色戒无删除版

Astrophos had his mouth wide open after hearing the master's introduction. He did not expect that the 'Ari' that the master was telling him in the past was this woman who looked like an apparition.

He was also shocked once Ari opened her eyes. She has golden pupils but the outside of the pupils was pure black. The black lines on her face started to have blue light running around on them. Her pale skin was emphasized because of this strange light in her body.

"Ari, you will be working with Astrophos once we enter the tower. He will be using the name Astro and you will be in-charge of his disguise so you better scan it now." Cygnus gave the instruction and with a snap, Astrophos returned to his disguise a while ago.

"High Mage Astrophos Veeto will be Astro – data has been stored." A mechanical and cold voice suddenly came from the woman which made Astrophos uncomfortable. Even the way she looked at him was a bit unnerving. "Appearance has been scanned. All data has been stored in the infinite drive. Do you have more instructions master?"

"I don't have any more instructions. Good job Ari." Cygnus did not forget to compliment Ari after she did what she was told to do. After that, Ari slowly disappeared until Astrophos could not feel her presence any longer.

"What-what was that?" He looked at Cygnus with disbelief. That was definitely not a ghost and he was sure that it was not a spirit summon.

"That is Ari, my personal assistant. She is in-charge of storing, sorting and analyzing everything I have learned from my past experiences. Even my memories are stored in her, so if I want to, I can easily access those memories from her." Cygnus explained but he was too lazy to explain it in detail.

"I don't understand what you are saying? Store? Sort? Analyze? Your memories?" Astrophos looked genuinely confused. His serious and cold bearing just a while ago disappeared in the face of his curiosity.

Cygnus looked at Mr. C which the butler immediately understood. He walked up to them to explain to Astrophos who Ari was. Since his butler was already there to tell him what he needed to know, Cygnus exited and left the both of them. He would rather go around the city than to sit there and listen to a boring explanation.

"Ari is a special creation that helps my master with every information he gathers from every world we occupy." Mr. C opened and yet he was forced to stop because Astrophos looked even more confused right at that moment. "Why don't you take a seat first so that I can explain to you what you need to know."

The mage took the butler's suggestion and sat down to listen to the man. He felt like if he did not listen now, he would miss something big and that he would regret it. He tried to make himself as comfortable as he could as he waited for the butler to speak again.

"My master, Nina and I are from a different world than yours. We opened a gate and made Moonvale our home. My master wanted to live a peaceful life with his bake shop but as matters progressed, my master needed to take action." The butler first explained where they came from since the concept of dimension was not already new to the mage.

Astropohos remained calm as he digested the first information. He already knew that these people were different and with the talk of other dimensions he could already guess and now that it was confirmed his suspicions were now eliminated.

"Even though he looks young, my master is already a thousand years old and he has lived in more worlds than you can imagine. I was only by his side for almost seven hundred years now and Ari was with us for five hundred years. Nina on the other hand has stayed with us for three hundred years." He then explained the gist of how long they have existed in any worlds where they had roamed around.

It was a bit surprising but Astrophos could strangely understand because sometimes, the master would talk as if he had seen many things in the world that nobody had seen. He often spoke from experience too and the way he brushed things off was not something someone inexperienced can do.

"Is the master a 'Dimension Walker' too?" Since the butler said that they have been to other worlds then he could only come up with one conclusion, the master was the same with Ezio.

"You can say that but we are not sure ourselves. His way of opening gates to other dimensions is a bit forceful because what he does is rip open the space with his power. This power then creates a connection to another world thus making a pathway we take to that said world." The butler tried to explain and he was not sure if the mage could understand.

"Alright I could understand it a little bit. So, you are saying that these 'Dimension Walkers' have the power to smoothly and accurately open a gate while the master does not have this kind of ability so what he does is to use his power to create that same gate," Astrophos told him what he understood and the butler nodded.

"Yes. Now to continue, at first, I was in-charge of keeping records about the worlds we visited but when we found Ari, she took that job. She has what she calls the 'Infinite Drive' where she can store and access information easily." He then proceeded to tell him about Ari.

He also explained how Ari was storing the master's memories. Because he had lived for such a long time, he was bound to go insane with all the things in his mind and to avoid this, Mr. C proposed that he should store his memories in Ari and after storing those memories, he would make himself forget.

"That's how he survived but along the way he lost many things too. Not even a shred of sympathy nor truth remained. He became like a doll only living a life he wanted without care for the things around him. He wreaked havoc wherever he went and he was given different nicknames." Mr. C added and Astrophos could already guess some of the nicknames that they would have given him.

"Can I know anything about the woman he was talking about a while ago?" He then remembered the master's story so he tried to ask but he was disappointed.

"That information will be provided by the master as I don't have the permission to tell you about that," Mr. C closed his eyes and shook his head. It was not his place to tell him who that woman was because it was a bit of a touchy topic.

"I understand. I'll also need time to digest everything you have said to me today. It is a bit overwhelming." Astrophos sighed and rubbed his head that started to ache after hearing all of that information.

"Since you will be working with Ari, kindly treat her like a human being. Although she is made by man and seems to be cold, I believe that with enough interaction with people, she will slowly change. If you need any information, you can ask her but remember that she will only answer the questions that the master allows her to answer." The butler looked at the mage as he was saying that reminder. "And one more thing, Ari is also powerful so don't mess with her and focus on your mission once you are in the tower because if you slack off, you might experience suffering from her."

Astrophos kept the reminder in his mind before he left. The barrier that the master wavered until it disappeared when the mage left the bakeshop. He took his time and walked slowly towards the manor while he processed all of the information that was given to him.

'Other worlds? If the elders of the tower would know about this, they would definitely clamor to be the first to acquire this knowledge.' He thought to himself as he walked home.