The Sealed Calamity

A 1st Class mage.

Set beside an adventurer's status window, it was a spare little thing. Where the usual sprawl of entries should have been, a single line clung to the bottom—impossible to say whether it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was a record of his deeds or a vow. That alone was enough to guess at the story behind it.

A treasure, is it.

And what actually left the Merchant Head's mouth was much the same.

"It seems the seal has come undone."

"Pardon?"

"...Count Dalant entrusted us with an item to be carried all the way to Edelin. We sealed it on account of its mana, and Mage René swore the seal would hold until we arrived. Looking at things now, I'm afraid..."

I didn't catch half of what he said. I didn't need to. The shape of the situation was plain enough.

"...What kind of object draws magical beasts in the first place?"

"That, I don't know myself."

"Pardon?"

Kane's face creased, and Merchant Head Yamel drew a small box from inside his robes.

It looked precious at a glance. Seals bound the lid on every side, and one corner of them had been peeled back, thin as a torn fingernail. The damage caught the eye at once.

"I believe this torn corner is the cause..."

"If it mattered that much, you should have kept it safe!"

"...I don't even know when it was torn. And I can't very well meddle with it further."

I watched their back-and-forth a moment, then quietly raised a hand.

"May I check it?"

The Merchant Head's eyes went sharp.

"If you touch this seal..."

"I only need to lay a hand on the box. I have a rather particular ability."

"...Is that so?"

Suspicion still sat on his face, but he nodded. I set my hand carefully against the box and triggered the trait.

A low thrum answered.

The description had barely finished before my face locked stiff.

"...What is it?"

"What's wrong, Char?"

A dozen thoughts hit at once. I chose the honest road.

"Can you trust what I'm about to tell you?"

"What reason would I have to doubt you now?"

Only after that assurance did I give them the box's information. Their expressions turned strange on the spot.

"Hah..."

"Merchant Head—then His Lordship...?"

Yamel let out a long breath. Kane looked as if the ground had shifted under him.

"His Lordship still hasn't let go of his vengeance?"

"...I believed it was a gift to bury the past and build friendship with Edelin. It seems that was not the case."

The two of them knew the history behind this. They accepted the truth more easily than I had expected.

"What will you do?"

"...This is a calamity. Hand it over to Edelin or withhold it—disaster either way."

"Merchant Head..."

"What would you do, Kane?"

"...Me? As always, I follow your judgment."

A bitter smile touched the Merchant Head's mouth. He seemed to weigh it for a moment, then shook his head.

"No. It won't do. We have to abandon it."

"What?"

"The moment we deliver this to Edelin and its nature comes to light, my people and I will be put to death. Refuse the delivery, and Count Dalant will kill us instead. It's checkmate."

"His Lordship has discarded you?"

"...I can't see it any other way. Better that we simply seek a new life in Edelin. We'll leave this here and go."

I nearly applauded the wisdom of it. I would have, if the quest hadn't come back to me.

No!

My thoughts spun in a panic, and then a better idea struck.

"There's a better way. Will you hear it?"

"What?"

"You?"

"Yes."

"...Very well. Speak. I'll listen."

He did not look particularly pleased.

"Why not arrive in Edelin having already earned merit? If you're going to put down new roots, that would serve you better."

"How?"

His eyes went wide at what came next.

"It's simple. We take this to Edelin exactly as it is and tell them the truth. That place you came from..."

"Dalant."

"Yes. That Dalant plotted against this city. And this is the proof."

"Hmm."

"Wait, Char. You're saying we keep carrying this dangerous thing and keep swallowing the risk? Sacrificing the caravan's people to do it?"

"We don't have to. We know the cause now."

"What?"

"This box. If we carry it and fall a little behind, the caravan should be safe, shouldn't it?"

"We?"

"I wouldn't trust myself to manage it alone. Come with me, Captain."

At that, Kane and the Merchant Head let out hollow laughs.

"A generous offer, but Captain Kane is in no condition to fight..."

"You still have the ability stone from the werewolf we killed. If Captain Kane absorbs it, that should be enough."

"...What?"

Both of them stared at me, startled all over again.

"And how would you know what ability is in it? Besides, my wounds haven't even finished healing."

"And whether Captain Kane's aptitude can even withstand the thing..."

"It can. More than enough. I can tell."

I could, because I had finally seen his information a little while ago, when Captain Kane and I caught hold of the Merchant Head together.

And so.

"Captain Kane can absorb one more ability stone."

"You can truly determine that?"

As expected. The people of the Labyrinth had no way of reading how many ability slots a person held.

"I'll give you your own words back. What reason do you have to distrust me now?"

It went without saying that I had already checked the stone the werewolf left behind.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Ten looked modest until you remembered it was every stat. Not only the body's measures—strength, stamina, agility—but mana and the resistances as well. Even a Novice would come out of it with the physical ability of a 1st Class or better. And the recovery on top of that.

Far too large for a red ability stone. Is that why it carries a penalty?

And the penalty was only that one's reason grew a little clouded. An ability stone any warrior would covet.

Still a waste, no matter how many times I look at it.

But the job still had to be done.

"Absorb the stone, and once the sun is down, Captain Kane and I will fall back with the box. How does that sound?"

