"Most of those who chase after solving those mysteries end up becoming part of them."
Tuan said while looking at the scene in front of him with a hint of curiosity in his eyes. He thought of exploring the place a bit and immediately followed up on that thought. No matter how much he didn't wish to know about the place, he had to inspect his surroundings first.
Alephee used her soul sense again to scan the place. It was she who discovered the place and the way to enter it. She had told Tuan that the place was an anomaly created by the overlay of many spatial arrays and runes overlapping over one another.
It couldn't be found with mana sense because it would react with anything in spatial distortion. Since there was no way to find or scan it, it could not be fixed. Only something like a soul sense would allow the array master or someone who was in charge of isolating the space to detect this place.
'Hmm. Eren, you should check this out.'
Alephee said to Tuan before directing him towards a peculiar bookshelf that seemed all empty. Upon hearing his partner's instructions, Tuan didn't hesitate and destroyed the bookshelf with his fireball spell.
Katalina was stunned when Tuan suddenly started casting an offensive spell. But she didn't disturb him and instead thought of adopting the wait-and-watch approach. After all, he was the one who had found the place. That was enough of a reason for her to trust his antics like these.
When the huge bookshelf was destroyed and its debris was blasted elsewhere, it revealed another spatial distortion, this time on the ground on which the bookshelf was on. Now it looked like a mercury-like substance was serving as the base for the bookshelf that had stood at the same place for who knows when.
Tuan didn't hesitate and dipped his hands into the mercury-like substance. It was surprising to discover how quickly he sank into the ground without any opposition.
When he retrieved his arms, he was holding something in his hand. After retrieving it, he placed it on solid ground and dipped his hand inside the mercury-like surface only to take out another item of the same kind.
Tuan started retrieving a bunch of old books that couldn't be found by normal means.
Even Kat was stunned by his discovery. She was too stunned to react at first. But then she picked one of the retrieved books up and analyzed it with her mana sense.
"What is this junk, Tuan? This is unreadable."
Kat put her just-picked-up book down in disappointment, registering her displeasure. Then she picked another one before putting that down too.
'That's why academy education is so crucial.'
Tuan sighed and muttered in his head. But he didn't stop what he was doing and kept on retrieving more space from the spatial distortion.
When he finished, he had retrieved 24 books in total. Only then did he start picking up the books and checking them.
'Hmm. Same problem with the language. I'll need some time to decipher them. But it can be done. At least a portion of each book can be recovered.'
Tuan thought of decoding a single portion of each book whenever he had time to do so. This way, he could get a preview of the content each book would have. Then he could prioritize a particular book that might have the most relevant content for him.
"Um… maybe I'll find something about these books when we get out of the subspace. Don't bother with these findings too much. This was an unexpected gain, to be honest. Not the main reason why I had brought you here."
Tuan flashed his cheeky smile at Kat after he said that. The latter knew what he was talking about. Yet she decided to act clueless.
"Oh? What other reason might there be?"
Tuan stepped closer to her and brought his face closer to her before whispering into her ears.
"Why, of course… I brought you here so we could..."
Tuan paused for a moment and observed Kat's reactions. He chuckled when he saw some traces of excitement in her eyes before continuing.
"So we could fight in peace. Away from the spectators, far from any of the competitors. Away from the competition itself."
Kat had a blank expression on her face when Tuan voiced what he had in his mind. Now she regretted acting dumb. She could have avoided the whole tease. But her fake ignorance was now coming back to bite her in the rear.
Tuan understood what was going on in Kat's head at the time. Previously, he had only thought of teasing her. But now that he had proposed a duel, he genuinely wanted to test out his battle skills. Especially against a fellow close combat expert and see if he could learn a thing or two from them. Or polish his style by looking at how others from the same class as his fight.
Of course, Tuan wanted to get intimate with Kat as well. He was the one who had been provoking her about it during these days, making her crave intimacy. But the night was young. There was no need to rush.
Tuan pulled Kat into his embrace and caressed her back before continuing what he was saying.
"I know what you are thinking, Kat. But we have time for that. Meanwhile, why not prepare ourselves for tomorrow's event?
Two close combat experts battling with each other without using any weapons or spells. Only relying on their techniques to face each other.
How does that sound?"
Katalina found the idea to be logical after she thought about it. She returned Tuan's embrace with an embrace of her own before pulling away from him. She then stated what she had in mind.
"We can fight the way you want us to, Tuan. However, there is no room for pulling any punches. Is that okay?"
Katalina said smilingly and hammered her fist into her open palms. She seemed pumped to beat his ass for some reason. Tuan chuckled before answering.
"I'm just glad that you think I have enough leverage over you for me to hold back against you."
Tuan said with a mirthless smile on his face and shrugged his shoulders. Katalina smirked at Tuan's sentence before stepping away from her previous position. Tuan also did the same and looked at his opponent.
In the next moment, the two close combat experts were seen battling. They both had stopped using their mana circuits, making them fight like mortals. Without the use of the mana, spells, or weapons, the battle was solely carried out with the technique both of the rankers had.
The butcher was using the technique Marla had taught him in the timeline. But unlike the original, he was adding his own moves to it. He was creating his own style that could accommodate various types of weapons as well as weaponless fighting.
