I loaded the Mysticism panel.

When Richard returned to school, he bumped into Fisher again at a corner in the corridor.

The guy was carrying a stack of proofreading assignments. When he saw him, he exclaimed "Hey!" in surprise.

"Williams, didn't you go home?"

"I'm back."

"You're back. Why didn't you go to the cafeteria?"

Fisher switched the work he was holding to another hand.

"We have potato and beef pie for lunch today... Even though there are more potatoes than beef, at least there's meat."

I'm going back to my dorm tonight.

Fisher's eyes lit up immediately.

"Going back to the dorm? There's less than a month until vacation, and you're still going back to the dorm?"

"Something came up in the department."

"Okay." Fisher had an "I understand" look on his face.

"I just recently composed a new one..."

"I won't listen."

"I haven't said what it is yet."

I don't want to hear anything you say.

Fisher caught up with them.

"This time it's a wordless, purely instrumental piece, and I've named it 'June'."

"Why is it called 'June'? Is it because it was written in June?"

"Of course, I can't think of any other name."

Richard stopped at the top of the stairs and looked at him very seriously.

"Fischer..."

"What's wrong?"

"Your name is actually quite good."

"real?"

"Really." Richard nodded.

"Much better than 'The Silent Williams'."

Fisher held the stack of assignments, and the initial excitement on his face gradually cooled down.

"You just don't want to hear it."

When they arrived at the dormitory building entrance, the limping messenger looked up.

"Williams, I thought you weren't coming back to stay this semester."

"I should come back and stay for more than a week."

The old man nodded and gave his usual instructions.

"Gas is charged by the hour, and it's not allowed to be turned on after 10 p.m.

I go to bed after 10 o'clock.

The old man opened the register.

"That's for the best. There are fewer and fewer people living on campus lately. There are only you and three other students taking make-up exams on the second floor."

Richard signed his name, and after he finished, he looked up and suddenly heard the old man add something.

"Oh right, yesterday afternoon, the red-haired girl from Cheltenham also went back to her dorm."

Is she alone?

"Yes, she's alone." The old man closed the register.

It rained all morning. Richard sat by the dormitory window, with Hecate's letter spread out on the table.

He did something he hadn't done much lately: he took out a blank sheet of paper and started writing from the beginning.

Richard wrote: "Why should I still be sitting at this table?"

After writing the title, he chuckled to himself and then listed the things he had taken from that table over the past year, one by one.

First, there's the Hermes mask, along with the caduceus and wing boots, and then the reversed [Reversed Face];

The materials obtained from Catherine's line and Demeter;

There was also the coagulation that he and Hercules used to settle their accounts each time, Prometheus's several bottles of stabilizer and etheric coagulation;

And his own little appraisal shop.

He stopped writing halfway through.

He earned all of this little by little through his own hard work.

But the accounts must be taken into account; a significant portion of his skill growth this year was related to that round table.

If someone were to overturn this table now, everything related to it would be destroyed.

He then wrote on the paper, "What will happen if I walk out this time?"

[Internal Awakening] takes effect and begins to manifest itself.

Leaving a meeting is not as simple as just standing up and leaving.

The ceramic coin was personally delivered by Hecate, connecting her to a messenger from the spirit world, meaning there was always a thread connecting them on her side.

His decision to leave the meeting suggests that the connection might not be broken so easily, especially given that he has already demonstrated sufficient value.

And Catherine was at that table too; he's already promoted her and helped her drum up business.

If he were to leave on his own during a team fight, how awkward would Nemesis's situation be on that table?

He put down his pen and leaned back in his chair.

Raindrops outside the window pattered on the tin bucket under the eaves, one sound followed by another after a long pause.

The next question, which he wrote slowly, was: "Why should I help Hecate?"

That's what's really stuck in his throat.

Hecate sat at the head of that table, and no one could say for sure who would ultimately benefit from the so-called third stage of the team fight.

Her torch and key were more tangible than anyone else's.

