Chapter 562: A Debate

Chapter 562: A Debate

“I don’t know why you’re asking these questions, or what kind of twisted goal lies behind them,” Max said, his voice colder than frost. “But know this—if I have to sacrifice a million innocent people to save my family, I’ll do it. Without a hitch. Without hesitation. Every time.”

His tone never rose, but it held the weight of immovable conviction. “My family is everything to me. They are my past, my present, and my only future worth fighting for. And if protecting them means burning the whole world to ash, I’ll set the flames myself and walk through them.”

He stood then, not out of defiance, but as if his body could no longer contain the cold fury within him.

“Those so-called innocents you speak of?” Max continued, his gaze unflinching. “I don’t care about them. I don’t even know them. Their lives mean nothing to me—not when measured against the people I love.”

He stepped forward, shadows from the fire dancing against his frame like flickers of black judgment. “They can curse me. They can hate me. But in the end, they’re weak. They ended up in a situation where I had to kill them, and that’s not my fault. That’s the cruelty of the world. I won’t carry guilt for choices I never asked to make.”

“That won’t justify for you killing so many innocents, does it?” Ragnar asked.

“I’m no saint. I’m no hero. I never asked to be.” Max said, voice quieted, but it was like the edge of a blade drawn across skin. “I’m just a man who refuses to lose his family ever again. And therefore it doesn’t matter what do I need to keep them safe.”

The silence afterward was deafening. Only the faint crackling of the fire remained. Ragnar stared at Max for a long time, the weight of those words lingering in the room like smoke that refused to fade.

Ragnar stared at Max for a long moment, the weight of his answer settling into the small wooden hut like a fog.

Then, slowly, he stood up from the bed, the firelight glinting off his weathered features. “And that, Max, is how tyrants are born,” he said, voice low, not in anger but in something heavier—disappointment, maybe, or sorrow. “The moment you justify killing innocents for personal love, for personal desires, you become no different from those you claim to hate.”

Max’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t speak, letting the man continue.

“You say you’d sacrifice a million people for your family—do you think that makes you strong? That’s not strength. That’s obsession. That’s selfishness dressed as loyalty.”

Max scoffed, taking a slow step forward, “Spare me the idealism. I’ve seen what the world does to good people. Saints die early. Heroes rot on forgotten battlefields while the people they swore to protect keep killing each other. My strength is survival. It’s protecting what matters—what’s mine.”

Ragnar’s gaze hardened. “And what if everyone thought like you? What if every man deemed his grief justification, every woman deemed her pain permission? How long before the world collapses under the weight of a billion selfish ‘justifications’?”

Max’s expression flickered, but the fire in his voice didn’t waver. “Then the world should’ve built better rules. You think I want this? I didn’t choose to live in a world where people die screaming just because they were too weak to fight back. But I did choose not to be one of them.”

Ragnar stepped closer now, shadows dancing over his face. “You confuse love with possession. Family is not a shield for sin. There must be a line, Max. A point where you say—’This far, no further.'”

Max met his gaze without blinking. “And who decides that line? You? The heavens? The Gods? The Black Dragon Palace? No. If I don’t draw that line, someone else will. And they won’t draw it in my favor.”

Ragnar studied him silently, the fire casting both their faces in flickering amber. “You are terrifyingly honest,” he said at last. “And that might be your greatest strength… or the seed of your greatest downfall.”

Max didn’t flinch. “Then let it be. I’d rather fall for those I love than live for those I don’t.”

For a moment, the hut was silent again, the debate settled like an unseen weight between them, and Ragnar, with a heavy breath, slowly sat back down on the bed, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Maybe that’s your truth,” he muttered. “But I hope one day you see that strength isn’t just about holding on to the people you love… sometimes, it’s about letting go of what you shouldn’t destroy to keep them.”

Max didn’t reply—not because he had no words, but because he had already spoken everything he believed.

Ragnar’s eyes narrowed slightly, his face losing all signs of the casual calmness he carried before. He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, and looked Max dead in the eyes.

The cozy warmth of the hut around them seemed to vanish under the weight of the silence that followed Max’s question.

“This trial,” Ragnar finally said, his voice deep and steady, “is not about some debate on morality, and it’s definitely not about me trying to change your ideals.”

He paused, letting the weight of his next words settle in. “It’s about truth. About whether you can speak your truth without flinching. Whether you can live with it. Whether, when the blood is on your hands, you still call yourself righteous or look away and pretend it was necessary.”

He stood up, walking over to the crackling fire, his back to Max. “And I’ll be honest with you, Max. I don’t like your truth. I don’t like how easily you discarded the lives of the innocent. I’ve seen tyrants say those exact words—people who believed the world owed them something simply because they lost someone. People who became monsters in the name of love, vengeance, or justice. And all of them, every single one, believed they were doing the right thing.”

Ragnar turned around, eyes burning with a quiet fire. “You think your answer makes you strong. But to me? It makes you dangerous. Unpredictable. And dangerously close to becoming the very kind of man who burns the world just to light his own way.”

Then he exhaled, shoulders loosening just a little. “Still… you didn’t lie. And that’s what this trial is. You were true to yourself. That’s the first step. Whether I like your truth or not, the painting accepts it.”

He added with a distant look in his eyes, “There have been others, you know—others who managed to reach this floor, who walked through the same door you did. Geniuses, talents blessed by world, the kind that made waves wherever they went. But when they sat in that chair and I asked them the same question I asked you, their answers were different—too different.”

Ragnar sighed. “They hesitated. Their eyes darted around. They tried to measure their words. And worse, they lied. Lied to me, and more importantly, lied to themselves. Some tried to appear noble, said they would never harm an innocent no matter the cost. Others gave vague answers, talking about fate, justice, balance, and the greater good. But I saw through them. They didn’t believe what they said. They were simply afraid of what speaking the truth would reveal about them.”

Your gift is the motivation for my creation. Give me more motivation!