Ch.220Outside. The Daily Life of a Faceless Fixer (1)

“You need to cut off your left arm.”

“…What?”

Lutegan, the client who had sought out the faceless fixer, was bewildered.

***

‘Ortes? You’re looking for Ortes?’

Lutegan was well aware of the reputation, or rather infamy, of the faceless one who was notorious in the fixer community.

‘Don’t go. There are only two outcomes for those who seek out Ortes. Either they disappear… or they become strange.’

The frontline of the interdimensional borderlands. A periphery isolated from the magical festival centered around the Jeongma Tower and the Ten Towers.

A place far removed from the ivory towers of magical research and knowledge, where each day was a battleground for survival. A gathering place for dreamers hoping to salvage fragments of bizarre knowledge flowing from other dimensions to create new magical paradigms, and for madmen fascinated by other dimensions.

Even there, Ortes had established his own solid power base.

‘No, rather than a “power base”…’

Perhaps it would be more accurate to call it a cult. From what he had gathered from other fixers, those captivated by Ortes regarded him almost as an object of worship.

The harbinger who would bring about the end of magical society. That was the assessment of the four characters that spelled Ortes.

Frankly, Lutegan himself didn’t want to join hands with someone like Ortes.

But he needed to venture beyond the interdimensional borderlands into the depths of dimension-contaminated territory, and the only fixers willing to accept such a risky request were Ortes and his cult.

Thud. Thud. Lutegan walked up the dark alley.

At first glance, there was a small bar in what appeared to be an ordinary commercial building.

But something was strange. It was evening now. This should have been the time when people gradually gathered at a bar. However, there was no sign of human presence at the bar Lutegan was heading to.

The bar door opened with a creaking sound.

Lutegan flinched as soon as the door opened. Was it because of the desolate scene with no people?

No. The bar was quite full of people.

What bewildered Lutegan was that despite there being more than a dozen people inside the bar, no sound leaked outside.

In the corner table of such a bar, “he” was there.

He matched exactly what other fixers had described. An appearance that somehow felt vague despite clearly seeing it with one’s own eyes.

But the combination of three curves drawn by two eyes and a mouth—the “smiling silhouette”—remained strangely vivid in memory.

The faceless Ortes was waiting for him.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Lutegan. I hear you want to entrust me with a request.”

Lutegan swallowed. Until Ortes opened his mouth, the bar had been filled with silence. Though it somewhat hurt his pride to admit it, this atmosphere was quite terrifying.

“…That’s right.”

“Welcome. But may I ask exactly what kind of request it is?”

“I’ve heard that even in these interdimensional borderlands, you’re the best at ‘diving.'”

Diving was slang for approaching the depths of dimension-contaminated areas. It was an extension of using words like “flood” to express interdimensional magical power. In the sense that the deeper one went, the harder it was to escape, advancing into contaminated areas had aspects similar to diving.

“I can’t claim to be the best, but I am confident in that field.”

Ortes’s eyes narrowed further. Judging by his upturned mouth corners, it appeared to be a smile.

Those who saw the ominousness lingering in his expression would consider any attempt to describe that as a “smile” to be an insult to smiles.

Lutegan took a deep breath. This was a request that everyone else had declined. He had to entrust it to Ortes, if no one else.

“Our tower has been researching interdimensional magic.”

It was a confession he had prepared himself for. After all, it was research that directly contradicted the magical research paradigm advocated by the Ten Towers.

But Ortes’s smile didn’t waver.

“There are many such people. They say it’s full of unique ideas and creative inspiration that break away from the framework of conventional magical research.”

He was even packaging interdimensional magic research as a “creative blue ocean.” Encouraged by this not-quite-encouragement, Lutegan revealed his inner secret.

“My grandfather realized that among the civilizations flowing in from other dimensions, there was a civilization of giants, and that their body modification technology far surpassed our current enchantware technology. Our tower tracked the location of giant ruins based on several interdimensional artifacts.”

“And those giant ruins are in the depths of the dimension-contaminated area, I presume.”

“I want to conquer the secrets embedded in those ruins. I want to get my hands on the giants’ technology.”

“Do you have any clues about the location?”

Lutegan showed him a map. A very primitive form of map created in analog fashion due to concerns about leakage. It contained information such as magical power analysis results of artifacts believed to have been excavated from the ruins, and common patterns found on them.

Ortes looked at the map briefly and then suddenly recited strange sounds.

A combination of specific characters and number sequences. If one listened carefully, it was a type of spatial coordinate expression.

