From the heights of a mountain, he beheld,

The city full of dragons that had to be felled.

The scaly monsters came, warning him of death,

Yet he fought, and slew them, enduring their fiery breath.

-The Travels of the Dragon Emperor

“Ah, the city of Krysperium. Weird name if you really think about it.”

The light of the morning sun, slightly cloaked by thin clouds, bathed one side of the towering city. The other side slowly lost its shade as the sun made its way across the sky, greeting the city as it had done so for the past five hundred years.

Once the ancient city of dragons, now the dominion of men.

The impregnable fortress. The citadel of heroes. The last stand of humanity. Even the heart of Forkspear! So many names, so many titles. The city that stood for five hundred years, growing ever beautiful.

A hundred of times more beautiful than what he remembered it to be. Decorating wasn’t exactly high on the priority list when they took control of the city during his time.

So this was what it looked like from the outside? It became a bigger layered cake iced with magical waterfalls, Aya mused. He should a get a cake after this. A cake all to himself. Choosing what to eat was fun.

“Why are you grinning like a fool?” said his opponent. “Are there no grand cities like these in whatever backward country you came from?”

So much for having a peaceful view of the city. Aya coughed twice before facing his opponent. Have they met before? This man looked familiar. Long blond hair with green eyes. Why does he remember him with blue eyes? Or was it another person with blue eyes? “Oh, I remember you now! You’re the one with the twin!” Aya exclaimed with a snap of his fingers, proud with himself for remembering someone whom he met only once. “How’s your twin? Still in this tournament?”

“How dare you!” someone said behind Aya.

Another man on top of a cliff to his right also spoke up. “You don’t have the right to talk about my brother.”

“Oh…er. Sorry or something. I didn’t know that I shouldn’t talk about your brother. I never received a copy of the book ‘Things I Shouldn’t Talk About'. ” Aya raised his hand that grasped the neck of a body that looked exactly like the men around him. His fingers sunk into its neck, squishing flesh against bones—although it was a weird sensation. It felt like how flesh and bones should feel, but there was something off. A clone? What else could it be? Unless they are quadruplets. One, two, three, plus the one he’s choking, made it four. But he has another brother? So five? “Hey, are you quintuplets? Is this also your brother?” He shook the body. It felt lighter than a human body should. He shook it harder, its legs dragged on the ground, its arms flailed wildly around, bending as if all the joints were dislocated.

“Obviously not, dimwitted monkey.” The man pointed his scimitar with a black colored blade at Aya. “I don’t know what sorcery from your puny country you used to incapacitate my clone but it will take more than that to defeat me. Show me your true power so that I can crush it.”

Aya couldn’t help but smirk. He has heard that line many times before. “I don’t even know my true powers. And I can’t do it now. And my stock is low. I’m going to look for monsters to eat after I win this tournament.” He raised the head of the clone he captured and stared into its empty eyes. A construct of sorts. Made of elemental essences? Some new invention? A lot of new stuff surely would have been invented while he was asleep. “Hey, so what is this? It’s not moving anymore.”

A black streak. Aya ducked sideways. Dust scattered in the air as a black blade buried itself where he stood a moment before. Two more flashes, from both sides. He jumped diagonally back and kicked at one of the clones. Another clone hacked at him making him pull back his leg. Three blades kept on aiming for him. He slipped through a space in the curtain of blades, dragging the construct he captured. These three sure have teamwork.

Three? Weren’t there four of these blond haired weirdos?

Searing heat instantly turned the grass at his feet to ashes. A blazing drill descended from the heavens. The roar of the flaming wind was deafening. He threw the clone that he held upwards. It exploded into particles of light as it met the attack from the person Aya assumed was the real one. Aya leaped sideways down the side of the mountain and found shelter beneath a ledge as a rain of boulders followed the explosion caused by his opponent.

“Such an annoying place to fight in.” Aya peered from the side of the ledge. “Oh great, there’s six of them now.” He strode out. Six people landed around him in a loose circle. “So why are there six of you now? It’s not like you’re purposely holding back. Gradually using your powers?”

