"Beast, Answer My Call!" V1 Chapter 1 - Business Day
Year after year — he kept walking — for years...
— Thud thud thud thud! —
"Wake up, you bastard! Get up or I'll kill you with my salary!"
At the sound of violent knocking on the door Orphen tossed and turned irritably in his sleep. It was just a flimsy bed, but still, for someone who was just there to sleep it was comfortable enough.
"You're taking too long! Today is business day! Are you going to ruin all of my plans? Hey, just come out or I'll kill you!"
Orphen's consciousness was hazy, coming around gradually at the sound of the angry voices. He opened his puffy eyelids. He looked up at the wood ceiling above him, which was covered in greasy stains, then he looked uncomfortably towards the window.
It seemed to be noon, judging by the angle of the sunlight shining through the window.
The knocking on the door got louder and louder.
"You jackass, are you that desperate not to come out? Huh? You want to die, do you? All right, come on, let's go! Today is the day Volcano Vulcan shows you how it's done!
(Who's going to kill me now? Volcano Vulcan? That little shit? Son of a bitch.
He stripped off the sheet that was spread out over him and sat up. Then screamed four words,
"Shut the fuck up!"
He yelled back at the door as he scratched his bare chest. As he moved towards the door he roughly pulled his shirt over his head, which had been tucked into the bedroom's small closet. Then he lifted the pendant that hung on the back of the chair. At the end of the chain a slender pendant glimmered — the crest of a one-legged dragon, made out of silver and entwined with a sword.
With the pendant in the palm of his hand he murmured to the silver dragon.
"So he's going to kill me, huh?"
With a wry smile he dropped the pendant around his neck.
At the same time there was a violent BAM! The door was struck with exceptional force.
"What the hell's that noise? Who the hell do you think you are, do you really think I wanna pick you up from this oily place?!"
Orphen ignored him, got off the bed, and looked into the mirror that hung at the corner of the room. There he saw the face of a young man, around twenty years old now, the black hair and dark eyes reflected. Yet, those dark eyes always seemed to have a sarcastic slant to them when he looked in the mirror, though they were glazed over from sleep.
Outside the door the voice was growing more and more hysterical.
"If you keep spewing nonsense, I'm going to beat you to death with a lint roller! Just get the hell out here!"
Orphen turned towards the noisy door, and as he shoved his right hand against it he chanted quickly.
"I release, the Sword of Light!"
At that moment, flash! A pure white light filled the room, a wave converted from light to heat emitted from Orphen's hand in a band. When the torrent of white light struck the sturdy door it exploded with a tremendous roar. The door shattered, and the dust from the explosion filled the area like a rolling sand cloud.
The boy of about 130 centimeters, wearing a fur cloak was flung without a trace. His mouth was agape and his eyes were open wide in dumb surprise. He was covered in grime from traveling, his face smeared with dirt and dark hair that obviously hadn't been washed for several days. His eyes were dark and perfectly round, dominated by pale black pupils rather than brown.
Orphen walked towards the boy, eyes half closed.
"You leaving?"
"... You came out, to see us ..."
The dust covered boy reiterated in a gingerly undertone.
"Good. How about you start paying respect to your elders now. Got that?"
Orphen looked down at the boy with a smug look on his face — The boy, who had a bit of a plump appearance, was probably around 18 years old. While 130 centimeters was a small physique, it was normal to dwarfs. He was fully clad in a fur cloak which was the traditional garb for dwarfs, and had the sheath of a thick longsword peeking out from under it.
He looked back with a slow glance.
"Well uhh, Mr. Orphen, we've set up your next money making venture!"
"I'll go after I've eaten. Wait outside for a moment."
"Yes, sir."
Vulcan mumbled, his eyes still wide open, then ran down the hallway in a hurry.
Orphen leaned back with a big stretch, listening to Vulcan's cries of insults while he went stumbling down the stairs.
"Business day, huh? But, before that—"
He thrust his hand against the crushed door again and spoke.
"I heal, the scars of the setting sun!"
As he chanted, the pieces of the door started jittering, then suddenly shot into the air and began to reassemble midair. Orphen lazily walked towards the restored wooden door, touched his fingers to it, and muttered.
"Well, I guess that's good enough."
There was a little burn mark left in the middle of the door, but he shrugged his shoulders and ignored it, giving the knob a gentle push.
Orphen had never seen a guest at the dreary, cheap inn known as Bagup's Inn. Nonetheless it was always well cared for and while an old building, wasn't bad; but it was placed in the back alleys of the complicated commercial district.
When Orphen came down from the upstairs guest room, Bagup was at the counter of the tavern, smiling as he polished a glass. His son Majic was in the process of mopping up the floor. Although they were supposed to be father and son, the two looked nothing alike. Bagup could easily be mistaken for a pirate if he lived in a seaside town. Majic on the other hand was a bright-eyed, blond fair-haired, neat young man. He looked up and greeted him.
