"Never mind where you learned all this. Since you want to talk about it, tell me the whole story from beginning to end." Helena seemed quite understanding.
That was one of Helena's best qualities: she never asked for proof or demanded to know where he had heard something.
So Zhao Si laid out everything he knew.
It had happened on a night known as the Night of the Black Knives.
A group of assassins carrying unusual weapons called Black Knives had infiltrated Leyndell.
They were all women, equipped with gear that rendered them invisible and silenced their movements. They had easily slipped past Leyndell's layers of guards and stabbed Godwyn, the Golden Prince, to death in what amounted to an execution.
The Black Knives that killed Godwyn possessed the power of destined death. In other words, they had been forged with the Rune of Death infused into them.
Under destined death, Godwyn should have become the first of the dead-the first demigod to truly die.
But that violated the Golden Order. Godwyn's soul had already perished, and his flesh should have naturally decayed. Yet the idiotic Golden Order insisted on reviving him.
Without a soul, pouring life into a corpse would only turn it into one of Those Who Live in Death. His flesh twisted into something increasingly inhuman, even manifesting "many faces."
Examples included the Prince of Death's eldritch face and fish tail.
Buried beneath the Erdtree's roots, Godwyn had been denied even peace in death, subjected to endless torment. More and more faces proliferated across him, and even his pustules took the shape of "faces."
Horrifying, and pitiful.
Heartbroken by the loss of her son, Marika could no longer endure the Golden Order's torment of Godwyn. She therefore decided to shatter the Elden Ring, which housed that order, with her own hands!
The Elden Ring shattered, and the world descended into chaos. Those blessed by grace, as well as the demigods who possessed Great Runes, all suffered some degree of damage to their minds.
To repair the Elden Ring, Radagon began struggling against Marika, causing his own body to start breaking apart as well.
The goddess had betrayed the order and the Greater Will, and was suspended upon the Elden Ring in the posture of a martyr.
As a result, Radagon could no longer serve as Elden Lord. With the throne vacant, the demigod children raised armies in an attempt to seize it.
A succession of tragedies followed. This war without a victor became known as the Shattering.
The demigods who carved out their own territories became regional rulers-the Shardbearers.
Only later did it become known that Ranni had orchestrated the affair, with Rykard involved as well. The uproar over Godwyn's death had been so great that Ranni's death had instead gone overlooked.
In effect, two demigods had died: Godwyn had died in soul, while Ranni had died in body.
After her flesh died, Ranni's soul entered a doll. She sought to change the order and bring down the stars, establishing her own order of the stars. In doing so, she would escape her fate and flee into the starry sky.
That was Zhao Si's understanding of what had happened.
It made Ranni sound like the mastermind, with Rykard merely an accomplice.
Helena pondered for a moment, then asked, "Who originally possessed destined death?"
"The Queen of the Full Moon Eyes. She made hunting gods her mission. She should also have been the Goddess of Night at some point, but her actual name is no longer known," Zhao Si answered.
"And whose hands did it end up in afterward?" Helena asked.
"Maliketh the Black Blade." Zhao Si remembered that clearly.
Helena clapped her hands. "So the goddess Marika's shadow, the Black Blade, was guarding destined death. That raises a new question: how did Ranni know about it? And how did she steal it?"
Zhao Si froze. "I don't know."
"Ranni definitely wasn't the mastermind behind this. Or rather, she thought she was, without realizing someone else was helping things along." Helena tried to analyze the situation.
Zhao Si scratched his head. "What do you mean?"
"Use your head, my dear Tarnished." Helena sounded exasperated with him. "Where did the Black Knife Assassins come from? Was Ranni really their master? Destined death was in the Black Blade's hands. How could she possibly have stolen it?"
Zhao Si had no answer. He really had overlooked that point. The Black Blade could defeat even the Queen of the Full Moon Eyes. What made Ranni capable of stealing anything from him?
"Could it have been Rykard? He should have been working with Ranni." Zhao Si remembered the other overlooked participant.
If he remembered correctly, Rykard had originally held the office of Justiciar. His home was Volcano Manor, but his duties meant he probably spent most of his time living in Leyndell. In terms of distance, he should have been closer to the Black Blade, allowing him to work from within while Ranni operated from outside.
At that thought, Zhao Si found a new approach-strip away the mythology and think it through.
He set aside who was a god and how powerful they were. Stripped of their strength and mystique, they were merely an ordinary king and queen and their royal children.
Of the three children Radagon had fathered with Rennala, aside from the peerless warrior Radahn, the Starscourge, the other two both had reasons to kill Godwyn-and it was all that bastard Radagon's fault.
