Veritas arrived at the cafeteria, Leo, Hana, and Alice were already sitting on a table, carefully munching on their preferred meals.
"Oh! Your majesty!"
"My liege!"
Leo and Hana greeted him with an enthusiastic tone. Hearing this, Alice also turned around to greet Veritas.
"Veritas..How is your condition?"
"I'm alright, thank you for your concern, it is greatly appreciated.
Alice offered the meal in front of her.
"You should eat."
"I shall. But first, did you all hear the announcement? Also, Leo.. drop the 'your majesty.'"
Veritas sat down by Alice's side.
"We did.. It was announced everywhere inside the castle. I would know, I had just arrived in the cafeteria too." Alice answered.
"Is that so.."
Veritas stared at Leo and Hana then continued asking:
"Is this a normal occurrence in the Academy?"
They thought about it for a second, each stopping their delightful meal time.
"It's.. not, this is in fact a peculiar thing for the council to do. Usually, they only announce on major days such as events, examination days, and other stuff."
After Leo answered, Hana added something more:
"In the past semester, a senior told us the same thing when we asked about the announcement. It was the day of an exchange event between an Academy from Palliz though."
Veritas raised his fingers up his chin and said:
"I see. Then, the announcement to be made is something worth noting after all. What do all of you propose that happened?"
The first to answer was Leo, as always.
"It might be the announcement of a new fun event! Maybe the For Honor tournament is starting again! That would be very exciting to participate in.."
The enthusiastic auburn-haired boy held a high expectation for the upcoming announcement this afternoon. It would be fun though.. to participate in such an event, Veritas would feel the essence of being a teenager widen in his perspective.
Yet, it would not be that helpful to the plan.
After him, Hana spoke up.
"It should be akin to something of utmost importance, not a fun-inducing event." She explicitly stared at Leo. "I guess that it would be in regards to a political change in the student council. Maybe Vice-President Lumen is finally claiming the Presidential role. That said, the announcement is probably related to an election to be held."
Leo pursed his lips and said:
"Pshhh, boring.."
"Shut your mouth Leo!"
The two bickered once more and glared at each other.
"So, what about you? What do you think?"
She placed a spoonful of rice inside her mouth and chewed for a couple of seconds. After swallowing, Alice finally answered:
"Someone has died."
The bickering Leo and Hana immediately came to a halt, clearly perplexed by Alice's terrifying words.
"Wha-"
"Wha-"
"...how so?"
Veritas asked softly, he wanted to hear the opinion of the blonde-haired daughter of the Duchess.
"My.. Path is related to the domain of Death and every time that death approaches someone or anyone at all.. I would feel it. However, these aren't always accurate, most of them were just mere guesses that were misdirected by my fatally incomprehensive understanding of my Path."
She ate another spoonful and added:
"I am still trying to understand my Path better, everyday I feel a presence of Death prevalent in the air and I've already gotten numb due to that feeling. It used to be terrifying when I first unlocked my Path, but now.. I feel devoid of emotions."
"That said, just this morning, that looming feeling of Death suddenly stopped. It only occurred for a few minutes though. Those few minutes felt as if every whisper and screams up to this day turned silent. It felt comforting somehow.. yet something was amiss."
She brought down the spoon and her emotionless eyes glowed.
"The silence seemed too loud. Matter of fact, it's like the sense of death was not there at all. When the minutes of silence passed by, everything returned to normal once more."
Veritas absorbed all of these with a calm face on his exterior. He could not take Alice's words seriously but if it were him of the past, he would not trust Alice at all.
After that encounter with Mr. Freedom, Veritas listened to her words with utmost understanding.
'That explains her lack of emotions.'
If he was also subject to the tormenting feeling of death everyday, he would also lose his emotions and the means to express them properly.
Veritas frowned.
"If what you say is true... Then it could truly be an important manner for the student council to discuss. However, why wouldn't they keep this a secret? Announcing this fact would only cause turmoil for the students in the Academy, especially ruining its reputation."
"You're right." She got back into eating, already stuffing her mouth with white rice.
Veritas thought about it deeply, he considered all the aspects and the political distress that it would cause for the reputation of the Academy.
