The Sealed Warehouse

The Arken Empire, the underground dungeon of the Imperial Palace.

Soldiers in duty uniforms shouted across the corridor.

“Hey! Shift change!”

“Ah, shit… Why the hell are you taking so long? Move it!”

“What’re you on about? I got here before the hour trumpet even sounded.”

“Ugh, you son of a bitch. I’m gonna pay you back exactly for everything you just did.”

The outgoing guard, face twisted in disgust, began the handoff.

“More importantly, it’s been ages since this dungeon actually had people in it.”

“Come to think of it, you went out on that raid, right? Are these really demon cultists?”

The man asked about what he’d felt while on duty. No matter how he looked at them, they seemed less like demon cultists and more like starving commoners.

“Dunno about the ones we dragged in, but they were with the cultists.”

“Whoa, real demon cultists? Isn’t that just a label we slap on rabble-rousers when we want an excuse to crack skulls?”

“These ones seem like the genuine article. We hit them in a surprise raid and nabbed them.”

“Actual demon cultists showing up… looks like the country’s circling the drain.”

The relief guard glared at him.

“Don’t go spouting that crap anywhere else. If I report you, you’ll be the next one locked up as a cultist.”

“Ooh, scary. Just shut up and finish the handoff already. I’ve got a date with Ashley tonight.”

“What the hell do you even see in that tavern wench…”

The relief guard checked the occupancy chart for the shift, then suddenly stopped clicking his tongue.

“Hey, you idiot. You were so out of it you can’t even count properly?”

“What?”

“You reported we captured twelve prisoners.”

He jabbed a finger at the total.

“So why does it say thirteen?”

“What’re you talking about? There were thirteen when we brought them in.”

“What the hell? We personally bound twelve and walked them inside. You saying we got it wrong?”

“You’re the one saying I got it wrong? I counted them one by one as I locked them up! Come look for yourself!”

“Oh yeah? One golden on it?”

“I’ll go ten golden, you bastard!”

“Okay! Ten golden. Get it ready, you little shit.”

Both men, absolute certainty on their faces, strode toward the cell holding the heretics. They pointed at the exhausted, collapsed figures one by one and counted.

“One, two, three, four…”

From the right end all the way to the left. The winner was decided.

“It’s twelve, you idiot!”

The relief guard smacked the other man upside the head.

“What? That’s impossible.”

Unable to believe it, the outgoing guard counted again himself.

“Huh?”

Just as the other had said—only twelve.

“You absolute moron. You nearly caused a full lockdown. Were you drinking on duty?”

“J-just a little, man.”

“A little my ass! Ugh, you’re headed for the stockade! If you don’t want to go for drinking on duty and dereliction, have those ten golden ready. Got it?”

“Aww, damn it… That’s weird.”

The guard tilted his head and peered through the bars. The powerless commoners simply waited for the day they would die.

Meanwhile, inside the Imperial Palace—

“As expected, this isn’t easy.”

Brown hair, a square jaw, and sharp, striking features. Instead of simply calling him handsome, most people would have said he looked like the type who had made more than a few women cry.

Jed Swallow.

He slipped into a washroom to avoid prying eyes and stared into the mirror.

“‘Only need two eyes,’ my ass. Of course I need them. Yeah.”

He was in a thoroughly foul mood. Getting into a prison and getting back out again demanded skills that only people intimately familiar with both processes could pull off.

This isn’t just any place. It’s the Imperial Palace.

The moment anyone realized someone had escaped, the whole place would go on emergency alert. And once that happened? The continent’s finest knights and mages would pour in to catch Jed, and then he would be well and truly caught—no wriggle room left.

So he had to appear and vanish like water flowing past. Not an easy process at all. Drawing on every scrap of experience he possessed, Jed devised a method.

Like ditching a partner at a party…

The key was to melt away the moment the other person got carried away by the atmosphere. That way they would start doubting whether what they had just seen was even real, and only notice the truth long after everything was already over.

The process itself turned out easier than expected. Easier, even, than abandoning a partner on the dance floor. At least these people weren’t going to scream his fake name while waving a knife around.

Maybe I’ve actually got a talent for this.

Having slipped free, Jed followed the route he had already scouted and sneaked into the servants’ changing room. At first he had worried whether any of the uniforms would fit him, but that proved unnecessary. Inside were uniforms tailored to accommodate every possible size.

Looks like more than a few people die off in this place.

Lives as cheap as flies. Dozens died as a matter of course, and the moment one dropped, another was swapped in. Treating servants like disposable goods made it possible. Jed found nothing pleasant about that. It hit a little too close to home.

Ferda Valdrova.

He found himself thinking carefully about his superior.

What am I to that man?

Judging by his speech, the man was not merely blunt—he bordered on rude. Yet even that rudeness carried no malice. Other people might miss it, but Jed could sense the nuance with absolute clarity.

He feels like someone who’s never really dealt with people before.

Someone who had never properly communicated—only ever spoken one-way. The classic tells that appeared when such a person tried to start a real conversation were all present in Ferda. Jed had noticed them most clearly right before the tea party, when the man had sought his advice.

