Discipline (3)
After spending time in the Black Market for the first time in ages, what came next wasn't difficult.
All I had to do was wait without getting impatient.
Galad would tell Leon that he was canceling the request.
Since I'd stepped in personally, the matter would be settled within half a day at the latest.
If he didn't, his own life was on the line, so he'd get it done no matter what.
Judging by how frightened Galad had been, he might even send Alcyone a message saying, 'I handled it.'
Anyway.
On the way back with Flora, I casually sounded her out about what she wanted to do to celebrate reaching Level 6.
"You reached Level 6, and you went through a lot fighting the Chimera. Is there anything you want to do?"
"Mm, do I have to decide right now?"
"We’ll do whatever you want, so take your time thinking about it."
Flora smiled cheerfully, tilting her head for a moment.
"Spend the weekend with me."
"Don't we always do that?"
"Uh, um... what I want is..."
Flora moved closer and lightly bumped her shoulder against mine.
Then she gently turned her head away and spoke in a quieter voice.
"...I want to be alone with you. Just the two of us."
"Is that really enough?"
"That's enough."
But to me, that still felt like too little.
Since we were at it, I wanted to give her plenty of options so she could enjoy herself to the fullest.
"That doesn't look like enough, so come up with a concrete plan."
"Then there's something I want to ask right now."
"Hm? What is it?"
At that moment, Flora kept her shoulder against mine as her warm hand cautiously wrapped around mine.
Though hesitant and trembling, her fingers slowly slipped between mine.
She averted her gaze, apparently not wanting to show me her face.
"Just like this... please walk with me as far as that alley."
But she couldn't hide the way her ears burned bright red.
* * *
She'd done it before she realized it.
After hearing that she could do whatever she wanted, she'd come to her senses to find herself holding his hand.
Startled for a moment, she'd tried to laugh it off.
But his hand was so warm that she couldn't bear to let it go.
She found herself wishing time would just stop.
The more she felt that way, the more complicated her feelings became.
Maybe she'd wanted to make sure it was real, afraid it might all be a fleeting dream.
'Where had it all started...?'
Until then, she hadn't been able to tell where her own heart was leaning.
Especially the day she met Madam, she'd been even more confused.
She'd barely pulled herself together when a tipsy Karon had come home and abruptly hugged her.
A flustered Flora had tried her hardest to push him away.
'...I'm sorry.'
At that single phrase, she'd stood still and stared at Karon.
'...And, thank you.'
Her own hesitant hands had risen and carefully embraced him back.
She couldn't understand why the harsh smell of alcohol somehow smelled sweet to her.
Normally she'd have smacked him on the back for drinking so heavily.
She definitely should have...
But today, she didn't know why she wanted to feel his warmth.
So, even though she knew it wouldn't reach him, she confessed how she felt.
'Me too.'
'Yeah. I made a pointless drunken scene... I'll handle the aftermath.'
Karon had spoken those words before falling asleep in Flora's arms.
She should have grumbled and put him to bed, yet for some reason she found herself smiling.
Because she didn't want to be abandoned anymore.
Because he was the only person who had held her warmly.
Time passed.
Flora, who had overcome her trauma and reached Level 6, cleared away the lingering bitterness in her heart.
The moment they stepped out of the alley they had promised to walk to.
"Ah..."
She realized that the lovely flower blooming in her heart was romantic love.
* * *
Flora’s clumsy display of affection left me a little flustered.
Ever since I'd brought her out of the slums, she'd shown me unguarded, blind loyalty.
If the path I walked was dangerous, she took the lead without hesitation, and within the organization, she stayed closer to me than anyone else.
We cared about each other enough that, even as boss and subordinate, we could joke around and remain close.
Flora had always approached me with a beaming smile.
That very Flora had blushed like a fragile girl and revealed her affection toward me.
That wasn't to say it was bad.
When had a person's heart begun to change?
I tore through my storehouse of memories at incredible speed, searching for the starting point.
Beginning from the slums where we first met.
The times I'd guided her so that she, a Level 5, could shine even brighter.
The time I'd encouraged her when she was glum over a minor mistake on her first mission.
The days we blended into ordinary life and spent wandering the shopping district.
My memories raced forward from the past toward the present.
I'd been released from prison, reunited with Flora, headed to the academy...
Wait.
Even the distant past came back vividly, yet there was one memory alone I couldn’t recall.
Namely—
'Could it be the day I drank with Madam?'
I couldn't remember what had happened after I left the Magic Device Shop.
The next day, Flora had asked me to drink less, which meant something must have occurred.
'Other than that, I really can't figure out the answer.'
Just as I thought that and stepped out of the alley.
She reluctantly let go of my hand, lightly shook her head, and slowly waited for the flush in her skin to fade.
Flora was the first to speak, as if wanting to break the oddly charged atmosphere.
"What I want is still what I said earlier. Getting back to work, though..."
After that, under Flora's direction, we briefly went over and organized our schedule.
"Is there anything on the schedule I should know about?"
"As it happens, there's one important schedule."
Multiple incidents had overlapped over the past few days, so I hadn't been able to share the information I'd obtained from the Magic Tower Master.
While I'd been spending time at the Magic Tower, Flora had poured everything into stabilizing her Mana Circuit.
Fortunately, that had been resolved within the window, so it was time to focus on the original objective again.
I conveyed the plan, which was still only roughly outlined, to Flora.
"It looks like we’ll be heading to the White Night Mountain Range before long."
"For what reason are you going there?"
"It’s a long story, but there’s a way to control the Artifact at the summit."
