Chapter 303
Scars on the Tree
Under the night sky, Eagle Cape Village was extraordinarily peaceful.
Not to mention the sounds of fighting outside, not even the chirping of insects or the calls of birds could be heard.
But this was clearly unreasonable.
Eivass had already realized the incongruity.
This was because in general rural areas, there should be many kinds of insects, snakes, birds, and beasts.
Unlike Glass Island, where the Inspection Bureau frequently checked hygiene, and various pest control and rodent control companies distributed flyers on the streets. Eagle Cape Village, nestled deep in the forest, even made it normal for wolves to roam the village streets in the middle of the night… It was not impossible to wake up and find a snake in your blanket.
Not to mention all sorts of small insects.
Even if humming insects were not active in winter… Eivass had been in Eagle Cape Village for several days, but he hadn’t seen even a ladybug, spider, or slug.
Not only were there no wolf howls or cat meows, but even the sound of birds flapping their wings was inaudible.
“Does your village have any hunters?”
Eivass asked Haina.
Haina hesitated for a moment: “Hmm… maybe, maybe not.”
“This is the most ridiculous reply I’ve heard this month.”
Sherlock complained, “Either you have them, or you don’t. How can you say ‘maybe’?”
“This is Shepherd’s Bay Country.”
Haina, pacing back and forth in the room, replied with her hands on her hips, “If you want meat, you have to find the shepherds. There are so many people herding sheep and cattle. Although there is occasional wild game in the village, it might have been bought from Windpipe Town, or exchanged from other villages.”
Now that she wasn’t sure if the fight outside had ended, Haina didn’t dare to go home.
But Haina was bored, full of energy and exceptionally excited… So she could only pace back and forth in the room, and occasionally go to tease the Gryphon, who was about to fall asleep.
Liz had already fallen asleep three times in the corner, but each time Haina woke her up.
The key was that after waking it up, Haina didn’t need it to do anything, but instead quickly petted its head and soothed it back to sleep. Then she paced around the room for a few laps and couldn’t help but go to play with the Gryphon again.
There was no other way.
After all, the other three people besides her—Eivass, Sherlock, and Lily—were not easy to bother.
Lily had an introverted and quiet personality. Even when talking to her, Lily would only smile faintly and listen silently. Only when Eivass talked to her would she react a little more.
She wanted to play with Eivass, but now, as the Minister of Affairs, Eivass was too powerful for Haina—she was already very afraid of Edward, the Chief Inspector, and now Eivass was much more formidable than Edward.
Sherlock was even more out of the question.
He was reading a book over there… Haina peeked and found that it was a book about astrology.
There were large sections of letters, numbers, and symbols. Haina felt dizzy after just one glance.
Of course, if she were forced to recite it, she could probably memorize the entire book. But understanding it was very difficult.
To her relief, Sherlock on the Path of Wisdom didn’t find it easy to understand either. The young Sherlock frowned in deep thought, looking like a younger brother struggling with his homework, very cute.
However, perhaps because Sherlock was also finding it headaches—Haina’s rhythmic pacing behind him caused Sherlock to slam his book down with a thud in annoyance, and he looked up and cursed a few times.
He hated Haina’s restless behavior of pacing around everyone late at night, making noise. He sharply commented that she was “an energetic stupid donkey warming up for tomorrow’s plowing.”
So Haina also didn’t want to go near Sherlock.
Stupid was stupid. She knew she wasn’t as intelligent as Sherlock. But she didn’t want to be called a stupid donkey!
—She was a beautiful girl who was popular in school, and being called a donkey was too much!
At least she should be a cute animal like a horse or a dog!
“Speaking of which,” Eivass, who was on the side, said thoughtfully, raising his hand to stop the constantly pacing Haina, “When you were young, you used to run around with your friends, right?”
“Of course. Otherwise, there wasn’t much fun to be had here,” Haina nodded.
“Did you go near the forest?”
“We often played in the forest.”
Haina replied.
Hearing this, Sherlock suddenly frowned and looked up, retorting, “You played in the forest?”
“…Yes, what’s wrong?”
Haina felt guilty, thinking she might have said something wrong.
“Then that’s a huge problem.”
Sherlock frowned like a little adult, “Did your adults let you run around in the woods like that?”
“What’s wrong,” Haina was somewhat bewildered, “It’s not like we’re going to the swamp. What’s the danger… They don’t let us go to the swamp. But just saying it’s useless, we still go every month, hahaha…”
Haina said something like “As long as we’re not discovered, it’s like we never went” and “No one ever got hurt anyway,” excitedly wanting to talk about her childhood adventures.
But her words were directly interrupted by Sherlock: “Don’t your adults worry about bad people or wild beasts and poisonous insects in the woods?”
Hearing this, Haina was stunned.
She vaguely realized, “Probably… Ah, didn’t Eivass say our village is within a Fey barrier? It should be for this reason, right?”
“Then aren’t they afraid you’ll be captured by the Fey?”
Sherlock retorted.
Hearing this, Haina finally fell silent.
She hissed softly and also fell into doubt.
Yes, why?
Eivass vaguely guessed something.
He gently asked, “Senior sister, how much do you know about these forests?”
“Ah, Eivass, please don’t call me senior sister anymore. I’ve already graduated…”
Haina waved her hand awkwardly, “Just call me Haina.”
Now, just hearing Eivass’s polite and affectionate title made her feel like she was breaking out in a sweat.
To have a young, powerful minister, the current head of a founding family, a member of the Round Table Hall… and possibly the future Prince Regent of Avalon, the future Speaker of the Round Table Hall, call her senior sister, she didn’t have that much face.
