Secret World: I Became a God Through Lies

Chapter 321 The Day of Silence
"They argued about who told the truth, but forgot—"

The truth is never something that can be said loudly by anyone.

Rather, it's about who lives long enough to leave an ending.

In the capital, on the morning of the seventh day, the morning mist had not yet completely dissipated.

A cool, damp air drifted through the stone-paved streets and alleys, as if the murderous intent of yesterday had not completely dissipated.

But the foggy city of Areston did not fall silent as usual.

On the contrary, the streets were busier than ever before.

Newspapers, like wild grass sprouting after rain, proliferated overnight in every corner of the city:
On the outdoor tables of cafes, on the bulletin board beneath the church steps, in the newsboy's basket at the corner of the bell tower...

The black and white ink spread from the first rays of dawn all the way to the shadows at the end of the alley.

Eighty-three newspapers of different sizes and with different stances published more than thirty different interpretations of yesterday's murder case almost simultaneously this morning.

And without exception, they all point to the same name: Celian.

However, this time, she was no longer just that cold-blooded "murderer".
No longer just a "dangerous individual" listed in classified files, but has become the most difficult mystery to define in the entire city.

[Shangcheng District - Silver Brown Coffee Shop]

"Look." A noblewoman, dressed in a velvet fur coat and a light veiled hat, elegantly flipped through the morning paper, gently waving a paper fan in her hand.
A mocking smile curled at the corner of his lips. "It's that 'dark force behind the Numberer's Lecture Hall' again... as if that child is possessed by a demon."

Her hands, gloved with white down, turned the pages of the newspaper, her gaze sweeping over the bold headlines as if watching a vulgar play.

The maid standing behind her hesitated for a moment, then asked softly, "Miss...which one do you believe?"

"I don't believe a single one." The noblewoman chuckled softly, a hint of amusement in her voice.

"However, the Morning Star Times really did something this time, portraying her as a pitiful foreign noblewoman who was wronged by our land."

The maid bit her lip and said cautiously, "But isn't she?"

The noblewoman paused for a moment, then casually closed the newspaper.
“I don’t care if she is or isn’t. I only care whether the ball at the Viscount’s manor tonight will proceed as planned.”

She tossed the newspaper into the silver basket on the table; the page with Celian's name on it trembled slightly in the wind before falling silently to the ground.

Zhongcheng District, Door Mirror Academy, Lecture Platform
In the lecture hall, dozens of students had just taken their seats and hadn't even opened their books when a crisp clapping sound interrupted everyone's attention.

A newspaper was slammed onto the podium; the sound wasn't loud, but it seemed to vibrate the air throughout the entire lecture hall.

The gray-haired, middle-aged lecturer stood before the podium, his gaze solemn, his tone steady:
"Class, we will not be studying Imperial History today."

“Let’s discuss a question.” He scanned the room. “When ‘information’ becomes a weapon, is it… still public property?”

Someone in the audience whispered, "Teacher, this says the church's 'Seven Sounds of Power' stopped working in the South District last night... Is it fake?"

The teacher didn't respond immediately, but looked at the student and smiled gently, as if she heard a hint of regret.

"Whether it's true or false, I won't judge," he said slowly.
"I just want you to think about this: if 'fate' can really be woven by people—then who would you be willing to let write this play?"

After he finished speaking, the entire lecture hall fell silent.

Even the sound of turning pages disappeared.

Lower City District, Ninth District, "Jimmy's Little Shop" Barber Shop.

"Look at this! Look at this!" Old Jimmy slammed a still-greasy newspaper down on the counter, making the scissors on the counter tremble slightly.

"This time they said that the girl was actually a good person, just unlucky!"

The retired soldier sitting in the barber's chair clicked his tongue, frowned, and said, "Hmph, a good person? That corpse wasn't just a drawing."

"It's said that other newspapers also reported that it was some crazy priest in the church who performed a blood sacrifice."

Another customer tapped his pipe on the edge of the table. "She didn't do it."

"What do you know?" Old Jimmy blew on his beard, lowering his voice even further.
“I told you long ago, those guys in white coats… they’re bound to get into trouble sooner or later. They’re not much cleaner than the military.”

For a moment, the barbershop was filled with a heated debate, with voices rising and falling, almost drowning out the hawking of newspaper boys on the street outside the window.

At this moment, the young man who had been silent in the corner finally raised his head.

His face was still damp with the lingering mist, and his voice was so soft it seemed to travel through a curtain of rain:

"What's her name?"

Everyone was stunned, and the arguing stopped abruptly.

