In a corner of a small alley in the town, Will was looking at the letter that Iaar had retrieved from her small satchel, which was a response to the question he had posted on the anonymous forum.
“Speaking of which, I stopped by the Adventurer’s Guild for a bit and gathered some information from the Guild Master. I wanted to find out if there was any intel about you…” Iaar handed the letter to Will and said.
“Hmm? And then?” Will took the letters one by one. They were much heavier than he had imagined.
“I feel like the Adventurer’s Guild isn’t looking for you as intensely as I thought… Otherwise, if someone as conspicuous as me appeared, and was recognized at a glance as the ‘Fire Dragon Killer’ like before, they should have made some move. My hearing is very good, and any discussions would definitely reach my ears!”
Will was taken aback when he received the letters. He had indeed considered the possibility that Iaar might be targeted, but among their group, Iaar was the least likely target. If Iaar’s inquiries yielded no results… Could it be that Carver hadn’t discovered him? And therefore, there was no internal manhunt?
“…This is useful information. Well done. However, it’s too troublesome to try and guess his thoughts. Let’s just focus on ourselves.”
“Mhm!”
Thus, Will stood in the shadows and unfolded the letters he held. To his surprise, the question he had posted this time had received an excessive number of replies, far more than usual. It seemed that people were genuinely intending to answer his “Can a wandering giant whale be seen at the deepest part of a dungeon?” question, which sounded both poetic and profound.
He curiously opened a few at random. There were “dungeon ecologists” who argued about the existence of “giant whales” as monsters based on the structural properties of dungeons. There were also those who worded their replies very seriously, treating the question as some kind of philosophical hypothesis and rigorously refuting his premise based on philosophical principles – these were the “dungeon philosophers.”
There were also some rather strange ones… A reply stated:
“I’ve been there. I didn’t see any giant whales, but it should be a good place if you want to find a wandering giant whale~ If you want to know, I can give you my contact information in the next letter~”
This felt like “online fraud.”
“So, so, which one of these letters is from Ms. Shuna? I don’t know her. If I asked her to answer this question, would she write a very serious argumentative essay? Just like the letters she used to send to Will…”
“Nay, nay,” Will smiled and shook his finger. After sifting through several letters, Will did indeed keep a few that were answered in a more interesting way. Then, he picked up the most conspicuous one from the pile of letters Iaar had brought back, the one that, judging by its appearance, looked like an advertisement and not a serious reply.
“Eh? You chose this one?!”
“…Actually, only this one is from Shuna among so many letters.”
“So, what does this letter say? Why does it just look like a simple… uh… Adventurer’s Item advertisement to me?” Iaar hopped over curiously, trying to get a closer look at the contents of the letter.
“If you look at it, you’ll only see an advertisement. If you look carefully, you’ll find that this shop doesn’t exist.” Will turned the letter sideways towards Iaar, making sure she noticed the name written in the upper right corner.
“Hmm. This address, Entak Capital, Street 30003? Wait a moment, streets starting with 3 in Entak Capital are already Royal Family…”
“Right? So this letter was fake from the beginning.” Will said with a smile, lightly brushing his finger over the letter’s surface as if wetting it with some liquid.
“After decoding, this letter can be read. Wait?” Looking at the contents of the letter, Will’s brow suddenly furrowed.
“Empress Daisianwei of Death Hall… As expected, it’s related to Reviers. However, this relationship isn’t exactly the same as Iaar’s guess of them being completely one.” In the first two lines of Shuna’s letter, without any pleasantries, she directly told him that she had been taken to the deepest part of Death Hall, where she met Daisianwei, and… the “Goddess,” who is known for focusing her gaze on certain individuals and bestowing blessings, was now in the form of a disgusting, shapeless meatball statue.
“And, the most important content of this letter… they plan to clear Zero Demon City?” When Iaar heard the name Zero Demon City, her ears twitched.
“Zero Demon City, hmm… I remember! That’s the dungeon where Treya is!”
“Not bad. I remember you only heard the name once.” Will rubbed Iaar’s head and even playfully tugged at the fur behind her beast ears.
“Because I was rescued from there, I remember it very clearly. Speaking of Treya, she hasn’t met us or responded to us at all since you left.”
“Don’t be angry, don’t be angry. Maybe she just doesn’t think… you need to see her?”
“That sounds even more infuriating!”
