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"Whitey? But what is Whitey?"
"It's the name of this mouse. I named it Whitey."
"Ah... cute. Whitey."
Thud.
Professor Billian, who had come down from the podium unnoticed, placed his hand on Liber's cage.
"Impressive. Liber Specula, is it?"
"Yes!"
"You understood all of my lessons?"
"I didn't understand everything."
"Can you give it other commands?"
Liber focused again and looked at Whitey.
Whitey was still doing somersaults in place.
"Squeak?"
Suddenly, it stood up, looked at Liber once, and then lay down on its back like a dog, exposing its belly.
"Hoo. Did you instruct it to do that?"
"Ah, no. I just told it to stop briefly to input the next command, but..."
"The brainwaves and longitudinal waves are perfectly aligned, and even mental communication has been achieved. It seems to be swearing allegiance to you now."
"Huh? Is that even possible?"
"It's content from the second semester."
"Ah..."
"Excellent. You can have this mouse."
That evening.
The dormitory common area study room.
"Squeak."
Whitey, who was on Liber's shoulder, made a short sound.
Its white fur contrasted with its cute black eyes and red nose.
Liber handed over one of the sunflower seeds he was holding in his hand.
Bellum from the Swordsmanship Department asked.
"So, in the Mental Magic class in the Magic Department, they teach you how to make pets?"
Liber, who had been looking at Whitey with a pleased expression, flared up.
"What are you talking about! How difficult do you think the Mental Magic class is! Sometimes I can't even understand the lessons properly, you know?"
Davian, Latia, and Luna simultaneously shook their heads.
'Sometimes'?
Does he know that 90 percent of the Magic Department students haven't understood anything from the first class to today's class?
Liber had already put Whitey down on the floor and was training it to 'shake hands'.
"Hand."
Whitey placed its rice grain-sized front paw on Liber's hand.
"Cute!"
Luna clapped her hands next to him.
Davian asked.
"Stop training Whitey. What happened? The informant. Is there any news?"
"Ah! That's right. News came in this afternoon."
"Do we have to ask for you to tell us?"
"Ah... the location is a bit ambiguous."
"Where are they?"
"The Western Mines."
"The Western Mines? Wait... isn't that where the fifth trace is?"
"Oh, that's right. Oh, Davian, did you memorize the order using the play script?"
He did memorize it, but not by looking at the play script.
He was locked in the underground secret library and had already memorized everything.
"Anyway, the Western Mines are too far from here... it'll be hard to go there over the weekend. So I think we should aim for next weekend, or just after the vacation starts."
Davian thought carefully about the memories of the past playthrough.
'The Western Mines, huh...'
The city closest to the Western Mines is Mane City.
A city of that size would have a warp magic circle for travel from the academy.
"Let's go this weekend. Let's get all the traces."
Everyone was surprised and looked at Davian.
"Right away this weekend?"
"Liber said it's too far away right now. If we can't get back by Monday morning, we'll get demerits."
"Are demerits important? If you can't go to class without a valid reason, your evaluation score will also be reduced."
"Ah... that's true."
Davian spread out his palms to calm his friends down.
"No. We can go and come back."
Saturday morning.
Davian's group opened the door to the warp room with the key they had received from the teaching assistant in advance.
It was impossible for ordinary students to be entrusted with the warp room key, but it was possible because they were the Gray Bear Exploration Team, which had been officially launched.
"The teaching assistant said they marked it in advance yesterday. Spread out and look for it."
The floor of the vast warp room was entirely covered with marble.
And here and there on the marble, complex warp magic circles were deeply engraved in intaglio.
They were warp magic circles connected to major cities all over the continent.
Nubes gaped in awe as he looked around.
"Amazing... I can't believe there was a place like this in the academy."
"Seriously. It's amazing. Is this the class of Elton Academy?"
A little later.
Luna shouted.
"Here! I found it!"
Luna held up a yellow flag above her head and waved it.
The group all approached the magic circle where Luna was standing.
"This is the right one. Let's go."
Liber fidgeted.
"Is it! Is it finally departure! Liber exploration... no. Gray Bear Exploration Team!"
Bonita asked.
"You're going to fight your brother, so are you happy?"
"It's not like I hate it. I've only been ignored as the youngest."
Bonita put her hand on the hilt of her sword.
"Hoo. Then can I cut off his head?"
"Ah, no! Crazy!"
"I'm just kidding."
"Ah..."
Davian stepped between the two.
"Let's try not to fight if possible and bring it quietly. So things don't get bigger."
Liber nodded his head greatly.
"Of course we should. Let's somehow steal it and return to the academy. Then round one is our victory!"
All seven members of the Gray Bear Exploration Team stood on the warp magic circle.
Davian lightly injected mana, and a dazzling light emanated from the magic circle engraved in intaglio.
Even though it was still early, Mane City's avenue was bustling.
Mane City was a city that naturally arose while processing and selling various minerals from the western Perum Mountains, and now it has grown into a fairly large city.
