The Gate (2)
Alan tossed a magic stone. It fell and rolled across the floor. The stone Lorenzo threw skittered off toward the far side as well.
Taylor's mouth fell wide open. His eyes bulged as if they might pop right out of his head.
"Wait, don't tell me—"
The mages' experiments continued. At first it was inanimate objects passing back and forth; now living things were crossing over.
The first to come through was an insect. When it arrived perfectly alive, the specimens grew steadily larger. A rabbit, a cat, a dog. Eventually, a person came through too—tightly bound at that.
"S-so you're going to spare me now, right?"
It was Connie, the Rabbitfoot thief who had stolen the key. Alan had wondered where he'd disappeared to, and here he was, repurposed as a guinea pig for human experimentation.
Lorenzo's subordinates answered on his behalf, in actions rather than words. They laid Connie down on the floor and attached all manner of instruments to his body.
"Breathing, pulse... mana flow. All within normal parameters."
"Still, caution is warranted. We'll observe for a few more days."
Just as Lorenzo had said, Connie was shuttled back and forth between here and there several times. And every single trial yielded the same result: no abnormalities in physical condition.
A few days later, Lorenzo summoned Alan's party again. For the first time, a soft smile played at the corners of his mouth.
"You've figured out what this is by now, haven't you?"
"A spatial gate linking the surface and the labyrinth."
"Aren't you being a little too nonchalant about it? This is the discovery of the century!"
Lorenzo raised his voice, uncharacteristically. Joy and excitement brimmed within it.
"At last, I have an achievement I can hold over my senior disciples' heads."
"Senior disciples, sir?"
"That's right. Among the Tower Lord's disciples, I'm one of the younger ones."
"So that's why the Tower Lord forbade open conflict among you. If he had to step in and crush disputes by force himself, the newly accepted disciples would never survive."
"Quick on the uptake, as always. Now, on to your compensation. For the three of you, yourself included, we will waive the usage fee for the spatial gate."
"That's generous."
"And I appreciate how readily you accept."
The spatial gate carried staggering value. Even Essel Magic Tower would have to split the profits with other corporations and governments—who was Alan to wedge his own spoon into that pie?
What was more, days of observation had revealed that maintaining the gate consumed vast quantities of mana crystals. Not mere magic stones—mana crystals.
When the deal was concluded and they returned to their tent, Taylor let out a long breath.
"Why the sigh?"
"Don't you think it's a waste?"
"With only the Cube we couldn't have done anything anyway, and the ruin belongs to Essel Magic Tower. If anything, we should count ourselves lucky."
"True. You're right. From what I've overheard, the usage fee will probably be set at ten million coins—that alone is serious money."
"Round trip, you mean?"
"No. One way."
"Time matters more than money now. With the spatial gate, we don't have to waste two weeks just reaching the Snowfield."
Even as he traded words with Taylor, Alan was recalling his nightmare. It had been only a dream, but the Cube had tried to leave this place.
If I'd walked out of the ruin, would the Cube have truly vanished too? But why?
The reason eluded him.
In front of Lorenzo, who had been tapping away at his desk, a shadow abruptly surged up from the floor.
"So you settled it like a gentleman, I see."
"Did you think I'd simply dispose of them and wash my hands of it?"
"Plenty of disciples do exactly that."
Lorenzo glared long and hard at the Shadow Mage. The creature behaved like one of his subordinates, but it was no true servant. His master had told him to use it like a secretary, yet its role could hardly be so simple.
Lorenzo turned his thoughts to Alan's party.
Dispose of them?
The old man whose entire body had been replaced with magicware was a former Breaker agent, and the dwarven monk belonged to the Mother Church. Were Lorenzo to lay a hand on them, there was far too much that could be pinned on him before anything else.
Alan...
An explorer and magitech engineer who had entered the labyrinth barely a year ago.
One year? The Snowfield, in just one year?
Anyone who overheard would call it nonsense, but what could he do when every investigation returned the same result?
And what if he did try to dispose of them, following the shadow's counsel, and they simply fled? When they returned someday seeking revenge, would he be able to bear it? Ideally, one of the senior disciples would trip over this mess instead—but they weren't stupid enough to do that.
