Making Gold (6)
Making Gold (6)
Ars Magna.
The collective term for those who make gold.
The realm all alchemists dream of.
To that extent, alchemists handle gold and try to get close to it.
Naturally, thinking an alchemist made Dojin's necklace crafted from gold was a reasonable thought.
"......You, you're an alchemist."
"Yes, yes... but why that...."
"The thing Dojin has, did you make it?"
Upon hearing those words, Noah instantly stiffened rigidly, not knowing what to do as she rolled her eyes around. Then, the action she chose was evasion.
"Ah, aah... I'm not sure... Ah! Come to think of it, I was in the middle of research! Sorry, I have an urgent matter so I'll be going─!"
"Where do you think."
Flick, Raize snapped her fingers and blocked her path. Noah, who had suddenly stood up, bumped into the floor and clutched her stinging nose.
"Wh, what are you doing!?"
"Did you think you could fool me with such an idiotic act? That's even more of a shock."
"Wha, what do you mean idiotic act..."
"You made that, right? Then I guess I can find out by rummaging through your head?"
"Ru, rummaging through my head!?"
At those words, Noah flinched and tried to move away from Raize. But in front was the mage, behind was a wall—there was nowhere to run.
'Uh, what do I do?'
Mages tearing open heads and rummaging through the brains inside was a tale so old in this world that it remained in oral tradition.
It was also a regular repertoire adults often used to tease children.
Noah, too, had grown up hearing that if you approached a mage, you'd be 'used' from head to toe, and thus had naturally grown up imprinted with a fear of mages.
No matter how small Raize was, only half her size, if she was a mage, she could only appear as a vicious witch.
'Sh, should I tell her?'
That she made the computer, the Intelligence Artifact she gave Dojin, with her own hands, that she had no bad intentions or ill will, that she just made it because she could.
If she begged while saying that, wouldn't she let her live?
'......No.'
However, Noah postponed that choice. If mages were beings that could be trusted that much, Noah would have long ago announced her research, patented it, and made a fortune.
The world would have instantly undergone a magic revolution, welcoming humanity's greatest period of prosperity. Humanity would have been able to conquer everything, be it dungeons, the deep sea, or space.
The reason that didn't happen was because mages were not that pro-humanity.
"......Let me go."
"What?"
"This wall, if you don't release it, I will resist."
Therefore, Noah decided to oppose Raize. Deciding to oppose a mage wasn't exactly an easy thing, but if she was going to die one way or another anyway, she had nothing to lose by going all out.
Raize looked at Noah with an incredulous expression upon hearing her words. By all appearances, she was Level 1, had no magic tools to threaten her with, and didn't seem to possess any special skills.
But what? She says she'll resist?
'What is she thinking...?'
She wasn't sure, but Raize thought she could simply subdue her gently and then talk. So, she created ice handcuffs and flung them toward Noah.
Seeing the ice handcuffs flying toward her, Noah grabbed a medicine bottle from inside her clothes and threw it.
Crash, the bottle broke and the moment the medicine inside touched the handcuffs, a steam explosion occurred. The rapidly expanding air pushed the handcuffs away and the released steam obscured her vision.
"Cough! What is this-."
As Raize recoiled in shock and blew away all the steam with wind magic, Noah had already melted the wall behind her and escaped.
"...Running away to this extent means there's something, right?"
She gave up on asking nicely with words from now on. Raize stretched her hand toward the fleeing Noah.
And her specialty, lightning magic, shot out. Seeing the lightning freely bending its trajectory as it flew, Noah pulled out a metal rod from inside her clothes and drove it deep into the ground.
Guided by the principle of a lightning rod, the lightning flowed through the conductor into the ground and scattered away. While Raize looked at her with a dumbfounded expression, Noah ran far away.
"Mr. Dojin! Mr. Dojiiiiin!"
Running swiftly, Noah urgently searched for Dojin. At her voice shouting loud enough to make the mansion fall apart in the dead of night, Dojin opened his eyes and, seeing Noah running down the corridor, asked what was wrong.
"What... Noah, what is it at this hour?"
"It's terrible, something terrible happened!"
"What?"
"A mage, a mage found out!"
"A mage...? Raize?"
"I don't know her name! But she's small!"
"Then it's Raize."
Hearing Noah's words, Dojin calmed her down, telling her not to worry. But Noah couldn't calm down so easily.
"No, she tried to kill me!?"
"......Raize?"
That couldn't be. Dojin recalled Raize's personality and wondered if she was the kind of person to be violent enough to kill someone.
She wasn't. Though Raize was blunt in personality, she wasn't the type to bluntly stab people.
"You must have misunderstood something. There must have been a misunderstanding."
"It's true..."
"Anyway, go in and rest. Don't shout so much in the middle of the..."
"Found you."
And then, from far away, a bunch of stone handcuffs came flying. Dojin swung his fist to knock them all away, and only then did he look at the person who had thrown them.
"......Raize?"
"Dojin, move aside. I have something to ask that person."
"You don't need to catch her."
"She keeps running away."
Hearing that, Dojin looked at Noah. Noah shook her head vigorously and hid behind Dojin.
Haa, letting out a light sigh, Dojin spoke on Noah's behalf and asked Raize.
"She says she won't run away?"
"......I still have to catch her anyway."
"Why?"
"Because I need to erase her memories."
"Eeek!"
The first thing that came to mind upon hearing about erasing memories was the image of a witch tearing open a head and spraying cleaning solution on the brain.
