Chapter 1349: Indirect Salvation (Part 2)

Soon, three witnesses were brought up by the court guards.

They were none other than the three colleagues who had gone with Vivian to capture Laina during the mission.

Vivian looked up and, upon seeing that all three were avoiding her gaze, already knew the answer.

Cowells asked in a deep voice: "Witnesses, when you met with Laina, did you feel that your personal safety was threatened?"

"We did not." The three shook their heads in unison.

"Then what was the specific situation at the time?"

One of the younger law enforcement officers among the three answered: "At the time, we received orders to investigate Laina. Whether it was asking him to open the door or entering the house, Laina was very cooperative."

"But Vivian hadn't said two sentences before she suddenly drew her gun and fired. We didn't even have time to speak before she had emptied the magazine, and she claimed that Laina attempted to draw a gun to attack her, which is why she acted."

"However, from our perspective, Laina had no suspicious behavior at all throughout the process; he was as cooperative as could be."

"Vivian said this Laina was a serial killer. Was that the case?"

The young officer shook his head: "I don't know. I was just following orders to make an arrest."

"Regarding the issue of Laina, I have evidence to provide here." The plaintiff's lawyer handed a document to Cowells. "Up to now, law enforcement has no evidence to prove that Laina was related to those murder cases."

"To prove this point, we even invited the families of those victims."

"Bring in the witnesses." Cowells called out again.

Vivian had seen the victims' families brought in to testify.

After Laina was previously declared innocent, Vivian had seen them cry their hearts out, wailing that no one could uphold justice for them.

But now, these people were denying it.

They said that the deaths of their loved ones had nothing to do with Laina, and that Laina just happened to be passing by the crime scene and was implicated.

They felt very sorry for Laina's misfortune.

It was precisely because there were too many law enforcement officers like Vivian that the murderer who killed their loved ones had not yet been brought to justice.

After the witnesses finished their statements, the plaintiff's lawyer struck while the iron was hot: "At this point, I believe the case is already very clear."

"Vivian, an illegitimate daughter who lacked fatherly love from childhood, must have had a childhood filled with bullying and oppression, and her personality would be more twisted and cruel than the average person."

"After becoming an intern law enforcement officer, this twistedness hidden deep in her heart finally had a place to vent, because she could legally kill people, and Laina was just one of the victims."

"Before this, she had already killed at least two commoners using the same excuse. For every life, I have sufficient evidence to prove Vivian's baseness and brutality."

"She has been emphasizing that Laina was a serial killer, but in fact, she herself is the true serial killer!"

Once these words were spoken, the public jury was in an uproar—shock, sneers, curses, and sighs.

Vivian's lawyer was covered in sweat, his expression bitter.

Prince Edward's face was gloomy, his arms crossed tightly.

As for Crown Prince Raymond's side, they had a triumphant and smug look.

Only Vivian, from beginning to end, appeared exceptionally calm, as if she had long guessed it would end this way.

If the scene were frozen at this moment, it would become an incredibly classic courtroom painting.

However, there were no mages proficient in space-time magic here.

And when Vivian heard the witness mention the word "father," she immediately recalled some past events from years ago.

The fact that she was the illegitimate daughter of a big shot was no secret in the Imperial Capital.

In fact, on the day she entered the academy, she had met her half-sister, though that sister did not know of her existence.

Vivian had later told Luo Quan and the others about this, in a tone like telling a joke.

She was the illegitimate daughter of a Duke, but she had never received any special treatment since childhood.

However, it was definitely not a miserable childhood as the plaintiff's lawyer had described.

On the contrary, Vivian felt her childhood was very happy.

Vivian's mother, Yalina, was a very beautiful woman who had traveled the continent for many years as a bard.

Later, Yalina met Vivian's father, Lude Shufanke, during her travels.

At that time, Lude Shufanke was not yet a Duke, but only the second son of the previous Duke.

The two traveled together and quickly fell in love.

In a village in the south of the Turinhan Empire, the two spent three sweet years together.

