CHAPTER 4
The Forbidden, Forgotten Name
1
Imperial territory. Easternmost Altoria jurisdiction.
Center of the eastern edge of the Empire, Altoria City.
“Is this an industrialized area?”
“It is what it looks like.”
Jhin had said that to Rin, who was murmuring while looking out the window of the large car.
“There’s plenty of land in the countryside. The outskirts are for dairy pasture, and they use this area for industry, apparently. They collect the iron ore from all over the Empire here.”
“…So it’s a military operation?”
“Why would something as large as that be out here? They make cars and airplanes, at most.”
Manufacturing plants dotted the vast green plains. Wisps of white smoke rose from the chimneys post-filtering.
“Hey, Iska?” Commander Mismis leaned out the car window. “I still don’t see the place Miss Sisbell was taken yet.”
“…It’s not going to look like there’s anything shady going on there, duh.”
They were seeing only one large factory after the other. Though all the buildings were easily large enough for hiding a single person, just as Jhin had pointed out, they were mostly plane and car factories, and privately owned at that.
…The workers who aren’t in on it at the factories would create a huge commotion if they discovered Sisbell.
…So they wouldn’t be able to use a facility unless it had ties to the Hydra.
That was likely why Rin also felt dubious.
It would have been easier for them to take Sisbell to a cheap hotel in an out-of-the-way town or keep her confined in a rented warehouse rather than in an industrial area like this.
Why would they bring her here?
“Well, whatever. We’re going to where the signal came from, at any rate. Then we can talk after.”
Rin held an earring in the image of a sun. They had come here believing that the transmission from the IC card hidden inside it pointed to the location where Sisbell was being held. They couldn’t turn back now.
“The coordinates are close. Do you see anything suspicious, Imperial swordsman?”
“Nope, not at all.” Iska was also paying close attention. Just as Rin had pointed out, no matter how far they drove, the only buildings intermittently popping up across the vast plain were factories. “Just the same old landscape.”
“Keep your eyes peeled. I’m sure you’d be able to see through a concrete wall with your naked eyes.”
“What are you going on about this time…?”
“I bet you could track Lady Sisbell’s scent if it was coming downwind.”
“What do you think I am?!”
He opened the map with chagrin.
“A suspicious-looking location, though…,” Iska mused. “If we can tell that the place is fishy at a glance, then I think the locals would see it that way, too.”
“Iska.” Nene, who was in the driver’s seat, pointed up ahead. “The coordinates are over there.”
She gestured to a construction building partitioned by concrete walls. They were still too far away from it to get a clear look at what was going on there.
“Nene, could you do a loop around the wall?”
“You got it, Commander. They’ll suspect us if I slow down, so I’ll keep the same speed.”
They headed to the factory where the coordinates seemed to lead them. As the car approached, the scenery came into focus.
“Hey, what’s going on here…?” Jhin leaned forward. “This isn’t a manufacturing plant. It’s just ruins.”
The dingy wall had been buffeted by wind and rain for years, leaving it in shambles. The overgrown thicket of wild grasses had grown taller than Iska, blocking the entrance to the grounds.
Both what remained of the factory and the concrete wall around it were dilapidated. No light shone from inside the building’s broken windowpanes, and it didn’t seem like it would have electricity or running water. Just as Jhin had proclaimed, it seemed that all production had ceased, leaving only ruins.
“…Looks like it could be haunted,” Commander Mismis remarked.
“…Haunted? I’d be more concerned about the rats that are probably infesting the place, Commander. I bet there are a ton of cobwebs all over the ceiling. Yikes! I can’t handle stuff like this…,” Nene replied.
It seemed to be deserted. If Sisbell was confined here, they could understand why no one had spotted her.
However…
Was this really where she was being held?
…If they had Sisbell, there would be soldiers on guard and security cameras set up.
…But I don’t see anything like that.
