Chapter 77
The story continues off the page
The Last Dance Before Midnight
A masked dragon asks the lanternwright for one slow dance
Tilda was overwhelmed by the atmosphere, stopped her greeting, and stepped aside.
After that, Ferda did not spare Tilda a single glance.
Humiliated, Tilda’s face turned bright red as she fled the scene.
Seeing Tilda, Stephan asked Ferda,
“Did you happen to hear what she said?”
“What are you talking about?”
“She mocked me, asking whether the exhibit would make money….”
“Did she?”
Ferda wore an expression that suggested he did not care.
Ferda had no idea what sort of situation Stephan had been in.
“Then why were you so hostile toward her?”
Stephan wanted to know the reason.
No one would be hostile to Tilda upon first meeting her unless they had overheard such vulgar talk.
She was a beauty who resembled her mother, after all.
“I did not intend to speak ill of her at first. But when I saw her, she seemed somewhat different.”
“What do you mean?”
“She rubbed me the wrong way. Her eyes.”
“Her eyes? What about them…?”
“Your sister is the sort of person who cannot rest until she has grabbed everyone and sat on them, is she not?”
Stephan’s eyes opened wide.
“H-how did you know that?”
“Because she had exactly that look in her eyes.”
Ferda had hated countless people.
To fuel that hatred, he had needed to understand different types of people, and several traits remained vivid in his mind.
Tilda Pascal was the type Ferda hated most.
People with ambitions beyond their station despite having no ability.
People who tried to roll human beings around in the palm of their hand like toys.
Astonished that Ferda had recognized Tilda’s nature at a glance, Stephan decided to change the subject.
They were in the middle of preparations for the exhibition, so there was no time for idle chatter.
“Have you met the marquis?”
“Yes.”
“Where did you put the mana stone, by any chance…?”
“Could you exhibit it tomorrow? You seem busy today, and I do not want to bother you.”
“Well, understood. Then let us make it look as though our main strategy is to keep the real secret hidden.”
It seemed they would need to exhibit even the mana stone to draw attention.
Stephan muttered to himself.
But the exhibition itself was not particularly important.
It was merely ancillary; the main focus was the presentation.
What they would discuss at that presentation was the mana stone,
and the magitech rifle hanging over there.
Ferda and Stephan looked up at the magitech rifle.
“Regent, have you ever seen that thing demonstrated?”
“I have seen something similar.”
“What do you mean?”
“It did not look like that back then.”
The rifle that fired mana bullets had been something far larger and more complicated.
It had been so cluttered that this object, with all its dangling parts, seemed downright simplified by comparison.
“What does it look like to you?”
“To me?”
“To you or any other merchant.”
“Well, um….”
Stephan scratched his head.
Tilda had looked at the thing and asked whether it would make money.
The other merchants had reacted much the same way.
Stephan included.
It was difficult to say anything bad about a place one was sponsoring.
“If the exterior were a little cleaner, would people not think more highly of it?”
“You mean it looks shabby.”
“Yes.”
“I suppose that is true.”
Ferda thought so too.
Looking at it now, it seemed more like a work of art than a functioning mechanical device.
This magitech rifle had become especially important to Ferda now.
“It would be nice if this thing could draw merchants from the north and south….”
“I will do everything I can for the north.”
Stephan did not mention the south.
With his eldest brother Murchit holding things there, he did not want to make any promises.
So he decided not to expect too much from the very first step.
That was what he thought, but something entirely unexpected happened.
* * *
Scholars who had spent their entire lives with books were intellectuals.
People mocked them as frogs in a well, but the time would always come when such intellectuals were needed.
Especially for groups dealing with information, the process of filtering and processing it was all the more important.
The Black Bandana had not overlooked that.
The Black Bandana.
They were a secret organization symbolized by black hoods, spread throughout the continent of Cerdès to gather and sell information.
To process the information they handled efficiently, they needed the intellectuals of Escolleia.
That was why Garnet, a member of the Black Bandana, had come here.
“Hmm.”
She had put on jewelry and dressed in clothes with little fabric, as though she were an ordinary noblewoman from the south.
Her dusky skin contrasted with her ash-gray hair.
Her appearance was perfect for pretending to be a desert dweller from the far south.
However, there was one problem.
“Are you alone, miss?”
Men swarmed toward her revealing outfit like flies.
“Huh?”
“I was just wondering if I could be your escort, ahem…!”
When the man met her eyes, he coughed awkwardly.
Then he turned pale and backed away.
“I-I apologize. Please allow me to pass.”
“…Huh?”
Garnet watched him walk away with one eyebrow raised, and the man hurriedly fled.
