“Aren’t you ready yet?”

I had no plans of returning to the Immortal Continent any time soon. It’s a nice place, sure, but it’s too much for me. The place is too big and dangerous, especially since I haven’t reached the magic circle equivalent of the sky realm. I’ve reached twenty-four circles, so in Immortal Continent terms, I’m on par with a high-mid-ranked earth-realm expert. Any sky-realm expert can decide they’re having a bad day and squash me. Who’d want to live in a world like that?

“Ilya, are you ready yet?”

Yet, despite my reluctance, Lucia insists on dragging me along for her return trip. If my anti-Lucia cannon weren’t only in its testing phase, I’d definitely refuse. But as it is now, I’m powerless to resist. If I’m being honest, I don’t really mind going back to the Immortal Continent. Things have gotten a little stale here. It’s like I’m the leader of a bunch of children in a playground; it’s novel at first, but then, in the end, it’s meaningless. However—

“Ilya!” There was a booming sound. Lucia just destroyed my door. “Why aren’t you answering me!?”

“Hold on! I’m almost done.” Packing away ten years of research takes a while, alright? Oh, and there’s this thing. “Hey, Durandal.”

“What is it?” Durandal appeared out of nowhere. He hadn’t changed at all in ten years. Not like I’d expect a weapon spirit to age.

“Here.” I held out an amulet. It was—

“Vera?”

My fingers almost broke when Durandal snatched the amulet away. Why are the two of them so barbaric? Couldn’t they be more like Puppers? Ugh, anyway. “I found the Godking’s magical treasure trove. The entrance was hidden in a rabbitkin brothel.” Where’d the letter go? It came with the amulet. Here it is. “And this is a letter from the amulet spirit addressed to you. Well, not to you specifically, just to the Godking’s weapon spirits in general.”

A paper cut appeared on my finger after Durandal yanked away the letter. Did I read it? Yep, but I resealed it with magic so no one would know that I did. Why did I read it? Obviously to see if it hinted at any treasures, but it didn’t. There weren’t any useful treasures in that trove, not even the formulas that the Godking came up with had any use. Well, that’s to be expected of ideas written up ninety years ago. I mean, they might’ve been helpful if I had less than ten magic circles, but I don’t, so they weren’t.

“This … was there anything else?” Durandal glared at me. It might’ve been a trick of the poor lighting in my lab, but it seemed like his eyes were glistening with tears. Weapon spirits could cry? I thought they had the emotional intelligence of a brick. Perhaps describing it like a brick’s is too harsh. Cactus, maybe?

“Durandal?” Lucia poked her sword spirit. “Are you alright? What’s the paper say?” She snatched it away and … passed it to me. “Read this out loud.”

Before I could, Durandal took the letter back. I cleared my throat. “There were a few treasures and stuff, but not anything you’re looking for. And I presume you’re looking for things related to the Godking’s amulet spirit.”

“So, Vera’s … gone?”

Lucia poked Durandal. “Durandal?”

“I see.”

Lucia poked Durandal again. “Durandal?”

“Thank you for passing this on to me.”

Lucia punched Durandal. “Durandal!”

Durandal stumbled into the wall and destroyed it. It’s a good thing I had already cleared that section of my lab. “Yes, Lucia?”

“Are you okay?”

Should you be the one asking that?

Durandal sighed as he steadied himself and put away the letter. “I was okay until you hit me.”

“Are you sure? You didn’t seem to be okay before that too. It looked like you were crying.” Lucia walked up to Durandal and placed her hands on his shoulders. I stopped watching because I had better things to do, like packing my items before the two destroyed the rest of my lab. Thankfully, with multiple interspacial rings, keeping my stuff organized is nice and easy. I don’t have to do any heavy lifting either.

When I got close to the end of my table, a bright light caught my eye. “Hey, Lucia.”

“Mn?”

“That’s Softie’s soul lantern, right? It’s burning super brightly.” Maybe it’s because it was really dim before, but the lantern looked way brighter than it did when Softie first handed it to Lucia. If the brightness corresponds to how her soul is doing, then isn’t she doing really well right now? She’s not on the verge of death at all. “I guess she was in a fight and recovered just now.”

“In a fight? Who would Softie be fighting?” Lucia picked up the lantern and sniffed it. I … don’t know what she was hoping to smell.

“Well, you did cause a lot of people to resent you, and by extension, the Shadow Devil Sect. Let’s see, you robbed over a thousand sects. You completely destroyed the phoenix one. There was also the fact that you beat up every representative at one of those exchanges. And there was that war you took part in where those twenty sky-realm experts on the other side lost their lives. Not to mention the multiple sects on our side that you robbed of merits.” Am I missing anything? Probably.

Lucia tilted her head. “But…, hmm. Did I really do all those things? You’re overexaggerating. There’s no way I did so many horrendous things! I would’ve remembered if I did, and I don’t remember, so I didn’t. Mhm.”

“Just because you don’t remember something doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

“But if I forget, then it absolves me of all responsibility of having done it!”

“No, that’s not quite right either. Sure, those people you’ve bothered can’t fight you while you’re here, but they can easily bother Softie instead.” I’m not sure why I’m trying to reason with Lucia. It never turns out well for me. I think I’ll stop now before she resorts to violence.