"Oh, Mr. Orphen, you're awake?"
He'd been staying at this inn for the past two years, so much so that Orphen had become a familiar face. He casually replied with a friendly wave of his hand.
"Yeah, after a wake up call from that idiot."
"I heard a horrible racket."
"He smashed through the door. I fixed it."
Orphen sat at a seat by the counter. He asked Bagup, who was beaming behind his beard, for a light lunch.
"What was all that fuss about work?"
Bagup switched the gas switch, his pride and joy, which he had recently installed to heat a pot of oatmeal. He looked as if he'd been smashed by storms and rough seas, and maybe even fishhooks, but he had a kindly voice and seemed like a good-natured old man.
Orphen rested his elbow on the counter and answered with a sigh.
"That Vulcan guy seems to have found some sort of lucrative opportunity, but I haven't heard the details about it yet."
Bagup grimaced.
"You don't sound too hopeful, do you?"
"Well, yeah. I've never succeeded with any of the work hes brought me."
"Then, shouldn't you just ignore it?"
Bagup was amused. Orphen gave an ironic answer, his mouth twisted into a sarcastic grin.
"You know what? He owes me money. If he doesn't make a profit somehow and pay me back along with the interest, I'm gonna go bankrupt."
"That's why you shouldn't be loaning money to those mugs."
"You're probably right... I don't know any place in the world where loan sharks would lend a hand to the people they loaned money to hoping to make a profit."
"You're right on that one."
With some cavil Bagup set the dish of warm oatmeal on the counter. Orphen took it, then looked around at Majic.
"Since I'll be teaching you magic later, isn't there a matter of the monthly fee?"
"Really?"
Thud — Majic's face lit up as he tripped over the mop.
"Hey, hey, hey, don't recruit my son into anything shady."
Bagup cautioned from behind them.
Orphen raised the pendant from his chest. It was the only thing of value in his possession.
"Orphen, the black magic sorcerer from the Tower of Fang, is going to teach you. Isn't this a chance for you to make a name for yourself?
"I don't think Majic has the same talent for sorcery."
Bagup added as he began rubbing his mustache.
"And what's the point of rising to the top when the man himself is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy?"
"How can you say that so easily, to me, a candidate for court sorcerer?"
"Then they found out you cheated during the selection committee and disqualified you, didn't they? I'm tired of hearing about it."
"Don't worry. Majic has talent, something that only a genius like me could understand. It's ... a feeling."
"Really?"
"Hey, don't take him seriously, Majic."
Bagup stopped tinkering with his mustache, then began to re-polish the glasses in the sink again.
"How could this guy be a candidate for the Thirteen Apostles? A sorcerer with that kind of power would never become a loan shark, no matter how much he had fallen from grace. Saying you have talent is just a lie."
Bagup sent his son away to the corner of the tavern while he continued to warn Orphen.
"You can't make fun of my son. He's a big thinker, and he's already half convinced that you're telling the truth."
"Oh come on. What I'm saying isn't a lie."
Orphen answered in a sullen voice, stirring his oatmeal with a spoon that'd been scrupulously polished.
"Majic really does have talent. He's what, fourteen years old? You should've sent him to school instead of letting him mop the floors of some deserted inn."
"He goes to school. For reading, writing, arithmetic, and rudimentary theology."
"Not to a regular school. He should go to a famous sorcerer school."
"Are you talking about sending him to the Tower of Fang?"
"I wouldn't say that. Just ... a special classroom."
Orphen seemed uncomfortable, chewing his words as he muttered. He removed his hand from the spoon and held up his pendant again — it was a type of identification given only to black magic sorcerers from the Tower of Fang.
But Bagup turned a grim look towards his son, who was scrubbing the floors with a mop, and didn't seem to notice the change in sentiment. He continued on in a nonchalant tone.
"For what reason do you think Majic has any talent as a sorcerer"
Orphen decided to ask another question in a similar tone.
"Do you know what it takes to be a powerful sorcerer?"
"I don't know. Is it being born of a virgin? Cause if so, I've got something to tell you about his mother—"
Orphen brushed it off.
"Pure and sincere passion. That's what makes a powerful sorcerer."
The moment he heard that, Bagup burst out laughing. He set the glass down on the sink so he wouldn't drop it, and spoke up.
"If that's the case, there's no way you're a powerful sorcerer."
Orphen snorted in disagreement, and set out to finish his oatmeal with his head down.
"Screw that guy!"
Volcano Vulcan snarled as he paced back and forth in the alley in front of Bagup's Inn.
"He's a nasty son of a bitch, showing off his power like that!"
