Daydream (1)
While Delice slowly recovered under the Ministry of Magic's watchful eye, I spent my time thoroughly examining and researching the Rosetta Stone. Most of the work took place in the Southend monastery I had purchased some time ago. Although Delice's testimony had undoubtedly cleared me of a massive portion of the suspicion, it hadn't reduced it to absolute zero.
The work was almost always the same. I would pour human souls into the factory-reset Rosetta Stone to activate it, then observe the magic carved into the relic and its activation patterns, looking for any areas I could tweak. It was highly analogous to running a program's code line by line to see if there were parts worth copying and pasting for my own purposes, and if so, how to optimize them.
The problem was that the Ministry's wizards weren't complete idiots; in programming terms, every single line of code was heavily obfuscated. The only way to bypass this was to dump more souls into it. Fortunately for me, I still had plenty of usable souls on hand. Traitors who had been utterly useless in life, but in death, generously surrendered their very souls to my cause.
Occasionally, I would prick my finger with a knife to draw blood—I had given up on slitting my wrists, as Pavel had nagged me to death about it—since feeding the Rosetta Stone a wizard's fresh blood and soul yielded excellent results.
Thus, on the fourth day after the heist. After pulling consecutive all-nighters, formulating countless hypotheses, and running endless tests, I finally managed to grasp—at least superficially—the profound principles behind this second national artifact.
"So you're saying they didn't build it from scratch, but rather modified something that already existed?"
"Yeah. It wasn't a British relic to begin with, after all. Its original purpose was likely to protect the Ptolemaic Kingdom from foreign invasions."
Napoleon's French expeditionary force had discovered it, and the British army subsequently seized it and shipped it back to their homeland. Up to this point, it didn't differ much from known history.
Pavel drew a sharp horizontal line on a piece of paper. At that exact moment, the faint, ragged breathing of a man who had been barely clinging to life in the corner of the monastery finally stopped. Another traitor had just breathed his last by my hand, converted into a fresh soul.
"So, as the era of modern magic dawned, they searched for a bulwark to protect Britain against the communist threat, and their eyes fell upon the Rosetta Stone."
"From the perspective of the newly established magical bureaucracy, they probably figured it was better to modify an existing relic than to pour national resources into creating a brand-new national artifact."
A rational decision. I would have done the same.
"Uh... then as a national artifact, the Rosetta Stone's very existence was basically a fluke?"
"Exactly. The magic was imbued in the relic from the very beginning. The Ministry people simply upgraded what was already there. You could say they gaslit the artifact."
"Gas... what?"
Ah, was that term not in use yet in this era?
"To put it simply, they pulled out every trick in the book to change the target of its protection from the Ptolemaic Kingdom to the nation of Great Britain."
"I understand. Invading anywhere in the world and saying, 'You are a subject of the British Empire starting today, got it?' while plundering them... It sounds extremely British."
I barely suppressed a snort of laughter before continuing.
"Of course, as I personally witnessed that day, it wasn't a perfect modification. Just look at how it failed to recognize the mummies being converted into golems right above it as a threat."
This was something I had considered even while planning the heist. If the simple act of creating a golem had been caught in the magical early-warning net, stealing it would have been far more difficult.
Even while conversing with Pavel about magic, my hands remained busy deciphering the magical program code. Out of habit, I picked up the knife to slit my left wrist—
"Miss."
—but under the intense, unblinking glare of my security chief, I was forced to merely prick the tip of my left index finger with the blade instead.
Using a relic that resonated with souls like a blood glucose meter needle naturally tanked my efficiency. I knew he was only saying it for my own good, but I couldn't help but grumble anyway.
"Tch. Slitting the wrist is the most reliable way to get the full effect, you know."
"Absolutely not. What if you accidentally nick a tendon, muscle, or nerve?"
