She gazed at him with an unmoved expression as her eyes of curiosity and wisdom bore deep into his.

"Who are you?"

Her tone was sincere.

Rui's expression grew amused.

How long had it been since someone within the Panama Continent had failed to recognize him?

"Ahem," the Scrier coughed uncomfortably. "That is His Highness Prince Rui Quarrier Silas Kandria. You know… the most powerful man in our continent."

Her eyes slowly lit up with realization.

"I see… so you are Rael's son." A soft smile emerged on her face. "No wonder you looked familiar, you resemble him."

Rui's ethereal eyes bore deep into hers. "You must be the Shepherd, I assume."

She took a step back before dipping in a graceful curtsy. "In the flesh, Your Highness."

"…Is it fair to assume you were looking for us, Your Highness?" The Scrier asked with a confused tone. "Is this about the offer you made to us, immortal sages?"

"I was looking for the Shepherd," Rui continued as he studied the woman before him with pointed interest. "I have something to consult you about. Something very important."

"Mmmm…" She turned back to the ruins she studied with an impatient expression before turning back to Rui.

"Can you wait for a week? We'll be done with this section by then."

An amused smile cracked at the edge of Rui's mouth as the Scrier coughed once more.

"What she means to say is that she'd be more than willing to help you with any task that you deem important." The Scrier flashed her a warning gaze.

The Shepherd heaved a sigh. "Very well then, come inside, we can talk more there."

She guided him into her own personal tent casually, removing piles of books, documents, and notes from the table and chairs within it and throwing them on her little bed on the floor of the tent, making space for them to sit.

"I'm sorry that we don't have a more worthy place to receive you in," she spoke with an apologetic tone, sitting down as she gestured to the chair across the little table.

"I'm not here for a vacation," Rui replied with a serious tone. "As I mentioned, I wish to consult you about something very important. As I'm sure you're aware, our continent has undergone grave tragedies. And now I must ascend the throne to—"

"Ascend the throne? Did Rael retire?" She asked casually. "Last I checked, he was on the throne fighting the war, right?"

Rui paused as he studied the woman with a dubious gaze. "…My father is dead. He was assassinated not even a full day ago."

Her expression grew melancholic as her auburn eyes grew hazy with thought.

Several moments later, she heaved a deep breath.

"I see. So he's dead. That's a shame… I would have liked to speak to him one last time."

Her tone contained a hint of darkness.

"…I was told you taught him statesmanship," Rui remarked. "I have heard that you are the greatest statesman on this continent."

She shook her head. "I am not a statesman. I am a statesman academic. I study, document, and research the birth, life, and death of societies and civilizations. I have done so for the past thousand years. But I would not call myself a statesman."

She smiled wryly as she pushed her glasses with a finger. "A nation ruled by me would probably crumble within a day."

She gestured to the mess of a tent that served as her abode.

Rui took a sweeping gaze as he studied the numerous books that were piled messily across the medium-sized tent. They were messily arranged, without any semblance of order.

Unwashed utensils, disposable food utensils, and vessels were stacked in one corner. It appeared that she had survived on instant food for months on end.

He turned back to the young woman, gazing deep into her eyes with deeper interest. They were youthfully vibrant, yet contained an aged sense of knowledge and wisdom. He recognized it. He saw it whenever he gazed into the Divine Doctor's eyes or those of Amare's when she embodied her Esil side more.

"They say you taught my father everything he knew."

A wry smile emerged on her face as she slowly shook her head. "I taught him everything he knew about the flow of civilization when he was a young man, but after that… he repaid the favor."

Rui's eyes lit up at those words. "He repaid the favor?"

"Of course." Her auburn eyes grew hazy with recollection. "The Kandrian Empire… a miracle among miracles. It was nothing short of a godsend for me; whatever I taught him, he went on to apply it so miraculously perfectly that it helped me elevate my understanding of the flow of life of societies and civilizations."

She gazed at him with an expression of profound gratitude. "What he did for me… was truly extraordinary. It's a shame that the Beggar Sage was too paranoid to elevate him to the Sage of Harmony. No one has done more for human civilization than he has. No one has done more for me than he has. If you understood how difficult research in my field is, you would understand the sheer value of his contributions to me. He was like a cheat code; in that regard, he helped not just me, but also other immortal sages in the humanities with his work."

"Your field, which is… academic statesmanship?"

"Civilizational anthropology is what I call it," she remarked. "Studying civilizations is extremely difficult. Data is always imperfect. There are always more variables that causally affect outcomes than you can ever hope to account for. The worst part is that, unlike the physical sciences, the humanities don't have the concept of control. We cannot perform an experiment on a subject and compare it to an identical subject where we don't perform an experiment to precisely measure the changes caused by the experiment, like in chemistry or biology. There is only one Kandrian Empire, which makes understanding causality very difficult."

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