Chapter 51
Chapter 51
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 51
Chapter Title: The Ledacable Ant Den Incident
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The Ledacable Ant Den incident came to a close thanks to the belated intervention of the Children of Gold and the Magic Alliance's Special Division.
The five thief guilds that had dominated the Empire suffered devastating losses and scattered to the winds. The estimated death toll alone exceeded two thousand.
The lord of Ledacable was hauled off to the Papal Court by the Children of Gold on charges of allowing such a massive black market to fester unchecked.
—This whole thing was orchestrated by the Papal Court, right?
—Yeah. They were aiming to wipe out the thief guilds in one fell swoop.
The decisive reason such rumors spread was that the mysterious figure behind the massacre had vanished without a trace.
The suspicions only grew since the victims were limited to the thief guild members and those who'd illegally attended the black market.
A day passed, and the bloodstains and flesh stuck to the ground began to rot, swarming with maggots.
Amid that maggot-infested field stood a man casually biting into an apple despite the gruesome surroundings, methodically checking the abandoned stalls one by one.
Doran Slade, chief of the Magic Alliance Special Division.
"Hmm, looks like most of them grabbed what they could and bolted, as expected."
A woman with a sharp, irritable look and hollow eyes approached him, yawning.
"Hey! There’s nothing left worth checking. It’s all worthless junk."
"Tirintid, the basics of investigation are 'why' and 'how come.' There’s plenty of value in digging through this."
The crows had raided this place far faster than Doran anticipated...
Why?
Were they after something specific?
If so, they could've just quietly snatched it and slipped away—why make this huge mess? Just to draw attention? And if so, why draw attention at all?
"Anyway, the Ant Den's done for now. The Papal Court will make sure to eradicate every last trace."
"You think so?"
"Of course. What do you mean 'you think'?"
"The Light Dragon has controlled humanity with remarkable intelligence. Just look at how they let this Ant Den slide despite knowing about it."
Doran picked up a wriggling maggot from a chunk of flesh in a pool of blood. He placed it on a stall and covered it with a wooden box.
"Here’s your maggot. If we leave it trapped like this, what happens?"
"What the hell kind of lame riddle is this? It starves to death."
"Or maybe it awakens some new power, smashes the box, escapes, and wreaks havoc on the human world."
Tirintid shot him a look like she'd never seen such a lunatic.
Doran chuckled, opened the box, spat out his chewed apple next to it, and closed it again.
"Now the maggot can survive on these apple scraps. That's the human world right now."
"What?"
"It's a world controlled through highly sophisticated means to prevent death or explosion... in other words, to maintain the status quo."
Cruel, inhumane entertainments forbidden by the scriptures of the gods and codified as taboos by the Papal Court were popular all over the world.
The Light Dragon Haraderiman, said to possess the power to overlook all creation, of course knew about them but let them be.
'What exactly they're waiting for, prioritizing maintenance over improvement, is beyond me...'
Tirintid scratched her head irritably, having grasped Doran's analogy. There were no fools in the Special Division.
"If they're deliberately letting it slide to prevent anything weirder from popping up... then a second Ant Den will spring up elsewhere. And the Papal Court will let that one slide too."
"Exactly. That's why you're my subordinate."
"Hey! Who’s your subordinate?!"
As Doran dodged Tirintid's angry swing, a mustachioed mage named Lunen approached.
"Chief."
"Yes?"
"Take a look at this."
He handed over a specific page from a thick binder of documents.
It was a list of adventurers deployed for Ledacable security, obtained with the Alliance's cooperation.
Of course, they wouldn't be punished. The Magic Alliance had no desire to sour relations with the Alliance. The Papal Court was another story.
"You had a close call. The prodigy young master really showed up."
Doran's perpetually smiling eyes widened slightly.
[Rain Ludwig.]
Thankfully, his name wasn't on the casualty list... but if something had happened, Doran would've never lived it down with Senior Kevn.
Who could've imagined a sheltered sixteen-year-old noble would track down a black market through the Alliance just from a few hints?
Young masters raised in luxury usually balked at the idea of a black market book hunt or sent proxies.
'Ha, what a character.'
Doran's wry chuckle faltered.
But why the obsession with Tureina's book? Just sense of responsibility for a lost item? Or was there something more...?
* * *
"How's Rain doing?"
On the outskirts of Ledacable, where ramshackle huts clustered like a maze, a hooded woman stepped inside.
A black-haired boy lay on a hastily made bed, breathing raggedly. Even familiar voices brought only pained, wheezing breaths.
The plump young man Sammy, sitting beside him and changing the cloth on his forehead, shook his head.
"No sign of waking. The delirium suggests he's in tremendous pain."
The woman pulled back her hood, revealing noble features lit by candlelight. It was Hirpien Dialr.
"Can't the priest heal him?"
"The dark poison's been purged. But the pain from its erosion lingers... That's beyond my healing."
Only rest would do. Hirpien gave a wry smile.
"We need to leave the city before the investigation net tightens. I have to go now. Please pass on my regards to Rain? Tell him we're all deeply grateful."
"Of course."
"This is your payment, and this is the item Rain entrusted to me."
Hirpien set a pouch bulging with gold coins on the nightstand—five times the usual fee.
But what stunned Sammy wasn't the amount, but the book beside it.