Even putting aside the risk of permanent damage, he was right; I needed to exercise restraint. There was no rush, so taking it slow was the correct approach. Besides, I had been suffering from frequent bouts of anemia lately. It was hard to avoid when a different kind of "magic" visited me once a month.
About two hours later, I finally witnessed the fruits of my labor over the past five days. I grabbed a mason's chisel and a hammer and began gently scraping the edge of the Rosetta Stone. The monastery's basement was already equipped with tools like hammers, which had previously been used for torture. Pavel, who had initially offered to take over the physically demanding task, quietly stepped back and watched once he confirmed that magic was involved.
I was extracting only the core magic engraved on the Rosetta Stone and pasting it onto this edge. In the grand scheme of things, the method wasn't much different from cramming the traitors' souls into tiny brain fragments. In other words, it was similar to how I had processed the Spiegel into a necklace locket.
Once I completely severed the shard from the main body of the Rosetta Stone, I began modifying the magic to suit my purposes, just as the Ministry's wizards had done decades ago. My magical knowledge, which was decades ahead of theirs—and of the current era—allowed me to expand the early-warning system's detection range from mere magical threats to all forms of danger.
Next was testing whether it actually worked. I instructed Pavel to hold out his hand and lightly sliced the tip of his finger with my knife.
"Now, let a drop fall onto this stone shard."
This was the crucial ritual of imprinting. A process to ensure the relic was thoroughly gaslit... no, made aware of who its true owner was.
"Is this really all it takes?"
"I told you, yes. Now then... shall we test it ourselves?"
I picked up the pistol lying beside me and pulled the trigger before Pavel could even react.
Bang!
However, the bullet aimed at his flank drew no blood. With superhuman speed, Pavel instantly twisted his body aside. The bullet fired from the Glock embedded itself harmlessly into the stone floor.
"Ha..."
Even though a bullet had suddenly flown toward him, Pavel showed no sign of anger, only letting out a breath of pure admiration.
"How was it? Did you feel something?"
"Definitely. It was a strange sensation... one I can't even describe as mere intuition."
"I'll need to tweak it from time to time, but this should be enough for now. Just don't rely on it blindly."
This early-warning system, directly linked to the soul, would prevent my subordinates and me from dying senseless deaths to stray bullets. It was an alarm that transmitted a resonance of the soul to its owner anytime, anywhere—even when they weren't awake.
Although there might be times when a projectile was too close for them to react in time, this would undoubtedly boost my men's survivability to unprecedented levels. For instance, they were now virtually immune to the threat of long-range snipers. If they could reinforce their defensive magic or simply dodge while the bullet was in mid-air, they were essentially untouchable.
Of course, the best course of action was to avoid becoming a target in the first place, but having a safety net that allowed us to live to fight another day was a massive leap forward.
Still unable to shake off his awe, Pavel asked in a slightly trembling voice, "Then, Miss, how many of these relics can you make?"
This was indeed the crucial point. Even if miniaturization and modification were successful, it would all be pointless if mass production was impossible.
"Calculating based on the volume ratio of the entire Rosetta Stone to this single shard... well, we should get roughly two thousand pieces."
"That is more than enough to equip all our men several times over."
True, but it was also an incredibly unrealistic plan. Even Jesus didn't perform the miracle of the five loaves and two fish with mere pebbles. It had taken several hours just to craft this single prototype; how on earth was I supposed to multiply that by the number of all our men?
Thus, for now, I limited this time-consuming process to the key executives of the organization—the chiefs who made up the Pentarchy, and Rybakov, who had to handle the IRA. I knew better than anyone that my body wouldn't hold out beyond that unless I found a clever workaround.
I wiped the beads of sweat from my forehead and collapsed backward. Since the monastery was now entirely owned by the organization, we had been able to replace the folding metal chairs in the basement workshop with a plush, comfortable sofa.
"Whew, it's getting hot in here."
I fanned myself with my hand, fluttering my poorly ventilated shirt to let some cool air inside. It was rather amusing to watch Pavel clear his throat and look away every time the sweat-soaked, slightly translucent fabric fluttered.
