Chapter 770: The Third Thesis (4)
Immediately after proposing the absurd solution of demolishing all the stairs near the first floor of the magic tower’s main hall.
“Professor. I apologize, but could we discuss the stair matter after the seminar?”
Jenny, who had belatedly snapped out of the silence among the group, hastily shook her head.
“It seems we’re a little short on time to demolish all the stairs in the tower.”
Jenny said, checking the time with a smile.
“Considering the rehearsal preparations, I think it would be better to have a bit more time…”
“Understood.”
Although he said that, Lennok hadn’t actually intended to demolish all the stairs as soon as he arrived at the magic tower.
Evan Vylun was a party to the agreement with the magic tower, but from Jenny’s perspective, he was still an outsider.
If it were simply improving the system, like adjusting the heating, that would be one thing. But making significant changes to the facility would likely feel excessive.
Seeing Lennok nod obediently, Jenny was about to check the time with a look of relief when—
“Then let’s just adjust the other systems around the hall that I saw on the way here and finish up.”
“…Huh?”
While Jenny couldn’t grasp the meaning of his words and questioned him, Lennok began moving around the main hall, tinkering with various systems.
“There’s an error in the expansion spell hanging in the second-floor exhibition hall. I’ll untangle the twisted mana flow.”
Clank, clank!
“The mana-embedded material used in the walls is consuming a lot. Just poking a hole at the bottom will noticeably improve it.”
Thump!!
“The elevator. It seems to have a cleansing spell on it, but it’s a crude method, so I’ll just remove it. That alone will significantly boost its power efficiency.”
Whirrr!!
“I’ve fixed the facility’s ventilation system. It seems the function was created but never managed, but now the air circulation between floors should be much smoother.”
“…”
Despite him touching every facility in sight, Jenny and Tatiana couldn’t say a word.
Lennok’s tinkering with the magic tower’s internal systems lasted only a few brief minutes.
But that alone was enough to produce tangible improvements that were clearly visible.
The warm air blowing into the magic tower became noticeably clearer, and the facility’s air circulated pleasantly.
The elevators moving between floors sped up, and various forgotten functions of the tower, even by Jenny, were being improved everywhere.
But Lennok didn’t stop, even with those busy watching his work, trailing behind him.
“A considerable amount of mana is accumulated in the underground power section, unused.”
Lennok, feigning ignorance, checked the system circuits of the magic tower’s power room and said,
“If we use these, it seems we can install additional convenience functions.”
“Huh?”
Instead of answering, Lennok reopened his laptop and began manipulating programs.
With Davi’s help, he configured the necessary algorithms, linked the systems for mana manipulation, and replaced the software.
System manipulation and arrangement that he could never openly perform as Van were instantly handled under his identity as Evan.
Bzzzt!!
“The construction itself is impeccable, so linking the facility’s systems with its embedded mana isn’t difficult.”
“…”
Jenny and Tatiana watched, unable to ask anything, as the tower’s system updated in real-time.
“If I add variables so the accumulated mana can be compatible, and remotely transmit it to an artifact whose ownership is bound…”
Whoosh!!
The tower’s corridors became giant screens, displaying scenery and highlighting people currently entering and exiting.
Above, mana-embedded drones resembling small birds flew around, exchanging encrypted signals.
Soft, jelly-like kiosks walked through the corridors, seeking guests to guide.
Rumble!!!
“Jenny, the tower’s been strange for a while now. What are you doing again?”
“We don’t need to evacuate, do we?”
Even Dylan and Dray, who were working elsewhere, rushed out in surprise. Jenny, looking at her noisy colleagues below, asked Lennok with a bewildered expression.
“All of this, you’re saying the Professor just created these systems…?”
“Strictly speaking, I didn’t just create them.”
Lennok brushed off his soiled lab coat and said,
“It’s more like I properly linked the surplus mana embedded in the magic tower and repurposed algorithms I had previously developed.”
“…”
He spoke casually, but no one dismissed his words lightly.
Everyone understood the value of the system manipulation abilities Evan had just displayed.
Even though Evan Vylun was an excellent researcher, it was generally natural for scholars to invest a long time in producing results.
Even if it wasn’t about publishing a thesis, reviewing research results or repeating experiments would require preparation.
But Evan completely skipped such preparatory processes, immediately overhauling the tower’s internal systems with his own hands upon arrival.
How profound must his research into mana manipulation systems have been to make this possible?
Just with that, the three of them felt they could understand why Van had rushed the agreement with Rebatenon.
It wasn’t for the convenient use of Evan Vylun’s anti-gravity thesis or his mana-to-electricity conversion thesis.
They instinctively realized it was precisely to readily borrow the abilities of this researcher, Evan Vylun.
“Astonishing…”
Felix, listening to Lennok’s explanation, shook his head.
