WeTried Translations
Translator: Botanica
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Became the Slit-Eyed Henchman of the Evil Boss ◈
Chapter 105
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Resolving the Misunderstanding (2)
Karisia was overlooking two things.
First, that her own way of speaking had been shaped enormously by Ortes's influence.
It was that same distinctive manner of speech that had made Lampades sense Ortes's shadow in her the very first time they met.
A pressure that lingered even though she was clearly addressing people with the utmost politeness, a feeling only someone who had actually been through Ortes could truly understand.
"A pleasure to meet you. I doubt I need another introduction for Lampades, but this is our first meeting, Knemon. I am Karisia, president of Hydra Corp."
Knemon shot Lampades a desperate look. It wasn't an attempt to communicate through their eyes alone, the two of them weren't nearly close enough for that.
If Lampades applied his bioelectric-current detection magic, he could read surface-level thoughts through the optic nerve. The eyes, being the organ most directly wired to the brain, were the best possible point from which to peek at someone's consciousness.
A cue: read my thoughts, and fast.
'What in the world is she to Ortes, anyway?'
The moment Lampades cast the spell, Knemon's bewilderment came through vividly.
Lampades mulled over how to answer, then just shook his head.
'I have no idea either...'
Karisia watched the two of them, tense as defendants awaiting a verdict, and gave her head a slow shake.
'Ortes told me he had three friends.'
She rather hoped the last one, at least, would turn out to be a real friend. Sending up a small prayer for a scrap of luck on behalf of her thoroughly friendless right hand, Karisia gave the papers in her hand a soft flick and turned them over.
Two bundles of paper rose into the air and, guided by her mana, drifted down to settle lightly in front of Knemon and Lampades.
"Out of concern for possible Ether Space hacking, I will be giving this briefing in a rather old-fashioned way. I hope you will understand."
Slowly, solemnly, the explanation began.
* * *
"I believe you are all aware that Etna City is currently in something of a state of war."
The three Magic Towers that split Etna City between them. Hydra Corp had, through remarkable control, pushed the Geryones faction to the very brink of collapse, but Kaicel's tower had abruptly allied with Geryones, throwing the whole operation off course.
...At least, that was how it looked on the surface. In truth, every Magic Tower in Etna City had already fallen into Hydra Corp's hands, and the fighting still going on was nothing more than demolition work to clear the ground for the city's swift redevelopment.
Maintaining the appearance of war served to keep the Ten Towers' attention to a minimum. A Magic Tower that couldn't even secure dominance over one measly city gave the wider mage society no reason to take notice.
Karisia didn't reveal any of this behind-the-scenes detail. She saw no need to.
"I understand why you might find this strange. With Ortes around, you are probably thinking, getting rid of the master of some city Magic Tower with a sudden, violent death ought to be a simple matter."
That was exactly the suspicion Lampades had been harboring. Knowing Ortes the way he did, it wouldn't have surprised him in the least if Ortes turned up one night carrying a Magic Tower Master's corpse, cheerfully announcing, "Ha, ha, ha. Seemed a waste of rice to keep him fed, so I cut his head off."
"And to some extent, that really is the case."
"To some extent?"
"We could remove Geryones this instant if we wanted. The problem is Kaicel. He has only ever issued a statement of support for Geryones. His actual whereabouts have never been revealed."
Karisia meant to smooth over this suspicion by leaning on Kaicel's disappearance.
Kaicel was the type to wander into Hydra Corp whenever he got bored, claiming he wanted to study the sacred relics they'd collected, and just walk off with them (something that had actually been sanctioned, for the sake of the artificial Ten Commandments project), or to show up at the president's office out of nowhere and wail for a bigger budget (apparently too intimidated to say it directly to his own workplace superior, the Head of the Divinity Investigation Office). But Lampades had no idea Kaicel had become one of Hydra Corp's own hands and feet. He wasn't likely to notice anything off.
"So our company intends to adopt a somewhat aggressive expansion strategy."
Kaicel had gathered sacred relics through various channels to use as samples for building the artificial Ten Commandments. Ordinarily, that would only earn him a bit of finger-pointing over having a suspicious hobby. But things were different now, with the Ten Towers having announced a sweeping inspection of sacred relics.
"Call it an off-the-record maneuver to flush Kaicel out into the open. I have heard Knemon has a hobby of collecting other Magic Towers' weak points."
Neither Knemon nor Lampades were politically dull. Lampades had honed the instinct navigating the checks and pressures that came after founding his own tower; Knemon had acquired his through the education he'd received as a Magic Tower heir.
Knemon spoke slowly.
"So then, President Karisia. Are you saying you mean to denounce Kaicel on some charge of concealing sacred relics?"
Knemon had withdrawn from the front lines, but he still had eyes and ears. The story that a terrorist group opposing the Ten Towers had joined hands with superstition followers. Naturally, he was well aware of how much more sensitive the Ten Towers had grown toward the old cults' relics, the ones people called sacred relics, because of it.
"That is correct. If Kaicel answers the Ten Towers' summons, we will be able to track him down. And if he does not answer, his tower will be dismantled by the Ten Towers' own hand instead. But I did not invite you here over something as small as Kaicel alone."
"Not just Kaicel?"
Knemon felt something strange, something like fear and a bizarre kind of fervor, both rising up inside him at once. He'd fled once, overwhelmed by Ortes's madness, but there had been a time when he too had dreamed of overturning the entire mage society.
