"Stolen"

"The Hall of Truth was robbed?"

Elvily quickly got a call from Iris and thought she'd misheard.

The Hall of Truth was a structure in the spiritual world. How could it be robbed?

"The library," Iris said.

At first, she hadn't understood either. It was only after the other person explained that she realized what had been "stolen" was books.

Books in the library couldn't be taken out of the Hall of Truth, but they could be "borrowed" from the library. If someone took a book and hid it in some inconspicuous corner of the Hall, then apart from him, basically no one would be able to find it.

This had happened a few times before, but most cases had been accidental, and the books were on the first or second floor. None of them were particularly important. Afterward, the Dawn Council had hired several librarians to work in shifts around the clock, and borrowers had to register their identities. There hadn't been any more mishaps—until today, when another book went missing.

And this time, it was on the third floor.

It should have been something to celebrate.

After all these years, someone had finally earned the statue's recognition and entered the sanctuary on the third floor.

He'd gone straight to the library, looking for the knowledge Lord Black had left behind, hoping to gain more new discoveries passed down from the Scholar Era and fill his mind to the brim—preferably until it overflowed. He had all the time in the world, so he could take as long as he needed to digest it.

But as he searched, he suddenly noticed that a few books were missing from one of the shelves. He kept looking and found a few more missing. Further in, an entire row was gone... When he reached the center of the library, he discovered that the most precious Book of Old Words, which should have been kept in a glass display case, had vanished without a trace.

Sean, who'd caught only snippets of the conversation over the phone, fell silent.

Were they talking about him?

"Is it possible they were never there in the first place?" Elvily asked.

No one knew what was on the third floor of the Hall of Truth or above. Perhaps those books on the third floor of the library had already gone missing back in the Scholar Era?

"That's possible," Iris said. "But apparently, he found footprints. Judging by the traces, they were less than a week old."

"Apparently?"

"Yes." Iris sounded helpless over the phone. "He's not easy to talk to. I heard about it from one of his students."

"Even you couldn't get through to him?" Elvily wasn't convinced.

Iris was the best at dealing with people in the Dawn Council. She was kind, beautiful, and spoke gently. And the name "Dawn Council" carried weight all by itself. Who would refuse to do Iris a favor?

"Sopea," Iris said.

Elvily fell silent.

Oh, Sopea. That made sense.

"That guy was already arrogant and cold. Now that he's made it to the third floor, I bet he'll be looking down his nose at us from now on," Iris grumbled.

Sean interjected curiously, "You can see footprints in the Void Arts Space?"

"Other people can't. He can," Elvily replied.

Sopea's mental power was incredibly strong. He knew a spell that let him see lingering traces of mental energy from a certain period of time. If Iris had heard correctly and Sopea had seen fresh footprints from within the past week, then the books on the third floor of the library had probably all been taken by whoever left them. That was a serious matter.

Sean ventured, "How serious?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Elvily said. "If he doesn't return the books, then every wizard who enters the third floor from now on will be missing some crucial knowledge."

That was it? Sean had thought there might be something he didn't know about, like some rule that said the library would collapse if books weren't returned within three days. He muttered, "Wouldn't everything be fine if he just returned them?"

"How do you know he'll return them?" Elvily asked.

Sean fell silent.

You tell me.

He couldn't answer that, but he could defend himself.

Sean countered, "Then how do you know he won't return them?"

"Because he's too low-key," Elvily said.

"Low-key" was putting it mildly. "Sneaky" would have been more accurate.

Some of it came down to women's intuition, but there was also logic behind it.

The Hall of Truth was a sacred place in the hearts of all wizards. Everyone wanted to enter the sanctuary. Even making it to the first floor proved one's potential. Compared with wizards who couldn't enter the sanctuary, those who could were automatically elevated in status. One could say that a wizard's standing in the Void Arts Space depended almost entirely on how many floors they could reach.

Until yesterday, the second floor had been the highest anyone could go.

Every wizard who could enter the second floor had Tier Four strength or higher, and they were all highly respected in the Void Arts Space.

Yet the person who took the Book of Old Words had entered the third floor, where no one in this era had ever set foot.

It was a unique honor.

A normal person would have been eager for everyone to know they'd done something momentous. But this person had kept quiet, not making a peep. A whole week had passed without a hint of news, and no one had seen him go up to the third floor. That meant he'd been deliberately avoiding the other wizards' eyes, not wanting anyone to discover him.

He seemed incredibly shady, no matter how you looked at it.

Elvily wasn't going to jump to the conclusion that this person was up to no good. But based on what she knew, he was probably not a good person.

Sean fell silent.

He really wanted to argue that keeping one's head down didn't necessarily mean someone was bad. He might just be a brother-in-law.

But after thinking about it, he let it go.

That assessment wasn't wrong, either. Judging by the things he'd done in the past, he really did seem to be a bad person.

Iris's voice came from the other end of the phone. "Hello? Hello? Are you two done talking? I'm still here."

Sean fell silent.

Elvily fell silent.

They'd accidentally forgotten they were still on the phone with Iris.

Sean's fault!

"Anyway, why don't you come over to the Void Arts Space first?" Iris said. "I still want to ask Sopea about the details."

"He won't do me a favor, but he'll surely listen to Miss Flame Crow."

"Flame Crow" was Elvily's title, like "Light Servant." Both represented Tier Five. Sopea was also a Tier Five wizard, known as the "Dream Weaver." To quote this annoying man, "Only someone else of Tier Five has the right to speak to me as an equal."

That alone showed just how arrogant Sopea was.

But there was nothing they could do. He was undeniably powerful.

Even without his entry into the sanctuary's third floor, few Tier Five wizards could beat Sopea in a fight. This master of dreams had terrifying personal combat prowess—so terrifying it was no exaggeration to call it monstrous. He could make his enemies fall into a dream without them realizing it, then crush them on a spiritual and mental level, leaving them without even knowing how they'd lost.

"Wait. What did you just call him?"

Sean asked, "Dream Weaver?"

"Yeah. What about it?" Iris said.

"I'll go with you."

He needed a wizard who practiced dream magic to help him remember his past more quickly.

"Sure," Iris replied at once, making her position clear.

She didn't mind Sean coming along, and she was sure Elvily wouldn't mind either.

But whether Sopea would mind, she had no idea.

And she had no idea whether the statue of Lord Black outside the sanctuary would mind, either.

"We're going to the Hall of Truth. Can you get in?"