Witch Hunt (3)
The date of Ito Souta’s trial was drawing near.
The sentence was simple, but its meaning was enormous. The citizens of Lindel, already half-mad from the chaos around them, clinked their glasses and toasted it as justice, while the people in Celia were so stunned by the sudden news that they could hardly collect themselves.
Of course, it had been Ito Souta who requested the trial, but there was no way people all the way over in Lindel or Celia would know that.
There was no need for our side to announce that he’d asked for it, either, and Ito Souta himself hadn’t passed the information on to Celia.
Last time, I had been the victim. This time, he intended to make himself the victim.
But for us, the only thing that mattered was that the bastard was going to be tried.
Kasugano Yuno was already doing a decent job of blocking his filthy little scheme to manipulate public opinion in Japan.
Perpetrator.
Honestly, most of the common folk didn’t care about the details.
All that mattered was that he was standing in court as the offender, while the virtuous Lee Kiyoung had been dragged in on attempted-murder charges.
That’s enough.
For now, that was enough.
I figured the trial probably wouldn’t proceed normally.
On the surface, the matter was supposed to be about the punishment due to Ito Souta, the man who had harmed the victim, Lee Kiyoung. But those at the center of this trial would have at least some sense that this was going to become a political battleground.
That was exactly why Lee Jihye was uneasy.
“It all came on a little suddenly, so I’m not sure if we’re fully prepared, big brother.”
“We’re more than ready, Jihye noona. Things with the judges are lined up, and we’ve got the papal office in a decent position too, don’t we?”
“I’m just anxious. I think I have a rough idea of what you’re hiding, Oppa, but I’ve got my own concerns too. You say you’ve set up insurance, but there’s no guarantee it’ll all go the way you expect. And… the trial itself might only be a formality. Courts here are a little different from modern ones. If I think about what he might say in his own defense… isn’t it natural to worry?”
“You don’t need to worry. Our Ito Souta is a smart man.”
Her face was quietly watching me, and I realized this was the first time I’d seen her looking so concerned. She seemed to know something, which wasn’t a bad thing.
If Jihye had pieced things together, that meant he had probably pieced together at least some of it too.
“I trust you.”
“Yeah. You can trust me, noona.”
She was uneasy, but it looked like she’d decided to shake off the rising anxiety.
Perfect. If Jihye wasn’t paying much attention, or couldn’t pay much attention, that meant this whole operation was being handled in complete secrecy.
I was a little curious what they were going to use to try and nail me, but either way, I’d already accounted for it.
The whole point of setting multiple traps, one after another, was to make sure nobody noticed what was going on.
Still, when she kept looking at me with that expression that said she had a million questions, I couldn’t help but speak up.
We were waiting for the trial anyway, and I was already bored enough that it wouldn’t hurt to know things in advance before the real fun started.
“You’re curious after all?”
“If I said I wasn’t, that’d be a lie. I’m only not asking because you told me not to worry about it. That’s how traps are supposed to be made in the first place. You said I’d just get in the way by running around everywhere, didn’t you? I figured too many people moving would only make us more noticeable.”
“That’s not quite it. Under normal circumstances, it probably would’ve been better to have your help. We could have built a more perfect trap that way. The reason I kept you in the dark and pushed ahead on my own was because I wanted Ito Souta to think I was being careful. That’s the insurance. So, what do you think, noona? How do you think this will play out? No—let me ask the first question more simply. Based on intuition alone, how far did you get? What do you think my original plan was?”
Jihye thought for a moment before slowly continuing.
“First of all….”
“Yeah?”
“You were going to end Ito Souta’s political career completely. After isolating him from both the papal faction and the imperial faction, you’d slowly finish him off.”
“And the method?”
“Probably the drugs you’re currently spreading in Japan. I noticed a few other things too, but I assumed the rest were just decoys to draw attention. The rumors about him running a black market for slave trade or organ trafficking were mostly fabricated anyway.”
“You knew that much?”
“Of course I don’t have any hard evidence. I just thought that was the likely flow based on intuition and the shape of things. And obviously, I kept it to myself. I didn’t dig around on my own, and even if I had, it would’ve been hard for someone as limited in movement as me to know for sure. Wasn’t the plan to use the drugs as the clear-cut evidence that would tie together all the crimes Ito Souta had committed so far and bury him completely?”
“Say it in simpler terms, noona.”
“The original plan was to destroy Ito Souta using false information that his Yamato Guild was distributing drugs in Celia.”
“Right, that’s the first route. Then why didn’t I tell you or anyone else about this case?”
“Because you had to be careful. There are all kinds of reasons, but the most obvious answer is this one.”
“That’s correct too, noona. But like I said, what matters here is that I had to make it look like I was being as cautious as possible. I had to make him think I’d prepared a heavy blow serious enough that I wouldn’t even share it with my most trusted proxy.”
“That….”
“And of course, the false information I prepared really is a heavy blow. The attempted-murder case involving Lee Kiyoung is just a passing ritual on the way there. If he doesn’t know a new potion is being distributed in the city, he’ll take a fatal hit from the drug-distribution charge. He’ll get saddled with the crime of illegally spreading concoctions inside the city. That was the first route.”
“I understand.”
“Now let’s consider one more possibility, this time if he does notice the potion.”
“Yes.”