“Very good observation from a monkey. It is as you say. I have received, a power upgrade, for lack of a better term. Indeed, I am still adjusting to my newfound strength, not that it would be an obstacle in crushing you.”

“Oh, now all of you are talking at the same time. Showing off that you’re getting better at controlling all your clones?”

“Why yes,” they replied with a forced smile. “This is simply a test fight for me. A warm-up before my battle against Garett Berklaw of the Draconyx Discipulus, where I will prevail. Be honored that you are helping me achieve victory.”

“Are these clones a type of essence construct? I’ve never seen essence constructs that appear to be real humans. I’m kind of interested what a scryers would see.” Aya raised his open palm in front of him then quickly closed it into a fist. “Although, you lost control of that one that I punched earlier.” He pointed his fist at each of the clones. “Let’s see if I can catch another one. I am honestly surprised that I wasn’t able to destroy it with one—” Flashes of blades and whips of fire. Aya tried counterattacking but his punches and kicks were met with blades—he immediately pulled back his attacks so that he wouldn’t take any damage. He couldn’t even connect his attacks. The clones covered for each other, apparently sharing their vision; they effectively didn’t have any blind spots. “You didn’t even let me finish speaking,” Aya protested while he focused on evading. There wasn’t much point in trying to attack. He kept a close watch on the person he tagged as the real person. “Can’t expect any manners from essence constructs.”

All the clones formed a circle again. “Essence constructs? I have no idea what you are talking about,” all of them said with a sly smile.

“You obviously know what I’m talking—”

“An interesting thing that I’ve noticed from watching your fights.”

“You keep interrupting—”

“While you apparently have an extremely durable body, you still evade attacks against you. Interesting isn’t it?”

“I’m not really interested—”

“This leads me to believe,” all the clones said, raising their voice to drown out Aya’s voice, “that you cannot sustain this defensive spell of yours or whatever skill it is you are using to increase your defense.” The clones scoffed at Aya. “Why are you silent? Did I guess correctly?”

“Oh, I can speak now? You keep interrupting me,” Aya said. He looked up, placed a finger on his temple and swayed his head, pretending to think. “I just don’t want to get hit?” he said. “Would you believe that answer?”

All the clones laughed. Their laughter became louder as two more clones appeared. Elemental essences formed the bodies, threaded by fine mana lines. Once the clones completed forming, they appeared to be completely human. Aya couldn’t tell the difference between them. A rather bizarre skill. The problem was that he still didn’t see how the spell started. The mana lines seemed to have snaked into existence from nothing. Was this all an illusion?

“A jester, are we?” The one in front of Aya raised his scimitar. Flame essences rapidly gathered around it. All the other clones hacked at Aya with wide arcs of their blades. Black crescent waves descended, merging together and forming a net that sliced anything in its path.

Aya rushed at one clone to avoid the crisscrossing slashes. The clone ran away before he could even pull a punch. He decided to chase down the clone. He could feel the heat from the fire spell that the original one cast. It was fortunate that only the real person could use high-level fire spells. He glanced back. The other clones backed away as a gigantic pulsating glowing ball hung in the sky as if it was a second sun then burst into thousands of glowing flickers like a flurry of explosive snow. Aya turned back to his quarry and gritted his teeth. “At least I can get this one clone.” He swung his fist. A hair’s width before his punch connected, the clone he chased burst into baser components; elemental essences, dissipating back into nature. “Grakk. He dispelled the clone,” Aya said with an amused expression on his face. “Nice one.”

A barrage of explosions grated the earth he stood upon.

Felix pulled his overly energetic sister off the bed. She got tangled up with the bedsheets. “I’m free!” Felixia shouted after she got out of the sheets. “And Felix, why did you pull me?” she said as she adjusted her glasses.

“You’re scrambling all over Quill. You might poke her eye,” Felix said. He patted the chair beside him, telling Felixia to sit there, but she pretended not to see him.

“I’m not going to poke her eye! She still has that metal thingy attached.”

“Is it uncomfortable?” Harvey asked. “I don’t fancy a metal circle attached to my head.” He drew a circle over his eye with his finger and shuddered.

