☆★☆★☆★
“…That size has always been twenty gold coins.”
“Orders came in from the necromancer circles. For use in ritual magic, they say. The market’s up.”
A cramped room. Sitting across a table from a pudgy man who plainly wasn’t going to engage, Sheryl puffed her cheeks out.
Well, as for what business a back guild actually does—it brokers.
In this case, that means taking an order and handing over goods.
They basically trade illegal items, so as a rule the goods themselves aren’t here on any day but the handover.
And the guild itself is just a small office. Unlike an adventurers’ guild, there aren’t adventurers… or rather, in this case, rough-trade assassins or bodyguards or thugs, hanging around.
Assemble what’s needed when it’s needed, meet supply and demand, settle immediately.
This would all be fear of a raid from above. Naturally, ledgers—anything that could become evidence—shouldn’t be here either.
Keep the damage to a minimum if anything happens… that kind of wisdom.
“…I need a magic crystal. Without it I cannot live.”
“Sorry, missy. We’ve got to give priority to whoever puts up the money.”
“…But my order came first.”
“This isn’t the straight world. In a hard business that moves on nothing but profit, it happens. Give it up.”
Sheryl went pale. Well, if her magic supply gets cut off it’s a literal matter of life and death, so that’s hardly surprising.
And then came the sound of knocking at the entrance. Three knocks, a pause, then two.
The pudgy man across from us stood and headed for the door. He returned one knock, and one came back.
He opened the lock, and the man who came in wore a black robe. The pudgy man checked him over and gave a small nod.
“Magic crystals, right. Got exactly what you ordered.”
At that, Sheryl said to the pudgy man, pleading.
“…Please wait. I will prepare the money. If you give me time… without fail.”
At that, the black-robed man dropped his gaze to Sheryl and me and cocked his head.
“Hm? What are these brats?”
“Ah, I had requests from two parties this time. This missy ordered at twenty gold coins, the gentleman at forty.”
“So that’s it. Sudden order, so… the cancellation notice didn’t make it in time, that it? Well, it happens. Give it up, missy.”
Sheryl glared at the black-robed man.
“…I cannot accept that. This man is obviously going to use it for something rotten.”
Something seemed to occur to the black-robed man. He looked hard at Sheryl’s hood and caught his breath.
“Cat-ear hood… ah, I remember. You… Brad’s little sister? He used to come around our… the Marx family.”
Sheryl gave a small nod, and the black-robed man said this.
“I see, I see… no wonder you need magic crystals.”
“…If you know the situation, then hand it over. All the more if you are Brother’s associate.”
Taking that in, the black-robed man wore a vulgar smile.
“Unfortunately, your big brother’s already out of our outfit.”
“…What does that mean?”
“He had a magic academy ID, see. Came in real handy. Said he needed money, so he’d walk right out onto any dangerous bridge you put in front of him. Gutsy kid, I’ll give him that.”
“…So I am asking what that means. I cannot reach Brother much either. I do not know how he is.”
“His head went clean off the rails lately. Don’t know what he’s doing now… but I don’t hear anything good.”
“…Regardless, hand it over. Twenty gold coins I can pay.”
“Hey, you? A minute ago you said I’d only use it for something rotten, didn’t you? Well—I probably will use it for something rotten. The man I’m passing it to is a necromancer, after all.”
“…Then hand it over.”
And the black-robed man cut her off flat.
“No. This crystal sells for a hundred gold. Which means sixty gold coins for moving it left to right, see? You know addition and subtraction? Well, that’s what it is. And so—brat. What makes you think you get to talk big?”
“…?”
“You’re living on dirty money the same as me, aren’t you? Aren’t you the sister of the sewer rat who earned his coin helping us out?”
“…I do not care about myself. But do not speak ill of Brother.”
“Let me spell it out. Living like that, you’re a filthy rag, a piece of garbage. You live on dirty money and you want to say you alone are clean? People like you are what piss me off the most. This is why brats—”
“…”
“So know your place. You piss-stinking kid.”
And the black-robed man took a pouch from inside his coat.
“Here you go. Forty gold coins.”
The pudgy man made a complicated sort of face and asked the black-robed man a question.
“A hundred gold… you’re moving it left to right at more than double? That’s a bit much, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s a bulk order. We’re cutting it fine too… if I don’t get the numbers together exactly, we breach the contract and eat an enormous loss. And look, even if you tried what we’re doing, you can barely source a single unit here, right?”
“That’s true enough… well, nothing for it. Forty gold is double the market anyway. Still, that necromancer’s something else. Completely ignoring the going rate… must want the numbers whatever it takes.”
“Yeah, well. Here’s to a long relationship.”
The black-robed man took a seat at the table across from us, and the pudgy man, sitting beside him, opened the mouth of the pouch he’d been handed.
