<h4>Chapter 596.1: Are You Still Around? (1)</h4>


    Roel Ascart had gained a deeper understanding of the Crown’s Stones, one of his core powers, in the most recent Witness State, when his soul was fused together with the ancient cmities.


    That was the reason he intuitively sensed the presence of folded space in Tark Stronghold.


    Tark Stronghold appeared imprable on the surface, but in terms of spatial resilience, it was much frailer now than it was in the real world after being devoured into this space.


    And the area Roel was intending to head to would be even frailer than this.


    If there was anything spatial magicians had uncovered over their centuries of research, it was thatyers of space became increasingly unstable when stacked upon each other. This was simr to how the foundation of a building was the strongest, and it slowly became increasingly unstable the higher up one went.


    Anyone who carelessly stepped into a space too frail to carry their weight would be forever lost in the crevices of the void.


    There had been cases of spatial schrs dying in that manner in the midst of their research, which was why Wilhelmina was particrly worried about him.


    In truth, Roel had prepared a hand regarding that.


    As the white fog enveloped his body, his senses abruptly nked out as if he had passed out, but he could still keenly sense Wilhelmina’s presence, albeit in a different dimension. The two of them were linked by the heart beating energetically in her chest.


    Wilhelmina might have ovee the rejection effect, but that didn’t mean she hadpletely assimted Roel’s heart yet. Rather, the heart had be his return coordinates. As long as she was around, he would be able to find his way back home.


    Thisyer of guarantee calmed Roel’s nerves.


    With the white fog enveloping him, he began to descend. It was a disorientating sensation, but having experienced numerous spatial spells in recent days, he was already starting to be ustomed to it. In fact, he had even made preparations for all kinds of situations.


    From his past experience, he knew that it would be nigh impossible for him to predict thending point of the spatial transference. He was lucky that he had been transported to Tark Stronghold’s basement the previous time, a rtively safe ce.


    There was no guarantee that it would be the same this time around.


    So, he tightly held two magic tools and grimly prepared himself for battle while feeling a distant heartbeat thumping at the same frequency as his own.


    When the darkness finally receded, he realized that his earlier tension had been unnecessary. He was no longer in Tark Stronghold but in a solemn, graceful pce decorated with all kinds of ornaments.


    This silver pce full of gleaming gemstones was gorgeous in every sense of the word, but Roel was astonished instead of awestruck. This was a ce filled with memories for him, as he had once resided and fought here.


    This was one of the three divine temples worshiping Sia, the Moonsoul Tower.


    …


    To Roel Ascart, his time at the Moonsoul Tower felt like a dream.


    He was always putting his life on the line to save others in the Witness State, though he would also receive rewards from the System in ordance with what he had achieved.


    In the previous Witness State, he had identified his goal to be correcting his ancestor’s regrets, but in the Moonsoul Tower, the heart of his greatest enemy’s base, he somehow reunited and connected with Her, earning Her affection while filling up the gap in his heart.


    ‘Mother’ had been a foreign word to the young Roel Ascart.


    His mother had passed away shortly after his birth, and Carter was busy with his military duties. Due to that, Roel spent most of his childhood with his servants, deprived of parental love.


    Parental love might not seem to be of great import to adults, but it was much more pivotal to a child’s healthy development than most people expected. Both paternal and maternal love were important for a child’s mental well-being.


    Roel had been running down the wrong track before he regained the memories of his previous life. There was no doubt that the early death of his mother had yed an important factor in his bing the antagonist in <i>Eyes of the Chronicler</i> and his eventual tragic death.


    Roel’s mother, Maria Ascart, was the daughter of a viscount house in the Saint Mesit Theocracy. She had died of an illness when Roel was very young. Her family was far beneath the Ascart House in terms of noble hierarchy, but that was hardly an issue at all.


    Maria and Carter had fallen in love with each other in the academy prior to their marriage, so they were naturallypatible. The Ascart House’s family tree had been so thin for so long that the elders in the family would have been delighted even if Carter married amoner.


    Maria was from a single-parent family, and her father passed away shortly after her marriage, so Roel didn’t have any close rtives on his maternal side.


