Chapter 1034: Milestone (21)
Shatter!!
From beyond the cracks of shattering memory, Lennok’s consciousness rapidly resurfaced into reality.
Yet, even amidst it, Lennok reflected on Anathema’s memories that he had just faced.
Memories of Anathema’s final day, when he was banished from the Central City. The true identity of the Lantern of Ephemeral Visions held by the fallen Apostle.
Jinwa’s corruption. World-Soul’s failure. Seonjong’s corpse. The departed Emperor, and the true reason for Anathema’s banishment.
The secret sorrows and ultimate fates of Ascendants, which he never thought he would glimpse through someone else’s memories.
Even the existence of the Transcendent who appeared before Anathema, shattering the sky like glass in his final moments.
After reviewing all those memories, Lennok finally understood why Anathema’s name could remain unbound by The Prohibition.
‘……’
The reason Anathema’s name was used as a message to banish him beyond the world.
The reason he was eternally excluded from reality instead of atoning for his sins through death.
What if all of it wasn’t merely a punishment, but a process to convey their message to ‘someone’?
‘……A process, you say.’
Anathema’s banishment was not an outcome, but a process.
Because there was a causality comparable to that of the great failures, his name remained unbound by The Prohibition even after his banishment.
Thinking so, Lennok slowly opened his eyes.
“Oh.”
Jutiya, the noble, who had been looking down at Lennok as he quietly opened his eyes, scratched her head.
“You’re awake. Sleep well?”
“……”
A somewhat awkward expression. Only after looking around did Lennok realize why.
A colossal coffin stood in the center of Undertaker Cyrus’s church chapel.
Lennok was lying inside that very coffin, meeting Jutiya’s gaze.
“The funeral ceremony finished while you were looking into Anathema’s memories.”
Jutiya scratched her disheveled hair.
“Anathema’s name has received soul pacification. Now his spirit will find rest without wandering.”
“That doesn’t sound like an explanation for this situation.”
“Oh, you mean you being inside the coffin?”
Jutiya’s expression momentarily turned bewildered.
“You shouldn’t be asking me that. Your body was in the coffin when I saw it after the ceremony finished.”
“……”
“I stopped Cyrus from closing the lid, so shouldn’t I be getting thanks instead?”
‘It’s because of the protocol.’
The moment he heard Jutiya’s explanation, Lennok understood why he was lying in the coffin.
The emergency spellcraft he had set up to protect his body in case he lost consciousness.
Did his body autonomously move to a suitable place to deploy the spatial isolation created by combining Barrier Spellcraft and a Domain?
At the same time, Lennok realized why the protocol activated the moment he looked into Anathema’s memories.
In the final moments of the memories, even Lennok himself had forgotten that he was merely observing.
That chilling sense of incongruity, shattering the sky like glass upon its appearance.
He couldn’t properly discern its form or face, but there was no doubt.
It was none other than Ban-gung, widely known as the strongest Ascendant in history.
The one who banished Anathema from reality was, in fact, him.
“……”
Why did Ban-gung intervene at that moment and aid Anathema’s banishment?
Why did the gate Pyeonram opened in the final moments lead to a meeting with Ban-gung?
Nevertheless, Lennok understood why Anathema’s existence could be so thoroughly excluded from reality.
An absolute decree, so powerful that even Ars Nova’s nobles could not escape it.
If such a monster intervened and carried out Anathema’s banishment, he could also understand why Anathema had suffered so much and allied with the Pontiff.
[You’re awake.]
“……Olivera.”
[To crawl into a coffin yourself, I almost thought you wanted to become a vampire now.]
Olivera, who had walked in from the back of the chapel, her veil fluttering, chuckled.
[I knew you were ambitious given your talents, but I suggest you refrain from changing your species.]
“Thanks for the concern,” Lennok replied indifferently, stepping out of the coffin and asking,
“If I was the only one continuously seeing Anathema’s memories, did others not see the same memories?”
“Not everyone who participates in the ceremony sees the same memories.”
Jutiya said, sitting behind Lennok with a languid voice.
“Just as one tidies up an encounter for a farewell, people generally look into the memories that led to their meeting with the deceased.”
“……The encounter?”
“I saw memories from when I worked at the Council of Fate. I met Anathema a few times back then.”
“……”
Memories of the encounter that led to meeting Anathema.
In that case, it should naturally have been the memories from when Lennok killed Anathema.
“I don’t know everything about him either. Just a few untold stories I heard decades after the city’s demise.”
Jutiya crossed her arms, shaking her head as she saw Lennok lost in thought.
“If you saw something in Anathema’s memories, it might be best to ask someone else.”
Boom!!
At that moment, the entire chapel Lennok was leaning against vibrated violently.
The vast church and the entire cemetery, forming the Domain, subtly tilted.
[He’s moving the location coordinates of the Domain.]