A treatise on Tureina... the one the Children of Gold were confiscating continent-wide.
"Farewell, Rain... Thank you so much. Let's meet again when you're well. Come to the archipelago, and I'll treat you like royalty despite our poverty."
Hirpien suddenly leaned in and lightly kissed Rain's cheek.
Huh...?
As Sammy stared blankly, she kissed his cheek too and smiled.
"Islanders like us always kiss the cheek to thank the opposite sex. Call it our highest expression of gratitude."
* * *
In the Black Church's old temple stronghold, an ancient sinister aura hung like incense smoke, warping and twisting the incoming light into eerie distortions.
Flutter.
A crow made of mana flew in, and shadowy figures began materializing one by one on the empty high seats.
"Numbers 3 and 6 are down."
The man standing before the high throne's steps spoke, and the human-like forms writhing in mana haze reacted variously.
[Ribeni? Who did it?]
[He could've died anytime and it wouldn't surprise me, but Milrek? Hard to believe.]
[What the fuck?]
The temple had eight high seats total. With Ribeni and Milrek dead, the third and sixth were empty.
Number 2 raged the most fiercely, while Number 1 alone said nothing.
The man spoke again.
"Luckily, Number 6 sent a crow before dying, so we got a rough profile on the enemy."
[What'd it say?]
"Rain, dangerous mana, eliminate immediately."
Dangerous mana... If even the ever-rational Milrek deemed it dangerous, it must be immensely so.
As all stirred with their own emotions, Number 5 spoke.
[Thirteen mages registered with the Alliance as 'Rain.' Four are already dead, five are nobodies.]
Her mind was in the temple, but her body was at a frontier city's Alliance branch, where fifty-odd corpses littered the floor.
More precisely, psychokinetically scanning hundreds of stacked documents at once in the office.
"But the other four don't seem like anyone Milrek would flag as dangerous."
[So 'Rain' is some secret code?]
"Wait, there's one exception."
Number 5 snapped her fingers, and a single sheet flew from the pile to hover before them.
"Rain Ludwig."
At the name, Number 1's closed eyes in meditation twitched faintly.
"Insane growth rate. Bronze rank less than a month after registering."
[Bronze? That's bottom-tier trash. You messing with us? Ribeni lost to that?]
[The Ludwig prodigy?]
"So he's called, but word is he snagged top spot among Delaiten's golden generation cadets."
Number 7 snorted with interest.
[Hmph, hid his power as a kid? Little brat's read too many novels.]
Number 2, who'd been seething silently, roared again.
[Hey, even if he's top cadet, you think Ribeni lost to some first-year rat? Use your brains, you idiots.]
Then Number 1, silent till now, spoke softly.
[Ribeni's carelessness could've done him in. He was too reckless anyway. Maybe divine punishment finally caught up.]
[What?]
Number 1 was beyond bad blood with the bloodthirsty radicals like 2 and 3—they were outright enemies. Before a fight could erupt, Number 5 cut in quickly.
"I'll interrogate the rest, but this Rain Ludwig's trouble. Kidnapping a great magic house heir from Delaiten ain't easy."
[Think different. With Number 1 at the school, doesn't that make it way easier?]
Number 4 said it, her voice brimming with mischief.
[Valensidis, even if he's the expert Milrek meant, he ain't your match. Stage it as an accident and off him.]
All eyes turned to Number 1.
And to the woman on the throne.
Her face was hidden under a deeply worn conical hat, but her overwhelming presence was unmistakable even to a child.
"Eliminate any potential obstacles now, Valen."
Number 1 bowed his head in submission after enduring her aura head-on.
[...We'll watch closely and quietly dispose of anyone confirmed back from Ledacable, Master.]
She signaled the end by puffing smoke from her pipe, and the figures faded one by one.
'Ribeni... the child I created through human-body alchemy.'
She'd guided her from infancy to witchhood, yet felt strangely nothing.
Because she'd never given affection? No, because she must never cry, no matter what. She'd long excised sorrow from her heart.
The woman didn't cry. Not since that unbearably harsh summer 300 years ago, the eve it ended, the day she parted from him.
Not because she was Fride the Fire Dragon's Shrine Maiden's disciple, nor because she'd once held the noble shrine maiden role herself.
- Master, take me with you. I'll fight too. Please, let me come...
Only, solely, because of the words he left as he placed his conical hat on her head while she clung to him sobbing.
- Mages don't cry. Others look down on you.
He'd added he'd be right back, so wait with Pipi, then her master left.
And never returned.
Not even after 300 years.
The hat he'd placed on her became a keepsake.
Not a single day passed without living for him. If he still hadn't awakened, some flaw in the magic was certain...
After two centuries researching both magic and shamanism, she'd found the key to perfecting Juyeo Soge Daeban.
- Impossible.
But the dragonkin rejected her results. Light Dragon Haraderiman, leader of the Papal Court, denied it outright.
- Even if you melt the ice binding the flesh, the chill gripping the soul cannot be thawed, for that is the domain of the gods.
Wasn't it worth trying? If his soul was trapped inside, unrescued, still wandering the chill...
The woman bit down on the pipe inherited from her master Fride, filling her mouth with smoke.
She caressed her master's hat mournfully and exhaled a long plume toward the starry night sky beyond the ceiling cracks.
'It's almost time now. Really, almost time.'