Chapter 260

Our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/PazjBDkTmW

Chapter 260

"Young lady." The surroundings suddenly cooled down. Sylas lifted her head from her drafts and notes, catching a glimpse of her teacher, the water lord, Hyectra. The deep blue water sphere said, "Your teacher asked me to inform you that if you finish today’s work, please come to her room."

Sylas looked up at the window, and it was already dark outside. In theory, it was past Xerath’s bedtime. Xerath’s health was very bad now, she was always slipping into a deep sleep. When she woke up, she would send the water lord to bring her food.

"Did she say what it was about, Hyectra? If she wants to punish me, please let me know."

Hyectra shook her head, "The lady didn’t say."

"Okay, thank you, I’ll be done writing soon and then I’ll go."

She wrote an equation full of confusing symbols, then wrote a series of notes on the nearby scratch paper. Only then did she put away her pen, stand up, and follow Hyectra to the top of the mage tower.

Above was the room of the owner of the mage tower, Archmage Xerath. What could it be?

In fact, she hadn’t seen much of Xerath since they returned.

She changed her workspace to her own bedroom. The vast and empty library was often only used by Sylas, and it was so empty it was scary.

"Hyectra, is the teacher’s… is the teacher’s injury really okay now?"

"Why are you asking this? You should trust the power of the temple, otherwise you wouldn’t have brought Ms. Xerath, right?"

Hyectra casually mentioned this, but it made Sylas blush.

Last month, some unknown Lich attacked the mage tower. Xerath got seriously injured while Sylas felt helpless. However, Xerath remained calm as usual.

Sylas still felt ashamed and embarrassed by the chaos of that time, but the reason for her blushing now was because of Xerath’s next command.

"I command you," Xerath used to use such imperative sentences when she was younger. Sometimes it made her obedient, sometimes it made her clean the mage tower, and sometimes it was a punishment to copy spells. But never before had it been so powerless.

"Kiss me."

Now recalling the scene–Xerath’s pale cheeks and chapped lips, her closed eyes and slightly tilted head–her heart still felt like it was about to burst out of her chest and perform a little dance before returning.

What’s even more dreadful is that she kissed back.

She couldn’t be sure if Xerath noticed something, which is why she bestowed that kiss before her death. Nor could she be sure if it was because Xerath didn’t die that she regretted that kiss.

Sylas nervously pushed open the door to the bedroom, her teacher was sitting by the bed, deep in thought.

She almost thought it was someone else, not someone who had the authority to enter Xerath’s bedroom. Her teacher had taken off the usual black, wide archmage robe, let down meticulously combed hair, and changed into a pure white nightgown.

If Sylas hadn’t been staring at this figure for months on end, she would have almost failed to recognize her. She softly called out, "Teacher," but Xerath seemed startled, her body jolted before turning around.

"Sylas, come here."

Sylas couldn’t read any intentions from her face: was she going to kick her out of the mage tower, or nonchalantly thank her for risking her life to use the illegally modified teleportation array to save her?

Nervously, she walked over, and Xerath patted the bed. "Sit, I just woke up. I hope you don’t mind me calling you up so late."

"Of course not, if you need anything, I’m always ready!" Sylas eagerly expressed her loyalty, perhaps a bit too much, perhaps others wouldn’t see it that way, but that’s how she felt. For Xerath, she would do anything. In comparison, being on standby day and night was a trivial matter.

"No…" Xerath opened her eyes slightly, "I was just… I was just asking about your paper. I hope the events of last month didn’t set you back, I haven’t been keeping track for too long."

Sylas sat down where she had just patted the bed, sinking into the soft mattress. Xerath followed suit, lying down next to her and asked, "How is your paper coming along?"

Sylas smiled shyly and said, "I’ve been having some troubles and feeling stuck, but recently I think I’ve made a breakthrough."

"Come closer, I can’t hear you very clearly."

"I just need…" She raised her voice and then realized it was not the right time to do so, standing next to this weary person in a quiet room. She bent down and whispered as softly as possible, "In your notes, you mentioned ‘purity,’ and I’ve taken apart each component of the scroll and measured their purity separately."

"Did you find anything?"

Sylas smiled again and said, "I encountered a problem, you see, to truly judge the ‘purity,’ the scroll needs to be burned. But once it’s burned, there’s no way to confirm the purity of each part."

