Uncle here isn't your average office worker!

Skadi could only frown and ask the same question she had asked countless times before:

What is your connection to the sea?

"There's no connection. If I had to say, I might have some connection with those things in the sea, but not much."

Roy replied.

There is a connection, but not much; that's how Roy defines himself. The deep sea holds secrets, secrets deeply connected to ancient civilizations. As a transmigrator with a human soul, Roy's connection to these civilizations, even if there is one, is limited to spiritual communion.

Seemingly not wanting to dwell on or explain too much about the matter, Skadi noticed a fleeting look of sorrow and sadness on Roy's face before he quickly regained his composure and steered the conversation back on track:

"After defeating the Firstborn, you must have realized this. There wasn't just one Firstborn; now, I can tell you definitively that there are four in total."

"The corrupted heart (Isamara, the Corrupted Heart), the primordial lifeline, the spreading branches (the Deep Blue Tree, the former zombie, later inherited by Watermoon), and an unknown name, they respectively symbolize migration, survival, growth, and reproduction, together leading the horde."

“Then you’re calling me a newborn…” Skadi’s expression stiffened slightly, as if she realized something, but the next second, her face suddenly darkened. “Who are you calling a newborn?”

Seeing this, Roy knew that Skadi had realized something, so he stopped there, saying, "Don't rush, I'm just reminding you."

Skadi was the one who beheaded Isamara in the abyss with ease. According to the description in Under the Tide, Skadi had long been aware of Isamara's influence. Skadi had not forgotten those faint murmurs, nor the lingering "oracle" she heard from Isamara at the last moment after defeating her, but she was unwilling to touch upon them.

Roy simply wanted Skadi to realize this in advance, so that if he wasn't by her side in the future, she wouldn't be completely bewildered by what the beautiful man said and end up resorting to giving up thinking and just killing him as a way to resist. This would avoid the troublesome situation in the original story where the Fool needed to gamble on a rhetorical die to change the timeline.

After all, a clear-headed person is definitely harder to fool than a confused one.

"Alright, we've finished talking about the troublesome things, so let's get down to business."

Roy clapped his hands, bringing Skadi back to her senses:

"When I first told you that I wanted you to come to the Great Knight Territory to play a match with me, I was actually lying to you."

Skadi shook her head, looking indifferent, and said, "It's nothing, you don't tell the truth much anyway."

But everything I just said was the truth.

Roy said helplessly, "I was actually planning to ask you to help my apprentice with something."

"What's the matter?"

“Keep an eye on someone for her. This person is very powerful. There are very few people in Kazimierz who can keep an eye on him, and most of them are unlikely to help me with this task. I am not really suitable to take action myself. After thinking it over, it can only be you.”

Skadi frowned slightly, but quickly relaxed. This task was simple, but compared to what Roy had just talked about—that simply telling Governor Agor could cause a political earthquake—the difference was unbelievable. For a moment, she even wondered if there was something fishy going on.

But then she thought, so what if there's something fishy going on? She's seen plenty of land creatures, whether they're bounty hunters, wandering knights, or businessmen in suits who deal with bounty hunters. They can't even make a flush toilet, and their technology is ridiculously low compared to Agor. How could they possibly compare to the deep-sea hunters who have been modified with Agor's most advanced technology?

"Who is the target?" she asked calmly.

Roy took out a photograph and a cyan-gold coat from his pocket and handed them to Skadi. The photograph showed a blond figure with a perpetually furrowed brow.

“Marna”.

He said,

"I will inform you of the time and location of the mission later. Wear this outfit when you carry out the mission."

Skadi lifted the clothes to look at them, then shook her head: "Not really."

Roy blinked in confusion, wondering why changing clothes wasn't allowed: "Why?"

“It’s a bit small,” Skadi said, sounding embarrassed.

Oh, because these are Monique's clothes.

After recalling Monique's measurements, Roy nodded subtly and took back the uniform.

"I roughly know which parts are too small. I'll take it to be modified and then give it to you."

Monique, why can't you grow up a little?

P.S.: The thread was blocked again. I know why, but I'm still really upset.

Now we have one less way to communicate with the outside world, and the lifting of the lockdown seems a long way off. I feel like I'm going crazy.

Volume 1: Chapter 93 Let's talk about work at the hotel tonight.

"Ah, Miss Linguang, are you here to watch the match too?"

Wearing winter clothes, Finn happily greeted the masked Knight of Light loudly. Margaret shuddered, turned around, and asked incredulously:

"You recognize me?"

But before she could finish speaking, Amiya, who was standing guard in front of the screening room, noticed them and raised her hand to greet them happily:

"It's Miss Lin Guang! I was just about to send someone to call you. Come on, everyone has already reserved a seat for you."

Margaret opened her mouth, trying to explain, "But, I..."

“Moonlit Night, you lost. I knew Nearl would definitely come to watch the match.”

Spot, head held high and a smug look on his face, stretched out his hand towards Moonlit Night. Moonlit Night could only sigh helplessly, take out his wallet, pull out two Lungmen Dollars, and hand them to Spot, then said with a hint of complaint:

"Sigh, I thought it was just a rumor. I didn't expect that Miss Radiant Knight actually has a childhood sweetheart. What a blunder."

But I really didn't!

Margaret finally lost her temper, ripped off her mask which offered no disguise, and complained tearfully.

Damn the Red Wine Journal! What happened to the idea that idols are time-sensitive? She's been gone from Kazimierz for over three years, stopped competing in knightly tournaments, and faded from the public eye for over three years. During this time, she hasn't exactly been thriving, but she's certainly been completely out of the public eye. And those unscrupulous reporters still remember her and are trying to fleece her. She really has to "thank" them.