Here was the situation: by rights, Godwyn had been first in line to inherit, only for Radagon to usurp the throne.
Radagon had married Marika, whose husband was still alive but absent, cuckolding Godfrey and turning Rennala into his ex-wife.
The implication was obvious. The throne now belonged to Radagon's family. If Radagon abdicated, one of his sons, Radahn or Rykard, should inherit it.
In all this, Godwyn was like a thorn lodged in the path of their succession.
Never mind that his revered, battle-hardened father Godfrey was still alive. Godwyn himself was an all-round powerhouse, theoretically accomplished in both civil governance and military affairs-the clear choice for the throne.
In a head-on confrontation, probably only Radahn could put up a fight.
Radagon's children had their roles precisely defined. Beyond the throne, Ranni, the Lunar Princess, had set her sights directly on the position of religious leader. The Two Fingers reflected this as well: Ranni had their support, along with a shadow bestowed by the Greater Will-Half-Wolf Blaidd.
She was practically being treated and groomed as another Marika.
The divine right of kings.
The god controlled religious faith and the order, and could designate the heir to the throne. The king governed secular affairs and ruled the country, obeying the god and the order.
Together, they formed a "perfect" system of rule: one god plus one king.
Taken together with Goldmask's statement that "a god and a king are all that is needed," even the marriage requirement was not necessarily unchangeable. After all, Ranni already had the authority to change the order. Nor should they be blinded by the Golden Order's mythological trappings. At its core, it was equivalent to a law carved onto a stone tablet, with the Elden Ring serving as that tablet.
"So there was no need to start a war at all. If Radagon abdicated and Godwyn stayed out of it, the age of gold could have transitioned peacefully into the age of stars." Zhao Si slapped his forehead as he reached that conclusion.
As for Miquella and Malenia's branch of the family, they seemed to have little interest in the throne.
As for the Erdtree, it was quite likely that changes to the order would
cause corresponding changes in it. The Erdtree had not always looked the way it did now. In the beginning, it had even taken the form of the crucible of life.
But Radagon would never abdicate. He was an absolute supporter of the Golden Order, and could even be called its embodiment.
Failing to understand that crucial point, Radagon's children had plotted an assassination. Clearly, Rykard had not understood his reclusive sister Ranni's true intentions either-she had no desire to become a religious leader. All she could think about was getting the hell out.
It suddenly clicked for Zhao Si. This was a straight-up version of A Song of Ice and Fire. So this bunch had been playing a murder mystery game all along.
"But I really can't figure out who the Black Knife Assassins belonged to." From the information Zhao Si had, he knew that they were all women, and all Numen, just like Marika.
"Hehe, could Marika have given them just a little help?" Helena boldly proposed a theory that startled even Zhao Si.
"How is that possible? They were mother and son, and there was no conflict between them. Why would she go after Godwyn?" Zhao Si shook his head, repeating, "Impossible. Absolutely impossible."
Helena smiled. "She was a woman, you know. And he was her former husband's perfect son. Wouldn't that make him a destabilizing factor for anyone?"
"Then exile would have been enough. Why kill him? Besides, the Golden Order didn't allow true death. She would have had to bring out the Rune of Death and use destined death to kill him. Why go to all that trouble?" Zhao Si had not expected Helena's imagination to outstrip his own.
"Exile him so he could reunite with his father, and then the two of them could fight their way back? Who could handle that?" Helena spread her hands. "When someone wants to remarry, the child from their previous marriage becomes unwanted baggage. How cruel."
Helena's reasoning was that a great tree rotted from within.
Zhao Si burst out laughing. "That's even more far-fetched. You make it sound like a family melodrama."
"There's no point thinking so much about it. Just find a Black Knife Assassin and ask her," Helena said as though it were obvious. "Disrupt the Night of the Black Knives and confiscate those dangerous Black Knives. Once the plan is ruined, the mastermind will surely fly into a rage. Then you can catch them out. Whoever they are, if they want to kill Godwyn, make them pay for it."
"But I can't figure out how to get involved." Zhao Si found himself facing a new problem.
Helena said, "You certainly won't accomplish anything by hiding here for the rest of your life. You need to go out and make a name for yourself."
"Preferably, I should get close to Godwyn and protect him personally. But how do I get out?" Zhao Si had no ideas at all. This was not Roundtable Hold, where he could teleport out.
Helena patted her chest. "Don't forget, I'm a Finger Maiden. Leave this to me!"
Zhao Si felt both excited and grateful. He had not expected Helena to be willing to help him. "That's my maiden for you."
While the two of them talked outside, the Two Fingers inside Roundtable Hold trembled. Beside them, Finger Reader Enia woke with a start and asked dubiously, "My lords, are you serious?"
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