"What are you doing here?" Rorschach asked, a little surprised.

Singrev scratched his fluffy beard. "After I left Valois, I came to Istani to try my luck. I was gonna head back home, but there’s been a little friction between our Federation and the Istani Kingdom lately, so the direct routes are cut off."

"Then shouldn’t you get out of here quickly? You could go to the Empire first and then continue north." Rorschach felt that with the two nations on the verge of war, someone as conspicuous as Singrev shouldn’t be lingering in enemy territory.

"I’m an Adventurer! And a Gold Level one!" Singrev emphasized his status again. "I just have to show my papers to the guards. As for everyone else, the humans here have caught the bean sprout disease—they’re completely indifferent to the outside world. Even though I’m a Dwarf, they just look down their noses at me and scurry off."

’For you, there’s probably no one here who *doesn’t* look down their nose at people.’ Rorschach thought it was a nice coincidence to run into Singrev in a strange place, though he hadn’t expected it to be a museum instead of an Adventurer’s Guild or a tavern.

The other visitors were all gentlemen and ladies, and they... did indeed look down their noses at the suspicious, mismatched pair of one tall man and one Dwarf.

The Dwarf clucked his tongue in amazement as he looked at the White Dragon skeletons. "My friend wasn’t lying to this Dwarf! There really is a... wait, the plaque’s got it wrong. They’re not a couple."

"Then what’s their relationship?"

Singrev’s brain whirred for a moment. "They’re my friend’s second maternal uncle and youngest maternal aunt, respectively. So, so they’re..." He reached a conclusion. "Definitely not husband and wife, that’s for sure."

’Singrev’s circle of friends is something else...’ Rorschach mentally recited the "your father’s father is your grandfather" mantra and concluded, "They’re brother and sister."

"Oh, right! Oh, no, wait."

"No, that’s correct," Rorschach said confidently.

But Singrev pointed out a blind spot. "Rorschach Mage, I get what you mean, but there’s one problem. Dragons are oviparous. Is it possible they were in the same clutch and happened to hatch at the exact same time?"

’What a contrarian...’ Rorschach was about to say more, but the next exhibit silenced him for a moment.

The Dwarf followed Rorschach’s gaze and saw it too. "Good heavens!"

The exhibit was no smaller than the dragon skeletons. It was the complete vascular network of a dragon, preserved as a specimen. Of course, they didn’t have injection molding technology, but a dragon’s vascular tissue was resilient enough that the specimen’s creator must have cast it directly with molten aluminum. The finished product was now a grayish-white, likely due to a dense layer of oxide on the aluminum’s surface.

The thickest part, the aorta, was as wide as Rorschach’s arm. These silvery-gray "branches" intertwined and overlapped, inviting one to imagine the form of a complete White Dragon.

It was beautiful, very expensive (considering the price of aluminum in this world), and very...

The subsequent exhibits were still dragon-related: various organs, meticulously preserved in formaldehyde. Muscle fibers, stretched fascia, and tendons were all on display for the visitors.

"No Dragon Hide?" Rorschach felt like something was missing. It only clicked when he saw an oil painting, a "posthumous portrait" of the White Dragon.

"My good sir, Dragon Hide is more expensive than aluminum! Plus, it’s a material for making Magic Supplies and Top-Grade Armor. They’d never put it on display."

The White Dragon was clearly the museum’s crown jewel, and the part that most attracted the average tourist. Further in, the theme shifted to Elves—specifically, the Gray Elves of El Island.

"They really picked it clean," Rorschach remarked after finally seeing the full set of the museum’s prized possessions.

"A primitive people, struggling in muddy swamps." The description made Rorschach a little uncomfortable.

Regarding the Gray Elves, Rorschach saw woolen fabrics with patterns that faintly depicted oceans, mountains, forests, and various animals. They were hung flat against the walls as artifacts. The curator had carefully arranged the exhibits chronologically, showing the Elves progressing from chipped stone tools to polished stone tools, then to bronze and crude iron tools, and then... it all came to an abrupt end.

The description for each exhibit tried to maintain a guise of objectivity, coldly stating where it came from, its speculated use, and how much this tribe of primitive Elves had suffered. Through the condescending words, Rorschach could feel he was witnessing a civilization that had been judged as "not having entered the civilized era."

One commendable set was a collection of crystal vessels. The crystal itself was not very clear, and each piece was covered in marks from being chiseled and drilled, worked piece by piece. There were also wax figures recreating scenes of fishing and hunting. These Gray Elves looked no different from other Elves, at least to an "outsider" like Rorschach, yet they were draped in furs and brandished crude weapons, a far cry from the elegance stereotypically associated with Elves on the continent.

The exhibition also presented their bloody sacrificial rituals. More wax figures recreated the scene, with paint splattered to look like blood. All the figures surrounded the High Priest—a female statue draped in a long, green shawl, wearing a crown made from a deer’s head.

A real male Elf skeleton was displayed to the side, its shattered skull indicating he had suffered a fatal blow before death.

Among the ritual objects was a large marble slab, mottled green and white. It had been broken into small pieces and then reassembled. The green veins had been carefully arranged to form various patterns, like totems.

In Rorschach’s memory, it was somewhat similar to the system of symbols left behind in the Elf Village in the Black Forest.

Rorschach recalled the codex deciphered by Professor Poincaré, trying to find a match. The stone tablet itself was incomplete and stained. Rorschach thought what he saw resembled the Rune for "Life."

A melodious male voice interrupted his thoughts. "You’ve been standing before the Danu Stone Tablet for a long time. Are you admiring it, or have you discovered something?"

Rorschach turned to the source of the voice. It was an Elf, slightly taller than him. Unlike the wild-looking Gray Elf wax figures in the exhibit, his face was handsome. His dark-colored clothing had subtle patterns, and the small, metallic trinkets he wore were eye-catching but not gaudy. His attire was so impeccable that even the lords and ladies of the Queens District couldn’t find fault. Rorschach’s gaze swept down to the fingers tapping a cane, where a silver ring shaped like a crow’s skull was wrapped around one.

’A dandy.’

"No, I just find it rather unique. The ornamentation is a bit mesmerizing."

"What a shame. I thought you might have read something from it." The man declared that he had overestimated Rorschach’s reading comprehension. "You’re not from Istani, otherwise you wouldn’t be dressed like that, let alone have a Dwarf for a companion."

’Is there something wrong with my clothes?’ The young man was wearing a standard outfit purchased in the Holy Kingdom, with a handsome indigo jacket that he himself was quite fond of.

"Yes, and it’s precisely because I’m a tourist that I’ve come to see the museum. As I see it, this building is Istani’s display window to the world."

The man grew more interested. "And what do you think of what you’ve seen so far? Please, focus on your thoughts about the Gray Elf exhibit."

"It’s meticulous, just like the White Dragon specimen in the main hall," Rorschach said, choosing his words carefully to express his feelings since entering the museum. "It’s just that one is the specimen of a powerful creature, while the other is a ’backward’ civilization, dissected and displayed for morbidly curious visitors."

At least, judging from the condescending exhibit descriptions, this was not a case of the Gray Elves proactively and confidently showcasing their own culture and history to the world. Rorschach couldn’t help but imagine a band of robbers breaking into someone’s home, crudely snatching anything that caught their eye, digging up the graves of their ancestors, and stealing relics from their Temple... Perhaps the theme of both exhibition halls could be summarized in one word: "Conquest."

Rorschach felt a faint sense of déjà vu and indignation.

"Your thoughts are quite unique." The Elf finally took off his glove and extended a hand to Rorschach. "I am one of the curators, Benedict Kangqi. You can call me Bandy, if you don’t mind."