Chapter 125: Hall of Honesty

Chapter 125: Hall of Honesty

Before the majestic palace, grayish-white in appearance and more than two hundred meters tall, several thick stone pillars stood upright, slightly shorter than the palace itself, like a row of straight-backed guards.

Klein could imagine that when the City of Miracles, Levished, had still floated in midair, those stone pillars must have had powerful dragons crouching atop them.

They would have been the ancient god’s attendants—or rather, divine servants.

He then raised his head and glanced at the open doors, saying to Leonard and Audrey,

“Stay close to me. If anything unexpected happens, I will immediately take you out of the book world and return directly above the gray fog.”

This was precisely Klein’s greatest support in daring to explore this place.

“Mm.” Neither Audrey nor Leonard tried to act tough. They each moved to one side of Klein and walked shoulder to shoulder with him.

Relying on their spirit-body ability to fly, the three crossed layer after layer of stairs and entered the palace through the exaggeratedly grand doors.

What first entered their eyes was a space so vast that several dragons could casually roll around inside it, and one ancient stone pillar after another supporting a dome like the sky itself.

On both sides of the hall were brilliantly colored murals. They extended continuously forward, finally converging behind a half-broken massive pillar that would require an unknown number of people joining hands to encircle.

That giant pillar stood in the deepest part of the hall, directly ahead. It did not rely on anything else. By its own existence alone, it made people feel intense fear and experience the vicissitudes of time, as though it were a petrified deity.

Almost instantly, a grayish-white figure was outlined upon that giant pillar.

The figure was covered in scales from head to toe, each scale resembling a sturdy stone slab. Merely its faintly visible outline seemed like an epic.

The Dragon of Imagination, Ankewelt! No sooner had this thought flashed through Klein’s mind than a strangely familiar voice echoed rolling through the absurdly broad hall:

“The Dragon of Imagination, Ankewelt!”

As Klein looked around in astonishment, he heard Leonard sincerely sigh from beside him:

“Deep in the listening air around Him hung;
“The murmuring wind scarce dared to breathe…”[1]

…This guy still has the heart to recite poetry? I don’t even know whose poem he’s quoting… Klein turned his head to look at Leonard.

Immediately afterward, he heard another echo:

“This guy still has the heart to recite poetry? I don’t even know whose poem he’s quoting…”

At that moment, Leonard’s expression looked rather shocked. He tightly shut his mouth and shook his head again and again in denial.

But in the next second, a voice beside him rang out:

“I didn’t recite anything!”

“What is going on? Strange…” As Klein’s heart stirred, he discovered that the strangely familiar voice from earlier was his own.

And once again, it reverberated, repeating the thought that had flashed through Klein’s mind.

Then, Justice Audrey’s beautiful voice, tinged with a hint of muttering, sounded:

“This… This hall can directly present the thoughts in our hearts into the surroundings, even manifest them? Mm… When I saw that giant pillar just now, I was imagining what the Dragon of Imagination, Ankewelt, looked like back then. I used the Mind Dragon I saw before as the base…

“Why are all my words—no, as expected, the hall said them out loud…”

So that is how it is. Good thing I did not think of anything strange just now. Mm. Restrain my thoughts. Restrain my thoughts… Klein began trying to concentrate through meditation, preventing his mind from wandering.

At the same time, the corresponding words rang out almost synchronously beside him:

“…Restrain my thoughts, restrain my thoughts, restrain my thoughts…”

“So this is what Mr. World’s mind is like. Like a child just starting school, constantly reminding himself of what he needs to pay attention to. Also, his meditation image is actually one layered ball of light after another. So beautiful. No—no, I didn’t think that, and I didn’t describe you that way, Mr. World, really!” As her true thoughts were continuously presented, Audrey finally could not hold back, and the corners of her lips lifted.

As for Leonard, the sound of “hahahaha” had long since echoed around him.

“These two fellows… No, why am I calling them fellows? Politeness, be polite…” Klein listened to the words in his heart while sighing helplessly. “This place is very suitable for playing Truth or Dare. Perhaps it should be called the Hall of Honesty…”

“What kind of game is that?” Audrey did not need to open her mouth at all to express her doubt.

“Probably invented by Emperor Roselle… I need to be careful. I cannot think about things I should not think about. Damn it, without meditation, it is far too difficult to restrain random wandering thoughts…” Klein answered while habitually warning himself inwardly. The result was that the hall mercilessly betrayed him again.

This time, Audrey actually laughed aloud:

“Haha, Mr. World has this side to him too. I had never interpreted it before…”

“Hahaha. Klein, so this day has come for you too—no, what did I just say…” Leonard abruptly lifted his right hand and covered his mouth.

Without surprise, he heard Miss Justice’s “question”:

“Klein?”