She had no idea why the man had come over to her in the first place.
A man dressed in northern clothing approached.
“Oh, come on, Chief. Try smiling a little. Are you here to kill someone? Are we an assassins’ guild?”
The man acted familiar with her.
He, too, was a member of the Black Bandana who had come to Halim to find an information processor.
In other words, he had come here to work.
Garnet looked back and forth between his face and the glass in his hand before asking,
“Are you drinking on the job?”
“It is essential during undercover work. If we are going to persuade rather than threaten someone, we have to relax, and alcohol is essential to northern warriors, you know?”
“A knife would suit coaxing some feeble bastard better than that glass. Are you trying to hire another slick bastard who gathers all the documents and pockets bribes like that guy?”
“Oh, I told you, I was out of my mind back then. I even handled it myself, remember?”
“That is what drinking does to you. Have one more glass, and I will shove my hand down your throat, pull out your stomach, and wring it dry.”
Garnet made her intentions clear in a deadly tone.
She was a woman who followed through when she said she would do something.
“Oh, come on, you are being scary again. Smile! A woman is prettiest when she smiles, not when she looks like she is about to kill someone.”
“Shut up and do your job. I will handle things myself.”
But the Northerner merely chuckled, raised his glass, and disappeared again.
Garnet sighed and covered her mouth with the fan she was holding.
‘This is why I said I hated the noblewoman concept.’
She was beautiful enough to pull off expensive-looking clothes, but that was all.
She had spent her entire life in a violent world closer to a battlefield awash in blood and flesh than a field of flowers.
Her fierce gaze and manly manner were impossible to hide.
She never wanted to wear those cumbersome clothes again, with flesh showing and their ornaments jingling every time she moved.
Even so, she had come to Halim.
It was because of one person.
Garnet decided to stop delaying and get moving.
The presentation would begin soon.
The presentation was being held at the opera house.
It was ideal, since it could accommodate many people and was built to carry sound.
Garnet went inside.
Pretending to look for her seat, she quickly swept her gaze around.
‘There it is.’
The orchestra seats, the closest place to the stage.
The first two rows had been left entirely empty and surrounded by his close aides, creating a state of complete security.
Garnet called his name silently.
‘Ferda Valdrova.’
Her first investigation had begun with Hellus Fobidas.
She had been hired when the man’s young daughter was kidnapped, and while searching for her, Garnet had learned about Ferda Valdrova.
‘He grew more fascinating the deeper I dug.’
The report that Valdrova had acquired a fiancée was impactful enough, but once she began investigating him in earnest, her interest only intensified.
Information on the Far East was updated weekly, and every update showed astonishing developments.
‘And today, he attended here in Halim.’
Garnet had wanted to see the man in person, and at last she had confirmed his identity.
Gray hair similar to her own, and a tall, handsome frame.
Though concealed by a slim dress uniform, she could immediately tell that his body was not trained.
‘He has no remarkable features to speak of, on the surface, but…’
His aura was different.
He was sitting on an armchair, and all she could see was the back of his head and his nape, yet she could sense a dignity only a middle-aged man in his fifties could possess.
Ease and composure unbound by youthful passion.
It was no wonder that quite a few women admired him.
‘I heard the president of Escolleia gave him a spot in this main presentation.’
The exhibition, and the main presentation in particular, was arranged only after years of rigorous evaluation.
Even the president had competed against other scholars for a place in that main presentation.
The fact that he had passed it on his own meant he was confident enough to stake his position on it.
‘His influence has strangely grown stronger lately, too. He must have a connection with Regent Ferda.’
He was worth investigating thoroughly.
Muttering that to herself, she took out her notepad and began scribbling.
As the continent’s foremost information broker, she did her duty as well.
“Excuse me, madam?”
“Huh?”
The moment their eyes met, the employee swallowed a nervous breath.
“Gasp! I-I apologize if I have offended you!”
In reality, Garnet had merely been lost in thought and was not upset.
Even if she had been upset, it would have been because of the employee’s attitude.
“No, it is fine. Could you tell me where my seat is?”
“Yes! I will show you.”
The seat assigned to Garnet was one of the opera house’s box seats.
It was in the exact center, and Ferda was within her line of sight, so it was not bad.
‘I suppose I will have to wait.’
It was time to see with her own eyes what sort of judgment Regent Ferda Valdrova possessed.
* * *
Meanwhile, Ferda was receiving greetings from many nobles.
He had rented out the entire expensive front section, so no one should have been coming and going, yet many people deliberately passed in front of him to offer their greetings.
