Chapter 289

I couldn't help but feel nostalgic as I walked through. Even with all the changes, it was just like the past. Once again, I was disguised as a servant, walking around, desperate to hide my true identity.

The only difference was the nature of the threat. In the past, I was afraid that anyone could take me down ... but now, it was different. I just needed to avoid the attention of the Eternals.

As I walked around, I took note of the changes. Amusingly, more than half of the teachers stayed, showing that they had no problems with the new management. Even more interestingly, the guilds were also here ... and they were acting far more arrogantly.

Enough to actually insult the teachers.

A rather interesting change.

However, the classes also changed, paying even lesser attention to the content of the classes, making Silver Spires even more useless ... and even the levels of the students were much lower.

"I wonder why they didn't just close it down," I murmured. Maybe it was a trap ... not for me, obviously, as they had no idea about my survival, but the girls. Considering they were wanted, it made sense.

Unfortunately, poking around the locations that could be accessed by servants didn't give me any clue about their destination. I needed to be more adventurous.

First, I visited the ruins of the headmistress' tower, trying to find any hint of a ward, a hidden clue, maybe a Divine Spark ... but nothing stayed other than a bunch of rock. Whatever destroyed it did so with a rather intense display of anger, and if anything survived, I wasn't able to pick through my magical probes — limited to avoid distracting the wards that surrounded the area.

Naturally, there was no hint of Divine Spark, which was not a shocking surprise. Without the darkness ward to protect it, the System would have long devoured it.

I needed to cast more aggressive detection wards ... but I was having trouble doing so, afraid of getting caught. Especially since my mana signature was slightly different than the one that the System provided.

I didn't know if they had the ability to catch, but either way, I didn't want to go around throwing epic spells.

Maybe I could tap into a different source instead, I decided.

Then, as I passed near a warding class, where an incompetent teacher teaching an even more incompetent batch of students, I had an idea. Do I need to be the one to cast the spell?

Sneaking into the class while staying hidden under a shadow was trivial with my stats, and a blanket of illusion ensured it would stay that way.

I didn't have to wait long for an opportunity. The incompetent teacher was building an unnecessarily complicated ward that would waste a lot of mana, so I stretched a tendril of mine, connecting to his soul space to pilfer a good amount of mana in the process.

Watching the ward stutter and die was a particular kind of fun.

Though, I didn't pull back ... because I had realized he also had a water magic skill. Just an advanced one, but I wondered if I could use it for my benefit. I pushed some of the mana I acquired from him ... and from the other side, I received some freshly converted elemental mana.

Just what I needed, I thought with a huge smirk, and decided to extend that trick to the rest of the class; their attempted wards failing just as easily.

Not that I cared, but when I discovered another student having earth magic ... so, I channeled the mana I stole through his skill as well.

{+1200 Mana}

Not a bad haul, especially since it was split between three sources, pure, water, and earth.

If I used it carefully, it should be enough to cast a decent detection ward.

However, as I played along in their soul space, I noticed something interesting. As they worked on their magic determinedly, I sensed the momentary appearance of Divine Spark. It was a subtle effect, barely more than a fraction of a point.

It reminded me worship of the elves and the resulting Divine Spark.

Of course, the existence of an occasional divine spark was not a shock. I had long deduced the reason the Eternals did their best to dominate the main material plane was the renewable Divine Spark generation. I guessed the reason they let the beasts survive was the same reason.

They wanted the people to live under constant pressure, and what better way to ensure that than a hostile environment, where the constant presence of numbers reminded them they just needed to fight a bit more to secure their freedom from the dangers.

A beautiful balance, I had to admit.

Yet, it wasn't what caught my attention. No, most of the Divine Spark had been just devoured by the System ... but a few drifted downward.

And disappeared.

Not devoured by the system.

"How interesting," I thought even as I extended my mana slightly, trying to touch what was going on. I managed to catch a glimpse, but it took quite a while. Still, I managed to capture a hint of Darkness Mana, concealing the spark before it could disappear.

"Wow,, that's a challenge," I murmured, but rather than rushing forward, I stayed put, not wanting to scare away my only potential clue. Instead,, I stayed back, carefully tracking the direction of the darkness ward to extrapolate a direction.

It didn't work, the directions were wild enough that, either the target location was on the move — wildly so — or the spell accounted for that fact.

Luckily, I had other options.

First, I stole some of the Divine Sparks that were being stolen ... and managed to inject pure mana in the depths of it, and injected my own Divine Spark into it. The ward protected it from being stolen, and my connection ensured that I could track it toward its destination.

It had traveled through a confusing path at first, but soon, it was revealed that the path had been the first layer of protective measures, and it steadily started to go underground.

"Finally, a destination," I murmured as I finally left the classroom and followed the path. First, I arrived at the storage rooms in the basements. With my stats, finding a weak spot in the damaged wards only took a second ... and I started using Earth Mana to create a tunnel once more.

"Fucking finally," I murmured as I enjoyed the smooth journey. It had been a long while since I didn't have to use rough arcana mana to replicate the task, and the difference in performance was incredible.

Still, I did my best to limit the mana presence while closing the tunnel behind me, afraid of getting caught — by Eternals, and by the owner of the Darkness ward.

I had to travel far deeper than I expected. Only after I was two miles underground, I came across a protective ward, one that had been created by Darkness mana, making it very troubling to sneak in.

Troubling, but not impossible. I stayed at the edge for another hour, stealing slivers of Darkness mana from the wards, aware that it would be the only way to conceal myself from the other tools of detection. Darkness mana was excellent for it.

And, the irony of using their own weapon for this purpose was very interesting.

Soon, I gathered enough mana to create a beautiful cloak around me, and used it to slip through the initial darkness ward. For all its amazing qualities of maintaining concealment, Darkness mana wasn't a good material to make wards. Once discovered, bypassing them was trivial.

Oh, whoever built it was smart enough to realize that fact and built a secondary layer under the first, but whoever built it wasn't exactly competent. High-leveled, but not competent.

"Probably the princess," I murmured as I assessed the evidence. That made sense, as she had access to the darkness ward, and if necessary, high-level skills, and the combination would allow her to dig down.

But, I could also deduce that it was not for her own residence. They had already bonded with Darkness Spark, and unless things had changed radically, she wouldn't be able to use the Sparks she had been stealing from the school.

With that in mind, I continued traveling down, bypassing the ward layers, taking note of the details.

Then, I arrived at the center of the wards, and I came across a familiar sight. Two familiar sights, even.

The first, and the less important, part was the crystal platform that the headmistress was using to suppress her divine spark continuously. However, not without some changes, as half of the supporting pillars were gone while the platform itself showed signs of damage as well.

All of those were just details compared to the more important aspect.

Helga was at the center of the platform, naked and frozen...

{Strength: 45 Charisma: 45

Precision: 45 Perception: 45

Agility: 45 Manipulation: 45

Speed: 45 Intelligence: 45

Endurance: 60 Wisdom: 45}

{Purified Divine Spark: 32920}

{Pseudo-HP: 1103 Mana: 2410}

{ADDITIONAL SPARKS

Light - Chosen 7.4

Nature - Chosen 10}

{MINIONS

GODDESSES

Elven Goddess}