The air in the meeting room was heavy, as if pressed down by something invisible.
Ivelia stood at the door.
Her gaze fell upon the magic screen in the center of the room.
On the screen, the tiny Lin Ling was holding Leticia’s hand, attempting to lead her away from the noble commercial street.
Leticia walked with her head bowed, allowing herself to be led like a doll newly dragged out of a nightmare.
Ivelia did not speak.
However, the floor of the meeting room had begun to vibrate slightly.
The cups on the table made a faint clinking sound.
The magic runes on the walls lit up layer by layer, only to be dimmed by an even stronger pressure.
Baroque’s Adam’s apple bobbed.
Cecil’s tail was ramrod straight.
Aliviel’s Dream Dust magic circle faltered for a moment.
Phelan held his recording board, but he couldn’t bring himself to write.
Niya was frozen in her chair, her breathing so light it was almost non-existent.
Ivelia finally spoke.
“Explain yourselves.”
Her voice was calm.
But sometimes, a calm voice was far more terrifying than an angry one.
“What exactly have you done?”
No one dared to answer.
Ivelia watched Lin Ling leading Leticia forward on the magic screen.
It felt as if the temperature in the meeting room had suddenly plummeted.
“I only received a transmission from Phelan.”
“Saying that Lin Ling had left today’s meal for me.”
She walked slowly into the meeting room.
With every step she took, the entire Demon King’s Castle seemed to shudder slightly in response.
“Then I arrive here.”
“Only to see her appearing within your spell.”
She looked at Cecil and Aliviel.
“You had better have an explanation for me when this is over.”
Cecil opened his mouth.
The playful smile he usually wore had completely vanished.
“Demon King, this matter—”
“Now...”
Ivelia raised her hand.
“Bring her out first.”
Dark red magic flowed from her fingertips.
It cut into the magic screen’s spell structure with extreme precision.
The magic runes around the screen flared brightly, as if forcibly suppressed by a more powerful hand.
Cecil’s eyes widened slightly.
“Demon King...”
Aliviel also immediately looked at the spell.
She could feel it.
Ivelia was bypassing her authority and directly dismantling the dream’s outer layer.
She was forcibly opening a passage to pull Lin Ling out of the dream.
This should have been an extremely difficult task.
Yet, under Ivelia’s hand, a faint ripple actually began to appear at the edge of the magic screen.
Niya’s eyes lit up for a moment.
“Demon King...”
Baroque also took a sudden step forward.
The magic screen trembled slightly.
The commercial street within the dream blurred for a split second.
The cold light in Ivelia’s eyes deepened.
“Found it.”
Just as Ivelia was about to completely open the passage.
A somewhat playful voice rang out in the meeting room.
“Oh dear, oh dear.”
“This won’t do at all~”
The moment the voice fell.
The entire Demon King’s Castle fell silent.
Everything was as if someone had pressed a pause button.
The cups stopped mid-vibration on the table.
The dark red magic at Ivelia’s fingertips, which was about to tear open the screen, stopped just an inch away.
In a corner of the meeting room, the moonlight shimmered slightly.
A figure stepped out from that patch of moonlight.
If Lin Ling were here, she would have recognized him as the young soldier who had supported her in the dream earlier.
With every step he took, his silhouette shifted slightly.
It was as if the lies draped over him were peeling away layer by layer.
“I thought a little bit of magic would be enough~”
The person said with a laugh.
The voice gradually shifted from the low rasp of an ordinary man to the soft, laughing voice of a woman.
“I didn’t expect our Miss Ivelia to be more impatient than I imagined.”
She walked up to the magic screen.
At that moment, the screen was also paused at the exact moment of the ripple.
Inside the dream, Lin Ling had just led Leticia out of the noble commercial street.
The masked woman looked at Lin Ling in the image, her tone carrying a hint of delight.
“I can’t let you ruin my carefully crafted stage like this.”
She raised her hand.
The fingertips of her white glove lightly touched the edge of the magic screen.
The ripple torn by Ivelia was smoothed over as if by a gentle hand.
It vanished bit by bit.
Even the originally unstable dream boundary became more solid under her fingertips.
“So beautiful.”
She whispered.
“As expected, a cherished child is most suitable to stand at the center of the stage.”
She bowed toward Lin Ling inside the screen.
The movement was elegant.
Like a gentleman at a theater’s curtain call.
“Little cutie.”
“I hope you enjoy this performance.”
As she bowed, the appearance of the young soldier completely shattered.
Like paper peeling away under moonlight.
In its place was a woman wearing a white smiling mask.
The smile on the mask was as gentle as ever.
But there was nothing real in that gentleness.
Only an inscrutable pleasure.
The rabbit shadow cast by her feet tilted its head slightly, as if it too were admiring the farce.
The woman turned and walked toward the time-stopped Ivelia.
Ivelia’s eyes were still cold and dark.
The magic at her fingertips was still just a tiny distance from the screen.
The masked woman leaned down slightly, bringing her face close to Ivelia’s.
Then, she slowly raised a finger.
“Shhh~”
She said with a smile:
“No one is allowed to disturb the performance.”
As her words fell.
The moonlight closed like a curtain.
Her figure faded from the meeting room.
In the next instant.
Time resumed its flow.
The cups continued to vibrate.
The spell at Cecil’s fingertips flashed violently.
Ivelia’s dark red magic struck the edge of the magic screen.
The dream passage she had torn open was gone.
The screen was as calm as if nothing had happened.
In fact, it was even more stable.
Ivelia’s pupils constricted slightly.
