Book 5: Volume 4 Chapter 7, The Plan

Translator: Kazumi

Editor: Silavin

 

Around the same time that Kousuke lay sprawled across the grassland, still processing the Prince’s request, a woman was making her way through a part of the city most people preferred to forget.

 

It was not exactly a slum. But it was the kind of place where a certain type of person gathered. Men who occupied the grey spaces between profession and lawlessness, who watched, and waited, and rarely asked questions they did not already know the answer to.

 

A woman walking alone here, in broad daylight, was the sort of thing that should have invited trouble.

 

And yet she walked as though she had every right to be there.

 

The men loitering along the street noticed her immediately. How could they not? Her features were striking enough that even the most jaded of them could not entirely look away.

 

And yet something in her bearing. Some quiet, settled quality kept their attention from sharpening into intent. They exchanged glances, weighing their options, and ultimately chose to restrain themselves.

 

She was a stranger to them. If they met someone like her, they would surely have remembered.

 

Whatever it was that surrounded her, some invisible boundary she carried without effort, it kept them on edge. The more perceptive ones recognized it for what it was and kept their distance. Those who might not have were, fortunately, absent today.

 

The woman arrived at her destination without incident, towards a narrow, unremarkable building with a door that was equally as unremarkable.

 

She opened it without hesitation and stepped inside.

 

The interior was dim, even by bar standards. A short counter, a handful of mismatched tables, a few men with drinks in their hands who looked up with expressions ranging from curiosity to calculation. Several of them called out to her. Their words were coarse. She paid them no more attention than she would a passing wind and made her way to the counter.

 

“Do you have Haven Rock?”

 

A ripple moved through the room. The bartender’s posture shifted subtly. The men who had been speaking fell quiet.

 

“…Yes.”

 

He lifted a section of the counter and gestured for her to pass.

 

She moved through the back corridor, descended a staircase into a cellar lined with liquor bottles, and kept going. Somewhere past the middle of the space she crouched, ran her hand across the floor and found what she was looking for. A section of the floor gave way, revealing another staircase leading further down.

 

Two men waited at the bottom. They looked at her the way men in their position always looked at strangers: assessing, careful, not too hostile.

 

“I’m the messenger.” She declared and produced a card.

 

They studied it. One of them leaned toward the door.

 

“Boss. A messenger from headquarters.”

 

“Send her in.”

 

She entered, card in one hand, envelope in the other. The man behind the desk studied the envelope first, then her face. He snorted softly.

 

“A messenger, with a face like that? You’d be better off being under me. I’d make sure you weren’t put through unnecessary difficulties.”

 

“I’m already committed elsewhere.”

 

He snorted again. There was something almost appreciative in it.

 

“Leave the letter on the floor. You’ll collect your payment at the counter.”

 

“Of course.”

 

She placed the envelope where he indicated and withdrew without another word.

 

After she left, the man retrieved the letter, verified the seal, confirmed the signature, and began to read. He reached the end once, then read it again more slowly.

 

A quiet smile settled across his face.

 

“So it’s finally time.” He let the words sit in the air for a moment. “Heh heh heh.”

 

He had been patient. Longer than he would have preferred. But patience, properly tended, had a way of paying out.

 

He was no longer bored.

 

He called out to the men outside and told them to begin preparations.

 

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Night.

 

The Sun had long since set over the Royal Capital, and the group that had assembled in one of its quieter corners relied on a single source of light: the soft glow produced by their resident wizard. It was not ideal, but they had all gotten used to it.

 

A man at the front of the group clapped his hands three times and the conversation died.

 

“Tonight,” he said, once he had their attention, “we finally move forward. We’ve waited long enough! The enemy hasn’t taken our bait, so we’ll show them something they can’t ignore! We’ll show them what we’re capable of!”

 

A collective sound of affirmation rose from the gathered men, low and rough and earnest.

 

The man was about to continue when the light simply stopped.

 

He turned immediately. “What’s happening?”

 

“Something’s wrong,” the wizard said, his voice stripped of its usual steadiness. “It won’t respond. My Spells are not working.”

 

The darkness that followed was disorienting in a way pure darkness rarely is. Something was clearly wrong, and the group responded as expected, with panic and noise.

 

“Calm down.” The man’s voice cut through it. “We don’t need magic to make a fire. Get to it and then prepare to move.”

 

The order helped. Most of them steadied themselves. In a world without quick flames, starting a fire took time.

 

It was during those minutes that a handful of men in the outer edges of the group became aware of something.

 

A sound. It was faint and distant. Something was moving through the air.

 

By the time they thought to say anything, it was already too late.

 

The projectiles struck with quiet precision, finding the weakest points, and several men went down before those nearby even understood what had happened. The realisation, when it came, arrived all at once.

 

“Something is firing at us! Get a fire going, right now!”

 

A few panicked. Most didn’t. Unlike soldiers, they had no shields, but they were experienced and pragmatic. They gathered whatever could serve as cover, tightening their perimeter, facing outward.

 

The projectiles continued for a time, then stopped.

 

When the fire finally caught and spread enough to cast light across their surroundings, they looked but saw nothing. Whoever had attacked them had done so from far enough away to remain invisible.

 

It seemed unlikely, all of them silently agreed, that an enemy capable of neutralising Magic and striking from a distance would stop after bringing down only a few dozen people.

 

“Don’t ease up.” The leader warned, his voice carrying across the lit circle. “Someone knows we’re here. Stay alert.”

 

He had already sent a small group to check the perimeter. He was calm in the way that men who have made their peace with difficulty tend to be calm. It was not because the situation wasn’t dire, but because panic had never once solved a serious situation.