Pillar of Yita

Fang Hong shook his head helplessly, ”I certainly can’t out-argue you, Miss Hilveld, but won’t these things get in the way if we start fighting later?”

”That’s why I need to find a place to hide them first,” Hilveld said, finally looking around, ”This is the principal’s office of Holite Academy, there is no better place than this. Even if someone else enters this room, keeping these things here won’t stand out at all.”

Fang Hong thought to himself that this was indeed precisely calculated at every step, and he would never believe it was done impulsively.

”Come inside first,” he said, looking serious as he opened the door for the two.

”What is it?” Hilveld noticed his expression, and let her maid with the stone sculpture go in first, then she followed and curiously asked.

Fang Hong gently closed the door and sighed, ”There were Dragon Worshippers here just earlier, I almost thought you were them at first.”

Lady Noble’s expression shifted, and she immediately grasped his meaning, ”That would mean this place isn’t simple either. Thinking about it, if those people are behind Holite Academy, its principal is naturally not an ordinary character. Perhaps there are crucial clues hidden here from thirty years ago?”

”I didn’t expect that Xiesta and I just casually picked a place, but it seems like we hit the mark, Captain.”

Fang Hong gave her a skeptical look, ”Miss Hilveld, how do you know this is the principal’s office?”

”Although I’m not very familiar with this place, I am quite familiar with Hustings Cathedral. Some principles are the same, it is the best room in this building,” she explained.

Fang Hong looked at her, thinking the reasoning made sense. In fact, when he had earlier inquired, Miss Tata had told him the same, except she was not familiar with the Fosha Era architectural style.

”Are there any ’interesting’ antiques here?” he suddenly asked.

Hilveld looked at him, smiled slightly, and nodded.

Just as he thought—

Fang Hong thought to himself that he knew it, shook his head, and couldn’t be bothered to deal further with the master and servant, who were clearly determined not to be forthright with him.

He had come to terms with it, this money was to be shared by all present— put another way, as the captain, he was pleased to let things proceed.

He then walked over to the desk and picked up the documents on top.

The documents, although shuffled, were dusty. Fang Hong swiped them with his hand, immediately causing dust to fly everywhere. Hilveld and Xiesta, who were placing items, couldn’t help but cough, they both knew what he was up to and turned around to glare at him unhappily.

Fang Hong, who had some mischievous thoughts originally, seeing the usually poised Lady Noble at a disadvantage, couldn’t help feeling secretly pleased. But when the latter slightly frowned and tossed a cleaning orb at him, he was taken aback.

Meanwhile, Hilveld found his dumbfounded look adorable and couldn’t help but cover her mouth and chuckle.

Fang Hong then blushed and quickly looked down, inwardly cursing his luck. Honestly, up until that point, although he found Hilveld beautiful, she seemed somewhat unreal to him.

Thus, while he admired her, he had always kept a certain vigilance and distance from her.

But just now, Lady Noble’s casual glance had for the first time made him feel unsettled.

He absentmindedly flipped through the documents in his hands, while Hilveld, watching this, tilted her head, narrowed her eyes and came over, deliberately using a gentle tone to ask, ”Did you find any clues, Captain?”

She deliberately made her voice very soft and tender, making Fang Hong even more embarrassed, as if guilty of some mischief.

”Well... I just started looking,” Fang Hong said, sweating, ”Don’t distract me, Miss Hilveld.”

”But I didn’t say anything, did I?” Hilveld’s voice was innocently sweet, as if she were a pitiful white lotus flower, ”Captain?”

Fang Hong inwardly cried out, thinking the Lady Noble looked just like a fox with a tail showing, and he was at a loss for a response, but suddenly a name flashed in his sight.

This made him forget the words on his lips, switching his attention back to the document in front of him.

’Hes, fifteen years old, daughter of a potter, no other special background… noted as important.’

Fang Hong inadvertently saw this sentence and couldn’t help but softly utter, ”Hmm?”

He hurriedly flipped to the next page and discovered that each page was composed of different people’s names, clearly indicating that this document was a roster.

The list had time annotations, dating back over thirty years. Could this possibly be an enrollment list from the Holite Academy?

But back then there were no Earthlings here, and many of Earth’s customs and cultures had not yet spread to Eteliria. Could those classical-era academies have such detailed rosters?

Or could this document serve another purpose?

Fang Hong pulled out the page with Hes’s name and set it aside, then continued to flip through the pages with pursed lips.

Seeing his serious expression, Hilveld’s eyes slightly moved but she no longer teased him. Instead, she looked at the document in his hands. However, when Fang Hong turned to a particular page, she also softly exclaimed:

”Mr. Ade, look at that mark.”

Fang Hong also stopped, looked again at the page with Hes’s name, nodded, and pulled out the page in his hand.

The list bore a name he had not heard before, a seventeen-year-old girl, one year older than Hes. The reason this list caught their attention was that it also featured a significant mark.

Specifically, a pale red seal, identical in form to the Mark of Sacrifice used by the Zealots.

Fang Hong examined the enrollment date of the person and was taken aback.

”Five years ago, so long apart?” he frowned. He had thought that there should be some connection between these two names, but surprisingly, they were separated by such a long time.

And this also implied that the Dragon Worshippers of the Holite Academy had been planning this perhaps not just recently.

”Keep flipping,” he and the noble girl exchanged glances, and she softly said.

Fang Hong nodded, sharing the same thought. He turned many more pages and indeed soon pulled out another list with the same mark.

”Is there a date?”

Fang Hong nodded, ”Year of the Badger Claw, July.”

”July? That’s your term, but the Year of the Badger Claw was forty-four years ago. I remember that year the Old King ascended the throne, his personal emblem was a badger, and again it’s five years?” Hilveld furrowed her pretty brows.

Fang Hong took out that list.

Then he continued to flip downward, discovering that every five years—no more, no less—a marked female name would appear on the list, usually no older than seventeen.

In total, twelve lists.

However, the earliest of these lists were quite rudimentary, and the recorded information was quite sketchy, often just a name, age, and a noted time, appearing quite different from the later rosters.

It looked more like an emergency measure from the mysterious organization’s nascent period.

Fang Hong sorted from beginning to end, realizing the roster began to become formal about sixty years ago, which was also around the time the Holite School rose to prominence.

”Twelve lists,” Fang Hong said quietly, ”spanning sixty years, about ninety years to date. If this is indeed a consistent conspiracy, what does it imply?”

”You should ask,” Hilveld answered, ”what relation does this conspiracy have with the Dark Giant Dragon, and what is the significance of these twelve people on the list?”

Fang Hong silently looked down, re-examined it, and then noticed another detail.

...