Chapter 170

That pricey tea. I really wanted to try it.

Inside the wagon making its way along the mountain road. Sally, perched on the jolting floor, scratched his head for no particular reason.

The cup of tea he'd missed out on last night.

A drink some country bumpkin who preferred bread over fruit and a meaty stew over chopped greens had never expected would pass his lips, and yet it kept flickering in his mind.

Well, it's a relief at least. The kid doesn't look hurt or burned anywhere.

Sally turned his eyes toward Maxwell beside him. The boy was sitting in a daze, staring at the sunset.

By any measure, it was just a sky settling into evening like any other. What was so fascinating about it that he'd lost himself like that?

"Ahem."

Sally watched the swaying profile for a while, then cleared his throat softly.

The scene from last night came back to him—when he'd returned with cold water after leaving the two mugs behind.

[Ah, what a mess. I tried to set the cup down nearby and spilled the contents all over my hand. So I had to run down to the stream….]

[Oh dear, you're not hurt, are you….]

Sally recalled Maxwell with water dripping from his soaked sleeves, then shook his head and let it go.

Expensive tea or whatever. It was already in the past—no point dwelling on it.

The kid who felt like a little brother to him wasn't hurt anywhere, and that was enough….

─Crash!

The wagon lurched hard and tilted sideways.

Sally rolled across the floor like he'd been ambushed, then scrambled upright in an instant.

He was about to shout and ask what was going on when a voice from nearby beat him to it.

"Hey, has this damn driver lost his mind? What is he even doing since yesterday? Drive the wagon proper—!"

Grrr….

That was when it happened. Cutting through the horses' shrieks, a sound that turned his spine to ice drove straight into his ears.

Sally froze in place, mouth still open.

The cry he'd just heard. He knew what it was. But it was also the very last thing he wanted to admit.

Don't tell me—that's the sound a magical beast makes….

Grrrrr.

The chilling resonance grew sharper, confirming suspicion as certainty.

The atmosphere inside the wagon froze in an instant. The passengers stiffened up and began trading frightened glances.

"D-damn it… damn it! Weren't we almost out of the mountain range? Why now, of all times…?"

Sally whipped his head around toward his companion.

Maxwell, sitting at the edge of the wagon, was staring blankly out at the scene beyond the lifted oil-cloth.

Sally hurriedly stretched out his arm, pulled the boy inward, and dropped the cloth. The body heat against his skin felt unusually cold.

"You have to keep quiet. Don't want the magical beasts spotting us."

When Sally looked down, Maxwell had his mouth clamped shut and was trembling faintly.

Then, as though it had taken him a beat to come to his senses, he raised his eyes, nodded, and pulled his shoulders in tight.

"……"

Only the sound of breathing passed between them. Everyone held still as mice and strained to listen to the noise outside.

Blades colliding and sliding, the clang of metal. The wet sound of something tough being split and torn. And the sharp report of something being fired off….

A jumbled mess of sounds rang out all at once.

Whoosh!

That was when it happened. The oil-cloth covering the wagon's opening was yanked aside, and a flushed-faced escort thrust his head into the cabin.

"All of you—help us out here! With the men we've got, we can't hold back the magical beasts coming at us!"

"What… what did you say?"

The passengers' faces went pale. Beneath the silence pressing down on the air, one man stammered out a reply.

"H-hold on. Does that even make sense? We've got no combat experience, nothing to swing…."

The escort scanned the cabin and shot back.

"Weak ones are flooding in and it's making a mess of things. We'll handle the strong ones, so just beat back the ones that latch on. We'll lend you weapons."

"……"

"Come on out. Move!"

Even after the escort's explanation, the passengers only shifted around, eyeing one another. None of them got up.

The escort surveyed every face inside and twisted his own with anger, then roared.

"You all want to die in here? Get out and pick up a weapon!"

"…!"

"We've sent up the support signal, so as long as we hold out until the patrol arrives, nothing'll happen! But if we go down before that? You think a bunch of greenhorns with no combat experience can hold back a swarm of magical beasts?"

The passengers stared at one another with stricken faces, mouths clamped shut.

A moment dragged on like that.

Finally, one man shot to his feet and shouted as if surrendering to fate.

"Damn it… fine! I'm going! Going out, all right?"

Once one man took the lead, the rest began muttering and grumbling, but they started getting up too.

Sally, watching the situation unfold, also pushed himself up on one knee.

He turned toward the exit and was about to move, then looked down at Maxwell beside him and spoke.

"Maxwell. You stay here."

Maxwell seemed to have meant to follow him out. He flinched, looked up at Sally, and stumbled over his words.

"Ah… but I—"

Sally curved a faint smile onto his lips. Then he pressed down on the restless boy's shoulder and continued.

"I get it. You want to help. But moving right now would just put you in danger. Sit tight."

Maxwell let the tension drain from his shoulders, though he hadn't fully accepted the words.

He hesitated, then reached up to grab Sally's sleeve.

But the motion stopped short. A laborer passing by the pair sneered and tossed in a remark.

