Semi-Coercive Imperialist

[ To Sir Knight Maximilian Ebenholtz ]

Forgive my presumption, but I dare to send this letter.

My name is Nico Beber, and I live on the outskirts of Imperial Central. I am a lowly subject who has read the Sir Knight's autobiography, Moonlight Below, more times than I can count.

I engraved every one of the Sir Knight's sentences on my heart, and when I finally reached Dr. Johann Georg's "A Thousand-Year Empire," my eyes opened at last.

Before the truth the Sir Knight revealed, I finally understood why I was born, what my purpose had been.

I am a pure Aran. A worthless man with nothing to his name but that one bloodline. Father and mother, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather, and further back still, unbroken and unclouded by even a single drop, flowing down from the central highlands. That alone is my one pride, and......

......My father died because of Izenheim.

It was debt. A debt that never shrank no matter how much was repaid. My father never escaped that swamp of usury in the end.

I knew nothing back then. I only thought my father had been weak, that our family had been unlucky.

Now I know. That tragedy was never our fault. It was their trade.

The only history belonging to those who build nothing and swallow everything, who reap without ever having sown.

Sir Knight.

Beneath a company called Alchemia, I saw the filthy altar of Izenheim.

Truthfully, I discovered it long ago. At the time I thought it mere coincidence. I thought I had simply happened to pass through there, happened to open that door, happened to overhear their rite.

But now I know. It was fate beyond any coincidence.

I intend to punish them now. I mean to restore the order that is right and self-evident.

I hope this letter reaches the Sir Knight.

Of course, I know a letter from someone as worthless as me could never land on the desk of the most exalted person in the Empire. And yet I write it. I send it knowing it may never arrive. Because this letter was never written hoping for a reply.

Thanks to the Sir Knight, my eyes have opened.

I have come to know that my family's tragedy was never our fault.

Thank you.

[ From Nico Beber ]

───────

* * *

I visited the site of the terrorist attack at the chemical company Alchemia. My identity was disguised.

Lately the name Maximilian had grown so famous across the Empire that my enemies might react sharply to every single one of my movements.

The optimal undercover identity, one that could infiltrate deep into a scene and secure police cooperation without question, was...

──[ Working Officer ]──

Name: Gert Vines

Affiliation: Office of Congressman Leute

────────

Even the nobles of the palace kept working officers, secretaries, and clerks under them. Leutern II in particular sat as a member of the House of Nobles, so posing as one of his hands offered the perfect shield for this mission.

"......Is this the place?"

"Yes, Officer."

The police escorted me in, bowing deeply. I walked through the wrecked factory at a calm pace, looking it over.

"Quite the mess, isn't it."

The officer said with a wry smile. The air still hung thick with the sting of chemicals mixed with the lingering trace of mana.

"I heard a circuit board exploded."

"Yes. Someone carved a mana circuit into a small board and turned it into a bomb. A calculated act of terrorism."

Going by Nico Beber's letter, this was an explosive device shaped entirely by the obsession of a commoner with zero magical knowledge. That singular, remarkable talent had produced this carnage.

"Though I have to wonder why Congressman Leutern would take an interest in a case like this......"

The officer studied my expression carefully.

"He wants to understand the danger of terrorism."

"Ah, of course."

Thud.

Just then, the virus beneath my collarbone pulsed.

The blast's epicenter had been crushed beyond recognition, but beneath the pile of stone under the collapsed wall, in the gap where debris had spilled and scattered, something foreign lay hidden.

"Mind if I take a look?"

"Uh, sure. Actually Georgen already took most of the evidence, but feel free to look all you like. Ah, but you know, lately Georgen's been snatching up every high-profile case before we even......"

I let the officer's grumbling pass through one ear and out the other, and dug through the debris with a gloved hand.

Thud.

A roughly carved chunk of stone caught in my grip. To an ordinary eye it would have looked like nothing more than a broken fragment, but to my vision, a dense wavelength clung visibly to its surface.

Thud.

My heart pounded hard.

Thud.

......I still couldn't tell what it was.

No language written on it. No meaning carried within it.

Thud.

And yet my virus fixed on this thing and shook violently.

Clunk.

I let the debris drop.

"......These pieces of debris."

I said to the officers.

"Tell everyone, no one is to clear this away. It must be preserved exactly as it is. By order of Congressman Leutern."

"Ah, yes sir. We'll make sure of it."

Behind that company called Alchemia, there was undeniably a "darkness."

I stepped out of the site and climbed into the waiting vehicle.

"Officer?"

One of the working officers who had been with me the longest. "Hans," a former warden at a western prison, answered in a tense voice.

"Yes, Sir Knight."

"I need someone to infiltrate."

He looked at me through the rearview mirror.

This wasn't a foreign country. This was the Empire itself. Even the man we had to face was a high-ranking official who had seen my face more than once. False teeth, a wig, a different eye color, none of that would be enough for a disguise here.

"A lawyer. Can you do it?"

At my question, he gripped the wheel tighter and answered.

"Yes. I can."

"You'll need to go to Georgen. It could be dangerous."

"I'll manage. I can handle myself well enough."

