Chapter 31
Lea ValenCroft.
She was usually the kind of person who only began to act once she was certain.
Of course, there had been times when she had to trust her own intuition.
But at this particular moment, Lea chose to break through directly rather than take the orthodox approach.
Since Seraph Industries and Archeon Genetics were rival corporations, one could also say she had walked alone into enemy territory.
However, Lea decided to turn that very fact to her advantage.
Many of Magitera's corporations were hyenas waiting for nothing more than an ‘opening’ to tear one another apart.
If the CEO of Archeon Genetics were endangered inside a Seraph Industries facility, it would provide those watchful hyenas with an ‘opening’ beyond compare.
So Lea decided to actively take advantage of this opportunity, even at the risk of danger.
Her intuition was telling her.
That something with potential was hidden inside this man.
..
..
“Are you the person living on the third floor?”
The man propped his chin on one hand as though her question were a nuisance.
“What if I am?”
“Hmm?”
“What are you going to do if I am?”
….
Lea looked at the man with her smile still in place.
‘He isn’t running.’
In a situation like this, an ordinary person would usually reveal their panic through their actions, becoming angry or trying to evade the answer.
But the man had simply thrown the question back at her.
“Nothing.”
“Then why did you ask?”
“Just out of curiosity.”
Lea’s interest deepened a little further.
The minute lens inside her eyes quietly adjusted its focus.
She had switched off the external analysis module while undergoing a search at the entrance, but she had not come in completely empty-handed.
There was no way Seraph’s security personnel could know everything the Archeon CEO might have hidden inside her own body.
A translucent information window appeared at the edge of her vision.
[Beginning biometric scan of target]
[Distance: 2.4 m]
[Heart rate: Stable range]
[Body temperature: Normal range]
[Signs of external trauma: Right back of hand, left shoulder, around the ribs… Damage detected in multiple other areas]
Lea kept smiling.
These were not injuries one would acquire or commonly see in everyday life.
They were unmistakable traces of combat. They could readily be used as evidence that he had been present during the disturbance in Grave Rock.
However, if he really was involved, there was one more thing she had to confirm.
[ACU detection: Failed]
Lea’s eyes wavered at the unexpected result.
[Artificial Circuit Unit response: None]
[Auxiliary circuit connection: None]
[Neural connection port: None]
Her expression relaxed for the briefest moment, but Lea resumed smiling as though nothing had happened.
‘None?’
Thinking she had seen it incorrectly, Lea looked over the scanned data several times.
There was no ACU in the target’s body. That meant he was not a mage.
At that moment, the information window impassively displayed the result.
[Tier assessment: Unregistered]
[Overall assessment: Ordinary biological subject]
An ordinary person.
Lea repeated the words silently.
Despite every circumstance pointing to him being the mysterious person Seraph Industries was protecting.
No ACU.
Then… why?
Why was Seraph Industries protecting an ordinary person like this?
That single question struck her head like a hammer.
Lea opened the next item and cross-referenced the biometric information against the city’s temporary registration network data.
Some functions had been restricted to get past the search, but a short-range identity cross-check was still possible.
The information window updated a beat later.
[Cross-referencing city citizen registration network]
[Matching record found]
[Name: Kael]
[Registration category: Temporary citizen status]
[Status issuance guarantor: Seraph Industries]
[Guarantee level: Special guarantee]
….
Lea’s fingertips stopped for a moment.
Seraph had provided a special guarantee to issue his temporary citizen ID.
For this ordinary man, who appeared to have nothing special about him.
The helplessness she felt for the first time, along with this new problem, gave her a faint headache.
Lea slowly drew in a breath.
“Interesting. This is the first time a matter has refused to resolve itself so neatly. It’s quite refreshing.”
He was still looking at her with his chin propped up.
Lea met his eyes.
“What is?”
Kael asked.
Lea recovered her smile.
“You….”
Just then.
A vibration sounded from the inside of her wrist, and a red alert appeared immediately at the edge of her vision.
[Emergency communication received]
[Sender: Archeon Holdings]
Another line appeared in the information window at the edge of her vision.
[Chairman calling]
[Return immediately requested]
….
The worst possible timing.
Lea slowly drew in a breath.
“What a shame.”
The man looked at her.
“What is?”
“Our conversation was just about to get interesting.”
Lea set down her glass and rose from her seat, at which point the bar owner spoke.
“Pay for your drink before you go.”
