Northern District, inside the residence Audrey had provided.
"He's hiding something from me."
Silas said suddenly, half reclined on the soft sofa.
"Meow?"
Luna, curled up beside him, raised her head at the sound of his voice and glanced over, but upon realizing he wasn't speaking to her, lay back down and rested her chin on her front paws with a yawn.
"You mean that teammate of yours, Leonard Mitchell?"
M's figure surfaced on the sofa across from him. She sat properly upright, the fingers of both hands pressed together, her golden eyes gleaming.
"Your guess is correct. Judging by the subtle look on his face at the time, he must be concealing part of the story. And whatever it is might be quite important, important enough to make him hesitate."
"He only just joined the Church, and he's a high Sequence Beyonder whose background I don't know. It's understandable that he'd be wary of me and hold something back."
Silas said, letting his hand slide down to stroke Luna's fur.
"Here I thought you'd say he might be a mole planted by that Church."
M said with a smile.
Leonard, a mole?
"Impossible."
Silas refuted without hesitation. "That guy's situation is a special one."
Back in Tingen, Leonard had behaved a little differently from usual. And it wasn't just him. Silas himself, and Klein too, each carried their own secrets.
There was no need to even mention Silas's own case; Klein could return from death, and the secret he carried was enough to provoke a counterattack from the Illusory Sea Tide itself.
As for Leonard, surely he too had secrets of his own he wasn't willing to share.
"Actually, I suspect he discovered something back in Tingen."
Before cutting in just now, Silas had, with his keen hearing, caught part of the exchange between the two of them, and suspected that after returning to Tingen, Leonard had figured something out. But what exactly it was...
"It's almost three."
M reminded him, rising from the sofa.
A crimson glow rose and fell before his eyes, and when Audrey opened them again, she found herself once more within the Fool's Kingdom of God.
A boundless gray mist filled her vision, hazy, indistinct, without end.
And the ancient castle where they gathered stood atop that sea of mist, grand and time worn, as though it had existed forever.
No matter how many times she had come here, the sight of this magnificent scene never failed to stir excitement deep in Miss Justice's heart.
Joy welled up within her. She rose to her feet and greeted the presence seated at the head of the table. "Good afternoon, Mr. Fool."
Once that figure gave a nod in response, she turned toward those seated below, welcoming each member of the Tarot Club in turn.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Hanged Man. Good afternoon, Mr. Sun..."
As she greeted them, she couldn't help but observe the people before her with the instincts of a "psychoanalyst."
Hm, Mr. Hanged Man had recovered his composure since last time. At the previous gathering, hearing what Mr. Temperance had done seemed to have hit him hard. Temperance, Sun, and Mr. World all seemed to show no particular emotion.
Miss Magician looked a mix of anticipation and nerves, perhaps she'd already pinned down the location of the Aurora Order's "Mr. X," but seemed a little afraid at the thought of having to communicate with Mr. Temperance. Audrey's eyes, green as emeralds, lingered on each of them in turn.
Strange, Mr. Moon looked somewhat depressed.
She recalled he'd issued several arrest warrants against followers of the " Primordial Moon" a while back; was it connected to that? Meanwhile Ms. Hermit looked quite pleased about something, though it wasn't clear why.
But Justice, Audrey, would soon understand the reason for the Hermit's good mood.
"Honored Mr. Fool."
Once the routine round of greetings had ended, Hermit Cattelya spoke up, seemingly unable to wait any longer. "I've gathered three pages of Roselle's diary."
Gathered?
Given to you by the "Mysterious Queen," you mean?
Hanged Man Alger sneered inwardly, though outwardly he showed no reaction, simply watching as the "Admiral of Stars" manifested the three diary pages and laid them reverently before the head of the long table.
Everyone waited quietly for the Fool to finish reading the diary.
I wonder what kind of hidden knowledge might be contained in the diary the "Mysterious Queen" provided, Silas thought to himself as he waited.
If he and Bernadette were to ask, perhaps they could obtain it from her after paying some price.
But that would risk revealing that he knew Roselle personally. Though she'd likely already guessed some connection between him and the Fool, exposing it further wasn't a good idea.
Just as his thoughts began to wander, the presence beyond the mist had already set down the pages, and asked in a calm tone, "What is your request?"
The question was of course directed at Hermit Cattelya.
Cattelya, as though prepared for this moment, gave a bow before speaking. "I want to know why Emperor Roselle descended into madness in his later years."
The moment the question left her lips, it sent a shock through the hearts of everyone else present.
Roselle had fallen into madness in his later years?
The one who had prompted the Hermit's question was the "Mysterious Queen" standing behind her. Given that person's relationship with Emperor Roselle, she should have understood his state at the time quite well.
If that was true, then the reason Roselle had been abandoned by everyone close to him in his later years was, in fact, because he had gone mad?
Thinking of this, Temperance, Silas, frowned slightly.
That predecessor, the crosser from another world, had reached a high Sequence as a Beyonder. Driving him to madness could not have been a simple thing.
Let's hear how Mr. Fool answers first.
The others all seemed to share the same thought, holding their breath, watching the presence at the head of the long table.
How would I know that.
Klein muttered inwardly, unsettled by the weight of everyone's gaze fixed on him.
The three pages of Roselle's diary came from three different eras. The first page recorded that he had become a Sequence 2 Angel of the Savant Pathway.
With a true god already at the top of that pathway, that meant he had reached the highest level attainable within it.
The Church of Steam seemed to have grown somewhat wary of him because of this, and had even brought his youngest son into the Church, but this had only stirred up his rebellious streak all the more.
On the second page, Roselle expressed his curiosity about the "Primordial Moon" and his resolve to switch pathways.
He seemed to have intended to leap to the neighboring Sequence 1 of Mystery Pryer, and to build an airship to land on the Red Moon... one could only call it courting death.
On the third page, Roselle's emotions had completely spiraled out of control.
He had written down, in obvious agitation, lines like "how could this be," "impossible," "everything, everything will be destroyed," as though, in order to resist the apocalypse that was surely coming, he had intended to keep ascending, to become a true god.
So then, how should he answer the Hermit?
Klein thought it over, then gave a light chuckle. "Spurred or influenced by some unknown cause, Roselle turned his gaze toward Sequence 0 in his later years."
It was, in its way, an answer deliberately left ambiguous.