Ch.13In Search of the Lost Kaicle (3)

Ignoring Arabel’s nonsense, I moved all the data left on dozens of production models at the Phytos Magic Tower into a single folder.

If my guess is correct, decrypting this pile of dummy data in a specific way would reveal the regular reports that Kaicle receives.

How to figure out that specific method?

“I need your help, Director Arabel.”

“What?”

I left Arabel’s hideout without looking back.

Everyone has their own aptitudes when it comes to work. I specialize in physical labor, so it’s only right to leave tasks requiring specialized knowledge to experts.

From behind me, I heard nonsense like “Both the boss and her secretary have the same nasty temperament…!”

I must have misheard. Unlike Carisia who arbitrarily “commands” excessive workloads, I merely “request” help within reasonable limits.

I need to verify the truth by the end of the month to infiltrate the ritual at the beginning of next month.

About three days left. With Arabel’s abilities, she should be able to find it by then.

***

Arabel gulped down water. With so many parts of her body replaced by mechanical prosthetics, she could maintain vital functions with just magical energy supply, without water or food.

But right now, she craved the refreshing coolness of water. She felt like she was burning up inside.

‘Damn it…’

She couldn’t just curse Ortes because, true to his word, there really was hidden information.

It wasn’t the latest encryption technique used by the Magic Tower. Rather, the opposite.

Encryption using sacred glyphs (聖刻文字) said to have been used by the cults of vanished ancient gods. An idea too archaic to ever consider.

For the first few days after Ortes dumped this work on her, Arabel had diligently attempted decryption, but no clues emerged despite multiple attempts.

In frustration, she ran every decryption method in the information broker association database through an automatic simulator, and it caught an encryption method from centuries ago.

‘Sacred glyphs. The language used to record the words of gods.’

She’d heard that in the distant ancient era, there existed a technique called sacred commands (聖令) that performed miracles through divine power.

Names that had now faded into the waves of history.

‘Come to think of it, if it’s sacred commands, that could explain Ortes’s presence without magic?’

After briefly considering the possibility that Ortes could wield sacred commands, Arabel let out a hollow laugh.

Such a person, a priest? Unless he considered his boss a god, he didn’t seem like someone who would worship anything else.

Above all, it made no sense that the gods would favor his vicious temperament and share their power with him.

Containing her deep anger, Arabel headed toward Ortes’s room, who had dumped this work on her.

Though she wanted to throw the report in his face, she couldn’t bring herself to do so and carefully handed over the stack of documents instead.

Ortes read through the report with a smile. To Arabel, his expression looked like a taunt saying “Didn’t I tell you so?”

That thought evaporated with the conversation that followed.

“So it was true after all. I’ll need to prepare.”

“Prepare? What, to sell the land?”

“No. A magician of Kaicle’s caliber would have prepared for intrusions through such methods. So we must enter through the front door he has prepared.”

“Front door…?”

Arabel recalled that Ortes had initially approached her saying the monthly sacrificial ritual at Phytos Magic Tower was suspicious.

“You’re planning to dive into lava?!”

Ortes shrugged as if it were no big deal.

‘No doubt about it…’

That smile definitely came from the satisfaction of confirming what he had reported to the boss.

Devotion—no, fanaticism (狂信)—willing to die if it meant taking one step closer to Carisia’s goal.

A powerful magician could surely survive even in lava. In this case, there was circumstantial evidence suggesting that instead of sinking into lava, one would be transported elsewhere.

Even so, accepting a lava dive so willingly was on another level entirely.

Arabel felt a chill run down her spine. How on earth had Carisia created such an extreme follower?

Would she herself someday become like Ortes?

She was terribly afraid.

***

I cursed the fate that had prepared such a situation for me.

From the moment I woke up in this world, I knew that luck or destiny wasn’t on my side.

Still.

Even though I was prepared, diving into actual lava? There are limits to what’s reasonable.

It had been a while since I’d faced something this absurd.

I desperately managed my expression in front of the director since I couldn’t express dissatisfaction about a company priority project, but seeing Arabel’s subtly hardened expression, I wasn’t confident.

She might have noticed my displeasure, so I’d better do some preemptive work.

“Director Arabel.”

“…Yes.”

“This stays secret from the president.”

Since we serve the same boss. Please look the other way just this once.

***

Sneaking in at dawn, Ortes easily infiltrated the area in front of the offerings arranged by the Phytos Magic Tower’s automatons.

