The distance was roughly two kilometers.
The direction was east.
But there were not just one or two of them. Perhaps he had other companions, because dark mages with similar lifespans appeared simultaneously.
There were five of them.
More than expected.
Rud, bewildered, focused every nerve on his senses and asked,
“Senior, are there perhaps other dark mages living in this town besides Fran?”
“No, there is no way.”
Shedia spoke firmly.
“I have lived here for several months. During that time, I investigated every possible thing there was to investigate, but no trace of any other dark mage came up.”
And there was no way Fran would have simply left that alone.
Dark mages had a strong tendency to regard one another as enemies. That was why, if they judged someone to be a threat to them, they would try to eliminate that person without mercy.
Shedia looked for a moment at Rud, whose nerves had suddenly sharpened, then asked,
“What is wrong? Did some problem come up?”
“It seems we will have to modify the operation a little.”
Our original plan had been this.
Rud would disguise himself as a dark mage selling a new drug and approach Fran’s subordinate.
Then he would propose working together under the pretext of doing business, earn their trust, be invited to the hideout where Fran was hiding, and assassinate him in one stroke.
Fran almost never stepped forward personally.
At first, they had considered creating a situation in which Rud pretended to sell a different drug and set himself up in opposition to Fran, but if a rival organization appeared in town, it was obvious Fran would hire subordinates or mercenaries to deal with it, so they had withdrawn that idea.
‘I still do not know exactly what is going on, but this is an opportunity.’
Fran had come outside.
That alone was a great gain.
After leaving the hideout, Rud pretended to stroll idly down the street while carefully examining the people passing beside him.
He could still feel the lifespan.
Perhaps the other party had also noticed him, because they were approaching cautiously.
The number had decreased to one. He could no longer feel the lifespans of the other four, and he did not know where they had gone.
‘Why did he come outside?’
Most matters could be handled by his subordinates.
Then why was Fran trying to act personally?
‘It may just be a guess, but he might be trying to keep me in check.’
Shedia had already left for another place.
She had moved in preparation for any unexpected situation that might occur.
Thirty meters remained.
There seemed to be no intention to attack.
Dark mages used magic by cutting away their own lifespans. If one tried to pull some petty trick, it could be noticed at once.
Even so, he could not let his guard down.
Fran might launch a surprise attack from behind.
Since Rud had memorized every face from the photographs Shedia had given him, he did not lower his vigilance for even a moment.
Five meters remained.
Rud felt the enormous lifespan right in front of him on his skin.
He would not act as though he knew him.
Rud was currently nothing more than a dark mage who was going around selling drugs.
If he reacted the moment he saw Fran’s face here, the situation would become irreversible.
Fran’s face came faintly into view beyond the crowd.
He was hidden well among the people, but just as in the photograph, he had a rather menacing face.
It was recognizable at a glance.
He was a man in his mid-forties, with dark grayish skin and a very scrawny build, his cheeks sunken inward.
His bushy beard looked as though it had not been trimmed in months. His dirty, tangled dark hair was swept back and had grown down below the nape of his neck, looking like a mop that had not been washed in days.
His heart pounded with tension.
The hostility Fran emitted was no joke. Fran’s peculiar, gloomy eyes seemed to pierce straight into Rud’s pupils.
His facial muscles twitched. If he relaxed even slightly, his expression felt as though it might melt away.
Rud desperately maintained an expressionless face and brushed past Fran’s side.
Their eyes did not meet.
Fran kept glaring at him from the corner of his eye, but Rud somehow succeeded in ignoring him until the end.
It was a kind of contest of nerves.
Contrary to what he had feared, Fran did not do anything in particular and passed by smoothly.
“Wait.”
A hard voice came from behind him.
Rud stopped walking. Fran also stood still in place and continued speaking.
“Are you the dark mage who has been testing a new drug in my territory?”
Rud answered in a sly tone.
“Testing? I am merely looking for colleagues to do business with.”
“I have already heard the story from my subordinate. They said you created Maktamin, the dark magic that increases physical ability, in the form of a drug. How exactly did you do it?”
It seemed the trio of men had told Fran everything that had happened earlier.
Thanks to that, the conversation would likely be easier.
“Well, I am not foolish enough to reveal something like that so easily to outsiders.”
“Are you telling me to pay you money?”
“Do you think I would sell that for pocket change?”
Even if it was a fake drug, there was no fool in reality who would sell the manufacturing method for a product to a rival company.
Fran’s brow lowered frighteningly.
He seemed to have thought that, since Rud was a young dark mage, he would be easily fooled by wordplay, but it appeared Rud had more experience in this field than expected.
“What is your name?”
“I am Gerard.”
“Gerard……”
Fran repeated it quietly.
It was a name he had never heard before.
If a dark mage with this much talent had appeared, surely word of it would have reached his ears.
A brief silence passed between them. To the eyes of the citizens passing nearby, it seemed the sight of them standing there did not register at all.
“I will remember that name. I think it would be good for us to have time to speak directly before long.”
“Thank you for such a favorable thought.”