As he saw it, now was exactly the right moment to overturn the world. While Argyrion kept the Ten Towers occupied, one could build strength unnoticed, amid everyone's indifference.
"To be precise, Ortes really did mean to call you in to deal with Kaicel. Everything from here is my own idea."
This was a courtesy on Karisia's part. Ortes had been reluctant, hadn't he, to say outright in front of Lampades that he meant to fleece other Magic Towers.
So if she let the "fleecing other Magic Towers" part pass as her own idea, and let the reason for seeking out Knemon be framed as her own order, to find a way to deal with a business rival, then Ortes's standing among his friends wouldn't take a hit.
'Though whether he has any standing left to spare in the first place is another matter entirely.'
Ortes.
Knemon repeated the name silently to himself.
The instant he heard that name, Knemon felt his excitement drain away, as if waking from a dream. All that remained where the fervor had been was a dark, creeping fear.
His own dream of overturning mage society had meant the end of the Ten Towers system: tearing down the Magic Towers' social structure with extradimensional power, then starting fresh atop a leveled, equal ruin.
But what Ortes dreamed of, clearly, was an annihilation that wouldn't even leave a ruin behind.
...And Karisia, the one to whom that same Ortes gave his loyalty, was surely no different.
"Yes. Other Magic Towers. Ones holding contraband that would spell serious trouble for them if word ever reached the Ten Towers. We intend to build a 'smooth working relationship' using the stolen goods they have been secretly hoarding."
'Needing other Magic Towers... does that mean using sacred relics as blackmail leverage to extract their secret arts?'
That was far too ordinary, too trivial, to be one of Ortes's plans. There was no way something that small could be a scheme with Ortes's own touch added on, let alone one embellished further by the president he was loyal to. A different possibility flickered through Knemon's mind.
'Subjugate the Magic Towers... to get their mana cores?'
That the greater the mana a thing held, the greater the explosion it produced, was a truth unchanged across all ages.
If one could draw and control a continent-spanning magic formation anchored on multiple Magic Towers, and then funnel every last scrap of accumulated mana purely into an explosion, it would surely become an annihilating flame that could scour the very surface of the earth.
'But is there any artifact capable of containing and controlling mana on that scale?'
If such a thing existed, there could only be the Decalogue itself-
'Ortes, and Karisia too, are drawing up some grand design. I can't afford to think about this in ordinary terms. They wouldn't give up on a plan just because it requires the Decalogue. I have to assume they mean to get their hands on it, one way or another.'
The chaotic situation. Magic Towers subjugated under the name of Hydra Corp. The Ten Towers' authority in decline.
'...A Succession War?'
Multiple Magic Towers banding together to challenge a single one of the Ten Towers was the traditional shape a Succession War took.
'Do they mean to seize a seat among the Ten Towers, and then blow civilization apart with a chain of massive explosions powered by the Decalogue!'
A shudder of horror ran down Knemon's spine. Climb to the very summit of mage society, only to destroy that society. It was exactly the kind of thing only Ortes would think to do.
A long silence stretched out. In the end, the choice was Knemon's own to make. Cold sweat ran down his forehead.
A ruin that left behind not even ashes, rather than a new world rising up beneath a burnt one, wasn't the future Knemon had wanted.
"I'm sorry, but-"
The door burst open.
"Karisia. There's something I need to ask-"
A height that looked to be twice that of an ordinary person. And, set into the socket where a right eye should have been, an enchant-ware artificial eye.
It was Kaicel, the one who was supposed to have vanished.
"...Oh, dear. I didn't realize you had guests at this hour. I'll come back a little later."
Kaicel bowed deeply at the waist and slipped back out of the room. Such extreme deference, shown toward Karisia. Knemon's mind reeled with confusion. Hadn't she just said she'd called him here to deal with Kaicel?
Then the thought caught up with him.
Ortes had been outside the door.
It was Ortes who had let Kaicel in.
Kaicel had walked in at the exact moment Knemon had been about to voice his refusal. Too perfectly timed to be coincidence.
All of it, surely, had gone exactly as intended.
A formality staged purely to deliver the message: even if you refuse to cooperate, the plan is already underway.
Knemon shot Lampades a sidelong glance. Whether he simply hadn't recognized Kaicel, or had no idea at all what was going on, his face was nothing but a mask of confusion.
"...I shall accept your proposal."
If ruin was certain no matter how he struggled, then he would rather face it head-on, from as close as possible. Knemon made up his mind.
Karisia agonized for a moment over how to smooth over this sudden mess, then decided to just brazen it out.
How could anyone be certain the person who'd just walked in and out was really Kaicel? If she simply insisted it had been some Hydra Corp employee who happened to look like him, who would know the difference?
Even if they'd noticed it was Kaicel, they had no way to actually prove it.
If Karisia claimed the person who'd just come and gone wasn't Kaicel, the two of them would have no choice but to accept it.
And it was here that the second thing Karisia had overlooked came shining through.
"A truly wise choice. One last thing."
She herself believed she was, at least, less suspicious than Ortes.
"My apologies for our employee's mistake. This meeting wasn't on the schedule, so he must not have realized we had guests."
"Employee...?"
Knemon muttered.
"Yes, just a rank-and-file employee."
In truth, there were times Karisia was even more suspicious than Ortes.
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