Chapter 190: Ergotism (2)

Crunch, crunch.

Lohengrin Headquarters, Chairman's Office.

Chairman Beidel was nervously chewing on his fingernails.

"Damn it..."

The Chairman was currently anxious.

He never expected the black sorcerers he hired to stab him in the back like this.

'To think they mixed such impurities into the medicine?'

The Chairman's gaze turned toward the desk.

It was an official document sent from the Heresy Inquisition.

The trading company's violations listed on the official document were largely two things.

One was regarding the violation of Life Magic Ethics.

This was something the Chairman had already expected.

Because he was in no position to be picky about the means and methods to protect his position.

However, he was confident he could handle the punishment for violating Life Magic Ethics.

Unless it was an extreme case, he could end it with a fine and a prison sentence.

And even that prison sentence could be avoided by paying a massive commutation fee.

But the second violation was the problem.

'The witches... I was suspicious because they were too cooperative, but to think they would do such a thing.'

It was none other than the charge of conspiracy in a black magic terrorist attack.

From the Chairman's perspective, it was like a bolt out of the blue.

He simply wanted to make money; he had no desire to massacre people for some grand cause.

"Those back alley little rats..."

Beidel growled as he flicked his finger, which was seeping blood.

Of course, it wasn't that the Chairman hadn't thought of the possibility that the black sorcerers might pull a ploy.

However, the board of directors and the chairmen considered that possibility low.

— "Currently, the Round Table of Thirteen lost all their funding sources a long time ago due to the Black Saint's successive great performances."

— "The drug business, murder contracts using curses, Demon Disease treatment. Now that these businesses are gone, they must be in urgent need of a cash flow."

— "Surely they wouldn't do something as foolish as throwing away their only lifeline themselves."

The black sorcerers, including the Round Table of Thirteen, had recently been backed into a corner.

The drug business went under with the launch of the Empire's Narcotics Control Bureau.

Curses also met their downfall with the advent of penicillin and vaccines.

The method of deceiving people desperate for Demon Disease treatments no longer worked either.

No matter how much of a secret society they were, as an organization, they inevitably needed money.

For this reason, Lohengrin's board of directors assumed the black sorcerers would obediently follow their orders.

Because without Lohengrin, the Round Table of Thirteen had no other way to secure funds.

"I planned to kick them out once they made just one new medicine."

So the board of directors decided to take advantage of this situation.

The plan was to buy time by creating a new medicine first, then kick out the black sorcerers and slowly cultivate life mages for the trading company.

But the black sorcerers' madness was beyond what the Chairman had imagined.

From the very beginning, the black sorcerers had only thought of using Lohengrin's capital and distribution network to lay a massive trap for the Empire.

They lacked the ability to calculate long-term profits and losses.

No, they didn't even have an interest in such things to begin with.

Those who prioritized immediate madness and objectives over profit.

It was a behavioral principle that the board of directors, who operated based on reason, rationality, and profit, could never predict.

'Why is the field of view of these mages so narrow...! I shouldn't have assumed they would be smart just because they are mages.'

But regretting it now was useless as it had already happened.

Fortunately, the experienced Beidel had a way to overcome this situation.

"Director Vautier, Director Kraus, Director Yen."

"Yes, Chairman."

"You know what I am about to say, don't you?"

"...It's my turn."

It was 20 years ago.

When the Merkur Trading Company, which was a subcontracted guild, lashed out by whistleblowing the corruption of their superiors.

Beidel had thrown away one director as a shield to clear himself of the charges.

The Lohengrin Trading Company stumbled slightly due to that accusation, but they didn't suffer a blow that made a comeback impossible.

He just needed to do the same thing this time.

"This incident was carried out through your unilateral action, wasn't it? The components of the medicine, the secret agreement with those little rats—you all made those decisions through unilateral action."

"...That is correct, Chairman."

He had immediately and secretly called in the three directors.

At the time of the Merkur Trading Company's whistleblowing, one person was enough.

But this incident was on a larger scale.

He needed to offer up at least three people.

However, the directors weren't exactly people who would sacrifice themselves for the Chairman out of loyalty either.

"...Please take care of our families."

"Of course. I heard the Southern Region is quite nice to live in these days. I've already purchased the right of residence for the territory with the best security. I will ensure your families can spend the rest of their lives there without lacking anything for their entire lifetime."

He was sincere.

Of course, it was possible to feign ignorance and pretend this promise never happened after the directors died.

