Chapter 540. Dumplings Are a National Priority (According to Kaela)

Chapter 540: 540. Dumplings Are a National Priority (According to Kaela)

The system offered no rebuttal. No explanation followed the chilling revelation.

William frantically swiped at the empty air, his fingers clawing through the translucent blue menus as he tried to force deeper access. He dug through every subdirectory—Energy Composition, Genetic Markers, Origin TracesTraces—but the interface remained stubbornly opaque, a wall of glass between him and the truth.

Finally, just as he was about to give up, a single, taunting line of text flickered into existence before the display dissolved into nothingness.

[Further data locked. Requirement: Ellie’s trust level must reach 80%.

William froze, staring at the space where the text had been.

"So that’s how it works?" he hissed at the empty darkness of his room. "You give me a warning that could mean a massacre, and then you slam the door in my face."

"That’s fucking great... That’s extremely helpful, System."

"I really appreciate the effort."

The air offered no apology. No mechanical hum acknowledged his sarcasm.

William, who had spent a significant portion of his second life engaged in one-sided arguments with an interface that possessed all the conversational skills of a brick wall, let out a long, ragged exhale.

He sank back onto his pillow and pulled the blanket up to his chin with the weary resignation of a man who had lost countless battles to an opponent that refused to acknowledge his existence.

He remembered a time, years ago, when the system had been insufferable. It had been a constant companion, a chatterbox that would congratulate him on every successful breath and every minor achievement and measure his most intimate affections in tiny, irritating percentages.

Now, at the exact moment when his life felt like it was tilting off its axis and he desperately needed answers, it had gone as silent as a priest in a desecrated library.

Sleep was a lost cause. Twenty minutes passed, marked only by the frantic ticking of his own pulse in his temples.

Unable to endure the silence any longer, William swung his legs over the side of the bed. The floorboards creaked beneath his feet a sound that seemed unnaturally loud in the dead of night.

He reached for a pen and a blank sheet of parchment on his desk. The lamp flickered as he lit it, casting dancing, grotesque shadows across the walls.

He began to write. He had learned long ago that when your mind becomes a storm, the only way to survive is to externalize the lightning.

Writing problems down was the one habit he had carried over from his previous life that actually functioned as a weapon against madness.

His pen scratched violently against the paper as he listed the fragments of the week:

Ellie: Her back. Persistent pain. Sudden loss of equilibrium. The way she presses her hand to that exact spot on her lower spine as if she’s trying to hold something inside. Or keep something from breaking out.

Mana: Not elven. White and gold threads. Twice now, seen in glimpses. It doesn’t feel like life; it feels like... something else.

Aetherion: The blade reacted. It didn’t just vibrate; it flinched. Grock’s warning: ’Too clean.’ A void where there should be a scent.

Clara: The guilt in her eyes is unmistakable. She knows a piece of the puzzle, but she’s terrified of the picture it forms.

Albert: He’s observant. He noticed the shift in her too. He’s watching, but he’s not speaking.

The Hollow Circle: They’ve been too quiet. Too still. In my experience, silence from them isn’t peace; it’s the calm before a slaughter.

The System: 38% Anomaly. Non elven energy signature. Trust barrier: 80%.

William stared at the list. The ink was still wet, gleaming like fresh blood under the lamplight.

The pieces were all there, scattered across the table like the teeth of a broken jaw, but they refused to form a coherent picture.

All he knew was that something fundamental was rotting beneath the surface of the academy, and Ellie Von Synthia was either the victim or the infection.

William stared at the parchment until the ink seemed to blur into black stains. A cold, hollow realization settled in his gut: this wasn’t a list of separate complications.

It wasn’t a collection of random problems to be solved one by one.

As he traced the lines with his finger, he saw the pattern. It was a ring of small, sharp points drawn around a single, terrifying void.

Each fact made sense in isolation—the pain, the mana, the silence—but together, they formed a perimeter around something he could not yet name.

And that nameless thing, that empty space at the center of his notes, frightened him more than the system’s warning ever could.

