"The divination result is out."
Leon cleared his throat lightly, interrupting Iris and Grani's pink, affectionate moment.
Iris immediately shifted away, sat properly on one side of the sofa, and casually smoothed her pale-blue bangs with one hand.
Grani, acting as if nothing had happened, crossed her legs again.
Iris took a deep breath and fixed her gaze on Leon.
"Go ahead, Leon. I'm mentally prepared."
"About your mother's whereabouts—within the next eighty days, she will remain in the royal capital. Her condition is strange. She may be attempting to break through to seventh-tier legend… or perhaps she failed, and her body has undergone some kind of abnormal change."
Leon continued slowly.
"That's everything I'm able to divine at the moment. As for a precise location, what I can confirm is this: there's a fairly high chance she'll continue wandering near the Prince's Estate District in the North Ward—again, within the next eighty days."
The "Prince's Estate" was not the private residence of a single prince.
It was a cluster of estates built specifically by the Kingdom of Holsha for its princes.
It could house thousands—guards, retainers, servants—on a massive scale.
To the east of the Prince's Estate District lay the estates of dukes, marquises, and counts.
By an old rule passed down through the kingdom's ancestors, all lords holding territory outside the capital at the rank of count and above were required to spend one month each year living in the royal capital, and to enter the palace daily to pay respects to the king and participate in governance.
Only border counts were exempt, required to reside in the capital only once every three years.
As for the title of prince, only three brothers and two legitimate sons of Holsha IX held it, and their lands were all in the area surrounding the capital.
For convenience—and to reduce the king's suspicion—princes tended to stay in the royal capital long-term.
They returned to their territories only for major incidents, such as a dungeon riot at the site they guarded.
As an aside, anyone granted the title of prince was at minimum a sixth-tier powerhouse.
The current king, Holsha IX, had lived beyond two hundred and ninety years—an eighth-tier epic-level powerhouse. He had accomplished many great feats and was said to possess the strongest epic saga of any Holsha king in history.
It was precisely because Holsha IX existed that the powerful Elven Holy Land was willing to establish diplomatic relations with the kingdom and regularly dispatch diplomats.
So-called "sagas" were blessings from the world that all sixth-tier and above powerhouses had to obtain in order to advance.
You could only gain them by completing great deeds and becoming someone the world sung of.
With a saga's blessing, combat power would surge, breaking beyond ordinary attribute limits and gaining tremendous might.
It was said that some ancient magic incantations passed down to the present day contained fragments of gods' old sagas and hymns—left behind from before those gods ascended.
"Still the Prince's Estate District?" Iris fell into thought. This divination didn't feel random—it felt real.
Could her mother's target of revenge be one of Holsha's princes?
Grani said uneasily, "We're diplomats. If we keep going to the Prince's Estate District to look for someone, it could attract gossip."
"Leaving gossip aside," Leon said, looking at Iris, "if you find your mother—and discover she's doing something you may not be able to accept—what would you do?"
"Something I can't accept?" Iris's heart jolted.
If Leon was asking this as a diviner… did that mean there was a real chance it would happen?
"Can you explain why I might face something I can't accept?"
"Miss Iris, you don't need to worry whether that relates to my divination result," Leon replied. "I've already told you the result. That question just now was personal curiosity—I want to know what choice you'd make in an extreme situation."
That answer didn't ease Iris's unease.
But after thinking a moment, she still said, "I can't imagine it. But I suppose I would try to understand my mother's actions."
Leon smiled. "Understood. In your heart, your mother comes first, right?"
"Yes. I'll put in everything I have for her."
Iris's eyes were firm.
"In that case," Leon said, "I'll send my familiar to keep watch. The moment I find anything, I'll notify you immediately. And during this period, you'll assist me in exploring the dungeon and help me find certain magic items I'm targeting."
"No problem. I'll help you explore the dungeon with everything I've got."
Iris's eyes flickered slightly. She remembered her original purpose: this was the perfect chance to figure out whether Leon's character was truly reliable—whether he was suspicious, whether he had ulterior motives.
Leon smiled. Good. Once you come along—isolated man and woman, bridge effect, all that—I'll have chances to farm affection. If you don't come, my plan stalls.
Of course, using Iris's strength to gather gear and raise his own power was also part of the goal.
…
The next day, at Leon's home.
"The security around the Prince's Estate District is insanely tight. I couldn't find any opening to sneak in, and I almost got my body pierced by holy light magic."
Bisce sighed, wearing an injured, needy expression as she spun around Leon's hand like a windmill, her body growing even more translucent.
"I didn't tell you to break into the Prince's Estate," Leon said, exasperated. "I told you to wander around the perimeter and look for signs of Hamla."
"My Astalia…!" Bisce cried. "Why didn't you say so earlier?! So I got hurt for nothing?!"
"You're just dumb. Everyone knows the Prince's Estate District has multiple sixth-tiers around it. How are you, a third-tier ghost, so bold?"
Bisce looked utterly deflated, eyes watery.
Leon then channeled some mana through their familiar contract. Bisce's fading body stabilized, and she immediately clung to him.
"I knew you were the best, Leon—mwah!"
"Stop being horny again!"
That was the afternoon of the day he officially confirmed teaming up with Iris.
They were at Leon's own place—and stopping Bisce's antics had become part of the daily routine.
Since Leon still had to clock in for his daily work that morning, he hadn't rushed off to the dungeon immediately.
