The Test
“Do you want to run from death? All you need to do is accept my request.”
Beyond the horizon where endless darkness stretched, from inside the belly of the shadow, Lord Bawry spoke.
“By the terms of our contract, as your godfather I am obligated to fulfill my duties. Just as you fulfill yours as my disciple!”
In the world of mages, a master and disciple are referred to as godfather and godson.
“Does that service include reattaching my head, by any chance?”
“Of course! How can I teach you anything if you don’t have a head attached!”
Lord Bawry cackled.
“And as I said, the reason I’m protecting you is…”
“To inherit that legacy of yours as a mage.”
“Exactly. And not just any mage—the legacy of a truly kickass shadow mage!”
At least that statement wasn’t an exaggeration in the slightest.
“All right, my bro! Since we’re on the subject, let’s jump right in.”
“…Jump into what?”
“The cute and adorable little test I’m giving you to determine whether you’re qualified to become a kickass shadow mage.”
…A test, huh.
Solomon frowned silently. Even so, there was no reason for him to turn down the chance to learn magic. If anything, he ought to call it good fortune.
“Perfect, that was quick! Then come find me at the Basilica Cistern whenever you have the time. We’ll continue our talk there.”
“That underground reservoir in District 1?”
Before Solomon could ask again, a sound came. Ptoo. The noise of something being spat out. It was distinctly unpleasant to the ear.
!
By the time he realized what was happening, the surroundings had brightened again. Solomon was back in the same place—the Dawn Lark Tavern. Lord Bawry’s figure had vanished. As for Roche’s new partner, the one who walked around with a golden head…
Died fast, didn’t he.
A cold corpse lay sprawled across the tavern floor, its head severed clean off. The people didn’t even spare a glance at the body lying out in the open.
Just as they hadn’t spared a glance at Solomon after he was swallowed by the shadow’s belly and spat back out.
“Oh, Solomon! You’re back!”
Soon the pig’s voice rang out. When Solomon turned, Roche’s expression was far brighter than before as he excitedly sliced into a steak.
“Roche.”
“Thanks a bunch! For all sorts of things…”
Solomon shrugged, indifferent to Roche’s words. Beside him sat an unfamiliar woman whose presence felt anything but ordinary at first glance.
It wasn’t as if he could have found a new partner that quickly.
“Ah, allow me to introduce her. This young lady is a contractor who works under Lord Bawry.”
“……”
At Roche’s introduction, Solomon stared at her in silence.
“My, so you’re that Solomon?”
“I’m not sure about the ‘that’ part, but Solomon is correct.”
“I’m Aila.”
She wore a rather archaic gothic dress that seemed entirely out of place in the Lower District slums. To make matters worse, she even carried a parasol.
Judging by the blood dripping steadily from its tip, Solomon could roughly guess how she used it.
“…You showed up quickly.”
“Overflowing eyes and ears are the virtues of a good mage and a proper lady.”
Aila opened her mouth without hesitation, making no attempt to hide that she was a mage.
“The Lord told me about you. He went on and on until my ears nearly fell off.”
So she was another underground mage belonging to the Sewer Magic Tower.
“For the Lord to talk about someone that much is… less rare and more like an absolute first.”
Given that she was a contractor working under Lord Bawry and that he had spoken about her so directly, she clearly held a far higher position in the tower than the corpse lying over there.
“Besides, you’re quite famous in all sorts of ways.”
“How kind of you. I don’t know what sort of talk is going around behind my back, though.”
“H-hey, why don’t you sit down too, Solomon!”
Solomon answered Roche’s words with pure disbelief.
“You were trying so hard to kick me out earlier, yet your mind’s already changed like a reed in the wind?”
“I-I have to make a living too! Still… thank you.”
Roche continued speaking as he sliced his steak.
“Honestly, how satisfying it was watching this lady here slice that bastard’s head clean off! The food’s sliding straight down my throat!”
“Has there ever been a time food didn’t slide straight down that throat of yours?”
“Well, these days it’s been sliding down a bit less… Look at this shrunken belly!”
“Your belly skin’s practically glued to your back.”
Solomon replied, utterly exasperated. Roche paid him no mind and kept talking.
“Anyway, Solomon, my friend! No matter what, how could you just go to Hotel Snark, shut your mouth tight, and disappear like that? Huh? It’s not like we’ve only worked together a day or two! How could you be so cold!”
Before long Roche’s voice had turned into something closer to a lament. Solomon could only shrug helplessly. Seeing the pig whining right in front of him, it seemed some affection had taken root despite the annoyance.
“…When I have time, I’ll take a few requests.”
“R-really?!”
“Yeah.”
“Hell yeah!! The legendary combo is back together!!”
Roche shouted with glee at Solomon’s words.
“Hah, see that! All the bastards who ignored me are finished! The King of Solomon has returned!! Let’s show them our bond as hot as flames!”
“My, so you two have that kind of relationship? I’m rather fond of that genre.”
“…It’s a misunderstanding.”
Solomon cut the misunderstanding off cleanly and rose from his seat.
“I have somewhere to stop by, so I’ll be on my way.”
“Sure! But come by more often! Ohhh, you’re the only one for me! Forgive me for acting like a total bastard! By the way, my ass is also…”
“…I got it, so please shut that mouth of yours already.”
Solomon stood, leaving behind the clinging, begging Roche. That was when it happened.
“Bye-bye, Solomon.”
The contractor and underground mage who worked under Lord Bawry—Aila—added with meaningful weight.
“See you again.”
Solomon headed straight for the Basilica Cistern. To keep his promise with Lord Bawry.