Meanwhile, another dwarf with a similar appearance sat dangling his legs from an empty water barrel by the entrance of the bar. This one, however, was shorter in stature and a little younger. He wore glasses that looked like they were made of heavy metal and had a huge leather rucksack lying next to the barrel, which seemed to belong to him. Although he didn't carry a sword like Vulcan, the size of the leather rucksack didn't make it a very light-traveling outfit, either. It was the kind of sack that, if poorly made, he'd be able to fit himself inside of.
Turning to the bespectacled one, Vulcan abruptly demanded an agreement.
"...Huh?"
The other boy, named Dortin, asked vaguely, obviously not hearing the earlier sentiments. Vulcan's expression took a noticeable turn for worse.
"That black-magic sorcerer guy. Don't you think he's too impudent?"
Dortin heard it, but looked up at the sky, a little lost.
"But brother, you're the one who owes him money, right?"
It seemed the two were brothers.
"In other words, I'm his customer!"
(If you can't pay him back in time, you can't really call yourself a customer.)
Dortin thought reflectively, but he didn't dare say it out loud.
Vulcan, perhaps taking this to be a form of agreement, continued in his rowdy tone.
"And then he goes around blustering about like he's the master of the house, but when you get down to brass tax, all he ever does is ruin every business opportunity I've set up for him! I've never met a human being who was such a complete failure, but he's the best of the worst."
(Isn't it me who always handles the negotiations?)
Which he also didn't voice.
Even so, the business meeting prepared today was unmistakably his brother's handy work.
Dortin had been feeling a little uneasy all morning because of that, and he tried many times to get some info on this profitable money making scheme from Vulcan, but his brother was adamant that he wouldn't talk about it.
In Dortin's experience, this wasn't a good sign.
Vulcan was still grumbling.
"What's the matter with him, anyway? He's only been alive a couple years longer than I have.. I'm not going to be made to feel like he's my senior over something as trivial as that."
(Then, what's the point of you acting like my older brother?)
Dortin murmured under his breath again and looked up at the sky, feeling the spring breeze blow through the alley. The sky overlooking the evening market in Totokanta was sparsely populated with clouds that looked as if they could drop on his head at any moment.
Tick, tock, tick, tock...
A clock stood in the center of a fountain, modeled in the shape of the goddess, swinging two pendulums, one of which was in the shape of a mother dog, and the other in the shape of her puppy, swinging in an alternating rhythm. The room was filled with magnificent furnishings, definitely out of place for Orphen.
There was a fireplace, but no fire, as it was approaching early summer, and there was no harm in that. There was a pure white tablecloth with such fine embroidery it hurt the eyes to look at, as well as two empty suits of armor at the corners of the room, silver swords clasped in their hands and the odd sensation that they were scowling. There was a thick carpet that was a nice, subdued red that someone could easily trip over. He was sitting in a chair made from a Kauai tree with delicate engravings that was probably worth more than a similarly sized one made with gemstones. The chandelier on the ceiling was probably larger than his whole room at the Bagup Inn. At first, Orphen was terribly confused, because he couldn't figure out what was going on around him, but now, it was turning to frustration because he just wanted to escape from this situation.
As a matter of fact, even Orphen himself was forced to dress up. He wore a suffocating tuxedo with a decorative emblem on the pocket. Beside him, Vulcan and Dortin were dressed in similarly, albeit in different styles, and Vulcan had been chatting with them since a few moments ago. Dortin didn't care to evaluate his expression, but he could tell that he was pale and trembling.
"I hear you're a businessman, even though you're so young."
— A shiver ran down Orphen's spine when a small, middle-aged woman of indeterminable age — the woman opposite of Vulcan - put her hand lightly over her mouth and said that.
Vulcan was quick to interject after seeing that Orphen was at a loss for words.
"Why yes. There isn't a person in the country who doesn't know the name of the Burpleworth Co., Ltd."
"Corporation? I'm not familiar with it."
"Y-Yes. Well, it's hard to explain in one word—"
Vulcan suddenly grew quiet.
"In short, there are stocks, and there's the company, which is to say, anything becomes possible with stocks!"
He strung together the words in a stumbling manner. Orphen held his head lightly to suppress his dizziness.
"By the way, Burpleworth, was it?"
It took some time for Orphen to realize that was supposed to be his name.
"Y—yes, Madame?"
He looked up quickly and spoke a word that seemed somehow suitable for the upper class.
The lady continued, smiling.
"You don't talk much, do you? Well, that's often the case with men and women who enter into arranged marriages. My daughter isn't usually like this either—"
As she explained she indicated to a young woman who was quietly sitting beside her. She then intervened with her name, Mariabelle. Mariabelle Everlasting. Her mother beside her was Tishtinee Everlasting.
When Orphen turned his gaze towards Mariabelle she returned the look with a pleasant smile. He hadn't heard a word from her since arriving a few minutes ago, but he could see that she was a young blonde woman with a refined and confident look. No, it wasn't that she seemed like one, she actually was one...
Age wise she was older than Orphen. 22, or 23. She was quite beautiful, but her shyness at this age seemed a little too much.
