The matter of the stolen paintings lasted for a whole month. The topic resurfaced again and again because of several parties.

One of them was the Melesviet family, trying to smear the Libation Fiesta's name. There was also the matter of capturing the thieves, and Absalom was absolutely proud of it.

Nevertheless, the people started to talk less and less about it over time. And since Clovis didn't make a direct statement, there wasn't much they could say.

Of course, his enemies would use this opportunity to keep talking badly about him.

While people were too focused on the stolen paintings, Clovis had been focusing on his own matters, especially the hunt.

It took them a week to clear the city and head underground. Thanks to the first city, they had enough experience to know what they were supposed to do when retaking the city.

It only took another two weeks before they secured both the tower and the underground city.

Without wasting any time, they started moving around the cities, hunting down any beasts they could find, especially the high-level beasts.

If they only focused on retaking the city, it would probably take them a total of one month, and they could let Hana and her team take over.

But since they wanted to increase their evolution progress, they kept hunting the beasts until they had to search for them a bit too deep.

In the end, they stayed for a total of two months.

"Are we done? I hope we are," Kanaria asked.

"Yeah. We're done. You can start managing the reconstruction." Clovis nodded. "The rest can do whatever you need to do or whatever you want to do."

"That's good, but we need to talk. It's very important." Melody suddenly came to him, whispering.

Clovis didn't know why she was being secretive, but he agreed.

After breaking away from the team, Clovis asked, "So, what's the matter?"

"I finished reconstructing the code two days ago. So, I thought talking about it with you first would be the first priority."

"You're done?" Clovis raised his eyebrows.

"Yep. Take a look at this." Melody projected a map. "What do you see?"

"Our world map?"

"Indeed. However, according to the code, it's inputted directly, meaning that the world we're living in, at least the surface, is the same as the real world."

"!!!" Clovis was slightly surprised by this finding. He thought the world would be different and simpler, considering they had to create it from scratch. "Won't copying the world be frowned upon?"

"Yes. If you copy a few countries and the way they are ruled is not to their satisfaction, it can cause a major issue for the game. But this also makes it very clear. If they're really copying the real-world map to this world, it means the world out there is not so peaceful to care about such a thing."

"!!!" Clovis's body shook. "Do you mean they're at war?"

"Maybe. I'm thinking about all possibilities, but I can't help but wonder, what if they're attacked by the beasts as well?"

Clovis thought for a moment before shaking his head. "I don't think so."

"I mean, it's pretty convincing to me. They created this world to simulate how we're fighting the beasts. By learning from us, they will be able to fight against the beasts."

"Yeah. However, there are two things that don't make sense with that theory. The special towers. If they created this world because of the beasts, what about the special towers? Is it unique only in our world?"

"Possibly."

"The second reason is simply the beasts. How can those beasts even exist? You can say that there is a zombie apocalypse outside and I can believe it more than the beasts." 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

"…" Melody couldn't exactly refute that statement. "Anyway, from the reconstruction, I realized something."

"What is that?"

"The towers are inserted directly. For example, this tower." Melody pointed at the city's tower.

She then projected the information about the tower. "If you look at this, each tower is inserted uniquely. They are not randomly generated."

"Hmm…" Clovis crossed his arms. "Can you search for all the towers in the world? For example, the Tower of Darkness. Is it here?"

"Yes." She nodded. "The Tower of Darkness is supposed to be the place to store the internal information. Only those who have access can activate it. In other words, those who have awakened their system can activate this tower."

"Do you think you can find other towers?" Clovis asked.

"I have to look at all the towers. Do you know how much work that is? How long do you think it will take?"

Clovis waved his hand. "No. I'm not thinking about the manual way. Can't you just list out all the towers and get their locations? Since those towers are hidden from plain sight or considered forbidden zones, we just have to exclude the towers that are registered formally."

"Oh!" Melody nodded. "That I can. Give me two minutes."

Melody processed what Clovis wanted and showed it to him directly. "There are thirty towers that aren't accounted for in this world."

"Thirty? That is more than I thought." Clovis crossed his arms. "Can we check their information?"

"Unfortunately, no. We know the Tower of Darkness is special, not from the code. Each tower has a function, so unless we know the true identity of the tower, I won't know which ones are the special towers."

Clovis thought for a moment. "In that case, we only know one tower, which is the Tower of the Lake. Hmm, how about finding out which of these thirty places are guarded heavily?"

"Hmm…" Melody tried to follow the instruction by searching for the image of the tower to see if there was anything around it. There was one tower that piqued her interest.

"Clovis. Take a look at this. Among the towers, there is one that is still out in the open. There is no structure around it at all."

"Really? Why?"

"Let's see…" Melody frowned. "From the looks of it, this place is known to have a Tier 9 beast guarding it."

"Well… mark it down for now. Also, give me all the information about the thirty towers. I will try to see if I can narrow it down further."

"Got it."