In Another World With My Smartphone: Volume 17

by Patora Fuyuhara

  The king of Felsen murmured that last part. Bah, I still don’t really know anything. Why would the east sea marquis have the south spring marquis killed? Maybe it’s something completely unrelated to this issue and is just a personal matter or something.

  But still... the south spring marquis seemed like a harmless guy. He sure didn’t look like the kind of guy that would upset anyone, but I guess being a noble can put you on certain shitlists just by virtue of being one.

  Honestly, Yae’s plan is starting to sound a little tempting. We could sneak into the east sea marquis’ room tonight, then have him confess to everything... Then I could just wipe his memories. No... No, I need to save that as a last resort.

  Ultimately, things were uncertain but still stable. So long as we didn’t let the guy get away, everything would be just fine.

  ◇ ◇ ◇

  “...You gotta be kidding me.”

  “We let him get away, we did.”

  Yae and I sighed slightly, our mouths agape at the sudden sight. The east sea marquis got away from us... He’d gone and escaped to the next life.

  At our feet, evening sunset washing over him, was the corpse of the east sea marquis. Obviously we weren’t the perpetrators.

  We’d been discussing our plans when the king of Felsen suddenly burst in to give us the bad news.

  Apparently the east sea marquis had closed himself off in his room about two hours prior, saying he wanted to have some rest. A maid had entered the room to see what he wanted for dinner, and it was then that the body was discovered.

  This was definitely not a suicide, either. He lay face-down by the side of his bed, a scarf bound tightly around his neck.

  “At least the method was simple this time, strangulation.”

  “Was he betrayed by the assassin he hired, was he?”

  “That’s definitely possible.”

  Hmm... That scarf doesn’t look cheap... It’s silky and smooth, definitely a luxurious item. It also seems to have a coat of arms sewn into it.

  Everyone gradually turned around and focused their gaze on a woman in the room.

  “West Forest Marquis... Why does this scarf bear your coat of arms?”

  Prime Minister Schwein glared at the west forest marquis. Apparently the coat of arms on the scarf was the Swill family crest.

  The west forest marquis went pale, shaking her head from side to side.

  “I-I... That scarf is indeed mine, but... I thought I had misplaced it yesterday, I assure you! I have no reason to lie!”

  “You were involved in an argument with the east sea marquis earlier, weren’t you?”

  “Y-Yes, but I wouldn’t kill him! And how could I have even made it past his guards?!”

  That was a fair point. Also, using a scarf with your family crest on it as the murder weapon would be both incredibly brazen and incredibly stupid. Even if she had done it, she’d have taken it back with her to hide the evidence.

  Flora leaned in and used a few magical devices to scan the corpse. She had a portable device that had been enchanted with the [Analyze] spell. It vaguely resembled a certain item used by medical staff in a particular sci-fi TV drama that was popular in the west.

  Flora frowned slightly as she looked at the device’s readings.

  “What is it?”

  “This is quite strange, you see.” I asked Flora to elaborate.

  Once she explained it to me, I agreed. That made no sense at all.

  “Is the analyzer busted, maybe?”

  Once I asked her this, Flora made a few manual confirmations on the body itself, turning over limbs and checking key points of the body.

  “The closer inspection matches the analyzer’s results, you see... There’s no mistaking it.”

  “Then that means he was...”

  Did they use magic, perhaps? Or maybe an artifact... If Flora’s right, this changes everything. But if the perpetrator is capable of magic like that, we can’t let him escape. Given that nobody’s left the castle yet, he should still be here.

  Welp... Guess we’re gonna have to do what Yae suggested. The old-fashioned bad police mystery drama method...

  Well, I’m hardly what people would call a great detective, anyways. In the end, this isn’t a mystery drama. It’s a story where bad guys get punched until the plot moves along. In the end, there’s no reason for me to hold back when it comes to merciless assassins, anyway. Let’s get this over with.

  I channeled divinity through my eyes and triggered my divine sight, then I glanced at everyone in the room. Prime Minister Schwein, Ganossa, West Forest Marquis, North Mountain Marquis... It’s not them. And obviously, it’s not the king of Felsen or the pope, either.

  “G-Grand Duke? What is it?”

  The pope, who was likely growing uneasy at the sudden silence, called out to question my behavior.

  “Sorry about that. Just checking something.”

  I smiled at the pope before heading outside and glancing over the nearby staff. I gazed at the maids and the guardsmen who were either standing or walking around. Then I saw who I was looking for, and made a beeline for him.

  The man in front of me was the kind of generic guard you’d see in a videogame. He had short brown hair and didn’t stand out in any way at all. He had a soft, non-threatening face, and was clad in the armor of Horn. He had a standard-issue sword about his waist, and a standard-issue spear in his right hand. At a glance, he was just another castle guard.

  “C-Can I help you?”

  The guardsman forced an awkward smile as he glanced around. I smiled back as I placed a hand on his shoulder.

  “Too bad, man.”

  “H-Huh?”

  “[Gravity].”

  “Gaugh!”

  The man crumpled to the ground under the force of the additional weight I’d pulsed into him. He couldn’t move a muscle, but he stared up at me, eyes filled with a mixture of malice and confusion.

