Miss Benanis’ eleven Spirit Runes had long since been complete; this new Spirit Rune Miracle—[Travel]—was just the icing on the cake. The Spiritual Light of the Ring of Fate resonated with the Golden Steps that symbolized the identity of the Grand Witch, and the girls all stood up in surprise, watching the Grand Witch they followed grow even stronger.

Only then did the beautiful blonde Witch stand up and look back at the Symbol of her own Power:

"It’s time to hold the ritual."

She said this, nodded to Shard and Ciris on the stage, then put away the Ring of Fate and the Golden Steps and hurried toward the exit of the performance hall. The Witch’s Followers immediately followed after her. The promotion ritual of a Grand Witch was far more complicated than that of a Circle Sorcerer; they knew Miss Benanis still needed their help.

"Not bad at all. I thought Van would only advance after things at Green Lake were over. With her, the Council will now have four at the Twelfth Rank (Chapter 1656). If we include Witch Edwards, who is also facing advancement, the Council will have five at the Twelfth Rank... It should be six—Miss Sylvia’s Talent is better than that of most Witches; her promotion to the Twelfth Rank is only a matter of Time. This is one of the rare flourishing eras for the Council since the Sixth Era."

In the small performance hall, only Shard and Ciris remained on the stage. The Golden-haired Girl was happy for her dear friend, then turned to look at Shard again:

"Right now, at least three Grand Witches advancing to the Twelfth Rank are tied to you."

"Since the ladies treat me so well, this is all I can do to repay them."

Shard said. Ciris shook her head slightly:

"Witches don’t care what you give them in return. Witches only care that they absolutely must get what they want to get."

Her beautiful eyes fixed on Shard; in the depths of her gaze, besides an extremely intense emotion, there was also melancholy:

"Just like Vanessa. Ever since you parted in Randall Valley, she has never forgotten the dance she performed for you... That night, I was backstage the whole time, watching you two."

Shard remembered perfectly well what "that night" referred to. As for Ciris being backstage while Miss Benanis danced on stage, he truly hadn’t noticed.

After all, Miss Benanis’ performance had simply been too spectacular.

Her eyes looked closely at Shard’s, and the distance between them grew shorter and shorter, until Ciris rose on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his.

The Outlander’s adventures in Randall Valley were mostly connected to Ciris’ father; it was with Shard at her side that Ciris ultimately witnessed the entire process of her father willingly becoming a "Guardian." So Shard knew very well what Ciris thought of him; otherwise, at "Black Mist Camp," she wouldn’t have appeared in the form of a scarecrow.

The kiss was rather deep. There was no third person in the small performance hall, so no one disturbed their embrace and kiss after their long separation. But when the kiss ended, Ciris softly reminded Shard not to tell Miss Benanis what they had done here: 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

"I’m worried Van would be upset."

As she spoke, she kissed Shard again:

"So it’s fine as long as we don’t let her find out... Do you still want to see her dance? After things here at Green Lake are done, I can arrange for her to do it again."

Even though their date was quite pleasant, Shard had not forgotten that there were other matters on this Friday night. It was already a bit late when he left the Glass Cask Opera House, but the carriage was fast. When Shard reached the agreed-upon location—the cemetery outside the northern village "Daeflin Village" of Mikaela Ironworks City—it was just five minutes to eight at night.

According to Legend, several hundred years ago, two brothers with the surname Flynn came here from elsewhere and settled separately in different places. The village descended from the elder brother was called "Daeflin Village," while "Little Flynn Village" north of the Lake shore was where the younger brother’s descendants lived. Of course, this was only a Legend among the local villagers, without any deeper meaning.

By the light of the moon, Shard entered the unremarkable rural cemetery. The cemetery was enclosed by stone posts and hedges and was not very large overall. Although the villagers had hired an old man from the village as Tomb Guardian, an ordinary person obviously couldn’t stop a Circle Sorcerer.

Under the Moon, Priest Augustus and Dr. Schneider had already arrived. When Shard saw them, Priest Augustus had an unlit pipe in his mouth and was crouching in the moonlight, examining a rather old tombstone, with two shovels lying at his feet. As for Dr. Schneider, he was sitting on another tombstone not far away, his coat taken off and folded under his backside as a cushion.

The only buildings in the cemetery were the Gravekeeper’s Cottage at the southernmost part of the cemetery and the house used to temporarily place coffins. The cemetery was quite flat, and the villagers’ graves were merely simple mounds with tombstones erected atop them—this was a very traditional burial method.

"If I didn’t know you two, I’d think we were here to steal corpses tonight."

Shard joked. The doctor waved at him:

"Detective, you really are punctual. I like people who have a sense of Time. As for my patients with appointments, I suspect most of them can’t even read a clock."