“That…the girl who died,” the young man said slowly, his eyes fixed on the blurry photograph in the newspaper. “What…was her name?”

The air seemed to freeze suddenly.

The newspaper was filled with words like "vampire suspect," "bloody ritual," and "out-of-control individual," each word chilling, yet no one could remember the girl's real name.

No one answered.

[Wangdu Broadcasting Building - Review Team Office]

"Have today's statistics come out yet?" In the review team's office, a middle-aged reviewer frowned and tapped his knuckles on the desk.

A clerk quickly handed over a densely packed data table: "The results of the public opinion guidance analysis are as follows:"
—The percentage of those who support the view that 'Serian is the murderer' has dropped to 41%.

—The percentage of those skeptical of the church's motives has increased to 23%.

—A staggering 36% of the group expressed a feeling of 'not knowing but sensing a conspiracy.'

The examiner scoffed, his tone tinged with resentment: "This is what you call a success? Not even a single murderer can be brought to justice?"

“What’s even stranger is,” the clerk said, pulling out another appendix and lowering her voice, “that is…”

"These articles are not authored by name and do not come from the same print media."

He paused, as if uttering a taboo: "It is said to be some kind of mysterious 'whispering dark web' system—the manuscripts are distributed anonymously to small printing shops, independent newspapers, and street bulletin board posters, spreading like a virus throughout the city."

"Like a virus?" the examiner repeated, frowning.

He didn't see it; it was right above them, in the wind rustling through the gray rooftops.

A nearly invisible "kite-like bird of wind," made of folded paper, is soaring through the wind, with a newly edited manuscript tightly wrapped between its wings.

It will fly over the bell tower and the temple, through the still-awakening city, and arrive in the hands of the next speaker.

Morning Star Newspaper Office - Old Printing Building

A few slivers of hazy morning light peeked through the dilapidated skylight, and condensation clung to the still-wet glass after the rain, casting blurry shadows that shone onto the stacks of paper piled high like a wall.

Ian sat by the window, flipping through the pages of paper rapidly, each page a different version of the "story".

Some depict the lives of ordinary citizens, using the voices of street vendors to recount the fear and confusion of that night;
Some focus on the victims, using the gentlest strokes to depict her smiles and the details of the name-giving ceremony.
Some articles have begun to analyze the lineage and destinies of vampires, listing a long string of terms and genealogical branches, as if hoping to neutralize fear with rationality.

Some of them are deliberately sentimental, while others are cold and restrained, but all of them cleverly avoid that inviolable red line—

“Directly accuse the church.”

However, the direction of the text did not diminish its sharpness.

Through the twists and turns of language, they lead the reader step by step to the hidden truth.

Ian murmured to himself, his voice seemingly only heard by the wind:

"This is not about persuading people."

"This is... letting people decide for themselves to have doubts."

Downstairs, the roar of an old printing press restarting rose, the metallic gears meshing together.

The scroll spun rapidly, and sheets of paper were expelled like snowflakes, falling one by one with the fragrance of ink and the faint glow of incantations.

Si Ming stood in the darkest corner of the room, without making a sound.

He gently lifted a blank sheet of paper that had not yet been printed, and a delicate circular life pattern on the paper was quietly shimmering.

That was an unfinished sub-entry in the [Lord of Fate] card—a "thread of fate" that had not yet been fully woven.

He is waiting.

Let's wait until this war, fought with public opinion as the battlefield and language as the weapon, reveals the opponent's next move.

He knew that he was very close to taking that step.

At this moment, deep within the Basilica of Our Lady of Procreation, beneath the ivory dome, a red silk curtain sways slowly in the glow of the sacred fire.

The ever-burning lamps made it impossible to distinguish between day and night in the hall, and the light remained perpetually dim and yellow.

Behind the curtain, the faint sound of a baby crying could be heard, mingling with the priestess's low chanting.

That was not a human voice, but a "birth echo" conjured up during the ceremony, proclaiming the inexhaustible grace and sustenance of the Virgin Mary.

Medici sat quietly before the high seat in the Chamber of Divine Diagrams, her slender fingers turning the pages of a blood-stained white scroll.

The scroll did not contain sacred texts, but rather a simulation of the dissemination of public opinion throughout the capital city today.

It is precisely marked with densely packed needle-like dots—"Subtle vocabulary," "Incitement patterns," "Inductive narratives," etc.

Each place is like a silver needle inserted into flesh, trying to evoke resonance or tear apart the old order.

Two bishops stood beside her, both women, draped in crimson shawls, their faces veiled by semi-transparent gauze, their eyes hidden from view, only the silent lines of their lips and jaws visible.

