Chapter 50
Chapter 50
“I’ll go with you as well.”
“Why would you, Sir?”
“Th-the mayor told me to keep an eye on you, young master.”
Sir Gordon, the captain of the Guard, said this with an awkward expression.
‘Keeping an eye on me is just an excuse. He’s trying to lend me his support.’
I glanced up discreetly.
On the third floor of City Hall, I could see Mariam looking down at me from her office.
When I gave her a little wave, she flinched, then roughly whisked the curtains shut.
‘Honestly, what a brocon.’
…She didn’t happen to have any pictures of me or anything, did she?
As I indulged in that silly little thought and smirked, Sir Gordon spoke.
“You two really do get along well. You should visit the mayor from time to time from now on. She pushes herself so hard that I often worry about her.”
“…I’ll think about it.”
I gave him a vague answer.
‘Truth is, Mariam isn’t someone I should get too close to, either. She’s one of the most important characters in the Demon Blade’s Character Scenario.’
Scenarios were divided into two types.
The first was the Academy’s main scenario.
These were the events that all the protagonists experienced together at the Academy.
The second was the Character Scenario.
These were individual scenarios connected to each protagonist’s personal circumstances.
‘The toughest, most brutal Character Scenario of all is the Demon Blade’s. I absolutely must not get involved.’
A faint sense of unease crept over me.
I still didn’t know who the other two protagonists enrolling at Rubines were.
‘At this point, I don’t care who they are. I just hope to God they aren’t the Demon Blade or the Massacre Maniac.’
Just then, Sir Gordon spoke beside me.
“Haha, I’m looking forward to seeing what you’re planning to do. I’m sure it’ll be another fine deed for the good of the city, won’t it?”
“Something along those lines. It should help the city in the end.”
“Oh! Is there anything our Guard can do to help?”
“Grant me the authority to kidnap, imprison, and interrogate people.”
“……”
Sir Gordon looked as though he were thinking, ‘I must have heard that wrong.’
But I was serious.
“I need to catch a pest who’s a blight on the city, and he’ll undoubtedly slip away like a loach.”
“…And you’re still going to do something illegal like that?”
“Why would it be illegal? It’s the Guard’s job.”
“!!”
Kidnapping, imprisonment, interrogation.
If the Guard did it, it was legal.
That is, as long as the other person was a criminal.
“Do you have evidence?”
“No.”
“Then what are you—?”
“We can make evidence.”
Sir Gordon flinched again.
He’d caught the meaning behind my word “make.”
“…You?”
“Isn’t competent bending of the rules better than honest incompetence? If it’s for the city’s peace and safety, that is.”
I spoke as if the devil himself were tempting him.
“This is all for the sake of the Free City, so please cooperate.”
Gordon swallowed hard.
Fortunately, Gordon didn’t refuse my proposal.
—You really are trying to catch a criminal who’s a threat to the city, aren’t you? Ban, I’ll trust you and follow your lead.
I went to meet another person as well.
“Oh-ho-ho! What an honor to see my benefactor. I would like to express my gratitude for the kindness you showed me at the Ranchel Plateau last time.”
The bewitching beauty was Lairan, one of the lords of the Four Dragon Fortress in the Slum and one of the Rebel Army’s leaders.
“I have business with you.”
“It’s about those rats, isn’t it?”
As expected of Lairan the Watcher.
She’d already seen through the reason for my visit.
“I will give you my full cooperation in whatever you intend to do, benefactor.”
“Thank you.”
“Think nothing of it. Compared to all the kindness you’ve shown us, it’s nothing at all. You saved Saint Yohen, and on top of that, you helped him receive the blessing of the great dragon. You even protected our settlement. I truly don’t know how I could ever repay you for all of this.”
I didn’t particularly deny it.
It was best to take credit when I had the chance.
“But will you be all right? The Witch of Cruelty is behind those rats.”
She was the mistress of a Prestigious Magic Family, and once a notorious Level Seven witch.
There was no way she’d sit still.
But—
“It’s fine.”
“But—”
“Do you think I’m going to all this trouble just to exterminate a few rats?”
Lairan’s eyes flew wide as she understood what I meant.
“Oh-ho-ho. As expected of you, benefactor. I’m curious what you have in mind.”
Lairan lowered her voice.
“Just be careful. It’s no lie that the Witch of Cruelty belongs to the Abyss.”
Lairan had said “belongs to,” not simply that the witch was “from” the Abyss.
That meant the duchess was still a member of the Abyss even now.
It was a surprising story, but it was true.
“I know. I’ll handle that problem myself, so don’t worry about it.”
After taking a few more necessary measures, I headed for my next destination.
“Squeak. Squeak.”
“Ugh! Why did we have to come to this filthy place? Aaah! My shoes!! What did I step in? I’m already a deadbeat beggar with bad credit, so I can’t even buy another pair!”
“Hey! You! Where do you think you’re going, running off behind me?! Get out in front, right this instant! Young Master Ban, I’ll put that good-for-nothing in front to light the way!”
There was a reason Linden and Hans were making such a fuss.
Pitch-black darkness.
A nauseatingly foul stench.
This was the dirtiest place in the Free City: the Underground Waterway.
‘Even I’m having a hard time putting up with this. This job’s going to take a while. How am I supposed to endure it?’
Just then, a baby dragon suddenly poked its head out from my clothes.
“Mari?”
I’d given the baby dragon the name Mari.
Personally, I thought it was a very gorgeous name.
“You want me to leave it to you?”
The baby dragon, Mari, nodded vigorously, then let out a burp.
Flash!
Was it because she was the offspring of the great Sacred Dragon?
