As both groups and Benjamin walked together in the long corridor of Ordeus's mansion, they arrived at the office where the Holder resided. Benjamin knocked on the door a few times.

  "Come in," Ordeus replied to the knock.

  "Pardon me, Sir," Benjamin said, opening the door and allowing the students to enter first. He then entered the room and closed the door, letting the discussion begin.

  "So, it really was you. The one I bowed and greeted two days ago," Carol said, her expression hardening as she saw the familiar face.

  "Heh, correct. Sorry I didn't manage to introduce myself back then," Ordeus said with a casual manner, hoping to diffuse the tension. "I'm Ordeus von Dark, the current generation of the Dark Holder, one of the Seven Holders. Nice to meet you."

  Every student felt a rush of excitement, unable to believe they were meeting one of the Seven Holders face-to-face. Carol, however, remained focused on her immediate question.

  "Alright, let's cut to the chase, shall we?" Ordeus responded with a smile, clapping his hands once. "There's already someone here who's impatient enough. Can't let her become a genocidal monster or something." He nervously laughed, joking around, though the tension was clearly etched onto Carol's face.

  Back in Neurn's territory, now within the capital city where the Tempest Holder resides. Hana, Yuno, Erick, and Dulcinia were sneaking around, trying to infiltrate Crake's mansion without getting caught by the guards.

  However, Hana's heart suddenly felt heavy, saddened by the city's condition. She saw so many orphaned children lying in dark alleys. Worse, she witnessed a slavery operation where children were caught by shady nobles and beaten harshly, leaving them bruised and bloody.

  "There's nothing we can do about it, Hana. The damage has already been done," Yuno said in a flat tone, trying to appear unbothered by the slavery.

  "But, that child... can we at least help the—"

  Before Hana could finish, the offending nobles were instantly beaten unconscious by Erick and Dulcinia, who moved too quickly to be noticed before their targets hit the ground.

  Hana widened her eyes in surprise, but also relief that the two former Sealers had taken immediate action. Yuno, however, sighed in defeat at their impulsiveness.

  "Are you okay?" Dulcinia asked, quickly loosening the ropes binding the children's hands and feet.

  Despite their fear, one of the children responded with a nod.

  "Good. Now run! Run as fast as you can from them!" Dulcinia exclaimed.

  Thanks to her order, all the caught children ran away. Erick and Dulcinia looked at each other, sharing a positive response to their selfless action.

  "Happy?" Yuno asked, walking toward them alongside Hana.

  "Oh, Sir Yuno... S-sorry if we took our own action. Is that fine with you?" Erick replied, nervously sweating as he looked down to the ground.

  "Just do what you like. But don't jump into action without thinking like that again, okay?" Yuno said, putting a hand on Erick's shoulder. "Remember that your life is still your most important factor. You can't just throw away your second chance like that."

  "I-I understand. But it wasn't that dangerous, from what I saw. We kind of beat them up easily."

  "Well," Yuno snapped his fingers once, revealing several pieces of sharp chains that had thrust into and neutralized camouflaged assassins who were protecting their noble masters. "How about this answer, Erick? Is this enough to tell why I don't want to intervene in this kind of business?"

  Erick instantly raised his head, shocked at the sight of the group of assassins easily taken down by Yuno's hidden attack. "Ye-yeah. It was more than enough," he gulped in disbelief.

  "That's all the info I can give, for now," Ordeus said, taking a slow sip of the warm, pleasant tea Benjamin had provided moments ago.

  "Let me get this straight," Carol asked for confirmation, looking genuinely confused by the situation. "You're saying the war started because Crake, the current Tempest Holder, was scared of your technological advancement and declared war against your territory, right?"

  Ordeus closed his eyes, nodding slowly before opening them. "Don't forget that he also had permission from the empire to wage a war against us."

  "But it doesn't make any sense. Even if he was scared of your advancement, he supposedly should have fought back by advancing his own territory. Not waging a war knowing his country will collapse anytime soon."

