Chapter 87
*
To put it simply, Boss recovered well.
For one thing, he hadn't drunk bleach; he'd eaten meat treated with bleach, and he had washed it fairly thoroughly.
It didn't develop into the serious situation we had feared.
“Didn't you say last time that when you were unwell, drinking milk would make it worse?”
“At the time, I suspected gallstones. And now the problem is bleach, isn't it? It's a different condition.”
“Ugh... I definitely washed it well before eating.”
There were moments when I felt like punching Boss a few times, though.
In any case, we neutralized it with milk and kept giving him diluted potion at regular intervals to guard against possible intestinal perforation (*a hole in the intestines).
Fortunately, perhaps because he was a first-tier superhuman.
His condition improved the very next day.
“Boss. If something like this happens again, we may have to open up your abdomen next time.”
“Are you joking?”
“If you don't believe me, I can show you photos of intestinal perforation repair surgeries in patients who drank bleach.”
“No. I won't do this again.”
If things had gone badly, we might have had to open him up.
“Come to think of it, if this ever happens again, what if I throw up....”
“Absolutely not.”
One common misconception.
Many patients think that if they ingest poison, they should vomit immediately.
But it's the opposite.
Vomiting after ingesting poison only brings the trip to the afterlife forward.
That's because the poison in the stomach comes back up through the esophagus and burns the esophagus to a crisp as well.
And the toxin-removal efficiency is less than 40%.
For a similar reason, modern toxic emergency medicine generally avoids gastric lavage as well.
Unless the poison was swallowed in a lump, gastric lavage isn't all that effective either.
In the toxicology of the era I lived in, the field had advanced toward safely expelling poisons by giving laxatives or activated charcoal.
Just like Boss.
“Doctor... how long do I have to keep taking the potion? Because of it, I'm leaking from the rear.”
“Keep taking it until the day after tomorrow.”
Potion contains crocus, which induces diarrhea.
That's the same herb used in colchicine.
It's usually added the way licorice root is in herbal prescriptions—so the potion keeps its restorative effect while the toxicity is flushed out quickly.
These side effects made potion a perfect fit for patients who drank bleach.
Not only does it restore damaged intestinal mucosa, it also has a slight neutralizing effect,
and above all, it induces diarrhea so the poison can be expelled quickly.
“Ugh... the bathroom...!”
“Go ahead.”
There was the minor drawback that daily life became a little inconvenient.
Still, if all it ends in is diarrhea after drinking bleach, that should count as lucky.
Wanting anything more than that would be shameless.
Whoosh!
Boss kicked the door open and ran out in a half-crouched posture.
At the end of the hallway, I heard the bathroom door slam shut with a bang.
....
Watching that, a thought suddenly occurred to me.
This time it had been an accident, though.
Bleach could just as easily be abused.
‘Especially if black mages exploit it, the damage could become uncontrollable.’
After all, the most horrific weapon of mass slaughter in human history was, in a broad sense, made from bleach.
It seemed necessary to issue a warning before anyone abused it.
After some thought, I decided to write a paper about it as well.
Bleach is a substance I spread.
If black mages abused it, my reputation could take a huge hit too.
So it would be right to prevent that in advance.
And it would ease my guilt as well.
‘Writing the paper is something Julian should do, not Director Shun.’
That was what I'd thought of when I asked him to take the position of professor of black magic defense,
and come to think of it, what had to be done was very similar to preventive medicine.
So it was Julian's job to warn people about substances like bleach and propose regulations.
‘Once I finish the lead poisoning paper, I should try writing this one too.’
I decided to keep the bleach paper a secret from my teacher.
It was, in a way, a surprise.
***
Imperial Year 1049.
This year, the whole world had been unusually noisy right from the start of the new year.
Right after the blizzard ended,
humanity suffered a devastating blow from the appearance of mutant monsters.
Fortunately, the Empire's losses were not severe thanks to the Saint and the Saintess,
but the losses in other fortresses and kingdoms that lacked them were by no means small.
Having lost too much power, humanity locked its gates even tighter.
Inter-fortress exchanges also declined sharply.
The number of airships taking off was cut in half, and even then most of them were military supply lines.
But even in this atmosphere, one form of exchange continued.
The Arcane Olympiad.
The mages' Olympics, where they showcase the scholarly achievements of their lives.
