Dragon and Ogre, Sacrifice and Sin (7)

★ Lef Magitech Empire: Tent City ★

Only Lulusha knew of El—though that knowledge was limited to an exchange of letters with El's mother. Even Lulusha had no idea what sort of person El was, and she certainly never imagined that El was a gigantic rabbit.

Even those who would normally have immediately objected to a sudden visitor could only watch in stunned silence. Taking advantage of that silence, El continued the explanation.

The origins of the two worlds and the information about the red rift in the sky, the Red Gate, were outlandish. Yet in the Kurvaan Holy Kingdom, they were treated as classified information while being accepted as true, and the fact that their respected emperor had already placed his trust in them left the people with no choice but to listen in silence.

But the information about the Red Gate and the handling of the Heroic Gear were two different matters. There was, of course, an aspect of the Heroic Gear being lent out in return for El's information, but many Lef people still could not tolerate the Heroic Gear they believed belonged to their Empire being handed over to another nation.

"The issue was muddled because of that rabbit, but taking Heroic Gear out of the country is out of the question."

The chief of Division 1 of the Labyrinth Conquest Department and the head clerk of the Rororo Trading Company, one of the major merchant houses dealing in magical devices, were meeting in secret after the conference.

"Quite so. In any case, we have not even confirmed whether the magical device brought back by Division 4 is worthy of being called Heroic Gear. They probably found some flashy Magic Gear and are crowing that it is Heroic Gear. Their pet merchant house is the 'Junk Trading Company,' after all."

The head clerk referred to the Muge Trading Company as the "Junk Trading Company" with undisguised hostility.

This head clerk had nearly died fighting the automaton that used "emotion attacks"—the one Reiji and the others had encountered in the "Labyrinth of Fear"—and had learned the power of those "emotion attacks" firsthand. As a result, he had bought the automaton acquired by the Muge Trading Company for 1,000 Imperial gold coins—but the dungeon itself had set an "emotion trap," and the automaton had never possessed an "emotion attack" function...