(But I'm the one who's really out of the loop—)
He decided in his heart.
(I should've just tutored Majic instead of taking this idiot's money making scheme to task. This idiot, this idiot, this idiot—)
He was glaring daggers at Vulcan, who sat there leisurely sipping his tea, not showing any reaction in his expression.
(So basically, he's planning a marriage scam!)
So, he'd been taken to meet one of the most famous, if not most famous families in Totokanta, the Everlastings. He had no idea how Vulcan could've possibly concocted such a crazy matchmaking scheme, and he had no way of finding out, but he felt his eyes darkening with despair.
"By the way—"
Tishtinee casually asked. She'd been trying to get her daughter to talk for a while, as if she were trying to get a dog to do a trick, but finally she'd given up and just opened her own mouth.
"What kind of work is it that you do, Mr. Burpleworth?"
"Huh?"
Just as Orphen started to sound like a cornered child, Vulcan once again jumped in front of him and interrupted him.
"Sleeping pills!"
(You idiot!)
Tishtinee's sense of responsibility urged her to follow up with the next question, before Orphen had a chance to say anything.
"What kind of sleeping pills?"
"Huh? No, I'm no expert on that—"
Orphen interrupted Vulcan with a brief answer before he could start talking again
"Most of the ones on the market, especially those grown in the highlands, which are made in powder form and easy to take. If anything though, our pills are more like eternal sleeping pills."
"Eternal sleeping medicine?"
"Put simply, it's a poison."
"Oh dear."
Tishtinee exclaimed, putting her hand over her lips. Vulcan's voice shot up in pitch from the panic.
"Of course, our company doesn't actually have anything like that in our lineup."
The well-dressed dwarf addressed the issue by subtly pinching Orphen's thigh under the table. Orphen didn't so much as twitch an eyebrow and twisted his hand.
("Why sleeping pills?!")
When he asked in a low voice, Vulcan replied with a pained expression.
("Sleeping pills are a necessity for upper-class ladies!")
Orphen didn't dare to pursue the conversation further, and instead made a pleasant face to play along as Burpleworth. With a faint smile, he silently observed Mariabelle.
Although he knew that nothing was more unreliable than a woman's smile, he still thought that she had a crush on him — but not with the commoner Orphen, the black magic sorcerer who'd fallen from grace to become a loan shark, but with the businessman Burpleworth from Urban Rama, far from this city. Urban Rama, which was terribly far away, was one of the few remaining autonomous cities on the continent, so no matter how paranoid Tishtinee was about the match, she wouldn't be able to identify Orphen. In which case, Vulcan's arrangement might not be so far off the mark.
(Aren't marriage scams usually for young women who live alone and don't know anything about the world?)
The Everlastings weren't proper nobility, but to a commoner like Orphen, they were descendants of a merchant family that could've been said to be in the same league as nobles — and now that the previous head of the family had passed away and Tishtinee was running things, they must've been making a living by selling off their past wealth, because if they weren't, they would've immediately discovered Vulcan's lies. Or maybe it was just less of a hassle.
While thinking about all of this Orphen continued to gaze at Mariabelle's face. She smiled at him.
Orphen smiled back while he continued to think. Was it possible that she'd marry Vulcan and pay off his debts?
"Can't you ad-lib, you incompetent sorcerer?"
Tishtinee and Mariabelle had retired for the evening somewhere in the house, and that left just the three of them in the dining room. Vulcan had suddenly started yelling and Dortin was slumped over in his chair nervously, like a prisoner with his head on the chopping block.
"Ad-lib?"
Orphen asked back hatefully.
"I dressed up in this cramped costume and came to this huge mansion without so much as an explanation, and my name is Burpleworth? Who has a corporation that manufactures sleeping pills? What the hell did you expect of me?"
"Yeah."
Vulcan said it with a straight face.
"You were supposed to pretend to be the president of the company and marry her without arousing even the slightest suspicion."
"I get it, I know what the plan is... Don't say it out loud."
Orphen tightened his grip on Vulcan's collar as much as possible without wrinkling his suit. His glare then turned to Dortin. The younger brother jumped up suddenly.
"N-no. I didn't know anything about this. My older brother arranged everything..."
"Are you sure about that?"
When Orphen pressed, Vulcan answered instead.
"That's right! Do you really think Dortin could come up with such a daring plan?"
"It's — too — simple!"
Orphen threw Vulcan down — literally — and got up from the delicate seat. He continued, waving his hands as if it were the end of the world.
"You woke me up, made a big deal out of this, and all you came up with was a stupid marriage scam! I've had enough of this."
After Vulcan heard the words he looked up in surprise.
"Marriage scam? What a horrible thing to say."
Orphen looked back with a vicious glare.
"Who arranged for it, huh?"
"Don't be stupid."
