Olivia put down the bone china teacup, bent down, and rummaged through the pile of books casually stacked beside the table leg for a while. Finally, she pulled out a thick book with a blue leather cover from within.
When she picked it up and placed it on the dining table, one could still clearly feel the tremor brought by the hefty book.
She opened the cover, casually flipped through a few pages, her pale silver eyes quickly scanning the pages.
A silver tray hopped over, delivering a small cake decorated with strawberries. Chen Yu swallowed it in one gulp, his round, plump body rippling with satisfaction, and he didn't forget to ask, "What are you looking for?"
"Castle operation logs." Olivia's slender fingers traced the yellowed pages as she answered without looking up.
"A little one is managing this castle. Almost every clock day, it records the castle's daily operational status—such as energy consumption, spatial stability, visitor logs, garden plant growth status, and so on—in detail in this log..."
Halfway through her words, Olivia narrowed her eyes, seemingly finding it a bit hard to see the tiny characters on the page. She reached out and picked up a pair of exquisitely crafted silver-framed glasses from the top of the book pile and put them on.
The lenses of the glasses were very thin, the frames slender, adorned with tiny sapphires, adding an intellectual air to her.
She adjusted her glasses, her gaze returning to the page. Her fingers quickly flipped through, the paper making a soft "rustling" sound. Finally, her movements stopped at a certain spot in the middle of the page.
"This year is Clock Calendar 1470, a difference of 47 years... It seems my memory is quite good, I didn't remember wrong." She seemed particularly satisfied with this, nodding slightly.
Hmm... Do dragons get dementia?
He instinctively asked, "I heard dragons have very long lifespans?"
"That is indeed true..."
Olivia pushed the silver-framed glasses on the bridge of her nose, then suddenly tilted her head, revealing a puzzled expression, muttering to herself, "Speaking of which, how long have I lived? Six hundred years, or seven hundred... I can't quite remember clearly."
Chen Yu silently said nothing. Being able to live this long, memory blurriness was probably the most trivial among her many little quirks. At least she didn't have dementia.
However, Viola and Count Bran also seemed to have lived for a very long time. In this world filled with magic and miracles, longevity wasn't such a rare thing.
Perhaps in the eyes of dragons, Olivia at six or seven hundred years old was still just a young woman in the prime of her youth.
Immediately after, Chen Yu hopped and jumped onto the dining table, his round, plump body facing her. "So, what is your purpose?"
"What purpose?" Olivia was very interested in his topic, or rather, she was interested in chatting and conversation itself.
After all, even for a dragon, staying alone in a castle for decades with no one to talk to would be quite a boring thing.
Even if the one conversing with her was just a slime, it didn't hinder her interest in chatting in the slightest.
Moreover, this slime was especially interesting.
"Of course, the purpose of tearing open planar rifts and attracting creatures from the Prime Material Plane to come here." Chen Yu directly pointed it out.
Olivia closed the log in her hand, her pale silver eyes looking at Chen Yu through the lenses, and she gently shook her head. "Your little Majesty has misunderstood. I have no authority to interfere with this castle's operation."
"It's just that some of this castle's core magic formations occasionally need to replenish fuel. Opening the rifts is merely to draw mana and arcane energy from the Prime Material Plane."
"I just happened to be traveling with the castle's lady and arrived here."
In other words, the castle's caretaker was someone else, not an artifact spirit, not a castle elf. Chen Yu understood clearly.
Olivia took a small sip of the flower tea in her cup, which was at just the right temperature, and continued, "This is a naive and pure soul. It almost only displays professional competence in specialized matters, such as maintaining castle operations and recording logs. The rest of the time, it hardly pays attention to outsiders."
"Over so many years, I've communicated with this little one countless times, but the conversation usually doesn't exceed one or two sentences. If you want to pry more information about it from me, you'll be disappointed."
"However..." She changed the subject, her gaze falling on Chen Yu's emerald green gel body. "Possessing the same power, you should have come for the master who built this castle, right?"
"You've seen him?" Chen Yu's heart stirred.