If subjected to such a thing, she'd become an idiot right away. Noah clung to Dojin's back again and started trembling.
Dojin heard Raize's words and asked for the reason.
"Erase memories? Why?"
"Originally, Dojin, I should erase yours too. ...Making such a thing."
"No, what do you mean such a thing... this?"
The solid gold necklace revealed itself to the world once more. Raize felt dizzy just looking at it.
"......Yes, that."
"Why is this?"
"That's an object that should not exist in this world. Even if I don't destroy it, other mages will come to destroy it."
"No... is that necessary?"
"It's that dangerous an object. Dojin, do you have the confidence to fight and win against the Magic Tower?"
"......No."
In this otherworld where the Magic Tower monopolizes everything from the maintenance, operation, repair, and sale of magic tools and scrolls, fighting the Magic Tower is akin to fighting an entire country.
Making an enemy of an entire country is something even Dojin couldn't possibly do.
"Then hand it over. I'll smash it and make it as if it never existed."
"Is there a need to react like that? This isn't that dangerous an item..."
"Even if you think so, others won't."
"Hmm... what if I say I won't give it?"
Dojin tucked the necklace back inside his clothes. Seeing that, Raize felt anger surge.
"Why can't you understand? I'm trying to save you right now."
"If you want it that badly... try to take it with your own strength. Raize."
"......From the moment we first met, I wanted to kick your ass."
Raize said that and raised her staff. Plasma sparked from the tip of her staff. It was a phenomenon created when ultra-high voltage electricity gathered.
Dojin saw that and smirked, then pulled out the necklace, transforming it into the form of a staff.
And he prepared magic just like her.
"You─"
Feeling humiliated by that fact, Raize poured every magic circle and magical power she could muster into it.
Dojin simply held the magic power injection port at the end and just poured in magical power. There wasn't much he could do in the first place.
A moment later, intense beams shot out from the tips of both their staffs. The beams meeting in the middle of the corridor collided and consumed each other, glowing brightly.
Vrrrrm!
The beams, madly pushing each other away, after repeating the push and pull hundreds of millions of times, began to fuse together.
And the fused two beams scattered with a violent explosion.
The mansion exploded.
Pshhh, as the mansion's ceiling shattered and collapsed, plaster dust began to rain down. Dojin brushed the dust off his head and got up.
"Ugh... what the..."
There seemed to have been some explosion, but he didn't see it clearly. His whole body ached. A cold wind blew in, and looking around, the mansion was destroyed, revealing the high sky.
'......Wow, what is this.'
Like the combined ultimate attack of two sci-fi robots, the fused beams caused an explosion, blowing away half the mansion.
Only then did Dojin startle and look for Raize and Noah. Fortunately, the two were merely knocked unconscious by the impact, without a single scratch.
"......What, what did you do now?"
Seoyun, who had come out from the intact part of the mansion upon hearing the loud noise, saw the half-destroyed mansion and Dojin standing there and asked what he had done.
Dojin scratched his head and thought of a way out of this situation.
"......Nothing happened."
"Nothing happened? Do you have a death wish?"
"......Sorry."
Seeing Seoyun frowning and saying that, Dojin immediately apologized and explained the detailed circumstances.
Seoyun frowned at the part where he made a tool that could freely use magic, and at the fact he had hidden it from them, she started getting really angry.
"Why didn't you tell us about something so important?"
"......Because secrets are better the fewer people know?"
"So, did you protect that great secret of yours? Ended up getting caught by the very person you shouldn't have?"
"Ah, that's true though."
Then, Raize opened her eyes. Raize looked at Dojin looking down at her and the shattered mansion, roughly grasped the situation, and then let out heavy sighs.
"......Dojin, good night."
"Good night...?"
The awakened Raize uttered such a random phrase and then pointed at the staff Dojin was holding.
"Anyway, give me that."
"......You'll break it, won't you?"
"I won't break it. Give it."
Dojin hesitated but handed over his staff. Raize, receiving the staff, looked at this dreadful monstrosity and let out thick sighs.
'Such a thing should not exist in this world.'
Dojin, who didn't even know the letter for magic, had performed magic equal to hers, who had trained for over 20 years. It was truly an absurd tool.
'If it already exists, and if its spread cannot be stopped....'
Raize held the staff and swung it this way and that toward the mansion. Then, as if time were reversing, the mansion began to regain its original form.
She felt her magical power draining rapidly, but Raize felt a pleasure beyond the draining sense of weakness.
'......I just need to stay ahead of everyone.'
The magic she just performed was magic she absolutely shouldn't have been able to use at her level. Yet she used it.
The meaning this signified was very simple. Proof that not only those who don't know magic, but rather, the more one is a mage, the more desperately they would desire this tool.
Because the ones with the strongest curiosity and greed for magic were, after all, mages.
Raize, having repaired the mansion, returned the staff to Dojin.
"Here, done, right?"
"Wow... amazing."
"That thing... if you're not going to smash it, you might as well mass-produce it."
"......You're telling me to mass-produce it?"
"Yes."
Raize advised purely. Having experienced it firsthand, she was certain that if this tool spread, division would occur among mages.
So think conversely—mass-produce it. Even if everyone gets their hands on magic, the value of mages wouldn't decrease.
Rather, it would only increase...
But there was one problem.
"Uh... I can't mass-produce this."
"......Why?"
"I don't know how to make it."
Raize looked at Dojin upon hearing that. Her expression seemed to ask if he was serious.
"......Really?"
"Yes."
A deep sigh filled the interior of the mansion.