And the pudgy man began counting, building four towers of ten gold coins on the table.
“Forty gold coins, confirmed.”
Nodding deeply, the black-robed man turned that vulgar smile on Sheryl again.
“If it stings, go ahead and stack up more towers than that. Though on your big brother’s earnings, I doubt it.”
“Ngh…”
With Sheryl on the verge of tears beside me, I took a large pouch out of my bag.
“Then I’ll stack the coins in this kid’s place. Five towers of gold… yeah?”
I opened the pouch and dumped the coins out onto the table.
Really glad I brought two hundred just in case, I thought, from the bottom of my heart. Well, the pouch got a bit big and that was awkward.
“Wh…!”
“Hm? Some problem? I heard just now that selling to whoever puts up the money is the back guild’s way?”
And the black-robed man went pale and raised his voice.
“Hey, wait! This has to go to some seriously dangerous people! If I don’t source it properly I’ll—I’ll get beaten half to death by the boss!”
Yeah, wouldn’t know. Nothing else comes out of my mouth in a situation like this.
“So? What’s it going to be?”
I asked the pudgy man.
“No, but… the gentleman’s a regular…”
At those words the color came back to the black-robed man’s face.
“That’s right! I’m a regular! I’m not like you people, once a year!”
Ah, what a tiresome bunch. And I shrugged.
“Then a hundred gold is fine. So? What’s it going to be? You wouldn’t enjoy it either… having it moved left to right at more than double?”
Well, there’s as much money as you like in the mansion’s storehouse.
My disciples… Merlin and the rest left half of my previous life’s assets untouched, the half I told them to use for the advancement of magic.
Frankly, I’m not hurting for money. And the pudgy man thought and smiled.
“Sold!”
And taking that in, I smiled back and answered.
“Bought!”
And so the black-robed man stood there letting out an anguished cry.
And on the way home.
Sheryl, who’d been silent from the moment she took the magic crystal until we got outside, asked me this.
“…Why does Ephthal do so much for me? A hundred gold coins is… a very great deal of money.”
“My house is the Alcott ducal house. Your family’s ancestor did mine a service, so… we have a family precept.”
The service is true. But the precept’s a lie. No such thing exists.
“…A family precept?”
“The Four Emperors walked the line of death as kin. Help one another, and let that bond be eternal… let it hold through every generation of our descendants… that kind of precept.”
Well, we did swear something like that before we stormed the Demon King’s castle. We fought constantly, mind, but everyone got along.
“…The Four Emperors… the Thunder God Emperor Ephthal. I have heard he hated crooked things, and was a man of duty and feeling.”
Oh, sounds like you educated your kid well, Isaac. And I nodded along, pleased.
“…Though I hear when he got angry he was violent, and on top of that his personality was outrageous and nobody could handle him.”
That part was unnecessary, Isaac… And I nearly fell over.
Well, it’s true. Once the switch flips there’s no helping it… yeah.
“…Ephthal? Then the first sandwich too? Did you do that knowing I was of the Ice God Emperor’s line?”
“That was simply me being a busybody. I didn’t know who you were at the time.”
And hearing that, Sheryl spread both arms. And she flung herself into me and—
“Huuug… Ephthal really is a good person.”
By the way— and I asked.
“Could you tell me about your brother? From what you said, he goes to the magic academy?”
Well, after a story like that of course I’m curious, and there’s no way I can leave it unasked here.
“…Money was needed to keep me alive. The means were as you heard. I have barely met Brother for two years. He said that, dirtied as he is, he might dirty me… and told me one-sidedly that he did not want to see me. Sometimes we exchange letters, businesslike… but that is all.”
Hmm. A strong sense of justice, or caring too much, or something along those lines.
Bound too tightly by his morals, probably. But thinking of a man like that earning his money in the underworld… it makes for a feeling I can’t name.
“…Come to think of it, I saw Brother at this festival, so I am surprised.”
“Well, the story is he goes to the magic academy, right? So wouldn’t it be perfectly normal for him to be there?”
At that, Sheryl shook her head, small, side to side.
“…For some reason he has been chosen as a class representative. Brother works incredibly hard… but he has no talent for magic, and his marks at the magic academy were faster counted from the bottom. So I am surprised.”
“I mean, wouldn’t that just be incredible effort?”
“…He should already have been making effort close to his limit. Climbing from there to class representative is impossible.”
And with that Sheryl looked up at the sky with distant eyes.
“…I am very worried. I think he is probably trying to do something for my sake. Money is still needed to keep supporting me. Win the festival and your future is as good as promised.”
“Worried? Why’s that?”
“…Humans have all sorts of enhancement methods… I worry he is wrecking his body with reckless doping. That person will choose any means for his ends.”