Hans had spent nearly five years by my side, sharpening himself the whole time.

Well, of course he had. I was the one paying for his self-improvement out of pocket.

"Good. Then."

I gave him the details he needed.

"Go to Georgen, defend Nico Beber, and check the combat boots worn by Georgen's agents......"

* * *

A detention center in western Georgen, in the Empire. Behind the iron bars, Nico Beber's condition was miserable. His whole face was swollen and purple, as if stung by a swarm of bees.

"......Inspector, at this point, don't you think he really did act alone?"

Detective Gavin asked, sipping his coffee. Inspector Fried shook his head.

"Doesn't add up. Look at the quality of that circuit board. You're telling me a commoner who's never even seen magic carved a circuit with an engraving knife and built a bomb?"

This called for a skilled technician, or help from behind the scenes.

Fried straightened his hat and shot Gavin a look.

"This bastard pulled off a terrorist attack in the heart of the Empire. There's someone behind him. Director Heinrich is furious about this. We have to find them."

"......Right, well. I'll get him stabilized first. He can barely talk right now. Maybe ease up on the hitting next time. We need him able to speak."

"Quiet. You my wife or something?"

"No, sir......"

Fried left the detention center first.

Gavin glanced around, checking for eyes, then stepped up to the bars. He spoke low to the trembling Nico.

"Three days. I'll give you three days."

Three days. There would be no reply to Nico's letter, obviously.

There was no way that knight would ever respond to a letter from some bottom-tier terrorist.

"If you're still not talking after three days, it's straight to execution."

Nico could only manage a ragged, wheezing breath. Gavin turned and climbed the detention center stairs.

Thud. Thud.

A spiral staircase that seemed to wind on forever. Georgen headquarters was needlessly vast, and this detention block was needlessly deep.

Thud. Thud.

After climbing a long while, he stepped out of the detention building.

"Chilly out."

He yawned in the night air and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

The moment he lit the one clenched between his lips.

Footsteps thudded.

Gavin turned toward the sound. A man stood there, a flat cap pulled low over his eyes.

"Good evening. Detective Gavin, is it?"

The man spoke first. Gavin took a deep drag on his cigarette.

"Sssh......"

He exhaled smoke and asked.

"Hah...... And who might you be? This isn't a place ordinary people just wander into."

Instead of answering, the man looked down at the toes of Gavin's boots.

"How many pairs of combat boots does Georgen issue, I wonder?"

"Two pairs...... Wait, that's not what I asked. Who are you."

Gavin narrowed his eyes, wary of the man.

"Let's see some ID."

"Of course. Here you are."

The man handed over his ID without another word.

Gavin took it with a suspicious glare.

──[ Imperial Central Bar Association License ]──

Name: Thomas Idunas......

────────

A formal license bearing the seal of the Imperial Central Court.

Gavin's brow furrowed as he asked again.

"Why would a lawyer be here......"

"I'm here to represent Mr. Nico Beber."

Nico Beber. Gavin turned the name over for a moment, then let out an incredulous laugh.

"Ha, are you serious? Do you even know who that man is?"

"Yes. I do."

The man smiled gently again.

"He's from my hometown. I too have lost something dear to me at the hands of those Izenheim bastards, so I understand his heart better than most."

"Listen. He's not an Izenheim case, he's a terrorist who blew up a critical state facility. Lawyer or not, that man belongs on the execution block, not in a defense chair."

Gavin tapped the ash off his cigarette and added.

"Besides, this is Georgen. Defense counsel visitation procedures don't just-"

"I've already formally submitted an application for defense counsel."

The man pulled a document from his briefcase and held it out.

"Under imperial law, any subject of pure Aran bloodline has the right to legal counsel. No state institution, not even Georgen, can infringe on that sacred Aran right. Isn't that so?"

Gavin looked back and forth between the document and the man's face.

"What's more, Alchemia is a 'national strategic defense contractor' that receives funding and technical support from the Imperial Ministry of Defense. Exactly as you said, a critical state facility."

The man pushed his glasses up and continued.

"Which means it falls under the domain of 'pure Aran territory,' subject to strict legal oversight and bloodline verification. So what happens if, say, that company's ownership or core research staff turn out to include disguised subspecies mixed in among them?"

Gavin's eyes wavered, a beat too late. He could already see where the man's defense logic was heading.

"Yes. That would be a clear violation of the Imperial Civil Law. Subspecies cannot hold public office, and they must be excluded from the decision-making structure of any company receiving imperial support. As you know, the Imperial Civil Law supersedes every other criminal statute."

A smile touched the corner of the man's mouth.

"In other words, if the targets in question were never recognized as imperial citizens to begin with, then there's ample room to interpret the defendant's act of destruction not as terrorism, but as a legitimate act to drive out subversive elements within the Empire."

Gavin ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. Sophistry. He'd never heard legal reasoning this twisted in his life.

"......Come back tomorrow, then. Visiting hours are over for tonight."

"Of course. I'll see you tomorrow."

The man gave a polite bow and vanished quietly into the dark.

"......What the hell was that guy?"

Gavin gathered the saliva pooling in his mouth and swallowed it down. He tapped his cigarette ash into his portable ashtray.

