[V10C9] Everyone! Let’s All Be Nice to Director Hegelich, Okay!
Translated by Jodas 10: A Job for a Con ManEver since Armster was young, he’d had a strange disliking of those creatures known as ‘people.’
He didn’t have a clear reason to despise them. Rather, as he interacted with people over the course of his life, he would sometimes come to feel hatred against them. Sometimes he would feel disgusted at them.
That was, of course, something that everyone experienced. However, amidst a life full of those experiences, Armster came to realize the beauty of dolls.
He lost himself in that beauty, working as if in a trance to create his ideal.
While some critics would tell him ‘The dolls you make don’t feel like people at all.’ or ‘It feels lifeless,’ if you asked Armster, he would say they were focused on entirely the wrong thing.
Dolls were wonderful because they didn’t feel like people. They were gorgeous because they had the beauty of a lifeless creation. Never once has Armster sought to create a doll that was ‘human-like’ or ‘lifelike.’ Dolls should be beautiful, nothing more.
A certain doll-maker, Armster’s master, had told him once:
“Love people. Understand what makes people beautiful. Once you do that, that beauty will show itself in the dolls you make before you know it.”
However, Armster always embraced the exact opposite philosophy to those teachings.
— I can’t love people. Instead, I will try to learn what makes people ugly. Once I learn how to shave off that human ugliness, what remains will be the perfect doll.
At some point along the way, as Armster continued to pursue that doll-like beauty, the dolls he made started to attract positive attention.
But Armster had no talent for business.
While it would have been enough for him to ask someone with more business acumen to handle it for him, he had no leads on account of his limited social circle. Ultimately, he sold off the dolls he made for far less than they were worth. Any time he went out to buy the supplies to make his dolls, the sellers would rip him off.
With each doll he made, he only went further into the red..
It was in those days that a particular someone discovered Armster’s talent.
Leonhard, the young Emperor who had only just ascended to the throne. People called him the Black Lion Emperor.
The Black Lion Emperor brought Armster into the fold as an advisor on magical technology and granted him a workspace where he could make dolls to his heart’s content.
His fellow advisors were also incredibly talented artisans who made lace garments and metal bouquets for Armster’s dolls… Although perhaps he preferred it without them.
When he dressed the dolls in garments made by true geniuses, Armster had a realization.
Both the lace and metal bouquets that adorned his dolls were masterworks. They were perfect. So perfect, they doll paled in comparison.
At this rate, the dolls he made would be reduced to mere mannequins that existed just to wear the works of true geniuses!
His dolls lacked impact. Or perhaps you could say they lacked spirit. As Armster desperately searched for that missing element, the Black Lion Emperor made a suggestion:
“*If that’s the case, then I shall send you to the Wedge Tower. It is a spire that collects all magic — new and old — from across the Empire. You may search there to find the skills you lack.”
“And while you’re at it, look into the reason they cut ties with the previous Emperor,” The Black Lion Emperor added casually, although that part must have been his real objective.
So, he came to the Wedge Tower. While doing his best to look into the connection to the previous Emperor, he met her.
The Daughter of God, in the room underground.
“Oh my, who could you be?”
Silky, flowing black hair. Pale skin that had never seen the sun’s rays. A perfectly proportioned face. The girl had more than just a beautiful appearance; there was something else about her.
This girl, who had been carefully groomed by the adults around her to be the Daughter of God, had a certain spirit within her. She had a divine presence to her.
‘Ah, this child truly is the Daughter of God!’ Armster kneeled and, streams of tears pouring from his eyes, clasped his hands together to give thanks to God.
“From then on, I devoted my all to creating a doll that could replicate her beauty.”
As Armster’s explained, Hütter responded with an “Ohh.” that carried his myriad feelings on the topic.
The moment this middle-aged man, who had been crying like a baby, started to talk about the time he met the Daughter of God, his expression morphed into an unsettlingly blissful face.
Most likely, Spiremaster Abel of the First Spire: White Smoke had Armster twisted around her finger and entreated him to betray his previous employer.
Armster knew he was being manipulated, yet still chose to betray the Black Lion Emperor and side with Abel.
(It figures that a guy who hates people that much can betray someone at the drop of a hat like that…)
Hütter was well aware that Sombart and himself were also that same kind of person.
There really were no honest men around him.
“Miss Abel rarely ever allowed me to meet the girl, but I didn’t mind. It is only natural that divinity be hidden away. It wouldn’t do for her divine presence to be lost because my eyes beheld her for too long.”
“Uh-huh.”
“It was my greatest pleasure simply to be the one carrying sustenance so that she may live on.”
“Oh, really?”
It appeared that Armster viewed Fiene as an object of devotion, and that he had been used to perform various chores like delivering her food or keeping watch on the door to the underground.
Step by step, he was beginning to get a picture of the people who surrounded Otto’s daughter Fiene.
