In the dimly lit room, an ancient relic emitted a faint blue glow, casting images of a scene long lost to the tides of history. Dorothy gazed at the emerging city model before her—miniature in scale, yet unable to conceal its grand and majestic aura—and murmured softly.
“Land of Divine Revelation… Heopolis… So that’s the name of this city? Could the secret of advancing to the Gold rank of the Pure Reason Path be hidden here?”
She set the Signal Key down on the table and slowly began pacing around the room, observing the city model from various angles. From the First Dynasty, she had seen many ruins, most of them little more than scattered remnants and collapsed walls. This was her first time seeing a First Dynasty city in such magnificent and complete form, even if it was just a projected model.
“Heopolis… Called the Land of Divine Revelation. If I remember correctly, the people of the First Dynasty claimed to be recipients of the Heaven’s Arbiter’s divine enlightenment. They honored the Arbiter as the ‘Holy Mentor,’ and ‘Divine Revelation’ must’ve been a term of immense sacred weight to them. For a city to be granted such a name shows how important it must’ve been in the First Dynasty.
“In that case, Heopolis might have been the Sacred Land of the Heaven’s Arbiter—a sacred land-grade ritual site within the First Dynasty. So the secret of advancing to the Gold rank truly is hidden in a place this significant?”
As she pondered this while examining the city model, Dorothy eventually finished inspecting its details and turned to look at the Signal Key on the desk again. She then asked aloud.
“Where exactly is this city located?”
Right after she posed the question, the projected model of the city began to twist and deform, eventually transforming into a completely different image—a large, flat map replacing the previous three-dimensional projection.
With a single glance, Dorothy recognized it as a map of the North Ufiga region. On this map, a small area was circled and marked. Seeing this, Dorothy quickly recalled the appearance of the current standard map of the world and pinpointed the corresponding region.
“That location is… it seems to be called Busalet. It’s a neighboring country of Addus, and one of the major kingdoms of the North Ufiga region. It stands out quite clearly on the map. But other than that, I don’t have much information about it.
“According to what the Signal Key shows, this city called Heopolis is located somewhere deep in Busalet’s territory. But the marked region is still rather broad… it’s not precise enough…”
With that thought, Dorothy spoke again to the Signal Key.
“Can you provide a more precise mark? I’d like to know the city’s exact location on a more detailed, large-scale map.”
But this time, the Signal Key remained unchanged. The projected map stayed at its current wide scale, showing no signs of zooming in for greater detail. Seeing this, Dorothy furrowed her brow slightly.
“That’s it? The Signal Key can only display maps at this level of scale? Is this as fine as its resolution goes? That can’t be right… The Grand Library’s positioning accuracy is incredibly high. It could even locate the crystal inside Federico’s body with precision—surely it’s capable of pinpointing something better than this.
“If this is happening… then the issue probably isn’t with the artifact’s capability, but with its permission level. Could it be that the Signal Key doesn’t have the authorization to reveal a more detailed location for Heopolis? Or is something else at play here?”
Dorothy continued thinking. Based on the current projection from the Signal Key, she could only confirm the general region where Heopolis lay within Busalet. But within that region, its precise location remained uncertain. On the map, the marked zone looked like a small circle—but in real-world terms, it was a massive area. If she had to search blindly in person, it would take an immense amount of effort.
“Looks like I’ll have to do some digging once I get there…”
Staring at the map, Dorothy muttered to herself, then reached out to deactivate the Signal Key. After returning the artifact to her magic box, she sat back down in her chair.
Having now completed her preliminary review of the greatest reward from the operation against the Dark Gold Society, Dorothy began taking stock of her expenses—primarily her spirituality consumption.
Overall, her spirituality expenditure on this mission had been significant. The largest cost came from creating the Anecdotal Spirit Body of Thief K for Nephthys to inhabit. Thief K-Nephthys fought the Dark Gold Society in two rounds, and in the second round, she completely tied down their strongest member—Federico. The spiritual cost was considerable. Fortunately, Nephthys herself was able to contribute some of her own spirituality to maintain the spirit body, which saved Dorothy a fair bit.
Over the course of the entire fight, Dorothy expended 8 points of Shadow, 2 points of Silence, and more points of Revelation to maintain Thief K’s existence and abilities.
Aside from summoning Thief K, the next major cost came from firing the railguns. She fired two shots, one high-powered and one lower-powered—Crimson-rank and White Ash-rank respectively. Altogether, these used 9 points of Stone, plus additional Revelation points.
Other miscellaneous consumption included transferring Nephthys’s injuries during the fight, using the Dreamscale Censer to enter dreamform, etc. This totaled 1 point of Chalice, and 2 more points of Shadow.
Summing up everything, Dorothy’s current spirituality tally stood at 30 points of Chalice, 6 points of Stone, 14 points of Shadow, 19 points of Lantern, 18 points of Silence, and 46 points of Revelation.
