Chapter 924: The Fourth Candidate

Early Saturday morning, the overcast sky looked as if it would snow again. The purple-eyed girl walked through the chilly mist of the winter morning, tightened the collar of her coat wrapped in a scarf, and appeared at St. Deran Square at 7:30 a. m. with a light step.

Her brown ladies' boots trod upon the square's ground. Luvia turned to look toward the center of the square. Now that winter had arrived, the pigeons in the square, often spied upon by little Mia, had mostly left the city to spend the winter further south.

Currently, there were only a few newspaper-selling children in the square waiting for passersby. The children selling papers by the street could accurately distinguish who was a customer, so they did not approach Luvia.

Luvia, holding her handbag, paused at the steps of Xia De's house and looked up at the bedroom window on the second floor. Seeing that the curtains were already drawn, she knew Xia De must be awake. Humming a tune in a good mood, she found the key to Xia De's house in her handbag and opened the door to walk in quite naturally.

She closed the door, tilted her head to look up the stairs, and then deliberately made some noise while climbing. Even if Xia De couldn't hear it, Luvia believed that the sharp-eared cat certainly would.

But after she reached the second floor and entered Room No. 1, just as she was about to greet Xia De, she discovered that sitting in the dining room was a beautiful lady she had never seen before.

At first glance, she seemed very mature, but when looking closely at that face, which was too beautiful to be mortal, Luvia realized that her age must be younger than her own.

Miss Sylvia, carrying a morning languor, held a teacup in her left hand at the dining table while reading a newspaper with her right. The outward-facing second page of the paper featured news of the Queen and Princess Margaret watching an opera at the opera house. Hearing the sound of footsteps on the stairs, the lady with short, black, shawl-length hair turned around. She had never seen Luvia before, but since the other party had her own key, she must be someone Xia De was familiar with:

"Good morning, miss. I am Emma Sylvia, a scholar, so to speak."

The Great Witch introduced herself.

Luvia finally understood the other party's identity. Although she was very curious as to why the other party appeared here so early, she also introduced herself:

"Good morning, miss. I am Luvia Anate, and I work at the Diviner Association. I am Xia De's... friend."

She placed her handbag on the coffee table and then walked into the dining room as well.

Mia, lazily licking goat milk, had furry pointed ears that looked semi-transparent in the faint morning light. It turned its head to "Meow~" at Luvia in greeting, then continued eating its breakfast.

Luvia still did not see Xia De. She also sat down at the dining table, and afterward, the two ladies did not engage in any further conversation.

A few minutes later, Xia De came out of the study holding Miss Sylvia's notebook:

"Miss Sylvia, I have finished copying your notes. Afterward... oh, Luvia, good morning. Have you had breakfast?"

Miss Sylvia did not stay here long; she took back her notebook, finished her tea, and then took her leave. Xia De saw her downstairs and only returned upstairs after the carriage picking her up arrived.

By this time, Luvia was already sitting on the sofa holding the cat, which had eaten and drunk its fill. But little Mia did not want to be held by Luvia; it liked to "stroll" around the house after breakfast. This cat was not lazy at home, otherwise, it wouldn't have consistently maintained its cute figure.

"Did this witch spend the night here last night?"

Only after Xia De walked up from the stairwell did Luvia ask.

"Yes, we were discussing my thesis last night, and we discussed it all night long. Oh, and there's the power of space; Miss Sylvia also knows 【Lagley's Leap】. She believes that although the increase in the range of my wonder arts is rare, it is not a situation that has never occurred before."

"If someone else said this, I certainly wouldn't believe it, but since you say so, I believe it."

The purple-eyed girl could not hide her smile; she knew Xia De very well:

"Have you finished your thesis? Tomorrow is Sunday; aren't you setting off again?"

"We discussed it until two in the morning last night before we finished the final draft."

Xia De yawned, picked up the teapot, and sat on the sofa:

"Because it was too late, I let Miss Sylvia spend the night in the guest room on the first floor, and treating her to breakfast this morning was a gesture of thanks."

He did not let Miss Sylvia rest in the second-floor bedroom because the Great Witch was also an unmarried lady, and spending the night in the same house as a strange man would not do. But if she slept on the first floor, there would be no such problem.

"Luvia, coming to find me so early, is there some big news... have you found the 'Invisible Person'?"

"How could that be?"

Luvia shook her head and finally let go of Mia. Mia hurriedly escaped from the sofa, not even looking for Xia De, fearing being caught again:

"I saw that Miss Pawo you mentioned."

Xia De was startled, and his tea-pouring motion stopped:

"The Ring-6 sorceress of the Truth Society? You really found her? Luvia, although I know your divination is very powerful, this action is a bit too fast."

"She was at the Lakeview Manor banquet, calling herself Mary Witt, the daughter of Viscount Witt. Viscount Witt is a real person, and that sorceress must have had a reason for mentioning this noble. So, I investigated using Viscount Witt as a clue and found that he fell from a horse and was injured this spring, but after treatment, he surprisingly wasn't paralyzed..."

