Chapter 14

Upon entering the ceremonial hall, the interior was surprisingly not as bleak as the exterior suggested.

Gold-crafted candelabras on the walls cast a soft light, and the floors were covered in plush red carpets featuring intricate circular patterns.

Well, I suppose there was no way the inside would actually look like a prison. This was a building that influential nobles entered every time there was a graduation or an award ceremony, after all.

“Welcome. You must be Master Merlin, Master Leo Baal, Master Bob Meijin, Master Kirio Rahura, and Master Van, correct?”

Waiting for us in the entrance hall was a woman of mature years.

She was human, possessing no characteristics of other races. She looked like she could be any age from her late twenties to her early forties. Her long gray hair was swept back, and she wore a single gold earring in her right ear.

She had a refined face, yet it was somehow unremarkable. She had the kind of face you’d forget the moment you looked away. Or perhaps that was a result of her own skill—she gave the impression of someone consciously trying to blend into the background. Dressed in a black simple vest over a white shirt and black slacks, the woman addressed us with a pleasant smile.

“Ah, it’s been a while, Yasha,” Merlin replied.

“Hey there, Yasha,” Leo added, his response casual.

“Allow me to introduce her. This is Yasha. In short, she’s a receptionist. She is employed by the royalty to showcase her skills whenever they host someone. She’s a familiar face to both Leo and me.”

“I get dragged along to royal hosting events quite often,” Leo agreed with Merlin, sounding somewhat fed up.

Bob glared at the two of them with a look of slight dissatisfaction. He probably felt like he was losing out in terms of status because he hadn’t met Yasha before. Kirio had finally stopped shaking, though her complexion remained poor.

“Master Merlin and Master Leo have always been very kind to me.”

After bowing deeply, she continued.

“Now then, everyone, if you would please check this immediately. It is a map of this ceremonial hall.”

She handed us the floor plans.

“Heh, so this is how it’s laid out. The second floor looks like a hotel,” I remarked reflexively.

The first floor consisted of a grand hall—likely the venue for the graduation ceremonies—while the rooms on the second floor were assigned to each individual.

In this world, the directions on a map were the same: north was up and south was down.

“That is correct. To ensure that everyone staying at this hall can spend their time as comfortably as possible, the rooms on the second floor are for your use. Of course, the organizers, including the royalty and the clergy, are staying there as well.”

I see. Just as Yasha said, our rooms were on the right side of the second floor. On the left were the rooms for everyone else—presumably the organizers—and further in were the rooms for the royalty and Princess Victie.

“It goes without saying, but please refrain from stopping by any locations where you have no business. Of course, you are welcome to come to my room should you wish to ask a question or make a request.”

Though her tone was polite, Yasha’s subtext was clear: if you don’t have a reason, don’t go near the kingdom’s VIPs.

Well, that made sense. Especially since Kirio, though a noble, was from a minor family with some bad rumors, and I was just a commoner. From their perspective, there was no reason to trust us.

The room assignments were organized as follows:

First, on the far right—the eastern end—was the staircase. From the top down were the rooms for Leo, Bob, myself, and Merlin. Kirio was across from Leo. There were rooms across from Bob, myself, and Merlin as well, but since no names were written there, they were likely vacant. The hallway ended in front of Leo’s and Kirio’s rooms.

To get to the left side—the western side—from our rooms, you had to pass the staircase and loop around. To do so, you had to pass in front of several rooms on the south side.
The south-side rooms, starting from the east, belonged to Yasha, Raika, Jin, and Uraenus.

I knew Yasha, and I knew Uraenus. Uraenus III was the current King of Shark.

I hadn’t heard of Raika or Jin, though.

“These people, Raika and Jin… who are they?”

Since I had nothing to hide, it was best to just ask.

“Lady Raika is a member of the Shark Royal Guard. Master Jin is a Paladin of the Church. They are the two entrusted with Princess Victie’s protection for this award ceremony.”

“Ah, I see.”

The fact that we couldn’t get to the west side without passing their rooms was quite clever. It was a setup designed specifically to keep us away from Princess Victie.

“Hmph. Right, I see how it is.”

Leo spat out a similar line, but unlike me, his face was twisted into a cynical smirk.

“One guard from the castle and one from the Church. They really are obsessed with power balances, aren’t they?”

“Well now.”

Yasha tilted her head as if to say she didn’t understand what he meant.

Anyway, according to the map, you could finally reach the west side after passing those southern rooms.

The west side had rooms lined up at the western end. From the south, they were Ice, Mintz, Arle, and Princess Victie’s room.

So the two caretakers, Archbishop Mintz and the court physician Arle, were with her.
Ice was the current Queen. She was famous for being a “strongwoman.” Rumor had it the current King was essentially her puppet.

By the way, the hallway ended right in front of Princess Victie’s room.

This meant that if we ever tried to sneak into her room, we’d have to pass near every other room in the building.

Security-wise, it was a solid design.

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“If there are no further questions, please relax in your respective rooms for now. Lunch will be served at noon, so I will come to call for you when the time comes. Lunch will be held in the grand hall on the first floor.”

Yasha bowed.

“Hey, wait. Lunch in the grand hall… does that mean…?”

Bob’s face turned red. Unusually, it wasn’t from anger, but pure excitement.

“Are the other people currently in this hall—I mean, the other guests—going to be eating with us?”

Bob desperately tried to fix his tone, which was becoming rough from excitement.

