Chapter 331: Seeking the Truth

In Skyborne City, Wang Yu and Avia moved quietly through the winding clusters of various scholarly guilds and societies in the bustling academic quarter. They were searching for the former home of a once-obscure member of the Church of Nightfall Church, a scholar named Zagro, whose past affiliations pointed to a small society known as the Seekers' Guild.

"The Seekers' Guild is a modest group, and shouldn't be far from here. Let's keep an eye out," Avia murmured, scanning the plaques and signs affixed to nearby buildings. The society's location matched the information she'd found on an old map.

Just a few days prior, the Midnight Library had relayed results from the Nightfall scholars' ongoing study of the research documents left behind by Lancer. After poring over those conclusions and cross-referencing them with her and Sieg's own insights, Avia felt she was on the cusp of something valuable.

Motivated by curiosity and the pursuit of deeper knowledge, she and Wang Yu had come to investigate the Seekers' Guild, which had apparently been dabbling in hypermagic over a decade ago.

They had prepared carefully. Using both magical and mundane methods, they'd altered their appearances and were avoiding any association with their real names and identities. They were now posed as two unaffiliated researchers, mirroring the same nondescript presence Zagro himself had once maintained.

"Over here!"

"There," Wang Yu said, his keen eyes catching the faded sign before Avia. He pointed toward an older, narrow building, with the name "Seekers' Guild" on its weathered nameplate. The two walked toward it without hesitation.

Unlike the newer structures occupied by more influential societies like the Council of the Arcane, this building was from the city's earlier days. Its facilities were dated, its exterior stained by time.

While the Council of the Arcane had long since relocated to the gleaming new streets, the Seekers remained here—a clear indication that they hadn't produced any significant breakthroughs in years.

As they reached the entrance, only a single figure could be seen inside: a young man hunched behind the reception desk, eyes glued to the pages of a thick book. He didn't look up even as the two approached.

"Hello, is this the Seekers' Guild?" Avia asked politely, breaking the silence.

"Ah, yes, it is. How can I help you?"

The man blinked rapidly as he was jolted from his reading. His gaze swept over their unfamiliar faces with a trace of confusion.

"We're here hoping to inquire about a former member of your society, whom we knew. His name was Zagro. We're particularly interested in his past research and were hoping to study it further."

Avia name-dropped Zagro, as planned, in hopes of seeking references to the guild's past investigations on hypermagic.

"Zagro... I'm sorry, I don't recognize the name," the young man replied, frowning. "I'm not actually a member of the fellowship myself. I was hired just to sit at the front desk."

Wang Yu and Avia exchanged a glance. That the receptionist wasn't even a member of the guild spoke volumes about the group's decline.

"But I do have a list of past members," the man continued, shrugging helplessly. "If the name's on it, I can let you in to browse the archives—though there's a small fee for access."

He began rummaging through a drawer beneath the desk. "It's not really a formal rule, you understand. Just something the remaining members came up with—to keep the lights on, I guess."

Wang Yu raised a brow. "Is it normal for guilds to grant open access to their research archives in exchange for coin?"

"Honestly?" The young man chuckled without mirth. "Probably not. But there aren't many left running the place, and those who are... well, they're not exactly picky, as long as you're not causing trouble."

A few moments later, the man extracted a worn ledger, scanned its pages, and tapped a finger against a name near the bottom.

"Here—Zagro. He's listed. So you're clear to access the archives, provided the fee is paid."

He tucked the ledger back beneath the desk and held out a hand in silent request.

Wang Yu shook his head with a sigh. "This place really is broke, huh. All right, how much?"

The man named a price. It was steep, at least by ordinary standards, but for two independent researchers accustomed to funding their own experiments in Skyborne City, the cost was trivial.

"Here," Avia said, retrieving a small pouch from beneath her cloak. She placed it on the desk. The young man's hand faltered, hesitating at the sight of the bag.

"Um..."

"This isn't coin," he said cautiously.

"No," Avia admitted with a sigh. "We've had to convert most of our funds into materials for ongoing experiments. That's refined alchemical-grade platinum. If it won't do, we'll have to come back later."