Lorenzo gestured to the shadow.
"For now, let something slip to the press. To launch a business, we need the public's burning attention."
< The Gate (1) > — End
< The Gate (2) >
Maze City exploded. No such incident actually occurred—the phrase was figurative. Not only Maze City, where tens of millions thronged shoulder to shoulder, but the whole world responded with fervor.
The opening of the spatial gate was an event of that magnitude. It shattered a law that had been carved into every explorer's bones through more than a century of labyrinth exploration since its discovery.
The Collector had already broken the law against interfering with other floors, but that was a power only he possessed, so it could be set aside for now.
In any case, the moment the spatial gate made the news, it became the hottest topic on the planet. If you had even a passing interest in the labyrinth—no, even if you had none at all—there was no way you hadn't heard of it.
On the surface, spatial gates had long served countless purposes: hauling cargo, ferrying people directly, transcending the very constraints of space and time.
Labyrinth exploration stood to gain an enormous savings of the same kind. An expedition to any real depth took months of travel alone—and with this discovery, a whole month of that simply evaporated.
If that month were reinvested in reaching deeper strata, expedition parties could descend to lower floors, and the average value of the resources they hauled back would climb accordingly. The deeper one went, the more one found: superior magic stones, refined soul stones, resplendent mana crystals.
People who had once abandoned their dreams of exploration out of sheer tedium began trickling back, one by one. And not only them—people from all over the world.
Rain clouds dragged darkness in their wake, and a fine drizzle pattered down over Maze City. Among its skyscrapers, one structure blazed with light noticeably fiercer than the rest.
A building that asserted its presence even under the open sun needed no introduction now that the clouds had swallowed it.
Neighbors grumbled about light pollution, but the building poured out its radiance without mercy.
For it was Essel Magic Tower—the largest nest of mages in Maze City, and a mega-corporation that had amassed staggering wealth through magitech.
On the topmost floor—a spot, exaggerating only slightly, where clouds brushed past the windows—a gray-haired young man was visible through the panoramic glass. Jake Marshall stood with his hands clasped behind his back, gazing down at the city.
"It seems we'll need to restrict access to the labyrinth."
"Says who?"
Obstruction came flying at once. The speaker was a powerfully built middle-aged man with yellow hair, yellow eyes, and bronzed skin. Jake, who had been watching the city, turned a sharp gaze on the reflection in the window.
"Lumiere."
Just then lightning flashed, briefly flooding the dim room with light. Several people were seated around a circular table.
The middle-aged man Jake had summoned shrugged and looked around at those present.
"And who are we, exactly? The moguls of Maze City, no? We could certainly manage to keep something as small as the labyrinth under control."
"If foreign explorers flood in by the thousands, crime, loot price fluctuations, mass unemployment—the whole cascade of problems detonates at once. We have to think not only of ourselves, but of the explorers already here."
"Maze City has more than enough resilience to endure. It isn't as fragile as you think."
"You make me repeat myself. Fine—we'll manage. But what about the humble explorer guilds and independents? The people whose livelihoods are tied to labyrinth-related business?"
"Did you catch some disease that kills you if you can't play the good Samaritan?"
Jake, who had been staring out the window, turned his body. Even in the darkness, his gray eyes gleamed with startling clarity.
The pressure he radiated was enough to give an ordinary person a heart attack on the spot, but Lumiere remained perfectly composed.
"Farmers crossbreed crops to leave behind better traits, don't they? The stronger ones survive—what's the problem?"
"People are not plants."
"Looks the same to me. Plant or beast, only the strong endure."
As the two men locked glares, a wave of mana rippled outward. The shock would have flattened an ordinary building in every direction—but this was Essel Magic Tower, and Lumiere's own floor at that, layered thick with every defensive spell imaginable.
Even in circumstances that would have spelled catastrophe in any crowded place, those seated around the table remained utterly calm. One yawned, one trimmed his nails, one drifted off to sleep.
"Enough, you idiots."
Along with the profanity, another shockwave smacked the two of them.
Jake and Lumiere both looked toward one side of the circular table. A woman in a perfectly tailored black suit sat there with both legs propped up on the table, her interlaced fingers cradling her head.
