Mike asked, "How much of what the teacher just said is true?"
The old man answered without scolding or being surprised; he was used to Mike always asking these questions.
"Most of it is confirmed to be true; of course, it all happened years ago, so naturally, there may be some inaccuracies," the teacher said.
Mike nodded and said, "Teacher, I read a few books in the library about notes of people living in that era; what I read can't be squared with what you said."
The old teacher's look finally changed slightly; he said, "Come to my office after class; we will discuss it in detail."
Mike nodded and said nothing more.
Another student asked, "Teacher, what was the spell that Master Max used to control the zombie horde?"
The old teacher said, "The spell is widely available in the library's spell archives. The spell is obsolete; it was custom-made for that specific zombie disaster. It won't work on anything else. It's easy to find; just look through historical spell books in the northern section, and you will easily find it."
The student nodded and didn't ask more.
Another student asked, "Teacher, I thought that before Master Max, Demon-borns were discriminated against; how is it that they were all leaders of the ancient cities?"
The teacher sighed and said, "You didn't listen well to my previous lessons. The discrimination against Demon-borns was at its worst long before the birth of Master Max. By the time master max was born, people living in big cities knew that the only way to survive was to rely on magicians' power. Only small cities and villages discriminated against Demon-borns by this point in history. After the creation of the Great Wall, the small villages and cities began to integrate into the wider society and gradually put aside their previous prejudices. The heroic deeds of Master Max and other Demon-borns only helped accelerate the process."
"Teacher, has the number of big demonic cities increased since Master Max?" another student asked.
"As far as we know, there were 99 demon cities, 9 of which were considered major settlements at the same level or stronger than the Tower of Death. After the destruction of the tower, only 8 remained, but 200 years ago, another one appeared to the west of our northern wall," said the teacher.
Students began asking questions one after another; after ten minutes, the teacher moved on to the next topic and started to teach.
...
"Teacher?" Mike entered his teacher's office. In this school, each student and teacher had exclusive office rooms. In addition, they had servants, bedrooms, and even exclusive cooks under their command. They were allowed to eat and drink whatever they wanted, no matter how expensive; the only restrictions were alcohol and drugs.
Magicians were completely prohibited from drinking and using drugs because, once under the influence, the chance of them falling would increase; they may suddenly let their demonic side take the better side of them and cause a disaster. Some spells allowed them to drink wine without getting drunk, but again, who would want to drink wine and alcohol if it doesn't make one drunk? Without it, one may as well drink water; at least, water is not bitter.
Some spells have been developed that can suppress the demonic bloodline in the body temporarily, essentially making mages unable to cast spells temporarily; those spells can allow mages to also get drunk; but those are only effective if the demon blood concentration in the body is below 5%, and if the purity of the demon blood is not higher than 30%. In addition, those spells may leave some small side effects afterward, such as headaches and tiredness; in all, they are not all that popular.
As such, anyone born with a demonic bloodline just has to accept the fact that they may never be able to experience drunkenness.
"Mike! Have you read those notebooks? I never thought a child as talented as you would be interested in history books! You know, history is one of the least popular topics among Demon-borns. They are always interested in spell science, magical basics, and even sports. As far as history, they may be interested in some basic textbooks, but they would never go out of their way to read the sources!" The teacher was smiling as he looked at Mike.
"Teacher, I believe that to learn the truth behind a subject, one must take the trouble to look at the source; if one only reads others' interpretation of the source, one would only learn what others think about that subject and would inevitably be affected by the thoughts of the writer," said Mike.
The teacher raised his eyebrows and said, "How about reading a few books from different authors about the same subject? Not everyone has the time or resources to look through the source material by themselves; even those notes you read were all translated, so even those are not the 'original' source material."
"What you say is true but irrelevant to me; I have the resources and time and I will use my privilege. As for whether everyone has this privilege and access, that is not my business. As for translation bias, those are the best source materials available to me, so I would naturally choose them. I didn't say that those were perfect. What's more, I have you, a teacher, who can dispel my doubts, which is why I came here," said Mike.
"A curious mind and a truth seeker! You have a bright future, Mike. Let me be honest with you; the truth can upset many people. Do you still wish to hear it?" he asked.
"Teacher, there is no point in closing my eyes and pretending; I know the world is darker than it seems. Please tell me the whole truth and nothing but the truth!" said Mike.
"Then listen carefully! The story I told you was the widespread consensus of what happened at that time up until 70 years ago."
"Seventy years ago, a group of farmers unearthed a ruin and discovered a lot of notes. The ruin used to be a library of one of the cities that was destroyed during the disaster. After looking around, the investigators found other libraries from a few long-destroyed cities, such as North, West, East, and South Horn cities, all of which were wiped out during the zombie disaster."
"They took them all and translated them and discovered a lot about the exact order of how things happened during that time."
"The findings were deemed unsuitable for publishing, so they were sealed. Only those with Diamond clearance were able to see them."