Vulcan said calmly,
"Scams are an abominable crime that take advantage of a person's innocence."
Orphen didn't understand, so he asked.
"Then why all this business? Is it just to return the money you owe me?"
Dortin also looked to his brother with a curious look on his face, while Vulcan patted his chest.
"That's what I call tact. With my help you'll be a rich man's son-in-law. You'll have all this wealth, and I'll be able to erase this stupid debt of yours!"
That was the last straw for Vulcan. Orphen kicked the chair and sent it rolling.
"You son of a bitch!"
Just as he rolled up his sleeves the door opened.
Orphen quickly braced himself and turned around. Vulcan scrambled to get up in a hurry, and Dortin almost screamed for no reason. In the doorway, where the three of them were staring, a girl of about 17 years old stood there watching them blankly.
"Who are—"
The girl stopped Orphen without waiting for him to open his mouth and come up with an excuse.
"Oh, sorry."
Then — Slam! The door closed.
After a second there was a knock on the door.
"C-Come in... No, wait."
Orphen helped Vulcan up from the chair that'd fallen on him. After placing him and his sibling neatly next to the table, he turned back to the door.
"Please come in."
When the door opened the same girl peeked her head out. She giggled and bowed.
"I forgot to knock. Please don't think it was a lack of courtesy."
The girl had a similar look to Mariabelle, but she was a little more lively. Orphen's intuition told him that she was likely Mariabelle's younger sister. She was wearing a white, fluttery dress that seemed more suitable for daily life, and it suited her well. Her hair was a little shorter than Mariabelle's, and she was a little more petite but her voice was louder.
Huh, it seemed the previous conversation hadn't been overheard so far — Orphen returned her politeness with a bow.
"Speaking of being rude, can't you introduce yourself to your guests?"
"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm Cleao."
She introduced herself and held out her hand, as if to a child. When Orphen shook her hand, she frowned a little.
"You have a very firm hand."
"Oh — Well, that's because even the president himself works hard in the fields—"
Orphen kicked Vulcan in the back when he came to interrupt them so that he'd be in the girl's blind spot.
"In citizens of Urban Rama, both men and women, are required to serve in the military for a certain number of years. Even if it's just two years, basic military training thickens the skin of your hands."
"Really? Come to think of it, I think I've heard that before."
Cleao said with decidedly casual grammar, then withdrew her hand.
(Ok. It looks like she missed our whole conversation from earlier.)
But the second Orphen was sure of this Cleao spoke up with a smirk.
"By the way, you guys are marriage fraudsters, aren't you?"
Uh — Orphen's face froze. He frowned, wondering if he'd misheard, but Cleao kept smiling.
"So you're going to scam my sister? How long were you planning to trick her? Hey."
"Oh, uh ... Why?"
Orphen's face twitched, and the second Vulcan and Dortin noticed it they shuddered and clung to each other. It wasn't often you heard of a man who lived a happy life after trying to cheat a rich person.
Cleao stared blankly for a minute as if she didn't understand the meaning of Orphen's question, then clapped her hands together.
"Oh, I heard you guys. I was listening. From outside the door."
"Uh, for how long?"
"Hmm, well... I'd say from the very beginning."
(She knows—)
Orphen was praying to the gods — or whoever would listen — and even considered if he could take the girl hostage and flee the city. Needless to say, that idea was rejected. There was no clear basis for the plan, but it seemed to him that even if the girl had a knife to her throat, she'd say "Oh, I don't care if you stab me" without a fear in the world.
As Orphen groaned, Cleao waved her hand to get his attention. She repeated her earlier question.
"You're going to cheat my sister and hurt her badly, aren't you?"
"No, I mean—"
Orphen was grasping at straws to find an excuse that'd get him out of this predicament.
"This is, um, it's not like that."
At that moment Vulcan popped out behind Orphen and continued the thought for him.
"It wasn't me! I didn't plan this!"
Orphen ignored him,
"Well, I, or rather — the entire staff at the Sorcerer Alliance have come to check the communities' awareness of fraud."
"I didn't plan this! This guy forced me to do it — he threatened to run me over with a cart and kill me!"
"That's terrible, brother! I'd rather not say things like that—"
"In this world of fraud and deception, we have a revolutionary system to deal with it — and for that purpose, we're carefully gathering information—"
"Lies! My brother's the one who set this all up from the beginning and brought us here!"
"I did nothing wrong! I was against it from the beginning!"
"That's right! This evil black-magic sorcerer brainwashed me! Night after night he threatened me with nightmares, that I'd die by being tickled to death with bird feathers—"
"I didn't know anything."
"Shut — the — fuck — up!"
Orphen shouted at the top of his lungs, throwing a photothermal wave into the ground to knock the two dwarf brothers off their feet.