But if he did that, no directors would sacrifice themselves for the Chairman when something happened in the future.

For that reason, the Chairman kept this kind of promise thoroughly.

The directors were well aware of that fact too.

They could tell just by looking at how the families of the directors who had sacrificed themselves prior maintained a luxurious lifestyle.

Because of that, they merely calmly accepted that their turn had come.

"Thank you, Chairman. It must have been difficult to obtain."

"It is nothing compared to your sacrifice."

Currently, the right of residence in the Southern Region was so highly sought after that people couldn't buy it even if they wanted to.

Ever since Imperial Prince Edmund recaptured the key strategic point in the south.

The Southern Region had been humanity's territory for ten years now.

With penicillin and the tetanus vaccine even being supplied here, the demonic beasts in the Southern Region had been downgraded to a threat on the level of a typhoon.

That is why requests to migrate to the southern territories were currently flooding in from all over the Empire.

Naturally, the Empire did not give away that right free of charge.

The top priority, naturally, belonged to the nobles who held the capital and power to pioneer the territory, and the next in line went to the soldiers who directly shed blood fighting demonic beasts on the Southern Front.

And the remaining spots went to ordinary citizens via lottery.

However, the Chairman of Lohengrin used a slight loophole for the directors.

"Make sure to tell your families well. They will have to take that disabled veteran in as a dependent retainer to maintain their right of residence."

"Understood."

"Then go prepare yourselves now."

Beidel stood up from his seat.

It was because contact had arrived from the first-floor lobby.

"The knights will storm in soon. You all just need to say exactly what we prepared."

"...Understood."

The three directors nodded, swallowing their respective resolves.

It was a destiny already decided.

Floundering wouldn't change anything.

In that case, it was better to become the Chairman's sacrificial lamb for the sake of their remaining families.

And shortly after.

Crash!

As soon as their deal was finished, the massive door to the Chairman's office was smashed apart, and armored knights stormed in.

"Chairman Beidel! I command you in the name of the Imperial Court and the Judicial Court!"

Shouted the Knight Commander standing at the front.

"Surrender peacefully. I don't care if you put up a resistance."

Beidel's reaction upon seeing the knights was fast.

Acting out a calculated fluster, the Chairman grabbed the collar of the director standing next to him.

"I-It is a misunderstanding! We are also merely victims who were deceived by these people and the black sorcerers! This man acted through unilateral action...!"

"..."

The Knight Commander silently listened to his words.

And stared at Beidel for a long time with an inscrutable look in his eyes.

A chill ran down Beidel's spine at that gaze for a moment, but he forced himself to maintain a calm facade.

Soon, the Knight Commander opened his mouth.

"...You are smearing mud on the Imperial Court for the second time."

At the Knight Commander's soliloquy, the Chairman and the directors felt their hearts drop.

However, the Knight Commander's hand did not move towards the sword at his waist.

Instead, he merely nodded.

"I don't know how long you'll be able to maintain that brazen face, but fine for now. First, we will arrest these three people pointed out by the Chairman."

Only then did the Chairman let out a sigh of relief.

As expected, it went exactly as he thought.

The Empire is harsh.

However, only to those who are incompetent and unnecessary.

To those who are competent or irreplaceable, it is instead limitlessly generous.

That was why this brazen method worked.

— "We'll give you an opportunity one more time, so do better next time?"

The Chairman understood the meaning behind the Knight Commander's words in that way.

Having arrested the directors like that, the Knight Commander spoke toward the Chairman.

"I understand that these men are your conspirators. In that case, where are the black sorcerers who supposedly deceived you?"

"I will mark it on a map and inform you."

Beidel gladly spilled the location of the secret laboratory.

It was a place he had gone through great lengths to prepare in order to create this new medicine, but he was in no position to pity its loss right now.

Rather, he had to actively cooperate to provide proof that he wasn't an accomplice with the black sorcerers.

"...Here, it's the Barzad Territory in the Southern Region."

"You hid it quite well."

The Knight Commander snatched the map from the Chairman's hands.

And right before leaving the Chairman's office.

He spoke to the Chairman with his back turned.

"You seem to be misunderstanding, so let me tell you this. I am a protector of the law, not a hunter of taboos."

"...?"

At the Knight Commander's cryptic words, the Chairman could only tilt his head in confusion.

But before he could ask a question, the knights had already left the trading company.

***

Lohengrin's secret laboratory was set up in the frontier of the Southern Region.

Ever since the Southern Region broke free from the threat of demonic beasts and was reborn as humanity's intact territory.

