The room was filled with books. A man sat behind a large desk at its center, working on documents. On the guest sofa across from him sat a woman of indeterminate age, drinking wine alone. The room was quiet. A gentle breeze drifted through a half-open window, making the scene look almost like a painting.

FLAP

A white bird flew into the picturesque room. It circled silently, then settled on a tall stack of documents. Neither the man nor the woman showed the slightest surprise. The man frowned faintly, untied a note from the bird’s leg, and unfolded it to read.

“So this is how it turned out after all.” He clicked his tongue, holding the note in his hand.

WHOOSH

The paper began to burn in his hand. “It happened just as you predicted, as always.”

“... Too late. A prophecy that can’t prevent failure is no use at all.”

“Well, no matter how powerful your ability is, you can’t possibly see every future.”

“But they all acted on the prophecy I gave them before. They must have trusted me...”

“Not every plan can succeed. Perhaps you’ve made success too easy for us until now.”

“But my ancestor dealt with almost every possible future and guided the other heroes down the right path. And I used to...”

Ten years ago—no, even five years ago—the woman drinking wine before him had possessed such powerful foresight that people called her the reincarnation of the prophet who had foreseen the heroes’ futures long ago. But ten years ago, small discrepancies had begun to appear, and for the past five years, her prophecies had kept changing and had even proven wrong. Of course, apart from her ancestor, she was still the greatest prophet there had ever been, and most of her prophecies were not far off.

The man recalled the words on the burned note. It had come from an agent stationed in the Marquis of Hierro’s domain and said they had learned of the secret passage and would proceed with the planned operation. The agent had even used an ability to send word quickly, but given the distance, the operation would already be underway. And the man had known it would fail before he read the note. The prophet had learned of the changed future too late to stop it.

He had intended to send someone to salvage what remained of their organization there, but... “Sending people to recover the survivors would be even more dangerous...”

“I couldn’t see it clearly, but when I looked at what would happen if we sent people, I saw a red aura following them back toward us.”

She had not seen the future as clearly as she usually did, but it was enough. “So they’d trace them back to us.” On hearing her prophecy, he gave up on the organization remaining in the Marquis of Hierro’s domain. They had spent years building it into a considerable force, but he severed the connection without hesitation.

“... I’m truly sorry.”

“You haven’t done anything wrong. However I look at it, your ability doesn’t seem to be the problem.” Not all her prophecies were failing. The trouble was confined to certain regions and certain events, which made it clear that some outside factor was involved.

“We’ll investigate that separately.” It was terribly important, but not something they could uncover quickly. The organization had already been searching for the cause for five years.

“More immediately, the operation is going to fail, and they may track us down. Does someone in the marquis’s family have that kind of ability? I underestimated the Marquis of Hierro.” Seeing what worthless children the marquis had produced, he might have dismissed the house too readily. “Then again, Martin is the marquis’s son too.” Thinking of Martin brought to mind the subordinates who would be abandoned alongside him, and his stomach turned.

He rose and sat on the sofa opposite the woman. When he picked up an empty glass, she filled it with wine. “Nothing beats a drink for forgetting your pain.” But both the woman pouring the wine and the man holding the glass knew it could not make them forget. It might, however, settle his uneasy stomach.

He drank the wine and spoke. “We’ll set this matter aside for now. We can’t succeed every time, and there are still plenty of places where we can carry out operations.”

“Will you be all right?” the woman asked cautiously, seeing how unwell he looked. He shook his head.

“I’m the one who should apologize. The futures you see must be drenched in blood.”

“It’s all right. I only have to see them. You’re the one walking that bloody path yourself.”

Her words drew a faint chuckle from him. At this point, they were merely offering each other empty comfort. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. We both knew what we were committing to. We can’t stop now.”

“Yes. Now that this power has been bestowed on me, this is my mission.”

“And mine.” They drained their glasses, pushing the memory of those they had abandoned to the backs of their minds.

* * *

After entering the secret passage through the temple’s hidden door, the mercenaries made it safely beneath the lord’s castle. They could not bring too many people without risking the secrecy of the operation, but several dozen of them were moving fully armed. Without the passage they were walking through, there was no way they could have slipped into the castle. They also had to watch their step.

“Ah! Careful!” A hushed shout came from the middle of the party as it advanced in silence. One of the wooden barrels some mercenaries were carrying had nearly tipped over. It looked like an oak wine cask, but the mercenaries watching it wore no expressions of anticipation. Those nearby rushed to steady it, leaving the cask intact. The mercenary carrying it got kicked in the shins by several others.

“What the hell are you doing? Trying to kill us all?”

“Are you still drunk? That isn’t ordinary oil! If you can’t carry it, hand it to someone else!”

The mercenary carrying the cask accepted the abuse without protest, his face white. After all, that oak cask was the centerpiece of today’s operation. They were sneaking in to burn the marquis and his entire family to death so Martin could become the rightful heir. They needed preparations to burn them all without leaving even the slightest cause for suspicion. The cask was that preparation. What it contained had been supplied by those above them: Hellfire, said to have been sealed away after the Great War.