A thunderous explosion roared and shook the mansion. A huge hole opened up in the expensive carpet, which made a sizzling sound. By the time the billowing dust disappeared into the air, Vulcan and Dortin had been blown away by the blast, and were lying in the corners of the room. The two were so durable that they probably wouldn't be hurt by this level of blast.
"You dumbasses, when you see someone trying so hard to come up with a good excuse, you don't have to ruin it every damn time!"
While not so sure about the excuse, Dortin stumbled up without a word. His big brother seemed completely out of it.
Orphen started heading towards the brothers with a ferocious look on his face, but upon hearing a strange sound, he halted. Looking back—
Cleao was laughing.
Cleao, laughing with the same gestures as a girl from down town, quite unlike Tishtinee.
"Ok. I get it. You guys, you're comedians, aren't you? I've heard of you — you suddenly trick people out of the blue, then later put up a sign saying 'So and so [Was shocked!]'"
While Orphen was thinking about how he'd like to be part of such a carefree business, Vulcan was getting up before he knew it, and took Cleao's hand.
"Yes, that's correct, miss."
"By the way, you're looking at 15 years in prison for fraud."
Cleao smiled brightly. Vulcan cried, a sudden change as he continued to hold her hand.
"Ah, but I was tricked!"
"... You're a little strange, Miss."
Orphen slowly stepped forward and kicked Vulcan to the side — out of the way like a piece of trash.
"Cleao will do."
"Cleao, then. You don't seem to be blaming us for anything, is that right?"
"That's right."
The girl quickly nodded her head.
"Then, what are you going to do with us?"
"I'm not going to do anything. If anyone's going to tell the police, it'll be my mother."
"... I... uhh... This guy is the main culprit — he's the one who tried to cheat your family, okay?"
"But from what you said earlier, it didn't sound like you were trying to do anything that awful. You said you were just going to marry my sister, right?"
"Well, that may be true, but—"
Orphen glanced over with a sullen look and wondered why he had to be the one to explain this.
"Okay, Cleao. Your older sister thinks that I'm some rich businessman, but I'm not. She's going to find out eventually—"
"They say it's inevitable that you'll see your significant other's flaws after you get married."
"I see."
"Hang on, are you starting to believe that, Mr. Orphen?"
Orphen looked down at Dortin when he poked him, then grasped the boy's scruff and crouched down to his hear. He quietly whispered.
(Stuff it. I changed my mind. With this girl on our side we might be able to escape this in one piece.)
(I don't know about that.)
Dortin's voice was anxious. It was the same for Orphen, though.
He turned to the girl and continued.
"You know what—"
At that moment an unmistakable explosion shook the mansion.
Boom!
At the same time they could hear windowpanes shattering, and the sound of the walls creaking and breaking under the strain — along with other sounds of destruction, some of which they couldn't quite identify—
Another explosion shook the whole residence. Orphen lost his footing in the tremors and nearly fell, but thought first of his own safety — even if he was fine. The explosion must've come from somewhere in the house, but it was far away from the room they were in. As for the cause of the explosion — he had no idea. If he had to guess, it sounded more like an impact, like some giant rock falling from the sky and striking the building, rather than some magic explosion. Either way, it was time to take advantage of this opportunity to escape as quickly as possible.
"Let's get the hell out of here!"
Orphen shouted sharply at Vulcan and Dortin. Instead of a nice reply, all he got was "Ahh!" Instead, he saw Dortin, in a state of panic and sobbing uncontrollably, and Vulcan, who was chasing his brother around, beating him up for no reason at all.
"Hey, You guys!"
The thought of leaving them behind and escaping on his own flashed through his mind, but he had to quickly dismiss the idea — If the two of them were caught, his identity would quickly be discovered. Even if not, it was hard to believe that the dwarf brothers would be willing to endure police interrogations to cover for their ringleader.
"Hey, wait! Mr. Burpleworth!"
Cleao shouted and grasped his arm. The suddenness of the situation made his previously carefree expression fade away.
"I'm not Burpleworth! My name is Orphen!"
"Orphan?"
"Yeah, that."
At that, Orphen reproached himself for being foolish enough to use his real name. But, it was too late to worry about that. He picked Dortin and Vulcan up in each hand, walked across the crimson carpet, and tried to leap out the nearest window—
Just as he tried, he felt his ankle catch on something and fell face first. He looked back, holding his nose. That's when he saw Cleao had grabbed onto his leg, as if she'd leapt to catch a falling vase.
"What the hell?!"
Orphen shouted at Cleao like a mother scolding her child.
"You've been using a false name! Even my teacher says people who falsify their names are generally bad people."
"Yeah, and?!"
Orphen half-yelled and half-ranted at Cleao, trying to shake her slender hand free of his ankle. But at that moment, Cleao's voice suddenly changed to a pleading tone.
"Are you really going to just leave us like this? There aren't any men in this house, and whatever that sound was, it sounds like it could've destroyed the storeroom! Its been pretty windy since yesterday."