Perhaps they had foregone the guards to really sell that the place was abandoned and deceive any pursuers. But a strategy like that would be too much of a gamble for the Hydra. The chances they wouldn’t assign someone to keep watch over Sisbell were slim to none.
Maybe this wasn’t the place? As Iska hesitated over vocalizing his doubts, someone else did it for him.
“Now that I think about it, this is futile.” Rin, who had been silent until then, suddenly opened the car door…while it was still traveling down the road. “Nene, or whoever you are, stop the car. If there isn’t surveillance, then you should be able to park by the wall without issue.”
“Whoa?! W-wait a second, Miss Rin. I’ll stop—just calm down!”
The vehicle came to an abrupt halt. That same instant, Rin leaped out of it. She stared intently at the dilapidated factory from a giant hole in the concrete wall.
“I don’t see any indication of surveillance cameras. If there had been some, then we could have been sure this was it. Then the only way to find out is to enter the grounds… So, Commander.”
“Y-yes?”
Rin shrugged at Commander Mismis, who was also staring up at the factory.
“What do we do in this situation?” Rin asked.
“…What do you mean?”
“Our agreement was that you would take me to Lady Sisbell’s location. We made a mutual agreement not to interfere with each other thereafter, but as you can see, there is no proof of Lady Sisbell being here.”
“…Oh. You’re right.” Commander Mismis crossed her arms. She gazed out into thin air for a while as though she was in thought. “So you mean you’d like us to search this factory? Um, hmm…I’m not so sure…”
“We will make an additional trade. I will give you something of value as well.”
Rin pulled out skin-colored self-adhesives from the handbag she had left in the car. They were likely from the same supply of backups she had given to Commander Mismis while crossing the Imperial checkpoint. There were five in total.
She pushed them into Mismis’s chest.
“You may have all the self-adhesives I have on me. I am sure you have some from Lady Sisbell, but as I told you the day before, those will not match your skin tone.”
“Uh…!”
“I’m sure you have no qualms.”
“Commander! Iska, Jhin, over here!” someone called from a ways off. Nene, who had followed the wall and walked farther away, motioned for them to come closer.
“Something’s up with this building,” she told them. “Could we have time to search it? Even an hour?”
“What’s suddenly gotten into you, Nene…?!”
“This,” she replied.
It was the giant concrete wall that surrounded the grounds. Nene pointed at double doors that seemed to be the entrance. Beside them was an engraved metal sign that read:
OMEN INSTITUTE FOR ASTRAL RESEARCH, ALTORIA BRANCH.
“Huh? That’s where we are?” Iska couldn’t believe his eyes.
Omen, collective of geniuses. In the Empire, where research on astral power was taboo, this organization alone was formally permitted to do their research. And if this place had that moniker, then that meant…
“So it was a research facility initially, not a factory…”
If this was an Omen establishment, then it was one of the country’s great secrets. Only those related to the organization would have been allowed to set foot in it. Even Iska, an Imperial soldier, had never entered an Omen building before.
“……Ngh. It is, but…,” Nene mumbled. She looked between the rusted sign and the virtually ruined grounds. “I’m curious. Commander, I’d like to explore this place a little!”
“Excuse me? W-wait, Nene! You can’t waltz on in to Omen property. The front doors are shut!”
“Over here.”
Nene pointed at the wall. Years of exposure to the elements had worn it down and caused the concrete to crumble. There was even a hole that was large enough for Iska and Jhin to enter.
“In we go… Hmm. I think I can get through. Miss Rin should be able to fit, and Iska and Jhin are both thin, so you two should be able to as well,” Nene said. “I think if anyone gets stuck, it’ll be the commander, considering her boobs and backside.”
“What are you implying, Nene?!”
“C’mon, boss! You’re holding us up.”
“D-don’t push me, Jhin!”
The commander, Jhin, and Rin headed through the hole after Nene.
“You too, Iska!”
“All right, I’m coming.”