“Calm down, calm down.” As he said this, he took the opportunity to gently rub Iaar’s ears again. At this moment, only rubbing Iaar’s ears could somewhat relax him. After all, the information about Death Hall’s movements that Shuna brought through this letter, made him, who had previously felt things weren’t that urgent, suddenly feel like he was facing a deadline. It was like being told at the start of a project that the public beta was next month. Shuna’s message from Death Hall was absolutely true. Because this method of communication was itself somewhat risky, she wouldn’t have informed him this way unless it was important news. However, this information itself was full of mysteries – things that even Shuna didn’t understand, and she would have surely revealed everything in her letter.
…Death Hall is making a move on Zero Demon City? They want to eliminate it? Why?
“The sending date of this letter is… As expected, she knew I was looking for the time and marked it. It’s… three days ago?” Will subconsciously wanted to confirm how much actionable time he had left. As he looked up, he saw that Shuna had marked it in code in the upper right corner of the letter.
Then… Considering the communication delay between them, he didn’t have much time left. Will began to ponder what he could do with the remaining time.
“Pat pat, dear, don’t be nervous, relax.” Then, he suddenly felt Iaar on his side tiptoe, reaching out her hand to pat his head. It was like how he had just patted Iaar’s head. Iaar had keenly noticed his emotions.
“Being petted on the head by you is quite a rare experience…”
“I often petted you when you fainted from practicing magic before, too. Although it was… when you were unconscious!” Iaar said with her hands on her hips, in a serious tone.
“Did you inadvertently reveal something…”
“I just wanted to say that, no matter how urgent this matter is, I will be with you, by your side. And…” Iaar looked up, her gray eyes reflecting the blue sky behind Will. Will, in her eyes, seemed to shine much brighter. “Because it’s you, my dear Will, you can do anything.”
“…” Seeing that Iaar was still unconditionally by his side, just like before, Will felt a bit more reassured. However…
“Hmm, but actually, this letter came at a very opportune time. So it’s not as terrifying as you say.”
“Eh?!”
“It’s nothing more than having to do some things that were planned to be investigated further ahead of time. However, given that my identity has been discovered, this matter itself had to be moved up anyway.” Will thought for a moment and looked at the bright street scene outside. Then, his gaze shifted towards the direction of Entak Capital, which was not far from here. He wasn’t looking at the city he had entered many times before. Instead… In a town very close to the capital, there was a “dungeon” forgotten by the Adventurer’s Guild, a dungeon that also had some entanglement with Zero Demon City, where Treya was.
“Let’s go find Liya. The capital is the next destination, but… the Witch’s Lair is not conveniently located to the capital, so we’ll need to find another place to stay.”
“Coincidentally, connecting ‘that place’ to the ‘network’ of witches wouldn’t be a bad thing either—”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“You’re finally back. Otherwise, I would have thought you were captured by Carver while you were visiting a grave.” As soon as they returned to the Witch’s Lair, Liya was pacing around the garden with her arms crossed. Her magic hat and the staff Will had given her were both worn, and her twin-tailed hair was meticulously styled, with the hair ties on each side having different color tones. She looked fully geared up to go out. Although her words were a bit sharp, Will could see through her intentions.
“If we were any later, wouldn’t you have grabbed your weapon and come looking for us?” he squinted and smiled, directly calling out Liya’s thoughts.
“No. I was just… practicing the magic of the Candle of First Creation here. You, you don’t think too much…” Liya immediately put away her staff, took off her hat, and patted her skirt.
“It’s good that you’re back. Liya just borrowed some teleportation chalk from me, saying that if you got caught, she would immediately lead a jailbreak…” However, Iaar, appearing from behind Liya, ruthlessly exposed her.
“Senior Iaar!”
“Oh my, I just went out for a bit, and you’re already thinking about a jailbreak?”
“As expected of Miss Liya! Very far-sighted!” Iaar clapped her hands, cooperating with Will.
“How can this not be described as far-sighted?” Liya pouted, leaned closer to Will, patted his shoulder, and carefully checked him all over, as if performing a routine check for monitoring or surveillance devices. “It’s good that you returned safely. I was overthinking it. So, what exactly did you do? You didn’t really go to a grave, did you?”
“Let me think… First, we dug up my grave, then we demolished the wall of my old house, and finally, we dug through Carver’s dark history.”
“???” Liya, who hadn’t witnessed it herself, only felt that Will’s “grave” was not only for himself but also quite stylish.