(There's no way. I know the sound of an explosion, and it came from somewhere inside the house.)
While Orphen thought of the answer, he also kept telling himself that he had to escape regardless. Now was his chance. 15 years in prison over fraud? He'd only lived for 20 years. He didn't have a wealth of memories from his first 15 years, and certainly none from before five years old. By that logic, he'd be in prison until he was so old that he wouldn't even be able to remember when he committed the crime!
"Hey, please! My mother's always forcing me to do all the heavy lifting, she'd never make my sister do it. Please help—"
"I don't have time for jokes."
He yelled as he raised his hand—
Just then a scream rang out. A woman's scream.
"That's my sister—"
Cleao got up and murmured.
(I've got to get out of here.)
Orphen thought to himself. This was no time and no place for him to be stuck in prison for 15 years. But, those screams, Mariabelle may've been trapped under rubble. They were in the middle of the city, so it was unlikely she'd suffocate to death under rubble due to delays in the rescue workers arriving, but even so, there was always the possibility that she was injured. If it were a bad enough injury, she may've already been crushed to death.
"What room is she in?!"
Orphen threw Vulcan and Dortin, then glanced at Cleao. The girl answered—
"This way!"
As soon as she shouted the words, she was out the door with great agility. Orphen followed, jumping out into the corridor.
The inside of the mansion was strangely deserted. The grand furnishings could be seen here and there, but there were no survents running around, despite the explosion that had occurred earlier. Though it seemed to have occurred in another wing of the mansion, and they were in the hallway just outside of the parlor, there were only traces of a broken vase on the floor.
"Hey, I thought we were running away, sorcerer!"
Vulcan called after him from behind, seemingly having regained his senses. If Vulcan was there, Dortin was surely with him.
Without looking back Orphen replied in desperation.
"Once again my life is being turned upside down!"
Orphen was the only one who truly understood the meaning of those words, but at the time, nobody bothered to ask. Orphen continued to chase after Cleao as she ran down the long corridor, not even worrying about the rental clothes, which made it so much harder to move.
"Here."
Cleao pointed to the door, her expression not so much nervous as it was excited, as if she was anticipating seeing something amazing. Delicate carvings decorated the surface. It was a rustic oak door that matched the white walls of the house, and was decorated with delicate, detailed carvings on parts of it. Looks like the pattern's inspired by forests, Orphen thought.
(Sleeping beauty in the forest, huh? Well, she wouldn't look so good buried under rubble.)
Cleao grabbed the door knob to open the door, but it only clattered. The door was locked.
"What should we do?"
Cleao looked at him, as if relying on him.
Orphen nodded and quietly closed his eyes. He concentrated, then took in a deep breath.
Not only black magic sorcerers, but all sorcerers on the continent of Kiesalhima, without exception, used their voice as a medium to cast magic. Therefore, the effects of their magic couldn't reach places where the voice of the incantation didn't also reach, and the effects wouldn't last beyond the sound of their voice. This was because all voices would disappear on the wind after a certain point.
It was said that there were two types of human sorcerers. Black magic sorcerers like Orphen who excelled in using energy, such as heat and light, and spells that dealt with the physical body itself. The other class was white magic sorcerers, who manipulated time and the mind. The latter was far more difficult, and only a few people had been born with these qualities.
Orphen opened his eyes when the image came to him, touched the knob with his hand, and murmured
"I tread, through the gate uninvited!"
In reality the contents of the incantation didn't matter. All he had to do was speak. Even a meaningless shout would work for a spell. However, since it was for appearances, and since it'd be foolish to lose one's concentration while shouting nonsense, Orphen preferred to shout the effects of the spell in a fairly straightforward manner.
Anyway, the spell worked. Without a key, the door made a sound, then unlocked. Orphen slowly pushed it open.
Behind him, he heard Cleao muttering in disappointment. That's all there is to it? He heard her say. She probably thought he was going to smash through the door with a blast like the one she'd seen him use just before.
Orphen ignored her and entered the room—
And stopped, stunned by the devastation.
Behind him, Vulcan was fidgeting and mumbling.
"... What the hell is that?"
Dortin added on..
"A-a monster?"
"... Shut up."
Orphen answered, his voice trembling. He stared motionless at the thing that stood in the room, unable to move. As if paralyzed...
The room was half destroyed. There was a large hole in the wall as if it'd been struck by a huge meteorite from the outside, and through it you could see the orderly streets of the Totokanta evening. The hole extended to both the wall and the window, and pieces of the window frame were still attached to what used to be the wall, hanging loosely and swaying in the wind. Just as Cleao said, there were strong winds. Most of the furniture was destroyed, and a small chair near the front of the room was toppled over and crumpled. A bed pulled up against the window was snapped in two, looking as if it had been involved in a fight against the unknown monster that was now sitting on top of it.