—How exactly does one talk to women?

He had never imagined someone of that age would ask a question so perfectly suited to it. Delighted, Jed had poured out every story and experience he possessed as advice. After the tea party, Ferda’s response to that advice had been:

—It’s fortunate for you that you have that face of yours.

Jed still couldn’t tell whether it had been an insult or a compliment. Either way, for this operation Ferda had dangled the promise of documents connected to Jed’s younger sister. If that wasn’t a lie, then Jed would finally learn exactly where their relationship stood.

“Haa… All right. Time to get to work.”

After checking the mirror a couple more times, Jed began moving according to plan. The very instant he set foot deeper into the palace—

“You there.”

A voice calling for someone echoed down the corridor. And the only person in that corridor was Jed.

“Who are you?”

Jed muttered under his breath.

Only need two eyes, my ass.

Ferda placed his hand upon the Orb of Truth, and the Orb asked him:

Hearing the question, Ferda thought to himself:

Orb of Truth, my ass.

He snorted inwardly. The Sealed Warehouse itself contained records of how the place had been constructed. The so-called Orb of Truth was not a tool that pierced a person’s heart and judged true from false.

The real key is the voice reciting the oath.

That voice, laced with mana. In the brief instant someone became fixated on the Orb, that voice gently shook their consciousness—and that was everything. The Orb merely detected whether the listener had wavered upon hearing the content of the voice.

Misinterpret it, and you’re fine.

For someone who had once decided to hate everything on sight, the technique was second nature.

The voice asked again.

“Lord Regent? Are you all right?”

Even Yuren seemed to find the pause strange and called out to him. An answer had to be given now. Ferda needed a demonic grimoire. Yet his heart belonged not to any demon, but to Baldrova.

“I swear.”

The second question came at once.

All of this was for Baldrova. There was nothing to ask.

“I swear.”

The Empire…

Must fall.

“I swear.”

A moment later the Orb of Truth, which had been glowing blue, began its judgment and changed color.

The new light was green. Ferda withdrew his hand.

So this is the entry procedure for the Sealed Warehouse.

It looked shoddy, yet it was a procedure that struck at a blind spot—if you didn’t know the trick, you would inevitably fall for it. Even thinking about it now, Ferda found it so absurd that he let out a short snort of laughter.

“Quite a ridiculous object, isn’t it?”

As Ferda stared quietly down at it, Yuren slipped in a comment.

“Yes. A ridiculous object.”

Leaving the ridiculous object behind, Ferda and the magic inquisitor stepped inside. They descended the stairs for a long while. Down an endless spiral staircase until at last they set foot in the first Sealed Warehouse.

The place was filled with storage racks, and inside those racks were stacked sealed copper pipes. It was the Record Seal Vault. A place that preserved the Empire’s shameful secrets that must never leak outside—or records of great events that could have destroyed the continent.

Ferda had used the existence of records here to lure Jed.

I thought he would have arrived by now… Still not?

There was no way to contact him, so Ferda had no idea how things were unfolding. He had no choice but to proceed solely on the faith that Jed would handle his part well.

Perhaps this could have been an operation that didn’t need him at all.

He had tossed the remark out himself, yet it wasn’t even funny as a joke. Jed was absolutely indispensable to this plan.

“Nothing interesting to look at here. Besides, it’s all things you have no need to know.”

The dismissive tone carried a clear warning not to touch anything carelessly. Of course Ferda had no intention of laying a hand on them. By way of changing the atmosphere, he tossed out a question.

“When you come to a place like this, don’t you ever feel the urge to take a look?”

Yuren nodded.

“Of course the impulse strikes me from time to time. For all that I look like this, I do have a scholar’s temperament.”

“And have you ever looked?”

“Not once. There’s no need for me to learn things I don’t need to know and then put myself in an awkward position.”

A man with professional conviction—rare to find in this rotten Empire. That was precisely why he could become a magic inquisitor.

After only a brief glance at the exterior, they moved on immediately. What mattered was the second Sealed Warehouse farther below. Together with Yuren, they descended.

And as they went deeper, Ferda could feel it.

A familiar scent.

The thick moans and seductive whispers shed by crystals of pure malice and curses. Like eels circling a corpse sunk at the bottom of a lake, they coiled around Ferda.

Sensing the growing depth as well, Yuren asked him:

“Are you all right?”

The correct answer here was not “Of course.”

“All right about what?”

“It’s nothing, haha.”

Yuren set his suspicion aside and walked on. Ferda must not show that he was sensing anything. Feigning a dull insensitivity that felt nothing at all was the priority.

The darkness grew thicker. Candlelight tried its best to illuminate the surroundings, yet driving the darkness away completely seemed impossible. It was a peculiar aura that would have filled ordinary people with visceral revulsion and a sense of danger strong enough to make them turn back. Yet Yuren strode ahead. Ferda followed.

As if piercing through a vast curtain, Ferda’s vision suddenly opened wide.

