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This look lasted only a moment, quickly replaced by the face of absolute focus before the man turned away from the window and walked off, well beyond what I could see from my current position.

\'It\'s your fault you made me deal with them, so I won\'t accept any scolding now,\' I thought, picturing myself putting on a brave front in this unnecessary confrontation.

This was my only chance of doing so, given how Chihiro was leagues away from crossing any of the actual red lines beyond which I would have no other choice but to consider him an active enemy.

No, for now, this imagery of mine was nothing but an exercise of imagination aimed to let off some of the steam that was building up in me to condition me for a proper follow-up on my confrontation with those two government officers.

"Tim!" Claire called out right as she appeared at the distant end of the stairs leading up to the second floor, only to jump down the full length of the flight of stairs, casually land, and instantly move to sprint ahead, only to slow down right as she was about to crash into me. "We saw it all, but..." she muttered, only to nearly instantly do a one-eighty and turn her eyes away as if all her excitement from just a second ago was taken over by some sort of uneasiness.

"Let me guess," I sighed, my instincts somehow making me connect the dots I wasn\'t even aware of before producing a likely answer to Claire\'s unreasonable change of mood. "That golden figure isn\'t really all that great at conveying live commentary on what\'s going on, is it?"

"How did you know?" Claire asked while her eyes opened wide, clearly indicating I had just revealed I knew something she didn\'t expect me to be aware of.

"Would you believe me if I said it\'s all just a feeling?" I half-jokingly asked.

Claire\'s face twisted a little bit.

Most likely from my tone and expression, she could tell I wasn\'t all that honest... but on the other hand, there indeed was a hint of truth in what I said, making it hard for her to decipher how to understand my words.

"It\'s just a feeling, but it seems that it is feelings that this golden being operates on," I explained what merely started as a guess but by now had become just a tiny bit less than certainty.

"That\'s..." Strangely enough, even though I just explained the situation to the best of my ability, Claire didn\'t seem convinced.

Or more like...

My explanation only served as a seed from which a massive frown appeared on her face.

"Are you aware of the meaning behind what you just said?" Claire suddenly asked, slowly raising her head as her eyes crept up from my chest, through my throat, and then all the way up to my face before locking down on my own eyes.

Claire\'s question... wasn\'t the kind that I wanted or was even supposed to just answer on the go. It was one of those questions that, when answered rapidly, would only serve to indicate that the person behind the answer either paid the question no mind... or was too stupid to notice the depth behind it.

And there most certainly was depth to Claire\'s question, something I could tell from just how serious of a look she had on her face.

"I\'m sorry, but what is that meaning you are talking about?"

After taking some time to think through my options, I decided that there simply was no point in me guessing.

It would only cost us time, force Claire to sit through a barrage of random guesses, and ultimately still end up with me either nailing it down by some accident... or doing what I did anyway and just asking for the answer.

"Haaa..." Claire heaved a long sigh before shooting her hands forth and locking them behind my back as she pressed her face into my chest. For a moment, she remained like that, simply recharging within my light embrace, only to suddenly put her palms down on my chest before pushing herself off.

"Do you know why people believe it\'s impossible to go beyond the mortal realm unless you venture out to the spiritual part of the world?" Rather than giving me the answer to her last question, Claire moved on and decided to ask another one.

"Isn\'t it because there\'s something missing in the spiritual energy of this part of the world?" I answered with what I\'d learned when we talked about this topic before.

"That\'s right," Claire nodded her head, proving that rather than her question being an actual question, she simply wanted me to bring this point up. "After Dad made some calls, we confirmed that it is indeed the case. But more importantly, while it cost us a pretty penny..." here, Claire\'s face twisted in an ugly grimace, proving that she too wasn\'t immune to the notion of suddenly losing a huge amount of wealth even if she was never in a position to be lacking in material terms, "we\'ve managed to confirm what that element is."

\'Is that what Chihiro was on the phone for?\' I thought, only to then squint my eyes as I noticed the flaw in this logic. \'But then, how would Claire know about it? She appeared on the stairs pretty much at the same time as I saw her dad through the window, so the timing doesn\'t work.\'

"And apparently, it\'s some sort of a remnant of a divine thought, a divine intention that shattered and diluted in time. Apparently, in the past, one simply had to wish to advance to automatically learn the ways of doing so..." the look on Claire\'s face steeled up. "But that\'s all in the past. Nowadays, it merely guides one\'s cultivation onto the correct path, allowing one to avoid the myriad of small mistakes that, when compounded on each other, drastically limit their future potential."

Claire\'s explanation was so long and convoluted, I actually had a hard time properly following it, not to mention processing all that she said on the go.

The gist of the situation was clear, though.

Whatever that element of spiritual energy was, it has now become a tiny little helper that guides cultivators on their path to enlightenment, even if its influence has become a mere shadow of what it once was.

\'The question is, why did she bring it up...?\' I thought, only to then close my eyes and take a deep, slow breath that I then slowly sighed out.

"This is just a guess of mine based on what I\'ve heard so far, but..." I hesitated for a moment, only to then grit my teeth and forcefully pry my own eyes open, locking them on Claire\'s face as I braced myself for the sacrilege of even spelling out such a ridiculous guess.

"Do you mean to say that the way this golden being influences me proves it\'s an actual deity?" I asked while lowering my voice just enough not to make my words obvious to anyone who gave even the remotest fuck about listening to our conversation.

"Not an intent, not a remnant, not even the full form of that divine intent, but an actual, real god?"

At this point, Claire\'s face contorted a bit.

"I wouldn\'t go as far as to call it a god as we understand the word, but..." she then gulped her saliva down before looking up and locking eyes with me. "But without even a sliver of a doubt, there certainly is something divine about it!"