Entering the house and ascending to the second floor, Elaina looked around and realized that the second floor was another place altogether that was different than the ground floor. Based on the layout of the place alone, the second floor was meant to be used as the main room of the occupants previously. She counted 4 rooms and one big vacant space without any furniture on the second floor that she could freely design or build something else.
"Here, Sis! Come here!" Julia poked out her head from the second room’s door to notify Elaina of where they were.
Elaina headed to the second room and even though she hadn’t entered the room yet, she could smell the musty smell of dust in the area. It’s not that bad but she has to cover her nose since she starts to feel her nose itchy the longer she breathes in the air.
Entering the room they were in, Elaina was surprised to see a room filled with various bookcases filled with books that looked old and antique.
"There is a whole intact library here on the second floor the entire time?" Elaina was surprised.
"We are surprised as well. These books are still intact and still in pretty good shape despite the age of the covers and pages. They are quite older than the books back in the imperial palace I presumed," Princess Margaux said while flipping the books on the floor one by one.
"Yeah. Some of them are even books written in a language I don’t know. But Sis! That wasn’t the reason why we called you here! Come, look here. We found this one."
Julia then dragged a chest that looked very old. It has some strange markings and is too big to be a regular chest. It has a lock that looks very ancient and even looking at it, anyone can tell that it is older than them, even if the ages of the three combined, their total age will not surpass the age of this lock at all.
"We wanted to open this chest but because there is no key anywhere here, we called you to use your expertise in picking locks and see what is inside," Julia explained.
"Is it safe to even open? We don’t know what lies inside and we can just let that chest remain closed, you know?" Elaina is cautious.
"I scanned it earlier and it didn’t contain anything dangerous inside. We wanted to fully see what is inside since my scanning magic can only detect if there are any dangers inside on something, not what is inside soo..." Julia then looked at Elaina with a smile on her face.
"Fine, fine. Let me grab my lockpick for a bit."
Although Elaina is not on board with opening a locked chest, since Julia said it should be safe, Elaina decided that she should open it. But she does admit that she is also curious about what is inside. If it is something bad they unknowingly freed, then they will just handle the consequences later. With the lockpick in hand, Elaina returned to the second floor, and seeing the lockpick on her hands, Julia and Princess Margaux gathered together to look at Elaina picking the lock open to the sealed chest.
"This is one complicated lock. Thankfully, it is still possible to open it with a lockpick. Give me a minute and let me open this one."
Elaina proceeded to make little twists and shake on the lockpick to open the lock. Slowly, but surely. Around a minute or two...
"There, the chest is open."
Elaina then slowly opens the chest and inside reveals a black box, a set of old clothes, and a thick journal that Elaina usually sees that had been used by her grandfather before. It looked very much like a replica of the journal to her grandfather she instinctively opened the journal to check if it was indeed his.
Thankfully, it seemed that was not the case. While Elaina is checking on the journal, Princess Margaux and Julia are fixated on the black box inside.
"This thing is strange. I thought it would be some sort of mini chest or something but it doesn’t open or anything at all," Julia said while checking it out. Check latest chapters at NovelHub(.)net
"I suggest you put that down for now, Julia. We don’t know what kind of stuff that one is and its function but just to be safe, put it down for now."
Julia nodded. She is also afraid it must be some sort of cursed artifact. She put it back inside the chest and her attention shifted to the uniform.
"Wait a minute...where have I seen this kind of uniform before?" Princess Margaux frowned as she pulled out the clothes inside and spread them wide.
"You recognize the uniform princess?" Julia asked.
"A bit. I remembered seeing it before but I forgot where I have seen it."
Elaina is only listening to both of them talk while she fiddles with the journal. She skimmed inside the journal and could easily tell that the one who previously owned this journal was someone who kept his records mainly in this journal. It is like some sort of biography or some diary of some sort based on the entries that she slightly saw after skimming through.
Elaina decided to read it for real this time around. The first page where usually is just a filler page to divide portions of the journal, there is something written there.
"If anyone is reading this aside from myself then perhaps I have finally died and the farmhouse is now occupied by someone who managed to last long enough to keep living here. Well, I must say congrats and thank you for finding my belongings here.
And since that is the case, then perhaps the role of keeping Darcero Kingdom’s border safe now falls within your hands. Also, I hope that the one reading this is someone who is a farmer who knows what he or she is doing for it is the vital thing needed to keep the Darcero Kingdom from being overrun by monsters.
If you are confused, just read the journal and you will understand what I meant soon."
Elaina is now in disbelief. Just what kind of sh*t did she unknowingly do now?