STM 178

The warehouse door shattered with a loud crash, but fortunately, no chase ensued. It was a secluded spot, and a bigger warehouse nearby blocked the sound from spreading.

In other words, it was a place where even a loud noise wouldn’t risk drawing attention. Then again, they probably wouldn’t have set up a portal for a raid just anywhere.

That must mean the person who created the portal was aware of this. I couldn’t help but look askance at the man slowly walking out from behind me.

“It’s quiet here.”

“I’ve always been lucky.”

He praised himself as he pulled the hood over my head. I was wearing a short hooded cloak, the kind the lower classes wear, as my own form of disguise. Other than that, I hadn’t made any special changes, aside from smearing a little soot on my face.

At least I’d covered my face a little; Tairok, on the other hand, hadn’t changed anything except his eye color. He had bundled his sword and carried it on his back.

“Are you really going to walk around with your face fully exposed, relying solely on luck?”

“Even without luck, there’s no way I’ll get caught. People don’t pay attention to those lower than themselves.”

His carefree tone stemmed from confidence born of experience. In the past, I would’ve just thought he was irritating and left it at that, but now it felt like proof of his own struggles. I couldn’t just dismiss it. He noticed my change and grabbed my arm as I turned to leave.

“Lu, you shouldn’t look at me like that.”

“How am I looking at you?”

“Like you want to fall into my arms.”

“……Take off that ring. It seems it doesn’t just change your eye color, it’s messing up your eyesight too.”

He chuckled again and playfully pulled my hood down over my face.

“Ugh, stop it.”

“My eyesight’s a mess.”

Right, he was the type who never lost an argument. I felt the urge to tear into him like a dog for the first time in ages. But we were currently on a covert mission deep inside enemy territory.

“If you can’t see properly, just follow me. Your Grace opened the entrance for us, but I’ll be the one clearing a path inside.”

And I wasn’t exaggerating, I’d already fed Mo the map of Montaine Castle and its surroundings that Solongo had given me.

There wasn’t much information on the castle’s interior, making it difficult to create a detailed floor plan, but the area around the castle was depicted precisely on the map.

Thanks to that, Mo was able to guess our current location just by looking at the distance between the warehouse building we’d come out of and the castle walls visible in the distance.

‘Mo, guide us to the gate leading into the inner castle.’

As soon as I gave the command, a red arrow flashed on the floor, pointing the way. Just as I was about to confidently step forward,

“Is there some kind of path marker on the floor?”

His voice was calm, but I couldn’t ignore it. So, instead of responding playfully, I ended up asking him seriously.

“Why do you think that?”

He looked down at me with a suspicious smile on his lips.

“I was wondering if a non-human entity was helping you.”

“That’s impossible.”

I shook my head and looked away. I felt a pang of guilt and couldn’t meet his gaze.

“Non-human beings rarely interfere in human affairs.”

“Is it some kind of taboo?”

“No. It’s not so much a taboo as…”

I paused for a moment, searching for the right words.

“Their intervention wouldn’t make any difference.”

The words came from my own mouth, but in that moment I realized it myself. Ah, right. That’s what it felt like. The divine beasts all had that same attitude. As if they knew that even if they intervened, nothing would change.

So they used a different method: waiting for me to figure it out and act on my own. No wonder it was so frustrating. I sighed and shrugged.

“So you were mistaken. There’s no way there would be markers on the floor. I just looked at the map of this place.”

“The interior of the castle too?”

“No. I couldn’t get the interior map, but I do have an informant who knows the inside of the castle well. Why do you look at me like that?”

“Those who work at Montaine Castle can never betray it. That’s why it’s been so hard for us to find out even the smallest details about the inside of Montaine Castle.”

He sounded less concerned with how I’d secured the informant and more skeptical of whether the informant was trustworthy.

“Solongo confirmed it, so they’re trustworthy. However, she said the informant would provide information but wouldn’t actively help us. She warned that if things get even slightly dangerous, the informant will wash their hands of it and back off, so we should just get the exact information we need and call it a day.”

“Who is the informant?”

