In the long river of ages, countless intelligent beings, in order to resist disease, aging, and at last death itself, threw themselves into the study of life like moths hurling themselves at a flame.
From the simple health-cultivation arts groped out at the very beginning, to the later frenzied craving for immortality so as to prolong an empire's rule.
This was precisely the greed for the unknown rooted deep in the genes of intelligent species, and their terror of extinction.
Life must inevitably come to an end.
——This was an iron law.
As one who had leapt outside the established rules, who by her own strength alone had forcibly torn open a corner of the gods' authority and created resurrection magic and the secret art of agelessness and immortality, Fels was precisely the guide the Holy Emperor most needed at present.
Therefore.
Haimer leaned against the stone pillar, watching the Holy Emperor, whose hands tightly clutched the hem of her skirt and whose eyes shone with thirty percent unease and seventy percent expectation, and in the end he too gave a gentle nod.
"If you want to go and learn, then go."
Haimer straightened up, his voice gentle.
He extended his right hand toward the Holy Emperor.
"As long as you wish it, I can take you to find her."
The Holy Emperor, however, stared at that hand suspended in midair and was stunned for a moment.
"Now?" "But… everyone's still training…"
The Holy Emperor turned her head somewhat hesitantly and glanced at the training ground in the distance.
"They've got Loki's people keeping an eye on them—nothing too disastrous will happen."
Haimer, for his part, couldn't have cared less.
"What's more, if you really are going to take her as your master, then I have to look her over personally first."
"After all, your personality's so soft."
"If I let you go alone, I wouldn't be at ease—worried someone might bully this flower I'm so fond of."
The moment these words came out.
The temperature on the Holy Emperor's face instantly shot up, flushing red from her fair neck all the way to the tips of her ears.
"Kami-sama… I'm not actually that easy to bully…"
The Holy Emperor mumbled in a small voice.
She bit her lower lip, her cheeks as red as a ripened apple.
Half in flustered gratitude, half unable to help herself, she raised her hand and gently placed her fair, delicate palm into Haimer's hand.
Haimer turned his hand and clasped it.
A man's body heat conducted across her palm—broad, dry, carrying a kind of security that made one believe in it unconditionally.
The Holy Emperor only felt her heart pounding, as if it would leap right out of her throat.
"Let's go."
Haimer led the Holy Emperor by the hand, walking straight toward the spectator stand, and greeted Loki and Finn, who stood beside her.
"Captain Finn, I'm taking the Holy Emperor out to handle a bit of private business. As for the rest, I'll have to trouble you all to keep a close watch."
"As long as you don't get them killed, just drill them half to death."
Haimer pointed at the figures in the training ground, a smile at the corner of his mouth.
"Huh?"
Hearing these words of Haimer's, Finn couldn't help breaking into a cold sweat. He had more or less seen it clearly now—Lord Haimer's method of cultivating a Familia was, quite simply, to toss people into magma to be tempered.
"Rest assured, Lord Haimer, we will."
Finn then nodded with a wry smile.
"Hey, hey! You're running off just like that?"
Seeing this, Loki, somewhat displeased, planted her hands on her hips and started hollering.
"Didn't we agree to watch them together? You're dumping these little monsters here with us—and if they tear my place apart, whose fault is that going to be?"
"Serves you right."
Hearing this, Haimer waved a hand without even turning his head, and led the Holy Emperor straight across the training ground.
As he passed by Amou Kirukiru and Tione, who were savagely pummeling each other, Amou Kirukiru merely spared a glance, let the blood at the corner of her mouth fling out, and flashed Haimer a toothy grin.
Then, with a single sweeping kick, she forced Tione back and threw herself once more into an even more frenzied slaughter.
She had already faintly touched the threshold of breaking through her body's current limits—as long as she kept grinding it out, before long she would tear open that barrier.
On the other side, the others too were constantly adjusting their breathing.
Through this brief stretch of high-pressure observation, they had gained an entirely new understanding of how to convert their newly acquired stats into real, lethal combat power.
...
Haimer and the Holy Emperor soon passed through the gates of the Twilight Manor.
The morning sunlight spilled over Northwest Avenue.
The shops on either side of the street had already opened for business; adventurers and peddlers came and went in an endless stream, the cries of hawkers and the rumble of carts and horses interweaving together, brimming with the vitality unique to this labyrinth city.
