What, Just That?
After finishing his call with James, Yosef gathered his thoughts for a moment, then picked up the report and rose from his seat.
Step by step, he made his way to the Pope’s chambers.
Knock, knock.
“Come in.”
“Papa. It is Yosef.”
Yosef went to the Pope’s side, set the report down, and laid out the conclusions he had reached.
“This is the final report on the incident in Bari.”
“Mm. There were many casualties.”
“Even so, only one person died. The others suffered gunshot wounds, but none of them should have any trouble recovering.”
“...Since the Director of the Apostolic Chamber came in person, I take it the report is not the end of it?”
“Yes, Papa. It concerns the matter of the Holy Grail I mentioned to you earlier, and my own assessment of it.”
Yosef held the position of Director of the Apostolic Chamber, serving the Pope within the Vatican, and like James had judged at first glance, he was a remarkably intelligent man.
“...You are speaking of the whereabouts of the Holy Grail?”
“Yes, Papa.”
James had thought that his alibi and Frank’s escape would keep anyone from connecting him to the Holy Grail. After all, there was no way to explain the Grail’s disappearance except to say it had sunk to the bottom of the sea.
“After speaking with Brother James, I became even more certain of my suspicion. Even when I told him that the boat carrying a man named Frank had exploded, he did not ask what caused the explosion. He focused only on the fact that the Vatican had lost the Holy Grail.”
“...As expected.”
“As I had originally suspected, it appears that Brother James recovered the Holy Grail and the Holy Paten separately.”
But Yosef had no choice but to connect this matter to James.
The destruction of the criminal organization that had fled to Bari, and the inexplicable explosion of Frank’s ship, were the same. James had an airtight alibi, since he had boarded a plane in Rome, but there was no one else he could possibly think of.
He is not an ordinary man. We have no way of knowing what abilities a magician possesses.
The fact that James was a magician who had inherited Merlin’s legacy was becoming the only explanation for the impossible. At Yosef’s words, the Pope nodded with a somber expression.
“It was probably because we were not worthy. So then... whew.”
“Yes. Since the Holy Grail, which we had barely recovered, was then taken by a criminal organization, he must have concluded that the Vatican was not a safe place.”
Yosef was reading James’s mind as though he had gone inside it and come back out again.
“Still, we should take comfort in the fact that it fell into his hands rather than a criminal’s.”
“For Brother James to feel inclined to return the Holy Grail again...”
“Director of the Apostolic Chamber. Remember this: unconditional, and unlimited.”
“Yes, Papa. I did not even bring up the matter of asking him to return the Holy Grail. Until he gives it back of his own free will, I shall extend him endless goodwill.”
But James’s merit did not end there.
“The Holy Grail is the Holy Grail... but we must not forget that he also recovered the Vatican Museum’s relics and handled the matter of Father Stefano. That miraculous recovery that day was a miracle from the Lord. It was accomplished by Brother James’s hand.”
“...Yes, Papa. That was merit unrelated to the Holy Grail, so we shall handle his reward separately.”
“Then everything regarding Brother James is always unlimited. Make sure the Director of the Apostolic Chamber carries out a fitting reward.”
“Yes, Papa. I shall mobilize the Vatican’s intelligence network.”
* * *
While James was making plans to repair his relationship with Suzy and swallow up TY Group, Colt was being worn down by Hojung.
“Col-Col.”
“Yes?”
“Since when did you become so good at Korean?”
“Not long ago. About two weeks...”
Colt said two weeks, but Hojung could not believe it.
In two weeks? That’s absolutely impossible.
“So all this time you’ve been eavesdropping on my calls too?”
“...It wasn’t eavesdropping. I just happened to hear them.”
“Same thing!”
“Those are completely different words. Eavesdropping means listening without the other person knowing, but you were talking on the phone as if you didn’t care whether I heard you or not.”
“I thought you couldn’t understand me...”
Colt had plenty of material to turn the situation around, because he had already memorized enough of Hojung’s calls to make use of them however he wanted.
“So what, you’re saying you did well? I heard everything.”
“......”
There had been a conversation when Hojung returned from the club and later spoke with her friends on the phone.
“You sneaked off to the club without me, had fun with your friends, and met handsome men with great manners to boot?”
From the talk of “this club” and “last club,” and from the phrase “well-mannered beast of a guy,” Colt could tell this sort of thing happened often.
“Ahem. My friends met them, not me!”
“But you still went. Without telling me. More than once! Every time, you’d cancel our date saying you had to prepare for a group project, didn’t you?”
“......”
Hojung had no excuse.
“...I’m sorry.”
“That’s it? What are you going to do to make sure it doesn’t happen again?”
“...I won’t go again. I promise.”
“Good. Still, I’ll be lenient about the part where you didn’t go home with the beast of a man for round two. If you’d gone all the way to round two, that would’ve been the end of it!”
Even while Hojung was being scolded, she remained curious about Colt’s Korean ability.
“...How on earth did you master Korean in just a few weeks?”
The words and expressions Colt used were not what you’d expect from a foreigner who had been learning Korean for less than a year.
“Well.”
“You’re not going to explain properly?”
James always showed up in Colt’s excuses.
“James taught me Korean every day so I could get along well with you.”
“...James oppa?”
“If I’d known I was going to overhear you going to clubs, maybe I should’ve just skipped learning Korean altogether.”
“I said I was sorry, Col-Col.”
Their argument was winding down. Colt had no intention of pushing Hojung any further.
What’s so wrong with going to clubs, dancing, and drinking?
He did not think Hojung had done anything truly terrible to begin with. To Colt, it sounded like perfectly healthy entertainment. Instead, he asked about what had happened recently.