Even amid humanity's tragedy, the mages never stopped exchanging knowledge.
No, if anything, they might have been even more enthusiastic this year.
To carry on the will of dead colleagues.
To remember the human perspective they had forgotten.
To make discoveries by chance in the midst of tragedy.
For various reasons, mages burned with passion and submitted papers for the autumn academic conference.
The papers submitted by countless mages passed the first screening by each branch of the Mages' Association, then the second screening by the Mage Tower,
and finally only the last round of review by the ‘Astrolabium—Mage Tower Lords & Great Mages Review Committee’ remained.
“Duke Bassfeld, are you still waging war by letter with Duke Eisenherz?”
“Yes. Last year we fought over the ownership of spirits, and this year we've ended up fighting over submarine mana-flow measurements. They still insist on using lead weights, as if we're living in some earlier age....”
“... So, the alloy circuit we discovered this time increased conductivity by a full 1 percent.”
“Even so, that's only an increase of 1 from 98....”
“Gaaah! If you turn it around, that means the inefficiency has dropped from 2 to 1! How can a Mage Tower Lord not understand how amazing that is!”
“Well, I'm not interested in metals.... Our school doesn't use metal as a catalyst to begin with.”
Before the real judging began,
conversation flowed among the Mage Tower Lords and the Great Mages representing their nations.
Every topic was about the achievements of their own school.
That was only natural.
Depending on the results they presented at this conference, the number of digits in the research funding their Mage Tower or magical knight order received would change.
So before judging even began, they took time to boast as much as possible about the group they belonged to.
After all, judges were people too.
Depending on the impression left by the place that submitted the paper, even the same content would be received differently.
“I still haven't forgotten that last year your disciple plagiarized my disciple's paper.”
“Well, I'm telling you, that was a misunderstanding. The Grand Master even said that topics can overlap sometimes.”
“Because of that, the poor boy lost four years of his life. Want to say that to him yourself?”
“I truly do regret that....”
Countless words were exchanged among the 19 judges inside the meeting room.
At that moment.
Thud.
The giant meeting-room doors swung open to both sides, and an old man entered.
“Sorry I'm late.”
The old man strode across the meeting room
and naturally took the most splendid seat.
As the old man sat down, he grumbled.
“Tsk.... I don't need such gaudy decorations. A plain wooden chair would do.”
“If the Grand Sage sits in an ordinary chair, we'd have to kneel on the floor.”
“Ah, no, that won't do.”
The one-eyed old man chuckled and casually slid the nameplate in front of him toward the front edge of the desk.
The nameplate read <Chief Judge Louis Edelhardt>.
“Now then, let's begin at once since we don't have time. I'd like to ask how everyone has been, but if I did that we wouldn't be able to keep to the schedule. Everyone all right with that?”
At the Grand Sage's question, the Mage Tower Lords and Great Mages nodded.
Snap!
When the Grand Sage snapped his fingers, all the windows and doors in the meeting room shut.
At the same time, a thick stack of papers was placed before each judge with a thud.
“Now then, let's decide which of these will pass and get to present this year.”
“Then the first paper. Submitted by the February Mage Tower. ‘Proposal for a Three-Layer Model of Submarine Mana Flow.’”
“Hmm. Since ocean currents are divided into three layers, this theory says that if you take that into account when using magic to interfere with the sea, mana efficiency increases. Quite impressive that they figured this out.”
Magic is understanding.
The more you understand a target, the less mana you lose and the more you can do.
That is why the magical academic conference never rejected any field of study.
“‘Magical Reproduction of Detonation Reactions.’ The July Mage Tower?”
“No. May. They say they intended only to reproduce the sound of an explosion, but ended up clarifying the principle behind detonation.”
“I was only a little surprised that such an unexpected topic came out of the May Mage Tower. So it wasn't those explosion-crazed lunatics who came up with it.”
“Haha....”
And so the papers were judged one by one, as though weighed in clockwise order around the round table.
Alloy circuits, bandwidth expansion for long-distance correspondence magic, error convergence for weather-control spells....
Most were improvements on existing magic, with the occasional innovative idea.
But none of them relieved the Grand Sage's boredom.
‘In the end, they can't break free of the framework I made.’
