Chapter 175: Observation (2)
Chapter 175: Observation (2)
The Underground City was perhaps the most alien place in the Empire—no, in the entire continent.
The modified human named Falkenrat standing before me was living proof of that, and this T24 Laboratory was deeply intertwined with the city's dark underbelly.
“What kind of experiments are conducted here?”
I looked at Falkenrat, who sat across from me. His hulking physique made even the oversized sofa seem cramped. A stray thought crossed my mind as I studied him.
Even if you forcibly tear apart a human body and graft mechanical devices onto it to create a monster, it still falls short of what Zebestian has become.
For some time now, Zebestian had become my only point of comparison for true monstrosity. By that standard, the creature before me was merely a curiosity.
—Experiments to achieve the desires of the Empire and our great Emperor.
I let out a sharp snort at Falkenrat’s synthesized voice.
“You truly think His Majesty desires a monster like you?”
Despite my blatant insult, the human half of Falkenrat’s face remained placid. In fact, his prosthetic eye glinted with a flicker of pride, as if he considered the term ‘monster’ a badge of honor.
It was exactly as the comic had described him.
“Sir… Sir Knight.”
The Lab Director, who had been frozen stiff between us, cautiously spoke up.
“I will explain. As your investigation has uncovered…” The director swallowed dryly, his eyes darting away from mine. “The victims of the Cross Killer were all, in fact, researchers from our T24 Laboratory. However, we had our reasons for not disclosing that information. We ask for your understanding…”
The director’s face was deathly pale. Behind him, the other researchers trembled with visible anxiety.
“Do you happen to have a family?”
My sudden question made the director stammer in confusion.
“What? Ah… yes. I have a wife, a son, and a daughter…”
These people, who had families of their own, didn’t hesitate to dissect living human bodies and forcibly inject them with mana. This was the common cancer festering within the Empire.
“So you have a family… How curious.”
—In any case. This is a matter for us to resolve.
Falkenrat raised a mechanical arm. At his signal, a group of heavily armed private soldiers poured out from the back of the lab. They carried mana-powered weapons that couldn't be found on any legal market.
“Sir Knight. We need you to sign these documents.”
One of them pushed a non-disclosure agreement and a case-closure settlement in front of me. They even bore the imperial seal.
“We, too, have just received a message from the Imperial Palace.”
It probably wasn’t a forgery. They were likely still under the Emperor’s protection—for now.
“Sign?”
To me, these men were simply laughable. They clearly hadn’t grasped their place in the world. They had forgotten who stood above whom, the weight carried by the name Ebenholtz, and above all, what kind of nation this Empire truly was.
They must have momentarily ‘forgotten.’ They must have become drunk on their own paltry success.
I picked up the papers.
“Hmm.”
The problem was, it was still too early to kill them all and destroy the lab. Mason Industries and the T24 Laboratory had to serve as the fuse to draw out the Outcast. I needed to exploit the inevitable conflict and chaos to gain what I wanted.
If the Outcast grew as strong as they had been before my regression, they would become incomparably more troublesome than Mason Industries…
However.
“You seem to take the knights of the Empire lightly.”
I had no intention of letting these men, who dared to challenge the authority of a knight, go unpunished.
I tore the papers. Horizontally, vertically, then horizontally and vertically again, scattering the confetti into the air.
—…You will regret this.
“Regret?”
Smiling, I gripped the longsword at my back. I swung it once.
*
A sliver of moonlight streamed in, precisely severing one of the men’s necks. At the same time, the pulse of my virus ceased.
“The crime of pointing a weapon at an Imperial Knight is grounds for summary judgment.”
Thud.
The man's head fell to the floor. Despite seeing their comrade die, the remaining soldiers didn't dare raise their guns. Instead, they lowered their weapons completely, paralyzed by the display.
I rose from my seat.
“I don’t care what kind of research you’re conducting here,” I said tonelessly, looking down on Falkenrat. “But I will be taking your investigation files on the Cross Killer.”
*
At the Mason Industries headquarters, the tallest skyscraper in the western Empire, Hector Mason gazed at the sky through a top-floor panoramic window.
“A knight, you say…”
“Yes. The heir of Ebenholtz, Knight Maximilian.”
The Ebenholtz whelp. He was certainly fierce, poking his nose everywhere and pretending to be the Sword of the Empire. But in the end, he was just a novice who couldn’t see the forest for the trees.
The world—the hegemony of this continent—was already in upheaval. Order would be rebuilt around capital and technology, and power would inevitably follow. And the key to shifting that paradigm…
“The completion of the Mana Engine is near.”
A power source that could replace the human heart and pump out mana. If they could perfect it, the Empire’s knight orders would be reduced to mere scrap metal. Those who had trained their mana by emphasizing the extremes of the human form—the Iron Man Ideology—would be defeated by ‘created mana.’
