The Wise Sovereign took a long look at Angel, quietly sighed to himself for a moment, then stopped dwelling on it and turned his gaze to the Black Earl: "That’s the end of the true-or-false questions."
Black Earl: "So now it’s your turn to give an explanation, isn’t it."
The Wise Sovereign chuckled: "Relax, I’ll explain why I brought up those true-or-false questions, and I’ll also keep my promise and tell you the situation of the relic land."
He paused, then began slowly: "The first thing I asked you about was the Qingkong Poetry Room. The fact that Noah descendants don’t know this name did surprise me a little."
"Because the Qingkong Poetry Room was painstakingly built by your Noah Clan ancestor, Augustine. Saying it ’belongs’ to the Noah Clan might be a bit of a stretch; but calling it your ancestral land wouldn’t be wrong."
The Black Earl seemed to think of something: "Don’t tell me the Qingkong Poetry Room is..."
The Wise Sovereign nodded: "That’s right, the Qingkong Poetry Room is precisely what you’ve been referring to all along—the relic land."
Then, starting from the Qingkong Poetry Room, the Wise Sovereign began to recount the story of those years.
"This matter has to start with the romance between Augustine and Margaret, daughter of the Warden of the Hanging Jail Stairway..."
Back then, Augustine and Margaret met by chance and thus became acquainted, and they grew closer through love poems; it was just that the Noah Family’s strength was quite weak at the time. Even though Augustine was a genius, Warden Franklin still didn’t want his daughter getting involved with Augustine.
And there was another point: Augustine was indeed a genius, but Margaret was a genius as well, and her brilliance was in no way inferior to Augustine’s.
Facing someone as dazzling as Margaret, Augustine couldn’t think of any other way to win her favor; all he could do was confess his feelings through love poems that stood for his heart and sincerity. From this alone, you could see how helpless he was in front of Margaret.
However, the Warden’s obstruction didn’t make Margaret and Augustine give up on loving each other.
They began secretly meeting, secretly passing notes and love poems.
At that time, the go‑between helping them pass notes and poems was Cicia. Back then, Cicia and Margaret were best friends.
But later, something happened with Cicia, and she chose to merge with the Box. From then on, the business of passing love poems came to a halt.
Even so, that didn’t hinder the development of the little couple.
Margaret used her own talent to draw the Wise Sovereign over, and he even moved to live near the Hanging Jail Stairway just so he could talk with Margaret.
You have to know, at that time Warden Franklin was one of the Dominators of Naraku City, and the Sage was also a Dominator.
Their ranks were the same, so under normal circumstances they wouldn’t be arranged to live that close to each other. But solely because of Margaret’s astounding talent, the Wise Sovereign broke the rules, chose to live near the Hanging Jail Stairway, and built a residence there—this residence is what’s now the Hall of Wisdom.
"Margaret was truly, truly talented. Especially in Alchemy and Magic Pattern, you could call her the strongest in Naraku City at the time. Most parts of the Magical Energy Array in the Underground Aqueduct adopted Margaret’s suggestions."
"Her glory was unmatched back then." The Wise Sovereign sighed with emotion. "Honestly, that a heaven’s chosen girl like her would fall for Augustine was something I really hadn’t expected. What I really hadn’t expected was that her reason for communicating with me, in the end, was still for that brat... ahem, I mean Augustine."
After all, with this Noah descendant, the Black Earl, present, the Wise Sovereign couldn’t openly disparage his ancestor and had to correct himself.
After the Hall of Wisdom was built, Margaret often came over under the pretext of ’exchanging ideas’. Warden Franklin also had no excuse to stop her, since the Wise Sovereign’s identity was far from ordinary.
But was Margaret truly coming to exchange ideas?
Partly, yes, but for the most part it was still to meet with Augustine.
They even went so far as to secretly build a private rendezvous place together.
And that rendezvous place was the Qingkong Poetry Room.
Building a secret base in the Underground Aqueduct was the sort of thing that was hard to hide from the Warden, yet they still managed it, thanks to the Wise Sovereign’s help.
The Wise Sovereign turned the area nearby into his own domain, which made it inconvenient for the Warden to pry, and thus he provided the young couple a safe environment for construction.
You could say the Wise Sovereign was Cicia’s successor; under his protection, the little couple gained a place for trysts.
As for why the Wise Sovereign was willing to help Margaret and Augustine build this Qingkong Poetry Room, it all stemmed from something Margaret said.
"I can carve out a place within the enormous and intricate Magical Energy Array of the Underground Aqueduct that will be absolutely unaffected by the Array and won’t be discovered by any Dominator. Would the Wise Sovereign like to see it? But if the Wise Sovereign wants to see it, you absolutely have to help me hide it from my father, otherwise he’ll never agree."
At the time, the Wise Sovereign, who was obsessed with Alchemy, didn’t hesitate at all and nodded right away. The result was that he boarded Margaret’s pirate ship and became an accomplice in building the Qingkong Poetry Room.
In the end, the Qingkong Poetry Room was completed, and as its Protector, the Wise Sovereign had actually only gone inside a handful of times.
Most of the time, it was still a rendezvous spot for Margaret and Augustine.
Ever since the Naraku incident, the Qingkong Poetry Room had been sealed off, and the Wise Sovereign had no further chance to enter. Ten thousand years have passed, and the Wise Sovereign actually doesn’t know what the Qingkong Poetry Room looks like now.
"As for what the Qingkong Poetry Room looked like back then, I do remember its internal layout, but only the superficial floor plan. Augustine very likely built secret rooms inside, and those are places I know nothing about."
With that said, the Wise Sovereign lightly tapped the True Words Tome.
At the same time, on the Book Pages in front of each person, a floor plan of the Qingkong Poetry Room’s interior appeared.
The Black Earl glanced over it and didn’t find anything particularly special about the Qingkong Poetry Room for the time being. It was just like an ordinary building: there was a hall, a poetry collection room, a study, a kitchen, and a poem-recitation room.
"There doesn’t seem to be a bedroom?" Dox muttered.
The Wise Sovereign cast a light glance at Dox: "Indeed, there’s no bedroom. That’s also why I think Augustine likely built a secret chamber."
"But then again, even if there were a bedroom, Augustine and Margaret wouldn’t necessarily have taken me there for a tour."
As for why, everyone understood.
Aside from the missing bedroom, no one else found anything wrong with the Qingkong Poetry Room. Only Angel, staring at this floor plan, felt a faint doubt rising in his heart.