Chapter 1364: 122. Visiting the Neighbor

"Of course! Absolutely!"

Feeling that his little life was completely at the mercy of that large hand opening and closing around his neck, Huffer hurriedly agreed:

"I'll tell you everything I know, without holding anything back! Sir......No, my lord, my lord, please don't let your hand slip!"

"Don't be nervous. I'm only doing this to improve the efficiency of our communication and prevent you from spouting irrelevant nonsense. I'm actually very easy to talk to." Muen smiled.

Although his face at the moment was still Enmu's cold, elderly mage face, Muen personally believed that he was being extremely calm and gentle right now.

Huffer should have been able to feel that too.

"Yes, yes, my lord is kind, my lord is the kindest person alive! If I weren't stuck in here, I'd definitely apply to have you named an Ambassador of Kindness!" Huffer looked as though he wanted to cry. The overwhelming threat of death forced him to lie through his teeth.

You call this fucking kind?

Even those bastards in the Tower treated me ten thousand times better than you when they interrogated me!

"Enough nonsense. Here's my question."

Muen couldn't be bothered wasting time. Even though he noticed Huffer slandering him internally, he ignored it and asked directly:

"That sound. Do you know much about it?"

"Sound? What sound?"

Muen said nothing and simply remained silent.

And so, once the prison quieted again, that sound became clear once more.

"Thump!"

"Hah......"

"Thump!"

"Heh heh......"

"Thump!"

"Roar!"

It was still the same dull impacts, accompanied by all sorts of irregular growls and gasps.

If it had only been those sounds, they wouldn't have drawn much of Muen's attention. After all, just as he'd said earlier, hearing this sort of commotion in a prison wasn't particularly strange.

The problem was that the sound actually contained some special power capable of influencing even his mental strength.

That meant he had no choice but to take it seriously.

After all, there were very few things left that could affect his mental strength now. Aside from that tiny handful of experts standing at the very peak of the continent, there were only those indescribable existences beyond the world.

"You......You actually don't know?" Huffer asked in confusion.

"Why would I know? I've been here for less than two hours, and I spent most of that time arguing with some old man." Muen asked in return.

"That's true......Not knowing is normal, perfectly normal. After all, this matter is considered a core secret throughout the entire Origin Tower. If I hadn't once come into contact with something related to it, I wouldn't know either."

Huffer muttered at an extremely rapid pace, "Come to think of it, even I admire myself. I'm clearly just a classroom teacher, yet I still managed to learn a secret like this. Heh, hehehe, if that old bastard had just passed the position of head of the Life School down to me, I wouldn't have......"

Muen's hand tightened slightly. "Less nonsense. Get to the point."

"Ah......Sorry, sorry. I've been locked up in here for too long, so I've gotten a little talkative, a little talkative."

Huffer winced again and twisted like an old duck being held by the neck, repeatedly giving awkward little laughs as he said:

"Arman. Has my lord ever heard the name Arman?"

"Hm?"

Arman?

Muen raised an eyebrow:

"Go on."

"Heh, so my lord really has heard of him. Cough, cough......Well, of course you have. That name is famous throughout the Origin Tower. Who hasn't heard of him? Let me tell you, even when I was little I treated him as my idol. I even had his picture hanging in my room......"

"One more reminder. The point."

Muen, smiled.

"I-I know! The point, the point is......Even though I've been locked up here all this time recently, I still know that the reason that old ghost Douglas took office at this particular time is because Arman's betrayal shook the foundations of the entire Origin Tower, forcing him to step forward."

Huffer pointed upward with one finger and rapidly said, "I heard that Arman didn't just collude with an Evil God. He's already gone completely insane, secretly acting as the Evil God's lackey and doing who knows how many things that betrayed humanity. In order to extract information from him and uncover the entire hidden arrangement of some Evil God, the Tower has him imprisoned somewhere extremely secret, torturing him day and night!"

"You mean......that secret place......is here?"

Muen also raised his head and looked at the dripping prison ceiling, his pupils contracting slightly.

"Exactly! The special prison holding Arman——Divine Sigh, was jointly constructed by several Truth-Rank Grand Mages. Its power is enormous, and there is absolutely no possibility of any mage escaping from it.

Correspondingly, something like that also consumes an enormous amount of energy. In order not to waste the excess power overflowing from it, the Tower's upper leadership deliberately placed that prison directly above every other prison that also required suppression!

In other words, right above our heads!"

Huffer's eyes went wide, and he was clearly getting excited now as well.

"Hahaha, this used to be nothing more than an ordinary prison, but ever since that Arman arrived, the people here have had to listen to him go insane every single day. After listening long enough, they all started going insane with him! Hahaha! They went insane!

