Mark reached into his mahogany table and pulled out something wrapped in a dark eggplant cloth. He carefully placed it on the table, smoothing its edges. He carefully unfolded the fabric, revealing a black crystal sphere with a swirling gray mist inside.

Gunther was the first to react. He immediately stood up, and a flash of light surrounded Henry and Gwen, and waved his hand.

"Master Chandler, witchcraft is a crime punishable by life imprisonment. Gunther's warning carried an unusual malice, betraying his usual stoicism.

"Mark, are you crazy?" Surya swallowed, his Adam's apple swinging nervously Why do you have a death ball? More importantly, who are you within?"

Agnes stole a nervous glance at Henry.

After World War I, necrosorcism was strictly prohibited by the Geneva Conventions. Any mage caught holding an undead item will be punished extremely severely. The minimum penalty for using death magic is exile, and the maximum sentence is the death penalty. Even Gwen knew the dangers of necromancy, as the first lesson we were taught in high school was the history of the Necrocalypse, which claimed nearly half of humanity, began the Great Exodus from Central Europe, and led to the creation of border cities. Now, in front of Gwen, are relics of that era. A Ball of Death, a work of art used to extract individual souls from the Aether and trap them for necromancers to read.

Over the next few seconds, Gwen could see her master considering his options. As the lord of the tower, he has the right to silence Mark at this moment. The moment Mark takes the ball out, that's where the end begins. But Mark also knew that Henry would listen: it was his character. Others waited patiently for Henry's decision. However, the question that burned in their minds was what Mark hoped to achieve with this sphere.

"Then won't you shut me up?" said Mark sarcastically to Henry in his steady voice.

Henry closed his eyes, as if in deep thought.

"You might regret it. Mark laughs, but before we start, there are still some of us here who don't know the truth. Agnes: Maybe you can enlighten the subject of our little failures, our own Void Assistant, how exactly did her predecessor be above board?"

"Henry?" Agnes asked carefully. Henry, of course, was their friend, but he was still the owner of the tower, the highest authority in the land. If the tower were to censor them or act on Henry's behalf, there was nothing they could do. Who is Agnes? she's a retired summoner, a lady in Bordeaux, and Mark, a soothsayer that few people are willing to summon? They weren't Henry's opponents. Gosh, if things go bad, they're no match for Gunther, who can take them out in less than a minute, leaving no evidence of a struggle.

Henry opened his eyes, and to their surprise, he was calm: there was no uneasiness in his eyes, and there was no particular sadness.

"The next thing will happen," Henry said slowly. "Even resorting to witchcraft..."

He turned to Mark.

"Perhaps, now is indeed the time to dig up the skeletons from their shallow graves. Allow me to tell the story for a moment, Agnes. ”

Her master turned to Gwen.

"Son, I'm going to reveal something that is very dear to me. It's not a pleasant story. There is no happy ending. So, I ask for your understanding. ”

"Of course, master," Gwen replied politely, looking at the wrinkles on her master's face.

They waited for Henry to concentrate their thoughts.

Officially, there was only one survivor of the massacre in Nusa Head. The hero of the Brisbane Line, Elizabeth Sobel. Later, she was found by a special team sent to investigate the incident. ”

"I led this task force. A team of translocation specialists and I arrived in the area at dusk. The base has been destroyed, destroyed. Once formed a hemispherical inlet, it is now filled with seawater. Everything is gone, washed away, no buildings, no mages, no names, no mermaids. There is nothing underwater. Just smooth bedrock, sand, and what the sea washed into. Further out to sea, we found a dead sea monster, mostly missing, which by then had fallen victim to a frenzied eating. ”

"That same night, we found Elizabeth, who was wounded, but steady, hiding in a cave. Sofina was treated and we returned to the city with her, considering ourselves lucky that she survived. God knows I am. ”

"Since I'm Marshall, I put myself in charge of the investigation. What a mess. Five hundred mages died, and more than four hundred were cadets, mostly from powerful families who thought the school was safe. Parents want justice, and I have to give them something. At this stage, all I can do is ask Liz. ”

"According to Elizabeth, they were attacked by a sea monster that broke through the protective shield of the base. At the time of the incident, she was drinking tea with Mark's sister Jane in a restaurant. The officers folded the whole building up. Elizabeth protects Jane, but she has to use most of her energy to make it impossible for the two of them to cover both of them on the collapsing cement slab. ”

"By the time they finally dug themselves out, the battle was in full swing. The sea monster tore the place apart, tearing the embedded glyphs from the building, penetrating the base's fortifications. There is chaos everywhere, merfolk are killing students, and teachers can't stop them. I wasn't there at the time, so Elizabeth couldn't use her powers without draining her life. ”