    That was roughly all Roel knew about Maria, with most of it being hearsay from the servants.


    There was a portrait of Maria in the Ascarts’ manor, which was drawn for Carter and Maria’s marriage. Carter had specially hired a famous artist in the Holy Capital for it. In the portrait, Maria was a gentle and beautifuldy with an exceptionally charming smile.


    However, this bit of information was not enough for Roel to build up an impression of his mother. Even Anna, who had been with him from a young age, knew more about Maria than he did. That was why he had never understood what a ‘mother’ truly meant until he met Her.


    Just like Maria was Roel’s biological mother, the Mother Goddess was the mother of the Kingmaker and all beings. Her maternal love was pure, devoid of any selfishness or agenda. Roel’s mental barriers came copsing down against Her loving embrace and selfless sacrifices.


    Looking at the familiar divine temple, Roel’s heartstrings were pulled by the memories of the time they had spent together. He stood dazed for a moment before he finally moved his feet to navigate his way through this familiar temple.


    The room where he was first attacked by the Death God.


    The High Elves’ quarter where the scepter of the Six Cmities was sealed.


    The banquet hall where he met the other race leaders of the Mother Goddess’ faction.


    These familiar venues evoked his memories, bringing him on a trip to the past. He eventually halted his footsteps before a garden.


    “…She’s not here?”


    Roel’s heart sank in disappointment. The garden was still decorated in the way he remembered it when he left, but the person who should have been there wasn’t there. Even the picturesque scenery of massive cities to the backdrop of a vast in had been obscured by a white fog.


    <i>Did Shrouding Fog devour the Moonsoul Tower in the Ancient Era? </i>Roel wondered, though he quickly refuted the possibility.


    Both the Mother Goddess and the Six Cmities had fallen into a deep sleep following their final battle in the Ancient Era. The real Moonsoul Tower was destroyed during that catastrophic war. This was likely to be an illusion created by Shrouding Fog’s memories.


    On the bright side, Roel had already found what he was searching for here.


    The entire Moonsoul Tower was shrouded in thick fog. He would asionally spot armored silhouettes shing across the fog as if shbacks about the past, yet these silhouettes weren’t the ancient races that had once lived here but Tark Stronghold’s personnel.


    Roel had no idea what the rules governing this ce were, but Tark Stronghold’s personnel had somehow be a part of the white fog. From time to time, he would hear murmurs of human speech from the armored silhouettes drifting along with the white fog, and it made him feel both ufortable and helpless.


    Knowing that he had to find a way to save them, he squeezed the middle of his forehead to snap out of it.


    He intuitively knew that he could open an exit portal linking to where Wilhelmina was, so it was possible for him to bring the trapped Tark Stronghold personnel out from here, but the problem was that he didn’t have the means to control the white fog nor to revert them to their original state.


    <i>I can’t possibly store them in bottles to bring them out, right? </i>Roel sighed in frustration.


    He couldn’t leave the trapped Tark Stronghold personnel in the lurch, not when he had finally reached them. He had always wanted to save them. Even as a student, he had put together a research team to trante and verify ancient documents so as to gather as much information about Shrouding Fog as possible. How could he give up when he was already on thest step?


    Besides, by saving Tark Stronghold’s personnel, he was, to some extent, saving himself too.


    He had no idea how to free the people trapped inside the white fog, but he wasn’t too worried about that since he knew people who might have the answer to that question—for instance, the ancient gods he had contracted with.


    “…It should be about time, right?” Roel murmured.


    His golden eyes lit up as he carefully channeled his mana to his Origin Attribute to re-establish the windows of connection he had with his contracted ancient gods.


    His four windows of connection were restored within a single second.


    In the blood-colored sunset ins, brilliant crimson lights shone from the hollowed eyes of a humongous skeletal giant.


    In a cold mountain valley, a massive serpent that hadin dormant for a long time began to stir.


    In a majestic city, the lips of a ck-haired witch curled into an ambiguous smile.


    In a dimly-lit library, an orange-haired girl slowly put down the book she was reading.