"It seems we underestimated the professor. I didn’t think he’d be able to convince Zovirru to give him the Antique."
"But you know the professor. He will stop at nothing to get what he wants."
"Shall we start probing for the Antique?"
The person sitting at the very center of the table nodded. "We already have a few of our operatives in New Sparta for defense, but we can spare a few of them for the Antique investigation.."
"A wise decision."
As the members of the table began making decisions, there was just one person completely left out of the conversation.
Katarina held on to her father’s body. "I’ll go back to New Sparta and help with the investigation," she said.
But the others from the table clearly didn’t like that. "Katarina, your efforts will be more appreciated in the front lines. You know how much we are in great need of strong warriors. Without you, there will be more unnecessary casualties on the battleground."
Katarina’s attention was pulled towards the map in the table. As of right now, there were multiple territories on there which had two conflicting colors clashing against each other.
On one side was the color green–representing the territory that their organization had full control over–while the other side was colored red, for the territories that their enemy had captured.
Even now, the map was ever changing. There were regions where it was a constant push and pull against the other side, capturing more territories but losing them just a day later.
With Katarina’s Nascent Spirit cultivation, she could single-handedly push some boundaries and expand their territory much further than it already was, saving lives in the process.
Usually, Katarina wouldn’t hesitate to throw herself into the battlefield.
But now, her focus was completely on her father. Even though he was crazy, even though he was absent for most of her life, he was still her father. And she would do anything she can to help him survive this.
"I need to go to New Sparta," she insisted.
"We have it all covered on that front," replied the vague voice. "But we will convene with you once we have the Antique on our hands."
Katarina shook her head. "I think you’re wrong."
"Excuse me?"
"You’re focusing on the wrong thing. I do not think that it was the Antique that caused the failsafe on my father," she said confidently.
The rest of the figures on the table were silent for a second, but it was clear they disagreed based on the looks on their faces.
"There is no other explanation. What else could it be?"
"The Antique is the only piece of relic that has enough impact in the world to cause such an intense reaction from the professor. Are you telling me that there could be something else that’s the same in New Sparta?"
Katarina pursed her lips. Of course, she wasn’t sure. It was just a hunch based on her instincts.
"I didn’t see the Antique. It wasn’t with him," she said.
If it was really the Antique that caused his failsafe, then it should have been with him when he fell unconscious. He should have been in the middle of studying it, trying to decipher it, before he stumbled upon an answer that was too much for his mortal brain to comprehend.
But it wasn’t there. So, the only logical answer must be that it was something else that caused it.
Once she reasoned this with the other members of the table, they began to finally understand her thoughts.
"That is a possibility... but do you really need to investigate it yourself? Can’t you leave it for others?"
But Katarina was adamant. "I need to do this. No one else can."
Eventually, a sigh echoed in the room as the figure sitting in the center of the table finally agreed. "Fine. We all know we can do nothing to stop you."
Katarina nodded to herself, her eyes determined.
"I already have a course of action," she said.
The other members were surprised. "You have a lead already?"
She nodded. "Before I left New Sparta, I did a little bit of digging into what my father has been doing for the last few days... and I found something interesting. He seemed to have picked up a protege of his own."
Upon saying those words, a few chuckles emanated out of the room. Even the figures in the table couldn’t help but express their doubts upon hearing it.
"A protege? Forgive my language, but that crazy old man having a protege?"
The thought sounded absurd to anyone who knew Professor Lichtenstein for even a little bit.
The man was obsessed with finding out the truth about the mysteries of the world. He cared about nothing else. In fact, even his own daughter would attest to that given how much he missed her childhood due to his little escapades.
As for students, the professor had none even after all these years. His criteria was too strict. He considered anyone who was even just a slight bit of lesser intelligence than he was to be an idiot.
The organization had tried multiple times to have someone become the professor’s protege, each one having incredible intelligence and interest in history. Yet he still rejected all of them.
He said that he would rather do everything by himself, which was what led him to make the extremely rash decision of putting a GodForge piece in his brain.
"You must have heard wrong, Katarina. The professor would never take on a student. You of all people know that."
Katarina subtly bit her lips. "I checked it myself. There were numerous testimonies of the professor walking with someone he introduced to be his protege."
Everyone went wide-eyed. "He introduced them himself?!"
"I wouldn’t have believed it otherwise," Katarina answered. "His name is Keo, and sources say that he is a child about thirteen years old with golden blonde hair."
People began to check their own databases for a boy named Keo with the same exact description as Katarina said. Unfortunately, they came up with nothing.
"Does he even exist?" the vague figure asked her.
Katarina nodded, her mind reeling back to the time she met him.
"Yes. I’ve seen him myself," she said. "I will go back to New Sparta and investigate him. He was with the professor during his failsafe. Only he knows what happened."
When she first met him, she didn’t think he was anything special. She just thought that he happened to come across the professor by accident.
But then, she found out that he was Keo, the professor’s protege.
And suddenly, everything made sense. She knew that there was something different about him. She still couldn’t explain that move of his, how he was able to move just as fast as her despite being only in the Body Formation realm.
It was clear to her that Keo had secrets of his own. And perhaps, that was the reason why the professor took him in as his protege in the first place.
So she decided to seek him out. She was going to interact with him and see if he could tell her anything about what caused the professor’s failsafe.