Olivera said, looking at Jutiya.
[Are you trying to leave Vulcan immediately after finishing the funeral ceremony?]
“You know Cyrus.”
Jutiya shrugged and stood up from her seat.
Passing through the chapel and exiting the church doors, Jutiya turned back to Lennok and said,
“He decided there’s no longer a reason to stay here since you’ve regained consciousness. He’ll probably leave as soon as he finds Thorben’s location.”
“I didn’t think the Undertaker had such a considerate nature.”
“No, rather than that… he needs a reason.”
Jutiya smiled.
“He can no longer distinguish the flow and order of time through normal means.”
“……”
A cogwheel moving according to its assigned role even after Ars Nova’s destruction.
The time and causality accumulated by continuing their roles even after the Central City’s demise were indeed incredibly powerful.
And precisely because of that, the Undertaker no longer moved according to his own will or intentions.
What was the role the Emperor bestowed upon the nobles in Ars Nova?
What did that role signify, that it still held meaning even after everything had ended?
Whoosh!!
The reddish field spread out beyond the church. Lennok walked through the cemetery filled with spider lilies, following Jutiya.
At the end of the red cemetery, where the wind blew, the Undertaker stood, his expression devoid of emotion.
“Ascension Candidate, you’re awake.”
Cyrus, his emaciated body bent, looked down at Lennok.
“Are you leaving?”
“Even for a defector who betrayed Ars Nova, their death must be concluded fully according to proper rites.”
Cyrus said with an emotionless gaze, seemingly uninterested in Lennok’s question.
“I thank you for your cooperation in the ceremony. The Funeral Ship to the Sea of Return will soon depart from the skies above Vulcan’s undeveloped district.”
“……”
“We will conclude today’s funeral ceremony by securing Akendrias El Thorben’s location and recovering his person.”
Whoosh!!
As he spoke, the Funeral Ship to the Sea of Return’s Domain rapidly passed over Vulcan’s undeveloped district.
An astonishing speed, almost unbelievable for a Domain moving by shifting its own coordinates.
This was only possible because Cyrus himself was born with the Domain and had never once retracted it.
Since the Domain and the spellcaster are perfectly assimilated, the Domain can be moved in this manner.
For the Undertaker himself to become a living Domain, pacifying and gathering the dead until the moment of their conclusion.
Was that the way of life for the noble Cyrus Ardeltio?
“Oh, right. There’s one last thing to take care of before Thorben returns.”
Jutiya, who was sitting beside Cyrus and looking down at the ground, spoke as if remembering something.
“Since we essentially used Anathema’s remains, which were rightfully your spoils, in the ceremony, we intend to pay a small price for that.”
“What kind of price are you talking about?”
Most of their assets would likely be buried in the epicenter of the ruined Ars Nova.
Aside from telling him about The Prohibition, what could these nobles from a fallen city possibly give Lennok?
“I told you I was the Scribe of the Council, didn’t I?”
Jutiya, fluttering the wide sleeves of her cardigan, gave a languid smile.
“I used to record and manage the tributes offered to Ars Nova.”
“……”
“Among those, I still have the coordinates of the tributes that couldn’t be brought in when Ars Nova fell.”
“Ohh……”
Lennok nodded at Jutiya’s boastful words.
“You’ll tell me the location of the treasure, and I can just take it?”
“Strictly speaking, they’re not my property, but at this point, with the Golden Land destroyed, what does it matter?”
Jutiya said casually, raising her hand.
Boom!!
As she struck down at the air, two heavy stone tablets simultaneously dropped at her feet.
Did she materialize something that had been invisible to others until now, bringing it into this space?
Lennok tilted his head at the familiar presence he felt from the stone tablets.
“While you were unconscious, I checked the tribute list and singled out the ones that could be immediately retrieved.”
Jutiya placed her hands on both sides of the two stone tablets and asked,
“My authority only allows me to transfer one. Which one will it be?”
“Are both the location coordinates of tributes offered to Ars Nova?”
“Yes. To briefly explain the tributes hidden at these coordinates–”
Jutiya glanced at the stone tablets and said,
“The first is a leaf from the World Tree imbued with a fairy’s blessing.”
“……What?”
“The second is a damaged engine part from a Singularity Reactor.”
While Lennok was speechless at the unexpected information, Jutiya shrugged.
“Just let me know your decision before we leave the mega-city. I plan to depart this city right after the ceremony too.”
“……”
A leaf from the World Tree, and a faulty part from a Singularity Reactor.
Both were undoubtedly rare treasures that Lennok wouldn’t easily acquire anywhere else.
Should this be considered an offering befitting a noble of the Central City, or was it something only Jutiya, with her unique position as Scribe, could do?
However, Olivera, who had been listening to the conversation, seemed to have a slightly different impression.
[A Singularity Reactor, how absurd. Are you saying such a dangerous object was hidden even after Ars Nova’s demise?]
