A door crushed despite no magic having been used.
Staring at the stone door, collapsed beyond recognition, Eric’s mouth fell open.
‘The door and the magic cast on it were annihilated wholesale…….’
It was something only those in the know knew.
The Owl entrances open all across the world were all made using the magic of the Clock Tower’s Tower Master. This place was no exception. Hadn’t Eric himself made the door right before coming to Korea?
The Owl’s stone doors were made in the following way.
First, flowers blooming near a volcano were smeared over granite, and horse blood was wrung out so that it seeped into the stone. Then the scent of blood and flowers would rise from the stone together, and at that point, magic circles were engraved into each individual stone using bone powder. It was a spell written in the grimoire possessed by the Tower Master.
The enormous stone door thus created came to possess defensive power strong enough to withstand most attacks with ease, as well as magic of proof. This magic of proof came in quite a variety of forms, so the method of entry would change every season. The door had been able to endure all of those fields of proof without issue.
Yes, until now.
“…….”
With a blank expression, Eric approached the crushed door.
The door, which had once been so huge it reached the ceiling, was now smaller than the palm of his hand. Its hardness had also fallen from that of a boulder to that of a slime. Whether it had melted and gone mushy, or whether the nature of the stone itself had simply changed, he could not tell at all.
“……What did you do?”
Thud.
Eric set the drooping door down on the floor and looked back at Ian. Ian answered with a sour expression.
“……I didn’t do anything.”
“What kind of bullshit is that? You’re saying the door ended up like this when you didn’t do anything?”
“If anything, I’m the one who wants to know. Why did the door suddenly do that?”
“……Hah.”
Eric let out a hollow laugh.
It was a trivial ability, but Eric possessed a ring capable of detecting another person’s lies about three times a week.
An item he had commissioned from an astrologer for the enormous sum of five hundred million. The ring, which had never once malfunctioned until now, was silently keeping still even at this moment. That meant Ian’s words were not a lie. The corners of Eric’s lips tilted crookedly, as if he found it interesting.
“……Fascinating. I’ve lived seventy years and never seen a phenomenon like this. What’s the cause? The door couldn’t withstand the rank of the mage? No, that can’t be. The magic cast on the door is not that of an ordinary mage, but one written in the Tower Master’s grimoire. There’s no way an Eastern mage could smash through it head-on.”
“…….”
“But aside from that, no plausible hypothesis comes to mind. No, hmm…… could the grimoire be the cause? The moment it sensed the omen of you trying to use magic written in a grimoire, the door was destroyed……?”
“It’s fine to speculate, but I’d like to go in soon.”
Ian cut off Eric, who had been muttering to himself. He let out a deep sigh and put the grimoire back inside his coat. Eric stopped talking and looked back at him.
“……Yes, I suppose so.”
Eric gave a faint laugh and adjusted his slightly askew glasses. The orange light of the torch fixed to the wall reflected off the lenses and scattered.
“What method you used doesn’t really matter. In any case, it’s as good as proven that you possess something capable of destroying the door. Enter.”
“……Any penalties?”
“There won’t be. I guarantee it. As you know, the society of mages is one that runs entirely on ability. A bloodline without ability is treated far worse than an outstanding natural-born.”
“I was like that,” he added, stepping aside.
Ian hesitated for a moment, then began walking toward the inside of the open doorway.
The other side of the door was filled with fog and difficult to make out with the naked eye, but since he knew it was a magical measure, he felt no particular unease.
“This matter will be reported to the Clock Tower.”
The moment Ian passed by Eric, he muttered in a low voice. Ian came to an abrupt stop and moved only his eyes to stare at him. At the rather sharp gaze, Eric curled up the corners of his mouth.
It was a smile of enjoyment.
“Don’t look at me like that. It’s not as though I’m doing it because I want to.”
“…….”
“In order to remake this door, the Clock Tower’s Tower Master’s permission is absolutely required. Naturally, I’ll also have to inform them of the circumstances behind its production. A verification team will come as well to determine whether my words are true or false.”
“……Tch.”
“I’m saying it’s a necessary procedure. As long as I belong to the Clock Tower, I have to follow their rules.”
“Fine. I understand.”
Ian did not like it, but if it was official procedure, he had nothing more to say. Pressing the matter further would be nothing but pointless nonsense. There was no reason to make a scene here.
“I hope you’ll explain it as favorably as possible.”
“I’ll try.”
Answering thus, Eric crouched down and picked up the melting door again. Ian left him behind and advanced toward the wide-open path of fog.
As for why the door had suddenly been blown away, Ian could not estimate the reason either. However, he could roughly guess that it had something to do with the magic of the Outer Gods. Most likely, the magic cast on the door had been unable to withstand the magic of the Outer Gods and had collapsed.
It was a little unexpected that it had collapsed even though he had not used recreation magic, but if the magic bestowed upon the stone originated from a grimoire, it was not that strange.
He currently had three grimoires of the Outer Gods alone, so it was entirely plausible that magic far removed from its master had failed to endure the aura of the grimoires and collapsed.