The lords were competitively expanding towards the unknown lands where insect demonic beasts used to swarm in the past.

Massive clumps of stone were transported daily, and new walls were built in the places where the dark forests had been pushed back.

It was a truly explosive period of expansion.

But the brighter the light, the larger the shadow it casts.

Sudden expansion inevitably birthed a massive security vacuum.

If it had been inside the wall of the cramped past, running such a large-scale secret facility would have been unimaginable.

It was something only possible if a lord turned a blind eye at the very least.

However, the story was different in the current frontier where the map was changing day by day.

The lords were frantic surveying new territories and consolidating infrastructure, and the administration and guard networks of the territory were full of holes everywhere.

A little bit of capital. And the cooperation of corrupt middle managers.

As long as they had this, preparing such a large-scale research facility in secret was entirely possible.

The knights stepped into the secret laboratory, which was officially recorded in the administration as 'Lohengrin Trading Company's Warehouse'.

"Listen closely. The black sorcerers will be inside. Given who they are, they probably already know we've arrived."

"Then what are you doing, Knight Commander. Shouldn't we breach before those bastards can run away?"

"Foolish."

The Knight Commander let out a sigh.

"The enemies are black sorcerers. Since more specialized individuals than us are on their way, we will solely focus on encirclement to prevent them from escaping."

"No, I cannot accept that."

As if to refute him, a young man wearing flashy armor stepped forward.

It was the Vice Knight Commander.

"You are always like this, Knight Commander. Isn't that why you lose those who should be caught, always playing it safe?"

"As the one leading these knights, I merely prioritize their safety."

"No."

The Vice Knight Commander tapped his own chest.

"What's more important than anything else is punishing those who eat away at the Empire. Isn't that why we became knights? If you're afraid of merely dying, you shouldn't have become a knight."

"Recklessly shoving your head in and dying is not courage, Vice Knight Commander."

But the Vice Knight Commander didn't even pretend to listen.

"They are nothing more than black sorcerers who hid like little rats in the back alley. Are you saying the elites of our Imperial Knight Order should tremble outside and wait for backup out of fear of those little rats?"

The Vice Knight Commander sneered, tapping the ornately decorated sword hilt of his weapon.

"This is a disgrace to the Empire's Knight Order."

"Vice Knight Commander! You speak like that because you don't know the black sorcerers. They are beings who defy common sense."

"Since you are of commoner origin, Knight Commander, you have a tendency to overestimate the threat of black sorcerers. Do not worry. We have the experience of dealing with such individuals when we were young. They aren't opponents to fear so greatly."

Emerson gestured with his chin toward the noble-born follower knights standing behind him.

The knights also gathered behind Emerson with confident facial expressions.

"Stop this reckless behavior, Vice Knight Commander Emerson."

"No. We can't foolishly hand over the opportunity to build merit to someone else. I will exercise my independent right of command."

At the Vice Knight Commander's declaration, the Knight Commander could do nothing but let out a deep sigh.

The Vice Knight Commander's skill was undoubtedly excellent.

Seeing how he secured that position at a young age thanks to his family's arcane magic, it was an undeniable fact.

But his experience was severely lacking.

'When facing black sorcerers, experience is more important than anything else...'

In his heart, he wanted to stop them.

However, due to the independent right of command strictly granted to the Vice Knight Commander, as well as the political influence his family possessed, it was tricky to block them.

In the end, the only thing the Knight Commander could offer these immature youths was advice.

"...If you don't want to die, keep your backs against the wall and move slowly."

"Yes, yes~ Charge! Let's behead those heretics and establish the Imperial Court's prestige!"

"Waaaah!"

Emerson and dozens of knights shouted war cries as they charged.

Those young men, who had learned arcane magic, had nothing to fear.

The young knights stormed in, throwing open the iron door of Lohengrin's secret laboratory.

The hallway inside the laboratory they entered was bizarrely silent.

Luxurious paintings and vases were on display, but the space, devoid of a single person, gave off a gloomy atmosphere.

"Where are you hiding! If you know honor, come out and fight, you little rats!"

Only silence returned.

The Vice Knight Commander sneered, adjusting his grip on his sword.

"Don't tell me, did they already run away."

"Maybe they are just reasonable. It seems they know how to value their own lives."

His followers chimed in.

At that moment, a bizarre laughter echoed from the darkness at the end of the hallway.

Uhuhut... Ahahat...!

The knights silently drew their swords.