Thanks to them, now everyone on Rhodes Island, except for a few Sarkaz who barely pay attention to modern news and outside affairs, from the oldest women to school-aged children, knows that she has this fictitious childhood sweetheart. Moreover, Nearl can't even figure out whether they genuinely believe the Red Wine Gazette's nonsense or simply find the story amusing and keep mentioning it to her every time they see her.

What's more troublesome is that Margaret feels she's got a problem too. Despite the baseless accusations, she finds herself both ashamed and engrossed in reading the novels about herself and Roy that have sprung up, and she watches every single one of Roy's matches.

Because the competition and the novel were indeed very interesting, she always responded to inquiries from the outside world in this way. But the more she read, the more she felt that she was probably just burying her head in the sand and trying to cover up the truth.

"Sigh, it seems I need to find some time to go back to Kazimierz and clarify this matter."

Margaret thought to herself, and then Amiya grabbed her arm and half-pushed her into the movie theater.

And Ms. Apofia, the current deputy editor-in-chief of Wine Journal and the instigator of this incident, is also having a hard time now.

The novel report, "The Childhood Story of the Radiant Knight and the Meteor Knight," certainly fits the Wine Gazette's consistent style of inaccurate reporting. It can be considered the culmination of the Wine Gazette's news reporting in 1094, and it directly propelled her, a junior reporter who had been with the company for less than a year, to become the deputy editor-in-chief and a candidate for the next editor-in-chief. But that's where the problem lies. The influence of this report was so great that the letters from readers wanting to read the sequel almost overwhelmed the Wine Gazette's editorial department every day.

This is a terrible thing, because when people focus too much on new products, the demand for old products plummets. As a result, in recent issues, the readership and sales of other articles in the Wine Gazette have dropped sharply—not because they are not exciting or topical enough, but simply because compared to the highly anticipated new chapters, other gossip such as the Blood Knight infection story and the Candle Knight's shopping spree of merchandise is simply not attractive enough.

Apophia had no doubt that unless she pulled off a major stunt like the Black Knight and Meteor Knight gossip, the sales of the wine report would continue to decline!

She could feel the hostile gazes from the other reporters and editors around her; if this continued, she would be devoured alive.

So here's the question: since everyone is so eager for a new chapter, why doesn't Apophia just write one?

The answer is simple: she couldn't write it.

Maria has stopped contributing articles.

Ever since that news broke, poor Maria has been severely reprimanded by Manna, Zofia, and even the Grand Knight Commander. Although the blame cannot be entirely placed on Maria alone, there is no doubt that without Maria's endorsement as "the little sister of the Nearl family," the Wine Gazette's report would not have reached its current level of influence. At best, it would have been just another piece of gossip, something to be enjoyed but not taken seriously, like those previous headless reports.

Maria isn't contributing, so how can we expect Apophia to fabricate a story about the Nearl family's household affairs? Even if she did, the Nearl family, having already realized what was going on, would have the Supervisory Council immediately step in to refute it—the last story already caused a misunderstanding, do you think they'd let this one off the hook?

"Sigh, it's really hard to write a news article these days."

Lying back in the chair with her legs stretched out, Apophia grumbled as she stretched and yawned.

If we don't give her some sensational news soon, her story of "the fastest editor-in-chief of the wine newspaper getting fired" will probably become the next sensational story.

"We need to think of a way, maybe... we should call the God of Wealth?"

Apofia glanced at her phone and swallowed hard. Since the news broke, she hadn't dared contact Roy again. Firstly, she was afraid Roy would unleash a torrent of abuse on the phone; secondly, she was afraid Roy would trace the phone line back to teach her a lesson.

But now that she was about to lose her job, she couldn't care less about anything else. Let Roy punish her if he wanted; as long as he didn't kill her, even if it was just to "discipline" her, she had still earned some hard-earned money through her own efforts.

With that in mind, she picked up her terminal and dialed Roy's number.

"Drip-"

The phone rang, and Roy's voice came through:

"You dare call me, huh?"

Apophis chuckled and, forcing a smile, explained, "Haha, Mr. Roy, what are you saying? We're good friends, you know. I've been a bit busy lately and haven't had a chance to contact you. As soon as I had some free time, I called you right away. How have you been? Is there anything I can help you with?"

“Now that you mention it, there really is some big news,” Roy said.

Apophis's eyes lit up immediately. She sat up straight, rubbing her legs together impatiently, and asked:

"What's the big news?"

"Well..."

“I’m willing to do anything!” Apoffie said without hesitation.

“I didn’t say I wanted you to do anything,” Roy laughed. “Don’t rush, this matter will have to wait. How about this, tonight, come to room 2301 on the 23rd floor of the NOX Hotel, and I’ll talk to you in person.”

In the evening, we went to the hotel to have a personal chat.

Apophis blushed, swallowed hard, and nodded without hesitation.

"I understand. Let me prepare properly."

Volume 1: Chapter 94 Just Kidding

Apophis dressed up nicely.

A dress with a small hat, an idol-style lace skirt paired with black and white striped over-the-knee socks, combined with the already excellent natural beauty of the film, and a few delicate touches of makeup, makes her look like a princess straight out of a fairy tale.

Knights have all sorts of strange quirks, and the journalism industry has its share of unspoken rules. Since entering this field, Apophis had anticipated this day. Anyway, it was bound to happen eventually, and Roy was a good candidate. Aside from his fabricated stories, he had no scandals, which spoke volumes about his character. As for the rumors about the Candle Knight, Apophis knew very well that in Kazimierz, every popular knight had some kind of rumor with the Candle Knight; it was practically common knowledge, and their veracity was easily refuted. Moreover, Roy was now wealthy and famous, about to be bestowed the single-word title of Grand Knight, and his future prospects were limitless, which would greatly benefit her career.