As for the so‑called basic conditions, the Black Earl had actually already mentioned them... it was foundations.
Talent, foundations, opportunity—these are all basic conditions. Maybe Dox has opportunity and talent, but when it comes to foundations, that he really lacks.
Right now, Dox is basically a guy so poor he can only treat ’freedom’ as dogma. In the Black Earl’s eyes, people like this, don’t even talk about truth, whether they can even advance into True Knowledge is still up in the air.
...
Angel had just witnessed what it truly meant to be a destroyer of atmosphere.
At first Angel thought Dox already counted as someone who derails the mood; the full, emotional atmosphere could be pulled off course by him whenever he opened his mouth. But Angel also understood why Dox was acting like this—he regretted getting too sentimental earlier, then discovered Vay hadn’t died at all, and now he couldn’t hold it together, with a bit of tsundere flavor mixed in.
Only later did he realize that Dox was merely derailing things; the real atmosphere destroyer was still the Black Earl.
The Black Earl directly shattered what had been a pretty decent mood, letting an awkward air spread and spread over the scene.
If they weren’t "best friends," Dox and Vay’s bond of friendship would probably have snapped right then and there.
Angel sighed inwardly and took the initiative to break the silence: "Things of the future can wait until the future to talk about."
When he finished speaking, Angel turned his head to look at Vay. "You just said your talent can be restored?"
Vay glanced at the Black Earl first, then nodded slightly and replied in a low voice, "Yeah... sort of."
"Sort of"? That was clearly a vague answer. In this kind of context, vagueness was almost equivalent to denial.
If Vay’s talent hadn’t actually been restored, then where did the talent he’d just used come from? For this question, he didn’t even need to think to know—there was only one possible answer: the talent must have come from the Black Earl’s nose.
In other words, Vay sacrificed his Death Sense talent, but the Black Earl grafted his own talent onto Vay.
However, from Vay’s ambiguous wording, although he could use this talent, it was not his own.
So did the Black Earl do all this purely as a pointless, redundant move?
No, the Black Earl would never do useless work; if he did this, there had to be another purpose behind it.
Combining this with what Vay had mentioned earlier—that his older sister Aila had the same situation—does that mean the reason the Black Earl sent his avatars to his descendants was actually to graft his own talent onto his descendants?
Angel felt this possibility was very high, but as for why the Black Earl wanted to do this, that he didn’t know. Relying on speculation alone, it was very hard to infer the answer.
"Since it can be restored, and the duel has been won, then it’s a happy ending for everyone." Angel said, "The other matters can temporarily be set aside. What we should focus on right now is the trial ’She’ is going to present next..."
He paused for a moment, his gaze sliding to the side. "And them."
Everyone followed Angel’s line of sight, and saw that on the other side of the arena, Grey Merchant and the others were walking toward them.
Clearly, Grey Merchant and his group still had things they wanted to say.
Only, they had just gotten halfway over when a resounding voice rang in everyone’s ears: "The duel is over. You are about to return."
The speaker was the Wise Sovereign.
Though he said "about to" return, he didn’t give them any time to react at all. He landed directly on the arena, placing both hands on its surface.
In an instant, the arena was like a disk being twisted, rapidly spinning counterclockwise as it shrank.
As the arena shrank, everyone seemed to be "shrinking" along with it.
But this shrinking wasn’t biological; it was a spatial relocation, distancing them on the level of space from the current Void. If you used this patch of Void as a reference, then yes, they were shrinking; but if you used the Material Realm as reference, they actually hadn’t changed at all.
The only thing that had changed was the outside world.
After a moment of darkness and a bout of weightlessness, they opened their eyes again. They had already left that Void swarming with Magical Creatures and returned to the Door in front of the Hanging Jail Stairway.
Once everyone had found their footing, the Wise Sovereign’s voice came again: "Those unrelated may leave now."
The so‑called "unrelated" referred to the losers of this duel: Grey Merchant and his group.
Grey Merchant said, "Honorable Judge, could you grant us a little more time? I would like to speak further with Wizard Earl Mi over there."
The Wise Sovereign did not answer, merely closing his eyes, which counted as tacit permission.
Seeing this, Grey Merchant gave the Wise Sovereign a small bow, then quickly headed in Angel and the others’ direction.
Grey Merchant had just approached, and before he could even open his mouth, he heard a cold snort.
The one who snorted was Dox. He wasn’t in a good mood as it was; seeing Grey Merchant and the others come over just made his mood worse.
Grey Merchant glanced at Dox, then at the others. Almost everyone’s attitude toward them had done a one‑hundred‑eighty‑degree turn.
Even Wizard Earl Mi, who had seemed the most mild‑mannered before, now looked at them with clear alienation in his eyes.
The reason really didn’t need to be spelled out. As for that shrew handing the Ancient Gaze to the Magic Elephant, they couldn’t be bothered to guess what her intent had been. All they needed to know was this: if Vay hadn’t sacrificed his talent to save his life, he would definitely already be dead.
Even if there had been no intent to kill, the killing tool itself possessed such enormous, uncontrollable power—at that point, did intent still matter?
Let alone... was there really no intent to kill?
Angel, for one, didn’t believe that.
Angel had also given Kaier some Out of Discussion methods. But one of those was purely for saving his life, with no offensive capability at all; the other, Speedy, was very powerful, yet its abilities were controllable. Unlike the Ancient Gaze, a one‑off consumption, its power overwhelming—once unleashed, it was no longer under anyone’s control.
The only reason they were still holding themselves back now was purely out of regard for the fact that Grey Merchant had made a move to save someone earlier.