To my astonishment, the baby dragon’s burp purified the nauseating filth of the Underground Waterway!
—Kyuu!! Kyuu!!
Since it was crying for praise, I stroked her head.
“Well done. Tonight, you’re getting a special sandwich.”
—…Kyuu.
“…All right. I’ll make it with sirloin.”
—Kyuu!!
Her voice was full of excitement.
Though she was a newborn, the baby dragon knew what tasted good, and she liked sirloin.
The two of them watched Mari with fascination, then asked,
“My lord, why have we come to the Underground Waterway?”
“I have business here. Do you know that all the filth in the Free City flows into the Underground Waterway?”
“Isn’t that obvious? Of course filth flows into the Underground Waterway. That’s what it was made for.”
“That’s not what I mean. Look.”
I cast Light Magic—Flash!
And then, beneath the water, an unimaginable sight came into view.
Corpses.
‘…That startled me. I knew they were there, but seeing them with my own eyes is even more frightening.’
My heart thumped, but the Black Flame Dragon maintained the dignity of a superior in front of the two of them.
“All the waste from every illegal act committed in the Free City is dumped in this Underground Waterway.”
“Then did you come here to find evidence of Viscount Conrad’s misdeeds?”
Linden tilted his head.
“But how are we supposed to find evidence in the Underground Waterway? It’s a place where you can get lost after walking just a little.”
The Underground Waterway was vast.
The place where we had exterminated Monsters with Katrinne and Libel not long ago was only on the outskirts of the waterway. Even the city officials didn’t dare approach its deeper reaches.
‘There’s a reason the deeper part of the waterway was classified as an Inaccessible dungeon. Once you go in, there’s absolutely no way back out.’
“It’s fine. I have a way.”
Linden and Hans started making a fuss again.
“You’re really going inside? Aaaah! I’m not going in there! No, I can’t go in there! I’m quitting graduate school right now!”
“Now, now, Linden! A graduate student’s duty is to be willing to lay down his life! I’ll prepare a rescue plan in case my lord gets lost!”
I sighed.
“…Who said we were going inside? We’re not going in.”
“Huh? Then how will we find the evidence?”
“We’ll make the evidence here.”
“…Make it? You mean, surely—”
The two of them blinked.
I nodded as if to say they’d got it right.
“That’s right. You two, it’s finally time to earn your keep. Hans in particular, your role is important.”
“…Me?”
I looked at Hans, who was staring at me blankly.
He might have looked like a bald, blustering old man, but his true identity was none other than a Five-Star Supreme Mage.
And he was more skilled than most of the Academy’s junior professors of the lower ranks.
His specialty was making and manipulating magical items.
“Use your magic here to make false evidence that will implicate Conrad and his people.”
“B-but even if I am an exceptionally talented craftsman, I can’t falsify evidence!”
Naturally, falsifying evidence with magic wasn’t easy.
Methods for detecting false evidence had been highly developed.
There was even a specialized institution in the Magic Tower that verified magical evidence.
But—
“What are you worried about? Have you already forgotten who I am?”
“!!”
I lifted the corners of my mouth.
“Whatever you lack, I, Ban Ecclesia, will make up for. So don’t worry about the Magic Tower or anything else.”
Meanwhile, loud shouting was ringing out from the Guard’s temporary Prison.
“What the hell is this supposed to mean?! You kidnapped me while I was asleep and brought me to a place like this? Do you have any idea who I am?! I’m Viscount Conrad—the younger brother of Duchess Beth, the matriarch of a Prestigious Magic Family!”
Sir Gordon, the head of the Guard, wore a pained expression.
‘They really did kidnap Viscount Conrad and his whole gang and bring them to the Guard’s Prison.’
When he had arrived at work that morning, Viscount Conrad and his gang had already been kidnapped and locked in the Prison without a soul noticing.
It was the work of Amanda, the Black Bird, a member of an assassin clan.
“How dare you do this to an innocent man? Sir Gordon, you’d better be prepared to lose your head.”
“That’s right, my lord. He must pay for daring to treat you this way.”
“His entire family should be thrown down into the gutter along with him.”
Gordon’s eyebrows twitched.
The reason he hadn’t refused even after hearing Ban’s absurd proposal was that Viscount Conrad and his gang were notorious trash in the city.
They were nothing like Ban the Trash, who was only a laughingstock. These men were the sort of rotten vermin who ate away at the city itself.
For the record, every student who had picked a fight with Libel was the child of someone in this gang.
“Illegal processing of Magic Crystals.”
At Gordon’s words, Viscount Conrad and his men flinched.
Processing Magic Crystals produced various harmful byproducts.
Imperial law required that those byproducts be disposed of thoroughly, but these men hadn’t bothered, relying on Duchess Beth’s protection.
“…Nonsense. Do you have any evidence?”
Viscount Conrad and his men sneered.
They had dumped the byproducts from their illegal disposal process into the Underground Waterway, so no one would ever find them.
But then—
“The evidence is right here.”
“!!”
They turned in astonishment to see a man with a powerful air of authority looking down at Viscount Conrad and his men with an arrogant expression.
“…Professor Ban, what do you mean by that? You have evidence?”
“There’s no use denying it. The Magic Tower has already examined it.”
It was true.
“That’s not all. I’ve also secured all the witnesses who can prove your gang’s illegal activities. You used the poor people of the Four Dragon Fortress to dispose of the byproducts, didn’t you?”
Viscount Conrad’s face stiffened, but soon he let out a derisive chuckle.
“So what? What are you going to do to me over a ‘minor’ matter like this? Young Master Ban, do you even know who I am?”