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n“Eh?” While Valyr listened to the words Sirius had spoken to him, a dumbfounded expression appeared on his face once he heard the latter mention the name Mystia. Though he had a hunch earlier that the final item of the auction had something to do with him in some way, he did not expect the idea to actually have a bit of truth to it.

nWith his mind still surprised by the idea being partly true, the young man decided to ask the man in front of him for more information.

n“Did she tell you as to why you’re giving it to me?” Valyr looked at Sirius with a slightly hopeful expression, inwardly wishing that the man would give him greater insight into the situation.

nFortunately, what he got instead was far better than that.

n“She did not,” replied Sirius with a shake of his head. Though, not long after, a faint grin adorned his face.

n“However, the messenger she tasked to bring the items to me told me that she expected you to have a question like that. Thus, among the items that had been given to me, one of them could be used to ask the Imperial Alchemist herself directly.”

n“I see.” At those words, it was only then did Valyr look at the items Sirius had grabbed from the drawer earlier, which totaled a number of three.

nThe first item on the man’s hands looked to be a vial filled with viscous purple liquid, which gave the young man a slightly uncomfortable feeling. On the other hand, the second item looked like a crystal that seemed to be filled to the limit with pure mana. Focusing more of his attention to it, he eventually sensed that a small part of the mana was being released in a certain direction.

n‘I guess this is the item she gave me to contact her,’ thought Valyr to himself, moving onto the third and final item Mystia wished to give him. Though, unlike the first two items, which were somewhat unfamiliar to him, the third item was something he had already seen earlier.

n“A Nascent Rebirth Pill?” muttered the young man in slight surprise, sensing that the feeling it gave off was considerably stronger than the one being emanated from the pill from earlier. Scratching the back of his head as he now felt even more confusion towards the current situation, Valyr turned to look at Julian, thinking that the man might have something to do with this.

nYet, just like him, a surprised expression was plastered on the man’s face as he stared at the Nascent Rebirth Pill Sirius was holding. With the man looking at him with widened eyes, it was more than apparent to Valyr that Julian had nothing to do with the matter at hand.

n“I… I don’t really know what to say.” With the solution to figure out what was going on already more than obvious at this point, Valyr received all three items from Sirius with an awkward smile. “Thank you… I guess?”

n“I am merely a messenger for Miss Mystia.” Hearing Valyr’s words of gratitude, Sirius let out a brief chuckle. “If anything, you should thank her directly through one of the items I’ve given you.”

n“I’ll definitely make sure to do so.” Valyr nodded in response, wondering if he should leave Julian with Sirius to check on the items.

n“Ah. I’ll have an attendant lead you to an empty private room, if you want.” Fortunately, Sirius had saved him the trouble of having to make a decision, giving the young man a suggestion. “From the looks of it, you’re quite eager to take a look at the items in greater detail.”

n“I would prefer that, thank you.” Inwardly letting out a sigh of relief, Valyr allowed Sirius to call one of his attendants to have him be led to a private room, eventually leaving Julian alone with Sirius.

n“So, is there any other reason as to why you had me come here, Sirius?” Hearing a notification sound resound in his mind, it did not take long for Julian to know where the notification had come from, throwing a question at Sirius with a solemn expression.

n“The fact that I wanted to give you the cut you’d get from this auction is true.” Having done the task given to him, Sirius’ body language greatly relaxed, making his way behind his desk to take a seat.

n“Then again, you’re not wrong in the sense that I have something else to talk with you about.” Taking a brief look at some of the documents on his desk, Sirius looked back at Julian with a faint knowing smile. “It partly involves the future of humanity, after all.”

n“Are you serious?” At those words, Julian frowned.

n“Yes, I am.” In response, Sirius remained smiling.

nFaintly scratching the back of his head, Julian took in a deep breath as to what kind of topic Sirius would talk about. Pondering over it for a bit, the most likely topics that came to his mind were the orc outbreak and the issue regarding entirety of the Zeihardt clan searching for Valyr’s whereabouts.

nHowever, the topic Sirius brought up instead was neither of those.