He jumped down from the tombstone, picked up the shovels on the ground, kept one for himself, and tossed the other to Shard:

"Get ready to work."

Shard also took off his own coat and tossed it onto a nearby tombstone:

"No problem. What’s the plan?"

The Priest straightened up and pointed at the tombstone he had just been examining:

"Dig this one up. The information you’ve been sending me bit by bit is very accurate, and I’ve been tracking down the descendants of Green Lake Town these past few days.

As for this grave, it holds an important townsman who escaped when Green Lake Town declined. He used to be the owner of one of the town’s only two general stores. He and his three brothers are all buried here, but his eight sons later moved to the far side of the lake. Those descendants who still live across the lake in Green Lake City have already been found and placed under the Church’s protection. As for these four graves here, I’m quite sure the Ghoul Three Brothers will come tonight to dig them up and steal the remains inside."

The Priest Augustus did not explain how he had reached that conclusion, but since he had been visiting all over the Green Lake Region these days, he must have discovered some kind of pattern.

"He alone, and eight sons? Did he have some special method?"

Shard was rather surprised. The doctor, leaning on his shovel, said with a smile from the side:

"We can try Necromancy and ask him in a bit, I’m curious too."

"Enough, you two stop joking around. We only have this one chance tonight. The Church will send people over here tomorrow; if our plan falls through tonight, it’ll be hard to find another opportunity like this."

Priest Augustus said very seriously, so Shard and the doctor prepared to get to work. They felt no psychological burden about secretly digging up someone’s grave—after all, this could count as protecting the grave’s owner. Once the Ghoul Three Brothers carried him off, he’d only end up as Ritual Materials.

"So after we open it, we set the trap, right?"

Shard spat into his palms twice, then dug out the first shovelful of earth.

Priest Augustus nodded.

"Open it first and see what condition the bones are in. It’s eight o’clock now, those ghouls usually move after eleven. We still have three hours."

"Three hours is more than enough to deal with a grave like this."

The doctor was in high spirits as well. Priest Augustus rarely took the initiative to ask others for help, let alone with something like this; this was a novel experience for him too.

With Shard and the doctor—two sturdy laborers—digging under the moon, opening up a grave was no difficult task. The mound of soil quickly grew higher, and soon the shovel struck the coffin below.

It was a wooden coffin, so decayed by time that it was about to fall apart. Shard and the doctor tossed their shovels aside, then briskly raised their hands together:

"Up~"

The nail-fastened lid sprang open at once, then fell quite steadily to the side. Shard glanced at the still-motionless Gravekeeper’s Cottage, and then the three of them leaned over the edge of the grave to look into the coffin. The corpse inside had indeed rotted beyond recognition.

"It’s been nearly a hundred years, after all. Time~"

Priest Augustus sighed. He jumped down into the grave, put on his gloves, and carefully examined the bones:

"No problem. The corpse is very intact, and it hasn’t been tainted by any other Power. If we turned it into a trap, a detonation-type ’Corpse Explosion’ would have the greatest effect—it would even harm ghouls. But we have no grievance with the old gentleman lying here, and casually destroying his body doesn’t sit right."

The doctor and Shard both nodded beside him, and then, somewhat to their surprise, each noticed that the other wasn’t in the least surprised by the Priest’s words.

"Then let’s set up some other kind of trap. But since it’s still early, I can try a bit of Necromancy."

The Priest spoke as he pressed his palm to the mud-stained forehead of the skull. A moment later, he frowned:

"No, that’s not right."

"What’s wrong?"

The doctor asked with great interest. Although he specialized in Demon Power, he really didn’t know much about corpses.

"The corpse itself hasn’t been contaminated by any Power, but his soul is actually still Sleeping inside the body and hasn’t left."

Standing in the grave, the Priest cradled the skull and analyzed the situation like a professional:

"That’s not normal. Even if he had an obsession and turned into a ghost, he wouldn’t have gone all these years without making a single stir. Wait a moment, let me see... Whisper Element... so that’s it—some kind of Relic that manipulates souls, forcing his soul to remain in the corpse after death."

"The Angel-Level Relic Soul Storybook—most likely that. The Corpses on the island were the same; after dying, their souls couldn’t leave. I’ve never examined the corpses of townsfolk who escaped that island other than those from the Edwards Family. I really didn’t expect that even after leaving the island, their souls still can’t rest."

Shard said, and the Priest nodded:

"That’s a very reasonable deduction. Using both Flesh and soul as Ritual Materials fits that Ascension Spell you described. But in that case, although we can use Necromancy, if we don’t want to trigger a backlash from the Power of that soul-controlling Relic, we can only ask three questions. Conveniently, there are three of us—one question per person."