“You came earlier than I expected.” Lyla placed the staff she was holding down. A moment ago, she had been pointing the staff towards the window.
“Thanks for this.” Zich threw the transportation artifact at Lyla.
“Were there many people?”
“Loads of them.”
Zich stood next to Lyla and stared outside the window. Armed troops crowded near their lodging; their weapons and armor reflected the sunlight and almost blinded them.
“Did you finish packing?”
“I finished packing yesterday.”
“You didn’t miss anything, right?”
“Do you think I’m a kid?”
Lyla gave him a pebble and looked inside the magic box. This meant that she had finished putting everything inside it.
“Let’s go. We don’t have any more reason to stay here. If we stay here any longer, some dangerous people might appear.”
Dududu! It was noisy outside. The troops surrounding their lodging were beginning to move. They saw soldiers roughly smashing the lodging door open and entering it. They would soon enter the room that Zich and Lyla were in. Lyla lifted her staff. Mana flowed out of her body and circled around her and Zich. Then, she recited a spell and moved the mana.
Whoosh!
Zich and Lyla were gone. Even their remaining scent dispersed and erased all traces of them.
Crash!
A moment later, the door hinges fell off and flew inward. Soldiers rushed in, but only an empty room welcomed them. They flipped the furniture and searched all over the room, but they couldn’t find any traces of human beings. At the same time, another group of soldiers stormed into the hut where Hans and Snoc were. Likewise, what greeted them was an open tunnel in the corner of the room, and even that tunnel was blocked in the middle so no one could tell where they went. They had lost the last remaining members of Zich’s crew. However, it wasn’t like their search was completely fruitless.
“Let the city know,” the commander of the troops told his subordinates. “…That we found Elena Dwayne.”
* * *
The one-sided mission to capture Zich and his companions—which they had pushed on despite the fears and discomfort their citizens felt—had completely failed. Even if their opponents’ skill-levels were higher than expected, it didn’t change the fact that they had failed. Since the one who proposed this plan was the master of the magical tower, it was obvious that he would be most affected by this incident.
At the moment, Walwiss didn’t care about his political position. He was only happy that his granddaughter had come back fine and healthy. No one bothered Walwiss right now even though he had many matters to solve.
“Aren’t you going to join them, Mr. Dwayne?” one of the mages asked Orland. While Walwiss hugged and checked Elena to see if she was injured anywhere, Orland stood a couple feet away.
“I plan to approach her after my father moves aside. I’m sure they feel more touched about seeing each other again since they live together.”
“Is that so?” The mage thought Orland’s words sounded reasonable and backed away after nodding.
Orland maintained his position and continued to stare at Walwiss and Elena. Then, after a bit, he murmured softly while sighing, “If only my father was like that to me…” It was a bitter lament, and following that, he wondered, “How can a person change so much?”
In the end, he shook his head. “He must have really changed. There’s no way that’s an act.”
Then, Orland came forward. Since Walwiss and Elena’s reunion seemed like it was coming to an end, he thought he should also step in. Although his murmurings had been quiet, there was always a chance that they could be heard by someone else since they came out of his mouth. This time, the person who heard him was the one who had been standing closest to him: Wayne.
Wayne stared at Orland’s back strangely. Then, he turned to Walwiss, and as if he thought of something, he smiled slightly and nodded. However, Wayne didn’t notice that Orland was wearing a similar smile as him as he passed by.
* * *
It was an incredibly joyful event that Elena was back. But they couldn’t celebrate forever, and Walwiss asked Elena what happened while she was captured. He thought it was time to clean up the mess. After listening to Elena’s story, Walwiss felt relieved. To his surprise, it seemed like she hadn’t gone through a rough experience, but the more he listened to her story, the more questions he had.
Her kidnappers hadn’t requested her to do much. Except not going outside, they placed no restrictions on her behavior. On the contrary, they actually helped her continue her magic studies. Thanks to that, Elena sounded like she had no antagonistic feelings towards her kidnappers. Since Elena showed this kind of response, Walwiss also pressed down some of the hostile feelings he felt towards Zich and his companions. But that was all; it still didn’t change that Zich kidnapped Elena and made fools out of them, and they had to continue their search.
While he was thinking this, Walwis heard some shocking news from Elena.
“He is the Karuwiman’s Honorary Knight?” Everyone else, including Walwiss, was incredibly shocked. Karuwiman was a powerful force that could bring about such a reaction. Furthermore, they weren’t the type of people who gave the title of Honorary Knight to just anyone. But then, how could the Karuwiman’s Honorary Knight be a kidnapper?
Walwiss asked hastily, “Is that true?”
“Do you perhaps remember what it looks like?”
“Yes.” Elena drew the brooch she saw on a piece of paper. Since she wasn’t skilled at drawing, she was unable to draw the brooch in detail, but if someone knew what the original brooch looked like, they would instantly be able to recognize it.
“…Are you sure that’s how it looked?”
“Yes.” Since Elena was also shocked and kept looking at it, she was able to confidently nod at Walwiss’ question.
Walwiss let out a sigh. It wasn’t a sigh that people made when they were worried about something; it was a sigh of relief.
The magician who looked at the picture with Walwiss laughed. “It’s a fake. Of course, how could a kidnapper be a Karuwiman Honorary Knight?”
