Preparations (3)

Once the Security Director had dragged the two sleazebags out of the office, Department Head Ha Yucheol bowed to me with a darkened face and returned to his own.

Was that the end of it, then? Honestly, the way I felt, I wanted to chase that unhinged little bastard down right now and smash him to pieces with my own hands. The only reason I didn't was Dad's teaching, and the fact that I now sat in a position where I had to mind how other people looked at me. I was holding back. Nothing more.

Does the seat make the man after all? Turning that idle thought over, I sank back into the plush executive chair and loosened my tie.

My mood was foul enough that even the feeling of the tie choking my neck irritated me. ...And why was this damned thing acting up again?

The knot refused to come undone and only tangled worse. My temper spiked so hard I seriously considered ripping it off — and then Franc came over and undid it with careful, delicate fingers.

Anyway, I still wanted to pulverize that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠bastard, and not being able to left me deeply uncomfortable. It was the unpleasantness of downing a shot of pure capsaicin extract, heat flooding my insides.

I thanked Franc for the tie and spoke to my sister.

"They called it due process, but judging by how that thug acted, he's definitely been using his father's name to pull all kinds of filth. No question."

"...Yeah."

"So I need you to help with the background check too. I'll ask Aunt Hyeryeong as well. Dig up every last crime he's committed and pile on the charges so he serves as much time as possible. Personally, I'd be glad if he never walked out of a cell again."

"I'll keep that in mind while we investigate. But Department Head Ha Yucheol..."

"We'll talk about that once Hwayeon and Boss Park Jiwoong get back. The call shouldn't come from me, who doesn't know enough. It should come from the people who actually work with him."

"...All right."

Siha stared at Ha Yucheol's employee badge with a pained look. Watching her, a thought occurred to me, and I asked.

"By the way, doesn't Hwarang have a General Affairs Director? Aunt Hyeryeong seems to be the only one in the department again today."

"Ah, Hwayeon's aunt took that person back. Right now Aunt Hyeryeong is the only director in General Affairs."

Took them back. So they'd been someone Yeongeun personally picked and installed? Then...

"Isn't that hard on you? Two raid teams merged, so the workload must have exploded."

Worried, I asked, and Aunt Hyeryeong looked at my sister and laughed.

"The Director of Integrated Management is so exceptional that my workload has dropped by nearly half compared to the Time River days. And with more staff in General Affairs, the intensity has actually gone down even further. It's so comfortable I almost wonder if it's all right to have it this easy."

"That's a relief."

It wasn't the important matter, so I set it aside, stood, and addressed the princess and the triplets.

"Lydia. This is Lee Hyeryeong, General Affairs Director, one of Grand Blue's core people. And this is my older sister, Jung Siha, Director of Integrated Management."

"It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Lydia Isla Marietta."

The princess had clearly been waiting for the introduction. She offered a polite, formal greeting, and the two women returned it in kind. After the brief exchange, my sister stepped forward.

"I must apologize for failing to present a better impression, Princess Lydia E. Marietta."

"Please, think nothing of it. This isn't a formal occasion, so don't stand on ceremony. I'd be grateful if you simply thought of me as Sir Seoha's friend."

Who's whose friend? The request she made of my sister threw me a little, but under the princess's laughing gaze I scratched my head.

This was probably her cute little revenge for the way I'd gone on about some international affair earlier and spun the terms of the deal to suit my side.

I let out a small sigh and spoke to my sister and Aunt Hyeryeong.

"We'll be back in a bit, then. My friends are still waiting downstairs, so I should at least feed them dinner and send them home. Princess... Lydia, want to come along?"

"Would it be all right if I joined you?"

"If you're fine with it, there's no reason not to."

As I headed down to the first floor with my sister, I texted the kids. They replied that they were gathered at the mall entrance, waiting.

When Siha and I found where they were clustered, they came rushing over with sparkling eyes.

"Hello, Senior Jung Siha!"

"Senior Siha, hello!"

They greeted her with the fervor of obsessive fans who'd just spotted their idol, and when I told her they were my friends, Siha smiled and took each of their hands in turn.

Kim Chang-hyun, having shaken her hand, wore the face of a man with no regrets left in this life.

