Find The Pattern, Crack That Code!

And the only way to determine who wrote those letters was to examine their handwriting. But the twins' handwritings are nearly indistinguishable from each other, so that doesn't help. But I didn't stop looking for more clues, hidden details we might've missed out on.

I peeked inside the empty envelopes and found that Vernice had dated each letter before sending it to Bryan. This led me to test my theory on the timeline of events of these incidents.

"Bryan, do you still recall each date that you've received the letters? From the first, all the way to the recent one before Vernice went missing. Plus, we should go ahead and ask Li Ling if she knows any about these incidents," I instructed, quickly scanning the letters and envelopes.

"I can arrange the letters for you. Vernice had sent each letter with an interval of a week to my knowledge. Also, she doesn't state where her location would be when writing the letter. And I don't want to contact Li Ling just yet. If Vernice isn't in danger, then there's no need to call her."

"Aren't those girls best friends or something? I thought they had an excellent connection with each other," I asked, finally sounding out the question that I had before Baldwin's rude pop out.

"Both of them were good friends until Vernice found out that Vincent was being married off to Li Ling. The Duchess got upset at the Viscountess for stealing her twin and demanded Li Ling return her brother. Unfortunately, this occurred right after the Umbra Major Mission."

"Since her parents wouldn't allow Vincent to join back and Li Ling refusing to call off the wedding, the young Duchess flew into a rage and shot down an entire village at the northern coast of the Urnsfield Domain, Li Ling's true home. And I would presume that this event is connected to..."

Baldwin turned to look at the Slayer, who had a guilty expression on his face.

"Yes, the start of the series of letters was Vernice describing that she had destroyed the hometown of the Viscountess, though it was only lightly touched upon before describing the issue of the missing children. I paid no heed to it because I want to keep my head attached to my neck."

"Also, I thought Vernice had managed to deflect the blame to someone else? How did you know that it was by the Duchess herself? It could be someone else that didn't like the people there. The folks over there are quite nasty at times," asked Bryan, puzzled that Baldwin knew of such a thing.

"That head of yours must be sleeping when Minwoo was telling you about the Arks. I may have stepped down as the one in charge, but that doesn't mean that I don't have eyes on those kids of mine. Minwoo nominated and gave a list of a hundred individuals, but I handpicked the Five Kings."

"I know every one of their personalities and their family lines. From what skills they have to the very diet they consume. All of it is under my surveillance so that impostors may get past the guards but not me. And Mavislin knows everything about them as well," explained Baldwin.

My face turned pale as I accidentally scattered the envelopes I was holding. The envelopes were all handmade, and the original shape was a square. This meant that the seal flaps were all triangular. At first, I didn't notice it, but tiny inscriptions were on the seal flaps.

The tiny dots were written in a semi-circle pattern, with the curve pointing downwards. I asked Vania to decipher the code and translate it into my vision, but my interface had a colossal error pop out. I was perplexed before Vania explained the situation to me.

"Notice. There was an error in deciphering the language in front of you as it doesn't exist in my archives."

I sighed in frustration as Vania replied to me. Come on; there must be some reason why there are little writings on the envelopes. It can't be from reusing other letters, right? That would be so weird for a noble family to do. I need to find the pattern and crack that code since it might help us.

Z looked at me with a questionable look before seeing the mess in front of me. Bryan was still trying to put the letters according to his dates while Mavislin looked at the Crystal Map.

"Do you need help in deciphering these writings? I could do it on my end since I have a way to filter out rogue letters," offered Z, seeing how frustrated I was.

"Rogue letters? Like, redundant codes?" I asked.

"Yea, the Vania you've got isn't that advanced yet since you've been here for only a few days."