He was just about certain that the ones who knew the secret of ‘Chariclea, the Wedge Tower’ and its contractor Fiene included: Headmaster Möbius, Assistant Headmaster Miriam, Spiremaster Abel of the First Spire: White Smoke, and Armster.
“Hey, Armster. Were the Maintenance Office and Library Office Directors in on it too?”
A look of surprise showed on Armster’s face at Hütter’s question.
“I’m impressed you figured that out… Mr. Pigeon Eye.”
“Don’t call me that. Just ‘Hütter’ is fine.”
The Maintenance Office was responsible for the upkeep of the whole Wedge Tower. That being the case, it would be strange if they weren’t aware of the fact that the Wedge Tower itself was an Ancient Magical Artifact.
While he was a little unsure about Library Office Director Linke, Hütter reasoned that she, as a devoted follower of Miriam’s, would also be a co-conspirator.
If she wasn’t, there would be no way for her to have thought to use ‘Despina, the Chain of Fools’ to seal ‘Chariclea, the Wedge Tower’s functions on the spot.
Now that he was starting to see the web of connections in the Wedge Tower, Hütter envisioned the face of Guidance Office Director Hegelich.
(Director Hegelich has to deal with Spiremaster Abel as a boss, and his subordinates are…)
Röhm (traitor)
Armster (spy)
Sombart (piece of shit)
Myself (con man)
These guys.
And even the Apprentices had the literal Monster Finn, the Emperor’s sister Sevil, and all sort of other problem children.
(Oh Director Hegelich… You’ve sure got it tough, huh…)
He was skilled, but for whatever reason, he just could not stop pulling the short straw. He was a lot like Headmaster Möbius in that way. He should make sure to be nicer to him from now on.
As Hütter was thinking about such things, Sombart cut in, sounding quite bored of all this.
“Um… Is that rea~lly all you’ve been doing, Mr. Armster?”
“W– What do you mean by that? … I really don’t care for anything besides doll-making…”
“Really~? Are you sure you aren’t hiding anything else? Hey, Mr. Hütter, show us how a bad man does a real interrogation!”
“What makes you think I’ll do that!? Who the hell do you think I am!? You know I could get executed for that kind of thing!?”
As Hütter shouted indignantly, Armster lifted his face up with a start.
“Y– You mean you didn’t come here to execute me? …Could it be that you’re here to support the Roseberg Master too, Pigeon Eye?”
“Huh?”
Hütter’s brows shot up at the words flying out of Armster’s mouth.
The Roseberg Master. It came so out of the blue that his first thought was ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
Hütter had assumed that Armster had been sent to investigate the reason the Wedge Tower cut off ties with the previous Emperor just like he was. Could they have had different missions after all?
Well, it wasn’t unusual for spies to have differing missions and not be privy to that information.
Not to mention that the third-rate con man Smoke Fox was a disposable pawn. Of course they wouldn’t let him in on any critical intel.
When Hütter fell silent, Armster ran his mouth in a panic.
“Ah– don’t worry! I haven’t told Miss Abel anything about that mission! I really have been supporting him from the shadows! Really! So… Mr. Pigeon Eye… You won’t tell His Majesty, right…?”
(…Now it’s getting even more complicated. What’s he on about now?)
He didn’t have the slightest clue. Regardless, Hütter gave Armster a look like he knew everything and shrugged his shoulders.
“That depends. What are you trying to say?”
“Y– You know! Since the head of the Roseberg Family, the Fifth Thorn Witch, is staying at the Wedge Tower under a false identity, the Black Lion Emperor told me to make sure things went smoothly for…”
Sombart interrupted Armster’s sentence with a prodding look.
“That’s the name of a famous mage family from the Kingdom of Ridill, isn’t it~? I’ve heard the current head of the house is one of the Seven Sages…”
Now that he mentioned it, he felt like he’d heard something like that before.
The Seven Sages of the Kingdom of Ridill. They represented the pinnacle of mages, and were granted the title of ‘Mage Count,’ equivalent in rank to hereditary Counts. They were powerful nobility who served as direct advisors to the King himself. The inspiration for Hütter’s ‘chantless magic’ act, the Silent Witch, was one of those Seven Sages.
Hütter pinched his brow and tried to get the story straight.
“Wait, hold on. The Fifth Thorn Witch, one of the Seven Sages of a foreign country, has been staying at the Wedge Tower under a false identity? … Since when?”
“Like I was saying, in this year’s class of Apprentices… Huh? Y– You weren’t aware?”
This year’s class of Apprentices. Witch.
The first thing to cross Hütter’s mind were six names: Sevil, Tia, Roswitha, Sophie, Ella, and Rukiye.
(Wait, no, that’s not right. Oh, of course, now I remember… The ‘Thorn Witch’ is just a title. The Kingdom of Ridill’s Fifth Thorn Witch is…)
…A man.