“This consumption… seems kind of heavy. Even though I avoided a lot of unnecessary combat losses thanks to careful planning, the final tally still cost me a lot of spirituality. As expected, fighting a Crimson-rank while trying to save resources just isn’t realistic…
“This time against Federico, I mostly relied on the railgun and the spirit body, so it’s no surprise that Stone and Shadow got depleted so heavily. Stone, I can deal with—but to think that my Shadow, which used to be nearly full, is now this low. Anecdotal spirit bodies are powerful, but their consumption is really steep… I wonder how long I’ll have to wait before I can eat another moth…”
While analyzing her spirituality, Dorothy mulled over her thoughts. Once her review was complete, she took out her Literary Sea Logbook and placed it on the desk, flipping directly to Beverly’s correspondence page.
It was time to report the final outcome of the operation to the behind-the-scenes supporter of this mission.
“The operation was successful. Federico is dead.”
Dorothy wrote this plainly on the page. Soon after, the neatly printed font she was familiar with appeared on the paper.
“You’re done already? Huh, pretty fast. I thought it’d at least take until tomorrow. Given how tough a Aurum Gargoyle is, I didn’t expect you guys to wrap it up so quickly. Looks like I underestimated you.
“By the way, what happened to his base?”
“His base was buried by the collapse he triggered himself. His subordinates were all caught in it too. No survivors.”
Dorothy responded decisively. Beverly’s writing appeared again immediately.
“All buried, huh? Then I think I get a rough picture of what went down on your end. To kill a Crimson-rank Stone Beyonder even while they had home-field advantage—that’s some skill.
“Anyway, did you gather enough evidence to confirm your achievement?”
“Don’t worry about that. I have plenty of material proving that guy is six feet under. I’ll bring it to the nearest White Craftsmen’s Guild for validation—you can take your time checking it.”
Dorothy wrote, and Beverly quickly replied.
“Good. I’ll make arrangements on my end to receive the materials for verification. But based on your credibility, I already believe you’ve accomplished the goal. So we can handle the verification later.
“Right now, go ahead and tell me your request. As promised, since you successfully took out a Crimson-rank of the Dark Gold Society, you’ve earned a reward. What would you like?”
Beverly had previously promised Dorothy that if she managed to kill Federico, she could choose her own reward—be it a rare mystical item, a valuable mystical text, or even special privileges within the White Craftsmen’s Guild.
Staring at the reply on the page, Dorothy paused briefly. After a bit of thought, she picked up her pen and wrote:
“As for the reward… I haven’t decided yet. Can I save this opportunity for later? I’ll come to you when I’ve figured out what I need.”
Dorothy had nothing she urgently needed from the White Craftsmen’s Guild right now. But that might change in the future. Every time she went through an advancement ritual, she needed resources across all spirituality types—Black Earth was like that, White Ash was like that, and Crimson was too. It was safe to assume that Gold would be no different.
During her Crimson-rank advancement, Dorothy had already used a divine artifact—a resource of extreme rarity. Who knew what the Gold-rank ritual might demand? Although she hadn’t even obtained the method for advancing to Gold yet, she had to prepare early. She planned to reserve this favor until then, using it to ask the White Craftsmen’s Guild for help in fulfilling the Stone aspect of her Gold ritual.
Beverly replied.
“You want to save it for later, huh… Sure, that’s fine. Once we verify it, your reward will be locked in. You can claim it anytime.”
Reading that, Dorothy nodded slightly and continued writing.
“Good. In that case, I’ll trouble you to record it down.”
After finishing this sentence, Dorothy paused in thought again, then added.
“By the way, while I’ve got you—do you know anything about a place called Busalet?”
She asked, and not long after, Beverly’s reply appeared once more.
“Busalet? You’re interested in that kind of place now? I don’t know a ton about it—just bits I’ve heard. Strictly speaking, you can’t really call it a country. It’s a region.”
“Not a country? Why?”
Dorothy wrote again with a hint of confusion. Beverly soon explained.
“Because the Kingdom of Busalet fell long ago—over a decade ago, actually.”
“It collapsed… Was it another rebellion? Like what happened in Addus?”
“Not quite. Rather than falling to a rebellion, it’s more accurate to say Busalet disintegrated naturally, according to its own historical cycle.
“Even in the North Ufiga region, Busalet has always been extremely remote—basically outside the Church’s sphere of influence. Unlike Addus, which maintained a relatively stable dynasty for centuries, Busalet has never had lasting order. For the past thousand years, it’s been a chaotic land filled with countless competing powers.
“Conflict and warfare are the norm there.”
Beverly’s writing continued to flow.
“I can only offer a general classification. The region’s most numerous inhabitants are its native desert tribes. These tribes are split into countless alliances, constantly at war with one another.
“In addition to the tribes, you’ve got North Ufiga’s typical treasure-hunting societies and desert bandits operating there frequently. Since there’s no law or order, they’re even more rampant than elsewhere in the region.
“On top of that, there are military forces stationed by nearby nations, supposedly to protect their merchant caravans. The Savior’s Advent Sect has also become very active in the area, preaching openly in a bid to expand their influence.
“The southern Longevity Church—the Afterbirth Cult's offshoot—has extended its reach there too. The mainline Church has been assigning more of its own personnel to the area over the past few years.”
“In short, Busalet’s situation has always been messy—chaotic and complex. Wars are common. Most of the factions there can’t suppress one another for long. Even if one group manages to forcibly unify the region on the surface, it usually falls apart not long after.
“It’s been over ten years since the last so-called ‘king’ of Busalet was overthrown.”