Felix nudged Harvey with his elbow after seeing Aileen’s murderous gaze. “I’m sure Harvey meant that it’s a great sacrifice to carry the right eye of Delphine.” Count on Harvey to get on Aileen's nerves without even trying.

“Yes, it’s a sacrifice and an honor,” Quill said in a monotonous voice while staring blankly outside the window. She sat on her bed, propped by a pile of fluffy pillows. Her gaze has been directed out the window for a while.

“An even greater honor to be a user of the eye,” Aileen added. “Well, after they remove the metal patch.” She laughed nervously then glared at Harvey like she wanted to strangle him with his wavy golden hair. Felix forced Harvey’s head down to apologize. “This is a great gift from Paximillon,” Aileen continued. She sat on the bed and held Quill’s hand. “I’m sure you will render great service to this empire with that eye.”

Quill gave a slow nod but kept on staring out the window. Aileen raised her brow to Quill’s reaction.

“I really, really, really want to see the eye,” Felixia said, apparently oblivious to the tension around her. “Felix, I’m going to stay here until they remove the eyepatch.”

Felix grabbed his sister’s collar and pulled her to the seat beside him. “They’re not going to remove that now. It’s not like they can simply unscrew the patch. That’s a magical seal, you know.”

“It’s supposed to suppress the eye and preserve it since Quill couldn’t use it before. Which was probably why her right eye bled after it activated,” Aileen said. “Although I do not know why it activated now. Everyone thought she was a dormant carrier that’s why she has the metal cover on the right eye.”

“You were chasing some criminal when it happened, right?”

“We lost him,” Aileen murmured followed some barely audible cursing.

“I mean the eye activated when you chased this person?”

“Actually, we were able to find that suspicious person that old man Gregory was chasing because the eye activated when Quill faced his direction.”

Felixia hopped back on the bed before Felix could stop her. She sat cross-legged beside Aileen. “So why were you chasing someone?”

Aileen loudly exhaled then shook her head. “No one would tell me what he did. We chased him because old man Gregory was going after him looking really angry. He also beat up some guards.”

“The guards were trying to arrest him?” Felix asked.

“There were two of them, and I think they were about to be arrested, not sure since I’m far away at that time, but it seems they fought back and there was a commotion. Some explosions as well.”

“Oooh. Sounds like they did something really bad,” Felixia exclaimed.

“I asked old man Gregory about it but he wouldn’t say. Annoying. My uncle probably ordered him not to say anything to me.”

“I think, there’s something in this person you were chasing that activated the eye,” Felix said.

“Quill, Quill, Quill.” Felixia waved her hands trying to catch the attention of Quill, but Quill kept staring out the window. “Quill, what did you see? What did you see with your magical eyeball?!”

All of them waited for an answer in excited silence; no one wanted to ask her about what she saw since she seemed inexplicably depressed by the situation—fortunately, Felixia’s tactlessness came into play. Quill turned to face them and shook her head slowly. “I-I don’t know. I don’t understand what I saw. So-sorry.” Her shoulders trembled as if she was about to cry. “It’s, I don’t really know.”

“That’s fine. We’ll ask help from Elder Matteo.” Aileen reached out to Quill and awkwardly tried to stroke her head. “He’ll arrive later, along with the other elders who’ll remove your eye patch.” Aileen then balled up her fist. “And when you can use your eye again we will look for that old man and—” she punched a pillow with a scowl.

“I can’t describe what I saw. I-I can’t describe it using words.” Quill brushed back her hair that covered her right eye. She lightly brushed her finger over the metallic cover on her eye. “If they re-remove this then I’ll see mo-more of those images?”

Aileen said, “Probably? I think so.”

“I can’t even say they were images. As if they were feelings I-I can see.” Quill grabbed a pillow and buried her face in it.

Aileen turned to Felix and mouthed, “What was I supposed to say?”

Felix said, “Quill, that’s the power of the eye.” That didn’t really help. They didn’t even know what the right eye of Delphine was supposed to do. Aileen shook her head at his stupid attempt at comforting Quill.

