As for an explanation of what Laurene was doing; the girl was using her mystic eyes to look into the 'Truth' of the 'Fake Hero' title, and the floating screens and lines of codes around her, were the constituents of said 'Title'.
For all the years she had possessed the Mystic Eye of Truth, there was no way someone like Laurene would not have tried to look into the true essence of her Hero title, to understand it and see if she could 'edit' some settings and grant herself more power.
Thus, although what she understood was very minuscule, Laurene's level of knowledge about the 'Hero' title was only a step below Evan who was the Leader, and Abigail for reasons that should have been obvious by now.
Her 'understanding', however, was a lot lower.
"Sir Luke. Can you come over for a bit?"
Laurene called Luke over with a frown on her face, one that let everyone around her infer she had discovered something unfavourable.
She dismissed 90% of the holograms around her and only left a few of the magic circles and circuit boards, changing their colour scheme to red.
After, she used light magic to generate another set of interconnected magic circles, some of them being within Tiers 5 and above, and Luke could even see some Tier 6 magic circles.
She gave the second set a blue colour scheme and then used magic to create a barrier that prevented her voice from escaping a two-metre radius around her and pushed the two sets of conjurings toward Luke.
"Pardon me, but I have zero idea of what this is supposed to be."
Luke spoke while alternating his gaze between the two sets of magic circles, and just when he was about to ask why they had different colours, Laurene spoke.
"Don't they look similar?"
"..?"
He took a moment to study them carefully and although he didn't understand them, he could at least see that they were visually identical to each other in a few aspects.
"The red one seems broken off in many places and has lower tier magic circles used, plus some of the symbols are different, but the overall outlook is the same."
"Now then, Sir Luke.
What if I told you that the blue one is a 'Hero' title and the red one is the 'Fake Hero' title?"
Hearing her words, Luke's expression turned dark as he instantly understood what Laurene was implying.
"The Demonic Hand was able to replicate your Hero title to this extent?"
"Indeed.
It's not as much as you see though.
What I'm showing you are only 10% of the Hero title's conjuring, the 10% I can understand at my current existence level.
So, the fact that the Demonic Hand's Fake Hero title conjuring has 70% similarities, means that they managed to replicate at least 7% of the Hero title."
Laurene replied as she dismissed the two light magic projections, before getting up to her feet and continuing.
"The fact that they were able to achieve this much, means that they have someone on their team who has a great understanding of the Level System and the Title Specifics."
Now then, although it was only 7% the Demonic Hand managed to replicate, that number should not be looked down on.
It should be remembered that the Level System, something Artemisia referred to as the 'Devour Class' system, was something that was active in the entirety of their universe.
So, one could only imagine the level of conjuring that the system was, and the complexities it entailed.
After all, Laurene's basic 10% understanding of the System on Aidos alone already involved a few Tier 6 Magic circles.
The fact that the Demonic Hand was able to replicate this was nothing short of praiseworthy.
The Third Finger on the Beta Continent would never have expected the assassination attempt on Laurene to fail so easily, and that she would end up studying a still-live Fake Hero with her mystic eyes and unravel truths about their project.
"But it should be flat-out impossible for anyone to achieve that.
If it wasn't for the fact that I am one of the Heroes myself, I would have believed whoever is responsible for this Fake Hero creation is a bona fide Hero themselves."
Laurene spoke with a frown as she turned her gaze towards the restrained Senior Member of the Demonic Hand.
'There's also the fact that the 'Hero' title they're trying to replicate…is Evan's; the title of the 'Hero of Mimicry'.
It's because of that title that he can skirt around the restrictions that prevent one from utilizing the Essence of the World Law Doctrine of Mimicry to copy other people's skills with just the knowledge of them.
Perhaps, that's why they all look identical to that control freak Arlan?'
The girl shook her head slightly as if trying to rid herself of unnecessary thoughts, her frown deepening as she pressed her fingers to her temples and thought.
'I thought I had completely subdued the previous Fourth's vestiges that affected 'me', why am I referring to the Previous Second the way she did?'
She used her eyes on herself and scanned her body all over, only stopping after she had confirmed there were no abnormalities with herself
'Anyway, someone in the Demonic Hand has a great understanding of us Heroes, and I don't like that one bit.'
Laurene took a deep breath before crouching down once more and disabling the soundproofing magic. She then picked up the body of the Fake Hero, much to the shock of her guards.
"Your High-!"
One of the knights wanted to speak but she held up a single finger to silence him and created analysis magic circles around the Fake Hero's body.
"Myriad Casting."
Seven fist-sized orbs of multi-elemental magic manifested behind her and she snapped her fingers, making the first orb light up and release a thin beam of light that passed through one of the analysis circles before hitting the Fake hero's body.
"Pen and paper someone."
One of the Mages nearby pulled out a notepad and pen from his magic pouch and handed it over to her, which she accepted and began writing down her test results.
She repeated the same process using all the elements of magic, and she even used her divinity on it, noting that the reaction upon using Divinity was different.
"I see."
"Weaker to Divinity."
"…plus, a very conditional existence."
"I see that there appear to be some restrictions, but applied by who?"
"…World Laws Doctrine? Oh, Causality."
"Can only be active for a limited time."
Laurene spent quite some time running her various tests, occasionally muttering things like this and from the expression of shock that appeared on the Captured Demonic Hand member's face, one could tell she was hitting the marks.
As for the Knights and Mages in her guard detail, they only smiled wryly as they watched her after cremating the Demonic Hand members' corpses.
They were well used to Laurene's 'Research Mode' after following her for years so this wasn't anything too surprising for them.
Her maids were also familiar with this, so they just waited nearby in silence, providing her with water and snacks at regular intervals.
'Ah, she's picked up bad habits from those old Court mages.
Using levitation magic to bring food and water to her lips while her hands remain engaged in whatever she's doing.'
Such were Luke's thoughts as he watched the teenage girl run various tests on the Fake Hero to acquire detailed info on all its characteristics.
"Hmm…that should be all.
You can kill him now."
Laurene spoke as she got up and stretched her body, but Luke decided to take his last Fake Hero along to the Captial with the captured Demonic Hand member.
"Why?"
"Your fellow Hero might know a few more things about them."
"Oh, Evan.
Come to think of it, Eliza told me he took her to Duscon."
"Duscon?"
Luke's expression turned strange when he heard Laurene's words. He inadvertently thought about the existence he met in Duscon decades ago, but shook his head and decided it was just a coincidence.
'There's no way he went there for the Regal Voi-"
"Yeah.
She said they were around Shelde."
"…"
The Sword Saint went silent upon hearing Laurene's other statement, an expression of surprise colouring his face as he retracted his earlier thoughts about Evan's location being a coincidence.
'Knowing him, that place might actually be his destination. He might already know about the Ouroboros too.'
Whether Laurene noticed Luke's expression or not, she only stood still and let her maid redo her hair that she had ended up scattering while she was running tests on the Fake Hero as she asked aloud.
"Just what on Aidos is he doing all the way over there anyway?"
◇ ◇ ◇
The answer to Laurene's question; was looting.
Evan had finished dealing with the Demonic Hand members sent his way and was now looting the corpses for valuable artifacts that he could either sell or utilize.
He also used Mesarthim's flames to torch the corpses and turn them to ashes as he knew that he was going to be crowded by the adventurers fighting against the Giant Bears running towards Shelde and Lastham very soon.
"I had wanted to fight in a forest away from Human Civilization to prevent collateral damage and civilian deaths, but doing so in this forest caused the original residents to flee in the direction of the Civilization I didn't want to damage.
Luckily they noticed the signs early and were able to defend."
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