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Chapter 462.2: Little Sisters Are Meant To Be Bullied (2)

The two of them took turns washing up before heading down for breakfast.

The employees of the Azure Manor were already accustomed to Alicia’s presence, so they didn’t show much of a reaction to the unexpected visitor. Paul and Geralt were also too busy settling in the new recruits, so Roel and Alicia were the only ones on the dining table.

Even up to this point, Alicia’s embarrassment still hadn’t faded yet. Roel could easily tell from her blush.

Alicia had a fair complexion that made even the slightest blush conspicuous, especially with those seashell ears of hers. Roel had always used that as an indicator to determine Alicia’s mood, and such was the case now.

“Alicia, ahh.”

“This… L-Lord Brother, didn’t you say that we shouldn’t do this anymore?”

“I did? But I suddenly feel an urge to feed you just like how we did back when we were still children. Are you feeling embarrassed now?”

“O-of course not!” exclaimed Alicia.

With a reddened face, she leaned in and ate off Roel’s fork. Her eyes were fixed on Roel as she chewed on the food and swallowed it down. Then, she meekly murmured under her breath.

“… Lord Brother is bullying me.”

“What are you saying, Alicia? Why would I do that?” Roel replied with a smile.

“You’re feigning ignorance…” Alicia muttered with an indignant pout.

Roel paid her protest no heed and continued relishing himself in Alicia’s rare display of dissatisfaction and awkwardness. Breakfast continued with a furious blush on Alicia’s face.

As soon as they were done eating, Alicia came up with an excuse and fled from the Azure Manor as if she was escaping from a terrifying monster. On the other hand, after receiving his dose of happiness, Roel stretched his back and returned to his work with great motivation.

…

Over the next week, Alicia confirmed her base to be a cluster of white buildings located not too far away from the Azure Manor. In contrast to the Azure Manor’s remote mountainous range, Alicia’s base had a lake and a beach in the vicinity, so there was no lack of students frequenting the area.

The student populace implicitly understood the rationale behind Alicia’s choice—the relationship between her and Roel was no secret anymore. In fact, a huge reason she had chosen that place was to reduce the distance she needed to teleport in order to get to the Azure Manor.

That being said, she hadn’t visited the Azure Manor even once ever since moving into her new base. Her face would automatically redden upon meeting Roel ever since his unsparing teasing that day, to the point that she began keeping her distance from him.

That was a disappointment to Roel, but he chose to leave things be. Instead, he doubled down on his work and study instead.

He was continuing his research gathering in the National Athenaeum of Wisdom every day. The ‘Tark Stronghold Search and Rescue Seminar’ held several meetings over the next month, but there was hardly any progress.

Roel and the other historians had substantially proven the existence of the Six Calamities, but they weren’t able to find decisive evidence to prove that they were related to the disappearance of Tark Stronghold. More importantly, they hadn’t found a way to deal with Shrouding Fog yet.

From Winstor’s precedent, Roel was fairly certain that it was possible to kill the Six Calamities even though they would return after some time. However, no one could say for certain whether those who had disappeared together with Tark Stronghold would return once Shrouding Fog had been killed. Worst of all, they weren’t able to find any traces of Shrouding Fog.

Regarding this, Roel and the other historians had no choice but to continue searching through historical records, hoping to find a precedent they could refer to. To boost their efficiency, he brought in even more manpower to help with the research.

This was exactly the kind of matter that the Rose of Dawn had devoted themselves to dealing with, so the Goldenrose Faction, Redrose Faction, and Bluerose Faction generously sent students to help with the research.

Browsing through historical records wasn’t a task that could be undertaken by just anyone. Taking that into account, Roel tasked the student helpers with the job of sieving out records relevant to their cause. These records would then be deciphered by Kurt before they were handed over to Roel to pick out the authentic portions.

This was a monotonous and boring job, but it was of utmost importance given that the lives of over a hundred thousand soldiers were at stake. Roel had emphasized this point while he was recruiting helpers, so those who applied tended to be more serious and responsible.

After a month of hard work, they finally found something reminiscent of a clue.

Only a very small portion of the historical records picked out by Margaret went further than describing a sighting of the Six Calamities, but even so, most of them were baseless guesses. However, there was one book in particular that caught Roel’s attention.

It was a record from the Second Epoch’s Ancient Austine Empire. Very little was known about the book since there were only a few pages left, but the information contained within was indeed about the Mother Goddess and the Six Calamities, and they were aligned with Roel’s knowledge of them.

The record proposed a hypothesis that there were numerous factors that could lead to increased activity from the Six Calamities other than the Mother Goddess’ influence, such as celestial events or a fixed cycle.

Roel thought that the hypothesis was plausible for one simple reason.

The Mother Goddess had spent most of Her time in deep sleep since the inception of the Third Epoch. There were times that She awakened from her slumber, but those were never more than a brief instant. If the Six Calamities were relying on this short window to destroy humankind, the odds were much more likely for humans to naturally die out before then.

There had to be something else affecting the Six Calamities’ activity cycles, and the deduction pushed forward by the record was the transformations of the moon.

In the Sia Continent, the moon had always been viewed to be a symbol of femininity and enigma since ancient times. Many bloodlines and spells used the moon as a medium, such that one could say that the moon made up half of all celestial events significant to transcendents.

Furthermore, the moon on the Sia Continent was unlike that of Roel’s previous world. There were many peculiar phenomena associated with it, with the most common example being the decennial Twin Moon Phenomenon.

The Twin Moon Phenomenon was not just a simple celestial event; it also caused tangible environmental changes all over the Sia Continent too, such as fluctuations in the mana density. Due to its significance, there were quite a few countries that had festivals around it.

Many scholars who were fascinated by the moon had devoted their lives to uncovering its mysteries, but so far, there had been no credible theoretical framework that properly explained the moon’s phenomena.

Given how the effects induced by the moon affected the whole Sia Continent, Roel thought that it was plausible for it to serve as a mobilizing signal for the Six Calamities.

There was just one problem.

The record did point out a direction to work toward, but it was far from easy to verify it. Quite a few acclaimed historians learned about the breakthrough in Roel’s research and rushed over right away. They found the findings fascinating and acknowledged the plausibility of the moon hypothesis, but they also quickly added that this piece of information wouldn’t be enough for them to build their case in the ‘Tark Stronghold Search and Rescue Seminar’.

Roel instructed Kurt to use his Renascence Origin Attribute on the record to see if he could gather any other evidence, but the latter was unable to see anything of value. He was only able to see a person flipping through the record estimated to be around several centuries ago, but that person was unable to understand the record’s content and soon lost interest in it.

In the end, Roel was unable to find conclusive evidence to push his case, but he did manage to gather quite a few records of the Six Calamities.

Similar research was also being carried out in the Saint Mesit Theocracy’s Holy Capital’s Royal Library. The only inactive one of the Three Great Libraries was the Austine Empire’s Millennia Glory Repository.

Roel wasn’t too surprised by that since it was not the first time that the Austine Empire had intentionally stood against the Theocracy.

He was initially intending to get Lilian’s help to access the Millennia Glory Repository’s archives, but that didn’t seem like a good idea now. She wasn’t in a good position right now, and he didn’t want to add to her troubles. Furthermore, he sensed that Lilian had been avoiding him recently.

In any case, the research scale of the Six Calamities had already reached an incredible size, such that it was probably just a matter of time before something useful popped up.

Just as Roel thought that everything was finally on track, an urgent communication suddenly came in from the eastern border. A bombshell was dropped, striking fear and unease into the hearts of all humans,

The deviants had invaded.