“……Hah.”

A gasp of pure admiration escaped him unbidden. Calling it a Sealed Warehouse felt wrong—it looked far more like a secret vault belonging to demon worshippers. And among the objects, one in particular seized Ferda’s gaze.

Completely different from the lesser junk, one volume among the books displayed on the central stand. A black cover that looked deeper than the thickest darkness, sealed with silver chains.

Barbatos’s Shadow Magic.

It carried the epithet of the Stealth Demon, yet it still ranked among the Great Demons, so the strength of its seal was high.

“How do you find this place?”

At Yuren’s question, Ferda answered almost reflexively.

“As expected of a place for demons. It truly reeks of a nauseating aura.”

“Haha, no need to force the formalities. Rather than nausea, it’s filled with wonder, isn’t it?”

Wonder. Yes—it truly had to be wondrous. The high-density mana pouring from cursed grimoires and sorcery tomes wrapped around one’s entire body, and anyone would feel rapture. The slightest permission, and it whispered that overwhelming power would soon course through one’s flesh. It was like rain after a long drought, more intense than the release of every suppressed desire.

“No. It is only nauseating.”

Yet Ferda’s refusal was absolute. Even in the days when he had lived purely on hatred, he had never once found this kind of mana pleasant. Back when he was steeped in hatred, anything he could not possess was something to be destroyed. And this mana was not Ferda’s—nor could it ever become his.

“Is… that so?”

Yuren tilted his head.

“A little strange… A mage of your caliber should be at least a little enchanted by it…”

He turned his eyes and fixed them on Ferda. The look in them was completely different from before. It was not merely the strange current circulating through the Sealed Warehouse. He was revealing the true nature he had kept hidden.

“Well, it doesn’t matter. What’s important is that the two of us are here.”

Yuren set the necromancy tome of Gami-gin he had been carrying down on the floor and turned his head. His face was now filled with the disgusting murderous intent he had been concealing. A look that suited this room perfectly.

“I wrote a little scenario on the way here.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“At the Regent’s request we entered the Sealed Warehouse together. He fell under the enchantment of this place, and I had no choice but to deal with him… How does that sound? Quite plausible, don’t you think?”

Listening, Ferda rested a hand on his chin. From the declaration that the man intended to kill him, the first thing that rose was not fear but curiosity.

“Is this a place where one is killed without mercy the moment one falls under black magic?”

“There are no exceptions for black magic. Beneath the omnipotent light, there is no mercy.”

A thin, oily smile curved Yuren’s lips.

“Even if that person happens to be the Grand Duke’s Regent.”

What a needlessly rigid country.

“If I die, you won’t walk out of here alive either.”

“No need to worry about me. Unlike you, I have quite a few escape routes prepared.”

Escape routes for killing the Grand Duke’s Regent. Ferda felt no curiosity about which path the man would use. What mattered now was that he intended to kill him—and what advantage that would bring.

He seems fully aware of the consequences if I die, and yet…

Unlike when he had been only a prospective fiancé, Ferda was now an actual fiancé. From the moment he took Baldrova’s name, he was practically family to the Red Dragon. Killing that family would inevitably birth vengeance, and that vengeance would be aimed at the Empire. It was an act of an entirely different magnitude from the Punitive Force vermin who merely came to nibble at some property.

Is that what he wants instead?

Inside the Imperial Palace itself stood a man who would casually commit an act that could throw not only the Empire but the entire continent into chaos. Suddenly Ferda recalled the Orb of Truth he had just passed. The man had cleared every oath. The reason he could do so:

He already knows the secret of the Sealed Warehouse.

From the moment they entered until now, he had been lying the entire time.

As expected, there isn’t a single decent bastard among the Empire’s lot.

Even cornered as he was, a smile tugged at Ferda’s lips.

“Why are you smiling?”

“It’s nothing much. I simply never imagined the childish scenario I wrote would actually come true.”

“The scenario you wrote?”

The smiling Yuren tilted his head.

“I envisioned a scenario in which I stopped the rampage of an inquisitor who tried to lure the Regent into a trap. Unlike yours, mine is actually happening right now.”

Ferda needed Barbatos’s Shadow Magic. To obtain it, he had to kill the magic inquisitor. Whether the man was truly upright or not made no difference to Ferda.

“Thanks to you, I no longer have to worry about carrying any burden on my conscience. I can simply think of it as taking out the trash.”

At those words the smile vanished completely from Yuren’s face.

“Do you truly believe someone like you can kill me?”

By the common sense of any ordinary mage, the statement was an unimaginable insult. Yuren had reached the 5th Circle—a Master Mage. He was recognized across the continent and held a high position even within the Empire. Ferda’s circle, on the other hand, was a mere 3rd Circle—nothing more than a Magic Walker.

“If you find it hard to believe…”

Mana condensed in Ferda’s right hand.

“Why don’t you confirm it yourself?”

Magic erupted from Ferda’s hand with blistering speed. A sphere so fast that no mage could have anticipated it streaked straight toward Yuren.