The Root Will
What a bizarre standard that was.
Were they seriously ranking Masters based on attack power alone? And what on earth was the Unbreakable Chest supposed to be?
Kaya, apparently having noticed the hook-shaped marks of concentration I'd been furiously emitting above my head, added an explanation.
"I know it sounds strange. But it's not exactly wrong, either... Anyone who crosses a certain threshold tends to have a monstrous Will. Even if it isn't an inherently offensive concept, once that degree of Will gets mixed into their mana, a mere sword strike transforms into something genuinely threatening."
"So it's really a measure of how mature one's Will is, in a sense."
"Close enough. That's how a simple impact reading can roughly estimate someone's overall ability. On top of that, there's a whole culture of Masters who hate showing their full strength, so... for one reason or another, this testing method settled in without any real objections."
"That's actually a reasonable rationale. But, um—this Unbreakable Chest? What's that about?"
"No idea, honestly. From what I've heard, it's something they dug out of a Ruins ages ago. Since it refuses to break no matter what you do to it, someone slapped a shock-measuring device onto it and, well, it makes a fine punching bag. So they just keep using it."
"Ahh..."
My questions were more or less resolved. Back when I'd first touched Will itself, I'd assumed I'd already stepped into the entrance of Master rank. Turns out I still had a long way to go.
Even so, now that I finally knew which road lay ahead, my heart felt strangely at ease.
"For the record, my own standard for a Master is a little different. Call it something you have to realize—a Will hidden within your very origin. Personally, I call it the Root Will."
"Root Will, you say?"
Something different from ordinary Will, then?
I tilted my head at the unfamiliar term, and Kaya poked me square in the chest with a finger.
"The Will of that Liberation you used was nothing more than a temporary desire given shape. That's why its power fluctuates depending on your condition that day or how well the concept meshes with your personality. Now that you've crossed the critical point, you'll naturally be able to wield all sorts of Wills besides Liberation with ease... but never forget that those Wills are ultimately rooted in something temporary and volatile. It might be a tall order for a beginner."
"...No. I'll keep that in mind."
"Good, that drive to improve will serve you well. Anyway—the Root Will is nothing like ordinary Will. It's the Will that makes up your subconscious, your foundation, your very nature... or rather, the desire itself, which means—"
"It's permanent. And that much more powerful?"
"Right. Of course, confronting the Will buried in your own deepest core is an brutal thing for a human to do. It's something like... a form of self-proof, really. In any case, once you can command your own Root Will, you'll possess a signature quality in that domain that no one else can match. Sometimes outright bizarre abilities come bubbling up out of it, too."
"Oh-ho."
"Ah, one more thing—the innate abilities that people occasionally awaken when their mana first stirs? The theory is that those are fragments of the Root Will leaking out. That little runt Lena ended up with Provocation, so maybe she's simply starved for attention?"
"...I'll be sure to treat her warmly, then."
The Root Will, huh... Could it be something I'd gain by reaching toward that Sea I saw?
I turned the revelation(?) over in my mind and recalled the vision: an immense ocean formed from countless rivers flowing together. Perhaps that place was the wellspring of my mindscape.
"And what would your Root Will be, Lady Kaya?"
"You don't just go asking people that. It can become a real weakness, you know."
"Ah. My apologies. That was thoughtless of me."
"Well, mine's pretty much public knowledge at this point."
'It's simply being the strongest,' Kaya said with an awkward grin.
"I just can't stand losing to anyone. It's who I am."
"Huh. It really does suit you, somehow."
"Damn it all! What's my undoing is that 'the strongest' apparently never took any aesthetic considerations into account!"
"..."
4:50 in the morning, the following day.
The sewer contract we'd picked up from the guild the previous evening was set to begin at five sharp, so we set out for the guild in the most literal sense of the phrase—at the crack of dawn. Quite a few others were already there, rubbing sleep from their eyes as they prepared to take on the same job.
Judging by their generally unimpressive armament, most of them were guild members who hadn't even reached Rank 8.
"Ugh... it's cold!"
"Chilly, isn't it."
Lena grumbled like an old man, rubbing her hands together over and over. Bolston's punishing winter was finally drawing to a close, but the pre-dawn hours were cold no matter the season. Every breath we exhaled came out in thick plumes of white.
