The Weight of Secrets
Even now, after making Muzark a member of her team, Yen visited his quarters every single day. She dropped by when she was free, and if she had any business—whether professional or personal—she would drop by a second time.
It was overbearing and a total nuisance.
A boss invading one's private life without any regard for weekdays or holidays. Yen had expected Muzark to lose his temper and tell her to back off sooner or later, but that "sooner or later" showed no signs of arriving.
He's sharper than he looks.
Muzark understood the situation he was in. Shadia had assigned Yen to keep an eye on him. Of course, even without those orders, Yen would have acted exactly the same way.
An unidentified magic, and a contractor of Harmensales.
Either one held immense significance for Yen. If Muzark had been a mediocre mage or a mediocre human... she would have been plagued by a powerful urge to crack open that round skull of his every time she looked at the back of his head.
But Muzark had proven his worth. And he was continuing to prove it, over and over. Even without the label of Harmensales's contractor, he was showing that he was a highly useful asset.
Because of this, Yen was constantly recalculating the terms of her relationship with Muzark.
"You did well. Knowing the Director, she won't try to pry any further. While you're temporarily out of her spotlight, you just need to build up your track record. Make her believe that you're a net positive for the Security Bureau."
"It's not like I have many other options anyway."
"Do you even need another way? For the Director, this is the most effective approach."
Muzark asked, flipping over one of Yen's white pieces on the Othello board.
"What's your relationship with the Director, anyway?"
Thanks to Yen, Muzark was becoming a master of all sorts of board games. There was even a game unique to this world that resembled Go, and after letting her win three practice rounds, he had won every single game since.
Yen was... incredibly bad at games.
"Just boss and subordinate."
"It didn't look that simple to me."
"Ah, haha. Was it that obvious?"
After a brief hesitation, Yen replied.
"It's exactly as I said. She's the superior, and I'm the subordinate."
"If you say so."
"It's true, really! We've just known each other longer than the other people in the Security Bureau. After all, we go back to before we were sent down to Redline."
The terrible gamer glared at Muzark's pieces as if she wanted to devour them. She looked ready to cast a curse with her eyes alone, but that was hardly going to turn the board in her favor.
"When I worked in Yellowline, she was my boss. Strange, isn't it? It's not like we were demoted together as a package deal, yet we ended up meeting again here in Redline. I couldn't help but wonder what kind of fate this was."
"That is pretty strange."
Muzark was learning the common sense of this Empire day by day.
Residents of the upper regions were usually demoted to the lower regions if they committed a crime. Conversely, they could climb back up by accumulating achievements.
For non-mages, climbing up was practically impossible. Unless they paid an astronomical sum to buy citizenship, or had a relative who was a mage that achieved a massive breakthrough and dragged them along.
On the other hand, promotion was common for mages, and they could also be demoted for reasons other than crimes.
It was a system that evaluated a mage's qualifications. If a powerful mage appeared in a lower region, they would naturally ascend to an upper region. If a mage in an upper region grew too weak, they would be demoted for failing to meet the standards.
However, demotion due to lack of qualification was largely a rule in name only.
Most mages in the Empire passed down the knowledge and expertise they accumulated over generations to their children. Unless the descendants were complete fools, they could easily maintain the bare minimum qualifications.
On top of that, there was a powerful safety net: mages stationed in cities were granted the right to have 'assistants.' Even if they lacked talent, as long as they secured a patron, their status as a mage was guaranteed.
By building connections with other mage families through marriage or other means, the risk of demotion virtually vanished. And if all else failed, they could simply renounce their privileges as a mage and live as an ordinary citizen.
Yet, here were two anomalies who had fallen all the way from the 5th region, Yellowline, to the 7th region, Redline.
And since they had even worked together before, it was far from a common tale.
"I figured you didn't seem like a local."
At his remark that he had finally figured out where she was from, Yen merely offered a faint smile. It was a smile that made it clear she had no intention of spilling every little detail, just as Muzark kept his own secrets.
It was an unspoken agreement between them.
When they questioned each other, if one party shut their mouth, the other wouldn't pry further. They had never explicitly agreed to this, but it had naturally become their dynamic.
