The developnt of events was so unexpected that Gawain didn’t react for a whole half a minute.
He stared at the now-opened chest that Noletta had unveiled, where a shield of peculiar design, approximately the size of a dium-sized single-handed shield, lay quietly amidst cushioning material made from so unknown substance. A series of mories related to this shield surfaced in his mind—it was not unfamiliar to him, even though he had long abandoned finding it. This shield was once a personal piece of equipnt for the body he now occupied, and the impressions in his mind were deep and clear.
He didn’t expect such a thing to appear before him in such a manner at this particular mont.
Noletta’s voice snapped Gawain out of his montary distraction: "This is yours, right?"
"Ah, yes," Gawain blinked and nodded, "the shield of the protector of Anzu Kingdom. I thought I would never see it again in my lifeti. Was it in the hands of the Mithril Vault?"
"If that were the case, we would have returned it to you long ago," lita shook her head, "we also recently found out about its whereabouts by chance—the Mithril Vault has always conducted business with integrity, and you’re one of our important clients, so we imdiately returned it to its rightful owner."
Dragons would not lie about such matters, Gawain was well aware of this, so he quickly believed lita’s words. He then furrowed his brows and looked at the two agents with curiosity: "Where did you find it?"
"In the elental world, in the domain of fire elents," lita said, "an elental lord secretly hid it away, even making it part of its inner shell. If that elental lord hadn’t happened to owe the Mithril Vault a debt, a few more centuries might have passed without anyone finding it."
Gawain was taken aback: "The elental world?! How did it end up there?"
lita spread her hands: "That’s hard to say—we didn’t expect the elental lord to secretly hide away your missing item, let alone prepare any inquiries in advance. By the ti we discovered it and wanted to ask, the indebted elental lord was unfortunately unable to answer due to so irresistible event..."
Gawain could tell with just his biceps what lita’s elegant and artistic words implied, and he looked at the agent Miss with admiration: "When it cos to verbal art, your Dragonkin are indeed impressive."
lita accepted the complint with calm elegance, and her smile behind the veil was both graceful and reserved: "Although we haven’t figured out the details, we can roughly infer that the shield was likely stolen from the battlefield by the elental lord—during your human civil war a hundred years ago. Perhaps so clumsy wizard opened a rift leading to the elental world, or maybe the elental lord preditatedly bewitched an elental mage to secretly extend its ’hand’ over—your shield carries great power and naturally attracts those creatures who crave magic."
Gawain couldn’t help but sigh: "Such things wouldn’t happen during the Gondor Era... Elental creatures also adhered to rules."
lita shook her head: "But the majestic Gondor Empire, which even the elental world revered, is no more. Nowadays, the elental inhabitants don’t hold much respect for the scattered humans."
"...In any case, I’m very grateful you brought it here," Gawain set aside his sentints and earnestly expressed his gratitude to the two high-ranking agents—not because a shield used in battle is as important to him now as it once was, but rather the recovery of an equipnt that shared legendary fa with Gawain Cecil was a heartening matter. Especially since the recovery was initiated by two dragons—if appropriately publicized, this could not only boost morale throughout the country but also elevate Cecil Empire’s prestige and influence internationally. Therefore, his gratitude was heartfelt, "I won’t let you return empty-handed—but what kind of reward does the Mithril Vault want?"
"Saying it like that creates distance," lita imdiately shook her head, "Returning lost items doesn’t require compensation, but as an exchange, before returning the shield, we hope to ask you a few questions."
Gawain paused for a mont, surprised at the generous gesture from dragons who typically haggle over even a copper coin, so upon hearing lita’s "few questions," his attention imdiately sharpened—what is free is often the most costly, and there might be so pitfall in the Mithril Vault’s few questions...
The two agent Misses certainly didn’t know what kind of magic-guided train was running in Gawain’s mind, they exchanged a glance with each other, and then Noletta spoke first: "The first question—we want to know the specific origin of this shield."
"Origin?" Gawain furrowed his brow, imdiately perceiving sothing from the first question, and cautiously countered with a question before answering, "Why are you interested in this?"
"...Considering you previously traded ’God’s tal’ with us, I can give you a hint," lita pointed to the shield of the protector, "Haven’t you noticed the main material of this shield is sowhat special?"
"Material?" Gawain was taken aback, and suddenly, so originally overlooked details in his inherited mories rapidly flashed through his mind. He imdiately bent down to pick up the shield of the protector, and amidst the corroded, decayed tal parts and covering material, he saw the most original material of the shield. It was a kind of silver-white tal, its surface flowing with very fine, star-like light points. When he touched it, he could feel a peculiar warmth—completely unlike any conventional tal in the world, "This thing..."
He didn’t recognize this material, but so characteristics of it seed similar to another material he knew, or they both shared the sa "advanced properties," like seeing two bold n in a girly comic world, the forr and latter weren’t the sa, yet Gawain could still judge they were of the sa origin—the art style wasn’t fitting the world’s setting...
The main material of the shield of the protector reminded him of "God’s tal," of the advanced ancient alloy called "Eternal Stone Slate," and of the remnants of weaponry and vehicles that imprisoned the God of Nature in the Shadow Fortress.
He furrowed his brow slightly—the inherited mories were clearly not his own, such detailed impressions had been subconsciously ignored by him.
If he were the genuine Gawain Cecil, he should’ve linked his shield after encountering shards of the Eternal Stone Slate, yet he wasn’t. Under non-essential circumstances, the inherited mories lay quietly archived at the deepest, causing many detailed matters to slip past him.