“There’s no engineer anywhere who could handle this kind of work in less than half a day. Professor, you don’t seem to grasp the value of what you’ve just done.”
“So this is what it means for talents to lie in different directions.”
Tatiana finally regained some composure and murmured.
“He’s excessively eccentric. This could actually be dangerous…”
Other mercenaries, who had somehow made their way to the upper corridor, surrounded Lennok and began scrutinizing him.
Even the bewildered representatives from the cooperating businesses in the lower exhibition hall were looking up this way.
“Most of the system updates worth attempting immediately are almost done.”
Lennok looked back at them and spoke to Jenny again.
“Lastly, we’ll just conduct a rehearsal on the podium, and then immediately begin the seminar.”
“He’s an unusual person, isn’t he?”
A massive podium, prepared in advance in the center of the main hall.
A stage built for a single speaker, surrounded by tiered, movable luxury seating.
Jenny, seated in the audience seats prepared for the seminar attendees, turned her gaze towards Lennok and said,
Evan, standing on the podium, was experimenting with the spell’s operation on stage with the help of other mercenaries.
Evan, measuring the light intensity, viewing angle, and screen size, looked like a calm researcher, unlike before.
“Looking at him like this, he seems like a completely different person from before…”
Tatiana tilted her head.
“Was there some common denominator that geniuses dislike? I’m just finding out now.”
“I did think he wouldn’t have a normal personality, but his reactions are somehow strange.”
At Jenny’s muttered words, Felix, who was standing beside her with his arms crossed, nodded.
“He’s certainly an extraordinary person. Isn’t he one of the handful of prominent scholars in this megacity?”
“I heard he hasn’t officially secured a professorship yet.”
Tatiana replied.
“There’s talk that he’ll pass the integrated master’s and doctoral program and take up a professorship based on the results of this seminar. Strictly speaking, he’s not even a prominent scholar yet.”
“Aris Richellen herself reportedly coveted his talent and scouted him. Either way, he’s quite an impressive person.”
“No, that’s not what I mean.”
Jenny cut off their conversation and asked,
“His personality, his words and actions… there are some suspicious parts. He definitely seems a bit strange.”
“Strange…? I haven’t really noticed anything like that.”
“That’s probably because you don’t pay much attention. If you talk to him directly, you’ll feel something off.”
As Felix tilted his beak, Jenny sharply turned to him and chided him.
“Besides, Felix, do you think I don’t know you’ve just been coming to the magic tower lately to mooch tuna?”
“…That’s going too far. I’m taking time for collaboration, it’s not just about that.”
Jenny sharply averted her gaze from Felix, who couldn’t quite deny it and looked away.
“Look at that. He’s already naturally making our people work for him.”
“…”
“Indeed. Since when did Manson work so diligently…?”
He was adjusting the positions of engines and models around the podium with the help of other mercenaries, and rearranging the seating.
Following Evan’s gestures, other mercenaries moved in perfect unison, creating space.
Aside from treating him kindly as a guest of the magic tower, it was strange that they were setting aside their own work to help with rehearsal preparations.
As Felix noticed this and tilted his head, Tatiana found the reason.
“It seems he’s looking after the mercenaries’ artifacts in between working.”
“Could he really be unlocking the system locks on their personal equipment?”
“…”
Among the high-performance equipment sold in the black market, some are sold using a subscription system.
Instead of paying regularly to get full performance, the initial purchase price is significantly cheaper than the market rate.
One might say it’s a way to sell installment plans to unreliable clients in the underworld.
In exchange for making the mercenaries work, Evan was hacking and fixing their equipment for them.
“To become friendly enough with the mercenaries to make such deals in such a short time, that’s quite surprising.”
“I’ve been thinking since earlier, but his abilities and personality are too different to work with Van. Even if they had some accidental connection, I don’t think they’d click well enough to consider collaboration…”
The wizard Van, as Jenny knew him, wasn’t someone who liked to rely on others’ talents or abilities.
He much preferred to acquire what he needed directly and was capable of handling most problems himself.
Of course, Van wasn’t someone who never accepted help from others, but that was purely a matter of efficiency.
It was only for tasks or problems he could personally handle and resolve at any time if he wished.
He might recruit and deploy necessary personnel to achieve his goals, but beyond that…
He rarely actively sought to draw someone in by their abilities, as he was doing now with Evan Vylun.
Should she consider it a sign that he coveted Evan’s abilities and talents that much, or was there more to Evan Vylun than Jenny could see?
“Even though his way of dealing with mercenaries is unfamiliar, he seems to know this industry quite well.”
Jenny murmured.
“Perhaps he’s someone who has worked in this industry before.”
“He might have heard information about us from Van. Aren’t you jumping to conclusions?”
Tatiana shook her head skeptically.
“He might not seem like it, but he’s quite talkative. It wouldn’t be strange if he talked about the industry while chatting with the professor.”
“…So I wasn’t the only one who thought that.”
