Supreme Magus

"Stop being so paranoid." Lith said in his best Solus impression. "Not every act of kindness hides a hidden agenda. Good people do exist."

Solus laughed hard as the earlier sour mood became a small cloud on the horizon.

They bought everything both the Verhen House and Mansion would need for months, enough to fill the pantries to the brim.

"I get the sugar, the flour, and the spices." The merchant said in confusion as he handed them the goods on the list. "But how can the owner of the biggest farm in Lustria County need to buy milk?"

Solus blushed hard. Everyone in the family loved ice cream but her enthusiasm for it was unparalleled, often depleting the share of the milk that Raaz kept for the family's needs.

"It's-" Lith pointed at her.

"Complicated." Solus cut him short, slapping his hand away. "We have lots of unexpected guests and some of them eat a lot."

"I see." The merchant nodded, picturing in his mind a mighty Phoenix as the cause of the milk shortage instead of a gluttonous, petite Forgemaster taking one night snack too many. "Thanks for bringing your business here, Magus Verhen.

"And thank you both for the Tablets. They save us a lot of time."

Most of the clients of the rush hours now submitted their orders from their houses first thing in the morning, giving the clerks the time to prepare everything whenever the work was slow. On pick up, the customers had only to check the goods and pay.

Once Lith and Solus got back home, they walked straight into the Warp Gate inside the barn, reaching the Mansion where everyone was waiting for them. With one thought, Solus set the tower in the keep.

The vigorous flow of world energy from the mana geyser filled them both with power and accelerated the mending process of her life force and mana core.

'I wonder what changes the tower and I will undergo when I finally reach the deep violet.' She pondered through their mind link.

'I'm more curious about what would happen if we got our hands on the Ears of Menadion, instead.' Lith replied. 'I believe that with each piece of the set we find, the tower recovers a part of the missing schematics of its power core.

'If I'm right, even though our version of the pieces of the Set of Menadion is inferior to the originals until the repairs are completed, the schematics of each artifact help the tower to find the best way to rearrange its floors and speed up its restoration process.'

'It's a very interesting theory.' Solus nodded telepathically. 'Too bad that we have no way to put it to the test nor any idea where the Ears are.'

***

Somewhere on the Garlen continent, Fringe of the World Tree.

'How is it possible that despite having access to every piece of information collected by plant forms and with hundreds of Chroniclers I still have no idea where the Ears of Menadion are?' The young Yggdrasil was angry and had no qualms about letting his servants know.

Their voice thundered in the Chroniclers' minds, bringing them to their knees while holding their long ears in the attempt to muffle the noise.

"My Liege, it's none of our fault." K'aylen, one of the oldest elves at the service of the World Tree tried to quell their anger. "We have followed the various pieces of the set of Menadion however we could.

"Only the Hands and the Ears have escaped our notice and not for our lack of trying. We had no way to follow Kolga in the depths of the ocean and algae don't answer your questions.

"As for the Ears, we know the whereabouts of the last mage who had them in his possession. The problem is that he has been recently killed and his murderer has taken care to erase every trace of their passage."

'Stop telling me what I already know!' The Yggdrasil could use magic to speak, but they preferred to use a mind link.

Both air magic and Body Sculpting gave them a voice, but it was a fake one. It sounded like they were pretending to be someone else. The mind link, instead, was the pure manifestation of their will and reminded the elves who held the leash.

'I want answers. I need them if I ever want to start my journey.'

"Can't you just wait until the tower recovers on its own and then take it from Verhen?" Tash'ar, another elder asked.

'You fool!' The World Tree roared, the mere violence of their aura sent the elf sprawling on the floor. 'What if without the Ears the tower fails to reach perfection? I have no use for an incomplete trinket.

'On top of that, once Menadion's opus gets back to its full power, how am I supposed to take it? Verhen is a Divine Beast and his mana core will soon rival mine. I can have the upper hand only if I fight him inside my Fringe or while he is away from a geyser.

'Defeating him and the tower while they are both at their prime is just a pipe dream. Verhen knows about the Removal Units already and after what M'Rael did, he's bound to be on his guard against a tactic he already knows.

'I need the Ears, not for what they represent, but because they will serve as bait. I just need to feed Verhen and Elphyn Menadion the information they already seek to bring them where I want them to be.'

***

Verhen Mansion, at the same time.

'By the way, we should ask Zoreth to look out for the Ears.' Solus said. 'I don't like the idea of Vastor and his Eldritches putting their hands on another piece of my mother's legacy but their information network is our best if not our only chance.'

The Master had already studied and successfully replicated the Fury.

Based on what Bytra told them, the Mouth was still a work in progress, instead. The Forth Ruler of the Flames could have easily made a copy, but there was no point wasting priceless resources to make a vessel for enchantments outdated for centuries.

Bytra, Vastor, Tezka, and every single Eldritch that in life had been a skilled Forgemaster were pooling their resources to update the spells imbued in the Mouth and improve on Menadion's work.

'Yeah.' Lith sighed. 'Zoreth's Dragon Eyes are the next best thing to the Eyes of Menadion and Nandi can do everything the Hands can, if not even more. I'm afraid that if Zogar studies the Ears, he'll add mage towers to his already considerable arsenal.'

On the one hand, they loved and appreciated the old Professor. On the other hand, they knew what his Master persona was capable of doing and how deeply rooted in Garlen's underworld his Organization was.

Vastor claimed that his goal was to heal Mogar and promote the evolution of the human species that had stagnated for millennia.

Yet looking at his associates, Lith and Solus couldn't help but question the means through which the Master aimed to achieve those goals and most importantly how he planned to achieve them.