Chapter 141
A dented door, even though no magic had been used.
Eric gaped at the stone gate, so utterly collapsed that its shape was unrecognizable.
‘The door and the magic hanging on it had vanished entirely…….’
A story known only to those in the know.
The entrances to Owl, open all over the world, are all made using the magic of the Clock Tower's Tower Lord. This place was no exception. Eric himself had just made a door before coming to Korea, hadn't he?
This was how Owl's stone doors were made.
First, flowers that bloomed near volcanoes were smeared onto granite, then horse blood was wrung out so it soaked into the stone. The stone would then reek of blood and flowers, and at that point magic circles were engraved into each stone using bone powder. It was magic written in the tower lord's grimoire.
The huge stone door thus created had defenses strong enough to block most attacks, along with verification magic. This verification magic came in a wide variety of forms, so the way of entry changed every season. The door could withstand every one of those verification tests without issue.
Yes, until now.
…….
Eric approached the dented door with a dazed expression.
The door, once so huge it had reached the ceiling, had now shrunk to less than the size of a palm. Its toughness had also dropped from a rock to slime levels. Was it melting into mush, or had the very nature of the stone itself changed? He couldn't tell.
“……What did you do?”
Thud.
Eric set the sagging door down on the floor and turned to Ian. Ian answered with a sour expression.
“……I didn't do anything.”
“What kind of bullshit is that? You're telling me the door looks like this when you didn't do anything?”
“I'm the one who's curious. Why did the door suddenly do that?”
“……Heh.”
Eric let out a dry laugh.
It was a trivial ability, but Eric had a ring capable of detecting lies roughly three times a week.
An item commissioned from an astrologer for the princely sum of 500 million. The ring, which had never once malfunctioned, remained quietly silent at this very moment. That meant Ian's words weren't a lie. The corner of his mouth curved crookedly with interest.
“……Fascinating. This is the first time I've seen anything like this in seventy years. What's the cause? The door couldn't withstand the rank of the mage? No, impossible. The magic on the door was written in the tower lord's grimoire, not by an ordinary mage. There's no way an Eastern mage could smash it head-on.”
“…….”
“But aside from that, I can't think of any plausible hypothesis. No, hmm... could the grimoire be the cause? The moment I tried to use the magic written in it, the door was destroyed as soon as it sensed the omen...?”
“Speculating is fine, but I'd like to get inside already.”
Ian cut off Eric's muttering. He let out a deep sigh and tucked the grimoire back into his coat. Eric stopped talking and looked at him.
“……Right, of course.”
Eric gave a small snort and straightened his slightly askew glasses. The scarlet light from the torch on the wall reflected off the lenses and scattered light.
“Whatever means you used doesn't really matter. In any case, it's as good as proven that you have something capable of smashing the door. Go on in.”
“……Any repercussions?”
“None. I guarantee it. As you know, mage society runs purely on skill. Bloodlines without skill are treated far worse than exceptional naturals.”
Adding the words “Because I did,” he stepped aside.
Ian hesitated for a moment, then started walking into the open doorway.
The far side of the door, thick with fog, was hard to see with the naked eye, but since he knew it was a magical precaution, it didn't bother him.
“This incident will be reported to the Clock Tower.”
As he brushed past Eric, he muttered in a small voice. Ian stopped dead and looked at him, moving only his eyes. Meeting that rather sharp gaze, Eric curled the corners of his mouth upward.
It was a smile of amusement.
“Don't look at me like that. It's not like I'm doing this because I want to.”
“…….”
“To remake this door, the permission of the Clock Tower's Tower Lord is absolutely necessary. Naturally, you'll also have to explain how it came to be made. A verification team will also be sent to determine whether what I said was true or false.”
“……Tch.”
“It means this is a necessary procedure. As long as I'm part of the Clock Tower, I have to follow their rules too.”
“Yeah, I understand.”
Though he didn't like it, if it was the official procedure, Ian had nothing more to say. Pushing further would only be pointless crap. There was no reason to make a scene here.
“I hope you'll put in a good word for me if you can.”
“I'll do my best.”
Eric answered that way and crouched to pick up the sagging door again. Ian left him behind and headed toward the gaping fog path.
Ian himself couldn't tell why the door had suddenly flown off. Still, he could roughly guess that it was related to the magic of foreign gods. Most likely, the magic on the door had been unable to withstand the foreign god's magic and had collapsed.
It was a little surprising that it had collapsed without even using re-creation magic, but if the magic bestowed upon the stone originated from a grimoire, it wasn't that strange.
As it stood, he had three foreign-god grimoires on him alone, so magic far from its master collapsing because it couldn't withstand the grimoire's aura was perfectly plausible.
