Chapter 240: Neighbor (2)

“Long time no see, Van.”

Evelyn Marcia, clad in a thin suit, walked into the bar, shaking the item in her hand.

“I was thinking about what to bring as a gift for your opening… you know?”

“I don’t know what you mean by ‘you know’.”

Lennok, sitting at the bar on the first floor and tilting his drink, shook his head.

“Is that what someone who brought a basket of vegetables says? And you haven’t changed at all from before.”

“Don’t worry, I grew them myself. They’ll be very good for your health.”

“……”

What’s more, looking at the contents, it was the exact same pile of vegetables Lennok had received yesterday.

As he subtly pushed them aside near the bar, Jordan, with a disgruntled expression, took them.

Evelyn Marcia, with a somewhat proud look, watched him, then sat next to Van and opened a bottle of whiskey.

Despite her quite striking appearance, the way she blended in with the people was incredibly natural.

Is it not so difficult for a top-tier archer to blend into their surroundings?

“About what happened last time. I have something to say.”

She said casually, as if passing by.

“This isn’t the kind of place for it, so let’s get somewhere… Are you alright?”

“What do you mean?”

“Your glass hasn’t moved at all.”

The moment he heard Evelyn Marcia’s words, Lennok realized his left arm was fixed in place, not moving an inch.

“…It’s nothing. Just a lot on my mind.”

The timing was so bad that it honestly made him wonder if Evelyn Marcia had truly figured out his identity.

But from her words and actions now, it seemed her attention was focused elsewhere, rather than trying to expose Lennok’s secret.

If he wasn’t exposed immediately, that was enough.

Lennok quickly gathered his thoughts, stood up, and guided her to the makeshift office.

It was a place he occasionally visited after the Cartel incident, primarily to stabilize mana cores, so a faint layer of dust had settled.

After closing the door and roughly clearing the dust, preparations were mostly complete.

Evelyn Marcia leaned back in the chair by the window, then turned her head at the sounds from outside.

In the bar’s backyard, Dray Krimgal and other Krimgal Mercenary Office staff were now sparring among themselves.

It seemed they had taken a liking to it since Weian and Mad Manson’s spar, turning it into an annual event.

She stared down at the scene, then smiled gently.

“Looks good. We sometimes do something similar. It’s effective for gauging members’ skills and boosting their training motivation.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course, I’ve never lost first place there either.”

“……”

Instead of replying to her trivial remark, Lennok tapped the desk.

A heavy wave of mana instantly enveloped the surroundings, completely blocking out all external sounds.

Lennok pulled out a thin cigarette from his pocket, lit it, and gazed at Evelyn Marcia.

“So, could I hear what you want to say, given all this preamble?”

“……”

“We’ve known each other since I started working in this field, so it hasn’t been a short time. And among that, you’ve only sought me out directly once, when you gave me a specific commission.”

He remembered their last conversation, to obtain Parden McQueen’s personal information.

Hadn’t she said recently that the Agent’s scope of work had expanded abnormally, making it difficult to find time?

The fact that she, who had said it was hard enough handling matters outside of Vulcan and thus couldn’t help Lennok further, had now sought him out, proved that the situation was far from ordinary.

But instead of answering Lennok’s words, Evelyn Marcia turned her head slightly and began to talk about something else.

“Van, do you remember the day we first met?”

“…It was a hard day to forget.”

How could he forget the day he met that alligator giant while smashing up the Dyke Corp. factory with Dylan?

That transcendent strength, which surpassed the limits of its species bare-handed, was still vividly etched in Lennok’s mind even after more than two years.

“Right. Back then, when I saved your life and Dylan’s, I never imagined you’d become like this.”

“……”

“Others might think you were hiding your skills, but I know. There’s an unimaginable gap between the you back then and the you now. And I also know you have the talent to make sense of that absurd growth.”

Evelyn Marcia rested her chin on one arm and lowered her head.

Her jet-black hair flowed down, obscuring her expression.

“Back then, because I saved your life, I have the right to know.”

Would it be a misconception if the green light shining through her hair felt incomparably chilling?

“Whether the potential I thought I pulled from Pandemonium’s mire… hasn’t voluntarily walked back into that mire.”

“Evelyn, you…”

“Van.”

Evelyn Marcia, interrupting Lennok, asked in a chilling voice.

“What is your relationship with Pandemonium’s black wizard?”