‘The Tower Master is also a mage who possesses a grimoire. In the end, if it’s magic recorded in a grimoire, there’s a possibility that it was devoured in reverse by magic from the same kind of grimoire.’
Of course, all of this was nothing more than conjecture. Even if he formed hypotheses in his head, it was not an issue on which he could reach certainty. For now, it was right to bury it and bring it out again when the Clock Tower took some sort of action. If a report went up, they would undoubtedly take some measures.
If possible, he hoped those measures would not be violent. Even for Ian, fighting an entire organization was something he would rather avoid.
Step, step.
As he continued thinking and moved forward, the fog that filled his field of vision slowly began to thin. Color returned to the hazy space ahead, and the figures of the party members who had entered before him came faintly into view.
“Ah, you’re here…….”
Yuna was the first to notice Ian and smiled with a soft giggle. Ian smiled back at her, then pushed fully through the fog and stepped into the interior of the Owl in earnest.
As though there were an invisible membrane of air. The moment he entered the place where the party stood, all sorts of smells swam into his nasal cavity.
Perfume, medicinal herbs, blood, beasts, and more.
All kinds of scents spread thickly from every direction. If someone were sensitive to smells, their head might have spun for an instant. Fortunately, Ian’s sense of smell was not to that degree, but it was unpleasant all the same, and his face twisted slightly.
“What is that smell…….”
“It’s because they handle so many goods! There are many kinds of mages, so there are many things they sell!”
Dolores answered Ian’s mutter. She looked around with an ohoho laugh. Ian moved his gaze as well.
The mages’ shop, the Owl.
Why it was called the Owl, and what its origins were, was entirely unknown. However, there was one characteristic they all had in common.
The shop was underground. And the overall shape of the shop resembled an underground prison.
“…….”
A long, straight corridor. An underground space with no sunlight. In the damp space, where blue torches hung on the walls and lanterns of blue flame floated near the ceiling to provide light, Ian let out a low groan.
On both sides of the corridor, shops stood in rows like prison cells.
[Astrologer’s Fortune-Telling House], [Alchemist’s Apothecary], [Mystic’s Curio Shop], and the like.
Shops of different natures stood aloof beneath the blue light. Naturally, there was no one calling out to solicit customers. The shop owners were all simply waiting for customers inside their own shops.
“I’m thinking of visiting the tailor first.”
Dolores said. She pointed with a finger toward the innermost part of the corridor, at a sign that read [Ivriato’s Clothing Shop], and smiled brightly.
“I’m planning to have a new custom dress made. What about the rest of you?”
“I’ll follow you, Dolores! I don’t know what’s here anyway!”
Ari answered. Dolores did not bother refusing her, and took her hand gracefully with a faint smile.
“Then shall we? And you?”
Dolores’s gaze shifted to Yuna. After thinking for a moment, Yuna walked behind Ian.
“I, I’ll go around with him…… I came just to look around too…….”
“Understood! What about you, Shin Ian?”
“I’m thinking of going to the materials shop first. There are some items I’ve been asked to get, and there are things I need to buy too.”
“Mm, I see! Then you should go to that shop over there called [Pleias’s Spoils]. It’s a franchise, so they won’t try to swindle you.”
She said, pointing with her hand to a certain sign written in Greek. Ian nodded.
“Right. Thanks for letting me know. I’ll wait once my business is done.”
“No! If you finish what you need to do, you can just go back. Tailoring clothes takes quite a long time, so this young lady has to stay here for a while. I can’t needlessly take up your time.”
As she said that, Dolores lifted her skirt slightly, as if a noblewoman were greeting someone.
“This young lady will take her leave here! If you come to the clothing shop, you can see me, so if there’s anything you’re curious about, feel free to come find me! This young lady likes talking with commoners. If you want, I can even recommend some clothes!”
“Sure. If I have time left, I’ll stop by.”
“Good! Then!”
Dolores gave Ian and Yuna a light kiss on the cheek, then set off with Ari. Ian stared at the back of her head for a moment before turning to Yuna.
“Then shall we go too?”
“Yeah……!”
Yuna gripped her staff tightly and nodded.
The two of them walked straight to the spoils shop Dolores had recommended and opened the closed door.
At the same time, the smell of all kinds of chemicals wafted out strongly. The scent of preservatives meant to keep the spoils from rotting pierced sharply into their noses. Ian and Yuna unconsciously furrowed their brows slightly.
It was then.
“Customers, nya?”
A voice came from the direction of the counter. At the sound, which could only belong to the shop owner, Ian raised his head.
And their eyes met.
“Hm, how long has it been since I last had customers, nya? Your face isn’t bad either, nya…….”
There was no person at the counter.
Yes, no person.
Instead, a single cat wearing something that looked like a witch’s hat was stretching lazily.
“So, what are you looking for, nya?”
The cat moved its lips.
At the sight of a cat speaking human words no matter how one looked at it, Ian let out a hollow laugh.
It seemed there truly were many eccentrics in the world.