Everyone in the meeting room realized something was wrong.
Baroque immediately looked at the screen.
“What happened?”
Cecil’s expression was grim.
“Just now, it was clearly...”
Aliviel’s Dream Dust magic circle exploded in a ring of fine purple light.
She gritted her teeth.
“Someone reinforced it again.”
Phelan’s detection crystals flashed frantically.
“Untraceable.”
“Interference traces have vanished.”
“Spell stability has increased.”
Niya’s voice trembled.
“Then Miss Saintess...”
Ivelia did not answer.
She closed her eyes.
A terrifying sense of perception instantly covered the entire Demon King’s Castle.
Corridors, towers, the kitchen, the underground warehouse, the city walls.
Even Lin Ling’s room.
Every flow of magic unfolded within her perception.
But there was nothing.
No unfamiliar presence.
No suspicious magic residue.
A moment later, Ivelia opened her eyes.
Her face was still dark, but she had suppressed the most dangerous part of her killing intent.
“At least Lin Ling’s vital signs are stable.”
Hearing that her “vital signs were stable,” the expressions of the others in the room finally relaxed for a split second.
But only for a split second.
Because Lin Ling was still inside that magic screen.
She was still within that rewritten dream that they could not control.
Ivelia looked at the screen.
“Whose spell is this exactly?”
Her voice was dangerously cold.
“I cannot influence it.”
Cecil said in a low voice:
“The magic generating the spell is still mine.”
Aliviel added:
“The dream is still formed using my Dream Dust.”
Phelan looked at the detection results.
“But they have been rearranged by some unknown rule.”
“It is as if someone borrowed the existing stage, lights, and actors.”
“And then replaced the script of the play that was supposed to be performed.”
Baroque slammed a fist into the wall.
A crack appeared in the surface.
“Then tear this damn script apart!”
Ivelia raised her hand.
“Continue the decoding.”
“Do not forcibly wake Lin Ling, and do not destroy the dream’s foundation.”
“I want her to wake up whole.”
Everyone bowed their heads simultaneously.
“Yes.”
Inside the meeting room, all the magic began to operate once more.
Cecil fought to regain authority.
Aliviel analyzed the Dream Dust.
Phelan recorded and deduced the structure.
Baroque stood guard at the door, his senses fully extended, trying to find the culprit hiding behind the scenes.
Niya sat before the magic screen, her hands tightly clasped, her eyes never leaving Lin Ling for a second.
Ivelia stood at the very front, dark red magic flowing silently.
She did not speak again.
She simply watched the screen.
She watched Lin Ling, who was still leading someone forward in the dream.
...
Inside the dream.
Lin Ling held “Sia’s” hand, jogging along.
They crossed the edge of the noble commercial street.
The magnificent shop windows and the shops filled with the rich aroma of pastries were gradually left behind.
The stone slabs of the road began to become uneven.
The buildings along the street also changed from clean and grand to low, crowded houses.
The scent of perfume vanished.
In its place was the smell of damp wood, old cloth, and the sour stench of sewers drifting from the distance.
Lin Ling finally slowed her pace.
She looked back; the magnificent commercial street had disappeared from sight.
“Phew...”
She breathed a sigh of relief.
“We should be out of there now.”
Leticia stood behind her, her breathing somewhat unsteady.
Her hand was still being held by Lin Ling.
Lin Ling didn’t seem to realize it.
Leticia, however, kept looking down at that hand.
Clean and warm.
It was completely different from the hands that had dragged her into alleys and pushed her into trash heaps earlier.
Lin Ling looked up at her surroundings.
Then she froze for a moment.
“This is...”
She blinked.
The street before her was entirely different from the commercial street just now.
That place had been clean, bright, and prosperous.
Grand dresses were displayed in shop windows.
The perfume on the noble ladies could be smelled from several steps away.
But here?
The houses were dilapidated.
The walls were blackened.
The windows were covered with old cloth.
Old people in thin clothes sat by the roadside.
Several scrawny children huddled in a corner, staring at the shopping bag in Lin Ling’s arms before quickly looking away.
Someone was using a wooden bucket to catch water leaking from the eaves.
Someone else was pushing a half-broken wheel, struggling to grind through the mud.
For a moment, Lin Ling was speechless.
“It was so prosperous just a moment ago.”
“Why is it so ruined here?”
She held the shopping bag and looked down at the uneven road beneath her feet.
It was a strange feeling.
She had clearly only walked a few streets.
Yet it felt as if she had crossed from one world into another.
From the blindingly beautiful noble district directly into a forgotten corner.
Lin Ling murmured softly:
“Have we just performed a leap across civilizations...?”
Leticia did not speak.
The two of them found a slightly cleaner spot by a wall to sit and rest.
Lin Ling placed the shopping bag on her knees, peeking inside to see if there was anything left to eat.
Leticia sat beside her, staring blankly at her surroundings.
She had lived in the capital of the Camillaya Empire since she was a child.
The White Tower was in the center of the capital.
The noble district was near the White Tower.
The streets were always clean.
The flowers were always perfectly trimmed.
The Holy See’s maids would clear the path for her in advance.
The carriages she rode in would never pass through a place like this.
The capital she had seen was always grand, solemn, and filled with Holy Light.
But what was this before her?
Dilapidated houses.
Exhausted people.
Children huddled in corners.
And those eyes that immediately looked down and avoided the patrolmen.
Leticia suddenly felt her throat tighten.
She slowly turned her head and looked at Lin Ling.
Her voice carried a hint of disbelief.
“Is this...”
“Is this really Camillaya’s capital?”
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