As many people have come and gone for a long time, it has become a large commercial city that buys and sells not only minerals but also various goods from all over the continent.
Nubes looked around here and there without a thought.
"Wow... the avenue is really wide, there are really a lot of people, and there are really a lot of stores."
Luna and Bellum were already arm in arm, running around various stores on the avenue.
Accessory stores were their main target.
Latia shook her head.
"Are we here to play or what? Right? Bonita."
Bonita, who had been walking next to Latia until a moment ago, had disappeared.
"What? Where did she suddenly go again?"
"There."
At the end of Liber's pointing finger, Bonita's back, with her red hair hanging down, could be seen.
She was frantically looking at and touching the swords hung outside the weapon store.
"Ha..."
At that time, Latia heard a merchant's call.
"Here, we're selling freshly arrived magic rings! We're giving magic rings made directly by dwarves from 1st grade raw stones for one plus one!"
Latia looked at Davian.
"Davian, let's go there."
"I'm okay."
"Then I'll go alone."
Latia headed to the magic material store, her blonde hair fluttering.
Nubes was also already next to Bonita, looking at weapons, and Liber had discovered a bookstore and ran off to it.
Before she knew it, Davian was left alone on the avenue.
'Well, nothing can be done.'
He wanted to say one thing: Are we on a picnic now? But these friends were bound to be different from Davian.
Even if he was the student representative or the ace of his department, he was just a seventeen-year-old freshman at the academy.
Perhaps they had only been outside their family a few times from a young age and had devoted themselves to studying and training.
Elton Academy is not a place that can be easily entered.
And now they have just left their family's embrace, and the academy is just as closed off.
A time when they are full of curiosity and wonder about the world.
They started out grandly with what seemed like a formal exploration team, but in reality, this moment is a picnic and a fun adventure for these friends.
While thinking about this and that, while walking down the avenue.
He heard someone calling.
"Hey, young man."
When he looked at the place where the voice came from, he saw an old woman sitting with a small table on the street.
"You're a young man with a strange aura. How about it? Aren't you curious about the past, present, and future?"
Several cards were scattered messily on the table.
All the cards were face down, but he could tell they were different from the cards that gamblers play with in back alley pubs.
'Is it something like tarot cards.'
Ting.
=====
[Event: Listen to the old woman's past, present, and future.]
Reward: None
Accept: Y / N
=====
He was just about to ignore it and pass by, but an event notification popped up.
But it's an event with no reward.
'It's probably better to ignore it.'
The moment Davian's gaze turned to 'N' in 'Accept or Reject.'
"This is a card that shows your past."
The old woman turned over a card and held it out in front of her.
'Her sales tactics are out of the ordinary?'
She turns over a card when I'm about to ignore her and just pass by.
She looks like a kind grandmother living in some country village.
The big city is scary after all.
Davian's gaze inadvertently turned to the flipped card.
Ting.
=====
[Event Accepted]
=====
"..."
This is an alarm window that is the shortest ever.
Was this an event that could not be avoided at all?
Davian gave up and sat in the chair opposite the old woman.
Still, seeing that even the system alarm window popped up, she probably wasn't a meaningless scammer.
"Welcome. Seeing your uniform, you seem to be a student?"
"Yes."
"What's your name?"
"I'm Davian."
Davian, who was sitting in the chair, began to seriously examine the picture on the flipped card.
A body lying on the floor.
Three sharp swords stuck in its back.
He can't help but sigh.
"Ha..."
"Good, Davian. Now, I'll give you a card reading."
The old woman looked back at Davian's past card, which she had turned over.
"Huh... that's true. This doesn't come out often with a living person's past card... how unusual. Let's see... the meaning of this card is..."
Davian raised his palm to stop the old woman, who was about to rattle off some forced interpretation.
He could tell what it meant at a glance, so there was no need to go through the trouble of listening to an explanation.
Yes. I died three times.
"The past is done. Show me the present card."
"Hoo... you're a rare young man who isn't bound by the past."
It's not that.
I know what kind of card it is.
The old woman must have thought that the past card she had drawn in haste was wrong, so this time she closed her eyes and slowly moved her hand to pick up a card.
She placed the card she picked up on the right side of the past card.
The present card depicts a knight riding a white horse.
A steep hill stretches out in front of the knight, and at the top is a splendid palace.
"Hmph... you're running forward with your eyes only on the goal."
Anyone can see that it's such a picture.
"But can you see this?"
The old woman pointed to the horse's legs with her finger.
Only then did Davian's eyes notice something unusual.
The horse's feet, including the hooves, were not drawn.
Now that he looked at it, the reddish paint underneath seemed to be blood.
"The road ahead won't be smooth. The knight's will is strong, but the horse's condition is not one that can reach the top normally."
"What do you think a horse with its feet cut off means? My people? My background? My environment?"
"The knight and the horse are running as one, so it's not the people around you. Nor is it the background or environment. This horse..."
The old woman looked into Davian's eyes.
"It's just you yourself... If I had to be specific, the knight is your soul and spirit, and the horse is your body."
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