He looked around again. The car was in the shadow of the wall. Even the few vehicles passing by on the road made no sign of coming closer to them. Once he made sure of that, Iska also leaped through the opening.
On the other side was a branch of the Omen Institute for Astral Research.
Iska found the abandoned grounds even quieter than they’d seemed from outside the wall.
The site was overgrown. A single decommissioned car stood in the parking lot, its tires deflated. In one section, heaps of unrecognizable equipment were piled in the garbage area.
“Uhhh…this place actually seems creepy. It’s really run-down…”
“The research center itself is amazing, Commander.”
It was a three-story institution. Even from a distance, they could tell that the windowpanes were all broken. From up close, the concrete cracks seemed almost like spiderwebs. Moss and unidentified black bugs crawled along the walls, giving the place an ominous aura.
“Hmm……”
One of them looked up with glistening eyes.
“Nene, did you find something?”
“No, nothing.” She shook her head, long red hair whipping around in its ponytail. “It’s actually very interesting that there’s nothing here.”
“Huh?”
“Not a single trace of astral energy.”
Klonk. Nene knocked on the concrete wall with her fist.
“If this used to be an astral power research institute, it’d be a problem if any astral energy leaked out, right? So they should have astral energy detectors outside the building and along the inner part of the walls, too. It’s weird they don’t.”
“Don’t you think they might have removed them when they closed down, Nene?”
“I considered that, but…” She pointed at the parking lot and the garbage area. “They’ve left a car and their machinery. I doubt they would carefully remove the detectors and leave everything else.”
“Oh…right.”
“Also, Miss Rin, may I ask you a question?” Next, Nene gestured toward the wall of the edifice. “So astral power research institutes should have a duct to pump astral energy up from the ground, right? With a slightly specialized filter on it.”
“Uh?! How did you…?!”
“I saw one at Snow and Sun.”
“…………”
Now it was Rin’s turn to fall silent.
“They probably process the astral energy they pump up from the ground outdoors in some way, right? They select only the energy they want to study, then pipe it into the building. That’s why I’m convinced the walls should have the same kind of tubing on them.”
“…That’s exactly correct.” Atypically, a strained smile graced Rin’s face. “The astral energy that surges from a vortex is never just of one type. You would need a classifier to sort them… Though I cannot go into details, I also had the same reservations.”
“I knew it.”
“Mm-hmm. I recognize this is rude; however, I will say that I underestimated you, Nene. It never crossed my mind that you could have been so observant at Snow and Sun…” Rin crossed her arms and turned to Mismis. “There you have it, Commander.”
“What?! Uh, ummm… Oh, I get that much; it’s okay. Even I understand.”
“This research lab is a sham. They probably made it just to resemble an astral power research institute.”
“Why did you beat me to it, Jhin?!” Mismis exclaimed.
“The sun is setting. C’mon, we’re going, boss.” He had a case over his shoulder. Jhin pulled out the sniper rifle stored in it and threw the case to the side. “We’ve got to act like Imperial soldiers occasionally.”
“What? Then that means…”
“If this is an illegal research lab, then this is an undeniable breach of the law. Not like I could keep silent as an Imperial soldier.”
Yes. At that moment, the situation underwent a complete about-face for Unit 907.
…If this had been an Imperial lab, we wouldn’t have been able to intervene.
…But if this is an illegal research facility, on the other hand, then the circumstances are completely reversed. As members of the Imperial army, we’re obligated to intervene.
They now had a reason to get on board. Instead of retrieving Sisbell, their objective was to investigate who had illegally constructed the lab.
“That’s how it is.” He winked at Rin, who was silently standing by. “Change of plans. We’re going with you.”
“As you wish.” Rin cracked her neck. “I’ve been building up a lot of stress these past few days. Since it’s not an Imperial facility, you won’t mind if I let off some steam, will you?”
The Empire. Visgehten, capital of the fourth state.
