A Bone of Legend
"Why do you think that?"
"I'm no fool, for one. If I'd only had a rough idea of the location, the personnel placement wouldn't have been so suspiciously perfect."
Nothing on the level of the dragon, to be sure — but wherever the other knights had been sent, monsters they'd have found plenty troublesome to face had come crawling out as well.
Kendrick had been forced to contend with a three-headed, six-armed orc ghoul, while Diana faced off against a swarm of wyverns that had been turned into ghouls.
Everywhere else had simply been buried under ordinary ghouls pouring out in droves.
It had lined up far too neatly to be coincidence.
"If you'd sent regular knights wherever the commanders went, at least one or two of them would be dead right now. And you're the one who gave those placement orders."
"I thought we had a mutual agreement not to ask certain questions."
"Moving the knights around for you more than paid my half of the bargain, I'd say."
Arendt asked with a touch of irritation, but the Crown Prince refused to back down.
"There's still one thing left. Who your informant is."
Apparently convinced he'd finally snagged the upper hand, Cantares curled his lips into a sly, mischievous smile.
"Surely you can indulge a small curiosity like this one?"
Arendt stared at the man who had provided all this plausibility with unimpressed eyes for a long moment — then shrugged his shoulders.
"Great and exalted Crown Prince. I could certainly give you an answer — but just how much sincerity it contains will depend entirely on how *you* choose to behave."
"...Strange. Why does this feel like *I'm* the one under interrogation?"
"Your eyes are practically sparkling. It's all over your face. You wanted to try squeezing out a cheap threat, didn't you?"
"......"
"Go on, then. Try telling everyone that you dispatched the Imperial Knight Orders to every corner of the country on the word of Arendt von Eckhart alone. I won't be the only one tearing into you for it — not by a long shot."
Trying to beat this guy in an argument had been the mistake. Watching the shameless grin spread across that infuriatingly even-featured face made Cantares's stomach turn inwardly.
"I have nothing more to lose myself, of course. But wouldn't it be far more pleasant for everyone if we went our separate ways nicely? You just *have* to complicate things. Tsk."
"You insolent little bastard."
"Is that anything new?"
With a shrug, Arendt settled back comfortably into the sofa, crossing his legs with every appearance of a man with all the time in the world.
And why, exactly, did that insolent posture look more irritating than usual?
The only person in this entire empire who could dare such brazen behavior in front of the Crown Prince was, unique and singular, this bastard here — his own father excluded.
Having two of them would have been rather inconvenient.
"So. What's your answer?"
"Well... I already knew."
Arendt waved a hand lazily, as if brushing the question away.
"Then why did you come here with Commander Laios?"
"You're asking the obvious. It was the closest, and outside of Commander Laios, there's no one who could hold back a dragon alone."
Kendrick and Diana were formidable in their own right, but it had been quite some time since Laios had surpassed them both.
"So you knew, and you still charged straight at the dragon?"
"It wasn't even a real dragon. Just a walking corpse."
"......"
It was hard to tell whether the boy genuinely lacked any sense of danger, or whether his nerves were simply thick beyond all reason.
Cantares asked with an expression of pure disbelief.
"Wouldn't a normal person think about running the other way?"
"Think about it. If a dragon ghoul appears and starts trampling the villages, do you honestly believe the Commander would have just stood there?"
Arendt fired an openly pitying look at the bewildered Cantares.
"That's..."
No. No, he wouldn't.
The Crown Prince's lips flapped uselessly.
He would have charged in ahead of everyone, swearing to be the first on the scene. No — orders or no orders, he'd have drawn his sword and bolted out the door without a moment's hesitation.
That was simply the kind of man Laios was.
"So which outcome is more convenient is obvious, isn't it? If the mess we have to clean up gets bigger, who do you think ends up dealing with it?"
In the end, they had prevented catastrophic losses — a deed that deserved nothing less than praise for a job splendidly done.
"Besides, I wanted to beat that masked bastard to a pulp with my own two hands."
"You shameless little..."
Why did the man *always* have to phrase things like that?
Glaring at Arendt with open distaste as the boy rattled on without a shred of embarrassment, Cantares finally let out a long sigh and changed the subject altogether.
"For now, I've dispatched imperial mage investigators to the other sites as well. The first report came in yesterday — they found human corpses near one of the scenes, drained of every last drop of their mana."
On Blake's orders, they had been wrung dry to the final drop and forced to power the magic crystals.
"It seems the places Blake headed for personally are just the two — the border region you pinpointed first, and this one. The rest were likely handled by subordinates in the surrounding territories, acting on his command."
That was how the ghouls had been able to erupt simultaneously across so many locations. If they'd been even one step late, the situation would have turned truly dire.
"Still, seeing as there were hardly any casualties, it seems you moved quite briskly yourself, Your Highness."
"I did. Damn it all, do you have any idea how much I suffered?"
After issuing the deployment orders to the Imperial Knight Orders, the next thing Cantares had done was send word out to the local Security Departments and the lords near each site.
He had no guarantee that nothing would happen before the knights could reach the scenes.
And it had proven to be the correct call.
By the time the knights arrived, there were several places where the lords' own soldiers and the Security Departments were already locked in desperate battle against the ghouls.
"There were some injuries, but no deaths. In Lady Diana's sector, the head of the Security Department was badly hurt, but his life isn't in danger."
By any measure, this had been a remarkably successful suppression.
The corners of Arendt's mouth curled upward in a slow grin.
"Good to know crawling through all that filth was worth something."
"Right, of course it was."
Cantares's expression, by contrast, soured into open displeasure.
"How is it that every time you leave the palace, you come back looking like a wreck? And it seems to be getting worse each time, doesn't it?"