“Won’t I be useless if I can’t even comprehend what I see?” Quill said, her voice cracking a bit, with a worried face as she emerged from the pillow.

“No. Don’t be like that. You’ll learn how to use that eye in time.”

Harvey said, “Aileen is so supportive, it’s disconcerting.”

“All of us are here to help you,” Aileen said. “Except Harvey.”

Felix said, “You’re probably seeing something like what the scryers see?” He paused and scratched his head. Not that scryers use their eyes to “see”. He wasn’t sure what the scryers do to their eyes but he was certain that they couldn’t see through the metal mask covering the upper half of their faces. Scryers in other countries sew their eyelids shut or even remove their eyeballs.

“And you have that eyepatch sealing your eye. It probably interfered with the power of the eye of Delphine, that was why you couldn’t understand what you saw,” Aileen said.

“Did you hit your head while trying to apprehend that suspect of something that no one would tell you about?”

Aileen gave Felix a surprised look. “Yes. How did you know?”

“You’re so…nice? You seem like a nice person now. Maybe that’s because you hit your head.”

Felixia sniggered beside Aileen. “She’s so caring towards Quill. Maybe she’s practicing being nice. Did your boyfriend comment about your attitude?”

“There’s nothing wrong with my attitude.” Aileen stood up and did a graceful spin on her toes even though she wore a full-plated armor like she always does when she's inside the temple. “I’m a perfectly nice human being.”

Felix and Felixia pretended to be vomiting then giggled. Even Harvey looked as if he was about to laugh.

“Very funny.”

“So what happened to that Roghinian guy you were dating?” Felix said. “He still in the tournament right?”

“One: I’m not dating anyone.” Aileen cracked her knuckles and stared menacingly at Felix and Felixia, although looked more like a rabbit imitating a wolf rather than a fearsome warrior. “Two: I don’t know what’s happening in the tournament right now since I’m taking care of Quill rather than watching the fight, since, you know, I’m such a good and caring individual.” She glowered at them while speaking so Felix didn’t know if she was kidding or not, or if it was a good idea to laugh at her again. “But, as far as I know, he’s still in the tournament and the semis fight is today.”

Harvey spoke up, “They’re holding the fight at Mount Promissa.”

“Mount Promissa? That’s new. Not in the arena?” Aileen said with mild surprise. Mount Promissa was one of the mountains that ringed the vast plains wherein Krysperium stood in the middle. “Eh, so then it’s fine that I’m not watching it. I’m not going to watch a projection of it in the arena. I’d rather watch actual fighting.”

“It’s an homage to the First Emperor. A new concept they thought of for this festival,” Harvey explained. He drew a mountain with three peaks in the air. “They’ll hold the semi-final fight near the south peak, where Emperor Krystfallen, according to legends, first gazed upon Krysperium.” He curled his hair on his finger and shrugged. “Not our actual Krysperium but the dragon hive that was here before.”

“I know this story,” Felix said. “It was there where he first met with a dragon that was guarding the mana node.” There were different versions on how Emperor Krystfallen reached the mana node and killed off all the dragons. Some say that he was alone, while others said he had companions—maybe some of the people who eventually became the Dragon’s Chosen were with him. No records of that event survived. That was if there were any records in the first place. Perhaps all of the current versions were merely various tales spun by people wanting to embellish the tale of the First Emperor. The most famous version was that he stayed on Mount Promissa before attacking the dragon hive.

“That’s the same place. The dragons warned him that he will meet death if he continued his journey. A warning that wasn’t heeded by our brave first Emperor.”

“Let me guess,” Aileen said. “The finals will be at the second peak.”

“Yes. Where the First Emperor battled some of the dragons and offered their blood in gratitude to Paximillon.”

“So what will they do at the summit?”

“The ceremony of the princess.”

“That’s a really nice concept. Good job to the one who thought of that.”

Felix nodded his head. It was indeed a good idea to hold the ceremony, the first time the princess would change into her dragon form, at the top of the mountain. All of the stories agreed that Emperor Krystfallen first changed into a dragon at the summit of Mount Promissa. Maybe he promised something to Paximillon in exchange for power which was the reason why the place was called Mount Promissa? Tying the tournament with the coming of age ceremony of the princess, were they aiming for something akin to a pilgrimage route across Mount Promissa?