  "So what you're trying to say is," Ordeus said, looking intensely at Carol, showing his serious, menacing expression for the first time, "that there's a third party already plotting this event, using Crake's fear to establish literal chaos against us. Am I right?"

  "Third party, you say?" An old flashback of Dein's figure during the exam's event flashed through Carol's mind.

  Because of that, Ordeus snorted, sensing this was the right time to answer her lingering questions. "Benjamin. Can you lead our guests to the dining room?" he commanded. "They might be hungry after such a long journey."

  "Understood, Sir Ordeus." Benjamin slightly bowed, then raised his head and opened the door. "Now, let us go, dear guests."

  Every student began walking out of the room as instructed. Carol, however, did not move.

  "Carol?" Aria looked back, confused by Carol's unusual inaction before stepping out herself.

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  "You guys can go without me. It seems like Sir Ordeus and I have some unfinished business we want to talk about together," Carol said, reassuring them as she turned her head over her shoulder with a small grin.

  "If you say so. Don't you dare try to talk something weird with him or anything that hurts Sir Ordeus's feelings, you got it?"

  "Alright, alright. I get it, Aria. You don't have to worry about it too much."

  Hearing Carol's usual nonchalant statement, Aria sighed heavily in defeat. "Fine. Don't forget what I said. Don't you ever offend his feelings!" she said, finally walking away.

  With that, Benjamin bowed his head one last time, closing the door as soon as all the students, except for Carol, had departed. Now, only Carol and Ordeus remained inside the office.

  "Is it really necessary for you to separate me from my colleagues?" Carol said, her expression hardening once again. "I just want to know how you and your secretary know my name, that's all."

  "Well... your question is rather... hard for me to explain, you see," Ordeus said, falling into a deep thought as he considered where to begin.

  "What do you mean by that? It's just a name. There's no way it's too special for you to explain to me like it was some sort of storybook."

  "True. I could actually say that I got your name because your uncle told me through a transmitter device before you and your friends arrived."

  Hearing his simple reason, Carol let out a sigh. "You could have just said that earlier."

  "But sadly, your situation is somehow more complicated than other people's."

  "Mind telling me what kind of 'complicated' situation?" Carol asked, growing curious as she put her hands on her waist.

  For that, Ordeus opened his cabinet drawer, pulling out an old photograph. "Here," he said, giving the picture to Carol.

  She took the picture, slightly surprised as she saw a familiar girl with dark, long hair in a battle uniform alongside a man with white, short hair wearing a dark, plain cloak fully covering his back and shoulders.

  "That girl in the picture is your mother in her prime, Lydia Harth. Also, the little sister of your uncle, Grey Harth."

  "I know that already. I even have her picture when she was my age at home," Carol replied in annoyed, unwilling to reminisce about her mother yet. "Though, I don't know who that man beside her. Is that my uncle or something?"

  "That's where it gets complicated," Ordeus said, trying to brace himself to tell the truth of her family's nature. "That man is actually your father, Erlikh, the current Leviathan."

  "Leviathan?" She looked back at the picture, confused as she repeatedly looked between the man in the picture and Ordeus. "He doesn't look monstrous enough to be the Leviathan. More like human to me."

  "In surface, that is. The Leviathan is an unknown being, just like Calamity. One of its abilities is to shapeshift however it likes," Ordeus explained, looking intensely at Carol. But this time, it wasn't her he was looking at; it was the chilling specter of Irene behind her. "Just like your Dark Ender. Shapeshifting to look exactly like you, while growing more and more powerful as time goes by."

  Carol paused for a moment, shaken by Ordeus's statement, but shook her head in denial. "Y-you're trying to say that I got my Dark Ender as soon as I was born, right? There's no way it would happen. I got that Dark Ender when I was exposed to a Grimoire."