If I didn't have at least a little ability, I'd have gone insane with them too! Hahaha! Gone insane together! They're insane! I'm not! My lord, aren't I fucking amazing!"

Huffer roared excitedly, his voice echoing throughout the empty prison before gradually blending together with all the other furious roars, curses, and cries.

There was no difference whatsoever.

"So that's how it is......"

Muen studied Huffer for a while before nodding in understanding.

No wonder even he had been affected by those sounds.

If it was that cheap senior brother of his, then it wasn't strange at all......He was both one of the continent's strongest experts and someone who had colluded with an Evil God, meaning he might even have received an Evil God's blessing.

Both conditions were satisfied.

"But......does this count as accidentally stumbling into exactly what I wanted?"

Muen narrowed his eyes.

His greatest purpose in coming here had originally been to gather information related to that cheap senior brother of his. Even after stabilizing his identity as head of the school, he still needed to think about how he could quietly gain access to the relevant intelligence.

But unexpectedly, getting thrown into confinement this time had actually sent him somewhere this close?

Even though there was no way he could truly make contact with that cheap senior brother just yet, at the very least, before obtaining information from the Origin Tower's side, he could first confirm a few things with his own eyes.

If that was the case......

"Mr. Huffer, I need to know......"

"Hahaha, you've finally exposed an opening!"

Before Muen could finish speaking, he heard Huffer let out an even more excited shout. As he spoke, Huffer thrust out the hand he'd kept hidden behind his back the entire time. Gathered within it was explosive magic compressed to the absolute limit.

Extreme light and heat erupted as the red sphere, only the size of a marble, touched the back of Muen's hand. The skin that hadn't even shown a white mark under Huffer's previous attack finally changed......

Sizzle......A faint burnt smell spread through the air. Under this sudden attack, Muen instinctively loosened his grip.

And Huffer showed absolutely no attachment to the results of his attack. The moment he regained his freedom, he sprang backward and immediately shrank into the far side of the cell, putting as much distance between himself and Muen as possible.

"Mr. Huffer......what exactly is the meaning of this?" Muen raised his eyes, smiling without any warmth.

"Hmph! I already told you I'm not insane! And since I'm not insane, how could I possibly let myself remain under someone else's control so easily?" Huffer laughed smugly. "Kid, learn your lesson properly. This time, your Grandpa Huffer will spare you, but if you want to get any more information out of me? Not a chance! Carry that resentment with you all the way to your grave!"

"......Is that so?"

Muen's expression disappeared as he asked curiously, "You're acting surprisingly arrogant. Have you already forgotten the pain now that the wound has healed? Aren't you afraid I'll punish you even more severely?"

"Punish my ass!"

Huffer spat, "Do you even know where you are? This is a prison suppressed by an ultimate formation jointly created by several Truth-Rank mages! The bars and walls here are almost completely immune to all magic, and they're so sturdy that even a Crowned One can't break through them easily!

Yeah, I'm insulting you! Yeah, I'm acting arrogant! And not only that, I'm going to mock you from right here! Mock the hell out of you! What are you going to do about it?"

As he spoke, Huffer even turned his ass toward Muen and shook it back and forth:

"If you don't like it, come beat me up! You only got me earlier because I was careless. Let's see if your arm can still reach this far now! Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!"

"......"

Muen said nothing more. He merely lowered his head and glanced somewhere, the corner of his mouth curling into a meaningful smile.

"Hmph, you dog bastard who only knows how to launch sneak attacks. Even if I stood right here and let you hit me, there's nothing you could do! Just you wait. Once I've accumulated enough mana, I'll definitely......"

"You'll definitely what?"

"I'll repay the pain you gave me tenfold!"

"Tenfold? Sounds pretty good. Then let's do that."

"Do what? What do you think you can do? You can't even get over here, so how could you......Huh?"

The previously arrogant Huffer froze in place.

Of course, this wasn't because his conscience had suddenly awakened and he'd realized there was something inappropriate about his behavior.

It was because the instant he turned around, he suddenly discovered......

That damned bastard was standing right in front of him.

There was no obstacle.

No wall or set of bars separating them.

He was simply......standing directly in front of him.

"H-How......How is that possible? How did you......" All color instantly drained from Huffer's face. He rubbed his eyes hard, thinking he was hallucinating.

"You're asking how I got through this 'indestructible' prison?"

Muen's fingers moved, showing Huffer the cute hairpin in his hand......It was something he'd casually yanked off at some unknown point during his fight with Ariel earlier.

"The cell itself really is indestructible, but this lock......doesn't seem particularly impressive. It took me less than three seconds to pick it, and I didn't even get to enjoy myself."

"......Huh?"