Amusing or not, I realized once again how inefficient this brute-force method was. To think I was this exhausted after making just one. Moreover, considering I had to shed my own blood every single time to ensure smooth crafting, a fundamental overhaul of the process was not a choice, but a necessity.
Still, since I had already started, it was only right to prepare the batch to be bestowed upon the core leadership. Riding the momentum, I spent another half-day crafting a total of seven degraded yet improved Rosetta Stone shards, including the one I had made earlier.
They were "degraded" in the sense that they didn't sound a massive alarm across Greater London, but instead delivered warnings solely to their owners. On the other hand, they were "improved" because their detection wasn't limited to magical threats. The fact that the alarm didn't spread could also be considered an improvement in its own right. Whichever way you looked at it, there was no denying that these items would more than double one's individual combat capabilities.
Coincidentally, the next day was also the day Delice was discharged from the hospital. The fact that his hospitalization lasted a mere four days was, of course, entirely thanks to Pavel intentionally avoiding his vital organs when shooting him. Naturally, even after being discharged, Delice would have to rely heavily on painkillers, sleeping pills, and antibiotics for at least a week, but escaping the hospital bed this quickly was nothing short of a miracle.
His discharge gift was, naturally, one of the hand-carved, improved Rosetta Stone shards. Calling it a get-well gift felt a bit bizarre, considering I was the very person who had choked him unconscious, but still.
Delice accepted the gift calmly and expressed his gratitude.
"Thank you. I didn't expect you to go to such lengths for me. Once again, I have received a grace far beyond what I deserve."
"Don't mention it. Thanks to you, Delice, they couldn't build a targeted investigation against me."
The British Ministry of Magic was a department that operated outside the standard cabinet structure. In the entire Thatcher administration, the Prime Minister was the only one who could even pretend to control the Ministry. Consequently, an organization so far removed from democratic policymaking could easily tighten its dragnet based on a "presumption of guilt," a possibility that could never be ignored.
After all, I had been in the main hall at the exact moment the blackout occurred, had ignored the museum staff's instructions to flee outside alone during the power outage, and hailed from the Eastern Bloc—just like the "Syndicate" suspected of being the mastermind behind the incident.
My cover identity, Irene Lonska, was a bona fide British citizen, Polish descent notwithstanding, and the Syndicate was a group originating from the Soviet mainland, not Poland. But there was no way our grand British lords would bother to split such hairs.
Of course, I knew they weren't singling me out specifically. If the Ministry lost its mind, it seemed entirely capable of conducting targeted investigations on every single suspect, regardless of the time and effort required. Besides, Britain had accumulated quite the mountain of bad karma during its imperialist days. The diverse nationalities of the suspects, both domestic and foreign, presented a classic case of "having so many enemies that it was impossible to narrow down the culprit."
Since I had intentionally equipped Pavel's strike team with IRA-sourced gear, the confusion would only deepen. In a situation like this, the testimony of Delice—the sole survivor of an encounter with the thugs who stole the Rosetta Stone—was bound to be incredibly effective. We had to do whatever it took to lighten their workload, even by a fraction.
"I am glad I could be of help to you, Lady Yerina."
"I heard your testimony was, 'It wasn't a woman.' Pfft. The old fogeys at the Ministry probably found that highly convincing."
On average, wizards tended to be more conservative than the rest of society. It wasn't for any particularly profound reason; it was simply because a wizard's average lifespan, barring unnatural death, easily exceeded a hundred years. The magical world's establishment was dominated by ancient geezers who had artificially extended their lives by plastering themselves with all sorts of relics, which made the community as a whole seem conservative.
Eventually, as time passed and the young, millennial wizards of today—Generation Z were still infants, fetuses, or mere sperm—rose to the mainstream, this trend would naturally fade. Considering the average age of the current ruling geezers, hmmm... maybe around the 2050s?