Standing around like this, I half felt like a day laborer waiting at a dawn hiring market.
"We'll do a headcount now!"
Apparently it was five o'clock on the dot. A clerk, looking just as bleary as everyone else, emerged from the guild building and raised his voice. Each party reconfirmed its assigned district, then received maps of the sewers corresponding to that area.
Lena studied her map with an air of wonder.
"Shouldn't these maps be classified or something? They're just handing them out."
"Ah... I found that odd too at first, but supposedly the interior layout of these sewers changes on a regular cycle. Since it's all going to be different before long anyway, they don't bother hiding it. And these aren't the full maps, either."
"The sewers change? That's kind of amazing, actually."
"Word is they're a legacy of the Five Kingdoms era... Honestly, how do you not know this? You're Bolston-born and raised."
"I was busy staying alive, thank you very much~"
The Five Kingdoms. The nameless-sounding designation Catherine had once mentioned referred to the period roughly a thousand years before the present, before the Unified Empire came to be—an age when the whole world was carved into small squabbling nations locked in endless cycles of war and plunder.
And among them, five nations stood supremely powerful.
"According to the records, Bolston was originally the capital of a kingdom called Stormhold. That's why a sewer network this enormous exists beneath the city. Bolston itself was probably expanded to match the scale of this facility."
"Hm... I guess that tracks. But a thousand-year-old facility is still running?"
"Ruins still function, don't they? No reason this couldn't. If anything, they say the technology back then was better than what we have now."
How many wars must have been fought before the Empire as we know it came into being? Human history taught the same lesson again and again: war drives technology forward. But unlike scientific advances, which were comparatively easy to steal, mana-based technologies were safeguarded behind layer upon layer of prohibition and secrecy.
That was precisely why so many secret arts had been lost—casualties of the wars that swept them away.
And yet... no matter how you slice it, is it really plausible that a thousand years passed without anyone catching up to that technology?
Given how relentlessly humans strive to improve, it made no sense. The power of a unified nation should have been on an entirely different level from the old days...
"Alright, then! Let me go over the instructions once more! Patrol your assigned district, exterminate any monsters you find, and for any massive obstructions clogging the channels, record the location on your map and submit the report when you're done!"
"What do we do about the squatters!?"
"Detain them and hand them over to the constabulary! Any other questions?"
"What if we run into criminal organizations?"
"If anyone looks suspicious, arrest them all and deliver them to the guild! If there's a bounty on their heads, you'll be paid separately!"
"In that case—!"
The scene grew rowdy, and my drifting thoughts were cut short at the edges. People peppered the clerk with one question after another, double-checking their duties with painstaking care. Since this was the kind of contract that built trust ratings, it seemed they'd filtered applicants to accept only the most diligent parties.
And so, after a question-and-answer session that dragged on and on...
"We depart now! The inspectors will be conducting spot checks on randomly selected districts, so see your assigned duties through properly!"
"Yaaay~"
"Let's head out too."
"Ah. Right."
The crowd broke off into their parties and scattered in every direction. Time for us to go as well.
Catherine and I hadn't coordinated in advance, but the nobles apparently had spies planted in the guild—which meant they'd already know which district we'd been assigned.
As expected, my hunch proved correct.
"You're right on time. Welcome."
"Lady Catherine?"
"Yes. It's me."
The sewer district assigned to us lay among the outer wards, close to the inner city. A network that had to handle a population of over a million was bound to have entrances scattered all over the place.
Near an entrance deliberately designed to escape the public eye, a young woman was waiting for us in disguise—Catherine, that is.
"Shall we go down and talk?"
"Yes."
Thud!
The moment we heaved open the lid—far larger than any mere manhole—a dank, subterranean stench came welling up, mingled with rot. A symphony of foul odors brewed from every kind of organic matter fermenting together. I hastily dulled my sense of smell.
Noah, it seemed, had already shut hers off entirely; her expression was perfectly serene. Catherine likewise appeared utterly unbothered, apparently using some odor-blocking enchanted tool—which meant the only member of our party left suffering was Lena.
"Ugh... the smell. It's almost nostalgic. If only my armor had a deodorizing enchantment..."
Clack, clack, clack.