"Heheh. I'm not washing this hand for a week."

Kang Ju-chan and Su Yu-ri were flushed red too, laughing ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in pure delight. Han Go-eun, Cho Min-ho, and Kang So-ra didn't show it as openly, but the way they looked up at my sister was obvious enough that I felt her popularity all over again. More than a year since she'd graduated, and they still remembered her.

When I suggested we all eat dinner together, everyone lit up, and we moved to a high-end Chinese restaurant on the third-floor dining level. Thirteen was a crowd, and I'd worried there wouldn't be room, but being an upscale place it had a private banquet room, so we were spared the disaster of splitting the group.

If we'd had to split up, a fight might have broken out over who got to eat with my sister.

We sat around a round table large enough for all thirteen, and Siha started ordering. Dim sum and gyoza-style dumplings to begin, then familiar dishes like mapo tofu and sweet-and-sour pork, oil-fried noodles — chow mein — kung pao chicken stir-fried sweet and spicy with peanuts, vegetables, and chili, and even chop suey, meat and egg tossed with bean sprouts, cabbage, celery, and a starch sauce. And then came things I'd never seen, something called General Tso's chicken and a zhajigai? — dish after unfamiliar dish, set out on the big round turntable in the center of the table.

I'd seen this on TV. You put the food on the wheel and spin it around to serve yourself.

Good food, and a noisy, lively dinner with everyone, slowly drained away the foul feelings that had risen all the way to my throat.

Franc, seated beside me, kept portioning this and that onto a small plate and transferring it to mine without pause. Siha poured my drinks so nothing would catch in my throat, ordered more of whatever ran low, fielded the kids' questions, and asked them her own — mostly what my school life was like — and the warm atmosphere carried on.

After an hour of pleasant eating, the kids looked as if they'd forgotten all about the unpleasant business at the swimsuit shop.

"See you Monday~!"

"Bye-bye~."

I called cabs, loaded the kids in, sent the princess off as well, and went back up to the fortieth-floor office with Siha and Franc.

The moment we arrived, Siha started gently stroking my hair, and Franc floated up, wrapped her arms around my neck, and nuzzled my cheek.

"What's with you two?"

"Feeling a lot better?"

"Feeling? What feeling?"

I didn't understand why Siha was acting like this, so I turned to Franc. She gave me a pretty smile and poked my cheek with a finger.

"Your expression was terribly stiff until just now, you know? Especially when Ha Cheolsu kept hurling abuse — a frightening aura poured off you so thickly that everyone around you was scared."

"...I was like that?"

When I was with that sleazebag... Ah. She meant that unpleasant, nauseating feeling. Now that I thought about it, the twins had been watching me warily, as if I were some kind of aberrant. The kids had kept checking my expression during the meal, too. Everyone had been looking out for me.

"Yeah. I'm all better now. Thanks."

"Don't mention it. More importantly, you were impressive earlier."

"Me? How?"

"The way you gave the Security Director orders so naturally when everyone was gathered, and the judgment you made — the most fitting one for the situation. You didn't learn something like the art of kingship from the Madam, did you?"

"Why would I learn something like that?"

"Whyyy. You'll have to start learning it. You're going to be the master of the top raid team in the country."

Well... she wasn't wrong. Still, I'd rather be the power in the shadows than the one out front. Play around in the back, step up when it matters, and leave the rest to the people under me.

Siha, who'd been grinning, composed her face and pinched my cheek lightly, looking genuinely proud.

"Putting off Department Head Ha Yucheol's resignation and how to handle him was the right move. If you'd accepted that resignation on the spot at your own discretion, people would have talked."

"He really is someone people trust, isn't he?"

"Yes. He's like the one who keeps Hwarang's house. If he were dismissed in an ugly way, the harmony between the two raid teams would crack, and you'd get discord."

So it had been the right call after all. Being praised by my sister made my shoulders lift despite myself. She glanced at the clock, then ruffled my hair and said,

"It's a little past seven, so loaf around here for an hour or two, holding down the office, then head home. Got it?"

"I will."

Smiling, she gave my backside a light pat and went down to her own office on the thirty-sixth floor. Though at this point it was less an executive suite and more just an office.