  “G-Grand Duke, what is the meaning of this?!”

  The prime minister came running over in a panic. Obviously he’d be concerned, given that one of Horn’s castle guards had just been assaulted by the leader of another nation.

  “Don’t worry, I’m just peeling back the skin on the snake in our midst. Give me a moment.”

  I used [Storage] to bring out some metal wiring, which I used to firmly bind his limbs. What I was about to do would remove the effects of [Gravity], so I didn’t want him getting away.

  “Alrighty then... [Absorb].”

  “Wh-What?!”

  My spell sucked up any and all magic surrounding the soldier, immediately undoing the [Gravity] spell I’d cast on him. But more importantly than that, it decloaked the disguise that I’d already seen through with my divine sight.

  His appearance shifted almost instantly. His brown hair lengthened and turned a dark black. His plain face morphed into one with narrow, foxlike eyes. His rounded features vanished, replaced by a stubbled, sharp chin. He no longer resembled a young man, but an older well-built man. His muscles were distinctly more visible as well.

  “Wh-What in the world?”

  Ganossa stared in absolute shock. The one on the ground was no longer taking on the form of a harmless and surprised young man. He was now a suspicious-looking fellow with furious eyes.

  “Magic that lets you change how you look, huh. Not bad. Was it an artifact, or perhaps a Null spell? Either way, it was perfect for undercover operations. You almost had me fooled.”

  “...Bastard. How did you know?”

  “The time of death didn’t match up, you see.”

  Flora came over to give her response. She was right. It was all thanks to that one piece of information that I managed to make it all come together.

  “Magic in the body depletes after death, you see. The amount left in the body we found suggested that he had died five or six hours ago, you see.”

  “Which means that the east sea marquis died around the same time as the south spring marquis. Which got m
e to wondering... Just who was the east sea marquis I spoke to? Who was the one that shut himself in his room? Obviously that meant there was an imposter. One with a powerful magic disguise at his disposal, too. Since nobody had yet left the castle, I assumed you were still here, just disguised as someone else since they’d found the east sea marquis’ body... And then I found you.”

  “Grrgh!

  Given that he was still sticking around, I could only assume it was to kill more people. Otherwise, he would’ve just run away.

  The man gritted his teeth and glared up at us. I could sense hatred in those eyes of his, but it was a much deeper hate than just having been found out. Clearly, he had a personal problem with me.

  “I knew it. You’re with Qulau, aren’t you.”

  “What?!”

  His frenzied glare turned to shock for a brief moment. I leaned down and fished around inside the man’s clothing before producing a black mask that resembled the kind you’d find in Beijing opera. Just as I’d suspected, he was one of them.

  “Tell me, now. What are Yulong’s former black ops squad doing in Horn? Are you trying to kick off a civil war?”

  “Heheheh... Qulau will always exist, no matter how you oppress us. I have no words for you, murderer. Feel free to end my life right now, but this country is already finished. We’ve made sure of that. Soon enough, Yulong’s wrath will come for you, and it w—”

  “Yawn. Boring. Who gives a shit? Let’s get your confession already. [Hypnosis].”

  “Gwuh?!”

  I cast a spell that immediately rendered the assassin unconscious. He definitely should’ve had some anti-magic charms or something. What a dumbass.

  Alright, mister spy. Time for you to let me prod around your brains.

  ◇ ◇ ◇

  The assassin, who wasn’t protected at all by any anti-magic countermeasures, immediately became susceptible after I cast [Hypnosis]. I did realize a bit later that had he worn anti-magic equipment, his disguise wouldn’t have worked... so that was just a risk he had opted to take.

  Either way, we got the following information out of him.

  • The south spring marquis had been rendered unconscious and put in the closet before the meeting.

  • The south spring marquis who had showed up at the beginning of the conference was therefore the imposter in disguise.

  • When we took the break later on, he immediately asked the prime minister to swap rooms, so that it would look like a failed attempt to kill the prime minister.

  • After securing the room, he dragged the sleeping south spring marquis out from the closet and used the poison to kill him, which made him puke up blood. This also caused the sound that Sakura ended up hearing.

  • He escaped to the roof through the window afterward, using a rope and hook to clamber upward. That was also what caused the wood shavings I noticed.

  • From the rooftop, he made his way to the east sea marquis’ room and strangled the man to death with the scarf he’d stolen from the west forest marquis. He then changed his appearance to that of the east sea marquis.

  The magic he used was called [Mimicry]. It was a Null spell exclusive to him that allowed him to copy the features of others.

  This spell was completely different to my illusions, as it actually reformed his body. Others wouldn’t even be able to tell through physical contact that it wasn’t the real person there, and the vocal cords were also identically mimicked.

  There were a few drawbacks, though. You couldn’t use the spell on anyone smaller than you, which meant short people and children couldn’t be mimicked.

  The caster also had to make physical contact with the target, and the target needed to be alive at the time of mimicry.

  Also, the maximum duration for the spell was just six hours. Once the spell wore off, the caster needed to touch the target again in order to assume their form.

  Regardless of its limitations, it was still an incredible spell.

