By the time I reach the Eastern entrance, Varoon and Irsha are already waiting. I'm glad they didn't go before I could say goodbye.

“Vyra?!” Varoon’s eyes widened when he saw me. It took me a moment to realize why.

“Oh yeah, I evolved last night. I'm a Dominance Orc now.”

“Really,” he shook his head, “You're piling too many achievements. I can't keep up.”

“You're leaving so quickly,” I offered a sad smile. “I only just met you too. You have to come visit, alright? I don't know where your village is to come find you.”

“Hmph,” Varoon snorted and shrugged. “As an older brother,” he hesitated, “I don't want to live in your shadow. I'm going to follow my own path, okay?”

“The path where you try to impress momma? That isn't still living in my shadow?” My eyes feel hot, but I'm not crying yet. It's just a temporary goodbye. We’ll see each other again.

But he’s going to war, a voice of doubt whispers inside of me.

Varoon snorted and glanced briefly over my shoulder, where momma was waving with a smile just a few feet away. “I can't impress her. I don't know why I bothered to try. But,” he turned around, and I could just barely hear what he said, “I can at least be a better father to my kids.”

“Varoon?” I asked because I couldn't quite hear him, and his demeanor was strange.

He looked over his shoulder and smiled. “Sorry, Vyra.”

I blinked. “Sorry? About what?”

“Because I'm not going to tell you either.”

“Tell me what?” He started walking away, with Irsha giving an awkward smile and a wave. “Hey, Varoon! Tell me what?” I called out but he refused to answer.

Ah! Crap.

Before he was out of sight, I managed to use . My eyes grew wide and my jaw went slack.

Brother… strong.

It’s the first time I've seen an aura that could gobble mine up.

Although I felt disoriented after seeing Varoon off, there were still things I needed to take care of. I went to check up on the Goblins. I built two storage buildings: one simple silo for the grain, and one rectangular room for the vegetables. I dragged Fiara over and had her conjure some ice with magic, then I cast at the entrance. Some heat will leak through the walls and ground, but earth is a pretty good insulator. And I don't think I'll have to worry about insects or vermin sneaking into a cold room. I cast inside, and since it's a spell that doesn't emit heat, I don't even have to worry about it.

With this, the Goblins can start harvesting the vegetables in earnest and they won't spoil quickly. I've made a big stone basin in the refrigerated warehouse for each kind of crop they're growing.

After that, because Fiara started begging me, I made a large room full of shelves to hold the stone tablets that have taken over her home. I figure this room will gradually expand into a larger library, so I built it in a fairly open and central location. I also wasted a lot of time carving letters and numbers on the sides of the tablets, based on my own version of the Dewey Decimal System (because I don't know how the real one works by heart), before putting them on the shelves, so they wouldn't get lost. Most of the tablets are still sitting on the floor in there.

Basically, I was running around all day. I accidentally neglected the Human guests, too. I didn't even see them until dinner. Armin managed to catch me after dinner. I'm curious about Runa, who's hiding behind him and staring at me intensely, but I'm choosing to ignore that for now.

“Hey, chief, do you have a minute?”

“Yes, of course,” I say to him, rubbing the back of my head. “I'm sorry I couldn't attend to you more during the day.”

“No, you looked busy,” he shrugged. “Besides, we got to see an Orc evolve in front of our eyes, so it wasn't boring.”

Wait, what? Who else evolved today?!

“Anyway, before we left the city, That girl that was here last time, Elly, as well as her sister and half Elf friend, asked me to give you this if we ran into each other. I forgot about it yesterday, because I really didn't expect to see you again. They said it's something important, so be careful with it.”

He took some kind of scroll out of his bag. It was glowing very faintly and wouldn't unroll even though it didn't look sealed. I'm curious what’s inside, but,

“Who else evolved today?!”

“Huh?” Armin blinked in surprise. “Sorry, I don't know her name. One of the women who was coating some baskets to make them leak proof.”

“It was Babett!” called an Orc who overheard our conversation.

“What do you want?” a woman’s voice called out.

“You evolved today, right?” the first Orc called back.

“Yeah!”

I looked over to where the voice was coming from. Sitting halfway down the fire was a brown-skinned Human: about six feet tall, with pointed ears, small tusks, and vertical pupils--Wait. Is she a High Orc?

“Hey, Babett, are you a High Orc now?” I called.

“Yes, chief!” she called back.

Dang. It happened right under my nose!

Dinner ended without much else to note, as long as I continue to ignore Runa’s persisting weirdness. I decided to use my time after dinner to go to my house and investigate the scroll Armin gave me.

This scroll is sealed somehow. No, not somehow; I recognize this feeling. It's some kind of variety of my Holy attribute spell. It feels like it will release if I respond accordingly.

I push a small amount of Holy attribute Magic Power into the seal and the scroll-like illusion is replaced by a small stack of papers. On top is a note from Elianora:

[Dear Vyra,

Olive and I wanted to give you these as thanks for everything. The Gods favor you, and without them I don't know where my sister and I would be right now…

Our mother was going to be a Court Mage before she contracted magic poisoning. She did a lot of research in the royal library before that. I don't know what it says, since it's all in code, but you should be able to understand it, right?

We'll come to visit you when Olive is an official Priestess, so can you keep these safe until then?

Blessings, from Elianora and Olive.]

Research from the Humans’ royal library? Of course I'm going to read it!

I move the top note aside. From there, the rest is coded language and diagrams. However, I can tell right away, the coded language carries the exact same meaning as the Human language, just with different characters.

Something like this is the easiest thing in the world for an Orc! Now then, what does the top page say?

I start scanning with my eyes excitedly.

[I’ve changed my cypher for these notes. I hope nobody else will be able to read it without my key. Therefore, whoever else is reading this, I hope you're somebody I can trust. I did something really bad this time.]

Hm? What kind of start is this? These research notes read more like a diary.

[I found something really amazing when I was looking through the old, untranslated works. They're leftover texts from the Indigos’ civilization, before it was eradicated. It's really hard to translate, and I don't have that much time allowed to me here, so I'm taking them home with me.]

Eh?! She stole texts from the royal library?! It couldn't be that what I'm holding is…

I look down at my the stack of papers in my hand with horror and excitement.

[At the bottom of this page should be a spell pattern hidden by a cypher. I should have given you the key to that, too. It's structured as a basic spell, so just cast it and the original contents of each page should reappear on the back. If you manage to translate anything, let me know. Nobody isn't curious about the race that invented magic tools.]

Just how important are these papers I'm holding? Elianora, you gave me something ridiculous.