Chapter 291: News About The Demon King’s Death

Only a couple of minutes had passed since the guild master’s concentration was interrupted. The sound of firm footsteps echoed in the wooden hallway, stopping right in front of her office door.

Irene entered first, opening the door wide. Behind her, casting long shadows on the room’s carpet, appeared the silhouette of three high-ranking heroes. The atmosphere immediately grew heavy under the presence of such powerful individuals.

"Master. Here they are," Irene introduced them, stepping aside with a rigid posture from nerves.

"You look pretty good, Sophia," the young man said, taking a step forward with a relaxed attitude that contrasted with the tension of the place.

"William. You came a day earlier than agreed," Sophia replied, without showing a single hint of surprise, maintaining her authoritative posture behind the desk. "I am very busy right now with guild matters, but anyway, you are here now."

Sophia directed her analytical gaze toward the nervous receptionist.

"You may leave us," Sophia ordered.

Irene nodded quickly, not daring to say another word, and withdrew, closing the door behind her with a soft click.

Once alone, Sophia sighed and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Your early arrival will stir up all the adventurers in the guild, you know that, right?" Sophia commented, evaluating the group."Coming all the way here accompanied by Delia and Alina is unusual, especially for you, the famous solitary hero."

"Ha ha ha, it is not that big of a deal," William replied, letting out a carefree laugh as he shrugged.

"Hello," Alina took a step forward upon hearing her name, raising a hand in a casual greeting, completely ignoring the formality required to speak to a guild master.

Delia also greeted with a slight nod, but instead of paying attention to Sophia, she stared around the room. Her sharp eyes scanned the shelves full of books, the maps on the walls, and the piles of paperwork.

"So this is where you spend your days, pretending to be just a simple guild master, huh," Delia murmured, with a tone laden with subtle sarcasm.

Sophia did not flinch at the provocation, but she looked at her with a seriousness that made the temperature in the room seem to drop a couple of degrees.

"Alright, let’s get straight to the point. If you are here in my office instead of being in the capital, it means you broke the relic that hides your system statistics again, doesn’t it?" Sophia asked in a highly serious tone, looking William straight in the eyes, expecting a confirmation of his usual recklessness.

Delia and Alina looked at each other for a brief moment, sharing a silent complicity.

William walked with slow steps and approached the desk, resting a hand on the polished wood.

"No," he denied with a shake of his head and turned sideways. He raised his right hand and pointed directly at the two heroines accompanying him. "This time is different. I need concealment relics for them."

"What did you say?" Sophia asked, frowning in confusion. Crafting relics of that caliber was both expensive and dangerous.

Alina took a step forward, speaking up to explain the strange anomaly.

"Exactly as you heard it. For some strange reason we cannot seem to understand, the two of us have progressed tremendously and leveled up with absurd ease since we survived Ligther’s attack in that A-rank dungeon," Alina explained, waving her hands to emphasize the gravity of the situation.

"Damn it. Since the plan did not work, we need those relics," Delia added.

Then, William fixed his gaze on Sophia, seeking her reaction.

"You remember that incident perfectly, right? It was the same dungeon you sent Ryan and his little group to."

"Ryan’s group?" Sophia frowned even more, feeling a headache starting to throb in her temples.

"Tsk," Delia clicked her tongue, losing her patience with the master’s lack of understanding.

The heroine walked up to Sophia and placed both hands flat on the desk with a dull thud.

"We had already talked in our last secret meeting in Eibach," Delia began to explain with frustration.

"You know very well what happens when an individual exceeds the average magical and physical power of an S-class. The system is supposed to intervene and notify you that you are now fit to belong to the ranks of the church’s holy knights."

Delia leaned forward slightly, keeping her hands firm on the table.

"The damn issue is that the two of us have already shown that progress. And despite that, we have not received any formal invitation or any message from the system. Other heroes from Varvylon who reached our same statistics have already even been recruited."

Alina approached the table and stood next to Delia, intervening in the explanation.

"The original plan was to get the Church to recruit us and have us serve as double agents for you," Alina said, recalling the strategy they had formulated some time ago." To try to find out from the inside what the church is really up to. But nothing happens. The system simply ignores us as if we were invisible."