As the head of the group, she was being targeted. Why should she have to use all the favors she had accumulated over the past year, including those from her maternal grandfather, the two professors, and others?

He sat there, genuinely feeling a bit indignant.

But anger can make people lose their minds. He silently activated the Mirror Condensation Technique and began to think again, only to suddenly realize that he had miscalculated something.

The Roman table devoured the other table, surely swallowing everything, including the people, the gods' names, and the masks—a winner-takes-all situation.

As the leader, Hecate would definitely suffer the greatest loss if such a complete wipeout were to occur.

But the fact that she suffered the greatest loss does not mean that she was the only one who suffered losses.

If this table is lost, his Hermes chair will also cease to exist.

What he needs to do now is to protect himself.

However, this incident also reminded me that I should be more mindful of my own interests when I'm at this table.

Once he understood this, his unease dissipated.

But then the second question arises: "Should we hire outside help?"

Foreign players are always on the field; if they die, they're truly dead.

To put it bluntly and bluntly, it's like asking others to fight to the death with you.

This is the cruelest part: foreign aid is directly equated with people who are willing to die for you.

So you can't buy it with money, you can't force it with threats, and you can't get it through indirect connections.

In this world, you can count on your fingers the number of people willing to risk their lives for him.

In the afternoon, Richard returned to Ashford’s mansion.

The row of holly bushes in the backyard had grown even denser than in May. Gerald squatted in front of the easternmost bush, but the little shovel in his hand remained stuck in the mud.

"Grandpa," Richard greeted him.

He sat down on the stone bench and began to speak about the roundabout questions he had rehearsed in his dormitory.

"I'd like to start by asking you a hypothetical question."

Gerald pulled the shovel out, knocked the mud off his shoe, and looked at him with amusement.

"You're going to pull this on me again?"

Richard spoke to himself.

"Suppose there's a battle where the rules are fixed, and you can only bring one extra person to help."

The person you bring must be someone you personally invited, and they must use their real body on stage; any injuries they sustain must be genuine.

The old man waved the shovel in his hand.

"What if they die?"

"Death is real death."

Gerrard stood up, supporting himself on his knees with both hands, and his knees cracked again.

"When?"

Richard grunted.

"Grandpa, I meant hypothetically."

"I'm asking you, exactly when?"

Mid-June.

Gerrard patted his hands on his trousers, and the layer of mud was brushed off.

That leaves less than a week.

"Grandpa..."

The old man took a few steps into the house.

"My knife was just sharpened last month, so it hasn't been used yet."

Richard also stood up: "I was talking about a hypothetical situation."

Gerrard turned around, and the expression on his face, which had been stern his entire life, slowly relaxed.

"Richard, you discussed it with me once in March, saying that you were going out for one night and would come back at dawn."

When I asked you where you were going, you only said it was an invitation from someone, and that's why I stood on the porch until dawn that night.

He put his hands into his coat pockets.

"You've gone through all this trouble to tell me this, do you think I don't understand what you're trying to say?"

Richard stood there, speechless for a moment.

Gerrard snorted.

"Do you think your grandfather has lived these past few decades in vain?"

"Of course I didn't think that way."

Gerrard didn't wait for his reply and continued speaking.

"You asked that on purpose because you're afraid I'll agree to your request."

So you first use assumptions to mislead me, and when I hesitate, you take advantage of that hesitation to change the subject.

Richard lowered his head.

"right."

"I won't hesitate."

Gerrard turned and walked toward the foyer.

"When your grandmother was taken back, no one in the Ashford family was willing to let me perform the reverse hunting ceremony."

My father was still locking me in that room on the second floor back then, not letting me go out.

"And then?"

"Later, I climbed out of the window myself."

Gerald reached out and patted the door frame where the invitation with the teeth marks had once been.

"That was the worst deal I ever made in my life, and I've been carrying the consequences for so many years until this year when someone finally took the fall for me."

The row of holly bushes in the backyard was swaying in the wind.

"I have never regretted it." He pushed open the door.

"So if you really need people by mid-June, don't beat around the bush with me."