This was where the one and only “unburied” vortex within the Empire had been preserved.
Astral power was originally taboo. Though the Imperial forces had destroyed all the vortices the Empire discovered, here in this province, one remained scrupulously preserved under the auspices of Omen, collective of geniuses.
All the information related to astral power that existed within the Empire rested here.
“Hey there, Nameless. How are you doing today?”
“You asked me that three hours ago.”
“It seems you are cognizant, then. We have been inspecting your arm within this specialized astral power private room for three hours, after all.”
The examination room was filled with bluish-white light. A jubilant voice and the sound of footsteps echoed against the room’s opal tiles.
“Michaela, the chart, if you could?”
“Chief Newton.”
“What is it?”
“You already have it in your hand.”
“Oh my. It seems you’re right. I was so lost in thought, I’d forgotten about it. Like when you’re looking for your glasses while they’re on your face.”
When the female medical officer dressed in office attire pointed that out, the mustachioed chief smiled wanly.
Saint Disciple of the tenth seat and head of the laboratory, Sir Karosos Newton.
His nickname was the “sickliest researcher.” The man’s shoulders and limbs looked as though they would snap against the slightest of breezes. They betrayed the fact he was an exception—a civilian among the members of the world’s greatest military force, the Saint Disciples.
He waved a hand at his colleague, who sat on a bed.
“So. I’ll ask again. How do you feel, Nameless?”
“…………”
There was something unusual about the other man’s appearance. He was clothed in a dark-gray coat suit from head to toe. His face was hidden, and it was unlikely anyone could even put a stethoscope to his chest. He didn’t look like a patient undergoing an examination at all.
“…My wounds sting.”
Nameless. The eighth seat of the Saint Disciples attempted to lift his exposed, muscular right arm. It barely moved an inch. He lifted his shoulder ever so slightly, but that was all he could manage. Manipulating his hands or fingers was beyond him.
“The plan to capture the queen. Growley, some old-timer who heads the Zoa household, flooded me with astral power, and this is the result. How many times must I explain?”
His right limb was covered in deep-purple bruises.
Though they looked like burns, in actuality, they were the symptoms of a corrosive astral power illness produced by the Vice astral power.
“I am Growley, the head of the Zoa. Now, how about we weigh out your sins?”
“These are avatars. You’re already guilty of a crime. That crime has become your punishment.”
Nameless still hadn’t realized the full extent of the astral power, even at the end of the incident. The astral energy had materialized as avatar beasts he’d clashed with, but when they attacked him, his right arm became immobilized. That was all he knew.
“Astral power illness comes in an infinite number of varieties, after all.” Chief Newton looked at the chart, his voice buoyant as he read it, almost as though he was enjoying this. “You fought a purebred, yes? There’s not much we can do if the Empire’s knowledge of astral power illness and how to treat it doesn’t work in this case. Goes to show how terrible the monster you faced was.”
“Enough chitchat.”
The Saint Disciple of the eighth seat glared at the researcher.
“What will happen to my arm? Will it rot away at this rate?”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps not. The quickest method of dealing with it would be to cut off your right shoulder and to replace it with an artificial limb like your left.”
“Works for me.”
It was as simple as that. As Nameless urged them to chop off his limb, Michaela shivered and paled. Wasn’t he at least hesitant? This wasn’t just any arm. This was the arm of the Empire’s greatest assassin. It was worth more than one of the nation’s most treasured swords. Why didn’t he even feel the fear of losing it?
“No reason to be so hasty.” Chief Newton tossed aside the chart and shrugged. “According to your report, that Vice astral power, or whatever it’s called, flinched at the anti–astral power grenade, right? In that case, there’s a high likelihood we’ll be able to eliminate it.”
“ ”
“We have resources astral power is averse to. Of particular note is the ore we collected from the highly contaminated region of Katalisk, which we can dissolve into a medicine. Michaela, please make arrangements immediately. Vary the concentration and try to collect as much of a sample as you can.”
