By Zephyria Flynn brought his nose close to the dirt placed on Hugo’s outstretched hand and sniffed. Then he said with surprised eyes.
“The smell of oil…!”
When Hugo nodded, Flynn asked.
“Then… is it someone else’s arson?”
“Yes, I think so.”
Hugo, who got up from his seat, shook his hands and continued.
“Leonardo Blaine is known to be very good at handling fire. It could be a trap, but if we think about it in a one-dimensional way, I don’t think he would need oil to set a fire. Moreover, judging from his past actions, he wouldn’t do anything so conspicuous.”
“I knew it… I thought it was strange that the embers suddenly jumped out when you were putting out the fire earlier. It was because a strong stream of water suddenly met the oil-soaked soil and the embers jumped out.”
As if he understood now, Flynn nodded and said.
“I’ll contact the northern branch right away.”
Flynn hurriedly ran out of the smoky fire scene. Hugo conjured water and washed the dirt he was holding in his hand. But he still felt an unpleasant oily film remaining on his hand.
He found it difficult to shake off the feeling that the cause of the fire that suddenly broke out in this village might be related to him and Flynn, who had been wandering around the surrounding villages and came to this village yesterday.
It was as if some opaque cause-and-effect relationship was lurking around him.
* * *
Before long, Council members from the northern branch that Flynn had contacted arrived at the scene. The number of people was a small number of about seven, as it was an investigation squad, and the person in charge was startled when he recognized Hugo’s face and bowed 90 degrees.
“C, Commander! I didn’t expect you to be here…”
“I came quietly, so don’t make a fuss.”
“Yes, yes!”
Flynn shook his head as he watched the person in charge, who was so nervous that he was drawing more attention even though he was told not to make a fuss. He said to the chief investigator for a situation briefing.
“Around 2 a.m. frost territory time, the fire was already spreading rapidly when I woke up. You put it out yourself, and in the process of putting it out, there was a phenomenon where embers jumped out when the water touched the ground. After checking, I found that the ground was soaked in oil. There was quite a bit of it, and there wasn’t really a place to handle oil around there, so I suspect it was a planned arson.”
“Oh, I see. You’ve already gotten that far…. Thank you. I’ll start the investigation right away, Vice-Captain Levernil.”
The chief investigator was impressed by the quick situation briefing and wrote Flynn’s words in his investigation notebook.
As the Council members came out and set up a fence and proceeded with the investigation, the atmosphere in the village became quite chaotic, even though it was still dawn. Flynn, who was watching the investigation from afar, said to Hugo.
“Who set the fire? I heard that the frequency of forest fires has increased recently. Could that also be someone’s arson?”
“Maybe.”
“Then, should I tell the chief investigator about this too?”
Hugo seemed to hesitate for a moment, then shook his head.
“No, don’t tell him yet. There’s something I need to check.”
* * *
Around dawn, the frost territory jurisdiction guards arrived at the scene to assess the situation. At the same time, Hugo told Flynn to wait in the village first and headed into the mountains.
Taking out a thermal imager, he flew through the air and investigated the places where the ground was holding heat, and the places where heat was detected were invariably places with traces of burning.
Hugo, who came down from the air, examined the soil of the scorched land up close. He held the soil and smelled it, or poured water on it to see if an oily film would float up.
However, all the places where there were traces of burning on the ground did not smell of oil, and no oily film was found. It was speculated that the forest fires that had occurred with high frequency in the past, like the fire in the village, might also be arson, but the connection disappeared.
Hugo looked around suspiciously. Then, he began to see very subtle traces of digging in the ground. However, it was ambiguous to regard it as suspicious without reason, as it could be traces caused by spraying water during the fire suppression process.
He thought about digging up the ground right away, but the northern branch Council was out for investigation and might conduct an investigation later, so he decided to stop because he thought he shouldn’t ruin the scene.
“Hoo….”
He was tired from staying up all night, and the connection to arson disappeared, so he felt frustrated as if he was blocked.
When he raised his head and exhaled, his breath scattered in the cold air. He felt a subtle flow of air between the trees with a light fog.
