After finishing the second book, Leo leaned back slightly in his chair, his gaze still fixed on the final page that now lay open before him.
Unlike the haunting memoir of Captain Vonn, this one did not end in madness or massacre, but it still painted a bleak picture.
Varn Elric had survived.
That was the first thing Leo acknowledged, the most important takeaway of all. The man had gone in, broken through, fought beasts, suffered injuries, and returned with his mind and journal intact.
His potential was permanently capped, yes— but even then, he had endured.
And that, Leo reasoned, was something to be admired.
As he reflected deeper, Leo's thoughts lingered on the irreversible damage to Varn's mana circuits.
The elasticity of his mana pathways, once capable of expanding and adapting to sudden fluctuations in flow, had become rigid and inflexible after meditating inside the world.
Tainted mana, though rich and empowering at first, had deposited layers of residue into the inner linings of his channels, corroding them silently over time.
It seemed to Leo as though, the mana of a time-stilled world acted like a silent killer that destroyed one's potential over time, as although he did not view this as a deal breaker, he still did note this with grave seriousness.
After all, Varn had been meditating in the tainted ambient mana for weeks.
If Leo relied only on his own purified sources and circulated sparingly, then perhaps he could reap the rewards without suffering the fallout.
But speculation wasn't enough.
He needed more.
The two books he had read so far had given him field perspectives, the human side of it all. But now, Leo sought technical precision— he wanted charts, records, and scientific data that could tell him more about a Time-Stilled world from an objective point of view.
He wanted theories. He wanted warnings to look out for, and most of all, he wanted confirmation that the anomaly he was entering had been survived by others before him.
Hence, without waiting further, he stood again and returned to the archives, his mind now focused solely on cross-referencing.
He scanned the book titles placed on the shelf with cold efficiency, overlooking the emotional memoirs this time in favor of indexed reports, bounty records, and internal guild documents with informative titles.
In the end, he selected titles such as 'Known Effects Of Time Stilled Worlds', 'How time distortion works in Time Stilled worlds' , 'What is tainted mana and how it affects one's body?'.
As he picked up everything he found useful and began reading at once.
For the next fourteen hours, Leo did not leave the archive.
No breaks. No distractions. No wasted motion.
Just him, the rustle of paper, and the steady blink of his eyes as line after line of forbidden knowledge filled the gaps in his understanding.
Some records were vague. Others were scientific. A few were merely scribbled notes from scouts who had failed to complete their missions.
But Leo read it all—every scrawl, diagram, and annotation the guild had preserved.
When he finally looked up, the pieces had begun to fit together.
Apparently, there were several Time-Stilled Worlds scattered throughout the universe.
They were all unstable fragments of space-time that existed in decelerated temporal pockets, sealed from the linear flow of the larger cosmos.
They were relics of unknown origin, each functioning as a self-contained dimension where time passed at different rates, and the rules of mana interaction skewed wildly from world to world.
Some were barely a moons width long, acting as nothing more than small, manageable pockets used by criminals to hide from law enforcement.
While others were death traps— psychological mazes filled with distorted mana, irregular gravity, mutated fauna, and time perception loops so intense that victims lost track of who or what they were.
The one Leo was assigned to?
Ranked in the top three most dangerous of all known anomalies.
But even then, it wasn't considered unbeatable.
According to the compiled logs, survivors— although very few recorded— had pointed to a few constants that increased one's chance of making it out alive.
Firstly, sticking together during the initial phase was key.
The world didn't seem to attack strength directly. Instead, it probed isolation.
Solo wanderers, especially in the first few days, were often overwhelmed by hallucinations, mana poisoning, or mental corruption before their physical skills could even be put to use.
However, the longer a person remained inside, the worse the group dynamic became.
At a certain point, whether it was day fifteen, twenty, or even earlier, the very presence of others began to fray the edges of trust.
Teams that stayed together too long inevitably turned on one another, usually violently.
Hence, the most successful strategy was a hybrid one.
Stick together early on, when confusion and disorientation were highest.
Then separate before the world had a chance to exploit proximity and sow seeds of madness.
The timing of that separation, however, was entirely dependent on mental fortitude.
Strong-willed individuals, those trained to resist illusion, pressure, and sensory distortion, could last longer, think clearer, and retain their sanity well beyond the baseline.
But those who were unstable?
Those who doubted, hesitated, or harbored guilt?
They broke fast.
Some as early as Day 3.
Leo processed it all in silence, his expression unreadable.
There was fear in these texts. Dread. Stories of people who'd begged to be left behind, who'd carved runes into their own skin to "ward off whispers," who'd snapped their own necks rather than continue deeper.
But Leo read none of it with apprehension.
He did not recoil from the descriptions of madness.
He did not hesitate at the risk.
Because none of it changed the reality of what needed to be done.
He wasn't going into the Time-Stilled World because he wanted to.
He was going in because it was the only way to get the vault access he needed.
And no hallucination, no distortion, no horror masquerading as his own voice, was going to stand in the way of that.
"Hmm… I suppose I can give this mission a shot by joining Mr. Raiden's party," Leo murmured to himself, his tone contemplative as he stepped out of the library.
"But before that, I'll need to evaluate the group's competence firsthand, as the last thing I need is to end up in a team that either has a Transcendent-tier warrior drawing unnecessary danger, or one that's simply too weak to survive in a world like that."
With that, he made his way back to his apartment without delay.
After spending over sixteen hours devouring every scrap of information available on Time-Stilled Worlds, Leo had come to a firm conclusion: survival was possible within a time-stilled world with the right preparation, mental resilience, and a capable party, however, it couldn't be attempted on a whim or without proper planning.
And so, he had decided that he would indeed take the risk after planning things through.
And that he would venture into the Time-Stilled World, and take on the golden mission, hopefully, with Mr. Raiden's team— if they proved suitable, but if not, then he was prepared to form a party of his own and undertake the expedition regardless.