Chapter 115:
Just as he took a piece from Adrian’s own puzzle, Snow who’d been confused and irritated, shot him an icy glare that could have frozen the very air between them, her serpentine nature barely contained beneath the surface
"Hey! What do you think you’re doing! Those are ours! You can’t just walk over and take whatever you want whenever you feel like it!"
Amy wore a deeply disturbed expression on her pretty features as well, while she hadn’t spoken, it looked like she felt the sa way as well.
Grey and Emma seed outright hostile, their postures shifting into a defensive one, as if getting ready to step forward.
But before that, Adrian himself raised a calming hand to stop them all, his voice cutting through the tension with its usual asured tone.
"It’s alright, all of you. I think our friend here might have caught onto sothing that the rest of us haven’t noticed yet." He stared at Lucuis with an expression that was difficult to read, a reaction approaching an imperceptible smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
"Let’s see what he does next before we make any judgnts."
Lucuis said nothing more in response to this defense, offering no explanation or justification for his actions. Instead, he simply walked toward the table of the old man who had spoken earlier, the stout figure with grey and black hair who had accused him of cheating just minutes before.
The old man watched him approach in silence, his calm face revealing nothing of his thoughts.
When Lucuis stood before him, he spoke with the sa calm confidence he had shown throughout. "Care to trust , sir? Just this once, I assure you that you won’t regret it."
The old man studied him for a long mont, his eyes searching for sothing in Lucuis’s expression, so sign of deception or mockery that would justify his suspicions.
But in the end, he found non. Alas he simply waved his hand dismissively.
"Take whichever you want, boy." His voice sounded like that of soone who had already made peace with failure and had decided that this year was not his year.
Already making plans to simply return to try again in twelve months. "I’ve long since given up on passing this thing anyway. Was planning on coming back next year and trying again when I’m better prepared. But if you think you can do sothing with my pieces that I couldn’t do myself, then by all ans, give it a shot. Can’t hurt anything at this point."
Lucuis nodded with a genuinely grateful expression crossing his features, appreciating the old man’s willingness to trust him despite having every reason to refuse.
He reached out and selected a few pieces from the scattered collection on the pedestal, adding them carefully to the growing assortnt in his hands.
But even as he did so, a frown began to erge on his face. He had been counting carefully, tracking exactly what pieces he needed to complete the vision forming in his mind.
He vividly rembered the type of pieces required because he had been paying attention to that specific detail throughout this entire process, noting that the puzzles were all identical in their composition and requirents. And yet, even after having searched through every single one of the puzzles belonging to his group.
Although he’d already taken pieces from the old man who had nothing left to lose, he still could not quite find the final piece he was looking for.
Sothing was missing. And until he figured out who that soone was, his theory would remain incomplete, his puzzle unsolved, and his gamble ultimately unsuccessful.
"This is impossible!" Just then, an angry shout filled the hall, which ca from none other than Princess Lucinda herself, her voice carrying across the vast space with enough force to make several nearby examinees flinch backward as if they had been physically struck.
The sound of her palm slamming against her stone pedestal followed imdiately after, a sharp crack that echoed off the ancient walls and seed to hang in the air longer than any simple impact should have lasted.
"There has to be sothing wrong with this examination."
" Its fundantally flawed in its design! I absolutely refuse to believe that I would lose on the very first test.’
’ how can soone of my standing and ability be brought low by sothing as trivial as this!’ she thought to herself.
At the exact mont her hand connected with the pedestal, at the precise instant that her frustration manifested in that violent gesture.
Lucuis turned in her direction, his eyes drawn by the commotion like a hunter sensing movent in the underbrush. What he saw made his heart leap within his chest, for one of the pieces scattered across her table, disturbed by the force of her impact, had actually hovered briefly in the air before settling back down into a slightly different position than it had occupied before.
That piece, that single fragnt of carved material, was the very one he had been searching for throughout this entire process, the final component his theory required, the last key needed to complete his own puzzle.
’ HAHAHA!!! Finally!!’
The word blazed through his mind like fire through dry grass, and his eyes flashed with such bright intensity that anyone watching closely might have been startled by the transformation.
Without hesitation, nor a single mont spent considering alternatives or the potential consequences of his actions, he sped forward, his figure sprinting across the hall. The sight alarming quite a few of the examines.
Lucinda jolted in surprise when she saw him shooting toward her with that unmistakable look of intense purpose burning in his eyes, her body tensing instinctively in response to the sudden movent.
What in all the hells was this madman doing now? She wondered.
Had the pressure of the examination finally broken his mind entirely? To think that he had finally beco desperate enough by the prospect of failure, that he would actually launch an attack on a princess of the realm in full view of hundreds of witnesses?
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