Alan processed what he saw earlier while lying down on his compact yet comfortable bed. He put his head on his arms that were crossed.
He could remember clearly that the mysterious hooded person walked past him and whispered something shocking into his ears. However, Gunther's reaction made him question the existence of someone who could show himself only to those he chooses to.
"How did he come to know about it?" He wondered while thinking about the sentence the mysterious person whispered into his ears. He considered various possibilities for them to say it.
While he traveled the world of thoughts, he sensed some movement near the opened barrier-less window. "Come, brother," He said when he saw the masked man entering through the window. He stood on the floor with his head held high like an emperor.
"Master," The masked man bowed his head.
"What is the update?" Alan asked with his arms behind his back.
"Master, the important people are in a state of panic now," The masked man reported. "They are trying to figure out the aspects of incidents today and in the past."
Alan nodded knowingly. "Do what I tasked you for now. Stay low and tell our supporters in The Land of Alabusia to not show much movement until I give further orders."
"As you order, master." The masked man bowed his head. When he raised his gaze, he noticed the tensed muscles on Alan's face. "Master, you look worried about something."
"Something happened today but believing it is difficult for me," Alan answered.
"What happened, master?"
Alan told him the entire incident of seeing the hooded man who whispered a secret into his ears. He recalled what the man whispered.
'We are watching you, Argus.' This was what the hooded man had said.
The masked man listened with a disbelieving face. "How can someone know about the secret?"
"I don't know," Alan replied. "Apparently, someone from the inner circle betrayed us and leaked our secret."
"Who could do this, master? I can't think of someone from the inner circle to reveal the secret. We are closer than a family," The masked man reasoned in disbelief.
"Ruther was closer than our family too," Alan mentioned which resulted in the masked man reflecting his trust in the inner circle members.
Inner Circle comprised the highly trusted people who knew Argus was alive. They could be counted on fingers in single digits and were scattered around the empire to act according to Alan's orders. They had camouflaged themselves in the Nigrosian society.
"It is still early to conclude," Alan said. "We would not know the truth until we find that hooded man. It is possible he shares his secret with someone since he used 'We' in his sentence."
"How would we find them, master?" The masked man asked.
"We will find some way." Alan looked into his follower's eyes. "Stay low until I give further orders."
The masked man understood his master had something in his mind. He bowed his head and jumped out of the window. Alan stared at the shining full moon out of the window, then lied down on his bed to have a good night's sleep.
Meanwhile, a pair walked by the accommodation building of the academy while having a chat.
The accommodation building was a four-story concrete building and was in the middle of the deserted woods with just a dirt street in front of it. There were no guards and no people around which was the idea of the headmaster to make the children responsible for their self-protection.
"Rebecca misses you so much. She says if she was not in the service, she would have come and seen you," One of them said.
It was dark outside which is why their faces were not visible but one could recognize them from their voices. They were the new master in the academy Calliope and the young prodigy Marya.
"I will meet her when I join the services," Marya replied.
"You sure will."
Everybody knew Calliope was the childhood friend of Marya's elder sister Rebecca. That was why her relationship with the 'Van Du' family was strong. It was this relationship that helped her get into the academy as a master. It had helped her earlier too.
"Why did you leave your service in the women's regiment and joined the academy?" Marya asked in a curious tone.
"I did not leave the women's regiment," Calliope answered. "I am here on a secret mission."
"Mission?"
"I can't tell you about it. It is confidential. Just know I am here until I complete my mission."
Suddenly, Calliope sensed someone's presence near her. She looked around and noticed a silhouette that was visible in the moonlight far on the roof of the four-story accommodation building.
She pulled out a dagger that was tucked in her waistband inside her overcoat. She took a deep breath and channeled the spiritual energy from her core to the different parts of her body. A violet cloudy aura covered the dagger before she threw it towards the silhouette. Marya got on her guard as she also noticed the silhouette on the roof.
The silhouette was of none other than the masked man who just left Alan's room.
"Who is there?" Calliope shouted when the dagger pierced the man's thigh.
"Ah!" The man moaned in pain but tried to escape while limping. "Where did it come from?" He looked down the roof and saw some movements on the street right in front of the building.
Calliope closed her eyes, joined her palms together which resulted in a violet aura covering her feet up to her toes. She opened her eyes and pushed the ground to jump high in the air.
The man limped to run away before she landed right behind him. "Stop!" She shouted. He turned and saw her standing on the building's roof just a few meters away from him.
"Damn it." He increased his pace of running even though it was of no use. She wounded his thigh which hindered his speed of escape.
Calliope placed his right ran forward with her fingers clenched to form a fist. The dagger stuck in the masked man's thigh suddenly got covered in violet aura again. The aura earlier had disappeared after the dagger pierced the man's thigh.
The cloudy violet aura covered her fist too. Both the clouds connected themselves through a violet string-like structured channel called 'soul-object link'. She enacted pulling a rope from one hand and pulled her arm back which resulted in the dagger getting pulled out from the masked man's thigh as she already connected it to her fist through the link.
"Ah!" The man fell down when the dagger got pulled out of his thigh.
"You can't run away," Calliope said and spun the dagger over her head which gave off a whipping sound.
Alan still had not gone into a deep sleep. He could hear the noises that came from outside. He heard the voice of Calliope and the moans of his closest follower of The Inner Circle.
Calliope whipped her dagger towards the masked man when he stood up and again tried to run away. When the dagger reached near his back, he ducked and pulled out the dagger he tucked in his boots, and cut off the violet 'soul-object link' over his head with a horizontal down to up slash.
"He cut the link?" Calliope's eyes expanded in surprise. Her dagger fell with clanking noises ahead of the man. She frowned and enacted pulling a rope from both her hands. "You can't escape me."
The dagger suddenly headed towards the man's gut at a lightning speed. It was about to pierce his gut, but he deflected it from his dagger.
By this time, he already reached the edge of the roof. He jumped down the roof to the street, and Calliope's dagger could only cut air through a horizontal swing over his head.
"Stop." She ran to the edge and looked down. She saw him entering the woods after he landed on the street.
"Damn it." He gasped and ran into the woods thinking that he successfully escaped. But he had to stop his feet forcefully when he found a young girl blocking his way. She had unsheathed her blade and pointed it towards him.
"Get out my way," He said and showed his dagger to scare her. She breathed in calmly and let her whitish aura cover her blade. She opened her eyes and slashed horizontally.
He jumped aside in panic when he sensed something heading towards him at an alarming speed. Suddenly, a tree fell down behind him after its trunk got a clean cut.
"What the hell? Are you trying to kill me?" He mentioned in shock.
"What were you doing on the roof?" She asked. "Who are you?"
The man stayed silent. Suddenly, a fist came out of nowhere and hit her face. It contained so much force that she fell flat to the ground and passed out. She could only see a familiar silhouette, but could not recognize the person and went unconscious.
After a few moments, Calliope arrived running into the woods and saw someone lying on the ground. When she reached near the person, she noticed it was Marya who had passed out.
"Marya?" She sprinted towards Marya and tried to wake her up. She put her head on the lap and slapped her cheeks lightly.
Calliope gritted her teeth. "Where are you, you coward!? Come and face me if you have guts!" She addressed the masked man in anger, but no one turned up.
However, a silhouette watched her from a distance behind a tree. It disappeared into the darkness of the night after a few seconds.