"It seems you’ve realized," Noletta broke the silence, observing Gawain’s changing expressions, "The primary material of this shield has a connection with the God’s tal known as ’Eternal Stone Slate’—they were made by the sa civilization."
Gawain looked deeply at Noletta.
For so unknown purpose, the dragons of Talronde have been collecting "God’s tal," whose "true identity" is the fragnts left in this world by the "God-slaying fleet" years ago.
The dragons seem to know so secrets of the ancient God-slaying war, and even the origin of the God-slaying fleet.
However, they clearly do not intend to, nor can they disclose these secrets—he had once asked lita about this, nearly causing the agent lady to collapse on the spot, and thus deeply confird this fact.
Considering that all dragons should be similar, a question capable of causing lita to collapse should also be capable of causing Noletta to collapse, so he did not pursue the matter of "God’s tal" and the "God-slaying fleet," instead exhaled gently, organized the mories in his mind and then answered Noletta’s question: "I acquired this shield as the Northern expeditionary army crossed the magic scorch mark—its main material was found in a supply warehouse while searching the Wepland Observatory."
Noletta showed a hint of curiosity: "Wepland Observatory?"
"The largest astronomy observation and celestial research center in the northern region of the Gondor Empire," Gawain said, "It was the site of the famous Wepland teor shower, after which the Gondor people established research facilities to study outer space matter that had fallen to the ground. Years later, they built an observatory, a star-gazing pavilion, and a giant gravitational analysis station known as the ’Star Axis’ on top of the research facilities—of course, all these were obliterated when the chaotic wave arrived, and our Northern forces were rely looking for supplies in the surviving underground warehouses."
As he spoke, Gawain couldn’t help but slightly sigh.
The once Gondor Empire... its technology was far more advanced than even the planet Earth of his previous life. Though due to the focus of their technological developnts, the Gondor people at the ti had yet to attempt stepping into the universe, the scholars of that era still had a certain degree of understanding of planets, stars, and outer space. But unfortunately, all these glorious achievents vanished with the chaotic wave; not only did the technical talents and materials in the empire’s hinterland fade into dust, even so research facilities set up in remote areas couldn’t survive.
To this day, the Gondor Empire’s understanding of the stars only remains as general concepts like "we live on a planet," "there are other planets beyond ours" among ordinary people, and these concepts are rapidly being obliterated, disappearing, and gradually rging with vague legends.
Fortunately, the resurgence of civilization brought by arcane technology is curbing this decline, and scholars who have been reassembled and inspired are beginning to share the knowledge buried in various mage towers, and are beginning to rebuild modern astronomical observation or research facilities in suitable areas.
Noletta had no idea what Gawain was contemplating; she rely focused on the background of the establishnt of the "Wepland Observatory": "So, that observatory was initially designed to study teorites—the things you found in the warehouse ruins were very likely to have fallen from the sky along with teorites."
Though Gawain was answering Noletta’s question, he himself also gradually realized the clues behind these questions and answers, many things that he had never noticed or buried deep in his mory began to erge and form a complete hypothesis—the God-slaying fleet, the Wepland teor shower, the mysterious tal...
All of this was forming into a massive truth, a truth he never expected to have been always lurking beside Gawain Cecil, hidden in the deepest parts of his own mory.
"What you an is, the tal we found in the Wepland ruins is part of the ’teor shower,’" Gawain looked at the Guardian’s shield in his hand, his mind subconsciously recalling the process of crafting (or processing) this shield, "It fell from the sky... no wonder..."
"I’m sowhat curious," lita suddenly spoke beside him, "You found just a mysterious tal plate back then—how did it end up becoming the Guardian’s shield?"
Gawain thought for a mont and spoke frankly: "None of us recognized this thing—at that ti, most of the expedition army ca from humble backgrounds, and the scholars, mages, and priests knew nothing about Wepland Observatory, but we found the tal exceptionally sturdy, almost entirely resistant to any magic attack, and it showed no erosion in the chaotic wave environnt; plus, its dinsions were perfect, so Charlie suggested attaching a handle to it..."
lita: "..."
Noletta: "..."
Gawain looked at the two wide-eyed agent ladies and spread his hands helplessly: "You can’t expect the human expeditionary army at that ti, with its supply shortages, urgent situation, and lack of high-level technical personnel, to perform better when faced with an unknown tal. We couldn’t form an expert team to slowly research what it was, but the expedition army urgently needed more powerful military strength—a shield that was practically invincible could allow a powerful knight to protect more people through the contaminated zone, while a heavy tal piece would only burden the journey. Of course, ’attaching a handle’ seed a bit hasty and crude... but Charlie was the one with the most imaginative ideas in the expedition army; everyone had no better plan, and Charlie’s proposal was at least an option."
"We’re just surprised that you dared to turn a piece of unknown tal into personal equipnt without knowing whether it was harmful or not," lita looked at Gawain seriously and said, "As a Gondor, you should at least have so concept of elental erosion and energy radiation, right?"
Gawain glanced at lita and suddenly laughed: "More than the elental erosion and energy radiation of the Gondor wasteland itself?"
"...Indeed."
lita reluctantly admitted that behind Gawain’s seemingly crude and ignorant approach at the ti was actually an afterthought with no other choices, while Gawain looked at the Guardian’s shield in his hand, his thoughts growing heavier—
As he searched Gawain Cecil’s mories with the shield as the keyword, he indeed found a disruption!
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