed to flow through his body, and Ye Xiao clearly felt that the chill in the cave was not so intense anymore, and the pain in his body was also relieved a lot.

"Am I so cold that I saw the ghost of a dead cat?" Ye Xiao wondered. He felt that although he was injured, he shouldn't be so close to death that he would have hallucinations.

Then the thing sitting cross-legged on his lap jumped up and slapped his face with its fleshy pads, as if to tell him that this was not an illusion.

"Hey, what's going on!" Not one to back down, Ye Xiao patted back lightly. To be honest, the soft texture felt pretty good.

But for some reason, the cat seemed to have offended him, because it meowed, jumped up, and pounced on his head, scratching wildly.

"Holy crap! Holy crap!" Ye Xiao hurriedly reached out with both hands to grab the creature that was scurrying around on his shoulder.

After all that fuss, he finally remembered that he had important things to do and that wasting time with a cat was a bit inappropriate.

"Stop, stop, I said stop!" Ye Xiao wasn't sure if the thing understood, so he grabbed the cat by the scruff of its neck in the darkness and lifted it to the ground. "I don't know where you came from, but I have things to do, go play by yourself."

"Meow!" Another meow rang out, and the furry creature hopped back onto Ye Xiao's lap, surprisingly not causing any more trouble.

Although Ye Xiao would prefer that the thing stay away from him in a corner or somewhere else, he reluctantly ignored it since it could help him keep warm and continued to concentrate on carving his wooden key.

Ye Xiao couldn't see it in the darkness, but the cat used its paws to smear the blood off Ye Xiao's body onto the severed finger that was lying to the side.

In the pitch-black room, there seemed to be a slight breeze. Before Ye Xiao could whittle the wood a couple more times, a weak and feeble old voice suddenly echoed in the darkness.

"I never expected... that the first person to find me wouldn't be my offspring."

"Holy crap, what is this thing again??" Ye Xiao's hand holding the stone slab trembled slightly, and he couldn't hold back. He just wanted to secretly carve a key, so why was this little dark room so lively?

"You're very rude, young man." The aged voice held a hint of displeasure. "Has the atmosphere in Loren become like this?"

"You're spouting Lorentic nonsense, like some pedantic intellectual." Ye Xiao raised an eyebrow. "You're all in jail like me now, so get down to earth, buddy."

Although he was talking, Ye Xiao didn't stop sharpening the keys in his hands. He wasn't going to let these inexplicable things interfere with his plans anymore.

"Alas, how presumptuous! They have no manners whatsoever that a citizen of Loren should possess." The voice seemed to carry a hint of melancholy.

"Meow—" A melodious cat's meow rang out, startling the old voice. "How come there's another cat here?"

"How should I know? Maybe it's your burial offering... Ouch, hey! This cat definitely understands what I'm saying!" Because of his rude remarks, Ye Xiao was slapped on the face again by the kitten's paw.

"How interesting." The old man's voice then brightened again. "Young man, what do you do?"

"Good question. What do you think?" Ye Xiao chuckled. "What else can I do when I'm locked up here?"

“Oh, I meant before you went to prison.” The old man’s voice circled around Ye Xiao, sounding very three-dimensional to him. “Even though you’ve been locked up here, your magic power hasn’t been restrained. Young man, you seem to have some tricks up your sleeve.”

"You flatter me." Ye Xiao finally finished carving the first key. He removed the neck cuff he had pretended to fasten, took the key, and tried to insert it into the lock. Sure enough... it wouldn't open.

"This thing still needs some attention to detail," Ye Xiao scratched his head, felt the scratches on the key with his finger, carefully judged which points were not aligned, and then took out a second wooden spoon to start shaving.

If it weren't for his ability to manipulate magic to enhance subtle senses, Ye Xiao wouldn't have been confident he could handle this thing with his own craftsmanship alone.

"Judging by appearances, he's at least not a carpenter," the old man chuckled. "You've already removed the neck cuffs but haven't left. Is there someone else here you want to save?"

"Are you interested?"

"I like responsible young people."

"Then you've misunderstood me." Ye Xiao shrugged. "I was just doing it for myself."

"Isn't that a kind of responsibility? If possible, I'd like to see what your future holds." The old man's voice was faint. "Unfortunately, I don't have much time left in this world. Could you do me a favor?"

"It depends on the reward." Ye Xiao never refuses opportunities for hidden missions, but he is also very realistic.

"...Alright, I'll just be frank. Young man, do you know that I am the King of Loren?"

"Oh?" Ye Xiao was a little surprised. "Then it'll have to cost more."

"Tsk, these young people nowadays..." the old man sighed. "Even so, I have nothing more to give you. How about you take my finger instead?"

"That finger was yours after all." Ye Xiao wasn't too surprised. "But what use is that thing to me?"

“Young man, I admire you, but can you think a little deeper?” the old man said helplessly. “Don’t always think about things so… so superficially.”

"I can only say that being shallow-minded is not always a bad thing." During the conversation, the second key was finished. Ye Xiao put it into the neck cuff again and twisted it. With a soft "click", the lock on the neck cuff actually closed.

Success! Ye Xiao was pleasantly surprised and breathed a sigh of relief. Now he could make a few more keys.

“I was once a follower of the God of Dreams.” The old man’s voice gradually weakened. “That finger, after my permission, will allow you to use it to cast spells that send dreams to others.”

“Then I can certainly consider accepting your commission.” After handing out a key, Ye Xiao didn’t hesitate to chat with the old king for a bit more. “But I’m still wondering, if you really are the king, then which generation of kings of Loren are you? As far as I can remember, since the founding of Loren, no king has ever been imprisoned in the Dead Sea prison.”

"Hehehe, I understand your doubts... But I am the current Emperor of Loren, Harold Betis."

Chapter Fifty-Three Last Wish

"Huh?" Ye Xiao was stunned. "The current king? But I just met him a few days ago..."

“Oh, that is indeed my body,” the old King Harold chuckled twice, “but my soul is right before you. If you had truly seen the remains on the throne, you would understand the meaning of my words even better.”

Ye Xiao frowned slightly, his thoughts returning to the scene when Ella met with a group of royal family members at the palace—

"At that time, the princes in the hall were whispering among themselves, while the old king sat motionless on his throne, neither expressing his opinion nor his attitude, like a withered tree that was about to die."

"Most importantly, the people under the throne seem to have gotten used to ignoring the old king's presence and are talking and arguing on their own."

At the time, Ella assumed that the old king had become senile and no longer had the mind to attend to state affairs.

Looking back now, that old king really was like a mere corpse.

So does that mean the emperor of Loren was already dead? And his body was turned into a puppet by something?

Ye Xiao swallowed hard. This chaotic imperial city was even more outrageous than he had imagined.

In other words, in the previous life, the king's corpse was enshrined on the throne in the palace, unknown serpents lurked on the spines of the royal family members, a mad bishop sat in the distant sanctuary, and the saint who was born with the hopes of the people was actually an evil god leading to destruction...

No wonder that in the middle of the previous life, the entire Loren began to collapse, and in the later stages, it became a world like the apocalypse in dark mythology.

Because from the very beginning, what lay hidden beneath the calm surface was nothing but destruction and madness.

Thinking of this, Ye Xiao couldn't help but shudder. He recalled the incident of the fallen angels summoned by the Aslan Empire, and the merging of hell and the real world spreading from the Holy City of Morning Star Ridge... Could other countries be like this as well?

Just how many other chaotic and evil forces are there in this bizarre world?

A furry touch came from the back of Ye Xiao's hand, and he found that the restless cat was rubbing its head against him.