“Of course.”
Lea lightly operated her wrist terminal, and a brief payment chime rang out.
“Unfortunately.”
Lea looked at the man with an expression of regret.
“I’ll have to stop here for today.”
“That’s fortunate.”
Lea gave a small laugh at that, then walked toward the door before stopping for a moment.
“I hope we get to meet again sometime.”
***
Jingle.
The bell rang, and the woman left Last Round.
Even after the door closed, the bar remained quiet for a while, but Mira was glaring at the closed door.
She spoke first.
“What was with that woman?”
“Don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“It was the first time I’d seen her.”
“You mean someone you’ve never seen before comes into a bar before opening and pulls that crap?”
“Seems like it.”
“Seems like it?”
Mira gripped the counter as though dumbfounded.
“Sometimes, just listening to the way you talk, you sound like someone watching other people’s affairs from the sidelines.”
“Well, it’s not like anything major happened.”
….
Kael pushed his empty plate toward the counter.
“Thanks for the meal.”
“Don’t think you can get out of it with a compliment.”
“It was good.”
“Do you think saying it twice will get you out of it?”
Just then, the door leading to the kitchen opened very cautiously, and a head of yellow hair appeared first.
It was Nia.
She poked only her face through the gap and checked inside the bar. Only after confirming the woman had completely left did she cautiously step out.
“Um, um….”
Nia looked at Kael.
Her lips moved several times before she awkwardly chose her words.
“Are you all r-right?”
The end of her sentence had stiffened strangely.
She was forcing down her usual soft dialectal intonation.
Seeing this, Mira placed one hand on Nia’s shoulder and brought her in front of Kael.
“Practicing standard speech again?”
Nia’s ears folded slightly.
“I-I ain’t… I mean, no. Just… so customers can understand me easier….”
“Most of the customers here understand you.”
“But customers… sometimes when I talk, they ask me to repeat myself, so… I mean, they ask me to repeat myself.”
When her speech wavered again at the end, Mira sighed.
“Nia. You don’t have to force yourself to change.”
“B-but still….”
Nia looked at Kael and paused to catch her breath, as though trying to use standard speech again.
“Mr. Kael… are you all right?”
Kael nodded.
“I’m fine.”
At his words, some of the tension left Nia’s shoulders.
Mira saw that and glared at Kael.
“Because of you, she’s even pulling out the standard speech first thing in the morning.”
“Because of me?”
“What, do you think she’s doing this because she likes that woman?”
Nia hurriedly waved her hands.
“N-no, it’s not that… I ain’t… I mean, it isn’t.”
Mira rested her elbow on the counter with a tired expression.
“See? Now I can’t understand a word she’s saying.”
Nia’s face reddened.
Just then.
Vrrrr.
A vibration sounded from Kael’s pocket.
He immediately pulled out the terminal card.
Only a short notification that looked like an ordinary alert was displayed on the screen.
[Private secure communication]
While the two continued their conversation, Kael opened the notification.
A short sentence appeared.
[If possible, I’d like to meet once today.]
The next sentence followed.
[I’ll tell you the details in person.]
An identification code for the sender was attached at the end.
Edrian Arclight.
….
Kael put the card back into his pocket.
***
The executive office on the top floor of Seraph Tower was quiet.
Edrian Arclight sat before his desk, reading a report.
The incident that had occurred in Grave Rock Block the previous night and Archeon Genetics’ approach to the site.
And Lea ValenCroft’s most recent visit to Last Round.
Finally, the unofficial contact with Kael.
The implications contained within were by no means trivial.
Knock, knock.
A knock sounded from beyond the office door.
“Come in.”
The door opened, and Elena Weiss entered.
As always, she was dressed in a neat suit. There were signs of fatigue, but her work remained impeccable.
“CEO.”
“You’re here?”
“Yes. Mr. Kael has arrived.”
At that, Edrian closed the report and lightly rubbed his forehead.
“Is he alone?”
“Yes. He didn’t use a Seraph vehicle. He was escorted only as far as an intermediate point, then walked here himself.”
“That sounds like him.”
Edrian laughed heartily and gestured.
“Send him in.”
“Yes.”
Elena bowed and withdrew, and before long, the door opened again.
Kael entered.
“Thank you for coming.”
He sat in the chair opposite without settling deeply into it, ready to rise at any moment.
“Have you had any trouble these past few days?”
