Chapter Nineteen: The Sage Is Not Benevolent

Dead silence blanketed the banquet hall that had been ravaged by the Bureau of Discipline.

It was not until the footsteps of those men faded into the distance that the congealed air in the hall seemed to be released from a spell, suddenly coming back to life. The delicacies on the tables still exuded enticing aromas, and the vintage wine in crystal glasses remained crystal clear. Yet, at this moment, no one cared. Even the beautiful, soft, and fragrant companions in their arms had instantly become burdens they were desperate to cast aside.

Guests shoved their companions away with brute force, rising in a panic. The attendant girls, caught off guard, were pushed onto the carpet. They instinctively wanted to pout or complain, but their mouths hung open, finding no words to say. Were they unemployed now? And from whom were they supposed to demand their pay for the night? Their blank, helpless gazes turned toward the head waiter, who stood with hollow eyes, clearly as stunned by the sudden turn of events as they were.

The guests flooded out of the hall as if fleeing a disaster. The midnight spring breeze hit them, but instead of dispelling the chill in their hearts, it made their hearts beat like drums. Cold sweat soaked through the linings of their expensive suits, and their hands and feet turned ice-cold. Amidst the clinking of glasses, the Bureau of Discipline had broken in like ghosts, dragging the high-and-mighty Administrator and the pharmaceutical tycoon away like dead dogs. To them, this scene was more terrifying than any horror movie.

"Quick! Get out of here!"

When a politician scrambled into his luxury sedan, his voice trembled violently from sheer terror. He wished his vehicle could immediately ignite its rocket thrusters to flee this ill-omened place. Luxury cars sped away like a startled herd of beasts, fleeing the manor that had been filled with extravagant laughter only moments before.

Meanwhile, at various locations across District 2, the news that the Governor and others had been apprehended spread and reverberated with astonishing speed through the business, political, and upper-class circles of the entire district.

...

Ring!

Deep in the night, ink-black darkness enveloped the bedroom. The piercing sound of a phone ringing suddenly tore through the silence, jolting Lars from his sleep.

"Who is it? It's so late..." his wife muttered in dissatisfaction, having been awakened beside him.

Lars, however, was instantly alert, alarm bells ringing in his heart. He snatched the vibrating phone from the nightstand, rolled out of bed, and swiped to answer with his thumb. "What happened?"

"It’s bad, Mr. Lars! Speaker Shumo... the Speaker has been taken away by the Bureau of Discipline!"

"What?!"

Lars gasped, his footsteps coming to a dead halt. He instinctively glanced back at his groggy wife, then quickly slipped out of the bedroom and pulled the door shut behind him, cutting off her view. "Why would the Bureau of Discipline take Speaker Shumo?"

"It was the Saint's order. It’s not just Speaker Shumo; Administrator Tanner has been taken as well..."

The person on the other end spoke rapidly, rattling off a list of familiar names. Lars’s brows furrowed into a deep crease. The very pinnacle of District 2’s political and business worlds was being uprooted!

"Is there any word from the Imperial Capital?"

"Rumor has it the Saint was absolutely furious about the proposal submitted by the Administrator and directly ordered the Prime Minister to conduct a thorough purge of the high-level officials in District 2."

"I warned them!" Lars’s voice was filled with suppressed, intense rage. "Don't test the Saint's bottom line!"

At the start of the proposal discussions, he had clearly voiced his opposition. But Shumo, Tanner, and their ilk had been corrupted by the sugar-coated bullets of the Roman Pharmaceutical Group and other interest groups, naively believing that the worst-case scenario would be the proposal simply being rejected.

But Lars knew exactly what kind of person sat in the Holy Palace. He possessed not only immense power but wisdom that pierced through history, surpassing anyone in the current age. Many cornerstone concepts of modern science had come from the Saint’s own lips; it was he who commissioned the research that created today’s glory. In Lars’s view, seeing the big picture from a small detail was the most ordinary of the Saint’s abilities.

