Endless Journey: Infinite Realms 145 Dead Ends Everywhere

Minutes later.

Once Alex and the others have settled down, Queen Mother went out to call the Alchemists.

The Alchemists came back minutes later, with their leader, Professor Frances looking quite happy with Alex.

"So, where should we go from here, Eldritch?" Professor Frances said as she sat down on the nearest sofa. Professor France's Companions chose to seat behind her, as they stared at Alex and Duplicator warily.

"Well how about you? What do you think?" Alex shot back in reply, as he seemed uninterested on answering Professor Frances' questions. "I already used a lot of my ideas here, so maybe you should start contributing something now. We are in a truce after all."

"…" Veins started to appeared on Professor Frances' face, as if what Alex said to her has struck a nerve.

"Oh, and now you want to boast that you did something important? Typical of you." Professor Frances replied as she brought out a glass of milk which she downed in one gulp.

"Glug, glug, glug." Alex watched as the seemingly angry professor drank all of the milk.

"What, do you want some liquid refreshments too?" Professor Frances said as she saw Alex's gaze on her. "I can give you one if you want."

"No! That is not what I want." Alex replied as he shook his head. "We are here to talk about what we will do next, not about that damned milk of yours! Hell, maybe that is not even milk. God knows what kind of chemicals could be there!"

"This is the mixture of hundreds of different kinds of milk. Cow, goat, Space Whale, Void Dweller, and many more creatures were the source of this milk mixture." The professor replied as she placed the glass on the table.

"Wow, that looks delicious…" Asteria muttered in the background as drool began to flow from her mouth. "I bet it will get more delicious if it has honey…"

"Oh, I can do that too." The professor replied as she gave an excited smile to Asteria. "If you have some honey, I can try it out with my newest concoction later."

"Hahaha! As long as I, Asteria, will it, I can give you all my hidden stock of honey!"

"Wait, you have a hidden stock of honey? I thought the one I hid earlier was your last supply?"

"Oh, that was a slip of tongue. Sorry about that, Alina."

"Oh please, let's get serious now!" Alex said, feeling extremely irritated with Professor Frances. "Are you really serious with our truce? I feel like you are just treating it like a joke."

"Cheer up, Eldritch. Why are you so hung up anyway?" Professor Frances replied as she shrugged her shoulders. "We got the attention of the Pantheon member, and now we have the chance to obtain the Legacy easily. I think that merits some relaxation time for all of us."

"If something can go wrong, it will go wrong." Alex said, quoting the words that Alina muttered to him earlier. "We cannot just assume that everything will go smoothly. We should still expect something wrong happening later! After all, we are dealing with an extremely powerful team of Superhumans! And besides, our teams were also destined to fight each other! There is no way that I will stay calm with your team this close to us!"

"Destined to fight?" Alex heard Lauren muttering in the background, with confusion evident on her tone.

Alex ignored these mutterings as he focused on staring at the professor.

The professor's only action was to stare back at Alex as she spun the milk glass on the table.

It was only when that glass stopped spinning that she stared to talk.

"Obviously, we should prepare ourselves before the Pantheon arrives." The professor said as she tilted her head. "I am sure that they will try talking with us, but underneath that promise to talk is a possible attack from them. We have to prepare for that kind of event."

"Seeing that they treat the Legacy as a very important object, I think that they will really fight us off just to keep it safe." Alex said as he felt like agreeing with what the professor said. It

"It's all set then!" Professor Frances exclaimed as she stood up from her seat. "Some of us should start reconnaissance to watch out for the arrival of the Pantheon, while the others should start laying countless traps. With all of our skills here, our chance of success is within the acceptable limit."

"…Well said, professor." Alex said as he realized that even if Professor Frances had some screw loose in her head, she can still think and relegate tasks properly.

The professor tried to not show it, but she seemed happy after being praised. She sat back on her seat as she crossed her legs as she resumed talking.

"Now that we have decided on what we should do for the following days, it is time for us to talk about the next important thing that we should be talking about right now." The professor then gave a slight glance at Lauren as she said,

"We should discuss about the true nature of the Legacy of Tartaros."

After hearing what the professor said, Alex could not help but give a nod, as he knew that talking about the Legacy right now is a viable task to do.

"Since we are all here already, sharing information will never hurt any of us." Alex replied, as he consented to the professor's request. "After all, we all want to get the same thing here."

"Um… is that something that I should not hear?" Lauren said as she saw the suddenly serious atmosphere between the Travelers and the Alchemists. "Even if I do not like to be left out here, maybe I can sit this one out..."

