Chapter 87 - Clue (1)
'I think I understand.'
From there onwards, Hyun didn't need indications from the quest.
Hyun remembered he had received some items from the Knight Commander.
The items with magic it was referring to were probably those.
'Is this it?'
He took out a piece of the skin of a demon and placed it on the altar.
But nothing happened.
A single message appeared.
[The magic on the medium is too weak, so it's impossible to track the soul!]
'This isn't it.'
Although it’d failed to activate, Hyun wasn't disappointed.
He had one more item he had received from the Knight Commander.
He took out the monster's claw and put that on the altar.
Ziinngg-.
At that moment, a small red dot appeared on the globe.
Just as if it were a GPS, it pointed to a certain place.
The monster’s coordinates were shown thanks to the unique magic emitted by it.
"Huh? What?" Hyun mumbled after checking out the location of the red dot.
"It's here?"
The red dot was located in the middle of the empire's capital.
According to the Knight Commander, that monster had appeared together with a demon and then disappeared.
The fact that such a creature was in the capital meant that the entire city was exposed to a possible demon's attack.
From the Heaven's point of view, it was clearly a dangerous situation.
Who would've thought that a demon would be hiding in their territory?!
"Tsk tsk, they do say that it's darker under the lamp…"
A quest was created.
- This is serious. The Empire is in danger! Please tell this to the Knight Commander as soon as possible!
- Once you report to him, you'll be known as the one who saved the Empire!
The red dot soon disappeared.
The magic remaining in the claws had disappeared.
Hyun was about to return when something weird happened.
"Oh… What?"
[There's one more item in your inventory that has been registered in the 'magic marble ball'!]
[There's one more item in your inventory that has been registered in the 'magic marble ball'!]
Although he had finished everything he had to do, he kept receiving that same message.
He placed the claws on the altar once again, but nothing happened.
It was the same with the skin piece.
[There's one more item in your inventory that has been registered in the 'magic marble ball'!]
But the message didn't stop.
'Was there something else?'
While tilting his head, Hyun kept placing all the items related to the Knight Commander on the altar.
But there was no reaction from the marble ball.
'Wait, maybe?'
Hyun, who had thought of something, took out something from his inventory.
Louise's necklace…
That item he'd found in the Evil's Seed Dungeon was the necklace that the little Louise of five years past had considered very important.
"Ugh…"
Hyun groaned shortly.
When he took the necklace out of his inventory, it began vibrating.
Whir- Whir-
He felt he was going to drop it if he didn't hold onto it tightly.
While struggling, he managed to get the necklace close to the altar.
Thud-!
The altar pulled the necklace to it as if it were a magnet.
At the same time, the marble ball activated, and in the Asra globe, a red dot appeared.
Ting-!
[Main Quest, 'In Search of Louise' has been generated!]
- You've discovered Louise’s location.
Hyun moved forward as if he were possessed.
The red dot on the globe was more intense than the one that had appeared when he placed the claws on the altar.
"The… Sea?"
Amazingly, the place where the dot had appeared wasn't on the land, but in the middle of the vast sea.
It was the equivalent of the Pacific Ocean of the Earth.
Did that mean that Louise had sunk?
Even he, who had been a ranker on the previous game, didn't know about a place hidden in the sea.
"This… Doesn't make sense."
Hyun was troubled.
Now that he thought about it, Louise was the only one from whom he couldn't get information, even with his knowledge of Asra.
When he’d met her, he hadn’t even know her name.
At first, he thought she was an extra NPC. But later on, he discovered that she was a Royal ranking Angel.
Louise always exceeded his expectations.
Then it was possible that, unexpectedly, there was a place hidden in the middle of the ocean that he didn't know about.
"How am I supposed to go there…?"
There probably wasn't a teleportation gate in the ocean.
He would run out of mana, even if he learned a flying skill.
Should he take a ship?
But the world's oceans, unlike Earth's, were full of dangerous monsters.
Even if he managed to dodge the monsters, he could be devoured by the sea.
'Huh? Wait…'
While thinking about how to cross the sea, Hyun suddenly felt that something was strange.
He felt that the red dot that was in the middle of the sea was moving.
'Didn't it move a little bit?'
Because the magic marble globe had the latitude and longitude drawn, it was easy to check the coordinates.
At first, the red dot was in the middle of the globe.
But after a while, it seemed like it was off the center.
'I didn't see it wrong, right?'
Hyun waited for a little bit more while standing still.
After a while, the red dot kept getting further away from the center.
He kept waiting and became sure that it had completely moved away from the center.
'It's moving!'
If Louise was the red dot, it meant that she was still moving.
'Fast…!'
Although the scale ratio must’ve been huge, it was easy to see the red dot moving.
She was probably moving at a speed of tens of kilometers per second.
Was she moving at that speed under the sea? Or on top of it…?
Neither option made sense.
