Chương 36: The Duke's Study.

I headed straight to my room after that. I was tired. That strange, beastly girl had taken a lot of energy out of me. I wanted to be mad, but it was hard to be mad at someone who was obviously pulling their punches. I wanted to believe she just enjoyed beating on people, but I didn't think that was it. It wasn't like I was giving her many fun reactions to work with either. It wasn't long at all before my invisible shadow ended up following me.

He hadn't been right outside the door, presumably so Violet wouldn't see him on her way out. That was curious, though a lot of things were. My mental map proved less useful than I thought as I ended up getting lost. Thankfully, one of the maids led me back to the safety of my own quarters. I tried not to look at those garish sculptures, though it was hard not to.

"I knew it." I mumbled, staring at the large portrait in my room. Many of those sculptures hadn't just looked similar, they had also looked familiar. They had looked at least vaguely like Scarlet Indri in some way. The features all changed, but the base was this woman depicted right in front of me. It was a revelation I both didn't know what to do with, nor did I know what it even meant. It made sense that a grieving widower would be forlorn over his dead wife, but this was something bordering on an obsession.

I reached for my necklace, channeled mana. Anias. Are you there? It took a second to get a response. Naturally, I had instructed Anias not to contact me unless it was a dire emergency. It would have been rather silly to have the necklace glow in front of Duke Indri. Yes, My Lady. You are safe? I am. Duke Indri isn't in the manor. Can you find out where he is? That had bothered me. He had gone through such an elaborate scheme to get me into his manor, and then he'd just… left? It didn't make much sense.

There was also the possibility that Violet simply didn't know what she was talking about, but I thought I could give her the benefit of the doubt here. I will see what I can find, My Lady. I wanted to ask more questions. To ask her how everyone at the manor were doing. To ask how Damian had reacted to my decision. To ask if Sere was alright. Yet, it would just distract me, and right now I needed to focus. I walked over, plopped myself down on the bed.

I had plenty of aches all over, though it did feel like Violet had been surprisingly careful in 'beating the stuffing' out of me. What a strange girl. There was a knock at the door. I froze, stared at it for a moment, before speaking out.

"Come in." Aline stepped in, pushing forward a small cart. The cart itself had several trays. This wasn't just a cart. This was a Magical Implement that doubled as a cart and a portable kitchen. The scents and sounds of food filled the air: fat hissing on invisible flames, something sharp and grassy cut through the smell of cooking meat. And then, there was this very noticeable grainy scent. Nobles in this world really did have it good. They didn't even need to leave their beds, save that it was more proper.

It was a shame that I didn't really care much for food. Well, save for sweets and bitter tea.

"My Lady, I thought you would call for food, but you never did. I took the liberty of bringing you something." Aline said simply, tipping her head.

"The Duke apologizes for not being able to share a proper meal with you. He's currently busy, but he hopes to rectify that soon." Being busy and him not being here were two different things. Was that intentional? Hmm.

"Thank you. I hope to share my next meal with him." I gave her my best smile. Well, it seemed I wouldn't even be able to meet with him today. Thankfully, I didn't have to wait long. I had only just woken up and had finished conversing with Anias. According to her and the Information Guild, nobody knew that Duke Indri had gone anywhere. He hadn't been seen inside the city, and so the assumption was that he'd been somewhere inside the manor. So, Violet had been wrong. That didn't matter now.

"The Duke will see you now." Aline bowed her head politely, right as she carted away the remains of my breakfast.

"Please, just follow me." I could admit to a bit of nervousness as I followed behind her. Still, it wasn't like Indri was going to do something right away. After all, his original proposal had been for me to occasionally visit him to 'help him with his research'. That implied that whatever he needed me for required time, either for preparation or something else. I trailed behind Aline as she led me down increasingly familiar hallways. She was leading me to his personal study, I realized.

I had used my Gift to check to see if my invisible watcher was still there. He was. The maid finally stopped, turned, and bowed as we stopped in front of one of the rooms. There was no more instruction after that. So, I simply knocked.

"Esra? Do come in." Duke Indri's voice called out. I stepped inside. The study was much the same as it had been last time. A mess of different Magical Implements and Artifacts… except there were even more things here than there had been last time. It was a little hard to even take a few steps without tripping over something. Duke Indri stood a few feet away from the door, hunched over a very large hammer. Violet's hammer had been rather… plain. It was a hunk of metal, the barest qualification for a weapon.

This was more. Intricate lines ran along the silver steel, forming symbols I didn't recognize. The handle itself was covered in a fine leather, with more markings running across it. Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. The Duke looked at me and smiled.

"I'm glad to see you're doing better. Has Aline been taking proper care of you?" Kill. The sword whispered; its voice sounded very sweet to my ears. It was also stupid. I had to resist the urge to clench my hands, to feed into the growing anger inside of me. Some of it was my own; most of it came from the sword. Click. Click. I tamped down on that feeling with my Gift. A vague sense of disappointment came. Let the stupid thing be disappointed. At least it hadn't tried to take over.

"She has. I have no complaints." I said with a small smile.

"Please, come closer. I want you to try channeling mana into this." Duke Indri gestured at the warhammer, stepped a foot back.

"Channel it through the handle." Whatever dark machination I had expected, this certainly hadn't been it. I stepped forward, bent down, gripped the leather. It was soft to the touch.

"I feel like I must warn you that I have a habit of being…indelicate, when it comes to channeling mana. Will that be an issue?" He just laughed.

"Ah, it won't be. Feel free to be as indelicate as you like." Alright then. I closed my eyes, felt the mana inside me, pushed it from my hands and into the handle. Despite the warning, I did try to be a little careful. I had tried to control the flow of mana, but the hammer was drawing it in, almost with some strange will of its own. Feeling came with it, a sense of anger that wasn't my own. This wasn't the righteous anger of my Godblade. This felt more like an anger targeted at creation itself.