  Ordeus responded with a deep sigh. "I wouldn't force you if you couldn't handle it. It was already a curse in the beginning that you have to endure it yourself."

  Without any words to counter back, she fell into deep thought, deciding to move on to another question. "What is your relationship with my mother and my uncle? Your tone sounds like you've known them long enough."

  "Let's just say that we've known each other as old acquaintances. I can't just tell you everything, you know?" Ordeus said, shrugging as a way to end their conversation.

  "You really are full of surprises, don't you? But," Carol put the picture of her 'family' inside her bag. "I'll take that in mind. It might be useful to know in the future if it was true." She walked toward the door, opened it. "Though I hope that 'Leviathan' identity you say to me isn't real." Then, closed it as she leave the office.

  "Heh," Ordeus slightly turned to a window behind him, looking directly at the blue skies full of chirping, flying birds. "I bet you're still wildly out there searching for your daughter, Erlikh. Knowing that you regained your own humanity back then, only for it to be crushed by humans who burned your happiness away. Even at that moment of burning village when your seal from Grey got unsealed itself." He mumbled to himself, feeling sympathy for how the situation had turned out in the past.

  In Verlyn, Grey felt an increasing unease in his office alone. He stood up from his chair, pacing in frustration as his worry for his niece escalated further and further. Just as he was about to lash out his frustration with his wand, the transmitter device on his table lit up in blue light. Noticing it, he immediately took the device and activated it.

  "Hey, Hey, buddy! Do you miss me?" Yuno's calm, friendly voice transmitted through the device.

  "Where are you right now, Yuno? Why didn't you respond to me a few days ago?" Grey asked, annoyed at his old friend's attitude.

  "I'm at the capital city of Neurn. Watching over Crake and his shady partner," Yuno replied. "Of course, I'm not alone in this. I even brought Hana and two Sealers with me."

  "So you've heard about it as well. Seems like that news of war is really spreading like wildfire," Grey said, shaking his head slightly in disappointment. "Mind telling me why you're there? Coming from you, I bet it's more than that."

  "Right on!" Yuno exclaimed, leaning against the wall of a dark alley in the capital city, still hidden alongside Hana, Erick, and Dulcinia. "I heard from one of your nieces that she noticed an abnormal ender, perhaps a Dark Ender, radiating from that mansion of Crake."

  "Is that even true, though? She's been shut-in herself at the mountain for decades. There's no way that chuunibyo can notice that kind of Dark Ender from afar," Grey responded, confused by his friend's statement.

  "Actually, there's more than just 'noticed' things she told me."

  "How so?"

  "You see," Yuno cleared his throat, trying to mimic Grey's other niece's exaggerated tone and dialogue: "Alas, methinks a strange phenomenon doth rise from Neurn. It doth seem some rogue attempts to wield what he should not. A device, perchance!"

  Hana was surprised by Yuno's accent, while Erick and Dulcinia tried to hold back their laughter.

  "Uhm, okay? You don't have to go that far, even to the point of imitating her, though."

  "I know," Yuno tipped his hat, a way to hide his embarrassment. "But anyway, if what she says is true, that Crake is actually utilizing a device mainly from the Dark Ender, it could be really, really bad in the long term."

  "To the point of endangering Carol's will as well," Grey said, tightly gripping the transmitter device in frustration and nervousness.

  "Don't worry. We'll try our best here. For now, do what you can do, buddy," Yuno said, reassuring him to prevent him from dwelling too much in his negativity.

  "Yeah, will do. Thanks, Yuno." Grey responded, closing the device afterward. He let out a heavy sigh, looking at the blue skies with a saddened expression. "Seems like I don't have any choice left. Just like I thought, this war isn't going to change anything." He took his jacket from the hook beside the door, ready to leave his office. "Well, time to visit that wild fantasy nerd niece of mine. I wonder how she's doing now at that mountain alone for a decades." He mumbled to himself, opening and closing the door as he walked away from the campus for the first time.