“Not particularly.”
It was a short answer.
“Your residence?”
“Not bad.”
“Meals?”
“I take care of them on the fourth floor.”
“Last Round, I assume.”
When Edrian recited the name of the bar written in the report, Kael nodded.
“That’s good to hear.”
Everything he had said aloud so far was ordinary, but entirely different thoughts were moving through his mind.
How had this man, who had no ACU, killed Pale?
That question had not left Edrian’s mind for days.
Pale had been the head of Seraph’s security detail.
He had been a legitimate Tier 6 ACU user with ample combat experience and loyalty that had been tested over many years.
At least on the surface.
Someone like that had been found dead on Sublevel 15.
More precisely, he had been in a state that made it difficult even to call him a corpse.
Only part of his upper body remained.
For the rest, vaporized was the more accurate description.
A huge, perfectly straight mark remained on the walls and floor around the body.
As though someone had fired high-output energy through the old structures of the lower levels.
Parts of the concrete, metal pipes, and blast walls had been pierced in a single direction.
The edges of the hole had melted, while some parts had hardened like glass.
When Seraph Industries’ analysis team first saw the traces, they suspected they were the marks of a high-tier output weapon.
But there was no record of such equipment being taken down to the lower levels.
Nor was there any record of a high-tier ACU user moving through the area.
They had checked everything.
At that time, no one on Sublevel 15 had been capable of reducing Pale to that state.
At least according to the city’s records.
So they had initially considered another possibility.
Kael had not killed Pale; he had merely recovered the ACU from Pale’s corpse after someone else killed him.
That was more reasonable.
An illegal resident with no ACU and no registration record.
It was far more natural to assume that such a person had happened upon the remains afterward and taken an item from them than to believe he had killed Pale, a legitimate Tier 6 user.
However, that hypothesis did not last long.
The lower and upper levels were strictly separated, and anyone entering or leaving would leave a record.
Even so, there was no particular trace of a skilled individual entering from outside.
That left only one answer.
The man before him had killed Pale.
The problem was how.
How had this ordinary man with no ACU killed a Tier 6?
That question kept circling through Edrian’s mind.
Edrian quietly looked at Kael, placed his hand on the desk, and spoke.
“I heard you had contact with Archeon this morning.”
“She came as a customer.”
“Lea ValenCroft is the kind of person who is good at finding loopholes like that.”
“That woman’s name is Lea?”
“You didn’t know?”
“She didn’t tell me.”
Edrian looked at Kael for a moment, then continued.
“Lea ValenCroft. She is the CEO of Archeon Genetics and the eldest daughter of the chairman of Archeon Holdings.”
“So she’s basically someone important?”
“That’s right.”
“Why would someone like that come all the way to Grave Rock herself?”
“I suspect she came to find you.”
Kael showed no particular reaction to Edrian’s words.
“More precisely, she came to find the source of last night’s abnormal magical discharge. And in the process, she must have listed you as a candidate.”
“Seems that way.”
“Do you think she learned anything during your encounter?”
“That I don’t have an ACU.”
Edrian’s eyes narrowed at his words.
“She confirmed that?”
“She scanned me.”
Elena’s expression turned cold.
“You mean she performed an unauthorized biometric scan inside the building?”
“Probably.”
“I’ll have it put on record.”
Kael looked at her once, then back at Edrian.
“Is that a problem?”
“It could be.”
Edrian said.
“But Lea knows exactly how far she can go without causing a problem. She must have moved without leaving evidence.”
“That type of person?”
“That type of person.”
Kael gave a short nod, as though that answer alone were sufficient.
For a moment, Edrian thought about it once more.
No ACU….
Then one word flashed through his mind.
Mage.
When he had first met Kael, the man had answered that way when asked what he was.
He had said he was a mage.
In this city, that word generally meant an ACU user.
But Kael was different.
There had been something subtly out of place in the way he spoke.
He did not sound like someone talking about Magitera’s mages, but like someone referring to an entirely different kind of mage.
Edrian slowly opened his mouth.
“Mr. Kael.”
“What is it?”
“You called yourself a mage before, didn’t you?”
When Kael’s eyes quietly shifted toward Edrian, Edrian continued.
“But it has been confirmed that you have no ACU.”
“That’s right.”
“You have no tier, and no traces of magic being used according to this city’s methods have been detected.”
“Seems that’s how it is.”
“And yet you killed Pale.”
