### Chapter 17: The Secret Covenant of the Shepherd
Avalon Kingdom, Glass Island, White Queen District Inspectorate.
It was busy as always this morning at the Inspectorate.
Men and women wearing leather or light armor walked quickly down the corridors. On the office wall of Director Kent was the silver-white, regal dragon head—the Silver Crown Dragon, ever-vigilant.
Director Kent, in his forties now but still strong, sat in his leather chair.
His back was straight, his wide shoulders and arms bulked out his baggy clothes. His tanned skin and scarred face lent him a wild, dangerous appearance. A thick, raised scar stretched across the area above his left eye to his lip, and he had a black eyepatch over his eye, like a pirate with one eye.
Even though he didn't battle on the front lines for more than ten years, protocol insisted that he work in armor, stand perfectly, and exhibit no wavering in attitude. Silver-white metal armor covered his arms, belly, and shins—expansion areas—while shining plates were worn elsewhere.
A top-level transcendent could only sit like this all day.
Four hundred twenty years earlier, Avalon's original monarch, Lancelot I, formed three judicial branches:
The Inspectorate, guarding the people; the Court of Oversight, keeping watch on knights and officials; and the Hall of Arbitration, declaring right and wrong. These were initially coequal, governed by Round Table Knights with representation in the Senate.
Avalon's symbol was a green eye inside a silver triangle, representing authority.
The eye stood for the royal house, represented by the still-hale, virtually eighty-year-old Queen Sophia I.
The silver triangle represented the Inspectorate, Court of Oversight, and Hall of Arbitration.
With time, the Inspectorate's responsibilities grew—taxation, safety, sanitation, fire prevention, public order, inspection, imprisonment—bifurcating into sub-departments with local offices, manned by trainee inspectors, inspectors, and chief inspectors, weakening its authority.
The Oversight Court had become a virtual clandestine police, investigating officials' allegiance, knightly families' morality, grassroots inspectors' corruption, and foreign spies, or intelligence gathering overseas. The Arbitration Hall had developed into the contemporary court system.
Both now stood above the Inspectorate.
Therefore, anyone who made it to the fourth level in the Inspectorate was transferred to the Oversight Court or Arbitration Hall, found to be "unnecessary" to the Inspectorate. Even in the White Queen District, close to the Glass Steps, Director Kent was third-tier only.
The new hire, Haina, just a little over twenty, was already competing with Kent, who was close to fifty.
He knew the Oversight Court would get her soon.
This was the time of geniuses. Haina, Sherlock—these newgen were far superior to peacetime-bred talents.
Not a good sign, Kent grimly considered.
It could signal impending chaos…
He reached for the phone and dialed 0-1-2.
"Bring Haina to my office," he instructed. "And bring our consultant as well."
He hung up and flung the Glass Steps Gazette on his desk before striding over to the bookshelf.
The front page of the newspaper included a picture of Haina and the young master of the Moriarty family.
The attractive boy, smiling serenely, was sitting in an elven-style wheelchair, his knees wrapped in a blanket, hands clasped, talking normally to some person. To his back stood Haina, hand resting on her sword hilt, muscles tense.
She appeared to have seen the photographer or to be greeting someone in the vicinity.
The boy's eyes moved to the camera mid-sentence.
He grinned a dazzling, sunlike smile and waved a hand as if welcoming the readers of the newspaper.
The action cycled back to him talking seriously.
—This was the "Magic Painting" power of the Beauty Path.
Although the Beauty Path was prohibited in Avalon, Master Yannis, the elven world-famous painter, who established the Glass Daily Society, was exempted. The largest and semi-official newspaper in Avalon, the society prepared critical kingdom information for the Round Table ministers and royal family.
The three court institutions offered complimentary Glass Steps Gazette issues to staff.
Some non-political rich purchased it to keep up with elite policies or express interest in the kingdom. University students bought it for social influence.
Every issue contained a fifteen-second "Magic Painting." Even at high material prices—one Red Crown per copy—the selling price was just two Red Crowns and five Copper Crowns, the latter paid to distributors, at times reduced. Most decent individuals could manage it.
This silent, monochrome animated newspaper, though a first-time experience, was a cheap thrill for common folk to observe transcendent power.
In this week's Gazette, Aiwass Moriarty got twelve seconds, with three left over for an ad for bicycles.
Kent had no doubt that Aiwass's radiant appearance and pleasant smile won him the additional time from Master Yannis.
"Smiling like that… sure to be up to no good," Kent growled, beast mode taking hold. "Wonder whose daughter he's after…"
But he saw to it.
Cracking such a big case at his age made Aiwass a future heavyweight.
This merit so unexpected called for big rewards—such a case should have been assigned to the Oversight Court, not them.
It was also an opportunity to bond with Professor Moriarty.
The reward had to be impressive, or it'd be rubbish to the Moriartys, embarrassing the Inspectorate.
…Such a nuisance.
"Devotion Path priest… theology student…" Kent muttered, reading the bookshelf.
He stopped at an angle.
A black-bound book with no spine title.
He picked it up and snapped the cover, a spark flying like a hammer on an anvil.
"This could work," he grumbled, reading the title: "*The Secret Covenant of the Shepherd*… Priest-sounding."
The bookshelf contained seized banned books—treasured assets.
Avalon forbade bribery outright because it was weakening "Authority." But making profit in one's own jurisdiction was permissible, not spoken, to keep officials from being bribed by foreign spymasters—particularly Star Antimony's—or selling secrets and assets, which weakened "Authority" as well.
One profit that was allowed was selling seized forbidden books to knightly families. This bookshelf belonged, in a way, to Kent himself.
Not a follower of Devotion Path, Kent could not open the book.
But its cover and title cried Devotion Path occult scripture.
When they died, their souls streamed into the Dream Realm's "Nine-Forked River," uniting with their most distant Path. Their power was translated into Path characteristics for successors' prosperity ceremonies, while their experiences and wisdom broke into the Dream Realm's flowers, fruits, clouds, and waves to create its fabric.
Wisdom Path Dream Monks were able to gather these broken, esoteric knowledges.
They organized them into "Original Texts."
Kept in the ancient Gupta script, invisible to the eye of most, these needed Wisdom Path translators with occult abilities to interpret.
By tradition, such Dream Realm knowledge books were named "Secret Covenant of [Something]," the prefix indicating the translator's interpretation.
An Original Text would have one full occult method, perhaps rediscovered at a later date but often lost to history.
Not always practical, but certainly scarce.
In other words, unattainable by regular means…
"As a reward and 'gift,' it's prestigious enough," Kent grumbled.
(End of Chapter)