“If he figures out that the potion I’m circulating right now is suspicious, realizes it’s a trap, and investigates it from the inside. Personally, I think this one’s more likely. After all, he was the one who asked for the trial himself.”
“I think so too.”
“He’ll probably have a hard time finding anything. It’s information known only to me and Kasugano Yuno…. If he’s competent, he might still be able to get somewhere or fabricate information, but I bet he’d be sweating buckets the whole time he was investigating. Like I said earlier, this was a job even Jihye noona wasn’t involved in. While he was digging around, he’d be thinking all sorts of things. With no evidence turning up, he’d start finding it suspicious. For example….”
I let the sentence hang for a moment, and Jihye hurriedly cut in.
“For example, that this is all you’ve prepared?”
“Yeah.”
“I think I get what you’re saying. But what if Ito Souta had already anticipated the second possibility? What if he already knows you’re trying to bury him with the potion case… and he even knows your next move?”
“What do you think my next move would be?”
“If I were you, I’d have pinned everything on Kasugano Yuno. Tagging Kasugano Yuno and Ito Souta together and sending them both down would be the most reasonable thing to do. If Ito Souta stands in court and says that the one distributing the potion in Celia right now isn’t me but you and Kasugano Yuno, then the only escape route left would be Kasugano Yuno.”
“Pfft.”
“You’d need false testimony to bury them both. But Kasugano Yuno is too valuable to throw away, Oppa. If I’m right, it’d be better to revise the plan even now. I understand that you’re angry, but using that shrine maiden against a lunatic… isn’t a profitable trade.”
“Do I really look that much like garbage to you?”
“I’m only thinking about what I would do if I were you. That’s the most rational choice.”
“You’re right. It is definitely rational. But I have no intention of throwing Kasugano Yuno away. Let’s say Ito Souta really does uncover the trail, and then at the later trial he comes forward with proof that I was distributing the potion. So then I’m in danger.”
“Yes.”
“You’re starting from the wrong assumption, noona.”
“What do you mean?”
“This isn’t drugs.”
“What?”
“It’s not drugs. More accurately, if I say it’s drugs, then it becomes drugs. If I testify that it isn’t, then it stops being drugs.”
“Ah….”
“If Ito Souta doesn’t know this potion exists, then it’ll be drugs. In an instant, he’ll become a drug offender and lose his head, or at the very least take a fatal hit. On the other hand, if he presents evidence that I distributed the potion in order to frame me as a drug trafficker, then this potion becomes not-drugs.”
“How can something like that be possible?”
“Why do you think it can’t be? I’m the only one who can identify the ingredients in this potion. There isn’t a single person on this continent who understands alchemy better than I do, noona. This potion is an original of my own making, so unless you crack open my head, there’s no way to know the recipe.”
“Ah….”
“I’ll only tell you a little secret, noona….”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what the catalyst base for this potion is?”
“…….”
“Holy water.”
“What did you say?”
“Holy water. The holy water officially handled by the Holy Empire of Benigore. The moment Ito Souta calls this potion drugs, the game is over. What else could that be but blasphemy, calling a potion made from holy water a drug? Fuahahahahahat. So what if he knows this potion exists? What can he even do? He’ll never, ever figure out that it was made with holy water.”
“…….”
“Puhahahahahahat. He’d be better off dying as a drug offender without ever understanding a thing. The second he tries to turn the tables and claim I was the one distributing drugs or whatever, the inquisitors are going to come running! Fuhehahat. Cough, cough. Fine, fine, I admit it—he’s smart, Jihye. So what? Whether Ito Souta is smart or stupid, the moment my potion entered Japan, the game was already over. That bastard isn’t an alchemist.”
“Ah….”
“Which means the choices were set from the start. Puhahahahihahat! That’s why I said he made the worst possible choice, noona. If he really thought he could use the potion I distributed to attack me, he picked the wrong target. In the Holy Empire, once heresy is involved, it doesn’t stop with just one person—it wipes out the whole family and every guild member too. This is the Holy Empire, after all.”
Jihye’s quietly watching face came into view. She was probably sorting through the information in her own head right now. There were a lot of possibilities, but the main two were simple enough.
First, if Ito Souta knew nothing about the potion. The prepared evidence would be the fabricated proof that the Yamato Guild was distributing drugs. In other words: the drug-trafficker ending.
Second, if Ito Souta knew about the potion and brought evidence to frame me as a drug trafficker, then the prepared response would be the recipe for the potion itself. I’d calmly say that I was the one who distributed that magnificent potion. In other words: the blasphemer ending.
Whichever way he chose, it would still be hell for him.
I was having such a hard time holding back my laughter that it was almost painful.
“Puhahahahahahahat!”
It was only natural that I’d been exploding with laughter more often lately.
Looking at me, Jihye’s face strangely flushed.
“Oppa.”
“Yeah?”
“You’re really sexy, you know that?”
“Your taste is messed up.”
“You’re also an amazing piece of trash. You’re seriously irresistible.”
“…….”
For some reason, that second remark left me speechless. I glanced at the clock and saw that quite a bit of time had passed; it was almost time to head to the courtroom. I stood up and spoke, and Jihye nodded.
“Let’s go wrap this up, Jihye.”
“I’m really looking forward to it, Kiyoung oppa.”
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