The receptionist turned the pouch over in his hands, inspecting the contents. Platinum was universally recognized in the city's academic circles as a valuable resource in countless magical and alchemical experiments. Among researchers, it served as a practical substitute for currency.

Wang Yu and Avia had no intention of revealing their identities. Paying using their identity cards would as good as reveal them.

"That's fine," the receptionist said. "Let me confirm the quantity and quality."

"All right," he finally continued. "You can proceed. Don't break anything, don't remove any materials, and be sure to leave before I clock out."

Wang Yu and Avia gave their thanks and proceeded into the heart of the guild.Avia was particularly curious as to how far the Seekers' Guild's research on hypermagic had gone, as well as why they had chosen to give up on such a promising line of research.

She hadn't expected that they would have fallen to the point of allowing access to their archives just for a modest fee.

The further in they walked, the more the Guild's decline was revealed. Dusty halls, silent laboratories, and old, outmoded equipment lined their path. Here and there, they passed a hurried figure—but even those few might not have been true members of the society.

"Place is a ghost town," Wang Yu muttered, eyeing the heavy, dust-covered doors designed to contain alchemical mishaps. "Didn't think they'd fallen this far."

Still, there were plenty of research guilds and societies in Skyborne City. This state of affairs wasn't unusual, and there were plenty faring worse than the Seekers' Guild. The thing was...

"They're not just declining," Avia said softly. "They're clinging to life. Other groups in this state would've disbanded long ago."

Wang Yu nodded. That was the strange part. The Seekers had made a deliberate decision to remain active. It suggested they weren't merely trying to bleed all the value they could from their old work. They were stubbornly clinging on.

But why?

Eventually, they reached the archive. Inside, the room resembled a traditional library—but instead of books, the shelves were filled with neatly bundled stacks of research notes, organized chronologically.

Avia's sharp gaze caught the trend immediately: the more recent the research, the fewer the stacks of papers. Only a few scattered stacks appeared on the latest shelves, while earlier work had clearly once been substantial.

They approached the section labeled hypermagic. With practiced ease, Wang Yu used the power of the Chariot to scan the document titles and pointed Avia toward a specific stack.

She picked up the relevant materials and began to read. The content was coherent, detailed, and—at least in its early stages—aligned closely with the path currently pursued by the Council of the Arcane. Their foundational assumptions were sound. The theory held promise.

But it stopped abruptly.

Just as Zagro had described, the research had reached the very edge of a breakthrough... and then ceased right where the Council's research currently was.

Avia frowned and flipped through a few more documents scattered across the next shelf. But there was nothing more on hypermagic. The guild had simply stopped working on such research.

It wasn't as if they had exhausted all leads. There was a clear path forward, but the Seekers' Guild had chosen not to pursue it.

"They must have known this held potential," she whispered. "It's one of the few areas with a real chance of advancing the arcane-alchemical paradigm."

Despite having successfully entered their archives, Avia was no closer to understanding why the Seekers' Guild had given up on hypermagic research. All she could conclude was that their progress had been consistent with the Council's.

In truth, she and Sieg, thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Nightfall scholars, had already found a probable way forward. The next step was to refine and test their hypothesis under controlled experimental conditions.

Still, she had hoped to find something here—some additional insight, or at the very least, a reason why the Seekers had given up. But nothing presented itself.

With their visit concluded, the pair returned to the front desk and informed the receptionist of their departure. The young man watched them go, his gaze lingering long after they vanished into the streets beyond.

He toyed with the platinum in one hand and flipped his identity card idly in the other.

"Coincidence?" he murmured to himself. "Or something more deliberate?"

They hadn't used identity cards. They had kept their names hidden. He couldn't confirm their connection to the sensitive research he was supposed to monitor—but the secrecy was telling.

He tapped the edge of the desk with a slow, steady rhythm. A moment later, a second figure emerged silently from within the depths of the building—someone Wang Yu and Avia hadn't seen. "Joey," the receptionist said quietly, "keep a close eye on the guilds pursuing related studies. Make sure nothing slips past us. And if possible... find out who those two really are."