"Whose fault would that be? Well, I'm sure the Crown Prince of this fine empire will see to it that I'm compensated generously for my trouble."
The young apprentice knight, his face covered in cuts and bruises, grinned — *hee hee* — like a mischievous child.
It wasn't a sneer, nor a wry laugh, but a boyish smile exactly befitting his age — and for one instant, Cantares felt his soul leave his body.
"You... are you feeling alright?"
"Hm? No? I hurt all over — how could I possibly feel good?"
But it had been an illusion, apparently, for it vanished the moment it appeared. Cantares, however, found himself unable to recover from the shock.
"Then what — did you hit your head or something? Are you completely out of your mind?"
Cantares reached out and pressed a hand to Arendt's forehead.
"The one who's lost his mind seems to be you, not me, Your Highness."
Arendt recoiled in disgust, leaning well back — and at that very moment —
"Your Highness, may I have a moment? ...Ah."
While the two had been bickering, Zereon had pushed the door open and stepped inside — only to freeze dead at the sight before him.
After a brief moment of deliberation, the aide simply backed out and quietly closed the door behind him again.
"What is it, aide?"
"Nothing at all, Your Highness."
Arthur, who had been approaching from behind, asked with a puzzled look, and Zereon answered with a pleasant, affable smile.
It was the aide's heroic, tearful effort to preserve what little remained of the Crown Prince's dignity.
Whatever else might be said of him, Cantares was a diligent and capable Crown Prince.
Once everything had settled, he announced the ghoul incident to the court — and faithfully carried out the secret bargain he had struck with a certain apprentice knight.
"...This is the record discovered in the magic crystal mine. The mine Marquis Grig tried so hard to keep buried. Count Stadler compiled it."
At the council packed with the empire's most powerful nobles, Cantares held up a stack of weathered parchment.
Upon it, written in careful ancient script, were detailed accounts of which types of ghouls had been sealed at each location — and the precise methods for stopping them.
The nobles nodded along without a shadow of doubt.
"Then Commander Laios's march to the border mountains was..."
"Yes. On my orders. Once he had confirmed the scene, Commander Laios grasped the gravity of it and immediately requested deployment. Thanks to that, we were able to contain the situation before it spread far and wide."
"Commander Laios's contribution is immense."
Someone burst out in admiration, and from there, praise for Laios began to ripple across the chamber from every direction.
That "record," of course, had been manufactured by Count Stadler himself.
His trademark timidity had made persuading him a bit of a struggle. The mere suggestion of forging a document slated for official announcement had been enough to scare him half to death.
Only after Arendt had coaxed him along — murmuring that without it, the nobles might obstruct the investigation into the dragon's bone later — and dropped the final trump card that this was Arendt's personal request, had he managed to secure the scholar's cooperation.
Reading the room, Cantares quietly breathed a sigh of relief.
Doesn't look like there'll be any trouble.
Arendt's name had not come up even once at this gathering — his purpose was thoroughly achieved.
Then next...
That thing.
A faint flicker of anticipation rose across Cantares's face.
And that night, at the hour when everyone slept —
a light came on in the Crown Prince's office.
Those who had gathered were Cantares, master of the office, and the aide Zereon who attended him; the loyal knight Laios; Arendt, still unable to escape his bandages; and Count Stadler, present in an advisory capacity.
"The item?"
"Yes, Your Highness."
Laios produced a small bundle he had kept hidden against his chest. It was the artifact recovered from Blake's corpse.
A clear, transparent gem swung lazily from the end of an ordinary leather cord.
Like the Frost-Tinged Touch and the Shadow of the Strong, its appearance at first glance was utterly plain. But it took only the barest feel of the mana radiating from it to know that this was no common trinket.
"Might I be permitted to examine it?"
"Of course. Please do."
At the Count's request, Laios handed over the necklace.
Squinting hard, the Count began scrutinizing the necklace — or more precisely, the transparent gem — with meticulous care.
After a long while, he muttered gravely.
"This is... not a mineral, I believe. I would need to study it properly in the lab to say anything definitive, but..."
"It's not a mineral?"
"No. It doesn't look like a gemstone to me. Something was carved and ground down, dozens upon dozens of times, until it resembled a jewel. For instance..."
Peering quietly into the necklace, the Count continued.
"The bones of a creature steeped in powerful mana, when worked with sufficient skill, can produce an effect quite similar to that of a magic crystal."
"...What?"
Laios froze. Zereon, who had been preparing tea as usual, stopped dead in his tracks.
Cantares and Arendt alike found their eyes going wide.
Bone.
At the word that had left his own mouth, Count Stadler's jaw dropped open a beat later, his eyes going round.
Arendt said, unbothered.
"I think I've seen something like that recently, actually. The bone of a creature holding more mana than any species on the surface of the earth."
A jewel made from the bone of a dragon.
Cantares murmured, his voice distant and hollow.
"So then, this is... dragon bone...?"
A material spoken of only in legend.
"N-no, wait, hold on. It's hardly certain yet, is it? You can't just—"
"No. I'm almost certain of it! The circumstances are far too coincidental!"
At Cantares's hasty objection, the Count shook his head furiously.
"The discovery of the dragon's bones was only just recently, was it not? If a portion of the dragon kin have defected to the Evil God Cult..."
Then even the mad act of fashioning ghouls from a dragon's remains would have been entirely possible.
Perhaps one of them, feeling the end of its long life drawing near, had donated its own corpse to the cult before departing — so that it might serve as a weapon when the evil god descended upon this land once more.
There was no one present who could fail to grasp the implications left unsaid in the Count's trailing words.
"Son of a—"
The curse died half-formed on the pale, stricken lips of the Crown Prince.