However, this sweet time ended with Vivian's birth.

On the night Yalina went into labor, Lude Shufanke disappeared.

In fact, for the past three years, Lude Shufanke would disappear for a few days every so often.

Although Yalina didn't know where her lover went, she didn't ask much, assuming her husband had gone into the mountains to hunt.

But after he left this time, he never returned, leaving behind only a letter and a sum of money.

The letter explained the whole story: Lude Shufanke was the son of a Duke. His meeting and falling in love with Yalina was unknown to his father, and even if he had known, he certainly wouldn't have agreed.

These three years of being together were just a dream. Now that Vivian was born, the dream should end.

During this period, he had left several times, actually to meet his true wife.

That was the daughter of a Prince, and this Prince had vast free territories in the western border of the Empire and held heavy military power.

Lude Shufanke had won the favor of the Prince's daughter, and by relying on the Prince's connections, he squeezed out his older brother and became the first heir to the Dukedom.

All of this happened after he met Yalina.

Choosing beauty over the country only appears in fairy tales; abandoning one's wife and children for wealth and status is the portrayal of most people.

Lude Shufanke confessed everything to his wife, and this daughter of the Prince also had great capacity, giving him two years to handle everything.

As for the result of the handling, it was running away overnight on the night Vivian was born.

Vivian didn't know how much her mother cried after learning the truth, or perhaps she hadn't cried at all.

In her memory, her mother was a strong and hardworking woman.

Although she held a large sum of money left by the heartless man, she had never spent it recklessly, living a frugal life every day.

Vivian had once asked her mother why she didn't buy herself some beautiful clothes.

Her mother was very serious, saying this was for her future schooling and even marriage, and she couldn't spend it lavishly.

Vivian, who had always been strong and rarely cried, burst into tears upon hearing this.

Her mother's meticulous care gave Vivian a happy and fulfilling childhood; she had never felt the lack of family affection for a moment.

However, this happiness came to an abrupt end when she was seventeen.

She remembered that she had just awakened her magic power, and it happened to be her birthday.

With double happiness, her mother planned to go out to do some shopping and come back to cook her a sumptuous birthday dinner.

But not long after her mother went out, Vivian heard her cry for help.

Vivian rushed out the door and found a group of people in black robes holding her mother hostage.

She immediately engaged in a fierce battle with them.

Giving it her all, she fought three against one, killing one person in black robes and seriously injuring two.

But the number of people in black robes was far more than three, and she was already exhausted.

Just as Vivian fell into despair, Lude Shufanke appeared.

It turned out that these people in black robes were all his subordinates. Although he had lived far away in the Imperial Capital all these years, he had always been paying attention to the mother and child.

Not long ago, Vivian awakened her magic power and was praised by the magic tutor of the Magic Association as a genius rarely seen in decades.

This news did not escape Lude Shufanke's ears. To test how outstanding Vivian's talent was, he brought his subordinates to stage this scene.

The result of the test far exceeded Lude Shufanke's imagination. The potential Vivian displayed was the best he had ever seen in his life; even her younger sister, who had received guidance from famous teachers since childhood, only barely reached half of Vivian's performance under the same conditions.

Especially Vivian's composure, like an ancient well, was something her sister completely lacked.

This was a natural-born powerhouse!

Lude Shufanke thought to himself.

"As expected of my daughter." Lude Shufanke looked down at Vivian and said the first sentence after the father and daughter met.

At that time, Vivian was lying at Lude Shufanke's feet like a drowning cat.

If she hadn't been truly exhausted, she would have really wanted to raise her arm and give this bastard a hard punch.

After the test ended, Lude Shufanke took her mother away.

He said he wanted to provide her mother with a safer and more comfortable environment, but in reality, he just wanted to use her as a bargaining chip to force her to be used by him.

Unfortunately, her mother believed the lies of this villain, truly thinking he was preparing a bright future for Vivian, so she willingly allowed herself to be taken away by Lude Shufanke's subordinates.