Flora slowly nodded.
In short order, she'd figured out the source of the intelligence.
"It's information the Magic Tower Master provided."
"So we’ll need some groundwork. Reaching the summit currently requires Level 6."
Artifact manipulation and Spatial Magic.
Both indispensable elements for me were gathered in a single location.
No matter what, I had to reach that summit.
"That means we’ll need to talk to the Imperial Court."
"Any opening I can exploit lately?"
"Mmm, just a moment."
After a brief silence, Flora spoke.
"Boss, do you remember the Inquisitor?"
"Of course I remember. The cardinal even promised to look into it separately."
"I heard that’s still ongoing. The Imperial Court is watching it too, so I thought you might be able to step in at the right moment."
"Do we have anything the Imperial Court would react to?"
"Alcyone’s report said there was a high chance Demons were involved."
Flora's words made sense.
The Imperial Court and the Order were friendly, but politically they remained on parallel tracks.
The balance of power kept either side from overwhelming the other.
But with Demons as their common enemy, the Imperial Court had deployed its trump card while the Order assigned an Inquisitor to monitor me.
If we could get access to the Chimera, I could use Alcyone’s intelligence to gain leverage between the Imperial Court and the Order.
"That's a decent approach."
"In the end, we just keep a relationship where each side uses the other."
I ended the discussion there.
Our next stop was the Magic Device Shop run by the organization.
A report had come in that the organization had held three meetings with various nobles recently over the Resistance Stone Mine.
According to the list Alcyone had sent, Leon was listed as attending.
"I’ll brief you on Leon Royce."
"Please do."
As we neared the Magic Device Shop, Flora handed me the information on Leon as though she had been waiting for the cue.
In short:
1. Leon's family had expanded through trade and possessed a wide information network.
2. He had recently shown interest in me, as I was well-known at the academy.
3. When his family’s information network failed to get results, Leon hired an information broker in the Black Market.
4. Of all people, he'd messed with me.
There was also a significant amount of other material that could turn the family upside down, but I excluded it as it wasn't suited for discipline.
Anyway.
It was obvious how deeply Flora resented what he had done.
She'd mobilized Alcyone and shaken out every speck of dust from the family.
Just then, we entered the Magic Device Shop.
"We appreciate your consideration on this matter."
"We’ll give your proposal serious consideration."
Alcyone and Madam appeared to have finished their conversation; I caught them seeing the visitors out.
A dashingly dressed Leon was among the party.
I asked the representative to excuse me for a moment, then approached Leon.
"Leon, do you have a moment?"
"Instructor Karon? How do you know my name?"
"I heard you’re friends with Gilbert. We’re connected through him, so to speak."
"Ah, I understand."
After that, I moved to a private spot with Leon.
Using the information I held, the conversation progressed quickly.
"I heard you've been up to something you shouldn't have recently. Any idea what that might be?"
"Me? Did I perhaps break a school rule?"
He was quite brazen.
Or maybe he genuinely had no idea.
So I approached a little more directly.
"It's more serious than a school rule. Imperial law, perhaps?"
"I-Imperial law?"
Finally, he seemed flustered, as if he'd taken the bait.
Here, I decided to lay my cards on the table confidently and apply pressure.
"You do know I’m a mage affiliated with the Imperial Court, right?"
"Yes, I am..."
"Then you obviously know the Intelligence Bureau exists too, don’t you?"
The Intelligence Bureau had its share of idle bureaucrats, but it was also full of people who knew their way around information.
They were the ones who moved the information flowing beneath the surface of the Empire.
"I didn’t come here to severely punish you, Leon. Curiosity is fine. But you need to know when and where to draw the line, don’t you?"
"You're right..."
"What you did was illegal, but you’re a student. Students make mistakes. I made mistakes at your age too."
If you spent time in the underworld, you inevitably became well-versed in the law to find loopholes.
Had this gone through Imperial law, his family could have been in serious danger for investigating someone affiliated with the Imperial Court.
Furthermore, the proposal itself, which was tied to an extremely expensive Resistance Stone mine, would have been scrapped.
"Everything I've been doing..."
As he realized the gravity of what he'd been doing, Leon's face rapidly darkened.
The fact that it had been overlooked so far was merely luck.
Sooner or later, someone capable of tracing it back, like me, would have caught him.
"Only you and I, Leon, know about this matter, so I'll turn a blind eye."
"Is... is that really true?"
"Yes. On one condition, of course."
Leon swallowed audibly and slowly nodded.
"Don't do that sort of thing in the future. If you get caught again..."
I trailed off intentionally, then continued in a low voice.
"I won't be able to protect you then."
"I'm truly sorry!"
Leon apologized, bowing deeply until his head nearly touched the ground.
Before long, Galad would firmly refuse the job, saying he couldn’t conduct the investigation.
Leon would say it was fine and leave the spot no matter what.
It would be a happy ending where everyone kept their lives.
Lastly, I reminded him of an important point.
"When you get back, study hard enough to make up for the scolding you got today."
"...Understood."
I left Leon behind as he kept thanking me until he disappeared from sight.
'If this had been another organization, I would’ve started with a conversation, forced the information out of them, then eliminated them...'
Lost briefly in reminiscence, I sensed a presence in a nearby alley.
I called out to the one who'd been eavesdropping until the conversation ended.
"Conversation's over, so come on out."
"Ahaha, you noticed? It's been a while."
Welton appeared, scratching his head.
His presence meant the Intelligence Bureau wanted my cooperation on something.