Chapter 31: The Decryption & The Teacher

Chapter 31: Chapter 31: The Decryption & The Teacher

"Behind every great fortune there is a crime." — Honoré de Balzac

The city of Caelmont spent the entire morning talking about the two dead bodies at the Mayor’s estate.

Early before dawn, two of Mayor Sterling’s personal house guards were carried down the hill wrapped in quiet white sheets.

The estate issued no public statement about the deaths. That silence made the people of the city even more curious.

The local garrison sent an official clerk to ask questions, but the Mayor received him behind closed doors.

By noon, the news had spread across the aqueduct and down into the lower districts.

The version told in the Rustward claimed that a terrifying shadow wearing the shape of a woman had done the killing.

The version told in the wealthy upper city blamed rival mercenary guilds. Every version agreed on one important fact that mattered to Joel: Mayor Sterling had been robbed in the night, and he could not complain to the authorities without exposing his own secrets.

Joel spent his day staying hidden in plain sight ("being grey"). He sat in the third row of the barracks hall during the official trial briefings.

A garrison instructor stood at the front of the room, explaining the rules for the upcoming Verdant Labyrinth exam.

The exam rules were straightforward: candidates had to survive inside the Labyrinth for three days, collect official tokens, and wait for a drone extraction at the final bell.

Maps of the trial quadrants were pinned to the back wall of the hall. Joel examined the maps once and memorized every detail.

Quadrant Nine sat in the deep southeast corner of the Labyrinth. It was dangerous Level 20 territory. The corrupt Warden had already assigned Joel to Quadrant Nine in his rigged paperwork, making sure Joel would be sent to a deadly area.

Joel studied the paths into Quadrant Nine. To keep anyone from suspecting him, Joel raised his hand during question time, asked a boring question, and was quickly forgotten by the instructor and his classmates.

During dinner in the mess hall, Miss Albright called out to him in her flat, sharp voice.

"Carrow," she said across the room. "Remedial theory in my office before lights-out. Bring something to write with."

Her excuse sounded so boring that none of the forty candidates in the room paid any attention to Joel as he left.

••••••

Miss Albright’s office was small, like a shoebox filled with stacked paper ledgers and lit by a single desk lamp.

She waited until Joel stepped inside and closed the door. She activated the magical warding seal on the doorframe, changing its glowing light from blue to red to prevent anyone from listening in.

"Two of my official letters came back undelivered this week," she said quietly. "And neither of them was posted."

That was her subtle way of asking Joel what had happened. Without saying a word, Joel pulled the stolen cipher-slate out from his coat and placed it on her desk.

She stared at the slate for a long time without touching it. The desk lamp hummed in the quiet room while she processed what she was looking at.

Miss Albright had spent eleven years reading official government paperwork. She recognized the high-level security encryption instantly.

It was Inner City standard encryption, bearing the seal of the quarterly tribute office. It was the kind of secret coding used only by the Mayor himself.

"This is real," she whispered. "This is his personal handwriting. Where you got this is a question I have decided not to ask. If you are smart, you will keep it that way."

She touched the edge of the slate carefully with her fingertips, like a person touching an old scar.

"I cannot read this myself," she admitted. "It requires special decryption keys that I do not own. But there is a man in the Rustward who has been waiting eleven years for this exact document. He has waited because he asked one question too many about what the city was measuring."

She stood up, put on her coat, and prepared to leave. Her face looked calm and settled, like a person who had rehearsed this exact night for many years.

"Come with me, Carrow," she said. "And bring your pen."

•••••

They walked down the cinder slopes toward the Foundry district. The group known as the Cipher-Rats lived beneath an abandoned bathhouse, and the entrance was a hidden laundry chute.

The underground room had a low ceiling and felt warm. It was lit by pale core-lamps and smelled like chalk dust, solder, and old paper.

This was the home of the Rustward’s only honest industry: processing information. Mechanical counting machines made of brass and bone lined the walls, filled with spinning dials.

Racks of hand-copied key codes sat on shelves between them, representing years of stolen security codes.

A small man named Farthing stepped out from behind the machines, wiping chalk dust from his fingers. He looked to be over sixty years old, wearing a tweed coat with shiny elbows and spectacles repaired with fine wire. Dark ink stained his wrists.

"Rachel Albright," Farthing said, looking at her. "In my basement after school hours with a student. This is either trouble or business, and both cost money."

Then he looked at Joel’s wrist and stopped talking. His eyes fixed on the special band Joel was wearing.

"That band," Farthing said, his voice turning quiet. "That is the third one of that model I ever built. I sold it years ago to a sharp young student from the drains who wanted to read secret ledgers without being tracked by system scanners."

He adjusted his spectacles and stared at Joel.