Ortes’s followers moved their hands busily upon hearing the list of coordinates. They seemed to be writing down the coordinates Ortes was dictating.

“Look.”

A hologram rose between Ortes and Lutegan. It was a hologram showing the approximate geography of the dimension-contaminated area.

“I’ve selected several contaminated areas with magical power distribution patterns similar to the artifacts’ magical wavelengths.”

What is he saying?

He remembers the magical power distribution of dimension-contaminated areas? When the interdimensional magical power would be raging and changing its composition every day, no, every moment?

“There are trends even in interdimensional floods. If you measure over several years, you can discover cyclical patterns.”

It was an absurd statement. To make such predictions over several years would require conducting close observations of dimension-contaminated areas every day for years.

‘This person…’

Just how deeply and how often has he been going in and out of dimension-contaminated areas?

Lutegan stopped thinking. He felt that digging any deeper would lead to a point of no return.

“If you entrust us with your request, we will first focus on searching these three locations I’ve identified. If we fail to find the ruins after searching all three locations, we’ll charge an additional fee.”

“Additional fee?”

If there’s anything more frightening than fear of people, it’s fear of money. That was the psychology of Lutegan, who unconsciously questioned Ortes.

“Of course, I understand your feelings. It’s natural to be dissatisfied about paying extra when the initial excavation site selection was our mistake.”

Ortes addressed Lutegan in a gentle tone, like an ordinary salesperson. Somehow, the dangerous transaction of interdimensional exploration began to feel like an ordinary service contract to Lutegan.

“But please understand. Interdimensional exploration is no ordinary dangerous task. We are indeed people who make our living by digging in the ground, but we can’t maintain large profit margins.”

“So, you’re saying the initial contract fee barely covers excavating three locations?”

“Yes. After that, it becomes difficult to even pay these fellows’ daily wages. But I can tell you one thing for certain.”

Ortes whispered that among those who had entrusted them with requests, the percentage of those who paid additional fees was less than 5%. If true, it was an impressive level of precision.

It meant there was a 95% or higher probability of finding the ruins within the first three explorations.

After a moment of contemplation, Lutegan signed the contract.

He had no alternative but Ortes anyway. The coordinates where the giant ruins were presumed to be located all pointed to contaminated areas so deep that other fixers adamantly refused to approach them.

Ortes was the only one who could accept a request to dive so deep.

***

Ortes’s assurance was true. He led Lutegan to the first coordinate, and the artifact Lutegan brought pulsated intensely as they approached the coordinate.

Everything proceeded as smoothly as gears meshing together.

“How is it?” asked Ortes with a slight smile to Lutegan.

“Our team will now begin the excavation work. Please wait a moment.”

“I wish to accompany you.”

“It will be dangerous.”

Despite Ortes’s dissuasion, Lutegan didn’t back down. What if they stole the secrets of the giant civilization? They were already notorious as a group of fanatics enchanted by other dimensions. There was no telling what they might do after seeing the secrets of the ruins.

It had to be Lutegan himself who grasped the secrets of the giant civilization.

Ortes scratched his head a couple of times. He looked at the excavation site, then turned his gaze back to Lutegan.

“You need to cut off your left arm.”

“…What?”

“You’re right-handed, aren’t you? We’ll prepare for reattachment later, but you need to cut off your left arm.”

“What madness are you talking about?”

“Those ruins have their own security system. It activates when it detects fluid objects. It’s calibrated for giant sizes, so its precision is inferior to ours.”

Ortes’s finger pointed at Lutegan.

“With your sturdy build, your shoulder width is large enough to be detected by the security system. For safety, you must cut off your left arm.”

“Nonsense! Are your team members going to do the same?”

Ortes hadn’t even gone down to the excavation site. He had merely glanced at the scene. There was no way he could understand the structure of the ruins’ security system just from that.

At Lutegan’s outburst, Ortes shrugged.

“Of course, I wasn’t planning to involve team members larger than you in the entry process from the beginning… But I guess it can’t be helped.”

Ortes looked back.

“Is there anyone here with a build larger than Mr. Lutegan’s?”

Ortes’s followers didn’t answer. It was the moment when Lutegan felt that silence and thought, ‘I knew it.’

Swish.

High-frequency blades flashed simultaneously from various parts of the excavation site.

“Uh… everyone, I didn’t mean cut them off right now.”

With Ortes’s feigned bewilderment, his followers lifted their severed arms.

***

Damn it.

I barely managed to hold back the sigh that was about to escape.

‘Oh, you people.’

At least listen to the full explanation before cutting.