But this originally bustling street, in the very instant Haimer appeared leading the Holy Emperor by the hand, fell once again into an eerie silence.
The passersby came to a halt one after another.
As though they'd touched a branding iron, they swiftly looked away, then lowered their heads and, in perfect unison, retreated to either side of the street.
A wide passage was yielded open.
The Holy Emperor followed at Haimer's side.
Feeling the gazes around her, mingled with awe, fear, and curiosity, her body unconsciously leaned a little closer to Haimer, her eyes brushing now and then, ever so faintly, across his face.
"What are you thinking about?"
Haimer noticed something off about the Holy Emperor and slowed his pace.
"It's… it's nothing."
The Holy Emperor looked at Haimer's profile and couldn't help answering cautiously, in a soft voice.
"It's just that, Kami-sama, you seem like someone everyone has to handle with care."
"You mean that others are afraid of me?"
Haimer gave a soft chuckle.
"All fear stems from the unknown, and even what one sees with one's own eyes is not the truth. It's because they don't understand me that fear is born in them. Look at Loki—she's not so afraid of me." Haimer gave the Holy Emperor's palm a squeeze.
"There's no need to mind the looks others give you."
"In the Lower World, the human heart is like flowing water—as long as you have enough strength, their fear of you will turn into worship."
The Holy Emperor nodded thoughtfully, gripping Haimer's hand a few degrees tighter.
The two walked along the street at an unhurried pace.
Before long.
The Pantheon came into view.
The Adventurers' Guild hall was as busy as ever.
The moment Haimer stepped through the gate leading the Holy Emperor by the hand, the originally noisy, clamorous hall fell silent like a duck whose neck had been throttled—every sound vanishing clean away in an instant.
Misha was just then holding a stack of documents, and seeing Haimer walk over, she nearly let the papers in her hands tumble to the floor.
"L-Lord Haimer! Good morning!" Misha greeted him in a stammer, her eyes flicking now and then toward the Holy Emperor, as though dazed, drawn in by that noble, elegant air.
"Good morning, Miss Misha."
Haimer's tone was easygoing.
"Eina is in the VIP room right now handling files. Yesterday, because of the construction of your Familia's base, she was busy until the small hours, and today she came to work again without getting any proper rest."
Hearing Misha suddenly mention that Eina was still working overtime.
Haimer felt a bit helpless too. After all.
He hadn't originally had any intention of seeking out Eina.
But as it appeared now, Eina's sense of responsibility really was a touch too heavy.
"Thank you, I'll go find her."
Haimer led the Holy Emperor across the hall, past those adventurers who all let out a long breath of relief.
The VIP room was much quieter.
Haimer pushed the door open and walked straight in.
And there—
Inside the spacious VIP room.
Eina was buried in a mountain-like heap of documents, the quill in her hand scratching swiftly across the parchment.
Hearing the door open, she raised her head somewhat wearily, her emerald-green eyes still touched with a few threads of red.
"May I ask who—"
Before she could finish, she saw clearly who had come.
"L-Lord Haimer?!"
Eina hurriedly stood up, an unnatural flush rising over her in an instant.
Those teasing words Haimer had said to her here last time still surfaced in her mind now and then, to this day, even making her dream of them in her sleep.
At this moment.
Eina noticed the Holy Emperor standing at Haimer's side.
This was only the second time she'd seen this girl.
That day, when registering this batch of newcomers at the Guild front desk, with so many people and so much going on, what had left her the deepest impression of this girl called the Holy Emperor was the extraordinariness of her name and her bearing.
Now, seeing her again, Eina still couldn't help but sigh inwardly.
Even though she had seen many elves, before the Holy Emperor they all somehow seemed to lack a measure of that bone-deep, compassionate nobility.
"Lord Haimer."
Eina hastily straightened her somewhat disheveled collar and came around the desk.
"Chairman Royman has just gone over to the construction site to discuss the details of building the castle—he's not in the Guild."
Royman had personally gone to oversee the work.
Whatever that fellow's lifestyle was like, at the very least when it came to efficiency in handling affairs and reading the room, one really couldn't find a single fault.
Haimer too silently nodded.
Still—since Royman wasn't here.