Lumiere's brow creased slightly at the sight.
"Ris, that mouth of yours is as foul as ever."
"My name isn't Ris. It's Iris."
"Your family name is Lee, and your given name is Ris."
"Shut it. Don't you dare pick apart my name."
Embroidered along the trousers of the woman raising her voice was the Big Dipper—the emblem of Chilseong, the magitech corporation born on the Eastern Continent.
"So, where does Chilseong stand?"
"I'm siding with Jake."
"Did you two come here already agreeing?"
"Bullshit. I hate you both, but I hate you slightly more. Outsiders flooding in? You just want to set the newcomers against the locals and watch? You voyeuristic freak."
"You understand nothing. There is nothing more valuable than the flame of struggle kindled by competition—the gleam of one striving toward victory."
"Is that why you leave your disciples to tear each other apart?"
"I accept no objections to my educational philosophy. Dissect your own methods closely enough, and I suspect you'll find we're not so different."
"Well, the ones dying off will be other people, won't they. Anyway, I despise noise. Sales wobbling because of chaos? Hate it. But..."
As Iris drew out her words, the others glanced up at her. Pleased by the attention, the corners of her mouth curled into a smile.
"I do agree with the old Golden Sun to an extent. With enough newcomers pouring in, at least one of them is bound to make it down to those depths. So compromise between the two of you. Stop squabbling like toddlers and settle it with words. Not that a fight would be so bad either—we've gathered all these people anyway; we ought to send them home with some spectacle to watch, shouldn't we?"
Jake and Lumiere ignored her and looked at each other. Jake spoke first.
"We amend the rules: only those registered in Maze City for more than one year may use the spatial gate."
"Six months. In my judgment, that's plenty to stabilize things."
"Fine. Six months."
Once the spatial gate opened, every capable explorer would scramble to use it. If they began their expeditions from the 27th floor, the loot harvested from floors 1 through 26 would dwindle sharply. Disrupt the supply, and countless downstream flows seize up with it.
So their compromise meant leaving that segment of the work to newer explorers. To use the gate, those explorers would have to maintain their licenses, and that required ongoing exploration of the upper floors.
The moment agreement was reached, those who had been merely occupying chairs quietly rose to their feet. Their faces had worn expressions of universal annoyance, yet when it came to leaving, they were faster than anyone.
It wasn't that they'd been too lazy to contribute and held their tongues—they had simply stayed quiet because, listening along, they'd judged the terms reasonably sound.
Within a single day of their gathering, legislation governing the use of the spatial gate was enacted. It was fast enough to make one wonder if such speed were even legal—but given the influence of those in attendance, it was only natural.
Viiiiiing!
Alan flipped up his visor and pressed hard at his temples and the bridge of his nose. The spatial gate was tremendously convenient, but it had a drawback: his Labyrinth Tinnitus had grown far more severe.
Even Taylor and Shiva, who had always shrugged off inter-floor transit without complaint, were now complaining of mild dizziness—so what hope was there for Alan, who had always been sensitive to it?
"Alan, are you all right?"
"It feels like someone has their mouth pressed right against my ear, screaming at the top of their lungs."
"The price of convenience, I'm afraid. We must simply bear it."
"Agreed."
The mages whispered among themselves as they watched Alan's party pass.
"Do they live in the labyrinth or something?"
"How many times have they gone back and forth now?"
Alan pretended not to hear and climbed the stairs, Panther and Box trailing close behind.
Other explorers' automatons were charged a passage toll, but Lorenzo let the ones Alan had built through free of charge.
Some might advise seizing the moment to march an automaton brigade through for profit, but since the other side had extended goodwill first, Alan's party had to answer it with a fitting gesture of their own.
"So don't sulk about the fee, all right?"
"What? When have I ever?"
"Brother Taylor's heart is transparent to behold."
"What nonsense is that? Is that any way to treat a frail old man? Agitation this easy is dangerous, you know."
Alan climbed the stairs, and when they emerged from the military facility, an unfamiliar landscape greeted them. The open ground that had stretched empty on every side was now, at some point, dotted with buildings—