"The two of you are looking for me?" Nordaniel saw Hedy and Katrina walking toward him and pointed at himself with a puzzled expression.
Hedy greeted him warmly: "Nordaniel, your speech about natural balance just now was absolutely wonderful — so fascinating!"
She had picked up on Nordaniel's relatively outgoing personality and adopted a friendly, familiar manner of speaking, dispensing with formal titles like "ma'am" or "miss."
Hearing Hedy's sincere and straightforward praise, Nordaniel blushed slightly and waved his hand in mild embarrassment. "I just organized the concepts the elders usually elaborate on."
"My name is Hedy, and this is my companion Katrina. We only arrived at the forest today as guests — I'm delighted to get to know you right away." Hedy was even more enthusiastic.
Unlike the introverted Anick, she introduced herself and Katrina to Nordaniel with easy confidence.
Spending time with such a talkative, cheerful guest who didn't put any pressure on him, the slight tension Nordaniel had been feeling soon evaporated, and conversation flowed naturally.
"Ah, we've been commissioned by Her Majesty to investigate the cases of elf corruption. Regarding Tress, we have some questions for you." After chatting for a while, Hedy asked directly, without beating around the bush.
Nordaniel was silent for a moment, his expression somber. "Hedy, Katrina — feel free to ask me anything about this. I sincerely hope you can find the source of the corruption and restore Tress and the others. Even if they can't be restored, at least they wouldn't have to suffer like this anymore."
"Did Tress show any unusual signs before her corruption?" Katrina asked according to the standard questions that Yulisan, Felipe, and the others had agreed upon.
Nordaniel was a Sun Elf, with fair skin and radiant golden hair that looked quite noble under the sunlight. Yet there was not a shred of a smile on his face as he recalled, "At least as far as I'm concerned, nothing particularly strange happened in our lives before that. We spent our days as always — hunting, gathering fruit, seeking places where the forest's balance might be disrupted and restoring them, communing with nature, comprehending Divine Arts, choreographing dances, singing songs, reading the various texts from the post-Mythological Era…"
Everything had been so peaceful, so leisurely, as though this beautiful life could never be broken. But then: "That morning, I suddenly noticed that the magical runes on Tress's skin had changed. They radiated feelings of hatred and killing. The day before, she was perfectly fine — we had danced together the special dance she had just learned, and we said goodnight to each other."
"Special dance?" Hedy jotted down Nordaniel's answer in her Magic Notes, her attention drawn by the word "special."
Nordaniel nodded slightly. "She said Lady Martha taught it to her. Shall I dance it for you?"
Hedy and Katrina answered simultaneously, half out of investigative duty and half from pure curiosity: "Yes!"
Nordaniel stepped back a few paces and began to dance without any musical accompaniment, moving with a remarkably strong sense of rhythm.
Many of the dance's movements were quite bizarre, almost defying normal physical limitations — only the light, supple bodies of elves, with their exaggerated flexibility, could pull them off.
"Though the movements are difficult and strange, I have to say — the dance really is beautiful…" Hedy moved her left hand and her legs, feeling an impulse to join in. But she chided herself with a light slap to her cheek, wondering whether she should brew a bloodline-awakening potion when she got back. Otherwise, learning this dance would be utterly impossible.
Katrina kept time for Nordaniel, secretly transmitting via a telepathic link: "This dance is of a ritualistic type. It gives me a strange feeling. When we share intelligence later, I want to highlight this."
Midway through the dance, Nordaniel seemed to be remembering his friend. A wave of sorrow and grief gradually radiated from him. It took him a long while to recover, and then he asked in a low voice, "There's nothing wrong with this dance, is there?"
"There's no arcane fluctuation, no trace of Divine Arts, and no sinister entity watching — but that doesn't mean it's free of problems. Until the investigation is concluded, you'd best refrain from dancing it." Hedy had taken a liking to this newly acquainted elven friend and offered the reminder specially.
After Nordaniel nodded in agreement, Katrina continued: "In the days before the corruption, did Tress's mood change at all, or did her views shift in any way?"
Nordaniel thought carefully. "She was somewhat downcast because the growth of her magical runes was slow and she hadn't made any substantial breakthrough. She told me very earnestly that she wanted to become a Druid — to study the natural Divine Arts and play a greater role in maintaining the balance of nature."
To play a greater role in maintaining the balance of nature… Hedy frowned as she recorded Nordaniel's account, then asked casually, "Are you a Druid?"
"Yes — I just became a Nature Guardian. That's what you'd call a mid-tier Druid." Nordaniel took considerable pride in the title of "Nature Guardian," and much of the gloom between his brows dissipated.
Elves did not classify their ranks the way humans did, with low, mid, and high tiers or numbers one through three, but the levels were equivalent. "Nature Warden" was a Druid apprentice; "Friend of Nature" was a junior Druid; "Nature Guardian" was a mid-tier Druid; "Staff Bearer" was a high-tier Druid, inclusive of the ninth level.
Hedy was quite interested in the Druid class and delved deeper.
"…Every elf can perceive the grace of nature, so there is no obstacle to becoming a Nature Warden. After that, we must sublimate our understanding of nature into our own personal philosophy and embody it in our daily actions. As our philosophy merges with nature, we form something akin to what you call the 'Heart of Nature.' It is named after the core of an elven tree and serves as the foundation for casting formal Divine Arts…" Nordaniel held nothing back.
The three of them conversed for a long while before parting ways.
That evening, Hedy and Katrina returned to their tree house with their Magic Notes full of findings, and joined Yulisan, Felipe, Anick, and Sprint to share intelligence.
"Special dance… Lady Martha…" Yulisan murmured these two terms. "Over seventy percent of the corrupted individuals are connected to the special dance. Thirty percent learned it from Lady Martha; the rest — it's unclear where they learned it."
Felipe's voice was low: "It could be an elven custom. They are extremely passionate about dance."
"Regardless, tomorrow we go and meet this Lady Martha," Yulisan said.
At that moment, Anick spoke up, both bashful and grave: "Could it be a dance similar to Vikan's 'Special Summoning Ritual'? Nothing appears unusual on the surface, but the real focus is on the concepts or emotions that are implanted and formed during the learning process?"
Hedy had just cracked a case along those lines and was acutely sensitive to this. She nodded seriously: "That's possible. The Nature Hatred Faction… hatred. I recall that among the ancient demons there was one called the 'Abomination.'"