They'd agreed to go in the afternoon after each finished their duties. And whether Iris fully trusted him or not, based on Leon's understanding of her character, he at least didn't need to worry about her stabbing him in the back.
Leon currently lived in the South Ward of the capital, renting the second floor of an old-style townhouse. The rent was ten silver coins a month—basically one-fifth of his monthly salary as a court mage.
Living in the capital was hard!
Even if he was only first-tier, he was still extraordinary.
If even an extraordinary professional needed that much money just to live here, you could imagine how impossible the capital was for ordinary people.
Either you had inherited land, or you had the backing of a powerful faction.
And despite Leon using a one-hundred-gold cheque to bluff Iris, the truth was he didn't actually have that much spendable money. Buying gear was already a struggle. He still had to find ways to earn and fund his activities.
Knock knock knock.
A knock came from the door.
"Coming."
Leon stepped across the wooden floor, opened the door—and sure enough, it was Iris, finished with her work and arriving by the address.
Her outfit now was completely different.
She'd changed into light gray leather armor that covered her chest, shoulders, and waist—still outlining graceful lines.
The armor was overlaid with delicate scales—clearly monster-hide gear, and not cheap.
A pack was slung over her left shoulder. In her right hand she held a jade-green staff about 1.2 meters long, topped with a small statue of the fictional judge-god, Saint Hermes.
Leon nodded. Nice—fully geared Iris looked striking and heroic.
As for Iris trying to use this chance to probe his intentions—Leon understood perfectly. He deliberately let her come in and look around, showing openness.
Iris was a bit surprised, but still didn't let the opportunity to observe his home slip away.
Hmm. For a court mage, he really is poor. Does that mean he truly saved up—so the hundred gold is real? Or should I think the opposite: if he's this poor, there's no way he has a hundred gold?
Iris thought: Either way, his suspiciousness has increased. At least I now know a hundred gold isn't a small amount to him—so him being that willing to throw it around is deeply questionable. I need to be careful around him.
…
Their destination was the giant dungeon beneath the royal capital: Oradu.
No one had fully mapped how deep it went, but the currently opened regions already extended beyond eighty floors, and the monsters inside were terrifying beyond belief.
This place would later give birth to the mid-game bosses of Parts One and Three, and directly trigger a chain of collapse events afterward.
Major cities across the world were built atop such massive dungeons.
The reason was simple: to purge monsters and prevent dungeons from reaching saturation and triggering monster tides.
That was why bigger cities contained more extraordinary adventurers.
If you wanted to advance tiers, slaughtering huge numbers of monsters was essential.
The founder of the Kingdom of Holsha had been a famous human hero and adventurer of that era.
With peerless swordsmanship, he roamed the continent, accomplished the great feat of suppressing multiple dungeons, and rose to ninth-tier demigod.
In the latter half of his life, Holsha I encountered the Oradu dungeon—and also his lifelong enemy—spending the rest of his years on this dungeon alone.
It was said he relentlessly raided Oradu because it contained secrets tied to becoming a god.
Sadly, even as the kingdom grew and the capital took shape, Holsha I never surpassed demigodhood. He ultimately died on the eighty-first floor.
Fortunately, the demigod hymn he left behind successfully prevented Oradu from expanding.
To this day, every generation of Holsha kings led royal guards and legendary mages to the eighty-first floor to reinforce that lingering demigod hymn and continue suppressing Oradu.
This time, Leon was heading to the twenty-fifth floor.
It was also where Iris's father had died.
And the place where Iris's mother Hamla would soon fall into darkness lay not far from there.
Leon's goal was one of the relics Iris's father left behind: the Elemental Magic Ring.
He hadn't told Iris that yet.
The Elemental Magic Ring was a third-tier magic material—not especially high-tier—but it had an extremely rare property: it could influence nearby mana elements, creating balance and harmony among them.
Ignoring its tier and judging purely by how rare and special its effect was, calling it an S-rank magic item wouldn't be an exaggeration.
That made it perfect as a core item in advancement and class-change rituals—especially for someone like Leon, who had mastered all four elements and had a high chance of class-changing into an Elemental Mage.
In specialization, it still couldn't match a Light Elementalist.
But in breadth of elemental mastery, an Elemental Mage was stronger.
Using the ring as the core item for advancement could also cause Leon's core skills to inherit similar traits and evolve into even stronger forms.
There was another advantage to class-changing into an Elemental Mage:
After advancing, the lifespan gained would be significantly higher than a normal mage's.
It was nowhere near an elf's longevity, but it was far better than an ordinary human's.
"I'm noticing your route is very clear the moment we entered the dungeon," Iris said, beginning to probe. "Do you already have a specific target?"
"Of course," Leon replied. "My divination isn't 'famous for being falsely famous.'"
"What do you mean 'falsely famous'?"
"It's an idiom from my hometown," Leon said. "It means there once was a man who loved 'spraying'—loved to fool around—so much that he exhausted his body. In the end, he became very famous because he was extremely 'vain'—very weak."
"Why would being weak make someone famous?"
"Famous because he has character," Leon said. "People without a distinctive trait are the ones who don't stand out. Don't you agree?"
"Pfft—what kind of nonsense is that?"
Iris laughed despite herself. This guy might be suspicious and his intentions unclear, but he really was kind of funny.
[Iris Affection +2%. Current Affection: 57%]
Leon, meanwhile, was surprised. Huh—he told a pretty ordinary joke and her affection went up again?