"No, you will stay." Professor Frances replied before Lauren could leave. "Since you are already this deep with us, for you to listen more won't make any more difference."

"Is that so…" Alex was not sure if Lauren took that statement well, as she only sat back on her place, with her face looking extremely uncertain.

Once everyone has settled down, Alex decided that it was now time for him to start it rolling.

"Plap, plap." Alex clapped his hands in order to get everyone's attention.

"Even if we know that the Legacy of Tartaros does exist, we still do not know what it was." Alex said as he looked at Professor Frances' team. "And if my guess was right, even you, Professor Frances, have no idea what the Legacy is, right?"

"Hmph, I hate to admit it, but even my bright mind was unable to divine the mysteries behind the Legacy of Tartaros." The professor replied as her grin started to falter. "Even with the assistance of my trustworthy assistants, we were still unable to make any headway on our investigation."

"Yeah, we also have that difficulty too." Alex replied, although he knew that he and his companions only did little to investigate about the Legacy, as they were busy dealing with other important stuff.

Alex will obviously not mention that kind of negligence in front of the professor, lest that she uses it to mock them.

"Isn't Tartaros the Deity and a place in the ancient Greek Mythology?" Lauren blurted out as she fiddled with her hands.

"Oh, we know something as simple as that, SIgnum." Alex replied before Lauren could start feeling pleased with herself. "An info like that is just easy to find."

"Ok…"

Even if he did a little research these days, Alex still have the knowledge about the meaning of Tartaros.

This word was obviously derived from 'Tartarus', which was both a deity and a place in ancient Greek Mythology.

As a deity, Tartarus was the third primordial deity to be born, just after Chaos and Gaia, and just before Eros. Tartarus also fathered the monster Typhon from the wombs of Gaia.

As a place, Tartarus was where most of the dangerous forces against the Greek Gods were imprisoned. Titan, Cyclopes, Hecatonchires, and countless monsters were thrown in this place.

These are the meanings of Tartarus, which Alex found on some good story books.

While remembering all this information, Alex started to grin as he knew that the meaning of Tartarus actually could be of help to them now.

"But actually, the info mentioned by SIgnum about Tartarus could be of help here." Alex said tapped his chin. "If we follow the meaning of 'Legacy of Tartaros' literally by using 'Tartarus' as the guide, then we will reach two conclusions on what the Legacy of Tartaros could be."

"First is that the Legacy could be an inheritance by a Superhuman who calls himself Tartaros." Alex muttered as he started to pace around the room. "Maybe this Tartaros left something so potent, so powerful, that the entire Pantheon decided to keep it secret. Hell, maybe even Tartaros was a former member of the Pantheon, and his teammates were just keeping the Legacy for themselves!"

Alex then continued talking as he ignored the incredulous expression on everyone's face.

"The second conclusion that the Legacy of Tartaros was actually a place, where everything that could pose danger against the Pantheon and the world were gathered. Maybe the Legacy of Tartaros is the only thing keeping the world safe. If that was the case, then the attitudes of the Pantheon members earlier was quite acceptable."

After saying these words, Alex looked back at Professor Frances, who for some reason, looked both impressed and disgruntled.

"With that limited information, you managed to extrapolate two extremely plausible conclusions. Very impressive! As expected of my rival!" The professor said as she started laughing again. "I like the things that you just said! It's too bad that they're all speculations now. They are still unproven, and I doubt we can prove any of your conclusions until we see the Legacy for ourselves."

"That is what I am thinking too." Alex replied as he let out a sigh.

With the way that the Pantheon restricted any information about the Legacy of Tartaros, it will be really hard for Alex and co. to know more about the said legacy. The only thing that they could do now was to hope that their enemies will slip up more info that they can use.

Once they reached that point, they decided to continue talking more, maybe in hopes that someone from them will have a Eureka moment.

****************

Hours later.

"...So we are back to a dead end then." That was what Alex said as he and the others slumped back on their seats, with their minds reeling in exhaustion. "All those talks, and we still get nothing."

"The pursuit of knowledge was always filled with obstacles and disappointments, Eldritch." Professor Frances replied as she let out a harried sigh. "If you will be deterred by something like this, then you do not deserve to be in my stature."

"Please shut up all of you, especially you two." Alex said as he glared at Asteria and Mephisto, who were playing some kind of game.

These two Guides seemed to have hit it off, which made Alex feel intrigued and dismayed. "Stop whatever you two are doing now. Come here and assist us!"

"Don't tell us what we can do, hoomans." Both Mephisto and Asteria said as they zipped out of the mansion, leaving their mentally exhausted Travelers with more frustrations than before.

"I really hate those two now."

"I concur."

Chapter end

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