Chapter 127

Conversation

A week later.

"Knock knock knock—"

"Master." Lucy pushed the door open and entered, bowing respectfully to Theodosius.

The old wizard lifted his head from the parchment scroll, his face wearing its usual warm smile.

When there were no intriguing specimens around, Master Theodosius always appeared like a kindly grandfather next door.

"You look well. Have you been settling in these past few days?"

After several days of intimacy with Princess Olivia, Lucy’s skin glowed with a rosy hue, looking as clear and beautiful as crystal against her silver hair.

"I'm quite used to it." The corners of her lips curved slightly.

This past week, she had spent her days familiarizing herself with the operations of the Star Law Institute, and her nights tangled in affectionate whispers with the princess, living a full and pleasant life.

It had to be said—this place was truly worthy of being called a holy land for wizards.

Within a vast complex that spanned an area larger than a city, nearly all the most gifted wizards and apprentices from across the Wizard Continent had gathered. You could toss a brick at random and hit two or three academic elites.

Then there were the numerous towers and all kinds of laboratories.

The library housed over a million volumes of various texts.

Every day, the air harbor saw the comings and goings of countless airships, transporting rare materials from all directions, which greatly broadened her horizons.

In addition, Olivia had introduced her to a few friends and even took her to meet Theodore Ashton, a wizard of the Tower of the Four Sages. From his mouth, Lucy learned of the ceasefire in the Kingdom of Cordova.

All in all, Lucy had treated this past week as a well-earned vacation.

"As long as you're settling in." Theodosius continued, "I originally called you here today to introduce you to the other members of our 'Zone 8.'"

"But as luck would have it, a descent ritual occurred in our jurisdiction two days ago, and all of them went out."

They all went out?!

Lucy was momentarily stunned. “How many official members are there in Zone 8?”

“Six. Including you, that makes seven.”

“So few!”

Excluding the president and Master Theodosius, that meant Zone 8 only had five actual members and one of them was herself.

“Nothing can be done about it. The membership rules set by the first Crown Wizard were too strict.” Master Theodosius tapped the table lightly, giving a wry smile. “Though we do have quite a few provisional members.”

Since the first Crown Wizard had established the rules for joining the Divine Remains Round Table, in the three thousand years since, there had only been a little over 1,400 official members.

At its peak, each generation had fewer than a hundred; in its lowest periods, only twenty or thirty.

Given the vast expanse of the Four Islands of Wizards, this number of personnel was woefully insufficient.

Therefore, the second president, without altering the entry rules, introduced the concept of “provisional members.” Thanks to the immense academic resources of the Divine Remains Round Table, the number of provisional members expanded rapidly.

This eventually led to the formation of the Star Law Institute.

At present, the number of provisional members within the Star Law Institute had already exceeded ten thousand, and the number of official wizards surpassed three thousand.

They had become the core combat force of the Wizard Plane.

“We’ll leave introductions for another time.” Theodosius suddenly straightened and grew serious. “There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about.”

Lucy straightened her back slightly. “Please speak, Master.”

“Have you noticed any physical discomfort lately?”

“Everything is as usual.”

“Describe in detail the process of how you absorbed Fenrir’s Law of the Soul—the more detailed, the better.”

Seeing the serious expression on Theodosius's face, Lucy recounted the entire process without omission, except for one thing—she concealed the existence of the system.

After listening, Theodosius's expression turned strange.

He hadn’t detected anything particularly unusual.

Lucy asked, “Master, is there something wrong?”

“No,” Theodosius shook his head, “but the absence of a problem is the biggest problem.”

Seeing Lucy’s puzzled face, he went on to explain:

“It’s like this—Law power originates from the 'Gods.'”

“Although wizards who reach the Crown rank can also wield law-based witchcraft, each Crown Wizard must spend years, even decades, learning to control it.”

“That you suffered no backlash is highly abnormal.”

His silver eyes flickered slightly. “Summon Fenrir—I have questions for him.”

Lucy nodded.

With a thought, Fenrir—who had been dozing off in the Abyss of Nightmares—was tossed out.

“You damn brat! You locked me in with that bunch of beasts!” As soon as the mutt appeared, he exploded with fury. “Old man, what the hell are you staring at my dad for?!”

Master Theodosius’s expression remained unchanged. A few silver threads drifted out from who-knows-where and promptly suspended Fenrir upside-down in the air.

“If you don’t control that mouth of yours, I won’t mind boiling you into dog stew.”

“!!!”

“Explain why you passed the Law of the Soul to little Lucy. Don’t tell me you don’t know how law power contaminates humans.”

Fenrir cast a shifty glance at the silver-haired girl.

He hadn’t expected this to be discovered.

Just as he was about to come up with an excuse, one sharp glare from Theodosius shut him up.

Fenrir, even at the peak of his power, hadn’t been a match for the old wizard—let alone now, reduced to a palm-sized pup.

“Alright, I admit it!” the dog bared his teeth. “At the time, I was trying to get her polluted by the law power so I could take the chance to escape. Who would've thought she’d be totally fine! And she even freeloaded off my Death Realm Law! What a huge loss!”

Theodosius paid no mind to the mutt stomping its paws in rage.

Under his control, the silver threads began to tighten.

Narrowing his eyes dangerously, he said, “It seems you’re still unwilling to tell the truth. Then I’ll have to use some unorthodox methods!”

“What’re you trying to do to me?!”

“Hey, stop that!”

“Don’t come any closer… Lucy, save me! Aaaah—!”

As the scene grew progressively less bloody, Lucy could only avert her gaze.

She knew perfectly well what had really happened.

It wasn’t that she had absorbed the [Devour Law], but that—just like with Olivia earlier—the system had converted the law into a “skill.”

But the system was a secret she intended to share with no one aside from Olivia.

Not even Master Theodosius, despite the trust she had in him.

Which meant—Fenrir would just have to suffer for it.

Lucy quietly muttered a “Hang in there” in her heart and shifted her attention elsewhere.

An hourglass later—

Theodosius wiped a thin layer of sweat from his brow. Fenrir had already been reduced to a pile of twitching organs, yet bizarrely, still remained alive.

The old wizard’s surgical precision made Lucy sigh in admiration.

Even without prior research in live dissection, Theodosius’s knowledge of anatomy was so profound that it could only be compared to an ancient butcher carving an ox—flawless and exact.

“This guy’s mouth is even tougher than I thought.”

He sheathed his scalpel, though he had, in truth, already believed Fenrir’s explanation.

Perhaps the mutt really hadn’t used any special trick. The issue might lie within Lucy herself.

Could she possess a unique constitution capable of absorbing law power?

It seemed this matter would have to wait for His Excellency Merlin to return before further study.

Once the corpse-stitching threads were undone, Fenrir’s body swiftly returned to normal.

“Wuwuwu, you perverted freak! I’m defiled!” he whimpered like a violated maiden, clinging to Lucy’s calf and pleading, “Hurry, send me back to that damn Abyss of Nightmares!”