In the end, they hadn't changed much from the magical applications the Grand Sage had unveiled a thousand years ago.
Mana management had improved, become cleaner, quieter, and more delicate.
But in the end, they were still far from the interesting ideas the Grand Sage wanted.
‘The Mage Towers are the same as ever this year.’
He felt like simply closing his eyes and going to sleep.
He usually did that every year too.
But this year was different.
‘Still, Julian submitted a paper this year.’
The thought of the paper that boy had submitted already made his heart flutter.
What on earth was the paper about?
Before long, the introductions to the papers selected by each Mage Tower and magic knight order seated around the round table had come to an end.
Finally, it was time to judge the papers selected by the imperial magic knight order.
The imperial representative mage began reading the title of the paper they had brought.
〈A Theoretical Review of the Feasibility of Large-Scale Black Magic Brainwashing via a Group of Mages with Chronic Lead Exposure〉
“Cough!”
“Grand Sage?!”
“No. I just got something stuck in my throat.”
The Grand Sage barely managed to keep from spitting out the tea he had been drinking.
The reactions of the other Mage Tower Lords and Great Mages were not much different from the Grand Sage's.
“Black magic research?!”
“Is it true that the imperial military has finally started officially researching black magic?”
“Brainwashing? What is this....”
Some mages murmured after seeing the security classification number assigned at the top of the paper.
“Security classification, Level 1?”
“When was the last time a Level 1 paper was judged?”
“Since the paper on lightning bombardment using weather phenomena.... so, five years ago.”
“My God.”
Magic could enrich the world and give humanity the power to defend itself against monsters, but at the same time it could also harm humanity.
That is why every magic-related paper had to pass a first review by each Mages' Association ethics committee before submission.
The meanings of the classification levels are as follows.
Level 3.
Magic that is safe to make public. Or magic that is already widely known.
Most papers receive this classification.
Level 2.
Knowledge for specialized mages or esoteric mages. Accessible only with permission from the Mages' Administration Office.
This level is somewhat dangerous, but mages who have earned a certain degree of social standing are still allowed to view it.
And finally, Level 1.
It is something that must be discussed academically,
but could greatly undermine the public good or lead to serious crimes.
Only those with the social trust of a Great Mage are allowed to view it.
In addition, any mage who views this level must undergo a confidentiality contract spell.
“... What on earth did the person who wrote this even have in mind?”
“Let's see... Julian... Julian Nihirit?”
“...”
Amid the murmuring mages, the Grand Sage silently read on.
Abstract
— [This study reconstructs the epidemiology of lead exposure across the Empire and theoretically examines the potential utility of that chronic exposure as an occult catalyst in black magic procedures.
Lead's effects on neural mana conductivity are reviewed on the basis of existing literature, and the technical feasibility of a large-scale mass brainwashing scenario, the mana required, and the identifiable epidemiological traces are estimated, with public health and counterintelligence recommendations presented in response.]
‘No matter how many times I look at it, the boy really does write papers neatly. It would have been great if the topic were ordinary.’
The abstract was neat.
Despite the ominous title.
The Grand Sage felt slightly relieved and began reading the paper's contents in detail.
— [Lead poisoning has been classified as an occupational disease of mages and higher-tier superhumans.]
That is true.
It is a well-known fact that lead is harmful to the body.
But there was no magic catalyst better than lead.
So the more one dealt with magic, the more likely one was to keep lead close at hand,
and mages lived with lead poisoning as though it were an occupational disease.
But the rest of the paper directly denied that common assumption.
— [In the course of epidemiologically reconstructing a total of 4,312 blood lead concentration measurements collected in the imperial capital region over the past three years, the present researcher confirmed that the above premise can no longer be sustained.]
“?”
The Grand Sage's eyebrow twitched.
4,000 people.
The scale of the investigation was on another level.
But something even more eye-catching stood out,
— [We confirmed that lead poisoning is no longer a disease limited to a small number of occupational groups, but one to which the citizens of Sanctum Hill as a whole are chronically exposed.]
Julian was saying that lead poisoning was not a mage's disease, but a disease of the nobles and knights of Sanctum Hill.
The reason the paper reached this conclusion was simple.
A comparative analysis of blood lead concentrations in 8,000 people from Limbus Pit and 4,000 from Sanctum Hill showed that Sanctum Hill's levels were far higher.