“Yes, of course. However, as Princess Victie cannot eat in front of others, she will only be attending.”

“Whoa… even so, that’s amazing. This is incredible!”

In contrast to Bob, who was beaming with joy, Leo looked somewhat indifferent.

Then Kirio, who was finally regaining some composure, muttered in a voice only I could hear.

“Just like Leo said… they really don’t look at her as another human being. To not even be allowed to eat in front of people…”

I kept quiet, but I agreed.

“Then, everyone, please head up to the second floor… Oh, that’s right. Before that, if you’ll excuse me, I must perform a physical search.”

“They’re really going that far?” I muttered, exasperated by Yasha’s words.

I didn’t think there was any point to such a thing, so I was genuinely shocked when the search turned up a knife in Kirio’s breast pocket.

When asked for a reason—

“I thought I’d use it to stab Bob if he started teasing me too much.”

I was even more shocked by that answer.

Bob’s face, usually red, turned a pale shade of blue.

Of course, it was just a joke. Kirio had come in the same clothes she wore for classes, and it turned out she’d left a throwing knife in there from the previous lesson, Long-Range Combat Drills.

By the way, Kirio was by far the best in the school at knife throwing.

Despite that heartwarming—for everyone except Bob—little episode, no other dangerous items were found, and we headed up to the second floor without further issue.

Once we reached the second floor, I was surprised yet again.

In addition to the candelabras and carpets, the walls were covered in chic, patterned white wallpaper, making it look more and more like a proper hotel.

“Wow, it really is a hotel,” I groaned.

“I’m already tired of looking at it,” Leo said, stroking ahead. “Well then, I’ll see you at lunch.”

With that, he ducked into his room without delay.

“Breathing the same air as a commoner is making me feel ill,” Bob sneered, giving me a nasty look before entering his own room.

“You’d best stay quiet in your rooms. If you’re caught wandering around without cause, you’ll be under more suspicion than you can imagine.”

Perhaps because he was the one who would have to take responsibility if something happened, Merlin’s voice sounded more earnest than usual.

“I’m counting on you. Seriously, stay put.”

“Wait, shouldn’t you be saying that to the two who just went inside rather than me?” I couldn’t help but ask.

“It’s useless telling those two anything,” Merlin replied, offering a line that was probably unbecoming of an educator before entering his room as well.

That left just Kirio and me in the hallway.

“Are you okay?”

Her complexion had improved significantly, but I asked just to be sure.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Kirio nodded. She wore a soft expression that I couldn’t have imagined when we first met. “It’s finally here, isn’t it, Van?”

She spoke with eyes shimmering happily.

“Eh? What is?”

Was there something to be this happy about? As I stood there confused, Kirio continued.

“The anniversary of the day your and Leo’s thesis is officially recognized… that’s today, right?”

“Oh, ah, that. An anniversary, huh? Yeah, I guess you could call it that.”

I nodded. I felt a bit embarrassed seeing that Kirio seemed even happier about it than Leo or I did.

“I’m sure everything will go perfectly.”

Kirio’s face suddenly clouded with a hint of anxiety.

“Yeah, of course it will,” I answered loudly to reassure her. “Everything will be fine. We have Leo with us, after all.”

With that man on our side, I couldn’t imagine things going wrong.

“We were lucky the moment we became friends with him. There’s nobody as reliable as he is.”

“Hehe.”

Kirio let out a little giggle. I blinked, not quite sure what was so funny.

“I think Leo probably feels the exact same way about you, Van.”

“Him? No way.”

I found myself laughing along, and with that, our conversation ended.

With a slightly lingering look, Kirio said, “Well, see you later,” and entered her room.

Left alone, there was no point in loitering in the hallway, so I headed into my room as well.

“Whoa.”

Inside, I experienced my umpteenth surprise of the day.

It was a private hotel suite. No, it was probably even higher grade than that. In addition to the gold candelabras, carpet, and white wallpaper, there was a closet, chair, and table made of a lustrous black wood.

This was likely made of “Silver-Tree,” the most valuable and hardest timber in Pangea. It was my first time seeing it. If I recalled correctly, it was worth about as much as actual silver.

To be honest, excluding the lack of windows, the room’s size and furnishings were better than what you’d find in a first-class hotel.

The construction of this room felt like a direct symbol of the high status of the people currently gathered here; sensing that made me feel all the more out of place.

A commoner like me… No, for someone like me who retained memories of a previous world, I wasn’t even a “commoner.” Mentally, I was still just a lackluster apprentice detective and mystery geek from a corner of Japan.

And yet, here I was.

Sitting down in the Silver-Tree chair, I started to feel like I was dreaming. It felt like I was in the middle of a long, incredibly long dream.

I wondered if, when I woke up, Kirio, Leo, this chair, this room, magic, and this entire world would all vanish, and I’d be back in that place, on the verge of death.

“Stop it. Can’t let myself get weak-minded,” I muttered to myself, shaking my head.

It certainly was strange. Reincarnating, coming to this world, and ending up like this.
But conversely, perhaps it was because I had a mission.

I remembered Leo’s words: the duty of those with power.

The power I possessed was the memory of my previous world and my knowledge of mysteries. I would use them to their fullest to revolutionize criminal investigation in this world.

Leo seemed to think of it as a massive conceptual pivot that would change not just investigations but the judiciary and everything else, but I didn’t care about all that.
I was just going to do what I could.

And it would all start here.

I told myself that firmly.

11:30 AM.