Having figured out the key issue, Lin Chuan naturally had no intention of persuading Klein to take the Moretti Family out of Tingen and settle somewhere like Winter County.
He floated beside the coal stove, his translucent outline glowing faintly in the firelight. He looked considerably more relaxed than before.
After a little thought, he decided to answer Klein's earlier question first: what exactly was going on with the Antigonus Family Notebook?
Of course, he would leave out Ince Zangwill's behind-the-scenes schemes using 008 for now, along with the deal between the Evernight Goddess and Adam, and the secrets surrounding Death's Descendant and the Uniqueness...
All of that was still far beyond the current Klein. Things had to be taken step by step, just like playing a game: clear the stage in front of you first.
Lin Chuan brushed those tangled thoughts aside and spoke casually.
"Since you read the diary, you should remember that line in it, right?"
Klein picked up his glass and took a sip of water. "Which line?"
"That one." Lin Chuan tipped his chin toward the notebook. "The Antigonus Family held a prominent position in the Solomon Empire."
Klein paused, then followed his lead with a guess. "So this notebook is connected to the Solomon Empire of the Fourth Epoch?"
Lin Chuan neither confirmed nor denied it. He merely adjusted his floating posture slightly and spoke in a reminiscing tone.
"The Antigonus Family was indeed a prominent noble family in the Solomon Empire, but they weren't truly among the great noble houses."
"Back then, the Zoroast Family, the Abraham Family, and the Zaratul Family were the empire's real pillars. As for the Antigonus Family... they were second- or third-rate at best."
He paused, a hint of the pleasure of sharing gossip entering his voice.
"It wasn't until they switched sides and supported the Blood Emperor Tudor in establishing a new dynasty that they joined the ranks of the great noble houses and became a pillar of the empire."
Klein listened quietly, committing the names Zoroast, Abraham, and Zaratul to memory one by one.
He quickly weighed the implications. A single notebook left behind by the merely "second- or third-rate" Antigonus Family had been enough to make Welch and Naya commit suicide under bizarre circumstances. Just how dangerous would those truly great noble houses be?
He silently resolved that if he ever heard those names again, he would never charge in alone when he could call for help, never look back when he could run, and never approach when he could keep his distance.
As though he had seen through Klein's thoughts, Lin Chuan continued, "There's something else most people don't know."
"The Antigonus Family's history actually goes back further than the Fourth Epoch. Its earliest origins can even be traced to the beginning of the Third Epoch, at the end of the Second Epoch."
"Because their ancestor, Antigonus himself, was the son of Flegrea, the Annihilation Demonic Wolf, an Ancient God from the Dawn of Fire Era in the Second Epoch."
The room fell silent for about two seconds. The flames in the coal stove flickered, and the firewood gave a faint crackle.
"Ah," Klein uttered.
"...What did you say?"
"I said the Antigonus Family's ancestor was the Annihilation Demonic Wolf's son."
Lin Chuan repeated it with perfect clarity, even adding a touch of considerate Surely you heard that this time. "So strictly speaking, this family belonged to the descendants of Ancient Gods. Not only did they have a formidable background, but none of them were human."
Klein froze for a moment. He truly hadn't expected nonhuman families among the great noble houses of a Fourth Epoch empire.
"But what does that have to do with the notebook itself?"
He quickly recovered and asked the central question. "Even if their ancestor was an Ancient God, that was already a thing of the Third Epoch. How could a notebook passed down to the present still be so dangerous?"
"Why couldn't it?"
Lin Chuan countered, his tone matter-of-fact. "You think that after several thousand years, anything supernatural about the notebook should have dissipated?"
Klein said nothing, but his face plainly read, Shouldn't it have?
Understanding his expression, Lin Chuan couldn't help chuckling. "If it were just an ordinary notebook, then even if some Beyonder ability had been fixed onto it, it really should have dissipated by now-unless a true god had personally blessed it."
"But from what we can tell, it probably isn't."
"Then what is it?"
"I believe it's a genuine Beyonder Item."
Klein's brow furrowed slightly. From the name, it sounded like an item with a sealed Beyonder ability, but since Lin Chuan had deliberately made that distinction, there had to be more to it.
Seeing his confusion, Lin Chuan patiently explained in detail. "Beginners often confuse 'Beyonder Items' with 'items with a sealed Beyonder ability.' But there's a fundamental difference between them: where exactly the power inside comes from."
He extended a translucent finger and casually drew a circle in the air, purely to make the explanation feel a little more like a demonstration.
"The first kind is what you'll most often find on the Beyonder market. They might be mass-produced by a church, or made by Beyonders of certain pathways."
"They're usually created through ritual magic or spiritual materials, with runes engraved on them. Their defining feature is that their spirituality drains away over time. Essentially, they're consumables."
"That's the kind you were thinking of. Better ones can last two or three years. Worse ones become useless after a few months, or even a few days."
Klein nodded. "What about the second kind?"
"The second kind is what truly qualifies as a Beyonder Item."
Lin Chuan's tone grew more serious. "Before I explain that, I need to teach you a basic fact about the Beyonder world. Or rather, a law."
"Is it like the sort of 'basic knowledge' you mentioned earlier?" Klein asked skeptically.
"Hmm... no, this one really should count as basic knowledge. Beyonder teams belonging to the churches, like the Nighthawks or the Machinery Hivemind, all teach it."
Lin Chuan thought for a moment, then looked Klein in the eye. "This law is called the law of indestructibility of Beyonder characteristic."
"Beyonder characteristics cannot be destroyed or diminished. They can only transfer from one vessel to another."
Klein's gaze shifted, and he immediately seized on the crucial point.
"So a genuine Beyonder Item actually holds a Beyonder characteristic? Or is made from one?"
"Bingo. Exactly right."
Lin Chuan snapped his fingers, though no sound came out. "For example, take the Spectator sequence you learned about at the last Tarot Club gathering."
"If a Sequence 9 Spectator dies, a Spectator Beyonder characteristic will separate from his body.
"If that characteristic isn't stored properly, it will automatically fuse with a nearby object, such as the deceased's clothing."
"So"
"that piece of clothing becomes a genuine Beyonder Item, allowing whoever wears it to gain the same abilities as a Spectator, such as exceptional mental strength and keen powers of observation.
"And those abilities won't expire with time. Even after ten thousand years, they'll still work just as well."
Before you continue