"Just 10 years ago, Parliament passed a law that allowed the publishing of any historical notebooks, as long as the sensitive and inappropriate parts were removed, though they remained restricted to only the libraries of A-Grade and S-Grade mage schools."
"As a result, the relevant officials removed the inappropriate parts and printed them, then sent them to us."
"When I first read them, I was shocked; the notes told a very different story of what happened than we all thought."
"I applied for temporary diamond access, and as the teacher of an S-Grade school, they granted me access."
"I read the complete version and saw a dark story."
"However, even though it was a dark story, it only made me admire Master Max more than I did before; it didn't dent my affection for him."
"I will tell you the whole story, and you can judge for yourself."
"Master Max knew about the Big Dark Crystal before the demons; a few northern human mages who immigrated to the south told him about it."
"He secretly leaked the location to the Tower of Death; as he expected, the Tower of Death wanted to get the crystal however possible, so they sent demons to the north."
"After the northern mages saw the demons, they immediately requested reinforcement from all major human forces, including Master Max."
"Master Max immediately sent a few of his best mages to the north as helpers."
"The northern mages were always afraid about the day that the news leaked; therefore, they didn't hesitate to ask for help even from those they hated. When it comes to fighting demons, humans were united."
"You must realize that before the liberation war, Master Max was not really popular; northern mages hated the Southerners and would not have welcomed him into their territory if it wasn't an emergency."
"Among the northerners, Master Heaven Horn of Northern Horn City was very dangerous; he was friends with the few mages who immigrated south and informed Master Max about the pit. Master Max wanted to get rid of him, so he forced him to go to the area and retrieve the object. He did tell Master Heaven Horn about the method of retrieving big dark crystals but didn't expect him to actually succeed."
"Unexpectedly, Master Heaven Horn actually managed to retrieve the two dark crystals from under the noses of demons; it was a massive surprise."
"Still, demons tracked Master Heaven Horn; by the time they reached him, he was already inside the city."
"But the demons who came for the crystals were powerful; they launched an attack on the city and completely destroyed it; they killed Mage Heaven Horn and everyone else that was inside."
"Afterwards, Master Max's subordinates arrived, destroyed the demons, and obtained the two big dark crystals; the crystals were not destroyed during the battle."
"Master Max arrived and personally studied them, then made a plan."
"Let me tell you a few things I left out about big dark crystals."
"Dark crystals contain 100% pure bloodline of a demonic line; demons can use them and replace their bloodline with the one from the big dark crystal."
"Each big dark crystal contains the entire 100% of a demonic bloodline and all of their abilities; as you know, each bloodline has its own exclusive spells."
"The two crystals Master Max got were unimaginably lucky; one was called 'Zombie Apocalypse' bloodline, and the other was 'Necromancer' bloodline; those two were a pair made in hell."
"Master Max, who was a master of spell design, immediately went to work; he sacrificed the 'Necromancer' crystal to be able to create a one-time use spell crystal of 'Undead Dominance.'"
"'Undead Dominance' contained the entire 100% bloodline of the necromancer bloodline, and its reach and power were supercharged to an unimaginable level."
"After having the Undead Dominance spell crystal, Master Max destroyed the 'Zombie Apocalypse' big dark crystal and released the bloodline into the world."
"Big dark crystals are feared for a reason; they are like bombs; if the bloodline stored inside explodes, it would not just disperse; it would vent its might on the land."
"There are records of the 'Lavaland' big dark crystals exploding, turning a fifth of the world into hell."
"Some say the ancient ice age resulted from the explosion of the 'Coldness' bloodline."
"The zombie apocalypse bloodline appeared in the shape of a red fog and spread around, turning everything in its way into zombies. Master Max allowed it to spread while, at the same time, sending his subordinates to evacuate the northerners, both to dispel any suspicion of involvement completely and to save as many mages as possible; anyone he saved would owe their life to him and would be very loyal.
"Finally, after he became satisfied with the size and magnitude of the zombie army, he used the 'Undead Dominance' spell crystal and completely took control of all zombies.
"Master Max had experience with zombies before and knew how tough to kill they were; they were basically the perfect cannon fodder; with them, he could really destroy the Tower of Death.
"Things went even better than he imagined; he destroyed the Tower of Death with only a few casualties; the zombies were also all killed in the war, relieving him of the work of finding a way to get rid of them. After all, the Undead Dominance spell had a limit, and he couldn't have kept control of them all forever.
"This is the true story, making me admire Master Max even more. Sure, what he did was evil, but look at the result; he managed to destroy the Tower of Death, the demon hub that prevented us from uniting for hundreds of years. Look at the Great Wall around you, protecting you! Look at the happy, well-fed people around you! It all happened because he saw the greater good; he was a leader with the courage to make tough decisions."
"A lot of people, if they knew the true story, would hate him and condemn him, but the fact is that they can live in peace because of him; he was and is the greatest human ever lived, one who sees the big picture, one we need to lead us against demons." The teacher almost screamed as he talked in a frantic voice.