At the time when Sigurd arrived at the room where the powerful energy came from, the door was closed.
The Nerthus recognized the voice of Theodor's mother on the other side of it but preferred not to meddle in her affairs so he decided to sit in the hallway without spying on the conversation inside the room.
Meanwhile inside: Darthañan had dressed and with Frigglene they were sitting next to their children.
“Explain to me again how you opened the padlock,” Darthañan said in an obsessive way that scared Elizabeth.
Frigglene hit her husband and trying to calm her little daughter whose eyes were starting to water down, she said:
“Don’t worry darling. We are not upset. Your dad is very excited because you accomplished something incredible.”
“I already knew that Eli is incredible. And, and I'm also amazing.” Theodor interrupted doing the gestures and poses that an old man would do when explaining things to his disciples.
“Yes, you are the best children we could ask for,” Frigglene answered, kissing his son.
“Agg!” Shouted the boy, running to the other side of the room. Theodor still considered kissing as a form of weakness.
“Please Eli, I need to know,” said Darthañan staring at his daughter.
The human's obsession with understanding the mysteries of magic was such that it seemed fanatic.
Elizabeth, listening to her mother, although she was still scared of her father's reaction, decided to tell them what she did.
“When I took the puzzle I moved it this way and then with a force I turned it to this side.”
“Just that?” asked Darthañan, surprised.
“Yes,” Elizabeth answered a little nervous.
Darthañan grabbed the padlock almost snatching it from his daughter, and as he saw his daughter do he began to move the pieces in the same way that Elizabeth indicated. Meanwhile, Frigglene watched the book that her daughter carried on her legs. It was not very thick, maybe it only had 50 pages. The cover was decorated with runes made of precious gems and materials that she could not recognize. A mystical aura emanated around it.
“How ingenious!” Darthañan exclaimed after having played with the padlock for several minutes.
He had had Elizabeth show him the process and repeated it several times until he finally understood how it worked.
“The padlock not only requires the puzzle to be solved, but it also takes force to activate the final mechanism. Once activated, it only opens when it detects that the user is under fifteen,” Darthañan said, almost laughing with excitement. “No wonder no one could open it, none of us fulfilled the last requirement.”
“Why would someone put a condition like that on the padlock?” Frigglene asked, stopping to see the magic book.
“You know how eccentric magicians are. And in a way, it's a good idea. No one who manages to steal the box would think of giving the precious object to a child to open it.”
“Have you seen the book yet?” she asked her husband.
“Which book?” Darthañan replied following the direction Frigglene was looking at.
Darthañan's eyes widened.
" Eli, can I see it? " Darthañan stammered, speaking with the shyness of a small boy trying to talk to the girl he liked.
Elizabeth offered the book to her dad. Anyway, she didn't even know how to read and it was not what she had expected to find: candy or toys. But the moment the book left her hands, it disappeared and reappeared on the girl's legs.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
" An object that is attached to the soul of its owner, " Darthañan murmured with fascination.
" This is dangerous, " said Frigglene.
“Eli, can you imagine the book disappears?” Darthañan asked calmer when hearing the words of his wife.
A girl walking with a book full of jewels and a powerful, albeit contained, the magical aura would bring much attention. The main problem being that to eliminate the union between the object and its owner's soul there were only two options: kill the owner or ingest a rare and expensive plant that would allow the owner to voluntarily eliminate the bond.
The moment Elizabeth did what her father asked her, the book vanished as if it had never existed.
“Wow!” Theodor exclaimed, jumping from the top of the bunk beds to where his parents and sister were sitting.
Elizabeth was as surprised as her brother to see the book disappear.
" Perfect, " said Darthañan.
Frigglene breathed a sigh of relief that the flashy book could be hidden.
“Now imagine that it appears in your hands.”
Following her father's instructions, Elizabeth materialized the book in her hands.
“Wow!” Theodor exclaimed again touching the book with his hands, confirming that it was real.
“Listen to me, you cannot show this book to anyone,” said Darthañan fearing what could happen if someone with bad intentions knew what his daughter possessed.
" You have to seal it somehow, " said Frigglene.
After taking care of the two little ones for the past few months, she understood that at some point Eli would not resist showing the book. The little ones were prone to doing things without measuring the consequences, talking to strangers, imitating everything they saw, and believing almost everything they heard.
Darthañan had a hard time understanding why his wife wanted him to find a way to seal the book. But after a scolding, he found the perfect way to protect Elizabeth and be able to research the book at the same time.
Taking out a small glass jar with powdered copper, he asked Frigglene to help him with some water. And although the vampire could create a bit with her magical energy, Theodor interrupted them by offering to fill a small container with water from the sink.
Wetting one of his fingers and placing it in copper powder Darthañan drew a rune that looked like a happy face in the palm of his left hand. Repeating the same drawing on Eli's right hand, he activated the marks using his internal energy making them disappear into thin air.
The book Elizabeth was holding quickly vanished.
“Do not worry.” Darthañan smiled “Give me your hand,” he said offering his left hand.
The moment Elizabeth placed her right hand on her father's hand the book reappeared.
" It is like a secret key, " said Darthañan so that her daughter would understand more easily what had just happened.
Now that Frigglene and Darthañan could rest assured that the book would not be a problem for their daughter, they decided to review it.
The couple sat on the bed, each carrying one of their children. Frigglene had Theodor on her legs and Darthañan carried Elizabeth while holding her little hand.
Taking the book along with Eli, Darthañan opened the cover.
'Heroes Legends'
A lost relic before the cataclysm. Considered by some to be the second most powerful object ever to exist. Depending on the definition of the power of the person. This book, considered a legend, was now before them.
Its ability: to keep among its pages all the heroic actions of each one of the chosen ones of the different Tellurus species.
Its most powerful counterpart was a book whose name had been forgotten, but which was believed to keep all past and current history, now seemed that could exist.
Coming out of the trance that caused him the title behind the cover, Darthañan looked at her daughter, and using all his will power he uttered the difficult words that he thought were deserved by Elizabeth.
“As a prize for opening the padlock, you can choose which story we will read first.”
The little girl was excited by her father's words and began to move the pages that seemed to disappear as they passed while those that were later seemed never to end. The letters and symbols in the book moved in and out of the sheets; it was beautiful chaos.
Having his dad read the names of all the chosen ones, she soon found the one that caught her attention the most: Laxus.
“This one, this one,” the little girl said hitting the page whose title her father had just read.
“Let’s see what great things Laxus did,” replied Darthañan, cleaning his throat before starting to read aloud so that the whole family could listen to the story.