Then his coming here this time to find Eina counted as good timing.
"Don't worry, Miss Eina. I haven't come to find Royman."
Haimer casually sat down on a soft single-seat sofa, his gaze turning toward Eina with a smile in it.
"It's just that Miss Misha said a certain workaholic has, once again, been slaving away here, working overtime without even sparing herself a moment's rest—so I came especially to take a look, and to say hello while I'm at it. Otherwise, if you wore yourself out, I'd feel quite heartbroken."
The moment these words came out.
Eina's pointed elven ears instantly turned crimson.
"L-Lord Haimer, please stop joking…"
Eina flustered, waving her hands, her gaze drifting about, not daring at all to meet Haimer's eyes.
Watching Eina get thrown into helpless fluster once again by just a casual remark, Haimer quit while he was ahead and didn't keep teasing her.
"Since that's the case, then I'll just have to get down to business with you, Miss Eina." "Miss Eina."
"Could you arrange for me a talk-room that's absolutely quiet, with no one to disturb us?"
"A talk-room?"
Though somewhat puzzled, from the standpoint of a professional advisor, Eina also knew that there were some things it wasn't her place to ask about.
"Of course, please follow me."
"There's a special reception room on the second floor with the best soundproofing."
With that in mind, Eina led Haimer and the Holy Emperor across the VIP room, came to the second floor, and opened a heavy black door.
The room had no windows; its illumination relied entirely on the Magic Stone lamps on the walls.
In the center stood a carved round table and several chairs, appearing exceedingly secluded.
"Lord Haimer, please rest here for a while with Miss Holy Emperor. I'll go brew tea for you and Miss Holy Emperor."
Eina finished her words considerately and withdrew.
As the door closed.
Only Haimer and the Holy Emperor were left in the room.
The Holy Emperor looked at this enclosed room and blinked somewhat uncomprehendingly.
"Kami-sama, weren't we going to find Lord Fels? Why are we waiting in this room?"
"Because this is the Guild."
Haimer stood in the room, looking all around, then cast a glance at the stone carving in the corner that seemed to serve as decoration.
"Since the one we're looking for is Ouranos's shadow, there's no need for us to go searching ourselves."
"As long as we're here, once Fels notices, she'll naturally come of her own accord."
The Holy Emperor nodded with only half-understanding, then quietly sat down to one side.
After a short while. There came a knock at the door.
Eina walked in carrying a tray, on which sat a pot of steaming black tea and two exquisite porcelain cups.
"The tea's ready, Lord Haimer. If there's anything else you need, call me anytime."
Eina set down the tray, bowed once more, and tactfully left the talk-room.
The aroma of the black tea slowly wafted through the enclosed room.
Less than half a minute after Eina left.
"Zzt, zzt..."
The air in the corner of the room suddenly underwent a strange distortion.
It was as if a transparent curtain were being drawn aside by an invisible hand.
A moment later.
A figure cloaked entirely in a broad black mantle, hands gloved in jet-black gloves engraved all over with patterns, appeared out of thin air in the shadows of the talk-room.
It was precisely the one they had come to find this time, the 「Sage」.
——Fels.
Fels was no fool.
After seeing, through surveillance methods, that Haimer had brought the Holy Emperor to the Guild and had not gone directly to find the Guild's great deity Ouranos.
Fels immediately guessed the purpose of Haimer's visit.
At the time, the Holy Emperor had tactfully declined on the grounds that everything was for the god she followed to decide.
And now this fell god had personally led people to a room on the Guild's second floor.
Clearly, it was her he was after.
Even though Fels had long since cast off her physical body and lived for several hundred years.
Yet at this moment, a trace of nervousness still arose in her. After all.
She knew all too well that for Haimer to come personally this time was absolutely no simple matter.
"Sit."
Seeing Fels appear, Haimer pointed at the empty chair across from him.
Fels too walked to the table and pulled out the chair, but did not sit down at once; instead she took the initiative to pick up the teapot.
Amid the rising steam.
Fels pushed the black tea over in front of Haimer, her manner respectful, without a single fault to be found.
After all, for the Fels of now, having learned the secrets of the Heavens through Ouranos.
She had to remain cautious at all times when facing Haimer.
"The tea leaves aren't bad."
