The Inspector Smiles as She Draws Her Blade
Evelyn had not melted the snowflake all night long.
To be precise, she had been desperately clinging to it so it would not disappear. Even as the morning warmth tapped against the thick glass windows of the Northern Grand Duke's Castle, the small glass vial still held its pure white crystal completely intact.
The problem was that this was not a successful completion of the assignment.
"Lady Evelyn."
"Yes, Master."
Evelyn tried to smile as brightly as usual. Yet the shadows beneath her eyes were a little darker, and her fingers gripped the neck of the glass vial far too tightly. The snowflake inside trembled with a faint, delicate shiver. It meant mana was still flowing into it.
"Did you stay up holding it all night?"
"It was the assignment you gave me, Master."
"That was not an assignment. It was lingering attachment."
Evelyn's smile stiffened slightly.
I watched without reaching out on purpose. If I offered comfort here, the child would cling to my hand forever.
"Do not deliberately fail in front of the inspection team today."
The snowflake inside the glass vial flinched.
"If I fail on purpose, will you be disappointed in me, Master?"
"Deliberately failing is not failure. It is betraying yourself."
"Then what if I succeed?"
"That would mean Lady Evelyn has chosen to stand on her own side."
Evelyn could not answer.
If she failed, she would return to being a failure. If she succeeded, her master might leave. That absurd conclusion kept sinking deeper roots inside her.
I spoke quietly.
"Even if you succeed, I will remain your master, Lady Evelyn."
"Regardless of the verification results?"
"Regardless of the verification results."
Evelyn let out a small breath.
It was not so much relief as the sound of someone longing to feel relieved.
At that moment the door opened.
Karen Wald entered and offered a short, crisp salute.
"Sir Teore. The Magic Tower inspection team has arrived at the outer gate."
A tiny crack appeared in the glass vial held in Evelyn's hand.
A low blizzard lay spread before the outer gates of the Northern Grand Duke's Castle.
Knights in black armor stood in rows on either side while mages wearing ash-gray robes walked slowly between them. Their hands held more recording tablets and measuring orbs than staves. They carried no blades, yet it was a procession of people who stabbed others with records.
The woman at the front bowed her head with graceful courtesy.
Ash-gold hair.
Thin gold-rimmed glasses.
A flawless smile.
Her eyes, however, were not smiling.
"I am Serpin Astra of the Magic Tower Inspection Bureau. I have been dispatched regarding the records of Lady Evelyn Arckenheim's abnormal growth and to evaluate Sir Reinfeld's Correction Formula."
Ludwig's eyes cooled to a wintry chill.
"Is calling my daughter's growth abnormal the Magic Tower's version of a first greeting?"
Serpin's smile did not waver.
"It cannot yet be conclusively determined, Your Grace. Therefore, for today, I shall refer to it as abnormal while extending every appropriate courtesy."
Karen's hand rose to his sword hilt.
I gave the smallest shake of my head. Karen cursed me with his eyes but did not draw his blade. He was an excellent knight. Not especially patient, but excellent.
Serpin's gaze turned to me.
"Sir Reinfeld. Achieving 5-Circle in only one year after being labeled a failure is closer to a miracle than any form of education."
"When a mage uses the word miracle, it usually means they failed to understand."
"Then let us say I have come today to understand."
"While carrying an official document titled an inspection?"
"The Magic Tower records before it understands. To avoid making mistakes."
I revised my internal assessment.
More troublesome than Bermann.
Bermann had been arrogant, so his thoughts were transparent. Serpin Astra was different. She knew how to provoke with perfect politeness and surgical precision. People like her could seize an opponent's throat with a single well-crafted sentence.
Evelyn stood silently at my side. She had folded away her usual affectionate gestures for now. Even beneath the inspection team's oppressive pressure, the child kept her shoulders straight, enduring the tension with the poise expected of a grand duchess.
When we entered the conference room, the inspection team immediately unfolded their conditions.