"Tch, listen to him. Dim kid jumping into the fray just means more headaches for the rest of us. The same one who was bawling over a few raised voices is gonna swing at a magical beast? Yeah, right."

"……"

Maxwell ducked his head down like a puppy caught in the rain and slowly pulled back the arm he'd extended.

Sally glanced at the laborer brushing past him, then tapped Maxwell's slumped shoulder lightly and said.

"That came from a guy with a rotten attitude. No point taking that kind of sneering to heart. But separately—I'm with him that you should stay here. You get what I mean, right?"

Maxwell answered yes in a small voice. Sally turned at once and stepped down out of the wagon.

Clatter.

The escort hadn't been exaggerating. The area around the wagons was complete chaos with magical beasts charging in from every direction.

Grrrrr!

Rabbits, mountain rats, small gold-crystal dholes….

Creatures bearing gold crystals sprouting like a shell, throats bared and teeth out, hurling themselves forward with nothing else on their minds.

Sally clicked his tongue, grabbed a wooden club lying nearby, and swung.

Thwack!

A mountain rat that had been lunging at Sally went flying through the air, scattering shards of gold crystal as it went.

Good. Next one.

Sally exhaled and tightened his grip on the weapon.

Just then, the muttering of a laborer swinging a club nearby drifted into his ears.

"Ugh, hell. Of all the times to get a headache. Like they say, bad things come in waves. What rotten luck."

---

"……"

Before long, the wagon interior went quiet.

Once the hush settled into proper stillness, Mikhail lifted his head and let his eyes sweep the space.

The emptied wagon held no trace of anyone left behind.

Lucky thing Sally told me to stay put. Saves me the trouble of moving in and out.

Mikhail let out a breath, pulled the decoy scroll from the bag he'd brought, and shuffled forward on his knees.

The peddlers who'd just left.

They'd glanced at Mikhail on their way out of the wagon, but they'd left without saying anything more.

They figured I wasn't worth worrying about. That's why they moved without bothering with any precautions.

…Of course, they'd be banking on at least one other safeguard besides that.

Rustle.

Mikhail moved over to the second pile of cargo, leaned in, and located the bag wedged between the crates.

It looked like any leather bag you'd see anywhere.

But deep inside, there would be a scroll keyed to set off some kind of disturbance.

Whrrrr—.

The moment Mikhail narrowed his eyes and laid a hand on the bag.

A red glow rose from the wooden tag dangling from the bag like an ornament, and a magic formula appeared.

I know what this is.

A security formula the enemy used.

Mikhail placed a fingertip on the crimson pattern that had just surfaced.

A standard security formula would key off an individual's mana signature, but….

But the enemy at this point in time didn't use standard-form security formulas.

Wary of pursuit, members of the organization avoided formulas that could pinpoint an individual.

Which is why what's running here is a security formula built off a pattern they're familiar with.

Intersecting diagonals and circles forming a distorted star.

To unlock the formula in front of him, he had to draw the pattern that had appeared in a single stroke, within three seconds.

Easy enough.

Mikhail moved his hand after the briefest pause. He traced the answer in his head onto the wooden tag.

Click.

The formula lost its glow and faded. Mikhail opened the bag and peered inside.

Amid an assortment of clutter sat a single scroll wrapped in black silk. The scroll he'd come for.

Rustle.

Mikhail drew the scroll out and slipped it into his coat. Before pushing the decoy scroll in to replace it, he gave the interior another look.

The situation was shifting, after all. He wanted to know if there was anything else worth flagging….

Nothing much else, by the look of it? In that case, I'll just—

That was when it happened.

─Clack.

A palm-sized crystal fell out from deep inside the bag. Deep purple, with a formula etched across its surface.

The moment Mikhail registered the shape of the mana stone, his eyes flew wide. His steady breathing snagged hard, as if it had caught on a high ledge.

A condensation formula?

Mikhail barely managed to swallow the groan trying to escape. He knew what the scene in front of him meant.

The enemy's mana operations had moved past the stage of using simple injection.

Even if only in rudimentary form, they'd begun applying formulas to their own mana and distributing it that way. Which meant….

Two stages ahead of the original progression?

His fingertips, gripping the bag, trembled.

In the same instant a red flash entered Mikhail's vision as he stared at the surface of the mana stone, a chill shot up his spine.

Mikhail rolled to the side without hesitation.

─Bang!

A hair's breadth. The instant Mikhail cleared the spot he'd been kneeling in, a thunderous crash blew a hole through the side of the wagon.

"Cough…."

Mikhail pushed himself up, coughing. He moved quickly to brace himself against whoever had broken in and stretched out a hand.

But he was a beat too late. The one who'd come crashing through was a fraction faster—seizing the back of his neck and pinning him down.

Thud!

Mikhail bit down on his lip with his head pressed to the floor.

Breathing in ragged pulls, he shifted his eyes and looked up at the figure straddling his back with a grip on his nape.

"Well, well. Didn't see that coming."

The highest-ranked of the disguised operatives.

The orange-haired youth was looking down at him with a sneer hooked across his face.