And the paper succeeded in tracing the cause.
— [The lead used as an activation catalyst in flexible mana-stone kerosene appears to be the cause.
To prove this, using the twenty years since flexible mana-stone kerosene began being used as a benchmark, we purchased corpses buried before that point and measured the lead levels in their bones.]
‘Wait... he dug up corpses...?’
— [The amount of lead accumulated in bones from twenty years ago was clearly lower than that in bones buried later.]
The Grand Sage almost found himself wanting to applaud.
There was nothing wrong with the logic.
Since the group that usually consumed the most mana-stone kerosene was the people of Sanctum Hill.
The conclusion that these people were more exposed to lead fit the causal chain.
He was even impressed.
When everyone else had dismissed it as merely a problem for mages,
Julian had essentially found the hidden patients as well.
But there was one problem.
First, there would be merchant houses and nobles who would be very displeased with this paper.
And second....
‘Wait. Then if the people exposed to lead are not just mages, but most of Sanctum Hill's citizens....’
The Grand Sage hurriedly turned the page, even though half the paper still remained.
— [Chapter 7. Potential for Black Magic Abuse: Threat Assessment]
— [Currently, the 'Dimercaprol' sold on the market by the Mercure Trading Company is commonly prescribed to mages.]
— [At this time, when dimercaprol is taken without special supplements, there have been many reported cases in which blood lead levels rise sharply and penetrate the brain.]
— [If this is applied in a black-magic manner....]
“...”
What followed was an utterly absurd story.
If lead is driven into the brain, it serves as an excellent catalyst for brainwashing magic.
And if used this way, it would probably be possible to quietly control more than half of Sanctum Hill's nobles and mages.
It would be difficult to control them for long because of their resistance.
But there would be endless uses, such as rendering them defenseless and assassinating them, or pinning crimes on them.
And the paper introduced all of those scenarios one by one in very concrete detail.
— [Based on this, a mock operation conducted with military cooperation confirmed that a large-scale riot could seal off Sanctum Hill's southern district]
— [In a mock siege of the Imperial Castle, there is a possibility of temporary fall due to the magic knight order self-destructing]
— [Possibility of activating a cultist gathering under review]
“...”
The Grand Sage stared at the paper in silence.
For an instant, the Julian from his dreams overlapped with the boy in front of him.
Then, beside the Grand Sage, the January Mage Tower Lord let out a low groan and muttered.
“How could this not have been classified as taboo-grade?”
The other Mage Tower Lords chimed in as well.
“The fellow who wrote this paper... seems a little dangerous.”
“I understand the public-interest purpose well enough... but this can't be presented.”
“From this moment on, all members of our September Mage Tower will be required to undergo routine lead-poisoning treatment. I won't be telling them the reason, though.”
Even the Grand Sage had nothing to say.
“He's in charge of black magic defense, huh.... Reassuring, but also a little unsettling.”
“...”
“Julian Nihirit.... I don't know where he learned black magic, but it seems his teacher only taught him dangerous things.”
No. That was me.
The Grand Sage forcibly swallowed those words and organized the papers.
“So, what do you think of this paper?”
“We can't officially publish it, but there's no doubt he has the ability to get a paper published in the Arcane Olympiad.”
“I agree.”
“I agree as well.”
Usually, in cases like this, they only announce that the mage has had a paper published in the Arcane Olympiad and do not make the paper public.
In that case, the mage would still be remembered in academic circles as the one who submitted an 'unidentified Level 1 dangerous magic' paper.
“Good. Then let Julian Nihirit carve his name into the Hall of Scholarship as well.”
The Grand Sage pretended to be calm as he put Julian's paper away.
“Then... next...”
“The next paper is from the military again.”
“?”
“The classification is... taboo grade.... The author is... Julian Nihirit again.”
“?”
I hadn't heard he was submitting two papers?
With a sense of unease, the Grand Sage checked the title of the paper.
<Theoretical Review of the Structural Vulnerabilities of the Imperial Capital's Water and Sewage Chlorination Infrastructure and Scenarios for Large-Scale Biochemical Attacks Using Sodium Hypochlorite>
“...”
For a while, the Grand Sage looked down at the paper in silence.
Had he done anything lately to make Julian feel slighted?
He spent some time thinking it over carefully.