  He used this spell to disguise himself as the east sea marquis, deliberately raising tensions between the prime minister’s faction and the king’s brother’s faction. After he retired to his room, he put the corpse of the east sea marquis in a visible area and made his escape.

  After that, he transformed into a regular guard, but I caught him. And that was that. The real guard that he’d mimicked was found unconscious in a cleaning closet elsewhere in the castle.

  But the most disturbing thing I found on him... was a storage card.

  The storage cards were items I had believed to be unique to the Reverse World. They didn’t freeze time for things kept inside them, but were useful for transporting money, objects, and Gollems.

  He’d been using that to store the corpse of the east sea marquis while he mimicked the man. Apparently the south spring marquis was left unconscious in the closet because the poison used to kill him was fast-acting, and the assassin didn’t want anyone suspecting he’d died too soon.

  After all, unlike my [Storage], time would have still passed for the corpses in the storage card.

  When I asked where he found the card, it became clear that Qulau discovered a lost refugee from the Reverse World, tortured him to death, and stole all of his magical tools.

  Either way, we’d solved who was behind the murders. Now we could all live happily ever after... Well, maybe not quite. The interrogation revealed something even worse.

  “The spy infiltrated Horn well over a year ago. He’s been seeking to cause discord here the whole time. He’s the one responsible for your conflict.”

  “What?!”

  “Impossible!”

  Prime Minister Schwein, along with Ganossa, looked taken aback. It was already nearing dawn, and the two of them were clearly exhausted, but they were still awake and attentive.

  The Qulau agent confirmed that he had mimicked the late king, and used that form to promise Ganossa succession rights. The goal was to then kill the king, and have the king’s brother conflict with the king’s son. The ultimate goal was a civil war. But the prince ended up dying in a completely random accident, which nearly screwed up Qulau’s plans. He considered abandoning that plan entirely, but then Prime Minister Schwein began making preparations to have the late king’s grandson ascend to the throne. That was when the spy decided to carry on with the plan and kill the king while making it look as though sickness claimed him.

  So instead of the original plan, which was the prince’s faction being pitted against the king’s brother’s faction, it instead became the prince’s son’s faction being pitted against the king’s brother’s faction.

  “S-So you’re saying we’ve been played like a damn fiddle...”

  Ganossa trembled gently as he sat down in a chair, shocked. Prime Minister Schwein offered him a sympathetic nod before opening his mouth.

  “What is their aim, here?”

  “Hear me out here, but... if civil war broke out... Is there something the two of you would end up using in combat?”

  The two of them looked at me in shock. They hadn’t expected me to know about it, but I did. Slowly, they glanced at each other before I opened my mouth again.

  “You have a Steel Battalion here, don’t you.”

  The two men flinched at the mention. The Steel Battalion was the name given to a platoon of Steel Soldiers invented by Bowman, a scientist from Roadmare. It was more plagiarism than an invention, though, since the man just ripped off the Frame Gears to the best of his abilities. He’d had backing from the secret golden order, Gordian.

  They were different from the dwarven-made Dverg in that the Steel Soldiers were constructed entirely as weapons of war.

  “You’ve been importing Steel Soldiers into your country, haven’t you? Both sides, right? You both received an offer from a mysterious third party to supply you with Steel Soldiers that you could use to fight the enemy.”

  Both men remained silent. This all came back to the storage card I’d seen earlier. The original owner, a drifter from the Rev
erse World, was killed by Qulau... and his belongings were all conveniently stored within this card. Including something that Qulau found extremely interesting... Gollems.

  Based on the information I got out of the spy, the drifter from the Reverse World was probably a high-clearance worker in a Gollem factory.

  His storage card contained over three-thousand military Soldat Gollems, the kind you’d find employed in places like Isengard.

  A single person holding that many Gollems meant he had to be an important guy in the sales or manufacturing sector. No single person could stand against an army of that many, even if they were mass-produced models. The man was probably delivering them to a customer when he was spirited away to Yulong’s territory.

  But it got even worse. Remnants from Gordian had joined ranks with the remnants of Qulau. Two groups that hated Brunhild the worst had joined forces under one banner.

  Qulau now had Steel Soldiers at its disposal, as well as thousands of Gollems. Their plan was to sell hundreds of these things to both the prime minister and the king’s brother, marketing them as the thing that could win the civil conflict if it came down to it.

  Of course, their motivation wasn’t financial at all.

  Their plan was to wear down Horn using the civil war, and having Steel Battalions fighting on both sides would devastate the national infrastructure. The largest battles would be around the capital city, leaving the borders relatively unmanned and unguarded. That included the territory to the north, which was the territory governed by Ganossa and the north mountain marquis... The territory bordering Yulong.

  These new Steel Soldiers weren’t quite the same as the old ones... They had Gollem technology incorporated into them.

  As the civil war in Horn kicked into full swing, a full Steel Battalion would start invading the country from the north.

  While that happened, the Steel Soldiers that were ostensibly serving the side of the prime minister or the king’s brother would begin to operate autonomously as their Qulau programming set in. They would attack soldiers belonging to Horn and conquer the land for Qulau, which would then allow them to establish a new Yulong dynasty.