Half-step Purgatory

Durin stroked the black cat on the armrest of his chair, sitting on the black leather sofa. Through the glasses perched on his nose, his gaze passed over the long table in front of him and settled on the man kneeling on the carpet:
"I understand, you've made money in Naples, your business has been very successful, and you've led a happy life. You've had those secret police, friends in both the law and the underground, and even the Royal Family speaking on your behalf."
"You don't need a friend like me, I know that. You're afraid of owing me a favor, and you don't want to get involved in troubles."
"But now you come to me and say, 'I beg you, Mr. Durin of the Corleon family, please help me seek justice, so that my life and my family will not suffer and sink into despair.'
Yet, in your eyes, I was nothing more than a second-rate artist involved in movies and music. Even at the brink of death, you still show me such disrespect, not even willing to call me by my title... Keeper of Secrets."

Durin's Diary

The greeting from her new student drew Marian's attention away from the training ground.


As the new student mentor at the capital's Mage Academy, the redhead looked at the boy in front of her, a fourth-year student who had been in the academy since childhood.


"What is it, child?" Realizing she couldn't remember the name of the child before her, Marian sighed inwardly—there were five thousand seven hundred and twenty-one children at the academy, distributed across seven different grades and six different Specialization Towers. Remembering all their names was an impossible task indeed.


"Mrs. Marian, will she also be attending the welcome dinner for the new students tonight?"


Following the direction of his finger, Mrs. Marian saw a silver-haired girl playing with a little Star Phase Dragon.


Antanya Aye, a girl as cold and aloof as an iceberg.


Chapter 2: We Prayed For Summer