Hugo lightly shook his hands and stood still, looking straight ahead. It was because he clearly felt the presence of someone other than himself nearby.
Right in front of him, a withered leaf that was barely hanging on a thin branch fell weakly. Hugo, who was staring at the weak fluttering, moved at a speed that the person who was stalking him could not even notice.
The point at which he moved to right in front of the target who made the presence was before the falling leaf even touched the ground.
“Keu, keueok―.”
“You followed me all the way here.”
Hugo twisted the person’s neck with one hand and slammed him hard against a thick tree behind him.
There was a thud, and the few remaining fallen leaves poured down.
“Keuk―, euheok…. Sa, save me….”
The black cloak of the person who was secretly following him was removed, revealing his face. He struggled, desperately trying to remove the large hand that was strangling his neck.
However, his grip was so strong that his eyes rolled back and blood vessels appeared in the whites of his eyes as his neck was gradually strangled and he couldn’t breathe. The large hand did not seem to want to stop, pressing firmly on the exact location of the jugular vein and eventually bursting the blood vessel.
The mysterious man, who was desperately resisting to live with a reddened face, reached out his hand towards Hugo’s face. Then, a small magic circle appeared in his hand. Just as he was about to open his mouth to chant a spell, Hugo lightly grabbed his hand with his other hand and froze it using magic as it was.
“Euaaaak!”
A tearing scream erupted as his hand froze. At the same time as Hugo released his grip, the man fell limply to the floor, clutching his blue-white right hand and writhing in pain and fear. Hugo took a step towards the man and said.
“If that ice breaks, your right hand will break with it. So stay still.”
“Heu, euheuk…, sa, save me―!”
His face turned pale white, and he knelt down in front of Hugo and began to beg with his frozen hand. The tips of his fingers were turning black and rotten beyond blue-white.
Hugo quietly looked down at the man in front of him. He felt the same magical energy from him as the cloaked man who had been spying on him last night. In addition, the magic that this person was about to use was water magic, and as he expected, he seemed to be a water mage who used water as his main attribute.
Looking at him sobbing in fear, Hugo asked in a cold voice.
“Why were you stalking me?”
“Th, that’s….”
The man hesitated, looking around. Then Hugo did not give him even a moment’s leeway and gathered cold ice crystals in his hand, then instantly created a sharp ice spear. The rays of light pouring through the foggy trees at dawn were reflected in the ice spear and looked fiercely.
As soon as he held the spear blade to his neck, the man was so surprised that he almost lost his breath and shouted urgently.
“I was just following orders!”
“Orders? Whose.”
“Count Serbia… ordered me to monitor the outsiders who appeared in the village down the mountain. So I was just following orders.”
Hugo frowned. The Count he mentioned was the lord of this territory. The lord of frost territory directly ordered him to monitor him, huh. He didn’t understand.
Looking back on his past actions, he had been asking around to find Leonardo Blaine, but he did not remember doing anything particularly suspicious.
If there were any suspicious circumstances, he could have sent a guard to investigate his identity, but it was quite unusual to send someone to stalk him like this. Especially using a mage.
“Count Serbia? Why.”
“I, I don’t know the reason either! He just told me to report anything suspicious―.”
“You were the one who was spying in the tavern last night wearing a cloak, right.”
“……”
“Are you the one who committed arson?”
“Yes, yes? Arson? No, I didn’t do that!”
He waved his hands frantically as he spoke.
“I wasn’t even in that village at the time! I only found out just now that there was a fire when I came to tail you at dawn!”
Hugo stared coldly down at him as he desperately tried to convey that he was telling the truth, and asked again.
“Then why aren’t you using teleportation today? You could escape.”
“Teleportation… I didn’t use my magic. I used a teleportation device, but I didn’t have time to recharge my magic, so… I left it behind.”
Hugo decided to stop questioning him in the middle of this forest, seeing the man’s almost tearful state as he met his fierce gaze. As he approached him to move the location, the man made a ‘hiek’ sound and curled up.
