The melody coursed through his ears and in an instant, he was absorbed into the dream.
He stood in the center of the university's plaza. Since the opening was so soon, people had already begun setting up stalls for the upcoming surge of students, but for now, most of the people that flooded the area were ordinary civilians.
Nuriel imagined masking his presence before leaping into the air to get a bird's eye view. He floated still in the air, turning and moving his body around to find Vivienne among the clutter of people below.
Quickly, he landed his gaze on her. She was walking toward a busy restaurant nearby.
He landed down near her location. Despite imagining a lack of presence, he was still careful not to mess up and let her see or hear him.
Nuriel quietly followed her, matching her pace from a distance.
'At least she's not dreaming about some deadly battlefield… let's see… she's dreaming about this morning?'
Although dreams are erratic and almost random, strong memories or experiences held a strong connection to them, sometimes making people relive certain experiences, whether good or bad.
Nuriel wondered what made her dream about this specific place. He thought it might've been a trained ability, such as recalling memories through the form of dreams and reliving them to learn what she could've missed.
The thought made him shudder. Having that kind of ability would've taken harsh mental training of the mind.
After a while, Vivienne stopped in her tracks. She looked at the wide space in front of the restaurant, filled with people dining outside, eating snacks and drinking various beverages.
'Did she find something?'
Vivienne looked around. Seeing this, he also tried turning in the direction she was looking at but found nothing important.
Standing for around a minute, she finally moved into the jungle of chairs and tables, taking a spot near a group of professors chatting loudly.
'Alright…'
To get closer, he thought about imagining himself as invisible, but he felt that was too risky. The best disguise was to be out in the open, being as inconspicuous as possible, but of course he couldn't just do it with his body and face.
He looked at someone in the distance—a well-dressed lady, looking as if she were prepared and ready for tea time.
'Perfect'
He closed his eyes and imagined his physical appearance to be the same as hers. Opening his eyes, he found himself wearing the same getup and face. It was a perfect disguise, but.
'This feels so weird…'
Nuriel could've only copied the outward appearance and not the physical aspect, but this would've given him away. Even the way someone walked and acted was a dead giveaway for someone who looked hard enough.
The odd feeling made him adjust quicker than he imagined. The different structure of the body made it so that he could now walk more gracefully without having to pretend like a lady, however.
'Maybe a gentleman would've been better… whatever, this won't be the last time I'll turn into a woman. It's best to practice as early as possible'
After examining the new body, he immediately thought about some certain things that he quickly put down deep inside his dirty mind.
Nuriel moved into an empty spot right next to Vivienne and the group of professors, and he began listening in while pretending to sip an empty cup.
"We're so lucky, to be able to study such a sacred artifact!" the old professor said.
"When do I get to see it?" another professor replied. He had a much younger appearance.
Nuriel held his emotions tight.
'To think Vivienne heard this amongst the noise despite her human ears… I should be careful' Nuriel thought, sipping air from the cup. He then stole a glance toward Vivienne, who was reading a menu.
The group continued.
"Tsk tsk tsk! You can't. Only senior researchers can access the upper parts of the Spire," an even older man said, as he opened a newspaper, hiding his grin behind it.
Nuriel and Vivienne instinctively twitched their ears.
The approximate location had now been reduced down from the whole campus to the Spire.
The Spire was the nickname of a college of magic, a prominent building with a grand spire on top. In terms of ranking, it was probably the most prestigious among the colleges, being the college with the highest amount of aristocrats attending, and it was known for its strict unofficial hierarchy of students and professors, making the atmosphere the most competitive of all, rivaling the College of War.
After the young professor heard his senior's reply, he said nothing more as he began eating a bowl of pasta with a fiery expression.
Unfortunately, their conversation died out soon after.
'You've heard it, Vivienne. Now what will you do?'
Nuriel quietly watched her. He saw her ordering. Moments later, the food arrived on her table. Watching her eat slightly made Nuriel hungry as well, but he couldn't just manifest a delicious plate.