They are the holders of fate's mysteries, belonging to the highest-ranking "Word of Power Compilation Division" within the church, and are known as—

"Echo Witch".

One of them spoke slowly, his voice like the sound of bones beneath flowing water, cold and ruthless:

"Please give the order, Your Highness."

“We are ready to launch ‘Seven Sounds Echo’ and use the ‘Law of Obedience’ as a platform for its dissemination.”

Another witch pulled a scroll of cards from her sleeve; it was a high-level Mystic Card of Fate, handcrafted from bone clay and copper shavings.

The surface is dry and old, with bronze characters engraved into the cardstock like veins, as if written with blood and bone.

The Law of Obedience

The entry for its will:
"When 50,000 people read this article, the first fact presented in the content will be transformed into a 'destined consensus,' and all subsequent readers will automatically accept this information as the 'most credible version.'"

And its enigmatic entries are even more chilling:
"Once a consensus on destiny is reached, any objection will automatically enter a low-impact state until it triggers another impact on the destiny layer."

A lie can become the truth if enough people "believe" it.

Medusa closed the scroll, raised her eyes, and gazed silently at the outline of the blood moon drawn on the dome of the Divine Map Temple, without immediately responding.

Her voice rose slowly, as if it came from a cold winter many years ago:

“When I was a temple priestess, I once burned a newspaper with my own hands.”

"The paper had a sentence written on it: 'Cards are the fire of freedom, the church is nothing but a shroud.'"

Her tone was calm, without anger, as if she were telling a fairy tale.

“I remember that day, the whole block was blocked off, thirty-seven printing houses were burned down, and three hundred and twenty-six people were sent to the Revelation Center.”

She smiled softly, her eyes curving slightly, but the smile was colder than wind and snow.

"And what happened? They're still talking."

She turned her gaze back to the two witches beside her.

"Since they've forgotten—fire can burn not only paper, but also people."

She whispered:

"Then—I'll remind you one more time."

"Activate Echo."

"In my name."

"Let the morning star hear its own echo."

The witch bowed her head in agreement, clasped her hands together, and slowly placed the Destiny Card into the ashes of the altar beneath her feet.

In an instant, the life-pattern wax seals throughout the entire Divine Diagram Hall began to float, as if their bloodlines had been awakened.

Streams of dark red light emanated from the altar, flowing along the life runes.

Passing through the gaps in the floor tiles, the symbols on the pillars, and the engravings on the dome, it connects to the publishing and dissemination hub of the entire church—

The advanced Fate System mystery, [Net of Consensus], is being activated.

At the same time, the special editors of the publications run by the seventeen churches in the capital received the same unified manuscript almost simultaneously.

Title: Lord of the Morning Star, or the Beginning of Fall?

Subtitle: "Their lies understand you better than we do."

In the distance, the silver-patterned steward entered the hall quietly, bowed his head, and reported:
"Your Highness, the echo of public opinion has been activated."

"Initial feedback will be provided at 5 p.m. today."

Medici didn't turn her head, but simply gazed at the distorted divine image, and softly replied:

"Be prepared to receive an echo of the Virgin Mary's wrath."

At the southern end of the capital, inside the "Preaching Hall" of the Church's Information Administration, twenty-four floating life-pattern terminals operated silently.
A silver-white star-shaped turntable, suspended in mid-air, revolves around the center, rotating at an extremely slow yet stable frequency.

The soft light shifted, like stars silently moving on a man-made celestial altar.

Within this "arched hall," all printed data from newspapers under the Royal Capital Church system, prayer broadcasts, transmission of church doctrinal texts, and "believers' emotional sampling" and feedback are stored.

All of them were collected, proofread, compiled, and disseminated.

This is the hub of information, the central node for the church to maintain the "miracle of the right to speak".

Noon should be the most active time in this place.

Especially this morning, the mysterious consensus of destiny, the "Law of Obedience," has already been put into operation. Theoretically,

There should be at least several thousand unified church voices—like a tide—surging towards all districts of the capital, establishing a "consensus" and suppressing dissenting voices.

But today, it's unusually quiet here, almost as if it's silent.

A mid-level Fate-type proofreader stood motionless before the second terminal, staring intently at the display screen. Her face gradually paled, and her fingertips tightened their grip on the verifier in her hand. The "Echo Graph" was empty.

She refreshed the interface three times and then called up the auxiliary identification tool again.

Still ineffective.

There were no ripples.

No transmission was made.

No feedback.

It was as if the entire city—had never heard a sound from the church.

Cold sweat beaded on her forehead. She frowned, gritted her teeth, and pulled out her backup Destiny Card, [Beacon Guidance], attempting to locate the coordinates of the "Influence Convergence Point" using the spell.