"Why are you going this far?"

The quest, obviously. What I said was something else.

"I was hoping that you, Merchant Head, would reward me in proportion to the merit."

The hardness that had held his face all this while cracked, and he let out a short breath of a laugh.

"Very well. I will see you properly rewarded. Only come back safely."

And with that, the plan ahead of us was set.

Before night fully arrived, we were hit twice more. Once by a flock of birds. Once by a swarm of snakes. Both times ordinary beasts moved with a few magical beasts among them, and both times we put them down without much trouble. No experience came of it, of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠course.

Then the sun went down.

"Let's go."

"Right."

Kane and I began to fall back behind the caravan.

"I'm counting on you, Captain."

"Obviously."

Having absorbed the Moonlight Blessing, Kane's face was brightening by the second. As he was now, he could probably take two werewolves at once.

Surely nothing stronger than that is coming.

I had turned it over all through the daylight and still hadn't found a better thought than the one that had come to me on impulse. There was no way the Labyrinth's second floor would keep throwing out enemies capable of troubling a native near level twenty. Thought of that way, it was as good a plan as I could ask for.

The thought didn't survive an hour.

"Behind us!"

"Hraaah!"

The same flame-wreathed spear I had used to drive off the bees that afternoon spun like something mad and batted the charging rats aside. Spear arts, technique, any of it—there was no room left to think about application. Rats, bees, and snakes were coming in from every side at once.

What the fuck is this!

None of them, taken alone, was a threatening enemy. There were simply an absurd number of them, and they did not end.

They don't even touch each other. They only come for us.

After reading the ability stone, I had assumed the attacks were only beasts drawn in by it. This was something else.

Someone's controlling them. No question.

I couldn't see it any other way.

"Hold!"

The impact cracked through the press.

"Even in a forest of magic beasts!"

Another blow landed.

"Numbers!"

Again.

"Have!"

A wet, heavy crunch.

"A limit!"

One last crash scattered the nearest bodies.

Kane's words had weight. Unless the beasts were being born without end, there would be a finish somewhere. The problem was only this: he seemed to be recovering stamina with every swing, and I was burning out fast.

"Hraaaaah!"

Fire wrapped the spear as I checked every direction, and my mana poured out in a steady drain.

This won't hold.

I couldn't last. The one controlling them—the fiend—I had to find it. I knew that, and still, among the beasts packing every gap, nothing stood out at all.

In the end I stopped thinking.

"Screw this!"

On instinct I hurled the sealed box far into a stretch of forest where the beasts ran thinner.

"Char!"

Kane's shout cracked with surprise. I kept my eyes on the box in the air.

It'll show. It has to.

If some other beast or animal swallowed that ability stone, we were finished. In a labyrinth city you could erase a stone once it had been eaten. You could not pull it back out.

Can a fiend control even the instincts of the animals it commands?

That was the bet.

The box struck, rolled, and came to rest. The moment I felt the attention of every beast around us swing toward it, a colder thought cut in. Was I wrong?

Then I saw it. From the woods on the opposite side, a shadow surged straight for the box.

"Kane!"

"I see it!"

We broke into a run at the same time, and Kane pulled ahead of me. He met the thing head-on—a humanoid monster in beggar's rags, hair flying wild.

The collision boomed. A shriek tore out of it.

Snake's eyes. Scaled hide. A lizard's legs, a lion's tail, a bear's claws. Every kind of animal stitched onto a human frame, and the whole of it screaming. It planted itself in front of the box and crashed into Kane again and again. There wasn't a shred of technique in the movement, and still it met him nearly blow for blow.

Damn it!

I had already walked through this once during the day. If this hadn't been a Perfect Clear—if it had only been an ordinary quest—how would it have gone? Help Kane and the guards blunt the attacks well enough, and the Merchant Head would have thrown the box away and that would have been the end of it.

Then the fiend would have appeared, taken the box, and vanished.

So this was a fire I had lit myself. A gate I had to clear. Sitting back and praying Kane would win it for me was a fool's game.

I'll finish it!

I poured mana into the Volante Footwork at its limit and kicked into a hard acceleration. Spear set, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠stance locked, I ran. The force of the charge and the thrumming vibration in the spear gathered as I drew the power in. At point-blank range my lead foot came down under a crushing weight, and that weight turned, whole, into force—bursting from the spearpoint together with my mana.

"Die!"

I didn't need the System's voice to know it. That one strike, at least, felt every bit the equal of Kane's.

A hand of bear claws and snake scales snatched the shaft. The leftover force still punched into the thing's flank, but it didn't look like a killing wound.

Goddamn it...

The failure had barely landed when the fiend's shriek broke off. A flash. A long, ripping tear. Snake eyes and tongue, in the middle of spitting malice at me, split cleanly in two.

Behind the falling halves stood Kane, a silver greatsword in his hands.

"Well done, Char!"

With his voice, the beasts that had been pouring after us broke apart all at once—a thin whine, a crackle, and then they scattered.

The experience gauge climbed nearly to full in a single jump, and my level rose with it. The most a single battle could give.

At the same time, something glinted and dropped. From the fiend's body fell a red crystal no bigger than a fingernail, and an orange crystal the size of a fist.