She eventually arrives at the crystal warehouse and uses her powers to slip through the gates, where she contaminates the crystal with hollow particles. Elizabeth tells Jane to run away, but the sea monster is on them. The behemoth exploded from the walls of the bunker, and Elizabeth had no choice but to make a phone call or die. With no other choice, she detonated the container, as a result of which the explosion destroyed everything nearby. She used her last strength to make an empty shield, but it couldn't cover Jane. When she wakes up, everything is gone, and she is drifting on a newly formed beach, with the tide coming. ”

"We've all heard the story," Suya told Gwen at the time, and there was no reason to suspect her. We already knew why Elizabeth shouldn't have lied to us a long time ago. ”

"Hah!" Mark chuckled.

"Well, then, go back to the trial," Henry continued, saying that the victim's family asked for a scapegoat, a culprit, and Brass suggested Elizabeth. I'm angry, angry. So what's the point? I know—we know, Elizabeth has void magic, but they don't! They use her purely to cover up their retardation! Then another rumor started, a fairly true rumor that the destruction of the bay was exactly the same as what Elizabeth and they did in the Brisbane Line incident. People began to join in on the dots, and some of the Brass members were crying out for her blood, saying that she had some kind of responsibility. They want me, and they sue her. I felt helpless, even Marshall. ”

"But then, we had a lucky chance. The merfolk retreated! They retreated like lizards! One thing was to seize the moment, so I did the only thing I could. Elizabeth and I went to a magic school in England. We showed them how her powers worked, and what she could do. We even agreed to conduct limited tests and experiments. They were impressed, impressed, and excited about the potential game-changer it represented. Suddenly, all the voices demanding her trial fell silent. She is now priceless. I defended her. The court reviewed the evidence and found it in Elizabeth's favor. ”

"And then our troubles began," Henry said, shaking his head slightly, announcing that we didn't know what effect the constant use of Void magic had on Elizabeth, only that we had carried out many missions, achieved victory after victory, and reveled in our successes. ”

"What has Mark been doing?" Gwen interjected suspiciously.

"I didn't do important research," Mark's voice trembled, full of anticipation, and I was insignificant anyway. Pray, keep ......"

Henry continued.

"Elizabeth and I got married a month later. We've been planning to get married after the promotional tour, and now we're on the long haul. Agnes was the bridesmaid and Sulia was my best man. Mark was uncomfortable. It was a small private ceremony and it was very romantic. We need each other, both in love and in craft, and everyone else calls us a dynamic combination. ”

Gwen performed twice and choked on the water. Deborah patted Gwen on the back, slowing her breathing.

Sofina poured Henry another glass of mead, and Henry drank it, then closed his eyes for a long time to regain his strength. There was silence in the room, and Barmac kept flapping his feet. After a while, Henry opened his eyes and spoke again.

"We carried out whatever mandate the Council had assigned to us, travelling the world at the behest of this party and the Government, and serving Her Majesty and the Commonwealth to the best of our ability. When the war stalled in the mid-70s, we applied for conditional discharge. The land of humanity is being reclaimed all over the world, and as mages and mages with a long track record of service, we can choose to stay wherever we like, as long as it's far from the first-tier cities. We wanted a place to get away from it all, so we chose Egger, a small Hungarian town an hour flight from Budapest. No one knew us there and we barely spoke the language, which was perfect. I bought a vineyard outside the city, hired a dozen people with the surname of a servant, and thought of myself as a minor nobleman of the Commonwealth. Elizabeth seems to like the country air, really likes it, in fact, her constitution has been weak since Brisbane, but she seems to be getting better......"

Henry touched the fragile flowers in the vase, the once-vibrant bouquet shattering into a dry brownish-gray powder. He sighed, found a dustpan, and patiently swept the body away. He placed his suitcase next to the open kitchen and walked down the long hallway to the bedroom. This area once belonged to the long-dead Ottoman Empire, and the architecture of the vineyards retains Baroque influences. The corridor is an intersecting network of light and shadow, alternating between bright sunlight and sharp silhouettes.

Outside, Henry could see the savages caressing the grapes, rows of stakes overgrown with green vines, stretching their gaze far away until it bent over the horizon. As a hobby, Henry began experimenting with winemaking a few months after their arrival. Unfortunately, his talent lies only in finding and drinking the finest wines hidden in the cellar.

It was a piece of paradise, a place of their own. Henry knew that happiness was short-lived, but that moment of respite was hard to let go.

