Chapter 237: Lilian's Doubts
Chapter 237: Lilian’s Doubts
Lilian Ackermann was a complicated and self-contradicting woman, and this trait could be traced to the family she came from.
Most children viewed their family to be a steadfast shelter they could fall back on whenever they encountered a storm, but to Lilian, who was born in the Ackermann Imperial Family, it was the source of her misery instead.
The current circumstances surrounding the Austine Empire were no secret to the world.
It had been more than a decade since Lilian’s two older brothers graduated from the Saint Freya Academy, but they still hadn’t made a breakthrough in their Origin Level yet, resulting in an unnerving tension enveloping the empire. With no clear successor in sight, the internal strife for power continued to persist. In fact, the conflict only grew rifer with time, especially in recent years as Lilian came of age.
‘Kinship exists not in the imperial family’, such a phrase couldn’t be more apt to describe Austine’s imperial family. Despicable schemes and vile traps, these were the gifts that Lilian often received from her older brothers. As for her parents, she knew deep well that she was nothing more than a tool in their eyes. One saw her as a tool for succession and the other saw her as a tool to sustain glory. The only reason why she hadn’t been swapped out yet was because she was currently the best one amongst them.
Even from a young age, Lilian had already been exposed to the ugliness of humans, and it had been a long time since she had already given up on the poor excuse of a family she had. Yet, this was the very root of her contradiction too.
The more one was deprived of something, the more one would covet it. Ironically, the one thing that Lilian Ackermann wanted the most was a real family.
A deep, lasting, inseverable bond between those who cared and loved one another; this was what Lilian viewed a real family to be like. All this while, this had been a pipe dream for her, something that would never be within her reach, but on this very day, an opportunity chanced before her.
It was just that it wasn’t a family member in terms of blood ties but bloodline.
Blood ties and bloodline—these were two different concepts on the Sia Continent. Blood tie was something determined at birth by the virtue of one’s parents whereas bloodline was a quality one had to awaken to. These were concepts that looked similar at first glance but had vastly different meanings.
Take Roel Ascart for example, the kin who was closest to him in terms of blood ties as his father, Carter, but his bloodline kin would be the previous members of the Ascart House who had awakened to the Ascart Bloodline, namely Ro Ascart and Winstor Ascart.
Born eight hundred years away from one another, even though Roel and Winstor both came from the same Ascart House, the generations between them meant that they were likely to be complete strangers in terms of blood ties by now. Nevertheless, if the two of them were to meet, it was likely that Winstor would accept Roel. That was because their bloodline had originated from the same source, and this was an objective fact.
The mysterious connection between bloodline possessors was viewed to be a superior, noble bond that belonged solely to transcendents. Usually, it would only happen within transcendent families that had their unique Origin Attribute, but on some extremely rare occasions, it was also possible for two strangers to find one another on the basis of their bloodlines, and this phenomenon was known as ‘Bloodline Resonance’.
The resonance Lilian had just experienced meant that there was a very high chance that there was a bloodline kin of hers in the academy.
She clutched her chest tightly, trying to calm her furiously beating heart.
The Kingdom Origin Attribute was something in the exclusive possession of the Ackermanns, but it wasn’t a unique bloodline. To put it more clearly, it was an Origin Attribute that most transcendents could adopt, just that it had been monopolized by Austine’s imperial family ever since ancient time, and it just so happened that the Ackermanns had a high level of compatibility with the Kingdom Origin Attribute.
Due to that, bloodline possessors in the Ackermanns didn’t resonate with one another even if they were all using the same Kingdom Origin Attribute. In fact, the reason why Lilian was much powerful than her counterparts was because the bloodline she had awakened to was far stronger than the others, allowing her to surpass her peers.
In truth, Lilian had always felt that her bloodline had its own unique Bloodline Origin Attribute, but as a core member of Austine’s imperial family, she had no choice but to accept the Kingdom Origin Attribute. Otherwise, it would become a weakness that her political enemies would use against her.
Besides, from a more pragmatic point of view, the Kingdom Origin Attribute was indeed one of the stronger Origin Attributes of the Sia Continent. Even if her Bloodline Origin Attribute was more compatible with her, it wouldn’t necessarily be more powerful than the Kingdom Origin Attribute. In fact, there were members of the Ackermanns Imperial Family who had opted for their Bloodline Origin Attribute over the course of its long history, but the results were often lackluster.
Lilian’s bloodline and Origin Attribute weren’t fully compatible with one another, which meant that there were two possibilities with the resonance.
“Judging from the fact that the feeling of resonance came from the academy gates, it should be safe to presume that the individual is a freshman… If it’s a resonance of Origin Attribute, it should be Paul Ackermann,” murmured Lilian to herself with a frown.
In terms of blood ties, Paul Ackermann was indeed her younger brother, and the fact that he had also adopted the Kingdom Origin Attribute meant that he was the most likely one to have resonated with her. It was just that she thought that Paul’s identity was a little sensitive.
For someone who had been brought up as a noble from birth, the label of ‘illegitimate son’ was a huge aversion factor. She viewed Paul Ackermann as a scandal of the Austine Empire, and frankly speaking, she wouldn’t want to have anything to do with him wherever possible. If the person she had resonated with was him, she would probably be put in a spot.
Of course, there was another possibility where it wasn’t a resonance of Origin Attribute but bloodline instead. However, the extremely slim possibility of it happening made the gleam in Lilian’s eyes fade.
In the first place, bloodline possessors were incredibly rare in the world, and the possibility of someone possessing the same transcendent bloodline as her being born in the same era, entering the same academy, and coincidentally producing a resonance effect was so implausible that she dared not even think about it.
“How could there be something as convenient as that in the world…”
Having finally calmed down from her initial excitement, the black-haired woman sighed softly at her impractical hopes. She slowly walked to the side of the table and her face turned solemn.
There was an exquisite envelope placed on the center of the table, stamped with the ‘Twin Eagle’ insignia of Austine’s imperial family. However, what was different from normal was that this letter wasn’t written by a scribe but Austine’s emperor, Lukas Ackermann, himself.
There was a difference in the significance of the emperor tasking a representative to write a letter for him and doing it himself, and Lilian naturally understood it. So, she opened the letter and carefully read it word by word, only to find herself confused by its contents.
There were two main points in the letters.
First, he requested Lilian not to put Paul Ackermann in a spot in the academy. Lilian did expect such a request since Paul was currently bearing the ‘Ackermann’ family name now. It was the second point that caught Lilian off guard.
【Don’t get close to the Ascarts.】
This was the second main point that Lukas had relayed to her, and Lilian keenly sensed that this might have been the primary purpose as to why Lukas wrote a letter to her.
The Ascart House was a prominent noble house of the Saint Mesit Theocracy, so it was only natural for a princess of the Austine Empire like her to be aware of its existence. However, she couldn’t understand why the emperor would personally write a letter to request such a thing of her.
Unable to make sense out of it, she picked up the student particulars document by the side and flipped through it.
“Roel Ascart…”
Looking at the name on the document, Lilian fell into deep thoughts.