Chapter 506: Drawing Near

While all eyes remained fixed on the conference everyone in the world was watching so closely...

Ambrose, who was at the heart of it all, lay sprawled across an enormous heap of gold coins, thoroughly savoring the sensation of being half-buried in wealth.

No one else around him, though, could share in his composure.

Harvey and his newly acquired fellow student, Selwyn, stood off to the side, utterly at a loss for how to respond as their master lounged about with not a shred of dignity befitting the role.

Selwyn couldn't resist nudging Harvey in the ribs and shooting him a pointed look.

Selwyn was decades older than Harvey, but Harvey had joined Ambrose first, making him the senior student by rank. In this awkward moment, naturally, the responsibility of speaking up fell to him.

But Harvey said nothing at all. He simply stood there quietly, until Selwyn finally couldn't help but whisper, "Is our master... always like this?"

Harvey said, resigned, "Sometimes... sometimes, yeah."

"And how long does it usually last?"

"Just wait a bit longer."

"...Fine."

......

Ambrose seemed to overhear the two students' whispered exchange, because he suddenly clambered up out of the pile of gold and, in one motion, drew the entire hoard back into the Golden Throne.

The Golden Throne, which had since been warped by the kouto's faith, had taken on a distinctly ugly, misshapen appearance. It was still gleaming gold, certainly, but undeniably grotesque all the same.

Ambrose didn't mind in the least. Gold's essential nature stayed the same no matter what shape it took, much like Ambrose himself, whose will and ambitions remained eternally unchanged regardless of his form.

Once he'd tucked away the latest tremendous haul of gold he'd earned, Ambrose finally turned to his two students. "The two of you aren't off working? Why are you standing around watching me? Have you actually finished your assignments?"

Selwyn glanced at Harvey. Once he nodded, she answered, "Master, nearly all of the island's facilities have been completed. Our first wave of sales personnel have already gotten quite skilled at their jobs. The goblins the dwarves sent over all have decent aptitude, and they picked up your sales plan quickly. All of them are hoping to meet you in person, though. They'd like you to come give them some kind of speech."

Ambrose was quite pleased with his newest student. When it came to managing the island's day-to-day operations, the older woman clearly outperformed Harvey, who was still something of a greenhorn by comparison.

And all diviners shared a strong intuition for people. When paired with real skill at persuasion, that gave them an overwhelming advantage in any negotiation.

No wonder Alderien had called Selwyn a valuable asset. She truly had solved no shortage of problems for Ambrose already.

But upon hearing Selwyn mention the goblins, Ambrose's expression soured slightly.

"Goblins are more trouble than they're worth. A clever few are decent enough at business, sure, but they have no sense of boundaries whatsoever, and they tend to leave an absolute mess in their wake for other people to clean up. What they're really skilled at is getting someone else to handle the fallout for them. So don't spend too much time dealing with those goblins directly. Use them and discard them—that's the correct approach."

Selwyn fully agreed with that assessment. If manpower weren't so tight, she wouldn't have been able to stand having those foul-smelling goblins constantly underfoot in the first place.

All they ever cared about was gold, and they'd tried to filch off multiple transactions already. Selwyn had been forced to use some fairly harsh methods just to put a stop to their side deals. Left unchecked, these goblins would happily pass off Ambrose's own products as their own personal stock and report the difference later as "spoilage."

The goblins could be safely ignored, but there were other matters that couldn't be brushed aside so easily.

Selwyn told Ambrose, "Master, we've finished making preparations for your friends."

"Oh? Already?"

The members of the Elegiac Society had arrived, but Ambrose had simply been enjoying the sensation of lying buried in gold a bit too much. It was time to get up and handle actual business.

Ambrose said to his two students, "Go on, get back to work, both of you."

Once Selwyn had left the vault, Harvey, who'd deliberately lagged a few steps behind, suddenly turned back, his expression uncharacteristically grave. "Master, you've been acting strange lately. I have something I want to ask you. Please don't lie to me. Have you... foreseen your death?"

Ambrose glanced at Harvey, puzzled. "Isn't all this workload enough to clog up that overactive imagination of yours?"

"This isn't my imagination running wild, Teacher. Don't forget, I'm a diviner too, and my talent is actually stronger than yours. You're not the only one to have seen your future. I've seen it too."

"And? You already know the answer, so why ask?"

"But..."

Ambrose cackled. "Who was it who once bragged that, if he saw his own death coming tomorrow, he'd calmly review his notes, write out a proper will, and quietly wait for his end? And it's not even you who's dying!"

"I..."

Harvey found himself at a loss for what to say. Had the lich who'd once devoted himself entirely to escaping fate really made his peace with all this so quickly?

Harvey couldn't stop himself. "Master, maybe we could try the same method you used to save me! I could work together with Selwyn—"

"Enough, Harvey!"

Ambrose cut him off sharply. "Selwyn doesn't even know that method exists yet. Are you really willing to burn her one and only chance of being saved on my account?"