n“How long have you known Ylvar?” Sirius asked, briefly leaving Julian at a slight loss for words as he did not expect to answer such a question.

n“It’s been a couple of years already, I think.” Then again, it did not take long for him to regain his composure, somewhat gaining an idea as to what the man before him was going to discuss. If his hunch was correct, then…

n“Is that so, Julian Pyrrhia?” In response to Julian’s answer, Sirius merely raised an eyebrow. “Have you really known Ylvar for a couple of years already?”

n“Just cut to the chase already.” At those words, Julian let out a low sigh. “We don’t have all day.”

n“So, you do have an idea, huh.” Sirius nodded, making Julian feel somewhat curious.

n“About what?”

n“That Ylvar might not be the person you think of him to be.”

n…

n“Thank you.” After being led to one of the most secluded rooms Valyr had seen in his current life thus far, the young man thanked the attendant that had led to this place before waiting for a couple of minutes to make sure that the attendant had truly left.𝔬𝑣𝗅xt.𝒸𝑜𝑀

nOnce he checked one more time that his current surroundings was clear of people, he then cast a barrier of mana around himself. After that, he infused the barrier with Shadow Energy to truly make sure that any words he said would not be picked up by anything that could possibly be in the room.

nFeeling that he had now made all of the necessary preparations to proceed, the young man then took a seat on the floor before grabbing the crystal filled to the brim with mana. Gazing at it for a bit while briefly scratching his head, the idea on how to use the crystal eventually popped into the young man’s mind, prompting him to infuse it with a bit of his own mana.

nSwoosh!

nIn less than an instant, a ray of energy shot out of the crystal, piercing through the barrier he had made without any difficulty. After a while, the feeling he had sensed from the crystal earlier gradually grew stronger, eventually reaching a point where this feeling solidified, causing the crystal to let out a brief burst of light.

nAfter that…

n“Hello?” Letting go of the crystal due to the burst of light, Valyr gazed at the crystal that remained floating in midair, only to snap back to reality once he heard a familiar voice coming from the crystal.

n“Hello?” asked Valyr back. “Is this Miss Mystia Aschel?”

n“That would be me, indeed,” said the voice in response, letting out a faint chuckle. “I suppose I should be talking to Ylvar at the moment, no?”

n“Or… would you prefer me to call you Valyr instead?”

n“Any is fine,” replied Valyr, briefly shrugging his shoulders in the process.

n“So, why have you contacted me, Valyr?” asked Mystia, her tone somewhat melodious. “Is it because you have a few questions you want to ask me? Or is it because you want to thank me and ask me what the items I gave you were?”

n“I definitely want to ask you the second question at some point, but…” Conflicted at which question among the two he should choose first, Valyr eventually decided to go with the one he initially wanted to ask her.

n“Why have you given me these items, Miss Mystia?” At these words, Valyr let out a soft sigh, thinking about how the entire situation did not make a lot of sense. “I don’t really know you that well. Plus, the one time we’ve only met was after the forging duel in the Blacksmith Guild.”

n“The only notable conversation we had between each other was back in Astarto Village when you helped Vera while she was concocting the Basic Reinforcement Elixir,” he continued.

n“With that in mind, why have you gone out of your way to give me these items, even though I don’t have any sort of connection with you? Is it because I’m a Herald of the Zeihardt clan?”

n“While the fact about you being a Herald is part of the reason behind it, it is only a small portion.” Pondering over the question for a bit, Mystia’s voice soon resounded from the crystal after some time. “You know me as Vera’s mentor, as well as the Imperial Alchemist of the Meltierre Empire, considering the Blacksmith Guild’s leader had mentioned it in front of you during the forging duel.”

n“However, aside from being the empire’s Imperial Alchemist, I’m also one of the empire’s imperial advisers, having a subclass that allows me to peer into the future through divination.”

n“With that, as an imperial adviser, I would just like to say, Valyr…”

n“That the future of humanity… no.”

n“The future of Veldanyr itself will depend on the actions you make in the future.”

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