'They would not announce a death so blatantly, especially when it could ruin the image of the Academy. '
His eyes deepened.
'Then, why..'
As Veritas let his thoughts drown in contemplation, Leo, who felt the mood to be sullen, tried to cheer them up.
But it was to no avail, the situation was very serious and it could cause a major discourse amongst everyone.
A couple seconds passed and Veritas' golden and crimson eye glowed.
"...they're not going to announce the existence of Death."
Snapped back to reality, the three of them stared at Veritas dumbfoundedly.
"It's obvious, they're going to cover it up with a more distracting piece of information to cloud any investigations regarding the Academy's conspiracies."
"What does that mean?" Leo asked innocently.
Veritas shifted his head towards the confused boy.
"It means that you are right, Leo. They're going to announce an event which would get the students riled up."
With this realization, everyone at their table made sense of Veritas' words. It seemed obvious yet also complex in their minds.
The brain of a Prince was truly amazing..
"However.." Veritas continued further.
"Someone with proper intellect and knowledge about the Academy's secret death could easily deduce this fact. It was as if a perpetrator was telling its victim to realize this opportunity to do an investigation. Is it a challenge perhaps?"
Now, Leo and Hana were troubled in understanding the Prince's words.
'A challenge, huh what?'
'My liege..'
"The student council? No.. someone else. There is someone behind the strings, but I can't quite discern who."
Veritas uttered silently, Leo and Hana couldn't hear but Alice heard it quite well.
He already knew who the person behind the strings was though, it was quite obvious..
'The Puppeteer is clearly behind this. I wouldn't even be surprised to find the corpse hanging around and its neck tightly wrapped in a single strand of string.'
Veritas' eyes widened.
'He already knows that we've already infiltrated! Then, does he know about Bello? or perhaps Alice? If not, then the plan was already working well!'
There was no way to know.. Veritas could only theorize the thoughts of the Puppeteer. He could not figure out what the mysterious figure was thinking but Veritas had a clue.
'An Ascension Ritual!'
The Puppeteer from back then was tricked diligently by Veritas, he saw clearly how the Puppeteer bowed and declared its Ascension but was stopped by Veritas' tricks.
This could only mean one thing though..
It's using the Academy to ascend once more!
It was only speculation of course, but this theory of Veritas was well-crafted enough to make one believe it.
Still, he could only expound his theory to Alice and Bello. But.. the risks of being seen with Bello was far too great, so he only decided to share it with Alice.
Veritas glanced at the direction of the daughter of a Duchess. He covered his mouth and moved it as if he were talking.. yet no sounds came out of his mouth at all.
With a 5 second delay, the message that Veritas portrayed to Alice finally reached her.
"Library... later"
Alice glanced at Veritas and tilted her head down, signifying a nod.
Veritas felt reassured by her affirmation.
He slowly got up and said:
"I'll quickly get lunch, what's on the menu for today again?"
"Something called Teriyaki Rice, I'm not really sure." Leo spoke out.
"Thanks, I'll return momentarily."
Veritas walked towards the serving area, he looked around and saw a short line leading up to the food.
Upon getting in the back of the line, Veritas waited patiently for his turn to come.
He squinted his eyes and saw a particular blonde-haired boy walking towards him. He had a cold demeanor yet his presence exuded that of a royal.
'Mercury!'
He wore the normal attire of the Academy, but slight changes were made to it. He was wearing darker colors but it didn't seem too different from the standard uniform of the Academy.
Veritas thought of how he couldn't notice it from the start, but it may have something to do with Mercury's Path, obstructing his vision from the truth.
It was already hard to look directly at the blonde-haired boy, so Veritas thought that his Path was akin to that of intimidation.
Still, he wasn't sure.
Finally, he arrived near Veritas and continued walking towards him.
'Is he coming to me?'
Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't.. Veritas anticipated his arrival and stood calmly.
But! The Son of the Duke was not heading towards him at all, or at least, not directly towards him.
Mercury was walking to the direction of the line, which is Veritas' back.
The blonde-haired boy with a calm demeanor stood there nonchalantly and awaited his turn to get food.