Just say: "Grandpa, come with me now."

"Then I'll take the knife and those equipment immediately."

The door closed behind him, and Richard stood alone in the wind in the backyard for a long time.

The butler peeked out and saw the young master standing there, then quickly withdrew his head.

After that, Richard went to room 314 of the Petrie Building.

The mint plant had already grown to halfway up the window, with the top few leaves covered in thick white fuzz.

Isabella is grading papers; she never finishes grading them all.

Hearing footsteps, the red pen fell on the paper and made an X.

"Tell me, you didn't look too good when you came in today."

Richard sat down opposite him.

"Auntie, I want to ask you about something academic."

"What exactly is it?"

"Seating competition."

Isabella put the pen in the pen holder and looked up.

"Where did you hear that from?"

"In the book."

Which book?

"I forgot."

His aunt stared at him.

"Richard, the last time you said that was when you asked me about changing traditions."

Richard shut his mouth.

Isabella pushed the test paper aside, rested her chin on her hands, and scrutinized her nephew.

"Speak, what exactly do you want to ask?"

"The question is about battles where you can only bring one outside helper."

"Okay, I understand."

"Auntie, why aren't you surprised at all?"

Isabella chuckled.

"What's so surprising? I've been in this business for twenty years. You think I don't know those tables?"

"When I was young, people also invited me to work. That year, I had just finished my postgraduate studies and my advisor was still alive."

"You probably didn't go, right?"

"Of course I didn't go. My advisor locked me in the archives room all night."

The office heating pipe made a gurgling sound.

"So?" His aunt glanced at him.

"What?"

"So you came to ask me today because you want me to tell you what to do, or because you want to ask me if you're going or not?"

Richard was about to speak when Isabella cut him off.

"I'll go."

"Auntie..."

I said I'd go.

"You don't even know what day it is."

Isabella glanced at the calendar.

"Is it mid-June? You started deliberately making sure to leave this Wednesday free last month."

She picked up the red pen again and twirled it between her fingers.

"Your maternal grandfather called yesterday to ask me if I had any classes or fieldwork scheduled for that day."

Richard tightened his grip on his knees.

"What else did he say?"

"He didn't say anything." Isabella raised an eyebrow.

"He was a man who never spoke much in his life; he would hang up as soon as he finished speaking, but I could tell what he wanted to say as soon as I heard him speak."

Richard knew that classical traditions had almost no positive combat effectiveness for practitioners.

While it becomes significantly stronger when mastering a minor skill, it is still relatively weaker compared to the Hunter and Stealth paths.

At the opposite table, the head of the table was a master of the Star Chart tradition, and the other five also followed a path that emphasized combat and tradition.

Isabella spoke first, her smile vanishing completely.

"Richard, did you hear me clearly?"

"Throughout my life, what I dislike most is being calculated and figured out by others."

"I spent six years on my bachelor's and master's degrees, three years as a teaching assistant, and taught marginal courses for several years before I was promoted to associate professor after I turned thirty."

Every step I took was calculated for me by others, who said that this path was too slow and I should change direction instead.

Or, instead of staying at the university, you could go to the branch office; the pay is higher, and you'll gain more experience.

Finally, someone asked me what I would do if I was still unmarried at thirty.

"Their calculations may be correct, but I've already walked this path to the end."

Richard didn't know how to respond.

"I was still in school the year your mother's backhaul was blown up."

By the time the news reached me, I had rushed back from university, and she was already sitting up in bed.

Isabella silently clenched her little fists.

"The first thing my sister said was, 'Don't let this interfere with your studies.'"

I stood in that room all night, unable to do anything.

She blinked as she said this.

"...Auntie."

"So you can't say no."

"I'm not going to say anything more."

"That's fine then."

Isabella moved the test paper back and picked up the red pen.

"Get out of here, don't keep me from grading the papers."

Richard closed the door, and the wind blew in from the end of the corridor.

His maternal grandfather and aunt agreed without the slightest hesitation, but he couldn't be happy at all.