Kays Translations

Chapter 36: Bonds Gradually Connecting

Several hours later, Ren was still thinking about the request.

(But how am I supposed to find a band of thieves without a single clue?)

The Arnevelde Trading Company wanted the clues themselves, so Ren understood why it had asked adventurers to search for them.

Even so, where could he begin?

An adventurer who specialized in investigation might know, but Ren did not.

He sat beside the lake where he had once hunted Berserk Fish.

Lingering snow chilled the ground beneath him as he looked up at several clouds drifting through the clear early-spring sky.

“…Why is there so little information when knights have already been mobilized?”

The criminals could no longer be called ordinary thieves. Judging by the scale of the simultaneous crimes, they were clearly an organized band.

They had broken into workshops belonging to magic-tool craftsmen in the Imperial Capital.

They stole documents and other items while leaving money and valuables untouched.

Someone might have paid them specifically to obtain those records.

“Even if they escaped unnoticed, they left far too few traces.”

From everything Ren had heard, they had vanished like mist.

“One thing is certain: someone among them has the Dispel skill.”

Dispel was a skill that acted against magical seals and similar barriers.

Yelquq had searched for someone who had refined that ability to its absolute limit.

The skill was not limited to breaking seals. It could also interfere with magic tools.

In Legend of the Seven Heroes, Dispel was often required to open magically sealed treasure chests.

Ren suspected the thieves had used it to disable the workshops’ defensive equipment.

Destroying the equipment outright would have created noise and attracted the knights’ attention.

“I should begin by asking the client to check a few things.”

The existence of a Dispel user was not enough to identify the group, but it was at least one firm conclusion.

Ren decided to share it with the Arnevelde Trading Company.

Once he returned to Elendil, he would visit the guild and ask an employee to contact the client.

“What else…?”

He continued staring at the sky as he searched for another useful question.

The people running a company like Arnevelde were hardly foolish. They and the knights had probably already considered everything Ren had thought of.

He tried to find something they might have overlooked.

“A Dispel user was involved… and the thieves targeted several workshops…”

Because the available information was so limited, Ren spent several dozen more minutes thinking.

He had placed a pelt beneath himself before sitting down. It was Little Boar fur, a familiar hunting necessity from his home village.

The pelt kept the cold away, while the cool breeze helped clear his mind.

—If this were a game scenario, how would I investigate it?

Part of Ren disliked relying on game-like reasoning in the real world, but he had reached an impasse.

“It still comes back to the Imperial Capital…”

The first question was how the thieves had left the city.

Guards patrolled throughout the capital, though investigating a nighttime crime committed by people skilled in stealth was undeniably difficult.

Still, the knights and guards were neither lazy nor incompetent. They were professionals assigned to the heart of the empire.

It was difficult to believe they had allowed an entire band of thieves to escape without leaving anything behind.

“Something about this doesn’t fit.”

Ren held his head while trying to identify the source of his unease.

At last, he organized several questions he wanted answered.

“Good.”

He rose to his feet.

The ice covering the lake had already thinned and cracked in several places.

Ren looked into the water and regretted not having more time to hunt Berserk Fish during winter.

Now that the season was changing, they swam calmly beneath the surface instead of displaying their former aggression.

◇ ◇ ◇ ◇

That same night, Radius sat in his room at the Imperial Castle.

His hair was still slightly damp after his bath, with a few strands clinging to his skin.

He rested on a sofa and sipped a chilled drink while thinking.

“Now then…”

His reflection in the glass showed a deep crease between his brows.

“It is impossible. Even if the crimes occurred at night, they could not have escaped as completely as the reports claim. And even if they left the city, they should have created evidence afterward.”

Radius had only begun examining the incident in detail several days earlier.

As the third prince, he had many official duties. In January, he completed the final examinations for the Imperial Military Academy’s Special Class, then immediately became occupied with state business.

He had even traveled abroad three times in a short period.

The schedule had not visibly exhausted him, but it delayed his investigation of the thefts.

Someone knocked on the door.

“Who is it?”

“It is me, nya.”

Recognizing Mirei’s voice, Radius told her to enter.

She came in carrying a letter.

“Did I interrupt your thoughts, nya?”

“It does not matter. Has something happened?”

“Yes, nya. There is something I thought you should know.”

Mirei handed him the letter, then sat on the sofa opposite him without asking permission.

She watched her lord break the seal.

“It came from the guild’s Elendil branch, nya. Unfortunately, only a few adventurers have accepted the request, but there is good news. They have sent what amounts to an interim report.”

The low participation was disappointing, but the report itself interested him.

Radius immediately began reading.

“—Someone reached the same conclusion we did despite having very little information.”

“Nya? What do you mean?”

“Read it. This is quite interesting.”

