Omni-Mastery

"Alright, it doesn\'t seem right to ask more than once for your own reasons, but I believe it shouldn\'t be too much to ask for the location of the \'Future Teller\' or at least his followers…"

Although I wouldn\'t normally seek to meet another player suspect unless I have completely grasped their identity in case one of them had malicious intent, this \'Future Teller\' seemed to be an entity that is completely shrouded in mystery, which appeared to be somewhat similar to my own complex collection of identities.

Most importantly, in the case he is truly a player, his ability to create quests made him a counterpart who could exchange benefits with me on the same level, he completely deserved to be actively sought by me even when considering the potential risk involved!

Naturally, I didn\'t plan to immediately meet him and expose my identity so thoughtlessly without even trying to observe him from afar, but having the piece of information that contained his location or even the way to locate him was crucial so that I can start investigating him when possible.

"That… I don\'t have the answer to that question as well. However, it isn\'t because I don\'t want to tell you this time, it\'s just that we don\'t have a way to locate him either."

"Is that so? Even the top clan of the domain\'s intelligence collecting ability couldn\'t get a wide-ranged location at the very least?"

Considering that the \'Future Teller\' periodically sent his followers to deliver his \'advice\' to various random people, it wouldn\'t be that hard to follow them to get a vague location of high diameter, especially when taking the fact that the Dragon Clan\'s higher-ups valued his \'advice\' into consideration.

\'They should have at least monitored him as a person of strategic value…\'

Even if the Dragon Clan sought nothing but peace, an entity whose advice could change the future of an event like a battle would obviously threaten that peace they valued, so it would be strange if they let him be without even basic observation.

"Like I said, we really don\'t know. The Future Teller not only changes his location quite often but all of his followers are untraceable past certain points as if they were never there to begin with…"

\'Hmmmm…\'

Just as I started to think it through, the elder who has been silent from the very start of the discussion opened his mouth…

"I know it\'s not very convincing, but I once gave it a try myself and achieved nothing in the end, a certain trusted person that I know also assured me to just leave the Future Teller to his own devices without worrying about him if I really wanted the best for the domain."

It seemed as if he sensed the doubts in my eyes even though only less than a second had passed, and for some unknown reason, I felt as if his words did really assure me deep inside.

\'This is…\'

"The most that I can tell you which is also the extent of my knowledge of this case is that there have been sightings of a group of organized fighters centered around one person that went around hunting the Shadow Alliance\'s uncontrolled \'hounds\' and protecting neutral parties, but they still similarly move away too fast without a trace. The only reason we got that piece of information is that the sightings have been quite frequent."

"Great Elder…"

"It\'s alright, he deserves to know of this since he has the answer that we seek. Shortening the time of our critical investigation by a few weeks is worth more than sharing a simple rumor coupled with our speculations."

\'This can be quite a lead…\'

Even though the effect of the Great Elder\'s words made me quite wary of what might be the cause behind it, this \'rumor\' he shared did hold some value of its own, and while it might not give the \'Future Teller\' a 100% certain \'Player Stamp\', it pointed out his actions which seemed to follow our principle of \'Grinding\' as well as fighting for NPCs.

Moreover, while uncertain, his way of moving presented the possibility of meeting with him as long as I started working on eliminating Corrupted in earnest.

\'In that case…\'

Obviously, since it seemed like there was no possibility of meeting or collaborating as early as possible then the best code of action was to proceed in my own \'Dragon Clan\' route and stop thinking too hard about the player suspect codenamed \'Future Teller\' till the most opportune moment presents itself.

"Much appreciated, I do believe this should be considered enough as an answer for my request. Either way, even though I might not be what the \'Future Teller\' presented me to be, We do share the same target of stopping what the Shadow Alliance has started. Naturally, filling the parts that you had yet to confirm would prove beneficial to both of us. You can start asking what you desire to know."

Looking at the Great Elder rather than the Clan Leader, he didn\'t seem to have the intention of being the one to answer as he closed his eyes and returned to being a silent stander even though his standing should be higher than that of the Clan Leader.

"It\'s great that we are on the same page. In that case, would you mind if we start with the origin of the Shadow Alliance\'s newfound strength?"

On the other hand, the Clan Leader once again started taking the lead, albeit speaking in a more polite yet trusting way as if the Great Elder\'s intervention with the discussion had more than one meaning to it.

"No problem, it\'s actually nothing too complicated as one might think, according to what I observed from the chasers who hunted us on the way here, I can completely confirm that what the Shadow Alliance had announced is nothing but the truth, the whole cause of their rising strength is one simple resource…"

"Elemental Crystals."

"Eh?"