The next day. Inside the Hearthstone Tavern’s Noiseless Room.
“Welcome to the Voice of Norland’s morning news broadcast. I am Pluk... Last night, the chapel located on Kercis Street was closed down by the law enforcers. This chapel constructed by the Nation of the Holy Church in Norland eighty years ago was the only chapel of the Holy Light in Norland. Reportedly, a teleportation formation constructed without permission was discovered in the basement of the chapel. The teleportation formation has been demolished by the law enforcers.”
The Deceiver Pluk sat before the Noiseless Room. After he finished reading the script, he looked to Joshua who was standing outside the Noiseless Room. Joshua raised his thumb to him.
Although this Faceless Demon with four adopted children maintained the appearance of an uncommunicative middle-aged man, he was quite up to par as a broadcaster. His voice only sounded slightly stiff at the beginning of the broadcast.
“No matter how I think about it, I feel that it’s a waste.”
The dark elf Thousand Faces was also outside the Noiseless Room. As she looked at Pluk holding the script in the Noiseless Room, she sighed.
Everything written in the script was ‘intelligence’ gathered by the dark elf last night. If those information were to be sold to people who needed them, they would definitely be able to fetch a good price.
But now...
The dark elf opened her magic network interface. With a gentle swipe of her finger, the Voice of Norland’s interface appeared.
A ‘Morning News’ headline was present on the page. The name of the broadcaster was under it. But, the most eye-catching thing of all was the amount of current listeners... over seventeen thousand!
That was an enormous number. Even though it was still a negligible number when compared to Norland’s population, it still meant that the intelligence gathered by the dark elf last night has been given to over seventeen thousand people free of charge.
When one loses the monopoly over a piece of information, when that information was known to a great amount of people, it would mean that information had lost its value.
“It’s enough as long as more people are able to hear our voices and believe in us. To you, information has been a commodity. But in this place... information is a weapon.”
Joshua was able to understand why the dark elf was sighing. No one would be happy to give away their commodity free of charge.
“Weapon...”
The dark elf was able to guess the reason why Joshua was doing this. But, it was unknown exactly how much this would affect the Holy Church. But, what Pluk said next inside the Noiseless Room called to the dark elf’s attention.
“The pictures of the chapel’s basement will soon be posted on the Mage Forum’s Voice of Norland sub-forum by the reporter that was on the scene. Everyone, if you’re interested in it, you can go and have a look.”
“You’re planning to publicize the photographs too?”
The dark elf was hesitant. She had thought that Joshua would be planning to use those photos as bargaining chips to threaten the Holy Church.
“The pursuit of news is the truth. Without evidence, no one will believe in the news. Those photos served as the most powerful proof. Could it be... Miss Thousand Faces, all the photos you’ve taken were those that cannot be posted?”
Ever since Joshua learned the dark elf’s nickname was Thousand Faces, he stopped addressing her by her face. As for Thousand Faces, she kept her promise. Upon returning to Norland, she became Joshua’s subordinate and became a reporter in Joshua’s entertainment guild.
“That’s impossible. Using this arcanotech device is similar to using a bow. The amount of arrows I’ve missed in all my life numbered less than ten.”
Even though it was her first time using the ‘magic camera,’ she had displayed outstanding talent and skill in its usage.
“There’s no problem then.”
Joshua made a ‘come in’ hand gesture toward the door. Waiting outside the entire time, the frost elf Tylene and the World Tree finally entered the Noiseless Room.
The current speed of the magic network was extremely slow, so much that it drove Joshua mad. Uploading the photos using one’s own magic network terminal would be extremely time-consuming. Directly uploading them through the root server was a much faster thing.
“You merely need to place the magic camera next to the World Tree.”
Instructed by Joshua, the dark elf took out the arcanotech device. The World Tree also cooperated without any issue. It extended its roots and grabbed the camera. The Runes of Order started to flicker on its roots. The World Tree was retrieving the photos stored in the magic camera.
“It... listened to you?”
It was the dark elf’s first time interacting with the world tree from another elven race. To an elf whose race has been exterminated, World Trees were things unattainable to her.
But, in her memories, her race’s World Tree would never listen to the request from any dark elf, much less a demon.
“About this... how should I explain it? If you’ve had a cat, you’d understand.”
Joshua scratched the World Tree’s leaves. In the meantime, he utilized the root server to post a new post onto the Mage Forum.
The World Tree had its own consciousness. But, compared to humans, its consciousness resembled an animal more. It might also be because the World Tree was still very young.
The dark elf looked at this scene in silence. She didn’t know what to think about it. The World Trees were the sacred beings to elves. If a grand elder of the Frost Elves were still present and saw the scene of someone playing with their World Tree, they would most likely choose to battle Joshua to the death.
But, as the final frost elf, Tylene was not only not angered by this scene, she instead smiled at the interaction between Joshua and the World Tree.
It was truly a pet... The dark elf sighed.
Five minutes later. A post by the name of ‘The evidence of the Holy Church constructing a teleportation formation under the chapel without permission’ appeared on the Voice of Norland sub-forum.
The dark elf took a glance at the person who posted it. The poster’s name was ‘Darkfeather Arrow.’ That was her nickname on the forum. Back then, Joshua even ridiculed her for that nickname and told her she should’ve changed ‘feather’ to ‘moon’ instead. Even now, she didn’t understand why Joshua ridiculed her for that name.
Thaty said, this post was not made by her. Instead, Joshua was the one who made the post.
She was not surprised by it. In the seemingly equal world of the magic network, Joshua was the only god. The rules of the magic network were all written by him. It was a simple task for him to intervene in the magic network and alter things.
“Your photos... are indeed excellent in every respect.”
Joshua had skimmed over the photos the dark elf took. Practically none of them were fuzzy. They were all exceptionally clear. Furthermore, they were also taken at very crafty angles. One of the photos in the set covered the entire construction of the teleportation formation. Not a single person was present in that photo.
Another photo managed to capture both Norland’s Law Enforcers and the Holy Church’s Ecclesiastical Templars.
A portion of the photos were deliberately taken with the Ecclesiastical Templars and the teleportation formation in mind. Joshua thought to himself how she compared photography to archery. In the end, he must admit that those photos were taken by an excellent archer.
If the magic camera was changed to a longbow, from the angles of the photos, those Ecclesiastical Templars might all be dead.