I opened my eyes and saw the hammer glow. All of the etchings were leaking a pale light. Puny. Thing.

"You really did manage to power it." Duke Indri said approvingly.

"It resonated. I knew I was right about you. Now, try lifting it up." I shook my head, banishing the foreign feelings.

"Pardon?" He stared at me.

"Just lift it." He said as if that was the simplest thing in the world. I stared at the warhammer. Well, if he was so sure, then I could try. I gritted my teeth, channeled as much mana as I could, and put my back into it.

"Come…on…." I grunted. His reassurance had given me some hope. It took two seconds for that hope to be dashed. The thing didn't even budge, let alone actually move. I stopped exerting myself, took a few deep breaths.

"It's…it's not working." I looked at Indri. I expected him to look disappointed. Instead, he just looked perplexed.

"That's odd. If you can power it, you should have more than enough mana to lift it." He finally shook his head.

"It's no matter. I just wanted you to power it, that's all. You can let go now." What the hell was that supposed to mean? Actually, hadn't Violet said something similar? I let go of the hammer, standing and staring at the weapon. It still glowed.

"So is this a Magical Implement of some kind? Or…an Artifact?" Given that I was here under the guise of helping him with 'research', I expected to be able to ask quite a few things.

"Somewhere in the middle." Duke Indri said without a moment's hesitation.

"What?" Duke Indri chewed his lower lip, and seemed to be weighing scales that I couldn't see. He finally nodded to himself, walking over to his desk.

"Tell me, what do you know about Artifacts?"

"They are ancient relics built by older civilizations. Ones whose effects we often try to imitate with Magical Implements." That was the sum total of all that I knew.

"That is what everyone knows." He nodded, gestured me towards his desk.

"But why are Artifacts special? Why is it hard to imitate just some of their functions, let alone replicate them entirely?"

"Because they were built by more advanced civilizations." I said. Wasn't that obvious enough? Now that I thought about it, ancient advanced civilizations were often a backdrop for many of the fantasy novels I had read back on earth. The idea was always that magic or something had faded over time, and so people couldn't replicate the miracles of their predecessors. Heck, this was a backdrop for many novels here.

"That is the general misconception, yes." Duke Indri nodded, gesturing towards two papers in front of him. Both papers contained…diagrams. Or perhaps, schematics was the better word.

"Misconception?" I repeated, staring at the two pages. They both seemed to depict the exact same thing. They were two…sacks? Pouches? The diagrams were thoroughly labelled, explaining every single symbol etched onto the outside of the two pouches. None of it made any sense to me.

"On the right, we have an Artifact." He pointed with his finger.

"It's dubbed the Sorted Pouch. It's a simple device. It organizes everything you put inside of it, and never weighs more than about three kilograms, no matter what you put inside it." That…was a rather useful thing. Simple in concept, but bloody useful. He pointed at the other diagram.

"This is a Magical Implement. Our best attempt at replicating the Artifact. It is useful enough but the effect is… much, much weaker. Even this Magical Implement can be considered a great success, as far as copying Artifacts goes. Can you tell me the difference between these two?" It was an odd task given that I couldn't make heads or tails of the diagrams themselves. Still, finding a difference between the two shouldn't be hard. It was.

I matched all of the symbols over a good two minutes, and didn't find a single difference at all.

"There…isn't one?" I said finally. Duke Indri had been staring at me intently. He now smiled like a proud teacher at a particularly precocious student. My anger flared. This was the last person I wanted to look at me like that. Click.

"Correct. There isn't one."

"I don't understand," I said absently. Without the anger, my voice sounded a little hollow. His smile grew wider.

"Nobody does. Or I suppose nobody did. We can replicate almost every single Artifact we've ever found, and yet the inner workings don't matter. It's never the same." I was ashamed to admit it, but I was curious. This had to have something to do with what this bastard had been doing all this time, right? Then, it wouldn't do for me not to understand everything. Duke Indri was watching me. This was a test of some kind, I was sure of it.

I suspected the answer; it was rather obvious when all the cards were put in front of me like this. Yet, did I actually want to give it to this man? I decided to give it anyway. Academic intelligence and real-world smarts were two different things, after all.

"There is a difference between them that the eyes cannot see," I said finally.

"Something you can't replicate with materials or those markings. I don't know what that would be, though."

"You are precisely right. There is a difference between them that isn't material at all. Nobody knows what it is. Nobody but me." He sounded very proud of himself at that comment.

"It's about Intent."

"Intent?" I murmured back, thinking.

"Like Godblades." Duke Indri pointed at the Artifact again.

"These have an Intent inside them, that's not something you can replicate." Intent. Like Godblades, huh? That almost brought up as many questions as it answered. The most obvious one, however, was: "What is…intent?"

"Hmm?" Duke Indri looked up at me, seemed to ponder the question.

"Nobody knows for sure but…most would agree it's a piece of the person's soul. Their driving essence? The fire that lights them, if you want to be poetic." That was downright mystical. I suppose it was hard for someone like me not to believe in souls, considering I was quite literally a soul in a foreign body.

"Gods can imbue some of their Intent into blades. That gives them special abilities and characteristics. I believe there was a time when any skilled craftsman could do something similar, with a wide range of things." Even I, someone with limited knowledge of this world, could see how this information would turn the world on its head if more people knew. It was the kind of information that could change the world if people could only harness this Intent.

"Is there really no way to make Artifacts anymore? Save for being a God?" Duke Indri stared at me. There was something unreadable in his gaze.

"None." A chill ran through me. Even without my Gift, I knew he was lying.