Olivia shook her head again. "No, I haven't seen him, but my grandmother's grandmother did meet him. I heard that at that time, the human empire hadn't yet collapsed, and they maintained a... well, ambiguous relationship for a while."
"Only later, that man disappeared, vanished without a trace. Any divination spells or divine magic couldn't find the slightest trace of him, as if he had completely left this material plane."
"You came here to help your great-grandmother find her lover?" Chen Yu blinked. He felt he was sniffing out the sour stench of love-hate entanglement.
Olivia gave him a glare. This action made her look even more like an ordinary human girl.
"Dragons just have long lifespans; it's not like we don't die. That past affair has long since returned to the embrace of sky and earth with her old self. I only learned about it in recent years."
"As for why I came here... I think you probably wouldn't be interested in a dragon's family trivialities. But our purposes are, to some extent, the same—both to find the master of this castle, or rather, to explore the traces and secrets he left behind."
"But unfortunately, as you can see, he hasn't returned to this castle up to the present."
Although what Olivia said was almost like saying nothing, Chen Yu still obtained quite a bit of useful information.
Olivia's great-grandmother's romance was at least a thousand years ago now, and she was still certain that the Golden Core great master was alive and might return to the castle.
This far exceeded the lifespan range of a Golden Core stage cultivator. This senior who came from Xu Xuan Heaven, his story might be even more legendary than Chen Yu imagined.
After all, he was an alchemist capable of creating alchemical objects that attracted gods to fight over them. The shackles of lifespan might have long ceased to be a problem for him.
He pondered for a long time before asking again, "How can I directly converse with this castle's elf?"
Those complicated operation logs were just piled up here, who knows how many times Olivia had looked through them.
She didn't mention any clues in the logs, so there probably wasn't any useful information to be found there. Directly conversing with the castle's caretaker elf was the most efficient way to obtain information.
"You wait a moment..."
Olivia rummaged through the pile of books stacked like a mountain beside her for a while before pulling out an ancient-looking small booklet.
She opened the booklet and laid it flat on the tabletop so Chen Yu could read it.
"Silver Sparrow, that's what I call her. As for her real name..." Olivia pointed with her slender finger at the mysterious runic signature at the bottom of the page.
"Yin Que?" Chen Yu discovered this was actually written in the ancient language of Xu Xuan Heaven. Although different from current calligraphy, it was from the same lineage. Even with slight differences, a cultivator a thousand years later could easily recognize it.
Hearing the strange yet familiar syllables coming from his mouth, Olivia was first stunned, then the corners of her mouth curled into a knowing smile.
"This booklet was something I picked up in an inconspicuous corner of the castle library. It might be helpful to you."
The language of his homeland—he was all too familiar with that.
Chen Yu thanked her and immediately enveloped the booklet with his divine sense, starting to quickly flip through it.
Strangely, most of the pages inside the booklet were blank. Only parts involving the castle's daily maintenance, energy node distribution, garden plant catalog, and other such content were sporadically distributed within.
This looked more like... another part concerning that Golden Core great master had been deliberately erased by some mysterious force.
He read very quickly, reaching the bottom in just a few seconds.
The good news was that this seemingly ordinary booklet was actually a magical artifact. When combined with a special Daoist incantation, one could issue commands to the castle elf.
Of course, these commands weren't mandatory. Instead, they were more like an agreed-upon method of communication with the castle elf.
Chen Yu tried silently reciting the short Daoist incantation recorded at the end of the booklet. For a Foundation Establishment cultivator, understanding and operating such a basic communication method was easy.
A few minutes later, he successfully activated the booklet in his hand.
"Hum..."
A soft halo surfaced on the booklet's cover. Those blank pages began to show faint runes.
At the same time, in the castle's inner hall, the colored light projected from the stained glass windows twisted and converged, slowly forming a slender human-shaped light silhouette.
The silhouette's outline was blurry, its specific features unclear, but its posture was elegant, like a young girl wearing a colorful dress.
She bowed slightly towards Chen Yu's direction, her voice calm and without fluctuation.
"Yin Que pays respects to Master."
Olivia watched this scene, the silver light deep in her eyes rippling slightly, showing her inner turmoil.