When diviners foresaw their own death, the only possible solution was for other diviners to reverse the past and save them. But the moment a diviner learned of this method, it would no longer work.

Ambrose understood exactly what flaw existed in the method he'd worked out for himself, which was precisely why he had no intention of wasting effort on something so ultimately pointless.

Harvey's fists clenched tightly in frustration, but there was nothing he could do. In the end, he had no choice but to unclench his hands helplessly.

Ambrose walked over and clapped him on the shoulder. "From the moment we first began peering into the corners of fate itself, the people around us have walked, one by one, toward their own predetermined deaths. Right around the time you start going numb to it, your own turn pops up. Every diviner goes through this, eventually. Selwyn brought you her notes. Have you gone through them? Do you understand them now?"

Harvey nodded silently.

His fellow student hadn't just delivered another diviner's last letter. She'd also brought along the magical notes that old man had spent his entire life researching. Harvey had made time to study them, and he'd more or less grasped the full body of knowledge behind Selwyn's lineage by now.

Ambrose marveled. "Your talent really is something else. I'm starting to understand why the Goddess of Fate went to such lengths to steal you away from Demogorgon's grip."

Harvey had once been tricked into worshipping Demogorgon and even became a full warlock in his service. Then, after glancing through just a handful of pages of Ambrose's own Introduction to Divination Magic, he'd successfully switched his entire career on the spot. Ambrose simply refused to believe something like that could have happened without the Goddess of Fate's direct intervention.

If the Goddess of Fate ever appointed chosen ones at all, Harvey would absolutely be one of them.

The only trouble was that this particular goddess was famously fickle. There was no telling how many more blows from her fists—or her boot—Harvey would actually be able to withstand.

"Master, is there anything I can do for you?"

Harvey felt genuinely wretched. Even the day he'd learned of his own impending death hadn't hurt this much. Like so many of the people who'd gathered around Ambrose, Harvey had grown up a poor child who'd never known much warmth in his life. It was only after falling in with this supposedly "evil" lich that he'd actually come to know real care and affection.

At the very least, this master of his had passed on everything he knew, holding nothing back. And when Harvey himself had once stood on the brink of ruin, it was this same master who'd reversed time itself to bring him back, at personal expense to himself.

And yet, faced with his master's impending death, there was nothing at all Harvey could actually do.

Ambrose thought it over for a moment, then said to Harvey, "Fate can probably be interpreted in countless different ways. Mr. Misfortune, Selwyn, and I all walked our own path all the way to the level of a legend—and in the end, every single one of us still lost to fate.

"Every diviner, eventually, has to stand against fate itself. Every diviner, eventually, gets defeated by fate. That's practically our shared destiny at this point. But you... You still have a real chance. Harvey, you may well be the diviner with the best chance any of us have ever had of breaking free from Fate's grip entirely. Don't let us down.

"If you're asking what you can actually do, I want you to walk further down the paths the three of us carved out than any of us ever managed. And even if you can't manage that yourself, at least clear a wider road for the ones who come after you, so they can get one step closer to the finish line than we ever did."

"Master... I will. I swear I'll make it happen."

Harvey lowered his head and squeezed his eyes shut, but the tears slipped free from the corners of his eyes regardless.

Ambrose walked past him without another word. This student of his had weathered his own share of dramatic ups and downs in life. He'd be able to push through this on his own, without needing to be coddled through it.

Leaving the vault behind, Ambrose made his way to the far side of the island, to the underground palace built specifically to house the members of the Elegiac Society.

Though all members of the Elegiac Society were legends, and none of them save Heki Stone had much reason to fear sunlight, a whole procession of undead walking openly across the island would have been more than a little alarming to onlookers. To avoid disrupting business, the group had graciously agreed to stay tucked out of sight for the time being.

Hurrying to catch up, Ambrose found Heki Stone already propped up behind an easel, brush in hand, apparently quite absorbed in his work.

Every member of the Elegiac Society was present and accounted for... except for the President.

A crowd of undead stood arranged in various poses before Heki Stone, letting the vampire capture them on canvas.

The moment Ambrose appeared, Gareth called out cheerfully, "Bro, you're finally free! Get over here! This spot's reserved for you."

Gareth gestured toward the open space beside Black Rose, saved specially for Ambrose.

It was fortunate this was a painting and not a photograph. Otherwise, they'd have had to wait an awfully long time for Ambrose to finally show up.

Ambrose walked over to the group, puzzled. "What suddenly gave you all the idea to sit for a painting?"

Black Rose explained with a smile. "The vampire pointed out how rare it is to have everyone gathered together like this. Given that we're all here because of such a historic occasion, he thought we ought to commemorate it properly with a painting."

Ambrose nodded. That made enough sense.

The members of the Elegiac Society were each formidable powers unto themselves, so having everyone together in one place truly was a rare occurrence. And with an international peace treaty and a divine wedding both happening at once, this moment genuinely was shaping up to be a significant chapter in history.

Heki Stone really did have a good head on his shoulders. A painting like this would fetch a fortune someday.

