Chapter 41: Interesting Findings

Chapter 41: Interesting Findings All the teachers in the academy had their own rooms to conduct their research. These rooms were in a separate building on the academy grounds, away from the main building. "The building is isolated for safety, you know. You never know when something might happen that can destroy things around you," Lindy explained. According to her, nothing dangerous had ever happened during their research, but the people in charge of the academy still wanted to make sure the safety procedures were in place. One of the benefits of having an isolated building was the silence—and silence was important during any research. Anyway, the building itself looked like the others in the academy. Just a normal type of building one could find anywhere. The building had four floors. "The teachers with the less dangerous subjects have their rooms on one of these four floors, while some teachers have rooms underground to increase safety," Lindy said. Lindy’s research room was on the fourth floor, which was nice. The place had a massive window, and because of the height, Damian could see past the wall surrounding the academy. He could see some green again. The room was similar to what Damian expected—a place with desks, shelves, and, most importantly, tons of papers. To his surprise, though, the room looked quite clean and organized. "You won’t see this from the other teachers," Lindy said with a chuckle. "I might be the only one who organizes my room every day." "It looks nice here," Damian said. "And silent too." "Right?" Lindy walked over to a wooden desk at the far end of the room. She opened the drawer and started looking for something. Once she found it, she handed it to Damian. It was a key. "This is the key to enter," Lindy said. "You can come here anytime you want, even if I’m not here. This might be better for any of your practices or readings that require more silence." Damian couldn’t believe how well things were turning out. He had landed an assistant position—already incredible on its own—and it had basically saved his ass after the whole Randal mess and the fact he couldn’t train like normal hunters. And now she was giving him full access to this place? That caught him off guard. "Thank you," he said. "I’ll work hard to help you with your research." Lindy smiled. "I’m happy to hear that. Come, let me show you where we stand." She led him to her desk and pulled out a few papers. This project was the translation of the scripture she’d shown him on his very first day of class. So far, she had managed to translate about 20%. Not much on paper, but enough to give her a glimpse of its meaning. "Read it, and tell me what you think," Lindy said, handing him a sheet. It was the translated portion. Damian could have read the original without trouble, but he didn’t bother. The text spoke of a city—an underground city, home to demons. It described its basic structure, but little else. No directions, no clues about where to find it. Still... it was fascinating. During his time as a mediator, Damian had seen demons in constant conflict with each other, rarely willing to work together for anything. But in that city, things were different—demons had worked side by side to build it, creating a society not far from what humans had. "So?" Lindy asked. "What do you think?" Damian placed the sheet on the desk. "There’s not much to think. This portion gives us good information about the underground city, but we still don’t know if it existed at all—or where it might be. It could’ve been just a project the demons never completed." Lindy nodded. "That’s exactly what I think, and that’s why we need to translate the whole thing. With your knowledge, I believe we can finish it in a few months." She was counting on Damian’s expertise to help with the translation. And now, with two people working, each could focus on different sections of the document, speeding up the process. Damian smiled. "Let’s work hard to finish this as quickly as possible." Lindy gestured to the bookshelves. They were lined with numerous volumes about demons—which Damian was itching to read—and several books on the demon language. "You can use those books to your advantage," she said. "They’ll help you not just with the translation, but with your overall knowledge about demons." "I will, thank you." Damian’s first impressions of his new assistant position were good, but he still needed a way to get more demon parts—and staying inside the academy wouldn’t make that happen. Leo would give him some parts over the weekend, which was great, but the stronger he became, the harder it was to keep getting stronger. He needed more demon parts, and soon. The problem was, the academy didn’t allow new recruits to just leave whenever they wanted. For Damian to get a job as a cleaner or a demon hunter, he would have to work harder—and, more importantly, wait. That made him anxious. "I have something I need to do, but I’ll be back before the morning’s over," Lindy said. "In the afternoon, you’ve got your other classes." "Okay. Take care," Damian replied. When Lindy left, Damian picked up the scripture she’d been working on translating and read through it. His expression shifted several times as he went on. The underground city wasn’t just a project—it had been built, inhabited, and sustained for a long time. Not only that, but there were other cities and demon settlements scattered across the world. If that had been all, Damian wouldn’t have been so shocked. But the real surprise was that this underground city had been built at least ten thousand years ago. The demons had been on the planet far longer than Damian had imagined—and so had humans. For some reason, the government and media made people believe demons and hunters were a recent phenomenon, dating back only a century or two. But that was far from the truth. Many researchers already knew this, yet none spoke about it publicly. Damian could only guess that they weren’t allowed to. Damian also spotted something intriguing in the scripture. It suggested that the underground city had been built on that distant continent—the one where only a small number of humans lived and where demons had taken over. But there was more. The text hinted at other continents where demons lived—continents completely unknown to the public. "Could this world have places we haven’t visited yet, even with all our technology?" Damian wondered. The thought excited him. He was now fully determined to explore these lost continents and uncover more about the demons and their origins. On top of that, Leo had tasked him with spying and gathering information about the dimensional gates and the dungeons. To his surprise, there was a brief mention of a dungeon in the ancient scripture. "So there are dungeons on the same continent where the underground city was built... isn’t that the same continent Mitra’s teacher wants to go to?" he thought. Before Lindy returned from the bathroom, Damian carefully placed the scripture back where he had found it and acted as if he hadn’t read a thing.