Felix nodded, agreeing that Lennok wasn’t simply a quiet person, while Jenny shook her head.
“I’m going to look for information on spirit mages who’ve worked in the underworld over the past decade or so. Can you help?”
“At this point, digging into Evan Vylun’s background… seems a bit risky. Is it okay to proceed without getting confirmation from Van?”
They weren’t immediately going to be at odds with Evan, so what purpose would investigating his background serve?
As Felix pondered the suggestion slightly, Jenny asked with a rather bewildered expression.
“What are you thinking? The goal is to find information on spirit mages and, if possible, erase their traces.”
“…Ah.”
Only then did Tatiana understand what Jenny was trying to say and nodded.
“You mean not to find out his background, but to hide it?”
“Even if it’s a low possibility, if the professor were to be caught by them, it could disrupt the agreement.”
Jenny muttered, fiddling with her phone.
“It’s about preventing any unforeseen circumstances that might arise in this industry.”
“Hmm, in that case, I have no objections.”
Felix nodded and pulled out his phone from his pocket.
He tapped on the tiny screen, minuscule compared to the giant bird-headed man’s massive hand, and said,
“There’s a list of personnel managed by the mercenary industry. If we entrust it to a broker specializing in such tasks, they’ll cleanly erase the traces.”
“I’ll handle the deep web. Don’t forget, don’t just erase spirit mages; pick a few other professions to make it less obvious.”
“There’s an association connected to the magic tower that shares personal information of mages who handle unusual spells. I’ll look for a way to contact them.”
As Felix, Jenny, and Tatiana each specialized in different fields, the division of labor was handled skillfully.
However, with the seminar presentation not far off, the actual work would have to wait until after the presentation.
“Hmm, we’ll have to find the right moment to make sure Professor Vylun knows what we’ve done for him.”
“…Do we really have to go that far?”
“Of course. If we don’t say anything, who will know about our efforts? That way, he’ll be more actively cooperative with the agreement.”
As Jenny chided Felix, who was shaking his head, a quiet vibration suddenly echoed from the back of the corridor.
Humm!!
A quiet yet clear resonance, as if pre-announcing someone’s arrival.
Tatiana, who had been lazily gazing at the podium, immediately sensed a change and sharply turned her gaze.
“Jenny, they’ve arrived. Representatives from other cities.”
“Did representatives from other cities arrive before Vulcan?”
By moving this seminar’s venue to the Adamant Thunder’s magic tower, the scope of attendees for the seminar significantly expanded.
Not only were there representatives from businesses and research institutions within Vulcan, but magic towers located in other cities or on the front lines had also expressed their participation.
And amidst this, representatives from distant foreign places, who must have traveled quite a distance, began to arrive first.
These individuals exuded clear and unique mana without restraint, so much so that it could be felt from beyond the corridor where the main hall wasn’t even visible.
“What should we do?”
“First, we should guide them to the VIP room and have them wait. If we start the seminar as soon as the rehearsal ends, time will—”
While she was contacting attendants to relay instructions to guide the representatives elsewhere, someone walked past them and began heading towards the podium.
Even though Tatiana raised her mana to block him, he seemed to phase through, like a ghost, and disappeared.
“…Wait. What was that?”
At that strange sensation, Tatiana frowned and stood up.
Someone who had easily bypassed the witch’s detection approached the front of the podium, gazed at Lennok’s back, and scratched his chin.
“Hmm…”
The man, staring intently at the podium, murmured,
“I generally understand what he’s trying to do. But this isn’t their method…”
“Old man, you’re not supposed to be in here yet.”
The man, blatantly ignoring Dylan who stood beside him with speakers on his shoulders, pondered for a moment before chuckling.
“Still, it seems worth the long journey. One really does need to attend a renowned feast now and then.”
Only then did Lennok notice the man, subtly check the time, and turn his head.
Less than 10 minutes remained until the presentation began.
At this critical juncture, with the thesis’s unveiling in countdown, an outsider had slipped past Tatiana’s and Felix’s guard.
He was no ordinary person.
Lennok, certain of this, asked,
“…Who are you?”
“You are Evan Vylun?”
Lennok, after thoughtlessly retorting, closed his mouth the moment he saw the approaching person. An unfamiliar face.
Mana he didn’t recognize.
An elderly man with an ordinary appearance, lacking any distinguishing features.
Though clearly a stranger he’d never seen before, an immense sense of unease washed over Lennok the moment their eyes met.
“Ah, I’m someone who slipped in among the Machine City representatives. Strictly speaking, I’m not really an industry professional, so, hmm…”
The old man smiled casually, calmly extending a hand.
“You can just call me Artemeyer.”
“…”
Artemeyer.
The moment Lennok tilted his head to manage his expression upon hearing that name—
“Though ‘The Doctor’ would be even better.”
The Doctor looked at Lennok with a peculiar smile.