Since then, Vivian had never seen her mother in person again, only seeing some magic images her mother had recorded herself from Lude Shufanke.

Her mother's complexion in the images was quite good; perhaps it was because she didn't have to work as hard as before, and the whole person had become much more spirited.

From beginning to end, she was sharing her daily life after moving into the new home with Vivian, and the smile on her face was as gentle as ever.

It looked like her mother was living well in this place she didn't know, if not for the chain on the ground.

She clearly saw a pitch-black chain at the bottom of the mirror behind her mother.

Although she didn't know where the chain was ultimately shackled, it made Vivian understand that the happiness her mother displayed might all be an illusion.

From this moment on, Vivian buried a seed named revenge in her heart.

She swore that one day in the future, she would definitely rescue her mother and then cut Lude Shufanke into a thousand pieces.

For this father she had never met, Vivian had no feelings in her heart; the only feeling was hatred, bone-deep hatred.

It was just that she didn't have the ability to flip the table yet. Lude Shufanke, as a Duke of the Turinhan Empire, had unfathomable strength himself and had many experts under his command; it wasn't something she could handle by fighting alone.

So she followed Lude Shufanke's arrangements and came to Turandot Academy to study magic.

Her cheap father wanted her to be used by him after she grew up.

Vivian certainly wouldn't refuse this opportunity that could make her stronger faster, so she was very cooperative from beginning to end and studied very hard.

It was precisely because off-campus internships could earn more points to exchange for more powerful magic secret books that Vivian joined the law enforcement team.

And with her sense of justice, she had indeed executed two local bullies who bullied the market before meeting Laina.

Some people in the law enforcement team felt that her methods were too extreme and she shouldn't execute criminals at will.

But Vivian didn't think so. If she didn't execute those two bastards who forced good women into prostitution, should she keep them for the New Year?

So Vivian had no guilt about killing those two bullies, and if she encountered the same thing in the future, she would make the same choice without hesitation, just like she killed Laina this time.

Between procedural justice and substantive justice, Vivian was the side that valued the result more. After all, no matter how procedural justice is, what's the use if it can't punish the criminal?

"Dong dong dong!"

The sound of the Chief Justice striking the wooden gavel woke Vivian from her memories.

After Cowells finished striking, he shouted loudly at the jurors: "Silence!"

The noisy courtroom, like a vegetable market, instantly quieted down.

"Duke Lude Shufanke, regarding the accusations of the plaintiff's lawyer, as Vivian's father, do you have anything to say?"

Cowells passed the word to the Duke, who was also present in court as a juror.

This Duke was only in his early forties, but he looked as if he were already at death's door, wrapped in a thick blanket, as if a breeze could make him tremble with cold.

Perhaps he was already terminally ill. Vivian looked at her father's appearance, feeling very happy in her heart.

Supported by a servant, Lude Shufanke stood up and answered in a low voice: "My daughter did indeed live with her mother since childhood, but that doesn't mean she had a dark and miserable childhood."

"As far as I know, Vivian grew up healthy and cheerful under her mother's care. Whether in the village school or the Turinhan Academy in the Imperial Capital, she was also a good student who excelled in both character and learning."

"She is my most outstanding daughter. I am proud of her, and I firmly believe she is innocent. Someone must have covered up the truth."

"Please mind your wording, Duke Lude Shufanke." The plaintiff's lawyer immediately retorted, "According to you, are we the ones fabricating evidence?"

Lude Shufanke pushed up the glasses that had slid to the tip of his nose and said slowly: "There's no need to be in such a hurry to take it personally. I am just questioning as a father after seeing my daughter being wronged."

The plaintiff's lawyer sneered: "I think you are pointing at the mulberry to curse the locust."

"That's enough." Cowells stopped the two from arguing, then cast a sharp gaze at the silent Vivian: "Defendant, now that the witnesses and physical evidence are all before your eyes, do you have anything else to say?"

"Where should I start?" Vivian raised her head, her voice low, as if asking herself. ===== CHAPTER 1350 =====