Chapter 46: Welcome to Starfall University
“Guessed it?”
Dean Silver wrapped their tail around a glass cup, sipping slowly through a straw with an expression of great contentment.
At that moment, the Silver Gear had already left the base, traveling through a remote and uninhabited forest.
The lush and towering canopy completely obscured the sky, casting the entire train into a dim shadow.
Only dappled specks of light filtered through the leaves, like countless stardust scattered across the earth.
“Mm.” Rast nodded. “Or rather, it was simple deduction.”
“From what I know about Starfall University, your school has zero tolerance for any factors that could destabilize the world—such as the Nightworld Remnant and the Twilight Calamity.”
“And the little trick I used during the psychological assessment might’ve fooled Ishta, but it couldn’t have passed everyone else’s scrutiny.”
“Even if Shiltina has some influence within Starfall University, she’s still just a student…”
“I’m fully aware of how unknown and risky I am. Honestly, I had mentally prepared myself to be detained and escorted by armed guards to a prison surrounded by electric fences the moment I returned from the Nightworld.”
Rast paused briefly before continuing, “Yet in the end, I was only asked a few harmless questions before being released. That had to involve help from others in the upper ranks of the university.”
“Moreover, even Ishta was completely unaware of what happened at the Deep Blue Port, which proves that the intel was highly classified. Shiltina must’ve only told someone she absolutely trusted.”
“And now, Dean Silver, you appear here at this moment and immediately bring up my two to three hundred years of looping experience in Deep Blue Port—it obviously can’t be just coincidence.”
Rast glanced at the unknown creature in front of him, who called itself a snowfield mink, and smiled.
“I didn’t know Dean Silver before this.”
“You agreed to help me, most likely because of Shiltina.”
He stared into the crimson liquid in the glass cup. “I didn’t expect that, before I’ve even paid off the sixteen hundred gold Kols I already owe her, I’d rack up another debt of gratitude.”
Dean Silver narrowed its eyes and stared at Rast for a long time.
“I think I understand now why that little girl Ishta got so thoroughly played by you.”
The dean returned to its usual languid posture, its fluffy snow-white tail swaying slightly.
On the table in front of Rast, a contract document written in black ink on white paper silently appeared.
“Your acceptance letter. Sign it.”
Rast took the document and began reading through it.
The contents were largely no different from the Offer letters he had received from foreign universities in his previous life.
The only notable addition was a half-page confidentiality agreement regarding the Nightworld.
It strictly forbade any disclosure of information about the Nightworld, Night Travelers, or the Twilight Calamity to civilians or the uninformed.
Given that revealing the truth about the Twilight Calamity could cause major social upheaval, the purpose of this agreement was easy to understand.
While Rast signed the contract, Dean Silver silently observed the boy in front of it.
As a magical creature, its advancement did not follow the same step-by-step path as human transcendents—it had to find its own unique way.
Over time, Dean Silver discovered that contact with humans and experiencing their genuine emotions seemed to stimulate its growth.
The purer and more sincere the emotions it encountered, the greater the benefit it received.
That was the reason it accepted the invitation to join Starfall University and became the Dean of the Department of Magical Beasts Research Institute.
And thus, with the power of the 「Moon of Truth」 that allowed it to easily discern lies, Dean Silver most despised students who were slick-tongued and insincere.
The impurity in their emotions offered it no help at all—in fact, it could even be detrimental.
Its unique bond with Shiltina also stemmed from this—compared to the other students at Starfall University, Shiltina’s unwavering conviction shone as brightly as the moon in the night sky.
Originally, based on its initial judgment of Rast, Dean Silver assumed he was the same type—complicated and guarded.
After all, the number of persona masks he wore was excessive, almost indistinguishable from someone with dissociative identity disorder.
To Dean Silver, such emotions were as worthless as sewage.
It had only agreed to look after Rast for Shiltina’s sake, intending to allocate a sliver of its spiritual power to observe him from the shadows—without even planning to reveal itself.
And yet—
During the final part of the psychological inquiry, Dean Silver inadvertently caught a glimpse of the iceberg beneath Rast’s surface.
“A champion of justice?”
Dean Silver looked at the boy reading the contract, recalling what Shiltina had told it about Rast’s deeds in Deep Blue Port.
It muttered softly, “Doesn’t seem like it.”
Ordinary people wear masks to hide the ugly, dark, and flawed parts of themselves, to appear perfect.
But Rast—he used layers of personas to disguise himself as someone who was a little greedy, a little lecherous, a little self-serving, full of desires and flaws…
An average, unremarkable person.
However, in that fleeting glimpse, the emotion Dean Silver saw was even more singular and pure than Shiltina’s.
So pure it bordered on absurdity.
As if he wasn’t a flesh-and-blood human being.
But a machine wrapped in a human shell, acting solely to fulfill some predetermined goal.
Machine.
“By the way, what happens if I don’t sign this?” Rast suddenly raised the contract.
“Do you know how much effort I went through just to get your enrollment approved?!” Dean Silver’s fur instantly bristled.
Its eyes glinted with a dangerous light. “By the way, Ishta got 20 points deducted in the Spirit Invocation Department for slandering the Dean of the Magical Creatures Department behind my back, and I also exiled her to a dimensional confinement space for two hours. There’s still one hour and thirteen minutes left.”
Seemingly intimidated by Dean Silver’s threat of “dimensional exile,” Rast’s fingers trembled, and the fountain pen slipped from his hand to the ground.
He bent down, picked it up, and quickly signed his name on the contract.
Dean Silver took in the entire scene before it.
A misunderstanding…?
Although the 「Moon of Truth」 never failed to distinguish truth from lies, the line between the two could sometimes be blurry.
For example, if someone declared, “My heart and actions are as clear as a mirror, everything I do is for justice,”
—even if that person were a heinous criminal, as long as he sincerely believed what he said, the spell would interpret it as truth.
Perhaps its confusion about Rast stemmed from that very paradox.
As this thought crossed Dean Silver’s mind, the train let out a long whistle.
Moments later, as the train moved forward, the dimness of the forest gradually gave way.
Blinding golden light poured through the gaps in the trees like a curtain of darkness being torn open.
The woods vanished from both sides, replaced by a vast, boundless plain.
It was truly a golden prairie.
Winds surged from the edge of the earth, stirring the grasslands into flowing waves.
Sunlight spilled across the land, dyeing everything, including the distant mountains, in brilliant gold.
The winding railway tracks stretched across this golden sea like a silver thread, and at the end of that thread—
Green lawns, red cobblestone paths, castle-like towers, white doves rising and falling above church spires…
Bathed in golden light, the magnificent campus was already in sight.
“Welcome to—”
“Starfall University.”
As Dean Silver’s voice faded, only the roar of the speeding train echoed across the vast plains.