I sat at the jet-black solid-wood desk, took out my study tablet, and calmly turned the day's events over in my mind.

...I kept coming back to the thought that there had to be some important connection between me and Alastor's Terrible Dark Castle.

Today I'd acted strangely unlike myself. I'd been plagued by some impulse I couldn't name, and I'd been violent.

If I'd shut Ha Cheolsu down the moment he approached, switched on my Certifier to intimidate him, and crushed him with status, the whole thing wouldn't have blown up like this. It would have passed. But for some reason I'd just watched until that bastard picked a fight. When the twins restrained him and he started spewing curses, I tripped him. And when he fell and kept running his filthy mouth, I grabbed the back of his head and slammed his face into the floor... That was definitely not like me.

...I wasn't even sure what "like me" meant, but openly throwing punches was one thing that definitely wasn't. And this change had started after I saw Alastor's Dark Castle.

I propped my chin on my hand and tapped my cheek with a finger, sinking into thought, and I could tell Franc was watching me with concern.

"When an ability user accumulates Phase Power and their class rises, what does it mean if they see a vision?"

"You mean the vision you saw, Seoha?"

"Yeah. Ever since I saw Alastor's Terrible Dark Castle during P.E., it hasn't left my head. Today's mess might have been because of that, too. I think that's why my mood was off."

I turned on the Certifier and searched the related entries, but there wasn't a single photo or illustration. All it offered was a description.

"Ugh. Why do I keep fixating on a place like this?"

"Won't you find out when the time comes? If merely keeping it in mind sours your mood... I think it would be better not to dwell on it too deeply."

"Right? There's no way to get more information, and obsessing over it just makes me look like an idiot."

I said it to reassure the worried Franc, pretending to give up, but inside I started scheming about how I might see that footage supposedly kept in the British royal archives.

Come to think of it, Dad had said he had to go to Britain in August for an academic conference. If I tagged along as his escort and asked Princess Lydia then...

Even if I went, Yeongeun wasn't likely to just wave me off with a Have a nice trip, dear~. And there was no guarantee Britain would greet me with Come right in! Welcome, welcome! and simply show me the footage they had.

Even if they did show it, they'd want something in return, and that something would most likely be an investigation into Franc.

Absolutely not. Instead, I could go through the government, dangle various carrots about Phase Stone trade with Britain, and bring the subject up that way. Or I could stitch together a reasonably believable story, mixing in just enough of the truth. That didn't seem like a bad approach — though whether the British royal family would actually fall for it was another question.

"...Franc, what are you doing?"

She had taken off all her clothes, folded them neatly, and squirmed her way into the space beneath the big executive desk. From between my legs she peeked her face out and looked up at me.

"Th-they say that when you're in a bad mood, making love helps take your mind off it."

"Who says that?"

Instead of answering, she shifted her appearance slightly — into the women's suit Aunt Hyeryeong had been wearing, a flipped-out secretary's bob, thin glasses. The so-called female-secretary look. She smiled brightly.

"I saw it on the internet. The concept is a secretary who serves her boss with her body. What do you think?"

With that she undid my belt, lowered the zipper, and drew out the lollipop reserved for lovers.

The ingenuity of it left me briefly speechless. I stared down at her. Flushed between my thighs, looking up at me, she parted her small, cherry-like lips and took the lollipop into her mouth.

I am not the sort to turn away pleasure on its way in, or to let pleasure slip away on its way out. I sank into the chair and happily accepted Franc's service.

I was enjoying Franc sucking on that enormous lollipop when Aunt Hyeryeong walked into the office, and I nearly jumped out of my skin!

I quickly pressed the back of Franc's head, forcing her to take the lollipop all the way down, and shoved myself tight against the desk. Suddenly crumpled in there with it down her throat, Franc's eyes flew wide and she convulsed.

Aunt Hyeryeong was already coming up to the desk. I had no choice!

"What's going on, showing up without a word?"

"I did a light check on Ha Cheolsu's movements over the past month, and I thought I ought to report the results. Would you take a look?"

Aunt Hyeryeong, her expression extremely grim, handed me the file she'd been holding against her chest.