“By the way, what happened between Suzy and James? Ever since James got back from the Vatican, he’s been in a foul mood...”
“Ah...”
Hojung thought there was no need to hide it.
“On the day James came back from Italy, he met Suzy’s parents on the plane.”
“Huh? Suzy’s parents?”
It was a slim chance, but it could happen. Colt didn’t think it was a major problem for James and Suzy’s parents to meet.
“And then?”
In America, that would just mean their parents had different jobs...
At Colt’s casual answer, Hojung was reminded of the difference in social perception between America and Korea.
“Colt. It might not matter much in America whether there’s a difference in status, but...”
“Status? What is this, the Joseon Dynasty? Or the Middle Ages?”
“Ah, no. Not that...”
“Then what?”
Hojung searched for another reason to explain things to Colt, something other than status.
“Still, parents want their children to meet someone good, don’t they? That kind of thing.”
“What’s wrong with James? He’s good-looking. His personality has no rough edges, either... if it were me, I’d like him.”
“...Right. James oppa is the kind of person who doesn’t have a single flaw.”
“So Suzy’s family doesn’t think much of James?”
“Uh... not yet.”
Suzy’s parents still didn’t even know that she and James were dating.
“Not yet?”
Because the conversation was missing a crucial piece, a question mark kept appearing on Colt’s face.
“The real problem isn’t Suzy’s parents or Suzy herself. It’s that James thinks that way. He seems to think he’s somehow lacking.”
Colt tried to recall whether James had ever done anything to belittle himself, and then laughter burst out of him.
“Pfft.”
“What’s so funny?”
“It’s funny because James thinks he’s lacking. Heh.”
“......”
“James has a huge pride.”
Colt knew exactly how strong James’s self-confidence was. As the world’s only magician, James lived with everything in the world below his gaze.
“What?”
“His pride is so strong he can’t even stand losing. If he’s defeated, he has to get even, whenever that may be, or he can’t settle down.”
The card game he had lost in Las Vegas had been the same. James had robbed the casino vault immediately afterward, then returned to the casino anyway and avenged the game he’d lost.
“He was the same when I got pickpocketed in England. I found the guys who robbed me and handed them straight over to the British police.”
“...Wow.”
“A guy like that says he’s lacking? That doesn’t make sense.”
But that was the sort of thing Colt could say because he didn’t know James’s brutal family history.
“...Suzy seems to be taking it very seriously.”
When you added in the matters of Suzy’s family that he still could not tell Colt about, it was not an easy thing.
“Just wait. They’ll probably meet again as if nothing happened.”
* * *
The next day, Colt and Hojung got to see for themselves that the two of them really were back to normal. James and Suzy, who had come home after going out on a date, were found stuck together on the sofa.
Their hair was wet, as though they had just come out of a shower, so it was easy enough to guess what had happened before the others arrived.
“......”
“See? What did I tell you?”
“You were crying like the world had ended when you talked to me...”
“Heh.”
Noticing them, Suzy lifted a hand in greeting.
“What’s up, man!”
“You sly thing. What happened?”
“Hehe. Everything worked out.”
Suzy had confirmed that James’s assets were larger than she had expected, and although she still didn’t know the exact plan, she believed his promise to help her father’s company. A great hope had taken shape in an uncertain future.
“You, come here.”
Hojung dragged Suzy out of the living room. At the sight of that, James turned to Colt, clearly baffled.
“Why is Hojung acting like that?”
Colt sank down into the seat Suzy had vacated and answered while tossing out a question of his own.
“You met Suzy’s parents?”
“Ah. So that was it?”
“Hojung was worried about it like it was some huge matter.”
“Haha. It’s nothing.”
“I think so too.”
James tapped Colt’s knee, as though the conversation between Suzy and Hojung looked like it would take a while.
“Col-Col. Want to cross blades after a long time?”
“Heh. I’ve been waiting for you to say that. Come on, kid. I’ll show you the majesty of a Sword Master.”
Snick.
Snick.
The two enormous swords that had been hanging there like ornaments were lifted into their rightful owners’ hands.
“......”
Colt, sword in hand, gave off a completely different air from the Colt without a sword, and James swallowed hard before he even realized it.
Again, after just a few days...
He could feel with his whole body that Colt had made considerable progress, even if he had not yet reached the level of a Sword Master.
“I can mix in magic too, right?”
“...That’s cheating. And didn’t you forget there’s another person in the house?”
“Ah...”
James felt a slight film of sweat gathering in the hand that held the sword.
“Go easy on me...”
“Training is supposed to be like the real thing.”
“Damn it.”
* * *
Hojung folded her arms and glared at Suzy.
“Report.”
“...Report what?”
“Everything that happened while I was gone. What exactly did the two of you talk about that turned an impossible situation into hope?”
Hojung still viewed Suzy’s situation realistically. She had spoken of a future like something out of a fantasy story to comfort her, but that was exactly what it was: fantasy. ST Group stood among the very top conglomerates, and Suzy was the youngest daughter of that family.
The chairman would never approve it...
Even if Suzy were a child who did not take part in the company’s training, that would not change anything. No matter how low you set the standard, there was no chance James would be chosen as Suzy’s partner.
“James said he could do it.”
“Do what?”
“Earn my dad’s approval.”
“How?”
“Uh... well?”
“Don’t tell me... you didn’t hear him out?”
“Yep.”
......
At that brazen answer, Hojung had nothing to say.
“Hey!”
“Still, oppa does have a lot of money.”
“A few hundred billion, and that’s it? What’s he going to do with that?”
There had been a time when Suzy had thought the same thing.