Hearing Envy's request, Daniel took the green crystal out of his suit's universal pocket. The crystal glowed with an eerie dark green light, revealing the trace of powerful necromantic magic within.
Daniel placed the crystal on the table in front of Envy. She took it in her hand, scrutinizing it, trying to understand what kind of magic could imprison the soul of a powerful mage. A mage's soul is more complex than an ordinary person's, often trained to wield magic even without a body, making it more resistant to control.
Envy cast several spells and used revealing glyphs to analyze the crystal's properties. She narrowed her eyes, looking at Daniel in disbelief.
"What kind of magic is this? You've made the soul imprisoned in this crystal incredibly susceptible to absorption, it's even reached 100%! Why did you do this?" Envy asked, as if she couldn't believe her eyes. It was as if she had never known Daniel before.
"Huh? Why? What do you mean, why did I do this?" Daniel was confused, not understanding Envy's agitation.
"This is a taboo! Don't you know!? We are not supposed to absorb souls and turn them into mana energy! Yes, the power is immense, but it's a taboo. If the Vatican found out, they would immediately send the Secret Exterminator unit after us!" Envy explained.
Daniel furrowed his brow. "Then don't absorb his soul. I put his soul in that crystal because it was formed by the spell I used," he said. He knew about the taboo, but he still didn't understand Envy's fuss. If absorbing souls was a taboo, then don't absorb them. It was simple logic.
Why make such a big deal out of it?
"Danny... that's not the problem. The problem is the existence of this crystal. It's the same as having a nuclear weapon. Even if you don't plan to use it, other people won't stay quiet about it," Envy explained, letting out a long sigh.
"I believe you, Daniel, that you did this without any malicious intent to become like those mages who break the taboo and consume souls for power, like hell lords. You're the one who synthesized a Chromatic Philosopher's Stone that has the same effect.
But other people who don't know you won't keep quiet and will make a fuss about it, just because this crystal exists," Envy continued, explaining her concerns.
She then turned to the others in the room. "I hope everyone will keep the existence of this soul crystal a secret." Everyone nodded. They had been actualized by Daniel and were incapable of betraying him anyway, but they agreed with Envy's request nonetheless.
Turning back to Daniel, Envy adopted the persona of a strict teacher, causing Daniel to sweat-drop slightly. "Daniel... After this is over, please read more about the history of the Curtained World, including past treaties... no, ESPECIALLY past treaties. I'll assign you some homework later."
"Are you going to be my wife or my teacher?" Daniel retorted, a mix of annoyance and teasing in his voice.
"I can be both if you want," Envy replied with a sultry smile aimed at Daniel.
"Ahem..." Cao Cao faked a cough, reminding the two to be mindful of the time and place.
Envy blushed but quickly concealed it, being more experienced in hiding her expressions than Daniel, whose poker face was less than perfect.
She placed a thin circular stone plate on the table and began engraving it with a precise laser-like spell. The stone filled with various ancient words and magical formations.
After thirty minutes, she finished and placed the soul crystal at the center of the stone plate. Envy then began to chant in an unknown language – not Latin, Greek, or any ancient language they recognized.
"In the name of Ereshkigal, Queen of Irkalla,
The spell complete, Envy closed her eyes and rested, as the ritual had taken a toll on her. In truth, there were many methods to communicate with the dead, and modern necromancy could also achieve this. However, since the soul in question belonged to an Archon-ranked mage, she didn't believe ordinary spells would compel it to obey her will and speak truthfully.
The solution was a spell used by high priests in the old era to bind and judge souls for their crimes. This spell wasn't limited to the dead; it could even be used on the living, forcing them to speak truthfully when bound by the chains of truth.
This spell contained a sliver of divine power and was difficult to perform, even for Envy. If a normal mage attempted it, their mana would be depleted before they finished chanting. That was the price of using such a powerful spell.
After resting, Envy opened her eyes and began questioning Thomas's soul.
"Who are you?" she began.
"Thomas... Thomas Anderson... Archon Rank Mage, one of the five Grand Elders of the Ivory Tower..." Thomas answered without resistance.
"Why are you here?" she asked again.
This time, Thomas hesitated, trying to resist, but ultimately succumbed to the power of the chains of truth.
"Resources... more resources... More places to conquer... We need more resources to bring more prosperity to us... the Ivory Tower," Thomas answered in fragmented sentences, seemingly giving up on resistance.
"How did you come here?" Envy continued her interrogation.
Thomas recounted the events, his answers incoherent and fragmented as he continued to resist. But the summary was this:
Thomas had arrived by sending inspiration and magical knowledge to his counterpart in this dimension. This alternate version of himself had opened a gateway through their souls, allowing Thomas to transfer a fragment of his consciousness to scout this dimension for resources and potential gains.
The so-called secret experiment of this dimension's Thomas was merely a fragment of knowledge sent by his counterpart. This information, presented as the "Soul Gate" spell, promised to open a portal to another dimension and grant unlimited power.
However, the spell's true purpose was to open a small gateway using Thomas's soul as fuel. The Thomas of this dimension, lured by the promise of limitless power, was completely deceived by his alternate self, believing the idea was his own.
Thus, the Thomas from another dimension arrived, taking control of this world, Thomas' body, intending to monopolize this world's resources for himself by establishing the connection between the two worlds and bringing his private forces over.
Hearing this, Daniel wanted to destroy Thomas's soul to prevent information leakage. Unfortunately, this was just a soul fragment, unable to utilize the original body's full power – at most, it could only exert about 20% of its original body.
This meant destroying the soul fragment was pointless. Moreover, doing so would send a ripple through the weak link between worlds, alerting the original Thomas to this dimension's exact coordinates. With some research, he could then bring his full force to invade.
Judging from Thomas's relaxed attitude towards taking over other dimensions' resources, it was likely that his world was far more advanced in magical knowledge and power, possibly following a different evolutionary path. This meant they were stronger, and this was not their first time targeting another dimension.
"It seems this guy came here to pave the way for invasion," Daniel concluded after Envy finished the interrogation.
Everyone nodded in agreement; this was the most logical conclusion. Daniel thought for a moment before asking, "Envy, can you ask him the exact location of his dimension's coordinates? I want to send some probes to survey his home dimension."