The current Haina was no longer as young, naive, and spirited as when she first started working at the Inspection Bureau. She had grown up a little more now and understood more things. And her contact with Eivass was not that much… The reason for their close relationship was simply because Eivass shared with her the forbidden secret of the Silver Crown Dragon becoming a Pillar God.
Since then, they had been accomplices. Because they shared a forbidden secret and both knew that the other also possessed it and knew that the other hadn’t reported them immediately—they had become like rats on a rope.
It was also after that that Haina was forced to join Eivass and Sherlock’s various plans. As a result, she knew more and more, and now she couldn’t run away.
And now that she fully understood what the name Eivass meant in Avalon, she wished she could go back in time and punch her naive past self twice.
Eivass just smiled, easily seeing through Haina’s concerns, “It’s okay, senior sister. The first time I called you senior sister, you responded kindly… Since then, I can call you senior sister.
“Later, I called you by your name, ‘Haina,’ to show closeness; now, the situation is different, calling you by your name has become a business-like matter, while calling you senior sister has become closer. Naturally, I will choose the closer title.”
“But…”
“There is no ‘but’.”
Eivass’s fingertips lightly tapped the table, the tapping sound gently interrupting Haina.
Although he no longer used a wheelchair, the habit he formed back then still lingered.
“You are the closed-door disciple of the Grand Arbitrator.”
Eivass said lightly, “A genius who touched the wall of the Fourth Tier at the age of twenty-two years and two months.
“Who can say… you are not the next Grand Arbitrator?”
“Ah no no no no, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”
Haina was greatly startled, her face turned pale, and she waved her hands repeatedly.
She didn’t feel the surging fighting spirit of ambition being ignited, but only immense pressure.
Even though Haina didn’t understand politics, her intuition could tell—the Grand Arbitrator was currently a national protector of Avalon. Without the Grand Arbitrator, Avalon would probably be dragged into war immediately.
So what did the next Grand Arbitrator mean?
It meant that she would bear this “national protector” responsibility!
In other words, if Avalon was dragged into war while the position of Grand Arbitrator was in her hands, it would be her responsibility!
—That would be all her fault for not being as strong as her teacher!
Further thinking, if Avalon was destroyed because of this… wouldn’t she be a sinner!
The thought of her being listed as the direct cause of Avalon’s destruction in future history books made her hands go numb.
How could she bear such a level of responsibility…
Eivass smiled and did not press further.
Instead, he returned to the previous topic: “Senior sister, did you carve a cut on a small tree on your way to school?”
“Ah, you noticed it?”
Haina was a little embarrassed, “As expected, its position was too conspicuous… Yes, when I was in middle school, I carved a cut on a small tree on my way to school. A few days ago, when I came back, I found it was still in the same place. The location of the tree and the location of the scar were exactly the same as in the past. I was truly moved. Everything seemed to have changed not at all.”
“…Carved a cut?”
Sherlock suddenly realized something.
He raised his eyebrows, closed his book, put it down, and sat up straight.
“You didn’t… use that tree to record your height, did you?”
“…No, is that not allowed?”
Haina hesitated.
She had an incurable disease of feeling guilty whenever Sherlock questioned her.
“Is it accurate?”
Sherlock just retorted.
“It’s quite accurate.”
Haina was a bit confused.
“Are you sure the width of the scar is the same as when you carved it?”
“It’s the same. I remember very clearly. The depth is the same, and it’s just formed a layer of scar.”
Haina answered very confidently, “Not only the carving, but the shape of the crown is also the same. That tree is very beautiful. I rarely see a tree that looks so much like a tree… This sentence seems a bit flawed, you guys understand what I mean!”
Sherlock gasped, “No, haven’t you ever suspected that there was something wrong here?”
Even Lily couldn’t help it.
She softly said, “Haina… A small tree is different from a fully developed tree, and a tree is different from a human. Scars on a person do not grow with age, but scars on a small tree will gradually widen. Although the speed is very slow, the imprint you left in the past will definitely deform.
“It won’t move up, but it will become longer and thicker…”
“—No. You’re saying this, and Senior Sister probably won’t understand.”
Eivass sighed, “When a person lives in a village where ‘trees don’t change’ from birth to thirteen or fourteen years old, how can she realize that trees grow?”
“What are you saying? Of course, I know trees grow…”
Haina said casually.
But she suddenly paused, covered her head, and murmured, “No, wait…”
The common sense in her mind kept changing—her hometown was unchanging, and trees grew.
Two completely different common senses rose and fell repeatedly in her mind, making her feel for the first time that the world was so illusory. Her pupils continuously exuded a faint dim yellow energy, which was then defeated by a clear azure blue.
Seeing Haina’s intense reaction, Sherlock looked at Eivass with some admiration, but also some confusion, “When did you realize it?”
“Just now.”
Eivass replied, “Because I am very clear about how close the explosion just now was to the forest, and how powerful it was.
“But after the explosion, the ground was left with a deep pit. Yet those trees were completely unharmed. Not even a few branches fell.”
He looked at Haina, who was holding her head, her pupils trembling violently, and said softly, “So neither of you actually understood my meaning.
“I wasn’t trying to tell Haina that ‘trees grow, so the carvings you left will distort and deform,’ or ‘that small tree from that year shouldn’t look exactly the same as it does now,’ these minor things.
“—I wanted to ask, Senior Sister, what did you use to leave the carving on the tree back then?”
Chapter One is approaching four thousand words!
Let the cat eat, and there will be a second chapter, meow~
