The Name "Judah"
“Bishop of the Blood Heaven Sect, Judah.”
Simon nearly let out a whoop right there in the library.
He had finally uncovered the source of the uneasiness he'd felt from the very first moment he'd met Professor Walter.
Walter's associates had called him by the name 'Judah.' Even the fountain pen he carried everywhere was engraved with it.
Walter was Judah.
And Judah was a bishop of the Blood Heaven Sect. Looked at that way, every piece fit together perfectly.
This man was a member of the Blood Heaven Sect!
The Blood Heaven Sect was a utterly depraved organization — one that had not only kidnapped and experimented on countless citizens of the Holy Federation, but had also fanned the flames of war between the Dark Alliance and the Holy Federation, engineered atrocities, and longed for nothing less than the mutual destruction of both powers.
Moreover, Walter appeared to have personally approved the mountains of directive documents before him as a senior officer of that very organization. His sins were beyond heavy.
I have no idea what the Blood Heaven Sect was doing sneaking into Kizen, but —
Now his scheme was finished.
For a moment Simon considered running straight to Lorraine, but he forced his excitement down and sat back down at the desk.
If he was going to report to Nephthys, he wanted to brandish evidence so airtight that no one could pick a single hole in it.
Let's find out what this 'Judah' has been up to under that name.
Simon fetched the library's registry volumes and set about searching for the name Judah with abandon.
...Huh?
And the instant he opened the first book, his hopes collapsed.
[Certified, 1st Circle — Judah Callan]
[Certified, 1st Circle — Judah Odo]
[Certified, 2nd Circle — Judah Andale]
[Certified, 3rd Circle — Judah Haoban]
[......]
Simon's head slammed into the desk with a thud.
T-there were this many Judahs?
He'd assumed it was a rare name because he'd never heard it before, but crack open any random volume and Judahs practically jumped off the page.
Pressing a hand to his aching forehead, Simon looked again at the name of the signer he'd deciphered.
「Bishop of the Blood Heaven Sect, Judah.」
If there had at least been a family name or some other distinguishing detail after it, things might have been different — but there wasn't.
With nothing but this one signature and the word 'Judah' on Walter's fountain pen, there was no way to prove that Walter and the Blood Heaven Sect's Judah were the same man. Reporting this to Nephthys was out of the question.
...Haaah.
With the feeling that everything had just snapped back to square one, Simon slumped in his chair and sighed.
And here I thought I had it all wrapped up.
After staring blankly at the ceiling for a while, Simon steeled himself and sat up.
It was true that without hard evidence, his vague suspicions had hardened into something resembling conviction.
Even if I have to do it alone, I'm seeing this investigation through to the end.
Simon's next steps unfolded in his mind. First, head back to the dorm and—
“Hey, you! Student!”
The librarian appeared and pointed at the desk Simon had been ransacking.
“You put all of this back before you leave!”
“Ah— s-sorry!”
Simon flushed red and scrambled back to his seat. Clearly, he needed to get his head on straight first.
“Handwriting analysis?”
Dick echoed, gnawing methodically on a strip of dried meat. Simon nodded.
“Yeah. If I bring you two signatures, can you figure out whether they're the same person's hand?”
Dick gave an awkward laugh.
“Dude! I'm not some fixer who solves every problem the second you mention it. Of course it's possible!”
“...Your premise and your answer don't quite match.”
“There's an old guy in Langestin who does it. Handles royal work too — the finest veteran in the whole field.”
Dick spread his fingers wide with a flourish.
“The pleasure of his services — labor included — for the low, low price of five gold!”
Simon promptly folded down two of his fingers.
“Bestie discount. Three gold.”
“Oh, come on.”
Dick shook his head like there was no chance in hell.
“Fine — introduce me to that hometown friend of yours, Elizabeth Weeper, and you've got a deal at three.”
Simon laughed awkwardly.
The 'Elizabeth Weeper' Dick kept going on about was the disguised Kizen schoolgirl mode of Erzsébet.
“Fine, five gold it is.”
He wasn't about to make Erzsébet work for free just to save a measly two gold.
Besides, she was an Ancient Undead unusually sensitive to the emotion called love. He couldn't ask her to go on a date with Dick, even as a joke.
