The Fourth Secret: A Fantasy LitRPG Adventure (Divine Apostasy Book 4) A. Kay (best management books of all time .TXT) 📖

“My dad told me about these,” Colyn said, a huge smile on his face. “But I never believed him, or thought I’d see one.”

“Or actually be in one,” Clarysa added.

“Your dad saw a Star Tortoise?” Ruwen asked. He had thought Sift’s Star Tortoise was extremely rare, and Ruwen’s parents never spoke of their parents. He had never met his grandparents.

Colyn’s smile disappeared. “In a previous life.”

The words reminded Ruwen how many secrets his parents kept, and coupled with the shock of them killing their group, turned his sadness and confusion into anger. “I can’t believe you killed those people. It’s like I don’t know either of you anymore.”

“We haven’t changed,” Colyn said. “We just never told you everything.” Without warning, Colyn punched at Ruwen’s chest.

Ruwen swiped the punch away with a Bamboo Step but stopped himself from flipping his dad.

“And just as I suspected,” Colyn said. “You have secrets of your own.”

“Not secrets,” Ruwen said. “I just haven’t had a chance to explain yet. A lot has happened since my Ascension.”

“After your Ascension,” Clarysa said. “That was when we planned to start explaining.”

“Explaining what?” Ruwen asked.

Clarysa locked gazes with Colyn and then sighed. She turned to Ruwen and sat down. So Ruwen and his dad did as well. She stared at the ceiling for a few seconds and then looked at Ruwen. “We were born here over ten thousand years ago, and you should have been too.”

Ruwen leaned back. “What?”

Clarysa bit her lip. “We lived in the northern mountains. I was ambushed by a band of Gravelings, and they killed me. I revived in the Deepwell temple and returned home. Eiru, or everyone calls her Uru now, visited your father and me. Among other things, she told me I was pregnant with you. She must have discovered it during the revival process.”

Colyn put his arm around Clarysa.

Clarysa swallowed hard and then continued. “Uru told us you were special and had the potential to fix a grand injustice. She said you’d never live to see your first birthday, though.”

Clarysa paused and Colyn spoke. “Uru told us the only way you’d survive was if your mom remained in the revival queue until Uru figured out a way to protect you.”

Both Ruwen’s parents grew quiet, their eyes distant.

“And it took her longer than you thought,” Ruwen said.

Tears fell down Clarysa’s cheeks. “My mom never got to hold you.”

“You two gave up your families for me?” Ruwen asked, guilt violently twisting his stomach.

Clarysa reached over and grabbed Ruwen’s hand. “Not a sliver of this is your fault. Even if I’d known how long it would take, I would do it again.”

Colyn grabbed Ruwen’s hand as well. “We would do it again, but it’s bigger than that. Uru convinced us you were critical to the future. Our sacrifice served a greater purpose.”

Ruwen desperately tried to keep the guilt at bay. Somehow failing to meet Uru’s, Blapy’s, and Pen’s, expectations for saving the Universe didn’t matter as much as the tears covering his mom’s cheeks. Failing now, meant his parents had given up their family and friends for nothing.

“You’d already given up everything,” Ruwen said, starting to understand. “So when she asked you to come with her to the Spirit Realm, how could you say no?”

“You know about that?” Clarysa asked.

Ruwen thought about Io and all the memories he’d shared with Rami in the Spirit Realm. “I’ve had a busy couple months.”

“Which brings us back to the original question,” Colyn said. “You wondered how we could kill, let’s be truthful, a group of awful people who likely planned on killing us when the delivery was complete. That aside, Uru told us the terium was crucial to our country’s survival. Without the precious metal we’d all die, and none of our sacrifices would matter.”

“Why doesn’t Uru just give us what we need?” Ruwen asked.

“I made the mistake of asking that question,” Clarysa whispered. “Uru said something called the Pact stopped her from acting directly. So instead, she allowed a group of greedy Priests to take bribes. Everything from revival priority, revival duration, and even Class assignments during Ascension were for sale. It makes me sad she allowed her people to suffer.”

The image of Slib and his parents, laughing and shaking hands with High Priest Fusil on Ruwen’s Ascension Day, flashed across his thoughts. That explained Slib’s Mage Class. Would Uru really allow such terrible behavior just to accumulate the terium she needed?

Colyn met Ruwen’s gaze, his face miserable. “We killed them out of necessity. I don’t expect you to understand or to forgive us.”

Clarysa sat up straight. The tears had stopped, but her eyes remained misty. “It breaks our hearts that you know what we did. That it validated your worst fears about us. But know that we would do it again. Our future required it.”

Ruwen remained quiet. His parents, more than anyone, knew how he liked to think things through, and they kept silent, letting him process their words.

At what point did a person’s actions outweigh the good of their goal?

The magnitude of Uru’s manipulation astounded Ruwen. To some extent, these Priest bribes made Uru responsible for the Class inequity that Big D had opened Ruwen’s eyes to. Hundreds of years of terium payoffs at the expense of fairness for her people, so that a shipment could be stolen and used to revive the army needed to protect her country.

But it was more complicated than that, because by the time Ruwen Ascended he was desperate to leave Deepwell and find his missing parents. Parents who Uru had manipulated into dying in the very place she needed Ruwen to take the Architect Role and restore her temple.

It made Ruwen feel dirty. How did Uru live with her choices when they hurt so many people? What else would she be willing to do in the pursuit of her goals? It terrified him.

Uru had told Ruwen he needed to restore balance to the Universe, and her