“Don’t worry about the knight.”
The necessary results had been gathered. With the test subjects finally succeeding, it was time to assemble the ‘bio-components’ that could withstand the engine’s overload.
“Retrieve them as quickly as possible.”
Hector Mason didn’t have much time left. Ten years at most; five if he was unlucky. He needed more test subjects, if only to create the life-support system that would extend his own withering life.
There was no time to waste trying to coax a little brat.
*
The Outcast of the Imperial Underground City was, to put it simply, a mercenary group. They were a pack of bottom-feeding wolves driven by improvisation and necessity rather than formal structure or a chain of command.
“…Bombs planted.”
They had built a reputation for themselves by handling the dirty missions that trickled into the back alleys.
“Countdown. Three.”
And now, they had emerged from the underground to the surface. Having built their strength, they had begun their counterattack against the corporations and the state—their sworn enemies.
“Two.”
This was a key subsidiary research lab of Mason Industries, located in the western Empire. They had already set numerous explosives on its outer walls.
“One.”
Their leader, Meden, smiled.
“Detonate.”
KABOOOOOM—!
With a deafening roar, one side of the laboratory was engulfed in flames and collapsed. A mushroom-like cloud billowed into the air—a spectacular sight.
The four members of the Outcast who had participated in the operation stood side by side, watching the show. Meden placed a hand on his hip, Elze stretched languidly, and Pain clasped his hands behind his back, each striking their own pose.
WEEEEEE-OOOOH!
“Let’s go.”
As the sirens began to wail, they fled back to their base: Tavern Quanda.
It was a proper hideout they had established in the Underground City with their earnings. The first floor was disguised as an ordinary tavern, while their real base was hidden in the basement.
“…No. Haah.”
Descending the stairs, Meden pressed a hand to his forehead at the sight of the utter mess before him.
“Ah, fuck! Filty!”
The room was chaotically littered with wads of paper. It seemed Filty, another member of the Outcast, had once again pushed her ability to its limit.
“Dammit! I told you not to do it alone!”
Super-Vision—the ability to see things far away. That was Filty’s supernatural power. She had been using it to observe her enemies, the key figures of Mason Industries, from a ‘third-person’ perspective.
“I told you not to overdo it…”
Elze sighed and crouched down, picking up the papers scattered on the floor. Meden moved the collapsed Filty from the desk to the sofa.
“She’s been losing control more often lately.”
Filty couldn’t fully remember the scenes she observed while using her power. She would enter a state of unconscious immersion and transfer what she saw onto paper in a specific format. It was a kind of learned instinct.
“Agh. Seriously, I can’t leave her alone for a second. We need to hire another person.”
“…”
While Meden grumbled, Elze silently stared at the papers. She flipped through them one by one, and then…
“Guys. Everyone, gather around.”
She called her comrades over, her tone deadly serious. They all stood by her side and looked at the drawings.
[— Clomp. Clomp. ]
T24 Laboratory. The silhouette of someone walking inside. An Imperial Sentinel uniform, blond hair, and golden eyes.
Rustle.
She turned to the next page, which revealed a clear, colored drawing of ‘his’ face.
[The moonlight seeps through the window. An Imperial Knight, silhouetted against it.]
Elze had never seen ‘him’ in person, but she knew ‘his’ name…
[Maximilian: My word is law.]
[Falkenrat: Knight of the Empire. Do you have any idea for whom, and for what great cause, we are working?]
And standing before him was the mechanical man Falkenrat, whose very image was nauseating.
[Maximilian: Do I need to?]
[Falkenrat: …I suggest you state the purpose of your visit clearly.]
[Maximilian: The Cross Killer. All the victims who died with their chests split open were from here, the T24 Laboratory. But more than that right now…]
It was a scene of conflict—a confrontation between Falkenrat, whom the Outcast had once feared immensely, and Maximilian, whom the entire continent dreaded.
[Maximilian: I don’t like your attitude.]
The monster of Ebenholtz had appeared in their episode. Holding their breath, they gathered the comics Filty had drawn and read them in order.
*
Priya stood on the other side of the yard.
I looked at her. My sight, my hearing, even the subtle feeling of the wind on my skin—everything was focused solely on her. She stared back, her longsword held at a ready angle. This was a duel with real steel, not wooden practice swords.
Swoosh—.
The instant the wind blew past, the distance between us vanished. Sword met sword.
*
It was a silent, quiet clash.
But the dust in the training yard billowed violently, and I was pushed back three full steps.
“…I’ve lost.”
When a mere half-step could decide life and death, I was still leagues behind.
“Maximilian. Why do you think you lost?” Priya asked, lowering the tip of her sword.
“The difference in our mana.”