“Aww, you're actually pretty good at this haggling thing.”
Dick crossed his arms, looking somewhat impressed.
“Okay, fine. Two gold, and—”
“Not even if you paid me zero.”
“Aw, why not!”
Dick grabbed Simon by the shoulders and shook him.
“You're really gonna be this stingy? You've got girls all over you! You're writing letters to that Serne Aindark and going on dates and everything!”
“...We're not a thing.”
“You blew a thousand lanterns with Nephthys's daughter Lorraine, didn't you?! Why won't you introduce anyone?! Don't tell me — do you actually like Elizabeth Weeper?”
“It's not that—”
Just then, Dick snapped his mouth shut and rolled his eyes sideways, gauging the mood.
At some point, from within the blanket on the second-floor bunk, a dangerously glowing glare had fixed itself on him.
“...Everyone shut up. You wanna die?”
“S-sorry, Kajan!”
Dick apologized at once. He was still terrified of the man.
Simon, by contrast, rose quickly from his seat and spoke up.
“Kajan, I'd like a word.”
“Going to sleep.”
“I'll buy you wine.”
At the word wine, a faint spark of interest flickered in Kajan's eyes. He glanced out the window.
The full moon was up tonight.
“...One hour. Usual spot.”
With nothing more than that, Kajan burrowed back under his blanket, and a short while later a faint snoring filled the room.
Simon got up to go find wine, and Dick watched him with an envious expression.
“Agh — seriously! Why does Kajan give only YOU the special treatment? It's like I'm the one getting bullied here!”
One of Dick's grand life goals was to become friends with Kajan.
Simon soothed his grumbling.
“I'll try talking him into letting all three of us meet over a glass tonight.”
“Kuuuh, that's my best friend!”
Beaming, Dick slung an arm around Simon's neck.
“So when are you introducing me to Elizabeth Weeper?”
“Not happening.”
An hour later.
A man with faded grey hair sat on the moonlit rooftop.
Perched with both soles pressed flat against the ground, head tilted straight back to gaze at the full moon, Kajan cut an atmospheric figure — like nothing so much as a lone wolf.
“You came.”
he said. His gaze remained fixed on the full moon.
Simon appeared cradling a bottle of wine, flashed a small smile, and sat down beside him. He drew from his subspace pocket a bottle purchased in Rochest, along with two glasses.
He popped the cork and poured. Down the glass's horizontal line the deep purple liquid descended, swirling into a heady pomegranate glow.
“This is the first time you've ever bought the wine.”
“True.”
Kajan rolled the glass slowly, then took a sip, savoring it. As Simon watched with a tense face, a low voice slipped from the man's lips.
“...You're planning to ask a favor.”
“How'd you know?”
“There's no such thing as a branded wine without a price attached. Free generosity ends at corner-store plonk.”
Simon burst into a quiet laugh, then stretched his legs out long and stared up at the full moon.
“I was racking my brain over how to handle business outside Roc Island while stuck with student status at Kizen. And then it hit me.”
Simon's eyes slid sideways.
“A high-ranking member of the Thieves' Guild happens to be my roommate.”
“You mean to entrust the Guild with a job.”
“Yes. Two favors, actually.”
Simon passed over a slip of paper. Kajan took it between two fingers and read it.
“An investigation into Count Caron. Last I knew, a noble of the Dresden Kingdom. That right?”
“Yep.”
Simon quietly reached back into the past.
When he'd visited the Ballot Fish Market with Benya, his senior from the club, he'd seen the mountain of hearts piled up inside the warehouse.
And none other than Professor Walter himself had appeared there with his associates. Among the things they'd said had been this:
“Lord Judah. Count Caron has arrived.”
“Leaving now.”
With those words, Walter had left the warehouse.
It was the kind of moment that could have been brushed right past — but the situation inside that warehouse had been so harrowing that it had etched itself vividly into his memory.
Walter had said he was meeting Count Caron. A trivial matter, and the odds of it yielding a clue were slim — but if even the slimmest thread of possibility could lead to information on Walter, Simon was willing to pull it.
“Very well. I'll have the Guild assemble a team.”
Rustling the note, Kajan tucked it into the pouch at his chest.