The door opened and Jel came in with a basket of fruits. Aileen visibly winced at the sight of the basket. “I’ve brought this. I don’t really know what I’m supposed to bring when visiting a sick person.”

“Quill’s fine now,” Aileen said, glancing at Quill, receiving a nod in return. “It was fortunate that I was with her. I was able to immediately bring her back to the temple.”

Felixia gasped. “Aileen’s a hero!” she squealed. “Three cheers for Aileen!”

“You should have seen her when she came with Quill. She was wearing her black leather armor while carrying Quill like a princess. Quill was in her full armor, mind you. And Quill’s face was half covered with blood.”

“I wish I was there to see it. That sounds awesome,” Felixia said. “Aileen is my hero!”

“It would have been dashing and awesome except that Aileen was cursing and shouting that she will beat up an old man. Really ruined the whole heroics thing.” Jel ducked as Aileen threw her a punch. “I’m just telling the truth. Don’t get mad.” Jel went to the side of Quill and gave her the basket of fruits. “Fruits are good for your eyes,” she said to Quill, who accepted the basket with a skeptical look. “It’s true, I guess. Some of those fruits are bound to be good for your eyes so eat them all. I don’t know what fruits are good for magical eyes though so they’re for your normal eye,” Jel said with an apologetic grin.

“Thank you,” stammered Quill.

“That’s a really helpful gift, Jel,” Aileen said dryly.

“I’m just following your footsteps, oh great and powerful hero, Aileen. After all, you were the one who gave a basket of food to the BasketSlayer.”

Felixia immediately took the basket from Quill and emptied it. The fruits rolled all over the bed. “Aileen!” she called. “Aileen, look at me. I’m your boyfriend,” she said as she punched the air and swung the basket around. Aileen snatched the basket from her.

“It would be pleasant if I stay and tease Aileen but I have stuff to do, so buh-bye,” Jel said. “And feed Quill some fruits. I really don’t know why I bought those, so just eat those. I think I planned to tease Aileen all day with the basket but duty calls.”

Aileen rolled her eyes and folded her arms. “Buh-bye, Jel,” she said waving her off.

“Jel,” Felix said, “wait a bit.” But Jel had already closed the door and left. He turned back to his sister. “I’ll just ask her something. I’m coming back so play with Aileen.”

“Stop treating me like a kid.”

Felix chased after Jel. She was already at the end of the corridor so Felix had to jog a bit. “Jel, wait for me.”

“Hey, Felix. You’re already out of breath?”

“I can’t remember the last time I jogged,” he said as he wiped his forehead with his sleeves. He couldn’t even remember the last time he did anything physically strenuous. One does not get much exercise working with a data orb in front of you. “Anyway, did you see the model I made?”

Jel stopped walking then checked their surroundings. She leaned forward and whispered, “The model you made of the citysigil you found in Delphine Hall.”

Felix nodded. After he deduced that there was another sigil somewhere, he made a simplified version of the citysigil they found inside Delphine Hall. Based from that he was able to make an approximation of how the missing sigil would look like, taking into account the structures being powered by the mana node that were not connected to the citysigil in Delphine Hall. It was like fitting together pieces of the puzzle that he already has and figuring out what the missing pieces were supposed to look like.

“That was very impressive. Surprising that you exerted a lot of effort on something that you weren’t required to do.”

“So what do you think?”

“You’re saying that instead of having one citysigil, the one made by Emperor Krystfallen that was expanded by Emperor Malvar, there are actually two of them, and the one in Delphine Hall is Emperor Malvar’s?”

Felix opened his mouth to speak then paused to think. He wasn’t sure if it was right to ask. “Um, don’t you kno—”

“Know about having two citysigils? No,” Jel said. She paused for a bit and looked down. Her brows furrowed. “The temple is not in powered by the citysigil design you found in Delphine Hall,” she said, more to herself than to Felix.

