Supreme Warlock System : From Zero to Ultimate With My Wives
Chapter 452 - 452: Not Stupid

Warlock Ch 452. Not Stupid

"You?" a councilwoman said. "You're not even sanctioned anymore."

"I'm more than sanctioned," Aria replied. "I'm alive because of him. I've seen what he carries. And I'm still here."

"Not swayed. Not corrupted."

"And not stupid."

Another pause.

"You all saw what happened," she continued. "You watched the rune recordings. You heard Ralvek's confession. You know who pulled the strings. And yet you're still trying to make Damian the villain of this story."

She shook her head.

"I was one of you. I believed in the Tribunal. In the Order. But now… all I see are scared old men trying to hold on to a version of power that's already broken."

The judge with the glowing eyes—the Head, clearly—spoke at last.

"Then what do you suggest we do?"

Everyone turned to Damian.

He met the judge's stare, not blinking.

"Clear my name," he said. "Publicly. Officially. No 'ifs,' no 'pending trials,' no conditions."

"You want a pardon?"

"I want the truth," Damian corrected. "Declared. Not negotiated."

"And after that?" another judge asked warily. "What then?"

A beat.

"I finish what I started."

"And the power you carry?"

"I don't serve it," Damian said. "It serves me."

Murmurs again. But this time, less panic. More... reluctant respect.

The kind that came when people started to see the writing on the wall.

The Head Judge's eyes narrowed.

"And if we refuse?"

That's when Lysandra finally moved.

She took a single step forward. The entire chamber shifted. Not from magic—but from instinct.

Everyone remembered, all at once, what stood behind that elegant armor.

A general. A dragon. An apex predator.

"We won't let you," she said simply.

The Fae King stepped up beside her. "Nor will we."

Victoria's crimson gaze swept the Tribunal like a torch across a battlefield. "Let me be blunt. If you dare label him an enemy again… I will consider that an act of war against the Vampiric Courts."

"And Haven City," Cassius added, cracking his knuckles.

The pressure was complete.

Surrounding.

Inevitable.

The Tribunal's head judge sat in silence for several long seconds.

Then, finally, he gave the faintest nod.

"We will deliberate."

"That's fine," Damian said, already turning.

"But remember—" He glanced back over his shoulder, voice low and steel-edged. "You already saw the truth."

And this time?

They had no one left to bury it.

The tribunal recessed in silence.

No gavel. No official announcement. Just that same eerie quiet as the judges stood—one by one—and disappeared through their enchanted veil, leaving behind an audience still too stunned to breathe properly.

No one said a word until the doors closed behind them.

Then—finally—a breath. A whisper. The first shift of a chair as someone dared to exhale.

Damian turned without waiting, cloak flicking behind him, Aria quietly matching his steps. The others followed. No orders. No cue. Just unity.

Once they left the chamber, they stopped in the circular antechamber—the same one where Kaelan, once upon a nightmare, had stood alone in chains.

This time… it was different.

No shackles.

No spit from the balconies.

Just glances. Heavy. Curious. Some bitter. Some awed.

But all silent.

"You know they're going to stall," Evelyn murmured, breaking the tension. "They can't say no to our faces, so they'll drag their feet until public pressure fades."

"They won't get the chance," Cassius said, rubbing the back of his neck. "We've already leaked the first set of runes to the outer networks. Those news feeds are burning right now."

Victoria smirked, just a little. "How scandalous."

But Damian wasn't smiling.

He was staring at the reflection in one of the rune-glass walls. Not his face. Not entirely. More like a shadow that hovered behind it. The faint pulse of the sealed mana core—buried deep in his soul—still beat like a sleeping god in his chest.

"They'll try to pivot," he muttered. "Offer me a conditional pardon. Ask me to hand over the core. Call it diplomatic."

"They're afraid of you," Aria said.

"They should be."

And he meant it.

Because Ralvek might have been the head of the rot—but the roots were still coiled beneath the floorboards of this city.

The loyalists.

The shadow-aligned senators.

The old blood mages who funded the ritual in Haven.

He hadn't missed the way some of them hadn't reacted at all during the confession. Like they already knew. Like they were just hoping no one would point too closely in their direction.

"They're not all gone," he said softly. "Ralvek might be ash, but his followers… they're still here. Watching. Hiding."

"We can't accuse anyone without solid evidence," the fae king said behind him. "Not with how carefully they covered their tracks."

"I'm not going to accuse," Damian replied.

Aria glanced sideways. "What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking they know they can't get to me directly," he said. "Not anymore. So they'll try to isolate someone else. Aria. You. Evelyn. Even Cedric."

"I'd love to see them try," Cassius muttered.

"They won't," Damian said.

Then, more quietly—

"Because I'll kill them first."

Victoria raised a brow. "Publicly?"

"No," Damian said. "That would give them power. Martyrs. Proof I'm the monster they warned about."

He turned toward the corridor, voice cold now. Measured.

"They want to play the long game. I'll play it deeper."

"And how, exactly," Aria asked slowly, "do you plan to do that?"

He didn't smile.

But something darker flickered behind his eyes.

"They think they can operate in the shadows," he said. "But I own the shadows now."

Lysandra tilted her head, intrigued. "Meaning?"

"Meaning," Damian said, lifting his hand, "[Observe]."

In a flash, his mana reached outward—his sight sharpening, overlaying magical trails over the walls, doors, and surrounding chambers.

Dozens of signatures.

Whispers of familiar energies.

A few had the stink of dark rituals still clinging to their robes.

Two were masked by wards, but not well enough.

One stood near the southern exit—pretending to browse a rune scroll while subtly scribbling notes on a cursed parchment. Another lingered in the gallery above, a tiny illusion distorting his appearance by only a few inches.

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