Although she couldn't understand what Yin Que said, she could clearly feel Yin Que's completely different respectful attitude towards Chen Yu.
Huh? It succeeded just like that? Chen Yu himself was a bit surprised too.
The castle elf just switched sides like that?
That light silhouette seemed able to hear his inner thoughts, speaking without emotion, "Castle Rule Three stipulates: Whoever can activate the command booklet and correctly recite the incantation is the master recognized by the castle. This is a rule the master specifically left behind."
"Similarly left behind was a message. Does Master wish to listen to it now?"
Chen Yu wobbled his gel head, indicating a nod.
Yin Que read the message in her calm, unfluctuating tone: "Ha, ha, ha, junior, surprise? You're not the first to wander into this place."
"If you're fortunate enough to meet Yin Que, help me take care of her. She's like half a daughter to me."
"Of course, if a silver dragon comes knocking, just say I'm not here. If her descendants encounter trouble, please help look after them..."
Such cheerful words being read out from Yin Que's completely emotionless voice had an unexpected sense of humor and contrast-cuteness.
However, this also completely shattered the mysterious, aloof Golden Core great master filter Chen Yu originally had in his heart.
This senior seemed quite interesting.
"How is it?" Olivia couldn't understand what Yin Que said. Seeing Chen Yu remain silent for a long time, and his facial expression seeming a bit strange, she couldn't help but ask.
"He anticipated you would come." Chen Yu translated the latter half of the message for her.
"Is that so? So he still remembered..." After listening, Olivia took off her silver-framed glasses and gently placed them on the table. Her pale silver eyes looked out the window at the eternal spring scenery in the garden. Her gaze grew distant, as if recalling some faraway past event.
Chen Yu then turned to the silver light silhouette in the air, asking other questions, such as why this castle was docked in the elemental plane.
The Yin Que light silhouette flickered slightly, calmly answering, "Replying to Master, this place is not a pure elemental plane, nor is it within the Prime Material Plane. It is a layer between the two, a material plane on the verge of shattering."
"Please rest assured, Master. The castle's periphery is laid with the 'Cosmic Concealment Grand Formation' and 'Spatial Maze Lock,' which can effectively conceal the plane's existence from outside. Most mysterious creatures or entities wandering in the outer layers of space will not notice this place."
No interference from outer gods? Chen Yu's little eyes lit up slightly.
This meant... this snowfield connected to many planar rifts was theoretically safe and could be developed and utilized.
Because of this snowfield's special nature, it was practically a natural strategic stronghold and transportation hub.
If this place could be incorporated into the Slime Kingdom's territory... establishing a [Kingdom Central Carriage and Horse Post Station] connecting major regions of the kingdom, then communication, supply transport, and military mobilization speeds across various places within the kingdom could increase several times in the future.
Moreover, among these were rifts leading to the southern kingdoms. Perhaps trade and exchange could be conducted with the southern kingdoms through the rifts.
From a longer-term development perspective, the Slime Academy, the Slime Adventurer's Guild... all could be built here.
Over time, perhaps a true winter city could be established on this snowfield.
Yin Que seemed to possess the ability to peek into thoughts, providing timely feedback on Chen Yu's ideas.
"According to the Master Motivation Guidelines, when Master makes plans or takes action, correct motivation must be provided. For example, 'Master, you're amazing,' 'Master, you're truly a genius.'"
"But it must be novel, not rigid..."
She chattered on for quite a while, finally finishing reading. Her figure flickered slightly as she clapped her hands in support, saying, "This is simply a genius idea. Master, you're amazing."
"Master Motivation Guidelines?" Chen Yu blinked.
What were all these strange things?
Anyway, gaining a castle for free put Chen Yu in a pretty good mood. Remembering his earlier conversation with Olivia, he happily wobbled his gel.
"Yin Que, Silver Sparrow... I'll call you Silver Sparrow from now on. This name suits you better."
Truth be told, the name Olivia came up with was indeed more fitting and pleasant-sounding.
"Understood. Silver Sparrow pays respects to Master. Pleased to meet you." Silver Sparrow nodded slightly.