"Anyway, the Director is a very rigid person. The harder you try to curry favor with her, the longer it'll take. In the end, her top priority is whether you're a benefit or a liability."
"I have no intention of being a liability. It's not like I have any grudge against my employer."
"The benefits and liabilities I'm talking about aren't for the Director personally, but for the city."
Even though it was her turn, Yen fell into deep thought for a long time.
"Ever since the old days, she's clung to values I don't really understand, like discipline and order. To someone like me, who only cares about eating well and living comfortably, she's an oddball I'll never comprehend."
In the end, she practically threw her piece down. It was a surrender.
"You're seriously terrible at this..."
"Do you do nothing but play board games all day? How are you good at literally everything?"
"At this point, shouldn't you be questioning your own talent?"
"Shut up! You should let me win at least once to be polite. I'm your senior and your team leader!"
Her screaming in frustration after losing was the hallmark of a sore loser.
"Why should I be polite to a senior who barges into my quarters whenever she feels like it?"
"You could've just said so if you hated it."
"If I said I hated it, would you actually stop coming?"
"Nope. In fact, I'd probably start eating all three of my meals here."
"Please, just spare me."
Yen giggled at his genuinely disgusted expression. She actually enjoyed moments like this—the time they shared while keeping a thin, invisible wall between them.
For a brief second, Yen's gaze drifted toward her briefcase.
What should I do with it?
Inside the front compartment of her bag, instead of secondhand tools, lay a few sheets of paper. It was something she had secretly swiped when leaving Claude Regan's workshop.
A grimoire densely packed with all kinds of formulas and diagrams.
It's useless to me anyway.
It was a matter of magical affinity.
Among the various schools of magic, dark magic was highly specialized and exclusive. While a regular mage could learn elemental magic or alchemy with relative ease, dark magic was an exception.
This was because practicing dark magic corrupted the mana channeled through one's magic circuits, turning it into dark mana.
It was essentially like using entirely different raw materials, though strictly speaking, they weren't completely incompatible. With some modifications, a regular mage could mimic dark magic, and vice versa.
However, the magical formulas would become exponentially more complex, and the efficiency would plummet.
Despite these drawbacks, dark mages often learned basic, common magic... but it was extremely rare for a regular mage to dabble in dark magic. Even if historical prejudice against dark magic had faded in modern times, there was simply no practical benefit to doing so.
Yen, too, was a complete novice when it came to dark magic.
Though I can tell it's an exceptional spell.
From a brief glance, the magical formula was far more sophisticated than she had imagined. Considering her physical condition, it was practically impossible for her to modify and learn it.
He probably got it from Harmensales.
It was a spell far too advanced for someone like Claude Regan.
And right in front of her sat a fledgling dark mage.
I could try trading it for knowledge from Harmensales, but...
That would be the cleanest option, but Yen hesitated. Muzark's growth rate might end up far exceeding her expectations. And that was far from what Yen wanted.
Let's wait and see how things play out a bit longer.
For now, they still needed their walls.
Thud, patter!
"I-I'm sorry! One got past meeee!"
A blood-drenched demon sprinted past Misha on all fours. It was a small, agile specimen. Closing the distance to Muzark, the demon bared its maw and lunged like a frog.
Disgusting bastards.
Muzark grimaced. The demons were even more hideous on the inside than on the outside. Floating inside its gaping maw was a slimy residue mixed with wriggling, black-and-red larva-like things.
Thwack!
He backhanded the demon with his iron-clad hand. After pinning it against the wall, he drove his hand axe into its head, and the creature's body instantly went limp.
"Phew."
His body was definitely moving much better than before.
Part of it was adaptation, but the biggest factor was having accessed the records of Cryptofetica. Even though the gap in skill was too vast to directly copy Haran's movements, it had at least given him confidence.
A magic he had once worried would be of little help.
Now that he understood its true value, he was using it much more actively.
I was worried about using it out in the open, though.
Apparently, the last time Cryptofetica had manifested was two hundred years ago.
This meant there had been wielders even further back in the past, and Haran in the projection had used the magic with seasoned mastery. In other words, he had been using it long before the incident.