With Lena's grumbling as our soundtrack, we descended into the sewer. At first a ladder ran straight down, much like those of my modern world, but after roughly three meters it gave way to a flight of worn stone steps. Only light sources embedded at regular intervals held back the eerie darkness.
We're going down even further from here? Does a sewer really need to be this deep?
Catherine answered my unspoken question.
"This isn't an ordinary sewer."
"I know it's an old facility—from the Five Kingdoms era, I believe."
"That's right. The difference is that back then, it served as a shelter. It was only retrofitted later to function as a sewer. They say its total area is nearly the size of Bolston itself."
"Hold on—if that's true, how does anyone manage it properly?"
I ran the astronomical scale of the place through my head and shook my own head. A facility this size—setting aside the maintenance of the visible sections—would have secret passages tucked into every conceivable corner. Managing all of it was effectively impossible.
Catherine agreed.
"It isn't managed. That's why the outer sections are left to the guild and the various associations, while we seal off and strictly control only the inner city's portion."
"Ha... nobles, am I right. No wonder those gangster types kept traipsing in and out of the city limits..."
Lena murmured, her voice pitched low enough that Catherine couldn't hear. There was less hostility in the sentence than a kind of resignation. Given the rough childhood she'd endured, discovering the root of the illicit dealings she'd witnessed all her life couldn't have sat well with her.
Oblivious or simply ignoring it, Catherine kept talking.
"The Ruins lie beneath the sewers of the inner city. Which is exactly why the security around them is kept so tight."
"What is this Ruins used for?"
"Hmm. That's rather difficult to explain. It was something like a factory, once... I think you'd best see it for yourself."
As we descended further, the spiraling staircase finally revealed its end. From here on was the true bottom of the sewer—long corridors stretching out beyond even what my eyes could resolve. Midway along the passages ran a separate channel, where foul water and bobbing refuse gathered together and drifted off toward somewhere unknown.
"So starting today, we're to guard that Ruins? Around the clock?"
"That's right. Ah—don't worry about the sewer contract, either. One of the inspectors is our person, so it'll be taken care of smoothly. Consider it handled."
"Understood."
"Haah... We didn't need to move this hastily, but as you're aware, the mood in the city is growing uglier by the day."
"I've been too busy training lately to keep up—what's happened now?"
Thanks to Kaya, I'd been buried in training and had barely registered the passage of time. Just yesterday I'd only exchanged a light bout with her, then spent the entire day in meditation to settle my new insights.
What on earth had blown up this time?
Catherine's face darkened as she spoke.
"The Evil Cult has officially confessed to being the kidnappers. All of their forces are massing less than a day's journey from Bolston."
"Good grief..."
"Keep this confidential, but more abductions have occurred since then—the hostage count now stands at ten in total. And last night, the cult sent one of the hostages out as an envoy... with a message: if we want the hostages back, we're to surrender a thousand people."
"Ten for a thousand? That math doesn't work... Don't tell me they mean commoners?"
"They do. Astoundingly, there were even people arguing we should simply hand them over."
"Hah."
Was this some ploy to drive a wedge between them? Purely by numbers, the common folk did hold tremendous power. But the Count didn't strike me as a man who'd cave to arithmetic like that.
"Exactly. My father declared there would be no negotiation with the cult, and many of the nobles are proud to a fault... So a sweeping punitive order has been issued. We'll likely be on a full war footing within eight or nine hours."
"...I see. That's why your color's been off. So Henry is being sent to the front as well?"
"Yes..."
So that was why Catherine's spirits had been oddly low—her lover was being marched off to a battlefield. I was sure the Count would have preferred to leave his youngest son-in-law(?) out of it under normal circumstances, but this was no time for such accommodations.
And Catherine, who knew better than anyone just how monstrous the cultists were, must have been worried sick.
The already pitch-black sewer seemed to grow heavier still with the mood. I forced a change of subject.
"My lady. Would it be possible to add one more person to this contract?"
"Yes—yes? That's rather difficult. There's the matter of security, and the compensation—"
"I extended the invitation on a hunch. It seems the Fist King can come."
"WHAT!?"
Catherine's shock rippled away down the corridor, echoing into the distance. Clearly, she had never imagined such a thing.
I let yesterday's events play back through my mind for a moment.