Hugo grabbed the back of his collar and lifted him up with one hand. The man looked as if he was being pulled upwards, with his torso half-hanging from his own clothes.
“I’ll ask you the details after I finish my business.”
As Hugo finished speaking, the magician who had been begging him soon felt the surroundings fill with white light, and he squeezed his eyes shut at the extreme glare.
A moment later, he opened his eyes again, feeling that the surroundings had become much noisier, and was startled to the point of almost collapsing. This was because he had arrived in the middle of the village, not the cold forest where he had been squatting just a moment ago.
Flynn, who had been talking to the investigating officer from the Council, was speechless when he saw his Commander suddenly appear with a man half-held in his hand, squatting down.
The man’s face, almost dragged along, was covered in tears and a mess, with brutal handprints on his neck, and most of all, one of his hands was frozen solid as if frostbitten.
Hugo dragged him and threw him at the feet of the investigator and Flynn, saying.
“The lord ordered him to tail us. This is the guy who was at the tavern yesterday.”
“Yes? The lord of frost territory?”
“Yes. Investigating officer, transport this guy to headquarters and detain him.”
“Yes, I understand!”
“Flynn, you and I are going to Count Serbia’s estate.”
Flynn looked at the man sobbing with one hand frozen, feeling a little sympathetic, and answered dazedly.
“Yes, yes!”
^
Count Serbia was pacing back and forth, not knowing what to do.
“Why did the Council suddenly barge in? How did you do your job?!”
He disregarded his dignity and nervously chewed his fingernails, pacing around the room. Delberg’s merchant leader, who was sitting on the sofa, tried to calm him down with a forced smile.
“Count, please don’t worry too much. Didn’t they say they came because of the arson problem? The area around there is not a place where our business would be suspected. They’ll go back soon after they catch the arsonist.”
“Really… you’re saying something so carefree! Haven’t you heard that the outsiders who have been hovering around here recently put out the fire with magic? The outsider was even a magician!”
The Count couldn’t hide his anxiety and began to get on everyone’s nerves.
“Suddenly a magician comes and stirs up the village, and then the Council shows up, so how can I not worry now!? If things go wrong, it’s all your responsibility!”
At that sight, Delberg’s merchant leader felt intense anger rising up, but he swallowed it with a smiling face and tried to soothe the anxious Count.
In any case, he had to have things work out well so that he could survive. If the Council caught on and everything was exposed and the reputation of the merchant group was damaged, he would be dead to Delberg’s chief merchant leader.
He thought he was in the same boat as the Count Serbia through the deal, but he often tried to put all the blame on him.
‘That’s why nobles are like this…. They want to fill their bellies, but they’re trying so hard not to get their hands dirty. How can they be so chicken-hearted?’
The merchant leader began to feel deep regret for suggesting the deal to Count Serbia. In the first place, he was not in a position to choose his trading partner, but the Count was always so nervous that he made people anxious that he would ruin things.
But that wasn’t all. There was another stress factor.
“Why did the fire suddenly break out? Isn’t it because of the guy you brought!”
The Count pointed at someone standing in the corner, wagging his finger. At the end of his finger was a man leaning against the door.
Yellow hair with sparse brown streaks and dark green eyes. The man with dark skin had his arms crossed and a very annoyed face. He looked at the owner of the finger pointing at him and said.
“Geez, I told you I didn’t do it, right? Count, you’re really accusing the wrong person.”
“If it wasn’t you, who set the fire?”
“Ah, well, anyway, it wasn’t me.”
With that, the man stepped on the sofa in an instant and sat like a street thug, tapping the Count’s forehead and saying with a menacing look.
“If you whine one more time, I’ll send you away first, so you know. Yeah?”
“Wh-what? You…!”
The Count’s face turned red as if it would explode, and he grabbed the back of his neck. He was very angry, but as he listened to the threat from the magician in front of him, his spine tingled and he was speechless.
Looking at the man laughing in the Count’s face, Delberg’s merchant leader said with a disgusted expression.
“Blaine, what kind of rude behavior is that to the Count?”