Mariabelle was at the very front of the room. She was standing there, stunned by the situation. The thought of how bad she'd look buried under the rubble was a bit premature, Orphen realized. This beautiful woman, who hadn't spoken a word to him, was standing there half-naked, covering the front of her body with a dress that looked like a curtain, and was trembling lightly. It seemed that the reason she'd suddenly left her seat was to change her clothes during the meeting. Maybe he hadn't made that bad of an impression after all.
Tishtinee was standing beside her daughter. She was taller than her daughter, and had her arms around her protectively, as if she was going to shield her from this emergency. She, too, was just standing there, frozen.
Tishtinee screamed — making him realize that the scream they'd heard earlier likely wasn't Mariabelle, but her mother. The beautiful woman who had never spoken to him, was still not ready to utter a word.
When Orphen started looking around, Cleao poked her head into the room. The girl spoke up, loudly and without restraint.
"Woah, that's an amazing monster."
Surprised, Orphen stiffened.
That was exactly what sat upon Mariabelle's bed, which was now broken in two.
"Guess 1..."
Dortin gulped, and then started stating his assumptions.
"I think if you crossbred a rotting dragon and a grizzly bear, then dropped them off a cliff, and a gigantic crayfish swarmed over them, then you sprinkled them with muddy water mixed with about 16 colors of paint, it'd look a little something like that."
"I told you to shut up!"
Orphen kicked Dortin right in the face, like a horse kicking its back legs while his line of sight always stayed locked on the monster. As it turned out, he'd actually kicked Vulcan in his attempt, even if he'd meant to kick Dortin.
"What the hell was that for?!"
Vulcan's yelling fell into the background as Orphen stared at the monster. The... resemblance...
In fact, Dortin's description wasn't far off the mark. The skin was daubed in a sticky, viscous mucus that covered the strange bristles over scales. The creature had to be about three meters long and must've weighed more than a ton. The silhouette looked almost as if it was just the head and countless arms and legs. No, only six, Orphen counted — there were tentacles growing from various parts of the body, with some thin, and some thick enough to look like additional limbs. On the tips of the actual limbs were blunt-looking claws, while the tentacles had none. A pair of huge wings stuck out of its back, making the monster look even larger.
It certainly resembled a dragon — the second most dangerous beast outside the town, second only to bandits. Orphen, who had actually seen a dragon, could point out the differences, however. For example, a true dragon's eyes were green. This creature's eyes were so badly burned that it was impossible to see anything. The eyes, along with the eyelids, were drooping down by the chin, as if they had melted right off the face, and were dripping what looked like blood.
As another example, dragons were intelligent — they would never approach populated cities. Yet, this one had, and Orphen wondered why? Did it have advanced reasoning skills, or any at all? If so, then it should answer his call.
"Azalie!"
Orphen cried out.
The monster didn't even twitch. Slowly — like a slow desert-dwelling lizard — it began to turn its head. It was searching for something. Orphen suddenly realized, the creature was blind. He screamed out again.
"Azalie—! It's me! I've been searching for you—"
Orphen took a step forward with open arms. Vulcan hastily ran up behind him and tried to hold him back.
"Hey! What are you, insane, black-magic sorcerer?"
"Shut up!"
Orphen knocked Vulcan away from him, then took another step towards the monster. He could still hear him screaming behind him.
"Hey! I don't know what you think you're doing, but the only thing that can kill that monster right now is your damn magic! You got that?"
"It's not a monster!"
"Well, then, what the hell is it? I'll kill you with my ear pick if you keep talking like that!"
"It's—"
Just as Orphen was about to say it, the monster reared its head and roared at the ceiling.
It was almost like the howl of a dog, but it wasn't just a howl. When its voice rang out, filling the air with moisture, the room was set ablaze
"Woah?!"
Orphen screamed, but before he could even think about it, he'd used his voice to activate his magic. Faster than the tongues of that fire could engulf everyone in the room, countless halos appeared between them and the monster's flames, forming together like woven chain link armor. The flames and the halos blocked the creature from view, but Orphen continued to scream.
"Azaliiiie!"
"That monster can even use magic!"
Vulcan was raving. The smell of burning plaster and fire filled the air.
"Azalie! Please don't run! It's me!"
Orphen called out, holding up his hands and chanting.
"I dismiss, the dancing shrew!"
Fwoosh! There was a sound like a stick whipping through the air, and the next second, the halos and the flames were gone - and so was the monster. All that was left was the wreckage of the half-destroyed, smoldering room, and everything else fell silent, as if in mockery of him.
As he had done in the past, Orphen rushed to the window — or rather, to the hole in the wall. He looked up into the void, searching for the giant monster. Only, the monster was nowhere to be seen in the clear city sky.
Table of Contents
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| (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) |
Business Day Call of Reminiscence The Revenge of Shrimp Man Baldanders 'Hunting' Night Demon Witch |