Late that same night, a bit later, by the Tussock River.
Rosago walked with steady steps, holding a sapphire pendant in one hand.
He had handsome features, black hair, and blue eyes.
His well-groomed beard accentuated his masculinity without making him look crude. No doubt such a gentleman would be favored by ladies of all ages at balls.
"Is it here?"
The pendant defied physics, maintaining a tilted, floating position that guided Rosago forward.
He walked to the riverbank and stopped, because going any farther would mean stepping into the water.
So he stood there by the river, which reeked of a fishy stench, and closed his eyes.
"Splash, splash."
Before long, the sound of churning water suddenly rose from the river as something floated up and swam toward him.
It was a three-finger-long bass, its eyes bulging, bobbing its head, completely unafraid of Rosago.
It swam right up to him, and as he crouched down, it delivered what it had been holding in its mouth into his hand.
After completing these actions, the bass rolled belly-up, died instantly, and sank to the bottom of the Tussock River.
What the bass had been holding in its mouth was a pale piece of flesh that seemed to have lost its healthy luster from being soaked in water.
"It has the scent of corruption."
Rosago frowned.
After failing to seize the manuscript, he had withdrawn from the battlefield, only to discover he could no longer contact his "Faceless" subordinate.
The man had followed his orders to infiltrate the gang and extract information about the manuscript, but had simply never returned, which was very strange.
Rosago had originally thought, what difficulty could there be in dealing with a bunch of gang thugs?
Who would have known his subordinate would simply vanish like that? He had no choice but to use divination to track him down.
Eventually, he found his subordinate's corpse at the bottom of the Tussock River.
Borrowing the bass's eyes, Rosago had seen the mutations in the corpse.
Combined with the sense of corruption from this piece of flesh, he suspected his subordinate had died at the hands of a Beyonder from the Secrets Suppliant sequence.
Holding the piece of flesh, Rosago attempted dream divination. However, in his dream he saw only a crimson blood fog, and nothing else.
"The Aurora Order? When I get back, I'll need to tell the ambassador."
Finishing his divination, he pondered silently, then said a prayer for his subordinate as a memorial:
"Poor Andor, may your soul return to the kingdom of the radiant Sun God."
This mission could be called a complete failure.
His subordinate had been killed, his marionettes had all been destroyed without exception. Most critically, he hadn't managed to take the third-generation difference engine manuscript.
No, that thing was probably never going to fall into our hands anyway, because we had a mole among us.
The information had already been leaked to MI9, and Ambassador Bakerland was implicated as a result and had to return to Intis.
Rosago felt somewhat regretful, because he reported directly to the Intis Ambassador Bakerland Jean Madan, and if the ambassador returned, he would have to go back as well.
Fortunately, his abilities were well-suited for intelligence work, so even returning to Intis, he certainly wouldn't be sidelined.
However, before that, the ambassador had assigned him one other small task: to kill a small-time detective who had gotten caught up in the incident.
If not for him, MI9 would never have noticed their operation.
Coincidentally, that small-time detective was actually a "Clown" from the same sequence as him, posing as a detective through divination methods, working hard to make money in Backlund.
Although all his marionettes had been destroyed, Rosago wasn't worried about being killed by a low-level Sequence 8.
Still, out of caution, he used the sapphire pendant in his hand to perform a simple divination.
"...Hmm?"
The sapphire pendant quickly gave feedback, rotating slowly in a clockwise direction.
In other words, it would succeed, but there would be some difficulty?
Rosago paused for a moment, then quickly came up with an explanation.
Probably because that small-time detective hired a Sequence 5 bodyguard... Heh, a "Wraith" happens to be countered by my abilities.
Although it'll be a bit troublesome, it can also serve as a replacement for my marionettes.
With this thought, he hesitated no longer. He bid farewell to his colleague at the bottom of the river, then turned to leave.
While the night hadn't yet ended, he would go to 15 Minsk Street and deal with that small-time detective called "Sherlock Moriarty," then report to the ambassador.
What a hard life.
He smiled bitterly as he walked into the pitch-black night.
***
"Stop following me!"
Silas Londor cursed angrily, forced to emerge from the shadows.
Behind him, the red-haired girl had been following him the whole time.
Seeing him stop, she stopped as well.
"Give it back to me!"
She shouted.
"Believe it or not, I'll kill you!"
Silas said coldly, his head buzzing.
Today he had forcibly maintained consciousness for a bit too long. If he didn't get back soon, he'd probably go half-mad on the street.
"Killing me won't be that easy!"
After Silas threatened her, the red-haired girl's face first turned pale, but she quickly retorted.
Silas glared at her but didn't immediately attack.
Because what this girl said... was actually true.
The red-haired girl had a great many mystical items on her.
With the support of these things, she had found and caught up to him several times despite his repeated attempts to hide.
And even when Silas attacked, she could dodge using her Beyonder items.
She had too many Beyonder items, and their effects were excellent.
Ordinary people would be doing well to have one or two, yet she actually possessed so many. It was as if she were a young scion from some ancient great family.
Moreover, Silas couldn't be sure just how many more Beyonder items she had or judge the danger level of those items.
A guy he couldn't hit and couldn't shake off kept following him, and he felt incredibly irritated.
"I've taken the thing, so forget about it," Silas said viciously. "If you keep pestering me, I'm going to get serious!"
If she insisted on pushing him, Silas would have no choice but to abandon evasion and attack with full force.
The red-haired girl backed up a few steps, seemingly truly frightened by him.
But soon, she rolled her eyes as if she'd thought of something, and asked, "Let me ask you, if you've taken the manuscript, can you find a place to sell it?"
Silas froze.
He'd only focused on snatching it and really hadn't thought about this point.
The manuscript was indeed very valuable, yes, but where could he sell it?
He hadn't yet been to the Beyonder gathering that fat apothecary had told him about, and he wasn't clear about what went on there.
Rashly exposing information about the item might lead to discovery by MI9. Other underground black markets had the same problem: he couldn't find a buyer in the short term, and it was easy to leak his own information.
"See, I knew it."
The girl's voice carried a Feysac accent, with pronounced trilled consonants.
"I happen to know of a Beyonder gathering where an important person is seeking this manuscript.
That person has a very good reputation and isn't with the authorities.
How about this: I'll provide the channel, and we'll split the proceeds. How about it?"
After she finished speaking, Silas felt somewhat hesitant.
Either way, it would be better to get rid of this manuscript quickly. If someone could handle it fast, that actually seemed pretty good.
After all, he'd obtained it with basically no cost, so accepting less compensation was acceptable.
"Fine. Ninety-ten split."
He nodded.
"No way! Why don't you just go rob someone! We split it evenly..."
The two haggled back and forth for a while, finally settling on a seventy-thirty split, with the red-haired girl taking him to that Beyonder gathering to introduce him to the important person.
"My name is Sophia. What about you?"
Her name matched her accent, both carrying a Feysac flavor.
"Kafka Anderson."
Silas gave his false name.