Xerath also smiled and asked, "So what are you going to do?"

"Not much to do, just continue burning the scrolls and record all the data I can think of…"

"Has it been useful?"

"To some extent," she replied with a mischievous twinkle in her green eyes, "You can’t imagine what happened next."

"Yes, please tell me quickly."

But Xerath’s eyes were half closed, showing a tired face. Her magic was exhausted, and she must be very tired. She needed rest.

"Teacher… um, how about I write it tonight? I’ll leave first, you rest first."

Xerath opened her eyes. Her gaze was sincere, and those gray eyes were beautiful and wise, sparkling at that moment.

"No, I’m not sleepy. I want to hear you talk about your thesis. You are the most talented wizard I’ve ever met, and I like… your arguments. It makes me feel much better."

Regardless, her teacher was looking at her at that moment. Sylas stayed because of this gratifying feeling. She leaned against Xerath and talked about her latest achievements.

"I found that the scrolls have different colors when they burn, of course, they were different to begin with. Some scrolls burn in a strange blue and white color. Although they are wrapped in flames, it’s not very clear to see, which makes me feel strange."

"Hmm? Never… I have never seen any records like that. Are you saying that everyone missed it?"

Sylas smiled. Xerath’s question, rather than questioning her credibility, made her feel good. "Do you remember when I first saw the scrolls burning?"

Xerath couldn’t help but frown, gazing at her deep in thought, when a wave of memories suddenly rushed into her mind.

"You, back then, where you were… was that the first time you saw a scroll?"

Sylas laughed happily, "Yes, I observed the magical flames bursting from the scroll in complete darkness, so I made the whole laboratory dark as well. The flames have their own characteristics, magical flames burn completely white, parchment burns orange with black smoke, different elements emit different lights. But there are some scrolls that are different, within the same category, the ‘impure’ ones often have a blue and white light."

"What causes this phenomenon?"

She was thrilled to reveal the mystery to Xerath, but she had to take it slow, "These ‘impure’ scrolls often come from some students who took a detour in their studies, for example, um, I specifically tested many scrolls written by Swis."

"He changed professions."

"That’s right."

"Now I’m going to reveal the answer, I believe it’s very likely that… I think it’s possible because the metal in the brass nibs – like copper – gets into the ink."

Xerath suddenly widened her eyes, her eyebrows creased in disbelief, and finally turned into joy as she looked at her.

Sylas liked this expression, even though it sounds silly. But she kept pushing herself to study hard for this expression. She noticed that the harder she worked, the more attention she got from Xerath.

"Copper…"

"Yes…Swis is not someone who takes care of things, especially things he didn’t spend money on. His pen tips are always Caroline’s, so he just sticks the pen in the ink bottle and does something else. His pen always gets clogged, but I noticed silver powder on his pen…" She turned to see if Xerath was still listening to her, but the archmage suddenly covered his mouth under her gaze, let out a tired yawn, and then revealed a weary smile, gesturing for her to continue.

Sylas was getting tired of holding on like this, so she decided to lie down. She had already made up her mind to get up and leave when her teacher scolded her.

But Xerath didn’t. She looked extremely tired, and Sylas watched helplessly as she closed her eyes and fell from her supporting arm without waking up.

One of her hands rested on Sylas’s body, and Sylas’s heart skipped a beat. Carefully, she grabbed her wrist, trying to free herself from her "embrace".

Just as she was slowly getting off the bed, Xerath’s arm wrapped around her from behind again.

She didn’t want to leave. She wanted this moment to never end.

Xerath gave her a kiss, and now she gave her a hug. Shouldn’t she accept it?

But she was very nervous. She was afraid that her nervousness would be revealed, so she had to control her breathing. The surrounding magical lights lost their support from their owner and quickly faded away. Her teacher was sleeping beside her. Her heartbeat was loud like hitting metal, one after another, becoming increasingly deafening.

Gradually, she discovered that the reason her heartbeat was so loud was not because her own heart was beating too hard, but because… because there was another heartbeat echoing at the same time.

Xerath’s heartbeat.

The two hearts were beating in perfect synchronization, giving her the illusion that Xerath was just as nervous as she was.

Xerath placed her hand on her chest, to be precise, on her right chest. Xerath’s pulse was touching Sylas’s chest, and their heartbeats were mysteriously resonating with each other.