Felix nodded. It was one of the clues that led him to believe that the missing sigil was the one made by Emperor Krystfallen. It was only logical that the former palace would be powered by the constructs of the First Emperor. Surely the people working in Delphine Hall would know that the citysigil they are maintaining was not a complete one. Was Jel telling the truth that she didn’t know about the secret of the citysigil? She was strangely accommodating when they wanted to break in Delphine Hall.

“What’s with the look, Felix? Don’t believe that I don’t know anything about the citysigil?”

“No, I believe you,” Felix managed to reply, slightly unnerved by Jel’s calm expression. Even if Jel knew about it, she would be certainly bound to secrecy by her some oath. And why would she tell someone like him? Or maybe she really doesn't know and he was just being overly suspicious.

“So what did you want to do about this information? I’m assuming you’re thinking that there are problems with the unknown citysigil.”

“Yes, that would be the most plausible reason for the slight power interruption.”

“And?” Jel resumed walking and beckoned for Felix to follow her.

“And what?”

“What would you want to do?”

“Well…”

“Felix, we can see here that the true nature of the citysigil is kept secret by the government; and for good reasons, no doubt.”

Shaking his head, Felix thrust his hands into his pockets and trudged behind Jel. His sister and Harvey said pretty much the same thing. Jel was right, of course. As always. Even though Jel looked like a mischievous teenager who liked to gossip, she was a Fahllyr and the leader, sort of, of all the young Fahllyrs in the temple. Being called a leader of trainees might not be much but it was common knowledge that the one chosen to become the leader of the young Fahllyr recruits would be bound for great things. The elder brother and sister of Aileen were leaders during their duty at the temple, if he recalled correctly. Of course, no one in their right mind would make Aileen a leader of anything. Not the way she is now, anyway.

“I am sure the power interruption you found has made its way to these mysterious people in charge of the mysterious sigil. Lots of mystery going on here,” Jel said, chuckling nonchalantly. “You have expected me to give this answer. And what did you expect to do? Fix whatever problem there is with the citysigil? I know you are a genius sealcrafter, and have a bright future ahead of you but at this point, I doubt there isn’t much you can do.” She glanced back at him to see his reaction.

Jel was right again. Unsurprisingly. Felix put on a smile on his face to show that he understood her point. What she said might be a bit dismissive and was something an adult would say to a child who can’t help with anything but she was correct. However, he wouldn’t back down that easily. “But isn’t it worrying that there might be something wrong somewhere with the citysigil? I heard some rumors of weird happenings in this city the past few days. And there are more guards around.”

“So you’re thinking that this might be a concerted attack by evil-minded people?” Jel said.

“Uh, yes,” Felix replied. That sounded stupid. He knew that he was like some kid with delusions of saving the world but something feels really off about everything. The secret sigil, the power interruption, the upsurge. He didn’t tell Jel about the error he found in the officially published data on the strength of the upsurge. Was he suspecting that Jel already knew about all this and wanted to keep him in the dark? No. He shouldn’t think like that. He pushed those thoughts far back into his mind lest Jel, with her uncanny ability to read people, sense it. “It can’t be denied that there are some worrying things happening around,” Felix began to say. New sets of footsteps made him stop.

An old man followed by two people Felix recognized as mentors of the sealcrafting students in the temple. They conversed respectfully with the old man. The old man was probably one of the sealcrafters of Delphine Hall.

“Lady Fahllyr, a pleasant morning to you,” the old man said, not even sparing a glance at Felix. The two mentors also greeted Jel. “How is the holder of the right eye?”

“Quill’s fine. I assume you’re quite excited to be able to witness the awakened right eye of Delphine? I am eager to see the nature of the eye as well.” Jel stood straight and looked the old man in the eye. “Adept Sealcrafter Matteo Fahllyr will arrive later today.”

The elderly sealcrafter averted his gaze and pulled his robes closer to his body. “Yes, I am sure everyone is excited that the right eye has been activated,” the old man replied. “And my gratitude for informing me that the esteemed Adept Sealcrafter will also arrive.”

“I know that you want to have a meeting with him. But I do advice to keep it short. He’s considered well advanced in age even as a Fahllyr and in between traveling back here and removing the seal of Delphine’s right eye, he might not have much energy to spare for entertaining guests,” Jel said a little too icily, which was a surprising tone for Jel.