Doping… huh. Well, there are various ways, but in most cases the downsides are too big and ordinary people don’t use them.
Concretely, your lifespan shortens, or it loads your brain or your organs. Nothing good comes of it.
“…Watching Brother get dirty for my sake, and get hurt… that is very sad, and I worry.”
And I let out a sigh.
“What a genuinely worthless breed.”
“…Worthless? My story with Brother?”
“No. The guy behind us.”
I turned around, and there was the black-robed man from before, flashing a knife, coming our way.
“Hey, kid. Hand over the magic crystal, nice and quiet.”
“Your reason?”
“I told you before, didn’t I? I bring that back or things go bad for me.”
Another deep sigh.
“You’re the ones at fault for walking around a slum like this with nothing but kids. Whatever happens, you can’t complain.”
“Right—whatever happens, there’ll be no complaining. From you.”
I scooped Sheryl up into my arms. And with that, I triggered physical enhancement, put the power into my legs, and jumped.
“…Eh?”
A single backhand, in passing.
“Aghk!?”
A joke of a sound rang out—thunk—and the feel of a cheekbone breaking came back through my hand.
And the man flew about ten meters, rolled and rolled along the ground, and eventually stopped.
Last of all I set Sheryl gently down on her feet, and that settles that.
“Right, let’s go home.”
And Sheryl blinked, and said this, looking startled.
“…Ephthal… you were that strong?”
Ah, come to think of it, Sheryl had never seen me fight.
And so I laughed and answered her.
“Well, I’m a descendant of the Thunder God Emperor.”
“…Ephthal?”
“What is it, Sheryl?”
“…There are words Maria said. I… somehow understand them. That she got a place to be. Warm and noisy… fun, a place where you can feel safe. I think for me that is here.”
The moment she finished, Sheryl spread both arms and dove into my chest.
“…Huuug.”
And so I gave a wry smile, and patted Sheryl on the head.
☆★☆★☆★
Right, today is day two of the semifinals.
We’d learn who we were up against in the finals, so we were watching from the competitors’ waiting room, scouting the enemy—
“Oh my, if it isn’t Maria-san? What is the lowest-year flat-chest doing in a place like this, I wonder?”
“Oh my, if it isn’t Irene-san? I showed you power like you asked, and you still talk that way? This is why holsteins who send all their nutrition to their chests—actually, you’re irritating, so don’t come picking at me.”
Feels like sparks are snapping between those two.
Well, the whole thing started with Irene-san and company coming to pick at us before we headed to the match.
“Fufu, but Maria-san?”
“What? Still got complaints?”
At that, Irene-san flipped from her usual harshness into a gentle smile.
“When I recall the days of being pestered day after day with ‘fight me, fight me’… I do have various thoughts about it, but—”
Ah, you got done by Maria too, Irene-san.
Those words gave me a sudden sense of kinship with her, and I had to laugh.
“I could acknowledge you now. Your ability.”
“Wh—what’s with you all of a sudden, it’s creepy.”
“I told you, didn’t I? The student council acknowledges those with ability.”
And the Student Council President held out his right hand to me.
“Ephthal-kun… was it? Your Level 5 was splendid. And Anonymous Hope-san’s illusion, too.”
A handshake, apparently.
Well, refusing when someone asks for a handshake is strange too. Let’s go along with it here.
“Which means the finals are us and you… is that it. I promise we’ll face it fairly and with everything we have. Right, Vice President?”
“Yes, that’s right, President. Ah, that reminds me, Maria-san? The truth is we’re short-handed for secretary. You kept challenging me because you wanted to join the student council… didn’t you?”
“W-well… that was true at the time.”
“Come and visit the student council room once the festival’s over—you’ll be welcome. All of you, of course.”
“What is with you, really, all of a sudden, it’s creepy… no, that’s wrong, that isn’t it… yeah, that isn’t it, is it.”
And Maria, whose face had been sour all this time, shrugged like someone giving it up.
“Thank you for acknowledging me. I really am glad about that. But I… won’t be joining the student council.”
Irene-san opened her eyes wide, startled.
“And why is that? After you were so persistent…”
“Because I got one… I guess.”
“Got one?”
Maria shifted her gaze to me, and her cheeks colored a little.
“Sorry, but I’ve already got—a place to be.”
And so Irene-san let out a slightly disappointed breath.
Straight after, Irene-san and the Student Council President looked at each other and gave wry smiles.
“It appears we’ve been turned down… President.”
“Haha, well. Free will is a thing to respect.”
And the Student Council President smiled and began walking toward the platform.
“Then let’s meet in the finals. First-years.”
“Maria-san, I acknowledge that on average your magic skills are higher. However—how will it go in a real fight, I wonder?”
And with that—the student council members climbed up onto the platform.