Fran did not answer Rud’s response.
When Rud slowly turned his head, Fran had already disappeared somewhere.
The response came quickly.
When Rud briefly went outside to eat, one of the men in the photograph handed him a note and disappeared.
The note said this:
―10:30, in front of Rendler’s Bar.
Rendler’s Bar was only a little over ten minutes away from Shedia’s hideout.
Things were going so well that it felt suspicious.
No matter how cautious Fran was, it seemed he believed there was absolutely no chance that a dark mage could be secret police.
Rud arrived at the meeting place ten minutes early and quietly looked around the street, where night had settled.
It was as quiet as a lie.
The roadside that had been bustling with people only a short while ago did not have so much as a single small rat passing through it.
The streetlights flickered constantly, as if losing their light. The eerie atmosphere unique to the city drifted through the surroundings, making it feel as though something might leap out at any moment.
‘He is quite late.’
A full ten minutes had passed beyond the appointed time.
And yet no one appeared, so Rud straightened his clothes and let out a short sigh.
He had already noticed that someone was watching him from nearby.
They seemed to be taking some time to observe his behavior, and the other party was every bit as meticulous as expected.
Shedia was waiting elsewhere.
She had said she would quietly watch the situation from a distance, so there was no chance her presence would be discovered.
The wind blew hard.
Rud was rubbing his hands together and enduring the night chill when he noticed a dark silhouette walking toward him from beyond the darkness.
It was the person who had been watching him since earlier.
“Are you Gerard?”
“That is right.”
“First, I will search your belongings.”
Rud raised both hands as if telling him to do as he liked.
The man touched every part of Rud’s body with his hands, checking whether he had any suspicious objects hidden on him.
He was empty-handed.
Even after searching inside his pockets, not even a speck of dust came out. The man glanced at Rud once, then jerked his chin.
“Follow me.”
Rud followed the man without saying anything.
Shedia would follow in accordance with this as well. Since she had said she was an expert in teleportation magic, he trusted that she would handle it well.
They walked for about forty minutes like that, but they merely circled the streets and showed no intention of going anywhere.
‘Is he doing this on purpose?’
He might be doing this to check whether anyone was following them.
Shedia would be following by moving through the interiors of buildings with teleportation magic, so there was absolutely no chance she would be caught.
The man carefully checked the surroundings and secretly glanced at Rud.
Even though they had been circling the same places over and over, Rud did not complain once.
Instead, he merely followed quietly behind him.
‘This much should be fine.’
The man suddenly turned toward the hill.
It seemed that, now that he knew no one was secretly following them, he was finally taking Rud to the place where Fran was.
As they climbed the hill, Rud felt several gazes from here and there.
In every visible alley, groups of about five or six people were smoking inside.
They were familiar faces.
All of them were people who had appeared in the photographs Shedia had given him.
“This is the place.”
The man stopped in front of a small two-story house halfway up the hill.
Its appearance was extremely ordinary. It was the kind of common residence one might see anywhere in town.
The man went up the stairs and knocked on the door. As if she had been waiting, a female housekeeper came outside.
“Please come in.”
“Go.”
The man jerked his chin again.
Rud finally climbed the stairs. The man stepped aside, and the housekeeper politely ushered the guest inside.
As soon as he entered the house, a sharp, musty smell pierced his nose.
It was the first kind of smell he had ever encountered in his life.
From the kitchen, white smoke that seemed to be the source of the smell was pouring out, and inside a bag protruding from a drawer was a suspicious dark powder.
It seemed like a house made solely for manufacturing drugs.
Rud was looking around with curiosity when the woman suddenly stopped in front of a room whose door was firmly locked.
“It is here.”
CLICK.
When she inserted a key and opened the door, a staircase leading underground appeared.
“If you go straight down, the master will be waiting.”
The security was considerable.
That was the first thought Rud had upon arriving at this house.
The groups standing in the alleys earlier, and this underground staircase as well.
He felt he finally understood how Fran had managed to evade the secret police’s pursuit and survive until now.
“Understood.”
Rud answered briefly and slowly descended the stairs.
The ceiling was very low.
The width of the staircase was also narrow enough that a single adult man could barely stand there.
Its depth, however, was not especially great.
Once he reached the bottom of the stairs, a fairly large space appeared.
The only thing expanding his field of vision was a single lamp hanging from the ceiling, and on top of the desk, all kinds of books, beakers, and flasks were scattered in disorder.
And if there was one thing that startled Rud more than anything else,
It was Fran Rekdorf.
“Welcome.”
Fran Rekdorf turned his chair and greeted him. Rud did not hear his words.
He had vaguely noticed it earlier, but there was not just one set of eyes looking at him.
‘I never imagined something like this.’
Rud felt that he finally knew the true identity of the lifespans he had sensed earlier that afternoon.
In this underground space, there were five people who had the exact same lifespan and the exact same appearance as Fran Rekdorf.
They were definitely all him.
Rud felt an instinctive chill at the sight he was seeing for the first time in his life.
“There are many people here.”