"Mr. Lars, what—what should we do now?"

"Let me think."

Lars did not provide an immediate answer and hung up decisively. He left the lights off, allowing the thick darkness to swallow him. A moment later, he walked to the living room sofa, sat down, turned on his phone screen, and opened the Progressive Party’s chat group. The group was already in chaos, with messages flooding in like a waterfall.

"The Saint must have been deceived by sycophants! We cannot sit by and wait for death; we must unite and petition the Cabinet!"

"Let’s get people out on the streets to protest the Prime Minister's incompetence."

"With all the high-level officials suddenly gone, isn't it normal for there to be major operational errors?"

Watching these reckless comments in the group, a surge of anger flared in Lars’s chest. He quickly typed out a long string of cold text and sent it with a heavy heart:

"Shut your mouths, all of you!

Are you delusional enough to try petty tricks? Do you think the Saint wouldn't dare to wipe out all our parliamentary seats in one stroke? Forget the distant past; have you all forgotten what happened in the Sixth Administrative District in Imperial Year 4672? That group of self-righteous doctors went on a collective strike to oppose the expansion of medical student enrollment. And what was the result? The Saint stripped every participant of their medical license and decreed that their direct blood relatives within three generations would never be allowed to work in government, business, or medicine. He had them all expelled from the Sixth District and brought in doctors from all four corners of the realm to fill the vacancies.

Battle the Saint? How many lives do you have?!

Remember, if you don’t sit in these positions, there are plenty of others who will break their necks trying to get into them. Now, immediately, right now! Stop these foolish discussions! Use all your connections and resources to fight and scramble for those vacant positions. Try your best to push our own people into them—that is the only viable path!"

After his long message was sent, the group fell silent for a few seconds. Then, the complaints and incendiary remarks vanished, replaced by tense and pragmatic discussions. They began analyzing which positions were attainable, who to contact, and how to maneuver...

Lars tossed his phone onto the expensive leather sofa as if it were a hot iron. He stood up, navigated the darkness with precision to the sideboard, pulled open a drawer, and took out a box of top-tier cigars in elaborate packaging. Lars pulled one out, cleanly clipped the cap with a cutter, and slowly lit it with an exquisite lighter.

He took a deep drag.

The rich, woody smoke was drawn deep into his lungs. An ordinary person could never handle the intensity of inhaling cigar smoke, but as a legendary-tier superpowered individual, Lars didn't care; he even enjoyed the violent impact.

"Hah..."

He exhaled heavily, lost in thought. In his youth, he had believed in the supremacy of power and disdained the muddy waters of politics. It wasn't until he reached the high-tier of transcendence and witnessed how power could leverage the world that he finally woke up and began working for the Progressive Party. Over the years, relying on a pragmatic spirit of "being willing to work, capable of working, and willing to lower his status when necessary," he had climbed from an ordinary legislator to his current prominent position.

According to the established trajectory, once the current Speaker Shumo stepped down, he would be the most powerful successor for the party leadership, and from there, he would have a chance to claim the throne of the District 2 Speaker.

However, a hundred years of enduring humiliation and carrying heavy burdens had been crumbled into dust by a single, light decree from the Saint.

Though he told the legislators to "go fight for it," he knew better than anyone else. Given the Saint's style of operation, he would never promote anyone from within District 2 to fill these core vacancies. He would certainly parachute in elite forces from other administrative districts. The new rulers, in order to secure their footing, might pull in or promote some inconsequential, peripheral figures.

But someone like him, the second-in-command of the original system?

Only ruthless suppression awaited him. Even if the Saint had not explicitly stated that he was no longer to be used, the newly arrived "paratroopers" would need to kill the chicken to scare the monkey to solidify their own power. His political life was already at an end.

As he thought of this, the sadness in his eyes vanished, replaced by a cutthroat, scorched-earth ferocity. He slammed the expensive cigar into the ashtray, crushing it out.

If the Saint is unrighteous, then do not blame him for being unfaithful!