"I see… So, my mother was…" Noel pinched the bridge of his nose, never thinking it would be the case. He had expected that the demon king might be involved because this was the only reason why he had to restart the time.
However, he never thought that the reason why he got acknowledged by Ardagan, as well as the fact he had to endure all the hardship, was because of it.
It was truly an amazing story to know what happened to his ancestors, but more importantly, this story allowed Noel to change the way he thought.
"What do you think we should do now?" Anna asked.
"After listening to the story, I have a few questions for you." Noel paused for a moment, reorganizing his words. It was clear that he was shaken by the story and felt a connection with it.
"I will do my best to answer." Anna nodded with a solemn expression.
"First of all, Livia and Tristan are not ready yet, so it's not possible to speed up the progress on the Rune Body. However, with the story you told me earlier, what if we change our strategy? Instead of letting them do it, we would supply the soldiers with some runes ourselves."
"Huh? You're not talking about Rune Body, right?"
"I'm talking about Rune Spell."
Anna contemplated. It seemed that Noel wanted to change his plan from Rune Body to Rune Spell. It was a good method to train his students and also cost less since they gathered the rest of the materials by themselves. Only after both of them were ready for Rune Body would they begin. "I don't think there is a problem. In fact, in the previous life, you've utilized everything. I don't know which one came out first though."
Anna was implying that he actually used the equipment that had been embedded with runes, utilized the Rune Engineering to change the movement, created Rune Spell for convenience and painted the Rune Body for improvement.
After getting the confirmation, Noel said, "Rune Enhancement will still be Roel's specialty, so I'll let him handle it. Rune Spell and Rune Body will be prepared by Tristan and Livia. The problem would be Rune Engineering… I'm wondering if there is someone revolutionary that could research these ideas."
"What do you mean?" Anna tilted her head in confusion.
"I mean, how about using Enhance Forward Rune in a carriage? Won't it make the carriage move forward without a horse? What if we apply that concept to other items? It can improve various aspects, including the military."
"!!!" Anna suddenly fell silent, imagining the Rune Engineering. What if they used the Enhance Forward on a big boulder? Wouldn't they be able to create a mobile catapult without even the tower itself?
"What do you think?" Noel asked for confirmation.
"I think that is good. I have seen multiple of them. Should I list them all?"
"You can do it later." Noel nodded. "So, who is that person?"
"Actually, I don't think there is a person for that. I've known Howard and the others in the past, but I don't think I've seen anyone working behind the scenes."
"I see." It seemed that getting the clue about this person was harder than he originally thought. Considering the impact of that work, it was normal if Noel actually protected the secret.
However, Anna had a different opinion. "How about I take part in that research? Since I know about runes and have a memory of my past life, I think I will be suitable… at least for the first step. Once the replacement comes, I will leave that spot."
"That's not a bad idea." Noel agreed, but there was one problem. "How about the soldiers?"
"I will be going with them during the day and take care of the other one during the night. It should be fine, right?"
"But what about your own improvement?"
"It's fine for the time being. I don't have any problem until I reach the peak Grandmaster or even Transcendence since I have the memory and experience. All I need is the Demon Crystals to speed up the progress." Anna assured him.
Noel was slightly concerned about it, but there weren't many options he could choose at the moment. Anna would be extremely exhausted after all this while he only handled all this paperwork. He promised in his heart that he would at least take care of her later.
"Alright. Then, move on to the second question. With that story, do you think that I only have the river, the outpost, and the mine as trump cards?"
"Well, you actually had a lot of trump cards, but it was after you developed the territory a bit more since they were located south of this place. As for the ones around this city…" Anna looked down for a moment before saying, "Can you come up with an idea after listening to the story? I mean, what would the War Maiden do in this case?"
"The War Maiden…" Noel fell silent. In the past, they had been defeated because of a simple trick, so he should prepare something to counter it. "I will think about it later. But I believe…"
Noel abruptly pointed at her, specifically her finger.
"What? Is there something wrong with my hand?" When Anna looked at her fingers, she suddenly noticed the blinking light coming from the ring. "Ah?! You're going to use this to send a message?"
"Yes. But I will think about the details later. This is just one of them… And I have to check the rune knowledge again to see if I can utilize it to communicate or something."
"Understandable."
"Then, the third question is that… What do you think about Old Ru?"
"Huh?" Anna didn't know why Noel mentioned him all of a sudden.
"I'm talking about the fact that he is willing to teach me, not us. Why would he do so?"
"Why would he do so? But we're talking about… wait, the story?" Anna seemed to come to a realization. "Now that I think about it, the Ardagan Family's territory should be far north, close to the demihuman kingdom. The mountain was split and turned into a canyon… Don't tell me…"
"Yes. I'm thinking about that." Noel nodded. "When we came to him in this life, he already understood everything from the past life, right? But what about the previous life? How did I convince him?"
