Edwin Lunar Chapter 84: The Forgotten Message

Read chapter 84 of Edwin Lunar by MananTayal on NovelPedia.

The next morning, Edwin woke before sunrise. For several moments he remained in bed staring at the ceiling. His mind was still processing everything Humming had revealed. Groader had been the leader of the Original Orion. The Observer was connected to mysteries even before the Great War. Wingard had discovered the truth before his death. And now only one lock remained on the Red Box. One lock. After decades. Whatever was inside was preparing to emerge. And somehow Edwin knew the timing wasn't a coincidence. Someone had planned this. Perhaps Wingard. Perhaps Groader. Or perhaps someone far older. A knock interrupted his thoughts. Before he could answer, Carl pushed the door open. "Emergency." Edwin immediately sat up. "What happened?" Carl pointed toward the hallway. "Iris discovered something." "Is the academy under attack?" "No." "Did another cosmic monster appear?" "No." "Then why is it an emergency?" Carl looked offended. "Because Iris hasn't slept in twenty-one hours." A pause. "That usually means something important." Five minutes later Edwin, Carl, and Lucien entered Orion's meeting room. Iris stood before a massive holographic display. Several dozen windows floated around her. Historical documents. Maps. Military reports. Ancient recordings. The usual signs that she had spent an unhealthy amount of time researching. "I found a pattern." She didn't even greet them. Edwin immediately knew it was serious. "What kind of pattern?" Iris enlarged several files. "Every document connected to Groader's betrayal." The files appeared side by side. At first they seemed completely unrelated. Different years. Different authors. Different locations. But then Iris highlighted several tiny symbols hidden within the records. Edwin frowned. "What am I looking at?" "Digital signatures." She zoomed closer. "Every official document contains them." Carl squinted. "They all look identical." "Exactly." The room became silent. Because that should have been impossible. The documents were supposedly created by different people over several decades. Yet the same signature appeared in every modification. The same invisible mark. The same hidden code. Someone had rewritten history personally. Again and again. For decades. Using different identities. Different positions. Different governments. Yet leaving the same fingerprint every time. Lucien crossed his arms. "Can you trace it?" Iris nodded slowly. "That's the strange part." The hologram shifted. A location appeared. Not a planet. Not a military base. Not an archive. A single room. Deep beneath Noroel Academy. Edwin's eyes widened. "Vault Omega." Iris nodded. The same vault containing the Red Box. The same vault protected by Humming. The same vault hidden from everyone. Carl blinked. "Are we saying the person who changed history is inside the academy?" "No." Iris replied. "I'm saying someone inside the academy has been connected to the changes." That answer wasn't much better. For several moments nobody spoke. Then Edwin remembered something. "Humming." The others looked at him. "He said Wingard left memory crystals." Iris immediately understood. "If there are more recordings, they might explain what happened." Edwin nodded. "Then that's our next step." Later that afternoon, Edwin returned to Humming's office. The headmaster was already waiting. Almost as if he knew why Edwin had come. "You want the crystals." It wasn't a question. Edwin smiled slightly. "Was it that obvious?" "Yes." Humming sighed. "You have your father's curiosity." "I've been told that's a problem." "It absolutely is." For a brief moment both of them laughed. Then the mood became serious again. Humming opened a storage compartment hidden behind his desk. Several memory crystals rested inside. There were far more than Edwin had expected. At least twenty. Perhaps more. "You never watched them?" Edwin asked. "I watched some." Humming replied. "Not all." "Why?" The old headmaster looked away. His answer came quietly. "Because I was a