Night fell, and the streets of the North District of Protos Royal Magic Academy were enveloped in tranquility.
In the living room of Gloria's residence, the heavy drapes beside the French windows remained drawn, walling off the garden's night from the cozy, lived-in warmth within.
"Let's see his broadcast."
Looking completely relaxed, Sigrid leaned back against the sofa full of anticipation and turned on the projection screen on the living room wall.
"Lord Bishop... he didn't do anything to you on the journey, did he?" Gloria asked, brimming with worry and a hint of timidness.
"What are you thinking?"
Sigrid gave Gloria a cold look that made the girl shrink her neck, not daring to ask such reckless questions again.
Gloria couldn't help feeling that the relationship between the Lord Bishop and the Holy Son was somewhat different from before they had left for the north—or rather, the Bishop had changed a bit, though she couldn't quite put her finger on what was different.
Last time, when the Bishop sat here watching the Holy Son's Monthly Evaluation Day, there had been an air of detached amusement, like watching a spectator show.
Now, sitting before the screen waiting for the Holy Son's broadcast, it felt more like she simply, genuinely wanted to watch it.
Gloria also glanced at the screen. It was still airing the preview for this episode, along with the character introduction and preliminary interview segments that Herrom Broadcasting Corporation had edited for their celebrity guest, Luoqi McCarthy.
On the screen, Luoqi McCarthy was discussing how he had constructed the teaching model that earned him a one-hundred-percent approval rating at Protos Royal Magic Academy, along with his success in the education industry.
Next, in the brief interview, he expressed his views as governor on the current state of the Protos Empire, particularly regarding trade policies and foreign relations.
"Wait, how did he become a provincial governor?" Gloria asked in shock from the living room.
"...It's a long story."
No matter what Lanqi discussed in the interview tonight, Sigrid wouldn't be surprised anymore. He was already a political figure in the empire now, not merely a headmaster.
Luoqi McCarthy's appointment had previously been unanimously endorsed and temporarily recognized locally in Snowfield Province. The provincial authorities had then submitted all official dispatches and paperwork to the Imperial Capital. Just days ago, it had passed ratification by the Protos Imperial royal family and the parliament; the formal letter of appointment would likely arrive within a few days.
And so, Herrom Broadcasting Corporation had updated his profile immediately upon receiving the news.
Gloria stared blankly at the screen, a sense of doom creeping over her.
This man seemed to hit right in the center of the Bishop's strike zone. The Bishop of Domination's long-cherished ambition to seize control of the Protos Empire—it felt like he might actually help her accomplish it.
The more Gloria thought about it, the more worried she grew. When the heavens want to rain, or a mother wants to remarry, there was no stopping it; but in the moments before the broadcast began, Gloria had an even greater concern weighing on her.
She sat down beside Sigrid and lowered her voice slightly to ask, "But about breaking into the prison... what is he really thinking?"
Gloria was already fraught with anxiety over their situation, unable to understand how the Bishop could trust the Holy Son's words so completely.
Hearing the utterly absurd conversation between the Holy Son and the Bishop before he left that afternoon, she had been too terrified to utter a peep.
Even if the Headmaster could use the cooperative program between Protos Royal Magic Academy and Herrom Prison to send a student inside, hardly any student in the entire school possessed the strength to reach the deepest level of the prison.
It was a bottomless underground prison. In the hundred-odd years since the founding of the Protos Empire, jailbreaks had occurred only a handful of times. Every floor was covered by ancient magical barriers and guarded by formidable wardens, and those three great demons were supposedly imprisoned on the bottom three floors.
As a third-year student at Protos Royal Magic Academy, Gloria was far more familiar with the academy's elective courses and graduation projects than Sigrid.
For students who selected the grueling graduation project "Herrom Prison Guard Assessment," every single second spent in Herrom Prison carried an enormous mortal threat. To advance downward and earn clearance, one had to repeatedly cross thresholds of life and death, confronting increasingly dangerous inmates and wardens.
And the hardest part wasn't just reaching the destination—it was communicating with the demon race.
Almost no humans in this world possessed the experience to deal smoothly with orthodox demons. If the Headmaster assumed real demons were gentle, harmless creatures like his student Zestira, he was gravely mistaken.
Every demon's brain and thought process were starkly different from those of humans. Approaching a demon with a human mindset would lead only to a gruesome death!
Negotiating a partnership with those three aloof, proud great demons was something even the Protos Empire couldn't pull off. And even granting the impossibly remote chance that Lanqi somehow managed to move one of those three great demons, breaking them out of prison would be harder than scaling the heavens.
"I don't know either, but if he says it'll work, then it definitely will," Sigrid answered Gloria without taking her eyes off the screen.
"Lady Sigrid, he isn't planning to have you infiltrate it, is he?"
Seeing Sigrid looking so unconcerned only heightened Gloria's anxiety.
In Sigrid's current condition, she was completely unfit to venture into such a perilous place, facing an immense risk of perishing.
Or rather, even if Sigrid were in her prime, a single misstep in the depths of that prison could leave her locked inside forever.
"Reasonably speaking, the best candidate would be me, since he needs to stay at the academy to stall the chief warden," Sigrid mused after a moment of thought.
She remembered Lanqi mentioning back in Snowfield Province that he had already invited the chief warden of Herrom Prison to Protos Royal Magic Academy to discuss campus initiatives and cooperative projects involving the Snowfield Province prison, which happened to allow him to track the chief warden's movements.
Gloria was momentarily stunned.
"No, absolutely not! You cannot take that risk, and demons would never listen to you anyway."
Although Gloria knew that if Protos Royal Magic Academy managed to recruit three eighth-tier great demons—regardless of what stage within the eighth tier they occupied—the academy's faction would possess strength rivaling any branch of the Resurrection Church, and even if the Domination branch was exhausted and depleted right now, the Holy Son would hold trump cards sufficient to contend with Askesan.
The problem was that she saw zero chance of this plan succeeding.
"We'll see how he arranges it. In any case, it's enough that I just listen to him now."
Sigrid shrugged, as if she had already abandoned all thought, having grown accustomed to the effortless ease of sharing a mental network with Lanqi.
"Oh? The show is starting."
Catching sight of the opening segment, Sigrid instantly forgot the serious topic she had just been discussing with Gloria and fixed all her attention onto the screen.
Gloria looked at the profile of Sigrid's smiling face and finally let out a helpless breath.
If this man truly had the ability to walk the talk and defeat Askesan, then she too would support the Bishop and the Holy Son being together; she would even find a way to lead the high clerics of the Domination branch to play matchmaker for the two of them with all their might.
The Holy Son's social circle was simple; his mind was entirely devoted to his career, and he was practically insulated from women. The Bishop was the sole person who got along with him. When the time came, playing matchmaker would be easy enough, and even if it didn't work out, it wouldn't devolve into some messy romantic battle royale that left both the Bishop and the Holy Son unable to save face.
Chapter 371