"Tell me where you got it," Farthing demanded. "Because I sold that band to Tommy Wren, and Tommy Wren died on the annex stairs eleven years ago."

"The annex stairs," Albright repeated softly, confirming the painful truth.

Farthing stared at the wristband for a moment longer. Then he set aside his questions and focused entirely on his work.

"Give the slate to me," Farthing said, reaching out his hands. "It uses Inner City tribute standards. I have the key files on my wall."

He locked the cipher-slate into a brass framework fitted with bone dials. His hands moved quickly as he worked, and his habit of counting under his breath resumed.

"This job is free of charge," Farthing added. "Tommy Wren paid for it in advance."

•••••

The decryption process took four full hours. Nobody in the basement sat down or took a break.

The brass counting machines ticked rhythmically as they tested one key file after another. Farthing shouted instructions to his two quiet assistants, adjusting the dials.

Step by step, the magical security seals on the slate broke open like ice melting on a pond.

The first column of data appeared on the screen: the officially reported weights of the quarterly Rift-Core tribute sent upstream to the capital city of Aethelgard.

At midnight, the second column of data unlocked. It revealed the true core weights written in Mayor Sterling’s own hand. The difference between the two columns revealed eleven years of massive theft.

Mayor Sterling had stolen one-tenth of every single wagon load for forty-four consecutive quarters.

In the early morning hours, the machines decoded the rest of the file. Joel stood around the table with Albright and Farthing, examining the complete records of the Mayor’s corrupt fortune.

Sterling had skimmed high-grade Rift-Cores from every delivery and replaced them with low-quality duds.

He sent the stolen wealth out under fake budget labels like "security fees" and "consulting retainers."

The money was paid directly to private military contractors and mercenary groups bearing Karst seals. In the last two quarters, those military payments had doubled in size.

Eleven years of stolen wealth had been converted into a private army.

[Ding!]

[Item Updated: Sterling Tribute Ledger (Encrypted → Decrypted)]

[Contents: 44 quarters of falsified tribute. Diversion: high-grade Rift-Cores. Recipients: private military contractors. Estimated total: massive.]

[System Note: eleven years of compound interest, in men and steel.]

"He is not just rich," Farthing whispered in the lamplight, wiping chalk from his sleeves. "He is building a private army. There is a huge difference."

Miss Albright’s hands began to shake with emotion. She pressed them flat against the table edge to steady herself.

The earliest stolen quarter listed on the ledger matched the exact time her former student, Tomas Wren, had died on the annex stairs.

"Proctor Harrison is an honest man," Albright said when she regained her composure. "The Inner Cities execute politicians for crimes like this. We must take this evidence to him tonight."

"No," Joel said firmly.

His single word quieted the room. He explained his strategy clearly so she could understand his reasoning.

"If you take this to Harrison tonight, here is what will happen," Joel explained. "It will cause a scandal, followed by a slow political investigation.

Sterling has won four elections, has powerful friends upstream, and controls government committees.

Even if the Spire Inquisition eventually comes down in a year and executes him, his corrupt system will remain intact under the next Mayor.

Joel pointed directly at the column showing the true numbers.

"Dead, Mayor Sterling is only worth a single news headline," Joel continued. "Alive, he can be blackmailed for Tier-3 Rift-Cores, rare skillbooks, and official protection.

That steady income pays every quarter. I am going to blackmail him quietly through untraceable channels. I will use his wealth to grow strong enough to survive the Inner Cities.

When I am strong enough, I will destroy him. Exposing his crime is the final step of this plan, not the first step."

A tense silence filled the room as Miss Albright considered his words. She had waited eleven years for justice, and Joel was asking her to wait a little longer.

"The evidence must still go to the Inquisition when the time comes," Albright insisted. "It cannot be sold away or hidden forever. The crime must be delivered to the people who execute criminals."

"Agreed," Joel replied.

"And the official record must be corrected," she added, her voice filled with deep emotion. "When this file is exposed, it must carry the name of the student who found the discrepancy first. The whole city must learn how Tomas Wren died and why. That is my non-negotiable price, Carrow."

"Ma’am," Joel answered respectfully, "you asked to hold the pen. Hold it a little longer, and when the final entry is written, it will be written in his honor."

They left 400 credits on Farthing’s worktable as payment before climbing back up the laundry chute into the night.

As they walked through the ash and smog, Nyx spoke softly from the shadows.

"The old teacher counts her dead just as carefully as you count your credits, Architect," Nyx remarked. "You surround yourself with interesting people."

’Our house hires only the best bookkeepers,’ Joel thought in response. He pulled his coat collar up against the cold air and walked up the hill toward the barracks. ’Tomorrow night, we contact the Mayor and discuss his next step.’