William stepped away from the desk, walked slowly toward the office door, and stopped halfway, turning his back to them for a second before turning his face.

"Do you understand what is really happening, Sophia?" He asked, tossing the final piece of the puzzle into the air.

Alina and Delia remained silent, staring intently at the experienced guild master, waiting for her prodigious mind to connect the dots.

"Yes, I admit it is something very strange," Sophia murmured, assimilating the information. "In Eibach, you two told me that after you miraculously survived the ambush, you managed to become much stronger in a very short time during other routine excursions against demons. Which, analytically speaking, makes no sense. It is impossible for an adventurer to progress that quickly... And despite demonstrating that power, the system does not warn you that you are ready, even when you surpass a common S-class hero."

Sophia brought both hands to her chin, resting her elbows on her scattered reports.

She thought in absolute silence for two long seconds, staring at the texture of the desk’s wood, and then suddenly looked up.

"If I remember correctly, according to the reports, the demon king’s son gave you a beating in that dungeon and left you on the verge of death," Sophia recalled.

"Hey! You do not have to say it in such a humiliating way," Alina grumbled, puffing out her cheeks and crossing her arms, feeling her pride wounded at remembering the defeat.

"But it is the truth, Alina. And precisely because of that, the progress you two have achieved after being defeated like that makes absolutely no sense," Sophia analyzed, her mind working at full speed. "Unless..." She said, looking up with her eyes wide open, as if she had just seen a ghost.

"You finally realized, didn’t you?" William asked, turning completely toward her with a huge, mysterious smile on his face.

Alina and Delia looked at each other, completely confused, unable to understand what conclusion the two strategists in the room had reached.

Then, Sophia slowly stood up from her comfortable leather chair, resting her hands on her desk.

"It could simply be that the church headquarters does not need more personnel at this time," Sophia theorized aloud, immediately discarding her own idea.

"But that is impossible. Because, for better or worse, the Church and its army of holy knights are basically the only ones keeping the demon kings at bay. They always need cannon fodder. Not to mention all the ones we suspect Ryan murdered. And speaking of him precisely... the only thing I can think of that altered the system’s rules for you two, is that your sudden change..."

Sophia fell silent for a second, fixing her intense emerald eyes directly on Delia and Alina’s figures.

"It might be solely and exclusively because you got involved with Ryan. He used his magic and healed you from lethal wounds inside that dungeon, isn’t that right?" Sophia said. Her tone was meant to be a simple question, but in reality, it was more a recount of the events that had occurred.

"Yes, that is true, he healed our wounds. But why the hell would that criminal have anything to do with it?" Delia questioned, wrinkling her forehead, unable to understand the magnitude of the accusation.

"Please, do not remind me of that disgusting, perverted guy..." Alina exclaimed, feeling a shiver run down her back as she remembered what she and her companion had done in the dungeon in Ryan’s presence.

"I also reached exactly that same conclusion," William said, with a noticeable smile on his face that did not hide his immense intrigue towards Ryan’s true nature.

And just as Sophia was about to say something else to delve deeper into her theory about Ryan, the office door swung open, crashing violently against the wall.

Irene burst into the room, completely agitated. With a crumpled piece of paper clutched tightly in her right hand, the receptionist bent forward, clutching her knees and panting heavily after running through the hallways as fast as she could.

"What the hell is wrong with you, Irene?! I clearly told you to leave us alone for a moment!" Sophia demanded, raising her voice seriously.

"B... but master Sophia... you have to hear this," Irene explained between deep, painful pants, holding the trembling paper up in the air. "An emergency messenger wyvern arrived directly from the church capital."

"What the fuck? And why would the church send a wyvern here?" Delia asked, going on guard out of pure instinct.

"It is just... it is just..." Irene took a huge gulp of air, lifting her pale, terrified face.

"A Demon King died in the north. The Beast King, Rigal... He died at the hands of the adventurer Ryan!" Irene yelled, letting the shocking news echo throughout the office as she recited the exact words from the official report she held in her hand.