Haimer set down the teacup, his gaze piercing through the shadows beneath Fels's hood.
"No need to be so tense."
"If I wanted to make trouble, I'd just go straight to the underground altar—there'd be no need to come all the way to this windowless room to drink tea."
"Lord Haimer overstates it."
"To be able to serve you is my honor."
"I only wonder—what are your orders, that you've come in person today?"
"Orders?" "I've personally brought my child here—does Miss Fels really intend to keep beating around the bush?"
"I wouldn't dare."
Asking herself honestly, Fels of course knew. After all.
It was precisely this seemingly frail girl in the white dress who had unleashed that wide-area healing magic capable of making broken bones regrow and flesh and blood reconverge.
That kind of terrifying magical attainment—with no casting wind-up at all, not even a visible expenditure of magic power.
For her, who had lived eight hundred years and devoted her whole life to pursuing the essence of life, it was simply like seeing a dazzling sun in the dark of night.
At the time, unable to suppress the excitement in her heart, she had taken the initiative to express her wish to instruct her.
Only to be tactfully declined.
She'd thought there would never be another chance in this life.
Yet who would have expected that today Haimer would actually bring the girl here.
"As it happens, I've just had the thought today of finding a teacher for my child."
"But." "Miss Riveria believes she's unable to teach the Holy Emperor."
"I think you should be quite clear on the reason for this."
As the 「Sage」 who had once touched the boundary between life and death and forcibly used secret arts to keep herself in the mortal world, Fels of course knew why.
Behind that green healing light back then, Fels had sensed from within the Holy Emperor's body an extremely heavy something.
That thing—an ordinary mage simply could not touch it; touch it, and they'd be driven mad by that immense tide of negative emotion.
"I do indeed understand."
"But, Lord Haimer..."
Fels raised her head.
"Though Lady Riveria cannot teach her."
"I can." Fels made, then and there, a guarantee that left herself no retreat.
Having lived eight hundred years, having studied the forbidden mysteries of life and death for eight hundred years.
There was no one more suited than a 「Fool」 who had died once to guide this heavy power.
Hearing this answer made without the slightest hesitation, Haimer nodded with satisfaction, then turned his head to look at the Holy Emperor, whose nerves had been taut all this while.
"And how do you feel about it yourself?"
He reached out and tidied the stray strands of hair beside the Holy Emperor's ear.
"This Miss Fels here will be your mentor from now on."
"If there's anything you don't understand, or when the magic's backlash makes you suffer, there's no need to grit your teeth and bear it alone—you can ask her or me about it."
The Holy Emperor lifted her eyes to gaze at Haimer, her nose suddenly stinging, her eye sockets quickly reddening.
After nodding hard, she stood up, lifted the hem of her snow-white skirt, and bowed toward Fels with the utmost gravity.
"Then from now on… I'll be in your care for instruction, Lord Fels."
The Holy Emperor's voice was sincere.
"I'll study with all my might, and I will absolutely never waste your time."
Looking at this girl who possessed such extraordinarily high talent and a noble air, yet who at every moment held her own posture so low, Fels too hurriedly extended a black-gloved hand and made a gesture of helping her up.
"Miss Holy Emperor overstates it—we're simply exploring it together."
At this point. The bond of master and disciple was formally settled.
Haimer looked at the two of them, smiling as well, and extended an olive branch to Fels.
"Miss Fels."
"Since you've become my child's mentor."
"Then once our new base in the Outer Ring ruins is built, Miss Fels, why don't you move over and live there together with us."
"There are plenty of rooms inside; I'll set aside a tower just for you, to serve as your exclusive magic research laboratory."
Hearing these words. Fels's body stiffened slightly.
That hand poised in midair to help the girl up hung there, fixed in place.
What her status was needs no further saying.
Ouranos's shadow, the hub through which the Guild governed all covert intelligence and contact with the Xenos.
If she moved into the base of the [Haimer Familia]...
"Lord Haimer."
Fels withdrew her hand, her tone turning exceedingly difficult.
"This… is perhaps inappropriate."
"I am the personal soldier of Lord Ouranos, charged with a weighty duty for the Guild..."
"And what of it?"
Haimer cut off Fels's words with indifference.
"You're the Guild's person—but does that conflict with your going to a better environment to teach my student?"