“I don’t know.”

Tairok stopped in his tracks and stared at me.

“You think I’m pathetic?”

“That can’t be. My heart is filled with nothing but love for you.”

He smiled brightly and took my hand. It was as natural as breathing. Fearing someone might see us, I quickly pulled my hand away and lowered my voice.

“They said as long as we pass through the entrance to the castle, they’ll find us on their own.”

I pulled a pass out of my pocket and showed it to him. Solongo had contacted the informant in that short time and received this along with it. She said we absolutely had to use this to get through.

“But why can’t the people working at Montaine Castle betray it?”

“Because they’re all wearing obedience bracelets.”

“What’s that? Does the bracelet explode if you betray Montaine?”

“Something like that. Their body rots away until they die.”

What the hell? I couldn’t help but frown. Just how many rotten secrets does Montaine have that they’d do something like that to their own employees? Then how did the informant manage to pass information to Adeye? I understood why Tairok had been suspicious earlier.

“I’m curious who the informant is. We’ll meet them soon. They said they’d come to confirm this.”

I pointed to the small leather bag slung across my chest. It was such a common bag that I wondered if they’d actually be able to recognize it, but Solongo explained why.

‘It belongs to the informant. Since it’s their own, there’s no way they wouldn’t recognize it.’

As she explained, she handed me the bag very carefully and gave me a reminder.

‘When you meet them, please give them the bag. Inside is the payment for the informant.’

Inside the bag was a box about the size of two palms, filled with dry grass that looked like packing material. Inside that was a single purple gemstone. I’d gotten nervous thinking it might be expensive, but Solongo had smiled and said,

‘It’s fine if the gem gets taken.’

Relieved, I was about to close the box when I asked again.

‘What about the other thing?’

I could still vividly recall the look in Solongo’s eyes as she looked at me then. It said, ‘You’re not a fool.’

‘That must never be taken.’

Her words made it clear to me. The gem was just bait; the real payment I was supposed to deliver was something else. Was there a hidden compartment in the box? I wondered what might be inside it.

‘Is the payment that valuable?’

Solongo’s reaction at that moment truly frightened me. She didn’t answer; she just gave an ambiguous smile.

It was the same Solongo who treated several houses as mere pocket change. Recalling that moment, I gripped the bag tightly and moved forward. I had to meet whoever the informant was and hand it over quickly.

But as is often the case in life, nothing ever goes according to plan. We hit a snag right from the start. The first obstacle came at the main gate. We couldn’t get in.

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Clang.

The small window in the thick iron door opened, and something fell to the floor. But Hoiga, crouched in a dark corner inside, didn’t even flinch. Even though he knew that what had fallen was his one daily meal.

Ever since he’d been dragged by Kilu to this strange place, this dreadful underground dungeon, he hadn’t eaten a thing. At first, it was due to shock; later, it was because his pride wouldn’t let him.

That bread was tasteless and moldy, something he had never eaten in Tubain. But how many days could he hold out? Eventually, when he got hungry, he’d have to eat it.

The thought of that future self was miserable and horrifying. Yet, in a way, he hoped his time locked up here would be long. Kilu, who had imprisoned him here, had warned him.

‘Just rest here for a few days. Once the entrance to Montaine is fully open, I’ll come to get you. You deserve to witness the spectacle of monsters swarming Montaine.’

Kilu’s voice, filled with excitement, kept echoing in his head. To think that the terrible catastrophe he knew would befall Tubain was all because of Kilu. Even though he knew the future, he ultimately failed to stop it, and instead, he had only hastened its arrival.

But what tormented Hoiga more than Tubain turning into a hellish wasteland was his own miserable situation. How did it come to this? How hard had he worked to get here?

He had spent so much time painstakingly deciphering ancient texts in an attempt to prevent the disaster in Tubain, and he had rarely had a moment’s peace while acting out the horrific persona of Hoiga.

He’d lived so diligently, so why? Why? He was overcome with a wave of sorrow. A moment later, the tears he’d been holding back spilled, and Hoiga’s hunched shoulders began to tremble.