And a certain person’s complaint:

“Perhaps only turning him into a marionette can stop this fellow from thinking nonsense. Wait, what am I thinking? Phew, calm down. Calm down…”

Klein drew in a deep breath and began focusing his attention on the matter itself.

“Let us first examine what the surrounding murals are telling us. In ancient eras, murals were an extremely important method of recording events, often containing a great deal of information…”

As he made the suggestion, he heard Audrey’s heart laughing while thinking:

“Klein—is that Mr. World’s real name? No, don’t think too much. Mr. World will be angry. No, I think it is more likely he will be embarrassed. No, no, this is all Lie’s fault. Mr. World, please believe me! Phew, calm down. Calm down. Focus. Focus!”

With the Spectator pathway’s control over her own emotions and thoughts, Audrey gradually restrained her mind and cast her gaze toward the murals on the right side.

Compared with them, Leonard’s ability to control his mind was slightly weaker. Noises still echoed around him:

“Marionette… Are this guy’s current thoughts already this dangerous? Tsk tsk, so this is your true mind. Haha, Miss Justice’s reaction is quite interesting… It has been so long since I saw that guy make a fool of himself…”

Only after Klein and Audrey had both started carefully examining the murals and rapidly communicating through the floating thoughts in their hearts did Leonard gradually calm his thoughts and focus his attention.

The murals on the right side of the three seemed to tell the course of history’s development. There were scenes of humans building cities, snow blanketing plains, wars and migrations, kingdom after kingdom and city-state after city-state, as well as towers and fruits symbolizing communication without barriers…

Clearly, these murals began at the entrance and ended at the Dragon of Imagination’s throne.

As he approached the end, Klein suddenly discovered a familiar figure.

It was an enormous dragon with dark-blue dragon eyes and ice-crystal scales.

It was the King of the North, Ulyssan!

“This… The development of this book world is all based on these murals?” As Klein’s inner voice was revealed, he quickly browsed further back. He found scenes of many blurred-faced adventurers hunting the frost dragon and opening the door to leave; he found images of ice and snow melting, of Pesot and other city-states appearing and flourishing; and he found an ending where the weather grew increasingly cold again and a new story was about to begin.

“Everything on the murals will become reality in this book world?” Justice Audrey found it difficult to restrain that thought from surfacing.

“These walls and paintings look very ordinary—worse than the works of street painters… As expected of the residence of the Dragon of Imagination. Is this the power and authority of an ancient god?” Leonard likewise felt emotional.

“That is possible.” Before Klein had time to give a more tactful answer, he heard the voice of his own heart. “Let us look at the murals on the other side as well, then analyze based on everything together.”

Leonard and Audrey did not object. They followed him toward the other side.

During this process, they discovered that inside this palace, even spirit bodies could not fly.

Because the murals were all enormous, it did not take long for the three of them to clearly see the corresponding contents.

And just the first mural near the entrance made Klein’s pupils abruptly dilate.

In that painting, a hard-covered book was being held in the hand of a grayish-blue-skinned giant with a single vertical eye, whose appearance could not be seen clearly.

“This…” Klein heard his own shocked and hesitant voice.

In the murals that followed, the common protagonist was that book bound with parchment and covered in deep-brown binding. It was obtained by elves. The writing on its surface changed. It was stored away. It was obtained by one person after another, changing hands and “wandering” until it flew into the clouds, reached the starry sky, and fell into an enormous claw.

In the mural immediately after that scene, the book seemed to have lost its connection to everything before. It abruptly appeared above the sea, inside a ship whose style was blurred.

In the second-to-last mural, it was obtained by a man wearing a top hat, who left the ship from earlier.

The final mural was behind the giant pillar suspected to be the throne of the Dragon of Imagination, Ankewelt. Its content showed that the book from before had encountered an ancient quill pen.

At that point, all the murals ended.

“0-08!” Leonard’s astonished voice echoed inside the hall.

“The Dragon of Imagination wanted to make this book and that pen form a set? What would happen? When we dealt with Ince Zangwill, that scene truly nearly appeared… But in the end, it still did not happen. Was that because the book fell into my hands and was sacrificed to Mr. Fool, or because Adam had already guarded against this and deliberately provided help?

“Right, earlier, in the travelogue, just as that ascetic mentioned the Angel of Imagination, Adam, the frost dragon came and attacked the camp… Was that the travelogue’s own will preventing him from finishing, or had Adam already heard it, cast His gaze over, and stirred a certain reaction?” Klein’s thoughts surged one after another, successively turning into language.

During this process, he could only control himself by treating The Fool as another existence.

While he “spoke,” Audrey’s thoughts were also presented:

“The contents on the murals here will become reality in the material world?”

[1] Adapted from Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Godiva.”