“I can hear the thrill in your voice.”
Nameless sighed.
To this emaciated scientist, even his astral power illness was nothing but precious research. He was devoid of the pride physicians took in healing patients.
“You can use my body as a sample, but don’t think that I’ll let you toy with me without consequences if you’re not able to cure me in the end.”
“I will do all in my power to cure you. I have never treated a patient with astral power illness lightly.” Chief Newton turned to the physician behind him and winked. “Isn’t that right, Michaela?”
“That was creepy.”
“Apparently, the trick to winking is practice. Now, that aside, I do consider myself an outstanding researcher, despite appearances. I won’t deny that there are incredibly rare cases of those you would call mad scientists in the world, though.”
“Now that you mention it…”
He laughed in a low growl. As he sat on the bed, Nameless’s shoulders quivered from mirth.
“I know of one. A certain someone who was taken under another’s wing but who secretly proceeded with research that outpaced even Omen’s morals. Someone who started doing human experimentation. Apparently, she was also a pretty decent mad scientist herself.”
“…………” Chief Newton went silent. He stroked his beloved beard as his face, unusually for him, clouded when Nameless pointed that out. “…All I can say is that it was a disappointment. That was what she was.”
“What was her name?”
“Kelvina. She had the potential to become the best astral power illness researcher here at Omen. She was outstanding when it came to experimentation—that’s for sure.” Chief Newton looked up at the ceiling. “But she had no morals and crossed a line indulging in her intellectual curiosity. She went so far as to remodel her own home into a laboratory so she could conduct human experiments without batting an eye. By the time I got there, it was too late…”
“Wasn’t she arrested for treason?”
“She escaped.”
“…What?”
A slight amount of apprehension entered Nameless’s voice. The Saint Disciple, who hadn’t so much as flinched at the prospect of having his limb cut off, had changed his tune when Chief Newton revealed that.
“You mean she escaped from the Divine Gallows?”
“I suppose she did.”
“…………”
That was the most strictly monitored jail in the Empire, which held only the mightiest witches and sorcerers, along with Imperial traitors.
“Fugitive Zero. I think that’s the catchy nickname they gave her. Perhaps the ninth seat guarding her made a blunder?”
“It was not Statulle’s oversight. And if I may add one more thing, I highly doubt she escaped through her own abilities.”
“…You think there’s a mole?”
“Very likely. And it must be someone with quite a bit of influence over the higher-ups in the Imperial forces.”
He sighed. The man in the white coat exhaled very, very deeply.
“Remember this? About a year ago, one of our own colleagues, a former Saint Disciple, broke a witch out of the jail. His name was, um… Michaela?”
“It was Iska.”
“That’s right. But this is a different situation than what happened then. For starters, Iska didn’t bust into the Divine Gallows, and most importantly, he was caught afterward.”
Even a Saint Disciple wouldn’t have been able to accomplish that feat. Regardless of whether you could disable the Empire’s security system temporarily and devise a break-in, the perpetrator would eventually be apprehended.
“However, they still have not found the person who broke out Kelvina. So how did they open the locks to the Divine Gallows? How did they get her out…?”
“Or, better yet, why did they break her out?”
“That’s the question. I still have no answer as to why they would want to free a woman as dangerous as her— Oh my. Seems we’ve made quite a divergence from the original conversation.” Chief Newton looked up at the clock on the wall and scratched the back of his head. “Let’s make arrangements for the treatment. I’ll come back in seven hours next time. Make sure to get some rest until then.”
“Understood.”
“Keep in mind that patients live longer when they follow their doctor’s orders. Now then, I bid you adieu.”
His white coat flipped around as he left the examination room.
In the hallway…
“……Kelvina, then,” he murmured in a voice so stifled, even the woman walking beside him wouldn’t be able to hear. “Kelvina Sofita Elmos. What a repugnant name I’ve remembered.”
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