He patiently held his hunger back. When Vivienne was done, he was getting ready to follow her again or even prepare for a sudden change of scene.
However, Vivienne ordered again. This time, a takeout for home.
"I'd like to order some macaroni and a drink for takeout," Vivienne asked the waiter, who was writing down her multiple orders.
"Would that be all?" the waiter asked.
. . .
Vivienne stared blankly into the waiters eyes, the silent gaze coming from her was suffocating the poor man who was being hung in the air.
"Make it for two people, please."
The waiter quickly nodded and disappeared into the kitchen.
Nuriel sat by, staring at Vivienne, who didn't notice his gaze, at that moment, nothing came through to him other than a slight red emerging on his cheek.
The world began to fade into blackness, Nuriel woke up, sitting in the throne room. The golden string slowly disappeared into tiny sparkles, as if it was a string being burned from one end.
[Disconnected]
Nuriel came back still wearing the same disguise. Closing his eyes, he imagined his normal self. His body was surrounded by a thick fog, which dispersed soon after.
'At least this fog only appears here… I would basically give myself away if this happened in the dream'
Looking at the countless other strings, he found that none of them seemed bright enough for him to bother entering.
He stood up from his throne to stretch his body. Despite the world being only a projection, the stiffness in his shoulder felt real. He questioned if, during the entire dream of Vivienne, he had actually been sitting still in the throne.
'Maybe a bean bag is much better…'
He went silent for a few seconds before asking the scepter some questions.
"Access files related to the Steel Witch."
[There is no entry regarding the term, Steel Witch.]
He sighed at the screen in front of him, but it didn't hurt to try at least. Nuriel continued.
"Access your internal database."
[There is no significant entry in the database.]
'Significant… so there's still data inside, but it deemed it to be insignificant'
It also knew what a bean bag is. Nuriel twitched as he realized the scepter had probably made a copy of his memories without him knowing.
But to think it could extrapolate what he knew into something that felt so real.
The first iteration he knew of the Scepter System was the simpler version. Limited calculation speed and a rudimentary AI as its core. Back then, it could only read and write inside your mind. This was what he used for the mind transfer, reading his mind, then writing it on another.
But things like projecting illusionary objects and even magic were far beyond its development stages, and unfortunately, he couldn't put his hand into developing it.
In the end, he didn't really know the inner workings of his own scepter. It had a hundred thousand years of development and evolution. He even thought the cube floating near the throne was merely a placeholder for the actual image of the scepter.
To him, it was more of a black box. Something he couldn't really understand.
"Is there a way to access more data?"
[There is no way to speed up the retrieval of data, other than expanding your mind.]
"???"
He grimaced at the answer. The last part was vague.
. . .
'Expanding my mind? My knowledge?'
Thinking about it more, it would make sense that the scepter was only limited to what Nuriel knew. Such as the rifle, he didn't know how it fully operated, yet it seemed to function as it would in real life.
"Do I simply have to touch something for the scepter to analyze it?"
[Your intuition is correct.]
His vein twitched in wry amusement.
'My intuition? Then you could've explained it clearer then!'
[...]
After a while, he decided to exit the throne room.
He woke up in a daze. The bright sunlight was stinging his eyes more than he expected. After gaining his momentum back, he saw the door to his room was already open, and Vivienne was leaning on the door frame.
"You're finally awake. There's a letter for you. It came from the mail just an hour ago."
'I woke up late. How embarrassing,' he thought, combing his messy hair between his fingers.
He dragged himself to the edge of his bed to sit.
"Thank you. Apologies for my… tardiness," he said as he extended his hand. Vivienne handed the letter over.
He noticed a red seal in the center. Looking at the design, it was the hilt of a sword. His still-sleeping brain took a while to process the image before finally, he woke up from the shock.
It was the seal of Yuncandel.