"It's not that you convinced him, but he already knew the truth!" Anna gasped.
"Exactly! He knew that I was an Ardagan and understood the story as well as the relationship between the Ardagan and the demihuman kingdom. In that tragedy, my ancestor fell for that trick because he was trying to reinforce the demihuman kingdom, right?"
Anna's face became solemn. "It seems that we need to visit the demihuman kingdom… No, Old Ru first."
"That's how it is. At the very least, we will have to defeat the first attack before being able to leave this territory." Noel nodded in agreement.
She never thought about this detail after listening to the story. As expected, it would be good to talk about it with Noel.
"Last question. I know that you are going to be tired after all these tasks, but I think I need to push you a bit further. In the past, my ancestor lost his wife due to the fact that there was only one brain in the family, right? While you were not a fool, you were still lacking compared to me. So, I wanted to ask you… are you willing to train with me? I will be imparting all my thoughts and my ways of strategy."
Anna almost forgot that she was similar to Alex Ardagan. She had overwhelming strength, but her brain wasn't enough to rival Noel. The latter was like Margaretha, slightly weaker than her, but had the ability to see through schemes.
If this continued, history would just repeat itself. That was why Noel wanted them to be equal so that they didn't need to tell each other about the strategy, and they already knew what to do. They were going to surpass their ancestors.
"Fine by me. Don't you dare to collapse from exhaustion before me." Anna smirked.
"Of course." Noel nodded before looking at Ardagan, asking inwardly, 'I know that I can't ask you much about my ancestor. However, I think it should be fine if I ask this, right… Can you compare me to my ancestor? I want to see the gap between me and him.'
Ardagan surprisingly replied with a few missions.
[Mission: Everchanging Emotion Sword Style.]
[Description: You have long past the basics, so it's time to begin mastering everything, taking it to a whole different level.]
[Reward: One with the Sword Medal and 50 SP.]
[Mission: Rune Master.]
[Description: Become a proper Rune Knight and master the combat with runes.]
[Reward: Rune Master Medal and 10 Random Intermediate Runes.]
[Mission: One With Spirit.]
[Description: Incorporate the elements in everything (Sword, Technique, and Rune)]
[Reward: Elemental Medal and 2 Elemental Abilities.]
[Mission: ???]
[Description: ???]
[Reward: Third Slot Medal.]
"!!!" Noel couldn't help but gasp when he received these four missions. While Ardagan didn't say anything about the ancestor or compare it, the missions had indirectly shown him the gap.
"What's wrong? You're doing something with your system again?"
"Yeah. I've just got a few missions." Noel shared the four missions with her, wanting to know her thoughts.
"Now that I think about it, you haven't mastered your Everlasting Sword… You might have been so distracted with spirit abilities and runes that you haven't pursued this path." Anna nodded in agreement. Ardagan was absolutely correct.
"I think I have a perfect person for that." Noel smirked.
"Me? No, wait… Are you insane, Noel?" Anna's eyebrows twitched. "You're not going to involve the Sword Arbiter, right?"
"Haha. Of course. The situation is pretty heated right now, but if we wait for a bit, I can actually invite the Sword Arbiter in one way or another."
"While the Sword Arbiter is not bothered with the politics, he might cut you down in case something goes wrong, you know."
"So, you're going to let yourself become a widow?"
"As expected, you want me to go with you." Anna sighed.
"You don't want to? It's rare to fight the number one sword user, you know."
"Well, I also want to test my ability against him, so I guess it's fine. But we're going to train even harder since we can't lose without a proper fight."
"Obviously."
Anna then took a look at the other missions. "What about this Rune Knight?"
"I have the mission way back, but I have almost forgotten about it. I guess it's time to become a Rune Knight and continue the path through this mission. Though, I might need to farm some honor points to buy everything."
"I don't have any problems with that. Runes are going to dominate the entire world… that's what I know." Anna then pointed at the elemental ability. "Now that I think about it, the element can also be imbued with runes. While it doesn't necessarily make it stronger, it can change its purpose. What if the rune arrow is infused by the element? It will create a blaze instead of an explosion upon impact. But it takes skill to do it. In the past, I didn't learn it since it took too much time."
"We would train together with this."
"As for the last mission, I don't know much about it. You should be the one thinking about it." Anna shrugged. "In that case, let's prepare for the mission… I think we need a map. Although this territory is near the border, there are a few villages and even one city in the south, so you should go there. Let me grab the map first."
While Anna was searching for the map, Noel's face turned solemn. The gap between him and his ancestor was extremely big, and he was running out of time.
But after all that seriousness, Noel actually asked in an innocent tone. "By the way, Anna…"
"Mhmm? What's wrong?" Anna asked while searching for the map.
"Should we get married now?"
Rumble!
Rumble!
Rumble!
After that question, Anna dropped a few papers and scrolls from her hand while looking at Noel in complete shock. "Ma—what?!"
