The three brothers arrived at roughly the same time.

Surprisingly, they were all wearing the same blue attires.

What was even more surprising was that they all looked alike...almost as if they were...triplets.

They were triplets. That I understood...but why go to such lengths to look identical?

From the unremarkable goatee to the blue attire and from the jewelry to their shoes, everything was the same.

Could their voices be the same as well?

I was starting to wonder if some of them were clones.

They stopped seven meters away from me and hovered there in silence.

I was now remembering that earlier, one of them said that they had been waiting for us for a millennium.

How?

How did they know that we'd be here at this specific time and even tail us from the very beginning?

"The «Ancient Codex». Take it out now!"The one in the middle said. His voice sounded like the voice of the one who had surprised us in the room earlier.

What were they talking about?

The Ancient Codex?

Could it be the Magus Stone?

It must be. It was the only thing of real value that I had on me.

But how could they have known about it?

I have never taken it out ever since we arrived in this world.

Did they find out about it when I was bragging to Kyle about having found a new spell in the Magus Stone?

In my mind, there was no doubt that we were both thinking about the same object.

Was the Magus Stone the reason they had been waiting for us for a thousand years?

All of that time to acquire the so-called Ancient Codex from us?

But how could they be so sure it was in my possession?

The man on the left turned to the man in the middle, the man who had just asked for the Ancient Codex and said, "Zayn. Have you forgotten? Earlier, he was bragging in front of the boy that he had found an interesting new spell in something called 'The Magus Stone'. It must be the other name that the Ancient Codex goes by in their world."

I had stayed behind specifically to know what they were after. Now that I knew, it was time to join Kyle in the ring.

That was the safest place I could be as the ring itself was impervious to any external attacks. It was basically indestructible even by the might of a Magus God. The man who created it and then sealed me in it made sure that I would remain his prisoner for all eternity unless something more powerful than a Magus God appeared.

My only plan was to read their memories first and find out how they seemed to know everything...but I couldn`t read their memories remotely like I would on an ordinary magician who couldn't find out if I was reading them or not. Chances were that these Magus Gods would find out immediately and cut the connection between me and their memories immediately resulting in my soul suffering from a backlash.

The only way this could work was for one of them to touch the copper ring physically. That way I could automatically access their entire memories without them knowing. The only reason it could work that way was that the ring contained sealing powers and touching it made you an extension of those powers. Being the one sealed in the ring allowed me to be cloaked from any probing and inversely I could probe on anything with my soul sense without being detected. It was a marvelous power that even the creator of the ring hadn't expected to exist and only known by me.

Having access to their memories, the mystery behind their appearance would be unfolded.

Without even bothering to talk to them, I entered the ring and as I did that, I felt a foreign imprint other than mine fall on the ring. They were probably afraid that I would have the ring teleported to a place that was out of their reach.

Now all that was left was hope that they touch the ring in the next 700 years.

700 hundred years was the limit for Kyle's body as a Master Hallowed Swordsman. His 2nd tier soul would be able to live on a bit longer but I didn't want him to become like me.

As I kept my eye at what was happening on the outside, I saw Zayn sigh saying: "So, it has come down to this. You two know what to do now. Let's begin." He waved his hand and the copper ring that had fallen on the ground started floating towards them.

What I expected didn't happen.

Instead of letting the ring land in his hand, he let it float before them.

Without exchanging any more words, the three brothers then started pouring endless torrents of mana into the ring.

Seeing all that was happening, I felt like my heart had just been pierced by a thousand knives.

How could they possibly know?

The ring could only be destroyed from the inside.

They didn't even think about destroying it from the outside, which would've been done by any sane person alive. It was the most rudimental and logical thing to do. Instead, they went for the only sure kill method without even consulting each other.

How did they know?

The ring could only store mana equal to the reserves of a single Magus God. If the threshold load was exceeded, the ring's inner world would crumble followed by the ring itself and everything inside would be pushed out in the outside world.

A Magus God's body automatically replenished their lost mana from the outside world.

With three Magus Gods giving us all the mana they had, the ring was destined to be destroyed eventually.

Fortunately for us, I had an idea that would keep us alive for the time being.

Since they were giving us mana for free, and chances were that they wouldn't stop until the ring was destroyed, I could exploit that to our advantage.

I could promote Kyle's strength and push him to the pinnacle of a Hallowed Swordsman.

If by misfortune they stop pouring in their mana before Kyle was strong enough to battle them, I had another trump card that I could only use in times where I had no more options available to me and even then I wasn't sure it would work. Using that trump card was basically risking my own life.

Let's hope the time to use it won't come.