Kael did not answer.
His attitude seemed to say that Edrian should tell him how much he knew.
Edrian lightly operated the panel beneath the desk, and a photograph was projected.
“Pale’s body was found on Sublevel 15.”
He continued speaking matter-of-factly.
“Only part of his upper body remained. The surrounding structures had been pierced in a straight line, and traces of high-output energy discharge remained.”
Kael listened quietly, but Edrian watched his reaction throughout.
“At first, we considered the possibility that someone else had killed Pale and you had merely retrieved the ACU from his corpse.”
“That’s reasonable.”
“It was. It was reasonable.”
Edrian nodded.
“But the access records eliminated that possibility. There was no one on Sublevel 15 at that time capable of reducing Pale to that state. At least according to the city’s records.”
Edrian answered immediately.
“But the various data points we obtained this time all point to the same answer.”
“I see.”
“So I want to ask you.”
Edrian looked straight at Kael.
“How did you kill Pale?”
Silence descended upon the executive office.
Kael remained seated and looked at Edrian, then after a moment, he spoke.
“Pale tried to kill me first.”
“I don’t doubt that.”
“Then the answer is simple.”
Kael’s voice was calm.
“I killed him to survive. That’s all.”
“…So I’m asking how you killed him.”
“Do I have any reason to tell you how?”
An uncooperative answer was within the range of what Edrian had expected.
The typical stance of a negotiator: give only as much as necessary and see what the other party puts on the table.
Edrian liked that about him.
“There is a reason.”
Edrian said.
“Because Archeon has begun to move.”
At that, Kael’s gaze deepened slightly.
“That woman?”
“Lea ValenCroft.”
“Does she know I killed Pale?”
“Probably not yet. But if she has begun to suspect you, it will only be a matter of time before she finds out.”
Edrian clasped his hands.
“Archeon will want to know how you killed Pale, whatever method you used. Especially if they have confirmed that you have no ACU.”
“Then Seraph would want to know too.”
“That’s right.”
Edrian did not deny it.
“I want to know as well.”
And he did not stop there.
“But the difference is that I will not do anything that could harm you.”
Edrian took a metal plate from beneath the desk, signed it, and slid it in front of Kael.
“It’s a contract stating that I’ll incur a fairly severe penalty if I take an action I judge to be harmful to you.”
Edrian gestured toward the contract as though Kael could sign it immediately if he wished.
Kael seemed to mull over his words, then after a moment of silence, spoke.
“I’m not from this city.”
Edrian looked puzzled.
“What do you mean?”
“It means it cannot be explained by this city’s methods.”
“You mean you can use magic without an ACU?”
“…Yes.”
“I see.”
Edrian slowly nodded.
“The mage you mentioned wasn’t an ACU user as we understand it.”
Kael answered briefly.
“That’s right.”
It was a short confirmation, but it was enough for Edrian.
At least he was beginning to see what piece lay at the center of the puzzle.
Edrian quietly exhaled.
“Mr. Kael.”
“What is it?”
“You’re in a very dangerous position right now.”
“I know.”
“It’s not just Archeon. The Black Society, the Upper Circuit Distribution Committee, Gardin, Novatron…. The moment your existence becomes known, they’ll all move.”
“I suppose they will.”
“You’re not surprised.”
“Panicking won’t change the situation.”
“Then this will be a quick conversation.”
Edrian pushed the thin metal plate on the desk with his fingertip. A blue contract rose above the plate. Sentences made of light aligned in the air, slowly taking shape.
“Let’s make a deal.”
Kael’s eyes narrowed.
“A deal?”
“I’ll conceal your identity. I’ll provide you with a residence, identity records, travel permits, and whatever equipment you need, as long as I can keep you hidden from the other corporations. If you wish, I can even teach you how to breathe in this city.”
“What do you want in return?”
“The magic you use.”
Kael’s expression did not change.
“I want to understand it and how it operates—the structure of the spells, the flow of mana, and how you produce phenomena without an ACU. Within whatever limits are possible.”
He glanced at the contract floating in the air.
“You want me to become a research subject?”
“I’m not saying I’ll lay you out on a dissection table, so don’t worry.”
Kael fell into thought for a moment, then continued.
“All right. In exchange, there’s something I want right now.”
“…What is it?”
While Edrian considered what he might demand, Kael calmly opened his mouth.
“A Tier 6 ACU or higher.”