Investigating a full month's worth in under two hours — her skill was one thing, but the gravity on her face raised questions. I set aside the sensation at my groin for the moment, opened the file, and read.

"...I could lose my mind. How can a piece of shit like this exist?"

"All of this comes from the confession of the man who was with him, Kim Chi-hwan. From what we can tell, he mostly used his background as a department head of a major raid team. Whenever he saw a woman he liked, he used his position to kidnap and threaten her family, then raped her."

"The employee in question had enough backbone to get out of the situation. But she respected Department Head Ha, so she couldn't bring herself to make it an official case, and buried it."

In a thoroughly cold, businesslike manner, Aunt Hyeryeong went on. Through the security department they were tracing Ha Cheolsu's crimes backward, and the criminal record they currently expected would exceed ten times what was in this file.

I set the documents on the desk and leaned back in the executive chair. From beneath the desk I could see the crown of Franc's head as she worked her lips, still sucking on the lollipop.

I sat up again and asked Aunt Hyeryeong,

"Does Department Head Ha Yucheol know about this?"

"He wants to know everything — the full circumstances. Every fact of Ha Cheolsu's crimes is being reported to him."

Franc kept squirming, so I reached down and pressed firmly on the back of her head to keep her still. She fussed a little, then tried to stimulate the lollipop with her tongue and throat instead.

"No, but how can a father not know his own son has been out committing crimes like this?"

"Huu... According to the team's psychological counselor, there are signs of antisocial personality disorder. She offered her opinion very carefully. Department Head Ha Yucheol said that when Ha Cheolsu was young, he threw himself into company work and neglected caring for his family, and that the boy grew up without his parents' affection, so..."

"No. You can't interpret it that way. Plenty of people grow up just fine in single-parent homes. The problem is him. He isn't some sociopath who developed a personality disorder from issues in his formative years — he seems like a psychopath who simply cannot empathize with anyone else's pain. Didn't you see how the other sleazebag, the one beside him, acted? That's what a normal person does. Ha Cheolsu behaved as if only his own feelings mattered."

Aunt Hyeryeong gave a small nod at my argument.

"Anyway, identify every woman he harmed, secure their cooperation, and push this so Ha Cheolsu receives the heaviest punishment possible. And... money can't undo what happened, but please see to it that some form of consolation payment can still reach the women who were hurt."

"I'll take every measure possible in the direction you've indicated."

I hesitated a moment, then asked Aunt Hyeryeong again.

"Aunt. What kind of person is Department Head Ha Yucheol?"

"...Strict with himself, but kind and considerate toward everyone else. When I was suffering in Hwarang's accounting department, he was the only one who came to see me. He comforted me, said he believed in my innocence, and often brought health supplements, telling me to keep my strength up."

"Hard to believe a father like that produced such a rotten brat."

"They say even a psychopath can live an ordinary life like anyone else, if given specialized education from childhood... He was an only son. They must have spoiled him rotten."

Perhaps because the business talk was over, Aunt's tone softened into something gentle. Franc, as if she thought the conversation had gone on too long, expressed her displeasure by lightly biting the base of the lollipop with her teeth.

"Anyway, I'll leave the rest to you, Aunt."

"Of course. Set your mind at ease. I'll carry out your instructions faithfully."

At being called Aunt, Hyeryeong smiled brightly, gathered the documents, and left. The office door closed. When I slowly pulled back from the executive desk, Franc, who had been hiding underneath, threw herself into it as if to say the real thing started now.

Yeongeun, getting off late in the evening, seemed to have had her restraints come undone at the thought that Hwayeon wasn't there. The moment she got home she jumped into my arms.

When Hwayeon was around, this and that had always been held in check. Without her, Yeongeun looked thrilled.

And what followed was a frenzied sex party.

Franc, too, seemed worked up from the secretary-service play in the office. She clung to me as passionately as Yeongeun, shaking her hips as if they were competing. Side by side they lay face-down, openings spread, tempting me as if each were begging to be tormented first. Satisfying the two of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠them, both excited enough to be half out of their minds, took considerable effort.

After several hours of indulgence, I caught Franc — unconscious on the waves of pleasure, floating — and pulled a blanket over her. Then I drew Yeongeun in from behind. She had climaxed again and again until her whole body was flushed red as a carrot and gone limp, and I pushed the part of me that was still standing rigid into the hole that belonged to me alone.