Ambrose, too, began to wonder if he should arrange for all the visiting kings to pose for a group portrait too, before the conference officially began.

Imagine the orc king standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the emperor of Lyon. What an image that would make! That might genuinely go down as a masterpiece for the ages.

While Ambrose was turning that idea over in his head, he suddenly heard Heki Stone say, "Hey, don't just sit there looking like a skeleton, would you? Nobody's going to recognize you like that! And look around—you're the only bag of bones in the whole group! Your whole vibe is completely off!"

Ambrose blinked, glanced around at his assembled friends, and realized the vampire had a point.

Black Rose's body had been preserved in mercury through some method or another, allowing her to retain the elegant, striking beauty she'd possessed in life. Despite being headless, Gareth cut a fairly dashing figure regardless thanks to his physique and armor. Alabastra had shown up in the form of a soul.

Aige, naturally, had projected a fully humanoid avatar as well, as did the ghoul Yugasi. His intimidating fangs notwithstanding, he possessed a body of flesh and blood, and an undeniably graceful bearing.

The last member, someone Ambrose didn't personally recognize, sat crouched on the ground, towering over the rest of the group by a wide margin. He looked a bit dull-witted, honestly, but he, too, had a distinctly humanoid form.

As for Poet, he stood posing dramatically with his lute in hand, looking every bit the part of a wandering bard.

Ambrose let out an anguished cry from the depths of his soul: "Am I seriously the only pure skeleton in the Elegiac Society?!"

Heki Stone shot him a look of pure exasperation and hurried him along. "Just shift into your human form already. Your black hair and eyes actually make you pretty handsome. If I paint you as a skeleton, people are going to think you're some summoned servant thrall or something."

Ambrose flipped the vampire off, but obediently shifted back into the form he'd worn before his own transformation—black hair, dark eyes, the look of a somewhat world-weary young man.

There was no denying that Heki Stone had a genuine gift for art. The whole group held their poses for perhaps three hours. Heki Stone churned out several finished paintings in that time, one after another.

Producing oil paintings at that pace alone was remarkable enough. But the work was also genuinely excellent. Every single figure was captured with striking, lifelike precision.

"But why are you standing right in the center of every single one of these?"

Ambrose pointed accusingly at the central figure in each painting, thoroughly annoyed. Every single canvas had Heki Stone himself at the middle of the composition, despite the fact that he hadn't even been standing with the rest of the group at any point!

Heki Stone said, unbothered, "Of course I had to paint myself into it. I could hardly stand there and paint at the same time, could I? I had to improvise a little. I painted myself in first, and only then arranged the rest of you around me. You wouldn't understand even if I explained it. You have absolutely no artistic sensibility whatsoever."

Ambrose shot the vampire a look of pure disdain. He never missed a single opportunity to steal the spotlight for himself.

Still, the paintings were already finished, and there was little point complaining about it now.

It was time for actual business.

Ambrose addressed the assembled friends before him. "All of you should have already received the private messages I sent. I trust everyone understands what needs to be done. If anyone has questions, now's the time to ask. When the moment finally comes, I want everything to go exactly according to plan."

Everyone nodded, signaling their understanding.

The Elegiac Society represented the single most crucial component of the entire plan, and Ambrose had assigned every single one of them a specific role. Aige and Poet, arguably the two most powerful members of the entire group, naturally had the most difficult responsibilities.

Just as Ambrose was preparing to walk everyone through the plan once more, the red-skinned giant finally spoke up.

His voice rumbled like a great bell tolling through the depths of an ancient tomb. He asked Ambrose, "You said Arthur Lyon has been revived. Where is he?"

Ambrose regarded the giant carefully. Though this was the first time they'd actually met face-to-face, he'd already exchanged words with the senior before through the group chat. He was one of the remaining giants of a long-vanished race—a relic of that lost lineage, not unlike the heroic spirits found down at the Arena of Storms.

This particular giant had been the very first such heroic spirit ever created, and had once been kept on display within a city. After the giants went extinct, that city had eventually collapsed and sank beneath the earth, sealing him away inside it along with everything else.

Across countless years buried below ground, the remnant of flesh and bone had somehow developed a will of its own, becoming a truly unique kind of undead. He'd given himself the name Im.

Technically, Im was a type of zombie, though he stood many times more powerful than any ordinary zombie by comparison.

Given the sheer span of time over which he'd existed, Im had actually taken part in the original war fought to bring down the Dragon Tyrant, generations ago.

Im had once been a comrade-in-arms of Arthur Lyon's. Hearing him ask after his old friend, Ambrose could only explain, "The Holy King is currently occupied with preparations. I'm afraid there's no way for the two of you to meet just yet—but don't worry, you'll have your chance to catch up once the day of the conference arrives."

Im didn't press the matter further, offering Ambrose only a single, silent nod.

Ambrose glanced around the room, confirming no one else had further questions, then declared solemnly, "Well then, if there's nothing else, I hereby formally declare the Elegiac Society's dragon-slaying operation officially underway."