While thinking for a while, he suddenly felt like a hammer had hit him in the head.
'No… It's possible!'
Because the map was made with flat surfaces, you wouldn't know at which height the target was.
That's why, up until then, he'd thought that she was under the sea.
But what if she wasn't under… but up?
He looked again with a different point of view. That time, he asked himself, “what if she was somewhere above?”
Translator - Daniel Shin
Proofreader - ilafy
* * *
'The moon!'
That could explain the mind-bending speed and the strange location of the dot.
Yes, there wasn't a place hidden under the sea.
He had to look up into the sky.
'Which moon is it?'
The Earth only had one moon, but Asra had two.
No, except for the Empire, a few countries had a satellite made of Magical Power. So there were more options.
What was Louise’s orbital path?
Hyun grabbed his head and thought about it again.
More than ten minutes had passed since he started watching the red dot, when…
Bang!
The door of the Abyss Repository opened while making a strong noise.
The noise of monsters’ footsteps started to spread through the room.
'Oh, damn…!'
Hyun quickly put the necklace away.
He leaped toward the wall from where he'd come.
Grrr-! While leaving behind the cry of monsters, he used his skill.
«Assimilation»!
Just as if he had suddenly appeared, he quickly disappeared.
The monsters entered the Abyss Repository after that.
A few moments later, even Bahmir arrived.
"You didn't catch the intruder?"
Bahmir got angry after receiving the report.
"There's no place to escape from here. Find the intruder!"
In the Abyss Repository, teleport magics were blocked.
But what Bahmir didn't consider was that «Assimilation» worked in a completely different way from teleportation-type skills.
That's why they couldn't find him, no matter how much they searched.
"What about traces?"
"That… over here…!"
The only thing clear was that someone had infiltrated the Abyss Repository.
There had been records of someone using the magic marble ball.
At Bahmir's orders, they began looking at the search records.
According to the record, the tracking magic had been used twice.
Bahmir frowned after looking at the records.
"It was clearly an agent from the Heavens."
There was a red dot on the magic marble ball.
Now he understood what was going on.
It seemed like the one who had infiltrated had discovered the existence of the monster that was hidden in the Empire's capital.
That was a plan that tens of Dukes had been planning for a while.
The location of the monster that was as strong as a demon had been discovered.
"I should order for it to retreat immediately."
"Then the plan…"
"Discarded."
How they'd lost a great chance would affect the Dukes negatively. But now that they'd been found out, it was better if they retreated.
'What's the second one?'
According to the record, the infiltrator had tried to search the location of another thing.
The problem was that even Bahmir didn't know what that was.
The identity of the presence that was in the middle of the sea…
"Is it… One of the Transcendents?"
Because of the strange location, there was a huge chance that the dot was a demon.
But he didn't know who from the Heavens had gotten an item of the Transcendent and why that person was trying the location of a demon.
Bahmir's thoughts deepened, and his eyes narrowed.
* * *
[You've canceled the large-scale event 'Gray Invation'!]
[All your stats have increased by +7!]
As soon as he exited the Abyss Repository, Hyun got more than one notification.
[Because of your actions, your tendency has changed!]
[You've gotten closer to the Abyss. (Current Tendency: -83)]
Hyun felt suspicious.
If he'd canceled the Abyss's plans while doing the Knight Commander's quest, shouldn't he get closer to the Heavens?
At first, he thought that it was a system error, But he soon concluded that was impossible.
Louise's quest.
The so-called main quest was so influential that it was able to overwrite the Knight Commander's quest influence and dragged him closer to the Abyss.
「My tendency started to change!」
TarrTarr shouted.
Because he hadn't influenced it, he didn't receive the achievement bonus.
But just because he'd provided a tiny help, TarrTarr's tendency had changed by a huge margin.
[You've gone a little bit away from the 'Heavens.' (Current Tendency: 11)]
The tendency of the user changed a little bit depending on the actions.
But TarrTarr's tendency had gotten cut in half.
That was enough to know how influential Louise's quest was.
'Louise…'
Hyun tried to remember details about her.
Even back then, his tendency changed when he got entangled with her.
After all, he had ended up as a member of the Abyss because of her.
Five years ago, after helping Louise escape, he changed history and, thanks to that, received lots of stats and skill points.
'What's her real identity?'
In the end, both hidden quests he had received from the Knight Commander were related to her.
Also, the quest that asked him to go and search for her was called a main quest.
It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that she was at the center of all incidents.
But even then, he didn't know her identity.
In the Evil's Seed Dungeon, he saw her as an angel.
She wasn't an Archangel but a Royal ranking Angel. Then how could she have such a big influence?
Also, if Louise was indeed an Angel, why was it that every time he got involved with her, his tendency got closer to the Abyss?
'I guess I'll discover the answer once I meet her.'
Even while moving away from that sector, Hyun's head was not easily unraveled.