The Magic Tower's documents always suffocated people with impeccable politeness.
Every sentence contained the words safety, objectivity, and procedure, yet the conclusion was unmistakable.
The Magic Tower would be the judge.
Serpin spoke softly.
"There are six inspection items. Confirmation of 5-Circle attainment, mana stability, independent operation, risk of runaway magic, and whether Sir Reinfeld's Correction Formula constitutes a forbidden technique."
Ludwig asked in a low voice.
"Forbidden technique?"
"Keeping every possibility open is fundamental to inspection."
"The Magic Tower uses the word possibility in a rather unpleasant manner."
Serpin slid one sheet of the conditions forward.
"First, I request that Her Ladyship demonstrate 5-Circle wide-area freezing magic. Should the records prove accurate, it would serve as the ideal verification procedure."
"Why demand wide-area magic?"
"To confirm whether she has reached 5-Circle."
"No. You are orchestrating the most dangerous possible outcome."
The conference room fell silent.
Serpin tapped the document lightly with the tip of her pen.
"Inspection is a safety confirmation procedure. Any risk must be recorded. Any absence of risk must be proven. If the Northern Grand Duchy truly believes itself safe, there should be no reason to refuse verification."
They were fine words.
On the surface.
"Success proves disaster-level firepower. Failure proves unstable growth records. Runaway magic grants immediate justification for containment. Whichever occurs, it is a favorable task for the Inspection Bureau."
For the first time, a faint change flickered in Serpin's eyes.
"An interesting interpretation."
"Is it incorrect?"
"It has not yet been determined."
"You really do enjoy that sentence."
Ludwig's heavy gaze settled on me.
"Sir Reinfeld. Is it dangerous for the grand duchess to display wide-area magic?"
"It is dangerous. That is precisely why the Magic Tower demands it."
I turned toward Evelyn. The snowflake inside the glass vial she clutched wavered dangerously. If left alone, she would collapse beneath her own weight before the inspection team's pressure could reach her.
"If what you truly wish to verify is educational potential and independent operation, the proper task should be manipulation of the smallest unit rather than wide-area freezing."
Serpin continued, her expression one of open interest.
"The smallest unit?"
"A single snowflake."
One of the mages on the inspection team twisted his eyebrows in disbelief. Serpin, however, smiled as though savoring an entertaining game.
"A single snowflake to verify a 5-Circle mage."
"Lady Evelyn's problem was never insufficient power. The issue was using that power on a small scale. That is also why the Magic Tower misjudged her as a failure one year ago."
"You speak on the premise that the Magic Tower erred."
"It has not yet been determined."
For the first time, Serpin's smile stiffened ever so slightly.
The formal verification was scheduled for noon the following day.
Serpin requested a preliminary confirmation on the grounds of verifying whether Evelyn could truly create even a single snowflake.
A small glass vial was placed in the center of the training room.
Evelyn stepped forward. I quietly retreated three paces. I omitted the Correction Formula and deployed only a thin Shielding Formula. Balancing faith and insurance was the true art of survival.
"Lady Evelyn."
Serpin spoke while holding her recording tablet.
"Please proceed at your ease. Failure will simply be recorded."
It was remarkably unhelpful comfort.
Evelyn drew in a breath.
A white point formed inside the glass vial. A crystal smaller than a petal, lighter than a breath. Neither the vial's temperature, the floor, nor the surrounding magic circles trembled.
At the eighth second.
Evelyn looked at me.
Her eyes asked a silent question.
Is it truly all right even if I succeed?
In that instant the snowflake shrank into itself and crumbled. It did not melt or shatter. It simply released its own form at the threshold of completion and scattered like something fleeting.
Serpin's pen stopped.
"Fascinating."
"What is?"
"The mana flow did not collapse from external pressure. It folded in on itself."
Evelyn's shoulders twitched.
Serpin asked gently.
"Lady Evelyn. Did you perhaps avoid success?"
I cut in at once.