"Aah... ngh..."

At that pitiful moan, drained of all strength, I sank in to the hilt and stopped. Her vulva, swollen plump from hundreds of strokes, squeezed me, and the pressure felt good.

Thrusting back and forth for that magnificent pleasure was good, but simply staying still in a place so narrow, wet, and warm was good too.

I held her waist so she could catch her breath, kneading her springy breasts, and told her about the day. She let out a deep sigh.

"I knew it would be like that."

"You knew about Department Head Ha Yucheol's kid?"

"How could anyone not know a rotten brat like that?"

"And you still left him alone?"

"Everyone has a territory you don't touch. For Department Head Ha, his child was that territory. At the time, even bringing it up was... aahn. E-even bringing it up was a delicate matter."

"Was it? From what I saw today, meeting him for the first time, he didn't seem quite that far gone."

It hadn't felt like a lie told to get out of the situation, either. Ha Yucheol had genuinely wanted that sleazy bastard Ha Cheolsu punished.

"I think it reached a point where even love couldn't cover for him anymore. The other party being rotten was a big part of it, too. And..."

"And?"

I gave a little twitch of my cock. The glans resting against the mouth of her womb moved, stirring that deep spot — her anterior fornix — and Yeongeun couldn't go on. I pinched her clit hard and asked again. Her waist bucked, and she forced her mouth open.

"Aahk...! A-and this is a secret, so you can't tell anyone else. Understand?"

"Yeah."

"I wondered whether something was wrong with Department Head Ha Yucheol. Even after he married, they had no child for quite a long time. Then, all of a sudden, his wife got pregnant."

She must have been clenching down on her petals; her vaginal walls gripped me and held me so I couldn't grind against the mouth of her womb. Just then Franc seemed to come to. She embraced me from behind and asked Yeongeun,

"Don't tell me you're saying Ha Cheolsu isn't Department Head Ha Yucheol's biological son?"

Sandwiched between two voluptuous bodies, I thought how very good it felt, and focused on what Yeongeun said next.

"Mm. I personally found it suspicious and wanted to look into it, but the man himself didn't seem to suspect a thing. I was afraid of picking at a scab for no reason, so I left it alone. In my view, there's a ninety-eight percent chance he isn't the biological child."

"Ninety-eight percent means you're saying his wife had an affair and bore the child. Are you sure?"

"Mm. I calculated backward from the birth date. She conceived during a stretch of nearly two months when Department Head Ha couldn't come home because of a business trip. What do you think that means?"

...As a fellow man, I felt a little sorry for Department Head Ha Yucheol.

Yeongeun had said not to tell anyone else, but if Aunt Hyeryeong happened to catch me muttering and grew suspicious enough to investigate on her own, that wouldn't count, would it? Anyway, Yeongeun seemed to have recovered some stamina, so I started moving my hips as I spoke.

"They say a thief who learns the trade late never notices the night ending. Pretty sure they coined that one for you, Yeongeun. Even while we're talking, your pussy keeps biting down on my cock."

"Hhk..."

Even after rising to B-Class, she'd made love every single day, and thanks to that Yeongeun had gathered over five hundred thousand in a single month. Her Phase Power was now past four million.

In a year, that would be an increase of six million? At this rate...

"If this keeps up, she might pass forty million TP within eight years. Of course, there's no telling whether hitting forty million Phase Power would let her rise to A-Class, but just in case, we ought to stockpile something like eighty million, right?"

Perhaps because she'd heard that staggering figure of eighty million, Yeongeun, who had been diligently working my length with her lower lips, stopped moving.

"Which means we need Phase Stones to store the Phase Power in. Otherwise we might have to ban sex after the fact."

"Mm. Hk... I'll try to gather as many discarded High-Tier Phase Stones as I... can! Hyaaaahn!!"

The moment I heard her answer, I focused the Mana Sieve into my cock.

I pounded into her rough and hard, and Yeongeun's lower belly bulged out in the shape of my glans.

I wrapped my hands around that belly. Watching Yeongeun climb to another climax, and Franc growing excited right along with her, biting and licking my ear and neck, I realized there would be no sleep tonight.