"Or is it that Miss Fels doesn't want to observe my child's rule-defying talent up closer?"
"Or perhaps that you don't want to find a perfect vessel to pass down what you've spent eight hundred years sitting alone and painstakingly researching?"
From creating the 『Philosopher's Stone』, only for it to be taken as a joke and smashed to pieces by the gods.
To becoming, as now, this skeletal form that was neither human nor ghost.
Calling herself a 「Fool」 and passing the long years underground.
Had Fels ever truly been resigned to it?
Of course not.
A proud person would never give up proving the value of her having existed in this world.
"But… Ouranos… on his side…"
Fels's line of defense had clearly already begun to crumble, leaving only the final scruple regarding Ouranos.
"As for Ouranos's side, I'll go speak to him personally."
"Miss Fels need only tell me whether or not she's willing."
Haimer set the matter down with finality.
A long wait. A full half-minute passed.
"If Lord Haimer can persuade Lord Ouranos…"
"Then I… am willing."
Fels lowered her head, her black-gloved hand slowly clenching into a fist, then at last slackening dejectedly.
Hearing this result.
The curve at the corner of Haimer's mouth rose slightly.
"Of course there's no problem." "And since that's the case, then today the two of you can first get acquainted with each other here."
"I'll just take this opportunity to go to the underground altar and catch up with Ouranos."
With that said.
After signaling to the Holy Emperor not to be nervous, Haimer turned, pulled open the door, and walked out.
...…
With practiced familiarity.
Haimer came to a massive bronze double door carved with intricate, sacred script.
Haimer didn't even knock—he simply reached out and gave it a hard push.
"Booom—"
The heavy bronze doors let out a dull grinding sound, slowly opening to either side.
The space behind the door was an extraordinarily vast, empty underground altar.
Several fire-pillars burning with blue flames stood erect around the altar.
Upon the high platform at the very center of the altar.
——It was precisely Ouranos.
Hearing the commotion of the doors being forced open.
Ouranos slowly opened his eyes.
"You've come, Haimer."
"Still fond of putting on that brooding, deep-and-mysterious act, I see. Though this wretched place of yours is as gloomy as ever."
Haimer paid it no mind. He stepped down the stairs, walked straight to the center of the altar, and stopped at a spot less than five paces from Ouranos.
"This place has no need for lavish decoration."
Ouranos looked at Haimer expressionlessly.
"You, on the other hand, Haimer."
"Why aren't you out there continuing to expand your power? How is it you've found the time today to come all the way to this underground altar of mine?"
Faced with Ouranos's question.
Haimer too sat down on the stone steps without the slightest ceremony.
"Don't take me for someone like you who enjoys fussing over all that tiresome nonsense."
"I've come today to ask you for a person."
"You should know full well who it is I want."
Seeing Haimer get straight to the point.
Ouranos's gaze instantly sank.
"Fels is my person."
Ouranos's voice was low and deep.
"She holds the Guild's most core intelligence network, and is also in charge of liaising with the underground Xenos."
"Haimer, you've already openly declared in the streets that you'd shelter those monsters, and now you want to poach away my one and only liaison." Ouranos asked.
"What on earth are you trying to do?"
"Don't put it so unpleasantly."
The smile on Haimer's face hadn't faded in the slightest.
"I've merely found a magic teacher for my child."
"This shoddy magic system of the Lower World simply can't bear the talent of that child of mine."
"Only those forbidden mysteries of life and death that Fels researches are barely worth a glance."
"Besides, I only want to have her move into my new base, to make day-to-day teaching convenient—that's all."
"As for everything else, whatever she's supposed to manage, she'll keep managing. I won't interfere."
Haimer spread his hands.
"There's no conflict in that, right?"
"No conflict?"
Ouranos gave a cold snort.
"The moment Fels moves into your turf, her every move will be entirely under your surveillance!"
"Haimer, I've already made concessions to you on a great many things."
"The matter of the high-end residential district, the matter of the Xenos—I've had the Guild cooperate with you on all of it."
"But Fels alone—no."
"So you're going to refuse me, then? Ouranos."
____
👻🔥Seek: Walnut-chan🔥👻
🔥 New history: COTE: Counterattack System
Let's hit these goals:
🎯 100 Powerstones = 1 extra chapter for the public!