She gently unfolded the card with her palm, and life patterns flowed into it.

The crystal track disk should point to a central node that converges, a "consensus convergence point".

However... the trajectory pointer spun repeatedly across the entire chart, like a runaway pendulum.

Circling, deviating, returning to zero... Finally, a deep red teardrop of destiny pattern suddenly dripped from the crystal tear core.

—Feedback path: Does not exist.

Her back stiffened, and she abruptly stood up, urgently presenting the results to the high platform.

In the altar area at the deepest part of the arched hall, a church public opinion priest wearing a grey and white cloak sat on a circular control panel.
Twelve life tablets surround his back, representing the twelve information branches under his jurisdiction.

He frowned and took the proofreading results.

The screen displayed three very short lines of feedback:
There was no response.

A consensus has not yet been reached.

The path is broken.

His eyes shifted slightly, and his voice was lowered to a whisper:
There was no response.

Without hesitation, he immediately raised his hand, summoned two rune envoys, and whispered the command: "Activate the backup high-level secret techniques."

Three mysterious cards were presented, and the Fate-based contingency plan was deployed in sequence:
[Premonition and Imprint], [Emotional Wave Network], [Subjective Absorption]

The three cards activated almost simultaneously, their life runes expanding like a network, penetrating the spiritual energy network of the royal capital, attempting to find the core motivation behind the flow of public opinion.

—No response was received.

Even the most basic "emotional wave network" has yielded a set of chilling data:

The communicator's perceived motivation is vague, untraceable, and leaves no trace of motivation.

What does that mean?
This means that all of this ongoing public opinion guidance is not the result of natural public opinion formation.

Rather, it is a chain of transmission being consciously woven by some "untraceable entity".

This has far exceeded the boundaries of the church's authority and ability to "modulate the word".

The public opinion priest slowly stood up, his movements stiff.

He said nothing, but quietly walked deeper into the data area. A heavy metal door opened automatically, and he stepped into the sealed space known as the "Listening Room".

There was no sound, and no metal machinery.

Only one tower-shaped Echo of Fate, forged from obsidian, stands in the center.

A rotating wheel of fate floats at the top, symbolizing a direct listening to and probing of the world's consensus layer.

Only the highest-ranking Fate Guides in the Church have the authority to activate it.

He placed his fate card on the center of the pillar and whispered an incantation:

"In response to consensus, let us invoke the name of destiny—"

Before he could finish speaking, the incantation got stuck in his throat.

The fluctuations of the life pattern abruptly stopped, the needle wheel stopped spinning, and beneath the stone tower, an extremely faint reverse waveform appeared.

His pupils contracted violently.

That was not an echo.

That was a voice of rebuttal from the blocked party—a voice of rebuttal to "Fate Contact".

More accurately, it was a suppressive force from the depths of fate.

Ancient, vast, and suffocating, it was as if some unawakened being was slowly opening its eyes, having slumbered for far too long beneath the river of fate.

That power did not come from the church, nor did it belong to any particular power structure.

It was like a giant dragon, gently turning over in the eternal flow of destiny.

Every whisper that tried to reach the edge of its dream was instantly silenced.

He abruptly pulled back the card, swayed slightly, and grabbed the pillar for support.

A moment later, footsteps sounded at the outer door, and a silver-patterned deacon entered, his voice low and slow:

"The Ministry of Education has responded."

"His Highness said—just listen quietly, there's no need to try again."

He nodded without answering, but looked up at the only narrow west-facing window in the listening room.

Outside the window, the setting sun was sinking into the edge of the capital. The sea of ​​clouds churned and the golden light faded, like a giant eye slowly closing, or perhaps a warning.

He murmured:
"It's coming."

"It is not the destiny we summoned..."

"But rather—the true master of destiny has awakened."

On the second floor of the Morning Star newspaper office, the wind blew in through the wooden window that was never fully closed. The old window frame was pushed open half an inch, making a faint creak, like someone turning over in their sleep.

Si Ming stood with his hands behind his back by the window, his grey-blue eyes piercing through the mottled street, gazing straight into the distance—

The moon relief outside the tower of the Temple of Our Lady of Fertility, still vibrant in color, gleamed with a cold, deathly light in the twilight.

His expression was as calm as a stone sculpture, and his voice was deep and clear, like a nail driven directly into the wind.

"Before the Lord of Destiny."

“Fate is ours to command; from this day forward, it is not my command, so we shall remain silent.”

At this moment, dusk falls between the tattered paper and the ink, like a script burned to its edge, struggling to continue writing in the ashes.