The purple-eyed girl asked Xia De, reached out to pick up her teacup, and toasted him:

"Guess what happened?"

"The Truth Society?"

"Yes, the connection between the Witt family and the Truth Society appeared at least three generations ago. Although Viscount Witt is not well-known locally, he is, after all, a noble of Tobesk, so he provided great help for the Truth Society's operations in the Tobesk region. I didn't disturb them, but based on my own divination and some clues, I saw that lady in the city yesterday evening."

"Is she a Chosen One?"

As long as Luvia saw a Chosen One, she could immediately determine their identity; this was her unique ability.

"No."

Luvia shook her head slightly. Xia De was a bit disappointed; he had really thought that Miss Pawo, who believed that mathematics would never make mistakes, was the Chosen One:

"Not a Chosen One, then is she a lower-ranked candidate?"

Xia De asked again. During the Mid-Hill Fort incident, Luvia had once seen Priest August at the Sikar Hotel through 【Traveler's Travel Door】, thereby confirming that the priest was one of the candidates for the Death Chosen One.

"Not clear for now."

Luvia still shook her head:

"I have known Priest August for so many years, and it was only before the Chosen One was about to hold the ceremony that I could judge his identity. Now, the Chosen One of Wisdom and Knowledge has not officially appeared, and there are no traces of the Chosen One ceremony. Currently, I can only judge the identity of the first candidate for the 'Wisdom and Knowledge' Chosen One, and I need to keep watching."

Xia De nodded:

"Actually, paying too much attention to candidates who are not the first in line doesn't have much meaning. Joey Barton losing his qualification involved countless coincidences that were impossible to replicate, and plus, he himself didn't value the position of Chosen One very much, so the qualification was transferred to the second candidate, Sister Devlin. But even so, Joey Barton didn't die; his Chosen One status was stripped by Death itself. Even after he failed, the subsequent three candidates surprisingly all didn't want this qualification. From this situation, making the first candidate for the Chosen One lose their qualification is no easier than directly killing the Chosen One."

Listening to Xia De's summary, Luvia nodded thoughtfully:

"The bad news is that it is very difficult for us to change the epic of the Sixth Era prophesied by the Poem; the good news is that the epic of the "Whispering Poem" can be shifted."

"Just like your dream, after the Battle of Mid-Hill Fort, that dream you mentioned where I didn't exist."

Xia De said, then carefully observed Luvia's expression, but unfortunately, Luvia had no reaction:

"However, when I saw her at 'Madame Wanda's Clothing Store' yesterday evening, my 'other self' informed me that Miss Pawo is extremely dangerous and told me not to approach her easily."

"But she couldn't even beat Tifa. If I hadn't wanted to avoid fainting at Lakeview Manor again, but instead exerted all my strength to throw a second thunder spear, I very likely could have let her sleep forever on Schluch Lake on Tuesday night."

Xia De was not bragging; at that time, he was in a state of "divinity overflow" after absorbing divinity, which could be called the strongest mortal in the material world.

"She herself may only be Ring-6, but the book in her hand is a big problem. That is..."

Luvia hesitated for a moment:

"The Angel-level relic (Level 1) "Codex of Smowell". That book originated in the Second Era and was written by a mad mathematician. Legend has it that the madman finally exploded into a pile of mathematical symbols, truly letting himself become numbers. Angel-level relics must never be underestimated. In the hands of the right person, the effect that book can exert is even more terrifying than a Level 0 relic."

"You can actually identify what kind of relic that is, and you even know the stories of the Second Era; this is truly amazing."

Xia De exclaimed.

He had asked many people about that large silver book, but even the two witches and the old gentlemen of the Light-Guiding Ascetic Society didn't know the origin of that book.

【Perhaps, it was her "other self" who recognized what it was.】

"Her" voice rang in his ears; "she" seemed to be guiding Xia De to explore Luvia's secrets. But since Luvia didn't want to say, he wouldn't ask, just as Luvia never asked about the many suspicious points on him.

"Since Miss Pawo of the Truth Society is not the first candidate for the Chosen One, we don't need to pay attention to her for the time being."

"Yes, next we need to wait for the appearance of the next 'Keeper of Secrets', and then compare the next list with the Lakeview Manor list."

"I will ask Princess Princess Lei Qianya for a list of guests tonight, but that list is very long, and the church hasn't finished checking everyone yet."

Xia De suggested, and Luvia nodded:

"Since you mentioned that princess... you see, I said that being closer to that princess is good for our cause. If we always let Iluna get intelligence, it will sooner or later make her suspicious."

Glancing at Xia De, the purple-eyed girl hummed and looked at the overcast winter sky outside the window again:

"Knight, I am not complaining about you; I said I knew you would do this. Just, never forget what we are doing. Every decision we make, perhaps, will really affect the historical trend of this world for thousands of years to come. What a heavy responsibility; how will people in the future evaluate us?"