Any quests that involved a reward from the Royal Treasury were completed without the players ever witnessing even the doors of the most heavily guarded location in the palace. The said rewards were always bestowed via King Arthur or his advisor Thomas, who was considered his proxy for reward ceremonies. Young Luca had never expected that his second life's talent was astonishing enough for him to receive such a grand investment from the King. The boy gave a deeper bow this time, "I will work hard to justify your faith in me, Your Majesty."
"I'm sure you will." Arthur Valar rose to his feet slowly, declaring, "Now then, we'd best get back to work. The last thing we need is a backlog of work because this meeting went on too long. Everyone is dismissed." He calmly made his way towards one of the four side doors to the hall, but not before using the King's response to the Nightwatcher's gestures, with his index and middle fingers curled under his thumb and the ring and pinky fingers half-bent while touching. This particular gesture, which Luca did not miss thanks to the System reminding him to watch for a response, meant for the Nightwatcher to wait nearby for further instructions.
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A few minutes later, Luca was admiring the multiple statues that stood in one of the palace's famous locations, the Gallery of Valour. History gave rise to numerous legendary figures, some of which were sculpted as a testament to their work. The Valarian Kingdom had the shortest history of the Light Nations, so their gallery was much smaller compared to its partner nations. However, their heroic figures were often beloved by more than just their own kingdom, as the Valarian Kingdom did not discriminate between heroic figures. In fact, there were fewer human statues compared to the number of High Elf statues. The human figures only amounted to 30% of the gallery's space, while the other races combined totalled 70%, with the High Elves holding the majority at 35%.
As Luca was perusing the journal of events for one particular hero's life, a journal that was written individually for each hero, Arcturus was strolling around to look at each statue. Compared to Luca, who could border on being a walking encyclopedia on Andor due to his unhealthy addiction to the game despite his weakness, Arcturus was almost an empty canvas, a book of blank pages. As such, every new piece of information he came across served to excite him all the more. Of course, he could ask Luca to teach him, and he had thought to before, but the dragon whelp knew that his partner cared for him dearly. Luca seemed to want to wait until Arcturus had grown some more, at least mentally, before beginning to do so. As they were bonded by life and soul, Luca could easily transmit most of his knowledge to his partner, but doing so at present would only be harmful to the dragonling. Plus, there was a chance it would alter his personality somewhat. Arcturus knew that Luca didn't want to force him to change, so he respected his partner's wishes. Until the time came, however, the dragon whelp would search for knowledge wherever he could find it.
Luca had just finished up reading the last pages of the journal when he heard a quiet click come from an alcove on the southern wall. There were numerous similar alcoves around the gallery, and none were particularly interesting enough to stand out from the rest. However, this alcove's placement was twelve paces east of the centremost alcove on the wall and a good forty paces from the eastern wall. The architect of the palace was also responsible for the numerous secret passages within it, all of which were planned down to the smallest detail. In order to access this gallery's passage, one had to first wait for a click from this alcove, then lightly tap their foot twice on a tile three steps north and once on the tile directly west of it. From there, one would then have to cross to the alcove directly north of the first one, take fifteen steps west, then walk straight into the northern wall. This process activated a special enchantment that would cause a portion of the wall to become intangible, allowing for the Nightwalker to pass through. The enchantment only lasted three breaths, so the timing was essential. Of course, the requirement was for that clicking sound to appear. This sound was caused by one of several small buttons made into the underside of the king's desk, each corresponding to a different entrance. Without prior activation, no Nightwalker could use these passages, save for emergencies. The emergency activation processes were much simpler, but were also very obvious, making them undesirable for the secrecy needed for a Nightwalker's duties.
Luca began to perform these actions as best as he could considering his size. Thankfully, the game's forums had listed the number of tiles between each activator, so his little gait was less hindering for him. As he did this, he called Arcturus over, the little dragon curious as to what his partner was doing. When the boy reached the stage where he needed to pass through the wall, he didn't have enough time to explain most of his actions, so all he could tell Arcturus was, "Just follow quickly. No time." He then walked through the wall hastily, the little dragon, with slight fear, closing his eyes and charging through the wall. Luca did not expect him to do so, leading to him making a rather adorable squeaking sound as he was half-tackled into the cold, dusty floor just as the wall returned to its tangible state. "That kinda hurt, Arc."
The young dragonling appeared to blush as he looked away awkwardly, "S-sorry, big brother... I panicked when I saw you run at the wall. You were really serious, so I did what you said without thinking, but I had to close my eyes to run at the wall..."
"It's okay, Arc, it's my fault too. I should've explained before, but we were being watched outside the gallery. Plus, the wall only becomes like that for three breaths, so we had to rush. If we miss the timing, we can't go in for another half-hour due to safety reasons." He spent a few minutes soothing his partner, making sure to explain what they were going to do now. He could speak freely now that they were no longer being monitored, after all.