“It is an honor to meet the consort of the Guardian of the Far East. I am the master of the Jade-and-Stone Merchants’ Guild….”
“It is an honor to meet the great Regent of the Far East! As for me, I am currently working as a mercenary….”
It was not only scholars; knights, nobles, and merchants all tried to make themselves noticed by inserting their names into the conversation.
It was the best way to catch the eye of one of the few distinguished figures who possessed both status and wealth.
Ordinary nobles would block off the entire passage to prevent a situation like this.
Letting one or two people pass with a smile was manageable, but it became troublesome when dozens lined up.
Even so, Ferda let them continue.
He was hoping he might spot a familiar face.
But, surprisingly, all he saw were nobodies unknown to him.
It had been a waste of time, but it was not a bad thing.
He had nothing to do until the presentation began anyway.
‘There are a lot of people.’
Stephan, who had arrived earlier, had said that the opening presentation had not even filled half this opera house.
Contrary to that, it was packed today. People had even gotten into fistfights over their seats.
Since this was where the most promising scholars presented a distillation of the most innovative ideas, nobles and merchants alike were on edge.
But the greatest competition at the presentation was not among the merchants or nobles, but among the scholars giving the talks.
“It is a pleasure to meet you! I am a scholar named….”
-Grrrrr!
-Rooooon!
Nobles and merchants collapsed the moment they heard the presenters’ voices, let alone made it through the presentation itself.
Even Ferda, seated in the VIP section, was struggling to resist the lure of sleep.
He began to wonder whether this was not a presentation but a sleep-magic resistance contest.
“Malcolm.”
“Yes!”
While everyone else was exhausted and dropping off, Malcolm remained wide awake.
Since he understood nothing, he had no need to understand anything, and therefore no need to doze off.
“When will it be Vernel’s turn?”
“I will check! Hmm… It is right after President Bernard Wayne’s presentation on the monster-appearance prediction device!”
“I see. Since we can hear you clearly, lower your voice. Is the presenter not looking this way?”
“Huh? Oh!!”
Since it was a place to present the achievements to which they had devoted their lives, people were sensitive.
Malcolm seemed to realize his mistake and closed his mouth.
As he listened to the presenters speak while half-asleep, a voice came that awakened Ferda.
“The device I will be presenting is the <Monster Appearance Prediction Device>.”
It was the voice of the president of Escolleia.
His turn had come.
Perhaps they had been thinking something similar to Ferda, because the eyes of the people who had been dozing began to shine again.
“First, to briefly explain how this prediction device works: when a monster appears, a strange mana is momentarily detected in the air around it. We analyzed that mana’s pattern and developed an algorithm, then used the formula to secure the runes….”
But he continued with an overwhelmingly boring explanation that made even those eyes lose their light and sent them back to sleep.
‘By the time Vernel comes out, eighty percent of them will be asleep.’
Even Ferda, who sponsored him, did not think he could endure the sleep spell disguised as an explanation.
Sorry, Vernel.
No, actually, I was not sorry.
If you do not like it, do better.
“Ha-ha, many of you must be bored, yes? I apologize. Few people get the chance to stand at a place like this, after all. I will give you a brief demonstration.”
Even so, as befitted the president, he sensed the mood and moved on to a demonstration.
The device he had brought was shaped like a metal pillar.
“Basically, this prediction device has been designed for use by both magic workers and mana workers. If I inject mana like this and activate the formula….”
Wooooong—.
“There, the device is working. Ha-ha, the explanation should be easier and more interesting now. Now, as you can see, this display was designed so that anyone who can read a simple map can use it. If a monster appears here, it makes a distinctive sound, going beep—beep—….”
Beep—beep—.
“Huh? Oh, yes, like that. That does not mean a monster is appearing, though. There is a peculiar issue that occurs when starting it up.”
Beep—beep—.
“Huh? Wait a moment. This was tested after being built according to the blueprint, so why is this happening…?”
Beep—beep—.
“Wha…?”
Bernard hurriedly fiddled with the device.
He knocked on it repeatedly as he frantically checked where the defect might be.
Ferda realized instinctively.
It was not malfunctioning.
“Everyone, get ready.”
“Pardon?”
“They are coming.”
The central point displayed on the screen began blinking, and all the candles illuminating the presentation hall started flickering at once.
“Oh my, what is that?”
“An earthquake?”
The people failed to realize that the situation was serious.
Among them, those with combat experience immediately reached for their weapons.
A rift formed in the space around the monster-appearance prediction device.
Something wriggled and burst out through the rift, where dizzying colors unfolded.
It was a wolf’s head.
No, it was a monster with a wolf’s head.