“What? It’s a fake?” Elena blinked her eyes. Walwiss moved Elena’s picture and then nodded his head.
“The Karuwiman Honorary Knight brooch doesn’t look like this. I saw it before, so I’m sure of it.”
Elena opened her eyes wide; she felt betrayed by Snoc who showed it to her with pride. However, everyone except for Elena was greatly relieved.
“Yes, of course. I heard that becoming a Karuwiman Honorary Knight is harder than becoming an official knight. There’s no way a real Karuwiman Honorary Knight would do a wicked act like kidnapping.”
“Since Ms. Dwayne is still yet inexperienced, it seems like they made up a lie like this to keep her quiet.”
“Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like they Ms. Dwayne was ill-treated, but I’m sure they kidnapped her with bad intentions. We must capture them and make them confess their crimes!”
People began sharing their thoughts out loud. Elena looked at her picture that had dropped on the ground. Did Zich and his companions really deceive her so thoroughly with bad intentions? Her heart grew heavy.
* * *
When a few days passed after Elena was safely rescued, Orland returned back to his house. A large investigation didn’t happen again after Elena was rescued, but the culprits haven’t been caught yet, so the situation hadn’t returned back to normal yet. Orland, as Elena’s father, continued to help Walwiss look for Zich and his companions. Orland felt very fatigued as he went to his room. Like usual, he took off his robe and put his staff down. Then he lit up a candle.
Flinch!
When he turned around, he stopped. Someone was sitting on his chair. It was surprising that someone had infiltrated into his room, but it was even more surprising that it was someone he knew. It was the person they were desperately looking for right now.
“Zich.” Orland uttered his name.
Zich smiled brightly and got up. “Sir, have you been well?”
“Because of you and your companions, I haven’t been well.” And while saying this, Orland took a step back. He glanced at his staff and calculated whether or not he should perform magic with his bare hands or take some time to grab his staff.
However, Zich spread his hands out as if to show that he had no intentions to fight. “Sir, I came here to talk. I have no intentions to fight you.”
“Do you think I’ll believe an intruder who secretly came into my house and kidnapped my daughter?”
“Sir, haven’t you heard from Elena? I’m a Karuwiman Honorary Knight.”
Orland snorted. “Yeah, I heard it. And I also heard that you showed her a cheap knock-off that was probably made in a random factory and passed it off as a Karuwiman Honorary Knight brooch.”
“Yes, that’s true. Because the one I showed to Elena was fake.” Zich threw something towards Orland.
Orland instinctively caught it and flinched. He wasn’t sure if the item in his hands would harm him, so he quickly threw it on the ground. Fortunately, it didn’t seem like some kind of dangerous object. The item hit the ground and made a sharp sound. Then, he carefully scanned the item on the ground.
“This is…!” Orland was startled. He lifted it back up and carefully scanned it with the candlelight in his room.
“That’s definitely a genuine article. Sir, what do you think?”
“…It looks the same.” It was clearly the brooch the Karuwimans gave to their Honorary Knights.
“If you’ve made sure of my identity, would you be able to return it to me?”
Orland threw back the brooch towards Zich. “How did you obtain it? They don’t give that to people easily.”
“I crushed down what the Karuwimans hate the most.”
“…You must have caused some serious damage against the Bellids.” If this was true, Zich would have been more than qualified to receive a Karuwiman Honorary Knight broach. Of course, the amount of damage he needed to inflict on them needed to go way above the normal standards.
“But I can’t trust you with just that. It can be a fake.”
“Of course, I’m not asking you to trust me with just this. Sir, but isn’t this enough for us to have a conversation?”
Orland looked at Zich with suspicion. However, after pondering about this for a bit, he nodded. “Fine. But, I will go and grab my staff. And let’s continue to maintain this amount of distance. It won’t hinder our conversation anyways.”
“Yes, if that’s what you want.”
Orland moved his eyes away from Zich and grabbed his staff. When he felt the hard surface of his staff, he felt his heart calm down again. His mind seemed to also work better. With more composure than before, Orland said, “Then why don’t you talk? For what reason did you come looking for me?”
“I came to ask you for help.”
“Help?”
“Yes. Sir, you must be aware of how on the day Elena was kidnapped, corpses of robed figures appeared outside of the city.”
“Yes. They were the guys who kidnapped Elena.” After kidnapping Elena, the robed figures took Elena out of the city, and then, Snoc and Hans killed all the robed figures and re-kidnapped Elena. This was all information that he had heard directly from Elena.
“The robed figures are the group of people that I’m chasing after. They are an extremely wicked and evil organization.”
“Really?”
“Sir, I’m sincerely sorry about kidnapping Elena, but it was all done to protect her. She’s not safe even after we killed all the robed figures. Those guys always have a local collaborator. While Elena was under my protection, I went around to find the collaborator in Sunewick.”
“I don’t know who the enemy is, but you should have at least told that to me or my father!”
Orland strongly spoke up, and Zich calmly continued, “If I’m being honest, I was suspicious of Elena’s grandfather, Walwiss Dwayne, and even you, her father.”
“What!”
“And after careful investigation, I was finally able to identify the culprit.”
Orland’s hands began twitching.
Zich looked at him and said, “I’m sure that the collaborator is Elena’s grandfather, Walwiss Dwayne.”