“Alright, now that we’re done, we should totally begin our exploration now.” Claud stretched his back. There was a small voice in his head urging him to push back the exploration to tomorrow, but that was just pure laziness. “First, however, we should get the two little fellows out.”

Two adorable little shapes meeped happily as Claud extracted them from his backpack, and they began to bounce around randomly. Within moments, a little silver ball was zooming around and bouncing off the walls of the place, and Claud had to stop it from acting like an idiot.

“Just because you can fly doesn’t mean you should bounce off the walls.” Lily held the little ball and pointed at Crown. “Look at Crown! So much more well-behaved.”

“Meep…”

“Meep?”

Claud looked at his little Divine Life Companion and shook his head. Popping the little box onto his hand, he said, “This here is Celestia. Last time, I wanted to bring you here and everything, but I could sense some danger just by thinking that, so I didn’t. It’s fine now, though.”

Handing the little guy over to Lily, who placed them on a nearby barrier that served as a table, Claud pulled out a Second Shadow.

“Where should we explore today?” Lily asked.

“Well, for one, we’re going to test a few things about the Second Shadow,” Claud replied. “And we’re going to test that by sending them there.”

He pointed at the building they explored the previous time. It was called the Secretary-General’s Office or something along those lines, but more importantly, it was a place that they were fairly familiar with. The danger level wasn’t that high, but even if it was, Claud had no qualms facing it.

Gazing at the black box in his hand, Claud fiddled with it, turning it into a headband that was meant to fit around someone’s nose, ears and eyes. The Second Shadow, when used, created a shadow that could be controlled by the person wearing the headband. The shadow’s immediate surroundings would be replicated and sent back to the headband, which the user could intimately feel by clenching his or her right fist.

It was hard to tell all this the last time he used it, but his senses were now more acute due to the completion of his fourth mana circuit. Given that he now had reassurance that they weren’t sending their mind into a shadow, Claud was all for using it very aggressively…well, there hadn’t been many chances to use it at that time.

Without much ado, he spawned a shadow and put on the weird headband. Right now, as his fist was unclenched, wearing the artefact wasn’t all that different from just wearing a blindfold, but the moment he clenched his fist…

His vision changed and his senses grew muted. Such a sensation would lead anyone to assume that their consciousness had shifted over to the shadow, but in reality, it was just a simulation that Claud had sank his consciousness into.

His movements were more clumsy than usual, and he felt like an old man waddling around with what was probably a case of bad knees.

There was no way he could fight like this.

Opening his right fist, Claud laid down on the bed and said, “It’s working fine. Go on!”

It didn’t take long before Claud, in his own shadow, was greeted by the sight of two idiots sitting on a translucent bed. A band was wrapped around their eyes, ears and nose, creating a most immersive experience that was triggered and maintained by him clenching his fist.

One of the artefact’s limitations was the mana expenditure, but Claud had that covered. More crucially, even if the Second Shadow ran out of mana, the user would first be disconnected. The shadow created would still linger for quite some time, allowing the user to jump back in after the Second Shadow was topped up with more mana.

Unclenching his fist, Claud said, “Let’s go.”

The two of them deactivated the barrier that was serving as the main door and stepped into the square. Without much of a fuss, Claud unclenched his fist, and the immersive illusion vanished.

Unclenching his fist, Claud pushed the metal band up from his eyes, before reactivating the barrier.

“It’s odd having to close the door after myself,” Claud muttered, before plopping back down on the bed. “But again, there are many odd things in existence.”

The shadow outside nodded. “Agreed.”

Pulling the metal band back onto his face, Claud entered the illusion once more. The world his Second Shadow was generating wasn’t as realistic as real life itself, even if it was directly based off real life. There were some things that seemed perennially off, especially when it came to his senses, creating some discomfort for him.

“Do you think the building’s changed?” Lily asked, her voice distant.

“The interior?” Claud asked. “Probably not.”

It was neat that they could speak out loud without needing to unclench their fists or anything. Claud hadn’t expected that to work, but when they were running through the Second Shadows during their preparations, Lily had discovered this really convenient function. To him, the more they learned about this artefact, the more suited it was for exploring dangerous areas. The only problematic part was its absence of combat ability entirely, and the inability to wield mana at all.

The shadow didn’t react well to physical damage either, so there was no chance of making an army with these things.

“Okay, good.” Lily made a sigh. “But that’ll mean we can’t get up to the very top easily. Do you still remember the time when we used the Sea-Queller?”

Claud nodded. “I’m wondering what happens when space collapses, though. I kinda want to take a look at what lies beyond.”

“No, I don’t think so…”

The two of them stopped at the entrance of the building. With his senses so muted, Claud could barely feel the distinctive chill he associated with entering this building, and neither did Lily.

They looked around the first floor. It was as stupidly defenceless as usual; the place was illuminated thoroughly by bright lights and the entrance was so unguarded that even a dead drunk guard would improve its security. They hadn’t tried to examine the first floor in detail previously, since their focus was on following the tested route upstairs.

Now, however, with the Second Shadow, they could change things around.

Ruined furniture that had been given a wide berth littered this place. Claud could vaguely tell that they were all from the same origin; it was as if a table had been broken apart by force for some reason.

“Lily, is it me, or did someone decide to break a table for no particular reason?”

She craned her neck and walked around the destroyed piece of furniture, and then nodded. “Looks like it, yes. Looks…like someone from our side did it, though.”

“Long ago, I guess.” Claud paused. “And I found the culprit.”

“Culprit?”

Claud pointed at a corpse that was buried under a particularly large piece of metal. A faint film of light covered the body, which hadn’t decayed at all. No particular stroke of genius was required to guess why the body hadn’t decayed, but this was proof that the two of them should avoid destroying or damaging the place in general.

Lily jumped, and then moved slightly closer to examine the film of light. Naturally, she didn’t think of touching it, and after looking her fill, she stepped away from the corpse slowly and returned to Claud’s side.

“Anything interesting?” Claud asked.

“Seems like one of us indeed,” Lily replied. “I saw some personal effects that came from Vacuos County.”

Claud nodded. “The only issue is not knowing why he died, but I’m sure this table has something to do with it.”

Stepping away slowly, the two of them poked around the first floor for a little while more, and then stopped at a small plaque that was lying on the ground. Despite untold years, the plaque was still reflective and everything, and the words carved onto it was still very much legible.

“So, this is the receptionist’s working place, huh.” Lily nodded. “Receptionist of the Buyeo Star Confederacy…I wonder what happened to the receptionist?”

“Probably dead,” Claud muttered. “Come on, let’s move on. And be careful of the spatial rifts. It shouldn’t affect us directly, but it takes mana to form a shadow.”

The shadow that represented Lily bobbed its head once, and the two of them headed up slowly. Taking slow steps, Claud kept his eyes peeled for the sudden appearance of deadly voids that would almost certainly end their little expedition today. Since these shadows didn’t bring the Sea-Queller — it was too valuable to give it to their exploration substitute — any spatial ruptures will definitely destroy these shadows.

It wouldn’t hurt, though.

Fortunately, the two of them arrived at the second floor without much incident, and once again, their greedy eyes began to scour the area.

What did this place hold for them?