If the entire Empire had banded together to eradicate this magic, Haran should have died much earlier. At the very least, it would have been impossible for him to integrate into the city as a high-ranking mage.
And there was a mention of the truth being covered up.
Judging by all the evidence, while the upper regions might be a different story, no one in Redline would recognize Cryptofetica. Besides, how could he survive if he kept hiding his only weapon?
He needed to gain as much combat experience as possible.
"..."
Evan stared at Muzark from a distance as the latter caught his breath.
Do mages usually fight in such a brutal, primitive way?
He had never fought alongside a mage before, but everyone had their preconceptions. To Evan, a mage was a snobbish scholar who flung fireballs from a safe distance, not a brawler who fought hand-to-hand.
That was the average perception of the residents of Redline.
It's not like I have any way of knowing what other mages are like...
He couldn't tell if his assumptions were wrong or if Muzark was just an anomaly. You only see as much as you know, and Redline was the most magic-ignorant place in the entire Empire.
Once the cleanup was finished, Yen offered a bright smile.
"Great job, everyone. You're all so capable."
She didn't mean a word of it.
While Yen and Muzark did the heavy lifting, Misha had made mistake after mistake, and Evan had done nothing but protect his own skin. Objectively speaking, they were only useful as scarecrows to draw attention.
Even so, she held no grudge against them.
After all, this was exactly the kind of setup Yen had wanted from the start.
Just as I expected.
It was a team perfectly tailored to her liking. One target to keep close and monitor, and two rookies she could control as she pleased. She had no need for sly, cunning snakes who might plot behind her back.
"Alright, alright! Now that the job is done, how about some food?"
"You think we can eat looking like this?"
"Of course we'll wash up first and meet back. My treat!"
"I'd love to. Teamwork is important, after all, hehe..."
Muzark didn't find the current situation too bad either. Decent clothes to wear, decent food to eat, and a decent bed to sleep in. Though he still had plenty of reservations, his initial displeasure had faded significantly.
"For the time being, we'll be operating as a team like this."
By the time they finished work and headed home, the streets were bathed in a deep crimson. The sunsets in Eastred were exceptionally red and dark. Mana pollution had a profound impact on nature.
"Normally, we operate in pairs, but we have a lot of rookies, and it's not like the Security Bureau is short on manpower. Whenever a spot opens up, a new recruit fills it immediately."
"Y-yes, that's true. Honestly, I don't even know how I passed the exam."
"You don't know? Our Misha got in because she's cute, of course!"
Was that a roundabout way of saying her skills were garbage?
Still, spending time with his teammates had shattered some of his prejudices. When he had first heard the term "demon contractor," Muzark had imagined all sorts of terrifying things, but Misha and Evan were just ordinary young people.
It seemed the power granted by low-level demons was truly pathetic. A slight boost in physical strength, a barely noticeable stroke of daily luck, or minor sensory enhancements like a sharper sense of smell or hearing.
Yen's comment about the Bureau not being short on manpower carried the subtext of 'plenty of numbers, but no real substance.' They were called demon contractors, but the vast majority of the Security Bureau were essentially ordinary humans.
Rather than feeling disappointed, Muzark felt a sense of familiarity. They're no different. Even in Redline, there were timid yet subtly social people like Misha, and cautious guys like Evan, who reminded him of an old classmate.
Not that it changes anything.
It was far too early to let his guard down.
He had simply realized that, in the end, this was still a world inhabited by people. Depending on how Muzark carried himself, some would become like Claude Regan, while others would become like Yen.
How would his relationship with Yen evolve?
"Try not to wander around alone if you can help it, Muzark. Eastred is more stable than ever thanks to the Security Bureau's crackdowns, but that also means it's about time for something big to blow up."
"I wouldn't go out even if you paid me. If I had my way, I'd spend the rest of my life lying in bed."
"I've seen plenty of folks spend the rest of their lives lying in hospital beds."
"Don't jinx me..."
And then, the threat arrived without warning.
Click.
The moment he passed a streetlamp and casually glanced down an alleyway.
Muzark found himself staring directly into the gaping barrel of a gun aimed right at him.