* * *

Meanwhile, I visited the hospital where the victims of the Alchemia attack had been admitted, to confirm with my own eyes exactly who these people caught up in the terrorist attack really were.

"......"

There they lay, sheltered beneath the Empire's finest medical care.

Six had survived the blast in total.

Wrapped mummy-like in bandages from head to toe, each one hooked to an oxygen mask, dragging in ragged, wheezing breaths.

I looked down at them, indifferent, unmoved.

Thud.

A heavy pulse rose beneath my collarbone.

Thud.

I didn't need to look any further.

Six out of six were Izenheim.

They had gathered beneath that factory floor to carry out some kind of "rite," without question, and the Empire's great commoner hero had stopped them cold.

Nico Beber wasn't a terrorist.

He was a man who deserved a reward, not a punishment.

"......"

I turned away without hesitation and walked out into the hospital lobby.

Thud!

At that instant, the virus reacted again, violently.

The hospital's front entrance. Someone in a suit was walking in.

"......!"

The moment he entered my field of vision, my pupils blew wide open.

An icicle seemed to drive straight through my temple, and a hollow, bitter laugh spread across my face right after.

A face I knew.

A name hard to forget.

Before the regression, a man who had coiled his tongue around me like a snake.

'Sir Knight Maximilian. I have an excellent business opportunity. If you'd only lend me your name......'

The businessman, Victor Heim.

Around this same period, he had used my name as a shield to establish a string of shell companies funded by the Ministry of Defense, and in return, he'd showered me with enormous bribes to keep my eyes and ears comfortably closed.

I once thought of him as a loyal retainer, but......

He walked straight into the hospital room where the Izenheim patients lay.

"......Ha."

The expression drained from my face.

Before the anger came, a vicious disgust surged up first.

Izenheim.

They really had coiled themselves through every corner of the Empire's veins, like cancer cells.

* * *

The next day, Inspector Fried received a report from Detective Gavin that Nico Beber now had defense counsel.

Someone had appeared, using the Imperial Civil Law as pretext, daring to put the brakes on a Georgen investigation.

"An odd sort of document actually made it to my desk."

Fried muttered, tossing down the formally filed application for defense counsel.

"What are you going to do? The guy seemed like a real piece of work."

At Gavin's question, Fried gave a cold smile.

"Every so often there's a fool who doesn't understand how the world actually works. Either a moron who can't see what matters, or an idiot drunk on playing hero. I'll handle it. You keep at what you're doing."

Inspector Fried gathered his case files. Gavin rose quickly.

"I'll come with you."

"No need. You just keep managing that terrorist."

As Fried passed him and walked out, Gavin's eyes fell, unthinking, to the inspector's boots.

......

The office of Georgen's deputy director. A cool draft circled through the gap of a window-unit air conditioner, and ornaments heavy with imperial authority pressed down on the room. Elegant classical music drifted through the air, and here, Fried bowed politely to the deputy director.

"......That's what happened."

"Hm."

One corner of the deputy director's mouth twisted.

Valerian, heir to House Taxis. An ambitious man in Georgen who held all three, ability, bloodline, and rank, at once.

"I already heard."

His voice ran deep. He always wore an easy smile and kept a calm, measured tone, but across every institution in Georgen, and beyond it, he was the hardest man of all to deal with.

"So the terrorist has defense counsel now?"

He asked quietly, flipping through documents.

"Yes. He just finished filing for a visitation request at the detention center."

"Take this. The lawyer's background. I just received the information."

The deputy director slid a photograph across the desk. It carried the man's features, his career history, his hometown, all of it recorded in full.

"......"

Fried felt it again, freshly.

This was power. The ability to seize every detail and every weakness of a man he had never once met, all in a single instant.

His intelligence network runs both wide and deep.

"What do you think, sir?"

"Hm. Interesting. This is the Empire working as it should. Citizens helping citizens. Aran helping Aran."

Valerian was a man whose depths could never quite be read. He carried a weight that defied description, a pressure that made facing him alone genuinely difficult.

"Even so, sir, the things he said were insolent."

Inspector Fried put force into his voice.

"He's a man who dared to sabotage a company that supports the Empire's national defense."

"Any ties to the Revolutionary Faction?"

"......Nothing confirmed yet, but we're still investigating."

Deputy Director Valerian offered a thin smile.

"My guess is, he's less some string-puller for the revolution and more just a man drunk on ideology."

"Ideology...... sir?"

"That's right. He thinks all Aran are the same kind of Aran. And that lawyer's exactly the same."

Valerian leaned deep into his chair and put a cigar to his lips.

"Men like that are persistent. He'll come back to the detention center. Send him up to me when he does. I'll have him tailed in the meantime."

"Yes, understood."

"You may go."

Fried saluted and withdrew from the office.

Creak.

The door closed, and the classical music settled back over the office like mist.

Tap. Tap.

Fingers drummed against the table, then stopped short.

"......These days."

Chin resting on one hand, the deputy director studied the lawyer's face in the photograph.

"Commoners keep crossing lines they really shouldn't......"

A thick, viscous contempt settled into his cold gaze.

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