While everyone was still sweating over the near mishap, Benjamin, who was leading the way, called out quietly. “Get ready, everyone. Slaughter every last member of the marquis’s family, and eliminate all witnesses.”

The hidden door leading to the marquis’s study was just ahead. Though he had said it many times before, Benjamin warned the mercenaries once more. “Split up as planned, and set off the Hellfire as soon as it reaches its position.” He checked that they were ready, then nodded to Martin. At Benjamin’s signal, Martin knocked on the wall as Adria had told him to.

GRRRIND

Part of the wall sank, revealing stairs leading upward. Perhaps because it was so late, the study at the top was pitch-dark. As planned, two agile mercenaries cautiously climbed the stairs when the passage opened. They vanished into the darkness above, while the others waited below for their signal. One, two, three... As time dragged on, Benjamin’s eyebrow twitched. The signal was taking too long. Worse, an ominous smell drifted down from above: metal and blood. Mana began to surge through his body. His face hardened.

“A trap?” Enemies were waiting above. “Shields to the front! Everyone else, fall back slowly.” The mercenaries’ faces tightened at his order. Just as those carrying shields moved forward—

WHIZZZ!

Arrows flew out of the darkness.

“Urgh!”

“Aagh!”

“I’m hit!” Screams and shouts filled the passage.

“Kill them all! They dared try to murder our lord!” A mana-charged shout rang out from where the arrows had come, and armored knights surged in behind another volley.

“The operation’s failed! Everyone, run!” Benjamin shouted, hurling himself backward as he spoke.

They had been caught completely off guard. Lately, the prophecies had seemed to falter now and then; with rotten luck, one appeared to have been wrong about this very operation.

‘Good thing Noah stayed out of it. Her instincts are uncanny.’

The marquis’s knights were pouring in from every direction. They seemed to have come down through other hidden doors as well as the one in the study.

‘Was it a deliberate trap? Or did they find out along the way?’

The question flashed through his mind, but it no longer mattered.

‘Where’s Martin?’

Fortunately, Martin was nowhere in sight. He seemed to have escaped first, thanks to his ability.

“Aagh!”

Screams continued to rise on every side. Benjamin had trained these mercenaries for years, but they were no match for knights who had come prepared. The mercenaries fell before they could exchange more than a few blows, and the number fleeing alongside him dwindled rapidly. At this rate, they would all be dead before they got out of the secret passage.

“Damn it! This thing’s heavy as hell. Can I ditch it?”

“You lunatic! You’ve been running with that on your back this whole time?”

Benjamin shoved away a knight who had swung a sword at him and looked toward the arguing mercenaries. One of them was fleeing with the oak cask on his back. At the sight of it, Benjamin snatched a torch from a mercenary running beside him and hurled it at the man carrying the cask, pouring mana into the throw.

WHOOSH!

The burning branch shot toward the oak cask like an arrow. The moment he threw it, Benjamin channeled all his mana into his legs and sprinted madly toward the temple.

“Get clear!”

“Stop it! Commander! Are you trying to kill us all—”

The mercenaries who saw Benjamin throw the torch shouted, but before they could finish, it punched through the oak cask. The next instant—

BOOOOM!

A massive explosion erupted where the cask had been. The mercenary carrying it was torn apart in an instant, and flames spread in every direction.

“Fire! Circulate your mana!”

“Get away!”

“Help me!”

The mercenaries near the cask were caught in the flames before they could escape. More than half the knights fighting them were engulfed as well. The fire kept spreading. Had it not been for the lack of air in the secret passage, it might have burned down the entire castle.

“The fire won’t go out!”

“That’s no ordinary oil!”

“Fetch a priest and a doctor!”

Every mercenary and knight who failed to escape the flames died. The mercenaries were consumed by the fire. Other knights dragged a few of their comrades out of the secret passage, but they could not extinguish the flames clinging to them. The pursuit ended, and the mercenaries were wiped out. The knights who had chased them suffered heavy losses as well.

Though the other mercenaries had all died, one made it back to the temple: Benjamin, who had thrown the torch and set off the Hellfire. Covered in black soot, he emerged from the temple as dark smoke rose behind him. There he saw people blocking his path—the very people who were supposed to have left the lord’s castle. They were the knights and soldiers of House Gresia.

“Are you the leader of these criminals?” Simon raised his sword toward him.

Benjamin sighed at the sight of the boy glaring at him over his sword. He had considered the possibility that the temple was surrounded, but he had not expected to be caught from behind like this. Absurdly, it looked as though he would become a young noble master’s prey. The boy himself was no match for Benjamin, and he could take on the other knights. But the middle-aged knight and the old man standing behind the boy were another matter. Behind Simon, Knight Commander Alonso and the head butler were limbering up.