Demon's Virtue

The overseer's palm pressed onto Eiro's chest. It pressed onto the cloth of the clothes he was wearing first, but then simply passed through and moved on to the demon's skin, as if the fabric didn't even exist. Similarly, the overseer's hand soon passed through Eiro's skin, and flesh, and passed on to the core in the place where his heart should be.

It was uncomfortable, but not painful. It was like having something wriggle inside of you, carefully pushing parts of flesh to the sides and sinews of muscle that wrapped around it. The overseer stretched their mana out and let it flow into the spirit gateway.

This part was honestly even more uncomfortable than their hand moving through Eiro's physical body; they were touching Eiro's soul, even if just briefly.

A few moments after they did, the overseer pulled their hand back, almost as though they were flinching. When they did, they placed their hand onto their own chest, dropping down onto one knee to bow to Eiro.

"My deepest apologies, Morgan la Fey. We had not recognised you until now, but with this, we have confirmed your identity," the overseer said, closing their eyes. They were shaking, as though they were scared. Eiro frowned lightly as he looked at them.

"So that was enough for you to tell?" he asked, "Also, I'm Morgan la Fey's reincarnation, I'm not them. I don't even have their memories."

The overseer raised their head, "But... Morgan la Fey always remembers their former lives."

Eiro crossed his arms. What the hell was Morgan la Fey? Eiro knew that he had the ruins of his former lives in the outskirts of the forest around the library, but no matter how much he investigated them, not much came from it. Though, some of the structures seemed to recover a bit more over time, though it was only the ones that already seemed to be the newest in the first place.

Maybe he would recover some memories at some point, though Eiro didn't even know if he particularly wanted to remember.

"Well, I don't. And you also know exactly why," Eiro said, pointing at the book that the overseer had placed to the side just earlier. And so, the overseer silently nodded their head.

"I see. Yes, in this case, there is no reason for us to doubt you any further. The implications of your very existence are certainly... intriguing," they replied, "But even so, whether you have the memories or not is, frankly, unimportant."

Eiro crossed his arms, "So, what was, or is, the relationship between the tower and Morgan la Fey?"

"... As you have correctly concluded, the Tower of Books is an entity, rather than a structure. A concept brought to life through extremely powerful arcane magic, shaped by Morgan la Fey themself. And then, the tower became their... your familiar."

Thinking about what this meant beyond the surface, Eiro smiled, "In that case, does that mean I have access to more than normal here?"

The overseer immediately nodded, "Yes. You may access any and all information that we have to offer, freely and without passing any tests. And, more importantly for your current situation, you may access the information related to Morgan la Fey."

"I thought they removed all information related to them from... everywhere."

"Of course, but they needed to leave some traces behind just in case something like this happened. Where an incarnation couldn't remember any particular details. However, even for the tower, most information was wiped from the world very clearly and distinctly, so any writing about them is forever lost."

Hearing what the overseer was saying, Eiro grinned broadly, "So the writing about them is lost, but their own writing is still here."

"... It is as you say. The journals of Morgan la Fey are still here, though you may not be able to read them."

"Hah? I thought you said he has full access," Sarius groaned, staring at the overseer annoyedly. He was kind of sick of being in the tower all the time and wanted Eiro to just get access to whatever he needed to and finally leave so that they could travel around this elemental plane more instead of being stuck inside all the time.

Eiro turned over toward the Sarius, "I'm guessing Morgan placed individual seals or tests on each of the journals."

"And why'd they do that? Isn't the only one that could look into them Morgan la Fey themself?" Sarius asked, and Eiro slowly glanced over at the overseer, who just stayed silent for a few moments.

"Frankly? I don't know. Sure, the security of this tower is beyond anything I've seen before, and the structure is nearly indestructible. But nearly doesn't mean totally. I'm not sure if I could do it just yet, but I might have been able to figure out how to break through certain parts of the tower if I really cared to," Eiro pointed out, and the overseer seemed somewhat nervous at that statement.

They had been so emotionless and uncaring until now, but today they've been showing their thoughts and emotions very openly somehow, "So, despite being safe, it's not totally safe. Someone as powerful as Morgan la Fey would have enemies that want to take them down no matter the cost, and breaking down something like the Tower of Books may not be the part to stop them.

So, not fully trusting the tower's defenses, but it still being the safest place they could imagine for their future incarnations, I'm sure they placed a few more layers of protection onto their own journals."

Slowly, the overseer nodded, "That was exactly their reasoning when they placed this system in the past. But what you have to know, while each incarnation was undeniably Morgan la Fey, they were also undeniably individuals with their own pasts and histories. People with unique perspectives, habits, specialties, and traits they focused on.

Each journal's lock is slightly different to the others, and some have requirements that might be a little... bothersome."

"I didn't expect anything else," Eiro sighed, "For the time being, just lead me to the top floor. I'll get to the journals later."

With a quick nod, the overseer did as told, leading Eiro up to the top floor floor of the tower. It was surprisingly large, considering the type of information that was supposed to be here. But even so, it was of course still the smallest of all the floors that Eiro had been to so far, so he should be able to get through these books fairly quickly. Immediately, the demon looked around the room.

There were books about the gods and their weaknesses, stories about the crimes they committed during their time walking the earth. At the same time, there were stories about the otherworlders, like Arc. Eiro was wondering why there was only surface-level information about them on other floors. But here, just glancing at the titles, there was information about what those other worlds were like.

Of course, there was a lot of information about certain magical creatures with transcendent powers that came from this realm. This being the tower of the elemental plane of fire still meant that all the information in this tower came from this realm, so it seemed less imminently useful to Eiro than he had hoped. That being the case, an idea popped into Eiro's mind just then.

He wouldn't be able to investigate right now, but maybe in the future.

"By the way, do you have something that will tell me the locations of the towers in other realms?" Eiro asked, looking at the overseer. They seemed to hesitate somehow, but quickly nodded their head.

"Yes, we have all the locations noted down. You may access them whenever you wish," they replied, "Which would you like to know?"

"Hm... the ones that I could even get to right now would be the towers in hell and the central material plane."

The overseer nodded, procuring two small booklets for the Demon from practically thin air. Eiro quickly flipped the first open. The one in hell was, expectedly, in the domain of a demon lord known for his greed of knowledge. Rather, that demon lord had made his domain there after finding the tower. But even so, Eiro should be able to make his way there somehow.

He could just forcefully expand his own domain into theirs. Not like they would be able to do anything about it, considering that Eiro's domain was seeped in Holy Energy.

However, the location of the central material plane's tower was a bit more unexpected, "No wonder it hasn't been found in a hot minute. It wasn't always here, was it?"

"The tower has relocated a number of times, but this seems to be particularly safe. We have created methods for those that are worthy to reach the tower easily, but due to the nature of that realm, we found it to be easier to not simply leave it somewhere accessible like in these elemental planes."

"Right," Eiro grinned, "But even so, who'd have thought you would put the Tower on the moon?"