Rex sat at the rickety old desk next to the printing press, one foot casually resting on the drawer, the other dangling in the air, the heel of his shoe gently tapping the ground.

With a half-smoked cigarette between his right and left hands, he slowly flipped through stacks of newly printed city tabloid supplements.

He had been watching for two hours, and no one had disturbed him, not even Si Ming had urged him.

Starting with the first headline of the Morning Star Times, he flipped through the Sunset Express, the Dome Times, and the Tower City Family Weekly.
This even includes those small, peripheral publications that used to only print hymns and recipes for festive cakes, such as "Digest of the Life of Parish Women".

He read every single one, every article, every editorial, and every anonymous comment in the sidebar.

“They’re all spinning,” he murmured, as if talking to himself, or perhaps addressing the entire room.

Ash fell and landed on the back of his fingers, but he seemed completely unaware.

His gaze was no longer focused on the paper, but rather seemed to see through the ink to the deeper intentions behind the pages.

All the reports revolve around one central theme, pulled and rotated by an invisible tide—

The corpse.

The girl who died.

However, what's strange is—

No one called out her name.

Rex put down the last newspaper as lightly as if he were closing a page of an epitaph.

He lit a second cigarette, the match hissing as it struck, leaving a spark in the dim light. He suddenly felt disoriented.

Those stacks of printed materials no longer resembled paper.

They are like pages of predetermined fate annotations, cold, dry, rational, and cruel.

The city has taken care of her.

That was handled...perfectly.

She became a topic of discussion and news material.

She is a case study on "whether mysterious violence is controllable" and a debate example on "whether vampires should enjoy civil rights".

No one asked her birthday.

No one mentioned whether her mother was still crying at home.
No one remembers whether her brother still has the courage to leave the house today.

Her silhouette was written between pages of manuscript paper, compressed into two columns and five paragraphs with a ninety-word introduction, extremely calm, yet not a single word of condolence was left.

Rex sat up straight and stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray very slowly.

He took out his Destiny Card from his pocket.

An old, worn-out, yet still intact Destiny-themed card—numbered No. 772—is named "The Eye of the Siren."

Official records state: Fate Perception Cards can detect potential threats and future ripples.

But Rex knew it was far more complicated than it appeared.

It's not a prediction, it's an echo.

Before death arrives, it casts a warning light on the surface of fate.

He closed his eyes and slowly placed the card over his left eye.

At that moment, an almost inaudible whisper, like a cold wind seeping through a crack, blew into the depths of his consciousness.

scream.

whimper.

The sound of tearing fabric.

The mother's cries.

And a blurry life pattern, like some kind of small dome design, quietly appeared in his field of vision.

In its center is a blood core that does not belong to any human body structure; it is bright red and faintly glowing.

Rex murmured, as if speaking to the card, or perhaps to a soul that had never left:
"Her family... is still alive."

He looked up and gazed out the window.

The roar of the printing press came from afar, heavy and rhythmic.

Sheets of paper are being pushed off the conveyor belt, forming yet another round of "world commentary" today.

The door creaked open, and Si Ming walked in.

Rex didn't get up; he just held a cigarette in his mouth and asked in a drowsy yet sarcastic tone:

"Which move of the 'Thousand Faces' did you use today?"

Si Ming glanced at him and replied calmly:

"'A true lie'."

"What's being lied about is the direction of public opinion."

Rex chuckled softly, smoke escaping from the corner of his mouth, billowing like a tide in the dim light.

"you win."

He paused, then his gaze suddenly darkened:
"But have we forgotten... that nobody cares about that girl?"

Si Ming remained silent, his expression unchanging.

Rex stared at him, a bitter smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, but without any hint of sarcasm:

"You know what? The people in this town aren't arguing about who the murderer is—"

"What they are arguing about is whether she deserves to be remembered."

He slowly stood up, brushed the cigarette ash off his trousers, and spoke in a light tone that sounded resolute:
"I'm planning to go out and check on her house."

Si Ming nodded, his voice extremely soft:
"Go."

Rex said no more. He turned and left, his back view unremarkable—just a tired man who had smoked two cigarettes, wearing an old coat, stepping into the night.

But in his palm, the Destiny Card shimmered with a faint blue light.

It is telling him—

The night is not over yet.

The danger has not yet subsided.

And the girl's story—

Not yet, not finished writing.

"When they argued about who told the truth..."
Someone quietly planted a new lie—

That girl's name was never spoken aloud.

—Morning Star Times, Page 7, Unsigned Poetry Review

(End of this chapter)