Chương 387: Another Apprentice
I soon discovered I wasn't the sole apprentice of Tower Elder Maximus. It seemed there was another, and as fate would have it, she was someone I knew quite well. Too well, perhaps.
Rose Springshaper.
The auburn-haired girl stepped into the room, dressed pragmatically in a buttoned shirt and simple pants. Her sharp brown eyes landed on me, and for a moment, there was a flicker of something unspoken between us.
"Oh, Rose, hello," I greeted, offering her a polite nod as she entered.
"Arthur, hi," she replied, her voice steady, but the air between us grew heavy with awkwardness. Rose had been a close friend during my first year here. But that was before her confession—a confession I had rejected. After that, things between us had drifted into silence.
"You two know each other? Fantastic!" Maximus exclaimed, completely oblivious to the tension in the room. He clapped his hands together with an enthusiasm that felt almost comically out of place. "This will make things much easier! Shared history, shared goals, shared brilliance—I love it!"
Neither of us responded. Instead, we exchanged the kind of glance one reserves for bumping into an ex at a wedding: polite, restrained, and steeped in quiet discomfort.
Maximus, mercifully unaware, dove back into his lecture with gusto, his enthusiasm filling the void. Rose and I, however, remained tethered in that strange limbo, navigating the uncharted waters of working together again.
Later, as Maximus busied himself with another one of his endless holographic diagrams, I finally broke the silence.
"So, what about your classes?" I asked, my tone neutral.
"The pass lets me skip most of them," Rose replied, her gaze flickering toward Maximus. "It gives me credit for advanced alchemical courses. One of the perks of working here, I suppose." Then, after a brief pause, she added, "And… it's good to see you again, Arthur."
"Same here," I said, offering her a small smile. "How have you been?"
"Good," she exhaled, and for the first time since she entered, her posture relaxed. "I've been good. Ranked ninth, you know."
"I know," I replied. "You've gotten much stronger."
Her lips curled into a smile tinged with pride. "Uh-huh. Hard work pays off, doesn't it?"
"It does," I said with a nod.
There was a pause, brief but weighted. And then, perhaps emboldened by the slight thaw in the air, she asked, "So how's it been? You know… with the three princesses?"
Her tone was light, but there was a glint of curiosity in her eyes. For the first time, I couldn't tell if she was teasing or genuinely interested.
"Fun," I said, a grin tugging at the corners of my mouth. "And exhausting."
Rose chuckled softly, shaking her head. "Sounds about right. I suppose they keep you on your toes."
"They do," I admitted.
Her laughter was short-lived, but it lingered in the air, softening the edges of our shared history. For a moment, it felt like a bridge had been tentatively placed between us—a bridge neither of us had expected to rebuild.
"I'm sorry about the confession, Arthur," Rose said softly, her voice steady but tinged with vulnerability.
I exhaled, the weight of her words settling between us like a stone in still water. "No... I just wasn't ready back then," I replied, shaking my head. Back then, my mind had been a maelstrom of doubt and denial. Losing to Ren during the field trip had shaken me more than I wanted to admit, but that wasn't the full truth.
At the time, I still hadn't fully accepted this world as being anything more than a novel. The people here had felt like characters—pawns in a story I was forced to navigate. That perception had shielded me, yes, but it had also isolated me.
It was Rachel who shattered that illusion. She forced me to confront the reality I had been so desperately avoiding, to see the people here not as figments of someone else's imagination but as real, breathing individuals. Her unrelenting presence had made me reevaluate everything.
But even after I let go of that detached perspective, my feelings hadn't changed. I didn't like Rose romantically—not the way I felt about Rachel, Cecilia, or Seraphina. Even when I allowed myself to feel, to see people for who they truly were, Rose had remained just a friend in my heart.
"It's not your fault for liking me," I said, offering her a light smile.
"I guess," she replied, her gaze drifting away, as though searching the room for something to anchor her emotions.
The air between us was quieter now, less heavy, but still thick with unspoken truths. And yet, something felt different—gentler, perhaps. The sharp edges of our shared past seemed to have softened.
'Time heals everything, huh?' I thought. Rose didn't seem bitter anymore, not about the confession, not about my lack of romantic interest. Instead, there was a faint sadness in her eyes, not from rejection but from how our friendship had frayed and unraveled in the aftermath.
And in that moment, I realized I felt the same way. The loss of that friendship had lingered like an ache, subtle but persistent.
"I missed being your friend," I said quietly, surprising even myself with the admission.
She turned back to me, her eyes widening slightly, then softening. "Yeah," she said, her voice a little warmer now. "Me too."
The silence that followed wasn't awkward this time. It felt more like a truce—an unspoken agreement to leave the past behind and begin again, even if it wasn't the same as before.
Perhaps we couldn't return to what we once had, but maybe, just maybe, we could build something new.
Well, that worked, and honestly, it was something I liked. Sure, I had the three girls, so loneliness wasn't exactly gnawing at me, but if I was being honest, I didn't have any real friends.
Yes, I know. Tragic. I, Arthur Nightingale, with all my strength and cunning, didn't have a single friend. The closest my phone contacts came to variety was the three girls and my parents. That was it.
Jin? He was my subordinate, and so was Kali. Respectful, sure, but friendship? Not quite.
Ren? Never a friend.
Luke? Well, betrayal and death does tend to sour things.
Lucifer? He had taken to look at me much more as a rival and not a friend.
And Ian? Let's just say Ian was simply Ian, and leave it at that.
There were a few others, distant names that blurred in the corners of memory. But a year of isolation training had frayed those ties into irrelevance. It was easier to drift apart than I cared to admit.
Which is why spending time with Rose was… refreshing. It was a different kind of companionship, one that didn't hinge on grand promises or life-or-death battles. Friendship, I realized, was distinct from romantic relationships. There were no expectations, no delicate tangle of emotions or attractions. Just time spent together, simple and straightforward. And for someone like me, that simplicity was a gift.
Of course, life wasn't all about mending broken friendships. While Rose provided a welcome distraction, my real work continued behind the scenes. Tower Elder Maximus, as brilliant as he was, remained wary of me—a challenge I intended to chip away at, piece by piece. The secret project I needed to expose was still shrouded in mystery, and time wasn't on my side.
I leaned heavily on Luna's senses, sharpening my search with her innate abilities. Unfortunately, her powers were still limited by the seal binding her, a frustrating reality that meant she couldn't locate the project's heart. It was like hunting for a needle in a haystack without knowing if the needle even existed.
And then there was that device.
I glanced at it now, sitting innocuously on Maximus's workbench—a black, metallic object that resembled an old phone. But its surface shimmered faintly with mana inscriptions, and its design bore a striking resemblance to the encryption device that stored the Violet Mist Divine Art I acquired from the Mount Hua sect.
Could it hold the key to what I was looking for? Did it contain the critical information I needed about the Paladin of Void project?
The thought gnawed at me. But another question loomed larger: 'How the hell do I get the information out of it?'
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