"Emotional agitation exists in every mage. Inspector, if you never trembled once during your own first 5-Circle verification, that would indicate a problem of character rather than talent."
Serpin laughed.
"My character has been a subject of inspection by the Magic Tower for quite some time."
She had a skillfully irritating way of returning every blow.
She wrote several lines on her tablet.
Potential for independent operation confirmed.
High Emotional Dependency.
Reacts to stimulation from exclusive master.
I did not miss the final line.
She was observing my Correction Formula and my relationship with Evelyn far more closely than Evelyn's mana itself.
After the preliminary confirmation, Serpin stopped me in the corridor.
"Sir Reinfeld's Correction Formula is most intriguing."
"Every time someone from the Magic Tower calls something intriguing, I find myself double-checking the locks on my study."
"It would be fortunate if matters ended there."
Serpin cradled the recording tablet against her chest.
"To speak honestly, I find your existence far more dangerous than Her Ladyship's."
"Because I am 7-Circle?"
"No. Because you have taken what the magical world dismissed as a failure and brought it into the domain of systematic education."
It was a warning with bones, dressed in the clothes of praise.
"The Magic Tower does not dislike dangerous knowledge. It dislikes knowledge without an owner."
"Does that mean the Magic Tower claims to be the owner of all knowledge?"
"At the very least, we do not release it into the wild."
"My disciple is not a wild animal."
Serpin smiled slowly.
"I was not referring to Her Ladyship."
It had become clear.
The Magic Tower's true target was not Evelyn, but the methodology that had produced her explosive growth.
"At noon tomorrow, we will conduct the formal inspection at the Verification Ground. The task will be a single snowflake."
Serpin closed her tablet.
"However, should she fail, I will record both Her Ladyship's inability to operate independently and the hazardous nature of your Correction Formula."
"Is that a sentence you may write so lightly?"
"An inspector's pen is always light. What weighs heavily is the life of the person being recorded."
She was a woman I thoroughly disliked.
As night deepened, Evelyn once again clutched my sleeve. Her lips, which had chattered without pause earlier, were now sealed. Only a taut tension remained in our joined hands.
"Are you afraid?"
Evelyn began to shake her head, then stopped.
"I'm very scared."
"A good answer. Far better than the lie of not being afraid."
"Is that praise?"
"It is a diagnosis."
"The Magic Tower chases pointless formalities, and you maintain unnecessary distance, Master."
Only then did she sound like herself again.
"If I succeed tomorrow."
"Yes."
"You will conclude I can stand alone, won't you, Master?"
"I will."
Her grip tightened.
I continued before she could flee.
"But even those who can stand alone still need a master."
Evelyn lifted her head.
"Why?"
"A master is not merely someone who catches you before you fall. A master is also the one who stands silently behind you, watching over you as you reach for even farther places."
Evelyn turned those words over in her mind for a long time.
"Then even if I do well tomorrow, you will still be my master?"
"That fact is unrelated to the verification results."
"Can't you ask them to write that in the Magic Tower records too?"
"That item is not on their inspection form."
"The Magic Tower truly uses the most useless formats."
At that moment Karen approached swiftly from the end of the corridor. In his hands was an additional conditions document bearing the inspection team's seal.
"Sir Teore. Serpin Astra has added conditions to the formal verification."
I accepted the document and opened it.
— Prohibition of Correction Formula intervention during verification.
— Immediate authorization for the Magic Tower inspection team to activate Containment Formula upon any signs of runaway magic.
— Review for preliminary registration as a Potential Disaster in the event of failure.
It was an exceedingly kind document. Like a razor-sharp blade wrapped in floral paper.
Evelyn looked up at me with anxious eyes.
"Master?"
I folded the document.
"Lady Evelyn."
"Yes."
"Tomorrow you need only create a single snowflake."
"Is that truly all I have to do?"
"Yes."
I placed my finger on the document.
"And I will sever this arrogant Magic Tower's outdated customs with a single stroke."