The underground reservoir on Megacorp Street in Downtown District 1.
The pinnacle of the sewer kingdom, where pillars that could easily be mistaken for ancient ruins rose majestically—an apparent regulating reservoir.
Drip. Drip. The sound of water droplets falling from an unknown source and the dampness that clung unpleasantly to the body. In that empty place, Solomon frowned silently.
He said we’d meet here, so where did he slip off to?
The space was vast. So vast that simply calling it vast felt insufficient. Solomon shouted several times in case Lord Bawry might hear and wandered around as best he could.
Yet no matter how much time passed, there was no sign of Lord Bawry appearing. Even after all the shouting and walking, not a single living thing showed its face.
He said come when I have time, but he didn’t mean right away?
With no other choice, Solomon began climbing back up the ladder he had descended.
Creak. Creak. Creeeeak—
The rusty ladder connecting the underground world to the surface along the sheer cliff. While climbing the hundreds of meters, a truly ominous stereophonic sound reached his ears.
?
It wasn’t the pig, but the fixed ladder screaming under the weight of a single Solomon.
Gulp. Solomon paused for a moment, swallowed silently, and looked down. It was high.
He looked up again. This direction was beyond high…
Damn. It’s so high it makes me want to curse.
One more unpleasant adjective had attached itself. Solomon clicked his tongue.
…There’s no way I can climb this.
So Solomon began descending again. He had no desire to prove with his own body the lesson that things without wings fall.
How far had he descended?
At first it was only the ominous creaking of metal. Soon the shaking became strong enough to feel against his skin. This wasn’t merely precarious. No way.
They say “what if” is what gets people killed…
“No, no, wait.”
Even Solomon’s desperately urgent voice was useless.
“Just listen to me for a second…!”
Crack. Boom!
As the fixed ladder snapped and plummeted, Solomon—suddenly like a pole-vaulter—clung to it and kept his cool. As if his body, relying on its high acrobatics stat, unconsciously knew exactly how to take the fall.
“Shit! You son of a—!”
Instinctively cursing while trying to minimize damage by adjusting his posture, Solomon spat out every foul word he knew. His profanity echoed through the vast underground reservoir like an orchestral symphony. No answer came back.
The only rope to the surface had snapped, leaving him as nothing more than a lost child abandoned in the sewer kingdom.
“This is annoying…”
The underground of Guild City had long since surpassed the level of “just some deep tunnels.” He had known that much already.
Someone with a suspicious mind imagines more than that beneath the city. Ancient ruins, wriggling evils, beings hiding in the depths and waiting for their moment…
The narrator’s voice ringing out as if on cue served as proof.
Even so, Solomon wasn’t overly worried. The underground reservoir where he had fallen—the Basilica Cistern—was, after all, the territory of the Sewer Magic Tower and its underground mages.
Wandering around a bit, running into one of them, and negotiating a peaceful way back to the surface shouldn’t be difficult.
Besides, when he considered Lord Bawry’s “eyes and ears,” the chance that his current situation had gone unnoticed was zero percent.
……
After thinking it through, Solomon arrived at one possibility.
The ladder he had just been climbing had coincidentally broken. The silence from someone who could not possibly be unaware that Solomon had arrived.
Lord Bawry’s test had already begun.
“What do you mean?”
At that same moment.
In the Special Affairs Office of the City Judicial Bureau, Violet—the Sword Watch blade wielder who had been summoned—asked back.
“…You’re saying Lord Bernier already died four weeks ago?”
As one of the mere seven Special Class blade wielders who existed in the organization unofficially.
“That is correct.”
The deputy chief prosecutor who now occupied Lord Bernier’s seat answered.
“The autopsy concluded that his corpse had been dead for a minimum of four weeks.”
“Then the person who gave me that confidential mission was…”
“Take a look at this.”
Before Violet could finish speaking, the deputy chief prosecutor handed her a single document.
It was the autopsy report. Violet easily recognized the presence of “it” that practically wallpapered the page.
“Great King Fly—”
It did not refer to the actual insect belonging to the order Diptera, the great king fly or assassin fly. Though the name was the same, what was here was not even a living creature, let alone an insect.
It was a demon. One that offered its loyalty to their demon lord.
“That individual—the Great King—assigned you and the hotel cleaner a confidential mission. The mission details and related information have already been erased from the city archives. Do you know anything about it?”
“…It was the disposal of Dr. O’Neil, the corpse collector.”
Violet answered.
“When you disposed of Dr. O’Neil, did you destroy the brain? Or annihilate the soul?”
“The mission parameters were strictly limited to biological termination.”
“…This is going to drive me insane.”
The deputy chief prosecutor’s expression froze coldly, as if he had been struck from behind.
“By now the necromancers of the Haunting Family will have captured and retrieved his soul.”
One of the five great families of Uptown.
“Since they didn’t even smash the brain, they will have obtained every piece of information inside his head intact.”
The Veil Family—Shadow Binders.
The Arrowhead Family—Prismatists.
And the Haunting Family—Soul Binders.
“So you’re saying Lord Bernier… no, the Great King intended from the very beginning to hand Dr. O’Neil’s soul over to them?”
“I cannot tell you that much.”
The deputy chief prosecutor answered calmly.
“More importantly, there is a task you must carry out immediately.”
“…As ordered.”
Violet nodded silently. Nothing would change. She was the sword of this city. Just as a cleaner’s duty lay in “resolution” rather than investigating the problem, her own duty was no different.
“Find the Snark contractor who made contact with Beelzebub at once.”