“……”

Lennok, lowering the hand that had held the cigarette, quietly looked at Evelyn Marcia.

It wasn’t strange for her to suspect Lennok’s relationship with Myeong.

At the moment Myeong appeared, cast his ritual acceleration, and conversed with Olivera Ron Maize, Evelyn Marcia, who arrived late at the scene, would likely have noticed his presence.

Even Lennok himself hadn’t expected Myeong to appear to help him during the executive general meeting, so how would Evelyn Marcia, who had helped Lennok in every possible way, feel?

The very fact that Evelyn Marcia had only sought Lennok out after everything had settled proved the extent of her patience with him.

How long she must have agonized before asking this question, and how she had steeled herself to accept a truth she might not want to face.

It would be impossible for Lennok to guess all her inner thoughts.

“He told me to join Pandemonium.”

That’s why Lennok answered honestly.

For himself, and for her, too.

“He asked if I’d decided my answer, and said he needed a sorcerer like me.”

“……”

“I refused, and he accepted it. But he said others would be different… That’s all.”

“…How am I supposed to believe that?”

“Well. I don’t know either.”

Lennok closed his eyes.

“But the value of the life you saved back then, I haven’t forgotten it yet.”

“……”

“At least that much, I believe I’ve answered you honestly.”

Silence fell.

How would Evelyn Marcia truly perceive Lennok’s answer?

In the worst case, Lennok might have to directly confirm if she knew the secret of an organization called Azure Eye.

The faint green light that had shimmered through her hair slowly faded.

Evelyn Marcia’s face, as she raised her head again, was that of a composed archer, just as usual.

“Alright. If what you said is truly the truth… there’s one thing I need you to do.”

“Something to do?”

Is she talking about a commissioned request?

Just as Lennok tilted his head slightly in confusion, Evelyn Marcia pulled out a stack of papers and placed them on the desk.

It was a newspaper, casually strewn on the bar.

Among them, one article particularly stood out.

[Blaiver Tower, finally normalizing?]

[Leaving unexpected troubles behind, returning as the pillar of the steel industry]

[Magic Tower spokesperson avoids mentioning past disputes]

“Some time ago, after the standoff between Blaiver Tower and Pandemonium, news from the Magic Tower ceased, disrupting the nearby steel industry.”

“……”

“Not long after, the Magic Tower began to operate normally again, but nothing at all was known about what happened to Pandemonium. The Magic Tower side refused to even acknowledge the dispute itself and kept silent about their internal situation with ironclad security.”

“So?”

“The upper echelons of the City Council suspect that Pandemonium and the Magic Tower may have reached a compromise after their conflict.”

Evelyn Marcia’s gaze sharpened.

“In other words, there might be evidence of negotiations with Pandemonium, or even its members, remaining within the Magic Tower. Which means…”

“That they can use the weakness of the Magic Tower’s alleged collusion with Pandemonium as an excuse to subordinate Blaiver Tower to the city?”

Lennok also adjusted his posture at the interesting viewpoint.

The idea of targeting Pandemonium’s facilitators to maximize profit, rather than making Pandemonium itself an enemy and pursuing it, wasn’t bad.

Ultimately, systematically hunting down and killing every member of Pandemonium was too inefficient from the city government’s perspective.

Isn’t the reason they leave Croken alone, even knowing he often roams the city at night, because they cannot bear the sacrifices that would occur in the process of hunting him down?

“Right. As you know, Blaiver Tower, or more precisely, the Magic Tower’s Western Continent branch, is located in a distant volcanic region. This means we don’t have to bear the losses incurred during the pursuit of Pandemonium.”

“I see…”

“The agreement between the two cities is complete, and the City Council has already issued the directive. A few Agents working in the field and I will form a team and move directly. And Van, I want you to participate in this operation as an external consultant for the Agents.”

So, it’s about raiding the Blaiver Tower Western Continent branch?

He understood why Evelyn Marcia had specifically sought him out.

Although it was nominal, Lennok still held the position of external consultant for the Agents, and it would have been difficult to find a wizard of his caliber.

Furthermore, if magical insight was needed at a time when a full investigation of the Magic Tower was necessary, there was no need to state who would be the most helpful wizard for the job.

He never imagined that the series of causal events he faced in the Autonomous Region would lead to this… but honestly, he found it intriguing.

