Chapter 1025: Web of Ploys
After Helena, Annette and Vida arrived as well. They expressed equal shock to suddenly see Raven cradling Northern.
But they had little time to linger and catch up. They had to move—and move fast. Northern had managed to explain to Annette, to a reasonable extent, how the whole of Central Plains was in danger, and Annette herself connected that to what she had been investigating.
Apparently, Raven was also able to confirm some unlikely event unfolding in the Stelia. And she believed the disappearance of Terence was connected to all of it.
The descent of Kryos and the disappearance of Terence—they were deeply intertwined.
Right there in the center of the ravaged landscape, where the battle between Northern and Rughsbourgh had scarred the earth, they sat and planned.
Annette shared what she knew.
She had been investigating this matter the longest; after all, she was the one most affected by it.
Annette used to be a very renowned Drifter. Unlike most in her family, though, she wasn’t a skilled forger, so many in her family didn’t value her as much.
But her control over fire was astonishing, so it was impossible to really dismiss her. She was cared for and respected nonetheless as a member of the family.
The Isha’r family was a renowned family that wielded fire in their souls. They were one of the very first families that discovered another branch of soul essence, called Flame essence.
And were stronger than any other. They were the most formidable forgers not just in Central Plains but arguably in the entirety of Tra-el.
Of course, they were also one of the Vassal families of the Reimgard Empire and were bound by duty to forge weapons only for the empire.
Of course, that alone was more than enough for them to amass riches. However, it also kept them shackled within the confines of the Empire. Annette was not a forger—she was a fighter—and as she grew up, the need to enter more rifts intensified, and she made a difficult decision that her family opposed.
It was forbidden for her to leave the Empire; it was forbidden for any member of the Isha’r family to leave the confines of the Reimgard Empire, whether they were forgers or not.
It was a rule to protect the secret art of forging that the family owned. Annette didn’t know the art and definitely wouldn’t leak it, but no one paid any attention to that.
Rules were rules, and because of that rule, she was barred from going to the outside world. Her growth was getting stunted.
That was when she met Rughsbourgh and Gilbert and also Felix. He was merely a brief moment in her story and had been a student of the Academy in his last year—Rughsbourgh’s aide, as a matter of fact.
Felix was an extremely intelligent non-combat drifter; he had a utility-type talent and was quite the fragile boy. But he was a repository of knowledge. He had the ability to create books and write information there.
So he usually followed Rughsbourgh as a scribe, documenting a lot of things. This exposed him to an inevitable truth about everything.
These truths began to make Felix question everything.
With Rughsbourgh and Gilbert’s help, Annette was able to leave Reimgard and became a drifter. Her growth was astonishing, and her relationship with Gilbert and Felix deepened as they challenged rifts together.
Felix was always there to note things about the monsters and resources and give reports back to Rughsbourgh, while she and others were always protecting him.
But there was something strange. The rifts Rughsbourgh usually sent them to were usually specific and dangerous.
But Annette never found out until she entered a tier IV rift. She expected the same level of difficulty as the one she had once challenged on Rughsbourgh’s orders; however, it was easy—so easy that she believed only she could have cleared it.
Out of curiosity, she began to venture into rifts without Rughsbourgh’s knowledge and soon discovered that a lot of rifts that emerge in the world are not as frightening as the ones Rughsbourgh would send them to.
Why?
This question burned in her mind no matter how much she tried to suppress it. Eventually she gave in and spoke to Felix about her confusion and questions.
This question of hers made her realize that Felix had been in a state of perpetual doubt for a long time. In fact, he had gone far deeper in questioning Rughsbourgh’s actions than she had.
Their questions and investigations grew more dangerous. Eventually they were unable to keep hiding it. Things became suspicious.
This ultimately led to Rughsbourgh sending them to a rift that they were unable to protect Felix in. It led to his death and Annette’s trauma about rifts—she stopped challenging rifts and her growth as Master was halted.
Eventually this led her to the Public Citadel under Gilbert’s jurisdiction and where she also met Northern.
Taking a short journey down that memory lane was harrowing for her.
Helena exhaled.
"So you’re saying this entire island, the academy itself... could have been just a plot to bring back some Chaos Prince?"
Annette interjected.
"Not just the Chaos Prince... I believe there are interwoven schemes in the creation of this island, from Milhwa to Professor Heimburger. Everything is interconnected somehow, but so strangely woven together—not intentionally, of course."
Raven was silent. Annette had explained a lot of things to them, and it had all sounded like she just dropped a mind bomb on them all.
It was harrowing, first and foremost, that an entire island was constructed to hide the existence of a corpse that should not exist.
Milhwa, according to Annette, would have been the one who most likely found the macabre corpse and also discovered the hack to Chaos essence.
She brushed her hand through her hair.
"This all started with Milhwa, but it also compels us to ask the question: how did such a powerful dead body get to this place? Rifts have told us about Tyrants and Origins, and to an extent we are knowledgeable that they exist beyond our world. How did a Tyrant die on Tra-el and not a single document of history speaks about it?"
"Lady Raven is right. If it was in a rift, it would be understandable. But it was not. Something is wrong—we are all missing something here."
Vida added.
Helena sighed.
"As right as we all are, that is not the way forward. Right now, we know for certain that Milhwa is not dead. Professor Heimburger is trying to bring back a Tyrant, and Koll is trying to bring back an Origin—all of which are using each other without each other realizing."
She paused for a moment and asked.
"Now, how do we disrupt all of it?"