“And the other favor?”
“Right now. With me.”
Simon's expression turned grave.
“I want you to help me infiltrate Professor Walter's laboratory.”
“......”
Beneath the silent rooftop lit only by moonlight, Kajan smiled quietly.
“Still suspicious of Professor Walter, I see.”
“Yes.”
“If Walter is still in that lab, it's dangerous. The two of us could both be expelled.”
Simon shook his head.
“Dick's information says Professor Walter left for an academic conference this afternoon. He's off Roc Island, so we're clear.”
Not once had the schedule intelligence Simon had gotten from Dick ever been wrong.
“......”
Closing his eyes and taking one more sip of wine, Kajan spoke softly.
“Get ready.”
The darkness that lay deep over the Kizen campus was unsettling. The chirring of insects and the low hooting of owls drifted beneath everything.
Perhaps because it was a school of necromancy, the Kizen campus overflowed with hundreds upon thousands of ghost stories.
Secret passages, lingering spirits who asked students for directions, a Priest wandering the Forbidden Forest — and, of course, that last one happened to be true.
Kajan and Simon had hidden themselves behind a building wall. Ahead, two lantern-carrying guards could be seen walking past.
Once the guards were gone, Kajan gave the signal to follow, and the two of them sprinted swiftly across the grass.
Their target was the building housing the Hemomancy classes — the Magic Bullet Shooting Training Hall. Somewhere inside it was Walter's laboratory.
“Wait a moment.”
Donning what appeared to be a pair of magic goggles, Kajan studied the building.
“Just as I thought.”
“What is it?”
“At night, Kizen activates its security systems across every building on campus.”
Kajan handed the goggles to Simon.
“Climb the outer wall and slip through a window carelessly and you'll be spotted. We're going in through the inside.”
When Simon tried the goggles on, the building's exterior was indeed painted over in black.
With no other option, the two headed for the main entrance. They expected a lock on the doorway, and Kajan was reaching for his lockpick kit when—
“...Someone's still inside.”
The building's lights were off, but the door stood open.
They slipped carefully within. Kajan led the way; Simon followed behind.
Dark in here.
He came here for a lecture every single Hemomancy class, but entering at night made the place impossibly eerie and strange.
“Laboratory's on the fourth floor, right?”
“Yes.”
Simon had been to Walter's laboratory exactly once. The two began climbing the stairs slowly.
—!
Lantern light was visible up on the second floor. Someone was there.
“All clear up top.”
Voices drifted down as well. A middle-aged man's voice.
“Lower floors are okay too.”
“Did you check the basement?”
“Don't even joke. How's anyone supposed to go down there?”
Hardly daring to breathe, Kajan and Simon eavesdropped on the exchange — a conversation between the two men who seemed to be building security.
“That's the second one this week they've hauled off.”
A sigh somewhere between complaint and lament.
“Something so dangerous the guards can't even approach it, just sitting down there in this building's basement? Does that make any sense to you?”
“You're telling me.”
Dangerous? What is?
Simon strained his ears even harder.
“What can you do? A few worthless henchmen carted off — hardly worth losing sleep over, eh?”
“Research comes first, after all. This is why necromancers are the way they are.”
“Time to clock out.”
Suddenly, the two men began moving toward the stairs.
Simon was startled, but he moved with a level head — he grabbed Kajan and thrust his hand upward.
Cloud!
Emerald vapor shot out and coiled around the third-floor railing. Their bodies were yanked swiftly up to the third floor, and a moment later the two guards descended the second-floor staircase, chatting amicably.
Phew.
The guards came down to the first floor and locked the building's doors behind them.
The two of them climbed the stairs and reached the fourth floor, where Walter's laboratory was. After what they'd just overheard from the guards, a chill crept through their bodies.
“This it?”
“Yes. Certain.”
Walter's laboratory — exactly as it had been the time Walter had summoned him there before.
Click, click.
The door was locked, naturally — but for Kajan of the Thieves' Guild, this much was child's play.
He slid a trace of Jet-Black through the gap beneath the door, and with a click! the lock gave way.
“Going in.”
Kajan took the door handle in his gloved hand.
“Yes, sir.”
Simon nodded with grave eyes. The door opened with a long, low creak.