Chapter 142: Your Master Must Come
Lucy’s lips remained parted in frozen silence, right as she was about to complete her utterance... Yet the words delivered by Old Man Darren stopped her dead in her tracks! She could find no logical explanation in her mind for how this old man was spouting those exact words. Her jaw locked for a moment from the sheer shock of the surprise, before slowly closing once more.
How could Darren—a mere inhabitant of a mortal realm like Earth—know her explicit name?!
Setting aside how thoroughly it defied all logic, she simply did not know how to respond at this critical juncture: Should she ask him sharply how he knew her name? Inquire about the identity of the woman he referenced to draw out what he knew? Or simply dismiss the matter as a passing coincidence?!
Believing it to be a mere coincidence was nearly impossible... If Lucy were forced to guess how this information had reached him, perhaps he had read that very web novel Cain had read detailing their native realm; only then might the scenario assume a degree of logic, though towering questions still hovered in the air!
Perhaps Lucy was overthinking as usual... yet this frail man was far too aged to recall most details of his life, let alone retain his composure under the horrific pressure he had just endured beneath the threat of the cosmic spear! After all that terror, was he truly recalling a trashy web novel he had read, after everything he had been through?!
She leaned toward assuming her thoughts were running wild as always, but she resolved to feign denial and pretend she was not the person in question—despite her stunned reaction having already betrayed her seconds prior.
Lucy spoke in a forced tone, attempting to reclaim her composure: "Lucy Montgrad... Hmm. Though you are a senile old man, you certainly know magnificent names like that! A name like that carries dignity and a passing touch of absolute supremacy... Perhaps it is a name fit for a celestial ruler. Who, then, might this Lucy Montgrad be?!"
Her acting was atrocious by any standard! That fabricated setup made it instantly obvious to anyone that she was speaking about herself. Moreover, the phrase "passing touch" she had jammed into the middle of her sentence to sound as though she were not praising herself became the single most suspicious detail in her entire speech!
Old Man Darren’s expression darkened, his eyebrows lowering as he processed her tone, which had flipped one hundred and eighty degrees in a single second.
Darren spoke in a confident, astonished voice: "You are most certainly her! Lucy Montgrad, whom my master told us about, is the only person who would act in such a manner during a situation like this! It is almost verbatim what is stated in Clause Fifteen on page one hundred of the Lucy Montgrad Character Analysis Manual... where it notes that when faced with an unexpected scenario or an unanswerable revelation, she begins to overthink, and will most likely attempt to act and deny in order to comprehend what is occurring rather than resorting to immediate threats!"
Lucy’s eyelid twitched twice in rapid succession as she listened to the precise analysis recited by the old man! Was there a sacred scripture on this Earth dissecting the intricacies of her essence and behavior?!
Were her sudden actions—from her perspective—so utterly transparent?! This discovery caused a real fire to ignite within her deep interior, until genuine wrath began to rise and shatter her cold composure!
Old Man Darren suddenly yelled, slapping his forehead: "Damn it! I forgot!... The manual also noted that when Lucy Montgrad’s actions are exposed before her as if you were reading her mind, she becomes instantly enraged!... How foolish of me!"
Old Man Darren looked at Lucy floating before him in the void, noticing that the twitch in her eyelid and her stern expression had grown considerably more intense and furious!
He swallowed hard... He had truly stepped over the line! Now he had to face the unrelenting wave of Lucy’s true wrath!
Simultaneously, Lucy wanted to rip the old man’s face off for his bold insolence. How dared he state directly before her that exposing her tricks made her angry while she was already angry?! His behavior was practically a voluntary request for death!
This old fool had crossed every conceivable boundary!
Lucy spoke in a low voice throbbing with lethal threat: "And did that manual tell you... what I might do to you now?!"
Old Man Darren’s body trembled violently once more under the influence of a denser, crushing magical aura that clamped down on his breath like a mountain!
It was far too late for apologies...
Darren’s mind raced at frantic speed for any way out of this fatal predicament, rather than being completely obliterated before enjoying his initial survival.
He muttered in a trembling voice: "Surely Lady Lucy is the absolute best in the entire universe!... She is a noble soul who would not wipe out foolish idiots like me... right?!"
Lucy smiled a cold, pale smile and said: "Hah... Your manual got that clause wrong! Do you have any final words to read before you perish by my hand?!"
Old Man Darren wracked his brain among thousands of thoughts that might save him from this inevitable fate before Lucy finished him off. When a final idea flashed in his mind, he voiced it immediately without hesitation, confident that even if he died afterward, he would die without a single shred of regret!
Darren said in a tone brimming with reverence and pleading: "My Lady Lucy... My master authored that manual and drafted those principles specifically for you! He built all his strength and strove to become powerful enough to transcend into your world, and he was the sole individual in this universe who believed your world was real and not a mere illusion! Yet in the end, he could not achieve it, discovering that this world groaned under constraints preventing his power from ascending further, making reaching you an impossibility... I believed in that alongside him, and I believed in him as he poured all his hours into writing and analyzing your facial expressions and body language at all times, relying strictly on what was recorded in the novel!"
Lucy felt a mixture of anger and astonishment... The leader of the Smile Organization had been utterly obsessed with her, much like her husband Cain had been obsessed with her in his past life! Yet she could not comprehend why the leader of the Smile Organization showered her with such extraordinary, miraculous attention!
Old Man Darren continued eagerly: "I hope, Lady Lucy... that you will fulfill the wish of my admiring master to meet you, and summon him here so he may behold you as a living reality, not mere words written on paper!"
Lucy pondered this proposition deeply...
She did indeed possess supreme magical ability to summon entities and beings, though the summoned subjects would not be their absolute original selves; rather, the process involved pulling the person’s soul and manifesting it inside a temporary vessel capable of holding their energy—not restricted to their current power limits, but at the absolute highest power level their soul had ever achieved throughout history!
Lucy was also itching to fight this man called "Cain," to discover the secret behind his overwhelming obsession with her and the true extent of his power...
The only issue lay in whether his power exceeded standard limits; in that case, the summoning technique would drain a colossal amount of mana to construct his existence...
Yet Lucy smiled inwardly with absolute confidence and a pride that challenged reality itself. This absent man could never, under any circumstances, be stronger than her—she who stood at the absolute pinnacle of the Truth Level! Even if he were summoned at his absolute historical peak, he would be nothing more than another stepping stone beneath her feet.