I spent the whole night biting and sucking with Franc and Yeongeun, and in the end I didn't sleep a wink.

Even so, I wasn't all that tired. If anything, holding Franc and Yeongeun had burned off that unpleasant impulse completely, and my condition was better for it.

I sat up, watching the morning sun rise beyond the floor-to-ceiling glass. It was Saturday. I ought to loosen up at the training ground.

Yeongeun lay on her side, arms around her swollen belly, sleeping with a happy face, and a bit of spite rose in me. I hadn't slept a wink because of someone, and here that someone was, sleeping with a face that sweet.

I slapped her ample backside, smack, smack. She groaned, opened eyes still thick with sleep, and looked up at me. I pinched her straight, prominent nose lightly and said,

"I'm going to the training ground to train. I'll be back."

"Mm..."

Yeongeun's head dropped, and she was asleep again. I turned to Franc. She was no better — clutching a belly just as swollen, dead to the world, not so much as twitching, like a corpse.

From here to the far end of the training ground was about four kilometers, wasn't it? Hmm. If I just relocated there, Franc would automatically be drawn into the Soul Stone — but then whatever was filling her belly would spill out and ruin the bed.

Spite welled up again. I reached out and pinched Franc's pretty nose, but there was no reaction. She had a body now, yet she seemed to lack ordinary vital functions, so pinching her nose was pointless.

I took her pink nipple, pinched it, and pulled. She only moaned and shifted; she didn't wake. This wasn't going to work. I picked Franc up and carried her into the bathroom.

Dressed in a black jersey tracksuit, I stepped out of the Grand Blue building into sunlight so fierce it was hard to believe it was morning. Looking at the weather, today was going to be brutally hot.

Franc and I drank in the clear morning air and ran along empty roads. The moment we entered the mountain, I pushed my body to its limit and raced toward the training ground, climbing where there was no path.

I activated Mana Mode - Acceleration and ran.

In only a few minutes I reached the training ground. Looking around, the area seemed to be changing.

The shacks you couldn't tell were occupied or not had all been cleared, and work had begun on laying out the site. Nearby, crews were putting down fresh asphalt.

It hadn't been officially announced that this was my training ground, but someone seemed to have caught on quietly and was buying up the surrounding land.

Land prices rising, I supposed.

Franc, whom I'd thought had come to her senses while washing in the bathroom, fell asleep again the moment we arrived at the training ground.

I left the floating Franc to keep sleeping, repeated the simple body-technique forms Hwayeon had taught me a dozen times or so, then took up the Extrema Ratio EX I'd brought and started swinging it...

Hmm. Yeah, dagger techniques really weren't for me.

Franc had said it was for dealing with people rather than aberrants, but if I was dealing with people, wasn't a Mana Laser simpler? If I ever had to draw a dagger, it would be because someone was trying to kill me, and in a situation like that there was no need to go easy.

If that didn't work, I could just throw up a Spatial Barrier and stand there looking blank.

Anyway, I held the dagger, fed it a little TP, and swung it this way and that. Beautiful blue lines scored the air. I had the odd feeling I might start seeing those lines on objects... Hmm.

The cutting power was certainly guaranteed, but as it stood this was nothing more than a downgraded version of the Mana Laser.

Thinking it had zero practicality, I wondered if I could devise an attack that used the dagger — but all that came to me was that I'd be better off spending that time researching and strengthening the Mana Bullet series.

Like spinning it the way that green alien in Dragon Ball does — the one who looks like you want to suck on his antenna — with his finishing move.

Hm?

Hmm...

Hmmmm.

The protagonist of Dragon Ball's finishing move was definitely the one where he goes, People of Earth, lend me your power! — gathering energy by taking a share of the energy around him, right?

I could draw in external Phase Power with the Mana Sieve, too... So when I used my Mana Bullet, Mana Cannon, and Mana Laser, instead of spending only TP, if I pulled in the Phase Power drifting in the air, would they get stronger?

...They probably wouldn't get stronger, but I might be able to save TP? I should test it.

I slid the dagger into the sheath inside my clothes, loosened my fingers, and began turning the Mana Sieve.