The unknown was always more dangerous than the known.

His hands trembled slightly as he folded the page in half, then in half again, then in half once more until it was a small, dense square.

He hesitated, hovering over the desk where the parchment would be obvious to any curious roommate or prying eye.

Instead, he slid it beneath his pillow, pressing it against the mattress. He couldn’t articulate why he did it; he simply knew, driven by a primal, instinctive dread, that if this paper fell into the wrong hands, it would become a death warrant.

Sleep finally claimed him, but it offered no sanctuary.

His dreams were fractured and violent visions of white light tearing through flesh like molten glass and the sound of something ancient and hungry breathing in the dark.

The morning of the festival arrived with an explosion of sound. A brass fanfare erupted from the academy gates, its triumphant notes echoing off the cobblestone streets.

By the time William’s group made their way toward the main square, the entire city seemed to have hemorrhaged into the streets.

It was a sensory assault. Paper lanterns in crimson and gold dangled from every balcony like glowing fruit.

The air was thick enough to taste a heavy, swirling cocktail of charred meat, sweet cinnamon, sugared nuts, and the sweat of thousands of bodies.

Near the central fountain, a street band played a raucous tune that sounded suspiciously cheerful, though it wavered off key in the humid air.

"Stay close," William muttered to the group, though the crowd made the command feel almost futile. "We don’t want to lose anyone in this chaos."

The academy’s orange stall proved to be an unexpected triumph amidst the carnival madness. It was a modest setup: a small table laden with herbal teas brewed from Catherine’s secret recipes, and a neatly arranged corner draped in white linen containing fresh bandages and antiseptic salves.

Ellie sat at the heart of it. She wore a warm, practiced smile that seemed to act as a natural balm for the festival’s frantic energy.

She had an uncanny talent for reading people soothing a crying child here, calming a harried merchant there.

By noon, the line for tea and basic aid stretched twenty paces.

By one o’clock, a burly blacksmith who had arrived with a sprained ankle was loudly proclaiming to a circle of awestruck onlookers that this was the finest first aid he had ever received, promising to return next year with his entire guild.

William watched her from the periphery, his eyes tracking her every movement.

’Is this real?’ he wondered. ’Or is this the mask?’

He watched how she moved gracefully and easily, but he kept waiting for the stumble, for the moment the mask would slip and reveal the hollow void Grock had described.

Meanwhile, Lia was treating the festival like a military operation. A laminated schedule was tucked securely into her sleeve, her fingers constantly checking it.

For the first two hours, she was a model of terrifying efficiency.

12:00 PM: Food stall assessment.

12:15 PM: Ring toss engagement.

She followed the plan with grim, unblinking determination. She even enforced her thirty minutes of ’structured free time’ at the appointed hour, standing at the very edge of the plaza with her arms crossed and a face as serious as a funeral dirge.

She looked less like someone enjoying a holiday and more like a sentry guarding a fortress, observing the revelers as if she were grading them on their ability to properly experience joy.

"You look like you’re waiting for an ambush, Lia," William said as he passed by.

"I am ensuring that the recreational activities do not descend into disorder," Lia replied without breaking her stance. "Spontaneity is statistically proven to lead to inefficiency."

Before William could respond, Kaela materialized behind her like a predator. Without warning, Kaela’s hand shot out and clamped around Lia’s wrist.

"Enough of that," Kaela grinned, her eyes bright with mischief. "Come on."

"There’s a dumpling contest at the east plaza, and you’re coming with me."

Lia stiffened, her eyes darting to her sleeve. "That is not on the schedule, Kaela."

"There is no provision for competitive eating."

"The schedule is wrong," Kaela countered, already beginning to drag the protesting girl toward the crowd. "Dumplings are a national priority."

"They are not a national priority," Lia argued, though her feet were already moving with Kaela’s momentum. "They are a regional snack."

"A minor culinary diversion at best."

"Then we are defending the region!" Kaela laughed, her voice carrying over the din of the crowd. "For honor! For dough! For dumplings!"