Magic-sensing sensors were meaningless to Ortes, who had no magical energy. Most security measures designed against magicians were neutralized.

To be cautious, he hadn’t brought his magic engraving drive, but there was little problem breaking through the security of an unmanned facility, especially one for offerings meant to be thrown into lava rather than a core facility.

The first productions from dozens or hundreds of production lines were stored in container boxes. The scene resembled a museum or department store of automatons.

Ortes climbed into an empty powered suit.

‘It feels like I’ve become that superhero from the movie who walked around in a steel suit. Though that guy struggled with cold places, not hot ones.’

Boom—

A heavy noise and vibration traveled up the container box. The transport had begun.

As they approached the summit of Mount Etna, the heat intensified. No matter how weakened the volcanic activity was, a volcano was still a volcano.

The container interior, and consequently the powered suit interior, began to heat up rapidly.

‘Damn it. Why would Kaicle make a hideout in a place like this?’

Cursing Kaicle’s obviously terrible real estate judgment several times, Ortes felt his body slowly tilting.

This was it.

Ortes began preparing to escape the volcano immediately in case the lava dive failed to get him into Kaicle’s base.

The hybrid fighting technique he had learned from various sources and modified drew out the latent power within him. He was ready to tear apart the powered suit and leap away at any moment.

Thud, clack. Screeeech!

Rather than throwing the entire container box, they seemed to be tilting the box to pour out the offerings inside. Ortes felt himself in free fall toward the inferno.

A gust of wind. The wind that had brushed against the lava didn’t cool the already superheated powered suit but added another piece of heat.

When the massive metal pieces touched the lava, molten rocks splashed upward toward the sky.

Lava typically ranges from 800 to 1200 degrees Celsius. Iron melts at 1538 degrees.

It wouldn’t be enough to melt magical special alloys with heat resistance and durability superior to steel.

But that was based on what Ortes remembered from Earth.

The volcanic fire dwelling in Mount Etna began effortlessly melting the Phytos alloy. Ortes was dismayed.

‘Could it be?’

Could even the data hidden in the automaton’s dummy data have been a deception? The paranoia of these crazy magicians!

Heat rushed in through the gap where the powered suit’s face plate had melted. Ortes reflexively opened his eyes wide.

And the next moment.

Ortes found himself standing on obsidian tiles polished smooth enough to reflect his face.

It was Kaicle’s hideout.

***

Walking with his head bowed, Kaicle scanned the machine debris with his glowing eye. The scan was complete.

Through the melted metal heap, he could see brightly glowing orange components.

They were the storage devices of the products he had created. As he approached to collect them, he was engulfed in deep depression.

He couldn’t even sigh anymore.

This month would be the same as last month. The report would show that his creation had diligently absorbed the volcanic fire of Mount Etna.

But despite that, the work remained incomplete. Though theoretically the amount of magical energy was already sufficient, it wouldn’t operate properly, and he continued supplying magical energy, hoping to find something wrong…

As he raised his head with these thoughts, something blocked his view.

Kaicle’s magical energy-detecting artificial eye showed no color. He adjusted the viewing angle of his artificial eye to examine the overall appearance.

‘A person?’

He immediately tried to prepare a dual incantation, chanting a spell with his mouth while forming a seal with both hands, but stopped due to overwhelming dejection.

“So the upper district finally found me. Geryon? Or Lernian? Or perhaps an outside force from beyond Etna City?”

“Of those, Lernian would be the closest match.”

“How unfortunate. What you people have been searching for, calling it the Artificial Ten Commandments, is a failure.”

Kaicle slumped to the floor.

***

Wait. What’s wrong with this guy?

The giant, who seemed about twice my height, approached while emitting some light from his artificial eye, then started lamenting his life as soon as he saw me.

Typical magician complaints about investing years to create something with no progress to the next stage, and how he should have kept some of the original magic tower occupants alive as research slaves.

At this rate, I might be able to resolve this verbally. I could pretend to sympathize and lure him in with something like “If you join our company, we can provide research personnel,” then secure the Artificial Ten Commandments.

As a first step toward building rapport, I played along with Kaicle’s words.

“Indeed. Recreating the divinity inherent in the Ten Commandments isn’t something that can be achieved simply with abundant magical energy.”

Kaicle, who had literally been pounding the ground in regret until just now, froze completely.

“You. How do you…?”

His artificial eye began spinning rapidly.