Then, a fragrant smell wafted from the darkness.

Across the hallway where the smell originated, silhouettes of women deeply draped in black robes appeared.

The Vice Knight Commander immediately deduced their identities from their attire and manner of appearance.

"They are the 'witches' belonging to the Hallucination School of the Round Table of Thirteen."

If it had been the past when nothing was known about black magic, they wouldn't have been able to guess with just this tiny clue.

However, thanks to the information provided by the black sorcerers and Belgian, who made a plea bargain in the Academy Territory, they had now reached a level where they could guess their school just by looking at a black sorcerer.

This was also the reason why Emerson had exuded confidence.

"Everyone. Put on your gas masks."

The illusions of the Hallucination School often utilize scents.

That was why they were at a level that could be countered simply by wearing gas masks properly.

"You filthy harlots. In whose presence do you think you are revealing yourselves. I will make you regret that choice."

Emerson, wearing his gas mask, swung his sword.

A sword aura extending from the tip of his sword slashed the necks of two witches.

The start was smooth.

That was the moment the Vice Knight Commander thought so.

"...?"

Emerson paused.

The hallway was twisting.

Heads were reattached to the bodies of the witches whose necks he thought had fallen off.

Immediately after, the perfectly fine walls bent like taffy, and the ceiling flowed downward like water.

Something formless crept out of the old portrait hanging on the wall.

Stone pillars coiled like snakes and lunged at the knights.

Demonic beasts revealed themselves one by one from the still-life paintings hanging on the wall.

"W-Uwaaaah! M-Monsters!!"

"M-Maintain the formation!"

A knight swung his sword frantically into the empty air.

He was a knight famous for being the most courageous.

As such a man fell into a panic, the formation naturally collapsed.

"Damn it!"

Only then did the Vice Knight Commander reach the conclusion that gas masks could not stop the hallucination.

'Was the painting the problem? Or was the hallway itself the problem?'

He couldn't tell.

He guessed that the hallucination was cast through the medium of sight, not the sense of smell, but it was already too late.

"Guaaaah! My legs! My legs!!!"

A knight screamed and rolled on the floor.

His legs were perfectly attached.

But the individual concerned firmly believed his legs had been cut off.

He crawled on the ground, unable to move his perfectly fine legs.

And blood pooled on the floor.

"Uwaaah! Water! Water!!!"

Another knight, believing he was engulfed in flames, frantically threw off his armor and gas mask.

There were flames nowhere.

However, his skin swelled up bright red as if he had suffered a burn, and blisters popped.

"Kuaaak! Take off the thing stuck to my eyeball!"

"My neck... My neck...!"

In an instant, the entrance of the laboratory was filled with the screams and self-harm of the knights who had gone mad.

In the middle of that pandemonium.

The Vice Knight Commander realized his own arrogance.

"T-This is all a hallucination...!"

"Can you be sure, darling?"

At the voice echoing in his ears, he instinctively swung his sword.

Clang!

A comrade who barely reacted blocked that sword.

"Get a grip, Vice Knight Commander! You mustn't believe the hallucinations!"

"I know!"

If the level of mastery is low, hallucination magic simply ends at seeing a hallucination.

However, hallucination magic that has reached a certain level of mastery actually affects the physical body.

The body of someone who believes they burned reacts as if they actually suffered a burn,

And for someone who believes their neck snapped, the nerves inside their neck might actually sever.

A magic where one's own beliefs and delusions are directly reflected onto the physical body.

That was hallucination magic.

"Do not believe in the things that make no sense!"

There was one countermeasure.

To filter out the nonsensical phenomena with one's perception in this situation.

However, even if they knew in their heads that it was a hallucination, not believing the sight before their eyes was near impossible.

And the moment they believed it, that curse immediately became flesh and blood.

"F-Fall back! We retreat!"

But it was already too late.

In the eyes of the Vice Knight Commander looking behind him, the path they had come from was gone.

The hallway twisted into an endless maze.

Where the exit should have been, a pitch-black maw was gaping wide.

Their sense of direction collapsed.

They couldn't tell which way was forward and which way was backward.

The young knights collapsed onto the floor one by one, tearing at their own bodies.

Those who prided themselves as elites were crumbling without being able to mount a countermeasure in front of an invisible enemy.

It was right then.

"...Brothers. Do not lose faith."

Crash-!!

The iron door of the laboratory flew inwards.

From beyond it, Holy Knights draped in gray robes over silver armor walked in, step, step.