In fact, all this had begun when Lennok disguised himself as Weizen and put the drug lord into a coma.

At the time, it had been an attempt to divert suspicion to the Magic Tower’s wizards, including Weizen, but he hadn’t imagined it would work so effectively.

However, there was one thing that bothered him…

“If you suspect I’m affiliated with Pandemonium, you definitely shouldn’t be proposing an operation like this to me.”

“……”

“If there truly is something amiss in the Magic Tower, and I betray you in the process of uncovering it, the operation itself… Ah, I see.”

It was only after saying that much that Lennok realized Evelyn Marcia’s thoughts and chuckled.

“You never thought I’d joined Pandemonium from the start, did you? Was all this long preamble just to propose this job?”

“Well, not exactly.”

Evelyn Marcia also smiled back at Lennok and said.

“If you’re not affiliated with Pandemonium, then just prove it directly in front of them.”

“……”

Even if she said that, if she truly had no suspicions, she wouldn’t have come to him directly like this.

Was she having him participate in this operation to confirm directly whether he truly had no connection to Pandemonium, while also utilizing his power?

Or, considering her position as an Agent, it was also possible she had received additional orders from higher-ups…

Lennok put those thoughts aside for now and nodded.

“Alright. It’s true there are circumstances that invite suspicion, and this job does intrigue me.”

Blaiver Tower was virtually a sanctuary, the headquarters of the unique flame magic Lennok had acquired.

Even without discussing Pandemonium, if he could visit there directly, he was highly likely to gain magical achievements or inspiration.

Considering the abilities of Lennok’s newly awakened Mental Domain, expanding ‘turning points’ through diverse experiences was essential.

But that didn’t mean he planned to offer his services for free.

“Even so, you’ll have to offer a price for me to leave my post right now.”

While his business was stabilizing and his combat abilities might not be as frequently needed, it was still true that leaving the city carried some risk.

Having only recently been appointed as an external director of the Cartel, no one would dare touch his business unless they intended to cross The Triad, but he couldn’t just blindly follow Evelyn Marcia’s words, could he?

“Don’t worry about compensation. The budget requested from the higher-ups for this job has almost all been approved, so if we manage those funds a bit, we can fulfill almost all your demands.”

“Good. Then…”

Lennok briefly summarized his demands and told them to Evelyn Marcia.

She accepted most of his demands, but didn’t immediately understand Lennok’s final condition, frowning.

“…You want that?”

“It’s virtually the biggest demand.”

Lennok said, crossing his arms.

“I don’t think an opportunity like this will come again if it’s not for this job.”

“Haa…”

Evelyn Marcia sighed deeply and nodded faintly.

“I knew you weren’t very wizard-like… but fine. At least it’s a request I can handle.”

“Deal.”

Lennok smiled and extended his hand.

“I’ll be counting on you for this operation too.”

Thus, the two set a simple meeting place and time and parted ways.

Basically, what Lennok demanded as an advance was an access pass to the isolated society known as Palgung Fortress, among The Triad.

In addition, a quantity of various elixirs more than enough to replenish what he expended in his battle with Parden McQueen, and a copy of a pharmaceutical method separately stored by the Agents.

Numerous catalysts consumed in drawing and maintaining magic circles, and one personal favor related to Evelyn Marcia herself.

It was a contract large enough for him to receive artifacts or relics from the Agent’s vault after the job was done, regardless of the operation’s success.

After Evelyn Marcia left, Lennok gazed silently at the object placed on his desk.

A shabby piece of paper, bordered diagonally with gold trim.

A temporary ID that granted access to the central part of Palgung Fortress.

It was the most closed-off and secretive organization among The Triad, one of the few hidden places in this city where even Jenny’s eyes and ears couldn’t easily reach.

A special zone where the city government’s influence couldn’t reach, as all sorts of illegalities and corruption ran rampant, even amidst the expanding megacity entangled with various interests.

A slum-like area, virtually a small country within the city, that had rapidly expanded its power and seized territory around the unauthorized building zones that sprung up there.

Although people from Palgung Fortress were occasionally seen outside the city, entering it was almost impossible unless one followed their own customs.

But precisely because of that, strange items that were hard to find in the city circulated there.

Within the fortress, there were rumors of forbidden areas where time flowed abnormally faster than in other ruins.

That’s what Lennok was targeting.

If they dealt in artifacts or relics from such a place, they would surely have something useful for Lennok.