How long had they been fighting the beasts from the wilderness? twenty years? He felt like he hadn't stopped since he graduated from the Academy. His feet stopped before he reached the double doors of the master bedroom. Looking at the verdant landscape outside, he recalled another sun-drenched prairie. He thought of Sydney. Where is Agnes? How is Surya? Is Mark still mourning for his sister? What are they doing? Have they carved out a home of their own and taken a respite from the war?

He walked into a spacious bedroom with a vaulted double ceiling. There was a four-poster bed, a double bed, which he had made to order from a local carpenter. Henry pulled the plate over and carefully placed breakfast next to the king-size bed.

Elizabeth slept in a large pile of pillows and soft white sheets. Her complexion was bloodless, and the blue veins looked noble against her pale and flawless skin. They started calling her "Countess", which made Henry laugh. She fell asleep carelessly, a wayward sheet obscuring her shameful figure, and her petite ** formed only a little reminiscent hillock. Henry appreciates the moment as his whole world lies in one bed.

"Get up, get up, Sleeping Beauty. ”

He waved his hand on the tray. Coffee and cookies emerge from the storage ring.

"I bought Pressz and Kaspersky Anti-Virus and Florida. He lured her to her senses with a fragrant breakfast.

Elizabeth moved slowly, rolling up the sheets, her slender legs curled up behind her.

"Good morning......

"Noon, you mean. Henry smiled softly.

Elizabeth stretched, and the white sheet slipped off her. Henry looked nervously around the room. The windows of the bay were slightly ajar, and the frolicking wind inadvertently lifted the curtains.

"You look beautiful," Henry said. "How are you feeling today?"

She smiled at him, her blue eyes reflecting the warm glow of the afternoon.

"Energetic. I'd love to go into town later. ”

"Am I going with you?"

"If you want...... Did you get it all done?"

"It's endless," replied Henry, a little bitterly. "The negotiations on the tower will take some time. ”

"I'm going to have a while and a lot of stuff to buy. I haven't even fully exploited the old market yet. Come with me that night?"

"Absolutely. ”

They ate the dessert he bought. Henry doesn't like sweets, but his "Lily Bird" has a sweet tooth. She could take a Martell, a Dobosstota, and a whole Gistentippre all at once. He sometimes wondered why she had never gained weight, though he thought it would be wise to avoid the problem lest he risk her wrath.

After breakfast, he watched Elizabeth in a chiffon tulip dress that fell to her knees, paired with sandals and a wide-brimmed hat, which was exactly the embodiment of elegance.

"Kevanok ......," the servants greeted her. She asked for a driver, it took twenty minutes to get from the vineyard to the market, and she didn't want to fly.

Henry walked to the study, a spacious converted bedroom overlooking the vineyard to the south, where he worked comfortably. Endless paperwork and negotiations. Study. Treaty. Correspondence. Repeat.

Day after week, week after month. Very good. The work was quiet and Elizabeth was comfortable in white sheets morning after morning. Henry loved to wake up with his head on her lap, tying him to the land, hypnotized by everything around him. His only wish was, perhaps, that this would continue, day after day, a slice of paradise of their own.

"I should have known something was wrong. Henry sighed deeply. "But I was blinded by the impossible happiness we all shared. ”

"Even if a dead plant becomes a critter, a bird, or something like that, I choose to ignore it. Lizzie admits that, of course, she always does. Sometimes crying, sometimes frustrated, sometimes angry and denial. It broke my heart. I should do something about it, maybe I can get her help, but I can't disturb our lives there. She was so happy that she always slept until noon and rarely went out, and even then, it was just for shopping and dessert. I'm sure it's exactly what she needs. ”

"Then one day a serf came with his dog and said that something had attacked it, fearing that it was a magical beast that somehow had sneaked through the barrier. This happened a lot in the days of the past, and the Doctor of Magic technique is fairly new. I knew what was going on as soon as I saw it. It was a big dog, one of the hounds they used to rid rabbits and foxes, but now it's just a skinned bone. It looks like it's been attacked by a drain. ”

"I asked him where Elizabeth had gone, and he told me she had gone into town. I had a terrible premonition. Whenever Elizabeth had a seizure, she would be exhausted, exhausted, and even delirious. After leaking enough Void mana to drain such a large hound, she shouldn't have traveled around the city again. I had to find her before she got hurt. ”

"So I abused one of my privileges as the caretaker of the new tower by using a conveyor belt to the town. I was asking around in the market. It's not hard to track down someone like Elizabeth. How many girls in white can there be in an old Ottoman market? I followed her dessert breadcrumb trail, and seriously, she left behind an impressive list of hotels and bakers. ”

"Eventually, I followed her to Warrios Valos Alat, a small town under the town, a network of tunnels used by old churches to store wine......".