“Yes, that’s right.” Priya nodded and took a step closer. “But from what I can see—and Zebestian would probably agree—the purity of your mana is exceptional. There are almost no impurities. It’s truly strange and wondrous.”
She flicked the flat of her blade with a finger.
“To refine mana, talent is merely a prerequisite. You can’t even start without it, but it doesn’t mean the speed at which you fill your vessel is dramatically different from others. The refinement of mana doesn’t just happen inside the body. It’s an endless cycle between the self and the world. How cleanly you can temper your mana is purely a matter of accumulation and completion over ‘time.’”
Therefore, as long as one is given the ‘vessel’ of talent, the speed at which it’s filled is nearly constant for everyone.
“But you… your mana is as pure as if it’s been tempered for thirty or forty years longer than your age.”
Her words made me flinch inwardly.
Regression. Had she sensed the decades piled up in my soul through the density of my mana?
“Actually, I’m a regre—”
“Cut the crap. You think this is a joke?”
“…No, ma’am.”
“Again. Why can’t you break through my defense?” Priya’s eyes flashed coldly.
“Because it is pure, but not flawless.”
“…Flawless.”
“Yes. The moment mana is released, it is inevitably wasted. The mana you draw up with 100 units of power inside your body is cut down to 30 the moment it’s projected from the tip of your sword.”
It was a mana theory proven by magical engineering—a phenomenon where mana clashes with the restraining force of nature, the laws of the world. It was analogous to air resistance.
“People think that reducing that loss is a high-level mana technique or a matter of sophisticated calculation.”
“Is it not?”
“No. At least, not for an Ebenholtz. We are not mages.” Priya tapped her chest, near her heart. “The greatest resistance that eats away at our mana is not the world, but hesitation. A will that is unshakable, yet perfectly natural. I told you, didn’t I? The Ebenholtz way is to embody nature. Therefore, if you can perfectly imitate nature, there’s no need to be restrained by the world.”
Simply put, she was telling me to become the air itself.
“If you can align your sword, your mana, and your will with such transparency…”
The ordinary tree branch in Priya’s hand was instantly dyed with the pure white light of the moon.
“That is what the Ebenholtz call ‘flawlessness.’”
She placed an index finger to her lips and whispered in a low, cool voice.
“If Chapter 3 was synchronizing your mana with your sword, then Chapter 4 is synchronizing your mana with your heart. Imbue your mana with only your purest will.”
The unity of mana, mind, and body. I took a deep breath and quietly settled myself.
But then—
“—Sir Knight!”
An aide suddenly rushed into the training grounds. My concentration shattered instantly.
“…What is it?”
I was annoyed, but if he had passed through the main gates of Ebenholtz, it had to be important.
“Yes, Sir Knight. Right now…” He gasped for breath, spewing out a torrent of words.
Reutern II was meeting with Chief of Staff Grossman. The vague rumor that had been spreading like wildfire through the Imperial Palace had suddenly solidified into a confirmed fact. As a layer of icy tension settled over the palace, the location for this historic meeting was revealed.
It wasn't some secret chamber within the palace, but my own restaurant, Lilac Vita.
“…So? What do I need to do?” I rubbed my brow.
“Yes. There are many documents that require your approval.” The aide, standing at attention, handed me a thick stack of papers.
[Request for Mana Detection and Poison Safety Inspection of All Areas of Lilac Vita]
[Cooperative Agreement for Pedestrian Traffic Control and Identity Verification within a 1km Radius of the Restaurant]
[Request for Approval to Deploy One Platoon of the Royal Guard for Outer Perimeter Security]
[Request for Approval to Deploy a Minimum of Three Sentinel Knights for Security Detail…]
“…”
This was absurd. It was ridiculous, but judging by the aide’s flushed face, he too seemed to be under the delusion that Reutern II was some monumental figure.
“Oh. This must be incredibly important,” Priya said, her eyes wide.
“Well…”
They were mobilizing the Royal Guard for a single meal. They were acting like it was a continental summit, but honestly, it wasn’t a bad thing for me. It meant Reutern was drawing all the attention and scrutiny of the palace away from my personal business.
“…..Understood. Make the preparations.”
“Yes, sir! We will prepare thoroughly so there are no issues with the meeting’s proceedings.”
“Right. And… don’t spare any expense.”
I might as well play along for now. The great Reutern and the Emperor’s closest aide, Grossman, were holding a ‘summit,’ after all.
“We will do our utmost to produce the best possible results. Your approval, please.”
I scribbled my signature on the proffered documents. After a sharp salute, the aide hurried back the way he came.
“…This is why I hate the central nobles. Why make such a ridiculously extravagant fuss over two people eating and drinking?”
I gave a small nod at Priya’s words.
“You’re telling me.”
Truly, I couldn’t agree more.