The sealcrafter from Delphine Hall jerked back a bit at Jel’s response. There was a moment of silence between the two parties where Jel just stared down at the older sealcrafters. Felix had one brow raised with no idea of what was happening. He coughed and cleared his throat, making the elderly sealcrafter look his way. The old man then shook his head, smiled broadly and said, “We won’t be taking any of your time, Lady Fahllyr. We’ll be on our way.”

After the trio left, Felix commented, “That’s a rarely seen part of Jel.”

“What were you saying before they arrived?”

“I said that there are weird happenings in the city. There are more guards strolling about. They even have those red golems. I’m saying there might be a connection with whatever is happening with the power interruption I found.”

“And what connection might that be?”

“Um, um…”

Jel walked into a bridge with tall open windows lining the side that connected the outer and inner temple, allowing the morning breeze to flow in. The windows overlooked the vast grounds where the relic of Emperor Krystfallen was displayed. She said, “You’re not suggesting that these troublemakers or whatever these people are can actually influence an ancient seal that can tame the power of the mana node?”

Felix swallowed every explanation he had. None of them made sense anyway. All of the young sealcrafters were required to learn about how Emperor Malvar made his part of the citysigil. Or his own citysigil, as Felix recently discovered. Gigantic pylons engraved with high-level seals by dozens of sealcrafters were driven deep into the mountain on which the city was built. Protective wards as large as a house were also buried deep in the ground. Excavations were made all over the city—it was a considerable construction project that needed thousands of manpower. All of that to merely to direct the power from the mana node. To stop the power from the mana node, even for a fraction of a second, would need much more. It’s impossible for his theoretical evil group to carry it out. And they would need to stop the power for more than a second to carry out whatever imaginary nefarious plans they have.

“Anything more?” Jel said. She clasped her hands behind her back and looked out the window.

“How about…Uh… Where you’re going now? It probably has something to do with those suspects that Aileen and Quill chased,” Felix said, desperate to find a reason to keep the conversation going. “Normally you’d be teasing Aileen, but you’re going somewhere. I mean there’s not much work here besides keeping the tourists in line.” Felix followed Jel’s gaze to the throngs of pilgrims circling the holy relic. Half a dozen white golems surrounded the artifact. They added two new forcefields and a transparent glass-like dome to keep the pilgrims much further away. “No offense meant with that statement. I…er…”

“I know what you mean. But this isn’t connected in any way to the citysigil. I’m going to converse with Uncle Malachi over a data orb.”

“The man in charge of the defenses of Krysperium? Must be something big.”

“Not in the way you think. It has to do with Aileen. Whatever approximation you have of the magical strength of Aileen is a severe underestimation. To the Fahllyr family, she is a precious asset, to be cultivated to her full potential.”

Felix let out a snort of disbelief.

“Her way of doing things is just to apply brute force as a solution. I can sort of understand how she thinks that way. But someday, when she's more mature, Aileen will stand beside the powerful heroes of history,” Jel said with a serious face. “That’s why her safety is of paramount importance. It’s true that there are some malicious elements running around the city, what their goal is I do not know, but Aileen shouldn’t have fought with them without guards to protect her. Even when she served under her sister in the army, she was always well protected and never in any real danger.”

“So you’ll get a scolding or something?”

“Yes. Most likely. Since I’m in charge of her. This is really an internal matter in our family.”

“Bu-but what about the…” The pilgrims below gave him an idea. “What about the miracle? The claw shard displayed magical powers. That should mean something. And those zealot warriors are patrolling outside the temple with their white golems. Maybe there’s a connection here or something.”

“I didn’t take you for a religious type,” Jel said. Felix tilted his head and raised a brow. He opened his mouth to speak but Jel continued, “No need to be surprised. Fahllyrs aren’t big on religion.” She pointed at the claw shard at displayed in the middle of the temple grounds. “I don’t know if that was a real miracle or not but the Church of the Dragon does. As well as a lot of people. I’m sure the Church wanted to help with the security because of the rise of pilgrims.”