“It’s a part, Olivera.”
Jutiya chided with a sleepy expression.
“It’s broken and can’t be used normally anyway. I’m just mentioning it in case, since he’s a wizard of that caliber.”
[Yet, it must surely contain technology worthy of its name.]
Olivera’s Mystic Eye glowed intensely through her veil.
[How can you guarantee you’re not trying to palm off a bomb that he can’t control?]
Olivera’s incredibly chilling message. But Jutiya didn’t seem to deny her words either.
Her demeanor treated the Singularity Reactor as if it were a bomb too dangerous for even the two of them to handle easily.
Sensing Lennok’s questioning gaze, Olivera spoke first.
[It refers to an engine that uses black holes as its power source.]
“……Black holes?”
[Originally, it was designed for voyages beyond the Outer Sea, not just within a planet.]
Olivera replied with a cold voice.
[It was technology that even the Emperor’s direct engineers in Ars Nova couldn’t touch. Even if it’s a defective part, it’s not something a human can safely handle.]
“Oh, Olivera.”
Jutiya’s languid smile subtly changed for a moment.
“Is it really appropriate for you, of all people, to say that?”
[……]
Olivera did not reply further.
She merely scoffed, retreating slowly with an icy chill that seemed to freeze the air.
Lennok watched Olivera and the two stone tablets before him, lost in thought.
A damaged part of an engine powered by black holes.
As seen in Anathema’s memories, had Ars Nova already prepared the technology to venture beyond the Outer Sea?
He could ask Jutiya, who seemed to know something about why Olivera Ron Maize was so knowledgeable about it–
But the moment Lennok heard Jutiya’s proposal, he had already decided what to ask for.
“Have you decided?”
Jutiya tapped the stone tablets, watching Lennok walk forward, shaking his head.
“A World Tree leaf is far more useful than a Singularity Reactor part, in terms of utility. Think carefully.”
“No. I will choose neither.”
“What?”
“Instead, I will make a different request.”
Lennok’s gaze, shifting between Cyrus watching from afar and Jutiya, deepened.
“From now on, the Funeral Ship to the Sea of Return’s Domain will turn around and head back towards the Magic Tower.”
“……Turn back?”
“There’s no reason to choose either the World Tree leaf or the faulty Singularity Reactor part.”
Lennok said, looking at Jutiya with a calm expression.
“I will take your time, both yours and the Undertaker’s, who possess that knowledge, as payment.”
“……”
[……You rascal.]
Cyrus and Jutiya fell silent, and even Olivera’s voice trailed off in bewilderment.
Lennok’s answer was clearly an unexpected proposition for all three of them.
“Adamant Thunder, I think you’re mistaken about something……”
Jutiya shook her head with a flustered look.
“Cyrus and I are the ones who did not abandon our roles. We don’t move based on such justifications.”
“……”
“Don’t you understand that even the payment I’m offering you now is intended to prevent any complaints about this ceremony?”
Jutiya’s eyes gleamed coldly behind her glasses.
“I like that you’re easier to talk to than Thorben, but this kind of stubbornness is troublesome. Or perhaps my explanation was insufficient?”
Unlike Thorben, who searched for lightning, the Undertaker and the Scribe were the ones who visited Vulcan for Anathema’s funeral.
Their very presence here was proof that they were fulfilling their duties even after Ars Nova’s destruction.
Therefore, changing the payment for the funeral ceremony could not fix their whereabouts.
Did it seem like Lennok, who understood The Prohibition, was being unreasonable despite knowing it?
“I’ve thought about it ever since I first heard about the Protocol Hierarchy.”
But Lennok immediately shook his head upon hearing Jutiya’s words.
“If Thorben’s will must be prioritized before starting the ceremony, then shouldn’t the Protocol Hierarchy apply equally when concluding the ceremony?”
“……”
“You’ll need Thorben’s consent to finish the ceremony and leave Vulcan. Right?”
“I don’t quite understand what you’re trying to say.”
Jutiya asked, narrowing her eyes.
“What does that have to do with the current situation?”
“Akendrias El Thorben was devoured by my Magic Tower’s Guardian Spirit Beast.”
Jutiya blinked silently at Lennok’s words.
“……What did you say?”
“His Root Mindscape was consumed, and he is currently detained within my Magic Tower.”
Lennok smiled, seeing Jutiya’s bewildered expression.
The chaos and fierce battles of the Central Front were now extending their repercussions beyond the front lines.
With legions, alliances, and cults deeply entangled, Lennok’s Magic Tower was not immune to this danger.
Even without that punitive operation, a deterrent was needed for when Lennok was away from his Magic Tower.
And two individuals with prestige perfectly suited for such a role stood right before Lennok.
“Both of you will have to stay in my Magic Tower and lend me your names until Thorben’s problem is resolved.”