After hearing this, the king slowly rose to his feet.
Facing Zhou You, he spoke in a voice that sounded almost confessional.
"Are you, too, a villain seeking to seize my throne?"
Zhou You frowned.
The words sounded exceedingly strange. They did not seem to be his own, but more like a performance carried out according to some predetermined arrangement.
Before Zhou You could figure out what was happening, the other man spoke again.
"Though I am grievously ill, I still know everything—each of you covets my throne, even going so far as to harm me..."
Wait.
A strange sense of familiarity suddenly welled up within him. Zhou You abruptly raised his head and looked at the other man.
The king continued.
"Doctors, sorcerers, bishops—everyone wishes to take my life. And now, you have appeared as well... What are you?"
Suddenly, Zhou You's lips curled up.
Everything had returned to before.
"Mad King Chronicle? I wonder whether this was deliberate or merely a coincidence."
But then...
It did not really matter.
With a flick of his sword, Zhou You bowed, then spoke in the same chanting tone.
"I am merely a humble Taoist priest. I came here only to cure Your Majesty's chronic ailment."
"What chronic ailment?"
"The sickness called living."
Silence.
A moment later, the king shook his head.
His eyes still looked half-dead, much as they had before. He appeared to be nothing more than a middle-aged man exhausted to the extreme, yet Zhou You could sense it.
This man had completely lost himself.
The one standing here now was merely a pitiable person wholly controlled, toyed with, and unable to resist the Blood Moon.
The king spoke.
"If that is so, there is no need for further words."
Rather than summoning guards as the script had suggested,