Felix didn’t know what to say next. He worked hard understanding the citysigil design and he even plotted out where the possible citysigil of Emperor Krystfallen was.

“Are you sure you’re not just looking for a reason to talk to me? Alone?” Jel giggled; parts of her armor clinked together. She smiled and gazed at Felix’s eyes.

Felix felt his cheeks getting red and quickly looked down. So that was why the old sealcrafter earlier turned his eyes away. It was as if Jel stared directly into his mind. Her eyes were calm but firm and looked as if they were staring past the outside appearance of a person. He didn't know how he expected this conversation to go but it wasn't this. Great. Now, Jel has a new person to tease. "So you're saying that I should just stop all of this after I had done so much?"

"Why are you doing this anyway? To become a hero? To save everyone the city from being cut off from the mana node? To show off your skills? To do something because you're bored?" Jel patted his head. "So what is it, young sealcrafter?"

He pushed Jel's hand away. "Don't treat me like a kid. Fahllyrs age at about half the speed of a normal human so that means that I'm supposed to be older than you."

Jel laughed at him. "That doesn't work that way, Felix. And you didn't answer my question."

Felix frowned and said, "You also did not answer my question. You want me to stop this because it's going nowhere?"

"I did not say that you should stop."

"So what-?"

"Felix," Jel said. She jerked her head in the direction of the palace grounds. "There are many groups in this empire. Take this temple for example. There's the Fahllyrs, the sealcrafters, the Church, there's a bunch of different groups here. Different groups, different motivations, different allegiances."

"Different allegiances? What are you talking about?"

"Not like those conspiracy theories that are surely filling your head right now." Jel reached out to pat Felix's head again but he stepped away. She grinned and continued with her explanation. "Let's take the Hasta and the Fahllyrs. Two Martial Noble families. The Hasta's have sworn allegiance to the throne, basically, the sitting ruler. The Fahllyrs on the other hand, have sworn allegiance to the First Emperor Krystfallen. There's a fine print to the allegiances of people."

"I don't really understand the difference."

"Seriously? You're a bright kid, go figure it out." Jel brought her hand to her mouth in a mock gasp. "Oh, I'm sorry. You're not a kid."

"Haha," he said sarcastically. "You're doing that on purpose. And I seriously don't understand the difference. I can see that there's going to be a problem if the First Emperor is still around but that's not a real problem, right? We don't even know where his body was buried." There were no actual records that they were able to recover his corpse from the Blighted Lands. The stories only mentioned that the survivors of the strike team that attacked the stronghold of the Blighted Multitude brought back a shard of his claw that was as large as a shield. Where was Jel going with this?

Jel pursed her lips and closed her eyes, probably thinking what to say next. She opened her eyes and pointed at the pilgrims again. "How about them? They believe that we are guarding the real body of the First Emperor and that it's hidden away somewhere in this temple."

What's going on here? Why was Jel changing topics? "But that's not true. The real body is not here. The true duty of the Fahllyrs is to guard the crux rune of the First Emperor." Felix paused to think. Why didn't he think of this before? There should be two crux runes if there are two separate citysigils.

"Guarding the crux rune is the sworn duty of the Fahllyrs. All Fahllyrs, even us younger ones. Its story can be traced back to the Siege. Too bad I'm not allowed to tell you about it." Jel patted Felix's head. He wasn't able to evade because he was deep in thought. "I have to go. Uncle Malachi might call anytime soon," she said as she hurried off.

Felix stood still and stared at the thousands of pilgrims surrounding the claw shard atop a pedestal. The wind ruffled his hair, but it felt cool to his skin. What was all that about? He rubbed the spot where Jel patted his head. Such a fearsome girl, transforming her personality at a moment's whim. He couldn't tell what she was thinking. He sighed. "So what am I supposed to do now?"

He walked back to Quill's room. Felixia's probably throwing fruits around or maybe Aileen has killed Harvey.

Wait.

His heart started beating fast. He recounted his earlier conversation with Jel.

Did she just tell him the possible location of the crux rune of Emperor Krystfallen?