Among the crowd, a priest who also held a faculty position at the academy clicked his tongue in wonder. "Elven bloodline... now that is a true rarity."

  "Indeed. Elves haven't graced the continent of Croatia for tens of thousands of years."

  "Who would have thought the House of the Rose Duke carried elven lineage? Simply incredible."

  Amidst the hushed murmurs, the three deans led a large retinue of priests toward Eros. Upon reaching him, they began scrutinizing him from head to toe, their intense gazes making Eros’s skin crawl.

  Deep down, panic began to set in. If my true foundation is exposed here, I’m finished.

  Barbara, sensing his rising anxiety, spoke with a hint of disdain in his mind: "From the moment you grasped the [Divine Art: Lord of Secrecy], your essence became invisible to all. Unless you permit it, even a god cannot peer into your depths—let alone a mere Holy Artifact."

  Eros let out a long, internal sigh of relief. He hadn't realized his skill was that broken.

  Glancing at the emerald orb of light in Eros’s hand, the three deans exchanged significant looks. "Follow us," one of them commanded.

  They turned toward the small chapel, with Eros following close behind. Undine tried to keep pace, but she was gently intercepted by a priest in grey robes. The priest offered a kind, reassuring smile. "The grade of the Holy Artifact is too high. With your current strength, gazing upon it directly would risk spiritual corruption."

  "But Eros—"

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  "He will be fine. The deans will shield him," the grey-robed priest replied smoothly, his smile never wavering.

  Though her heart was thumping with anxiety, Undine knew better than to push further. she retreated to her spot, head bowed, concealing her worry behind a mask of silence.

  Inside the inner sanctum of the chapel, the three deans came to a halt. One of them pulled the heavy doors shut, leaving only the four of them in the dim, hallowed space.

  A dean wearing deep-blue ritual robes nodded. "Let us begin."

  He carefully drew a plain, unassuming circular mirror from his breast pocket. He began slowly infusing it with spirituality, chanting with profound reverence: "We summon the Great Holy Spirit to deliver his judgment!"

  As the words fell, the mundane mirror erupted in a hazy, ethereal glow. It drifted from the dean’s palm, hovering in mid-air. After a moment of flickering phantasmal light, a cute young boy, looking no older than eight or nine, manifested in the air.

  The instant the boy appeared, the other two deans placed their hands on Eros’s shoulders, erecting a shimmering barrier of light around him. Their intent was to act as a "blur filter," obscuring his vision so he wouldn't see the entity clearly.

  If Eros were an ordinary person, his vision would now be a grey, indistinct fog. He understood that the deans were doing this for his protection; for a low-sequence warlock to gaze directly upon a high-sequence entity without "filtering" could lead to physical collapse, mutation, or instant madness.

  But Eros was no ordinary human. He had gazed upon gods; a mere Holy Artifact was nothing to him. The deans’ "pixelating" techniques were utterly useless against the [Eyes of Eternal Night]. He could see everything with perfect clarity.

  However, the sight of the young boy left Eros stunned.

  Wait... so Artifact Spirits can actually manifest in the physical world? If a Holy Artifact could do it, then surely Barbara, who was a Divine Artifact, could—

  Seeing that the secret could no longer be kept, Barbara spoke up in his mind, sounding somewhat reluctant: "I... I can indeed manifest."

  "Oh ho! Then why haven't you come out before?" Eros asked, his mental voice full of mischief.

  Barbara fell into a stony silence.

  Heh! Why don't I come out? Do you really have no clue? In the Soul Space, you already do such "excessive" things... if I manifested in the real world, who knows what depravities you'd attempt!