Mirei took back the letter she had delivered and read it herself.

The message contained several questions submitted by an adventurer who had accepted the request that day.

First, the adventurer wanted the client to investigate the defensive systems in every workshop that had been robbed: how had each system stopped functioning during the theft, and what condition was it in now?

Second, did any of the affected workshops employ someone with the Dispel skill?

“Several workshops were robbed, yet the thieves left almost no trace. It is an unnatural situation,” Radius said.

The crimes strongly suggested that the band had collaborators within the Imperial Capital.

Naturally, the knights and guards had considered the same possibility and were already investigating it.

But there was more.

“The defensive systems are themselves magic tools. They incapacitate intruders or alert the outside by producing a loud sound.”

In this case, they had probably been rendered inactive through Dispel.

The fundamental question was how the thieves stopped them.

The defensive devices were enormous because they were built into the workshops themselves. Destroying all of them would have been impractical and conspicuous.

“They must have planned from the beginning to use Dispel or a similar method, nya.”

“Yes. At the very least, destroying everything would have been difficult.”

Mirei continued thoughtfully.

“But one Dispel user could not have carried out every theft alone, nya.”

“Exactly. That is why several crimes occurred in the same night.”

The Dispel user’s role had not been to steal.

That person needed only to disable the defenses at one workshop, then move quickly to the next.

Accomplices could enter each workshop after its protective systems stopped.

Dividing the work in that manner shortened the time required for the entire operation.

That was the theory the existing investigation had produced.

Radius was not alone in reaching it. The knights and guards had done the same.

The public, however, had not been informed.

The authorities were controlling information to avoid alerting the criminals.

“If the Dispel user belonged to one of the companies or workshops, planning the crimes would have been much easier, nya.”

That explained why the reporting adventurer suspected someone connected to the victims.

A person with inside knowledge would obviously have an advantage when planning a theft.

Someone in the same industry would also understand the defenses used by other workshops.

Such people therefore had to be investigated first.

The band’s seemingly impossible disappearance supported the same theory.

An insider might have hidden the criminals temporarily, then helped them escape once the immediate search weakened.

“The adventurer who contacted us appears to have reached our working theory from very limited information,” Radius said. “Because there was no proof, the questions were phrased as suggestions rather than accusations.”

No one had yet confirmed that an employee of any affected company was involved.

It remained only the strongest possibility.

Even so, refusing to investigate it would have been foolish.

The knights and many others were already doing so.

“I also learned that the defensive systems in the workshops completely isolate the inside from the outside. The thieves may have stolen part of one system, modified it, and attached it to a carriage or another vehicle before leaving the Imperial Capital.”

“Normally, modifying or repairing such equipment would require time, nya. But if the crime was planned in detail, they could have completed the necessary preparations beforehand.”

“Precisely. That would explain how they escaped without leaving traces.”

“I heard the guards at the workshops were defeated easily as well, nya.”

“Yes. But the workshops and the companies that owned them were foolish too. They must have feared that admitting the theft would reveal the loss of their technology, so they delayed notifying the knights.”

The authorities had not been contacted immediately after the crimes.

Even the Imperial Capital’s guards and Leomel’s finest knights could not investigate effectively after losing the most important hours.

A separate inquiry would likely determine whether those responsible for the delay deserved punishment.

“They were probably protecting their future business and their standing in the industry,” Radius said.

“Well… knowledge is their merchandise, nya. But Your Highness, could the person who delayed the report also be connected to the thieves?”

“I think that is unlikely, but we cannot ignore the possibility. Investigate it as well. Tonight.”

If the delayed report had nothing to do with the band, then the victims had merely acted to protect their company’s interests.

“I can understand the victims’ fear. But the thieves and their collaborators clearly understood it too and used it against them. Their cunning is obvious.”

Radius sighed deeply and looked at Mirei.

“Mirei, can you handle this?”

“Of course, nya. Leave the minor details to me. What will Your Highness do?”

“I am leaving the castle for Eupheim. Knowing Ulysses, he began investigating before I even learned of the incident. I want to hear his conclusions.”

Radius rose to change his clothes.

Mirei left the room and went to carry out her orders.

“Still…”

Radius thought again about the adventurer who had sent the questions.

The person had accepted the request only that day and almost immediately noticed the same inconsistencies.

Knights and civil officials would eventually reach the same conclusions, but Radius and this unknown adventurer had done so far more quickly.

More importantly, the other person was not a trained investigator or knight.

Radius could not help admiring the sharp judgment displayed with such limited information.

“I would like to meet that adventurer someday.”

For now, other duties came first.

After changing, Radius left the castle with a small amount of luggage and an Imperial Guard knight.

They boarded a magic ship bound for Eupheim.

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