‘The tower lord is also a mage who possesses a grimoire. In the end, if it was magic recorded in a grimoire, there's also the possibility that it was swallowed up in reverse by another grimoire's magic.’
Of course, all of this was nothing more than conjecture. No matter how many hypotheses he formed in his head, he couldn't reach certainty. For now, it was better to bury it and bring it back out if the Clock Tower took any action. If a report went up, they would surely take some kind of action.
If possible, he hoped it wouldn't be a violent method. Fighting an organization was something Ian would rather avoid as well.
Tap, tap.
As he kept walking while thinking, the fog filling his field of vision gradually began to thin. Color returned to the hazy front, and the figures of the party that had entered before him came faintly into view.
“Ah, there you are…….”
Yuna was the first to spot Ian and flashed an ehehe grin. Ian smiled back at her and pushed through the fog, finally setting foot inside Owl proper.
It was as if there were an invisible air membrane. As soon as he stepped into the area where the group was standing, all kinds of smells swam into his nostrils.
Perfume, herbs, blood, beasts, and more.
A wide variety of scents spread thickly in all directions. For someone sensitive to smells, it would be enough to make their head swim in an instant. Fortunately, Ian's sense of smell wasn't that sensitive, but it was unpleasant all the same, and his face twisted slightly.
“What the hell is that smell…….”
“That's because they deal in so many different things! The more kinds of mages there are, the more things they sell!”
Dolores answered Ian's murmur. Letting out an ohoho laugh, she looked around. Ian shifted his gaze as well.
The mages' marketplace, Owl.
Why it was called Owl, or what its beginning was, was completely unknown. There was only one common trait it shared.
Namely, that the shop was underground. And that the shop's overall shape resembled an underground prison.
“…….”
A straight corridor. An underground space where the sun never shone. In the damp area lit by blue torches on the walls and blue-flame lanterns floating from the ceiling, Ian let out a low groan.
Shops lined both sides of the corridor like prison cells.
[Astrologer's Fortune-Telling Shop], [Alchemist's Pharmacy], [Mystic's Curio Shop], and so on.
The shops, each with a different character, stood proudly in the blue light. Naturally, there wasn't a single person calling out to customers. The shop owners were all just waiting inside their own stores.
“I plan to go to the tailor first.”
Dolores said. She pointed a finger toward the innermost part of the corridor, at the sign reading [Ibriato's Clothing Shop], and smiled faintly.
“I'm planning to have a new custom dress made. What about the rest of you?”
“I'll go with Dolores, unnie! I don't really know what's here anyway!”
Ari answered. Dolores didn't refuse her, and with an elegant smile, took her hand.
“Then shall we? What about you?”
Dolores's gaze shifted to Yuna. Yuna thought for a moment, then walked behind Ian.
“I, I'll go with him…… I came here just to look around too…….”
“Got it! And you, Shin Ian?”
“I'm thinking of going to the materials shop first. I have a few things someone asked me to get, and I also have some things I want to buy.”
“Mm, I see! Then you should go to the shop over there called [Pleas's Spoils]. It's a franchise branch, so they won't scam you.”
She said, pointing at a sign written in Greek. Ian nodded.
“Sure, thanks for telling me. I'll wait until you're done.”
“No, it's fine! Once you're done with what you need to do, you can just head back. Tailoring clothes takes a while, so this young lady has to stay here. I can't waste your time for no reason.”
Dolores said that and lifted her skirt slightly as if a noblewoman were greeting someone.
“This young lady will take her leave now! You'll be able to see me if you come to the clothing shop, so if you're curious about anything, feel free to come find me! This young lady likes talking to common folk. If need be, I can even recommend clothes!”
“Sure, if I have time, I'll drop by.”
“Great! Then!”
Dolores gave Ian and Yuna each a peck on the cheek and set off with Ari. Ian stared at the back of her head for a moment, then looked back at Yuna.
“Then let's go too.”
“Yeah……!”
Yuna nodded, gripping her staff tightly.
The two of them immediately walked to the spoils shop Dolores had recommended and opened the closed door.
At the same time, a blast of all kinds of medicinal smells hit them. The preservative scent keeping the spoils from rotting drove hard into their nostrils. Ian and Yuna grimaced slightly despite themselves.
Just then.
“A customer, meow?”
A voice came from the counter. Hearing the unmistakable voice of the shop owner, Ian looked up.
Their eyes met.
“Hmm, it's been a while since I've seen a customer, meow. And you don't look half bad, meow…….”
The counter was empty.
Right, no human.
Instead, a cat was stretching lazily with something that looked like an upside-down witch's hat pulled over its head.
“So, what are you looking for, meow?”
The cat's lips moved.
No matter how he looked at it, the sight of a cat speaking human words made Ian let out a dry laugh.
There really were all kinds of oddballs in the world.