Salosa Von Benzin

World Era 1919, August 20th.

It was the morning scene that began an utterly peaceful day in the capital, Pullea. Shops were opening here and there, and police officers moving on foot for their early morning patrols could also be seen in various places.

Even the birds that had awakened from sleep were sitting side by side on the power lines and inspecting their wings, and at that moment, a tremendous impact suddenly occurred, blowing away the quiet dawn.

Kwaaaang-!

It was a shock that shook the surrounding area, and many people still asleep had no choice but to wake up in surprise at the sound. In that situation, even those who were already awake could not help but stop what they were doing and come outside, their faces pale with fright at the sound.

Tatatak, even the police officers who had come out on patrol were seen running toward the place where the explosion had occurred, and the startled birds flew up all at once, briefly dyeing the dawn sky black.

What in the world had happened? Was it an intentional explosion? Or was it an explosion that had occurred by accident? Amid all kinds of speculation, fire trucks were dispatched and began greatly waking up the morning. At that moment, Ian, who had heard the sound of the explosion even in the royal palace, had awakened from sleep as well.

“Mmm, what could it be?”

“Sleep a little more. It is probably nothing serious.”

After saying that to the queen, who was lying face down as if she was still short on sleep, Ian quietly got out of bed. Then, moving carefully, he was also able to check on his daughter Karina, who was lying face down asleep in her own separate bed.

‘She sleeps well without waking up even from that sound.’

A loud noise had been heard for a moment, but as if sleeping came first, she was sleeping soundly without a care in the world. Ian looked at his daughter like that for a moment, then lifted the blanket that had been pushed to the side and covered her body with it again.

After taking care of his daughter as well, Ian quietly put only a robe over his pajamas and headed to the terrace. When he stepped out onto the wide terrace, the cityscape spread out in the distance. And amid that sight, he was able to see black smoke rising.

‘Did something happen over there?’

After looking at it for a moment, he left the room, and soon he could see the people waiting along the corridor. He asked a question to one of them.

“Is there anyone who knows what that explosion just now was about?”

“We are currently looking into it.”

“An explosion this early at dawn. If it is an accident, it will need to be handled quickly, and if it is terrorism, we will need to find the people behind it.”

Of course, he was negative about the possibility of terrorism itself. For one thing, there were no people who would commit terrorism against their royal palace right now, and for another, it made no sense that they would not have noticed it beforehand. If they had failed to notice it, then it would become known that the Mauter, which had been promoted to the intelligence department, was incompetent.

In any case, at Ian’s words, the corridor could not help but become even more bustling.

‘I should go to the office.’

Thinking that he should not conduct work here, if only to keep the queen and Princess Karina, who were sleeping well, from waking up, he walked straight toward the office while still wearing only his robe. Half of those in the corridor began moving after Ian like that.

He thus arrived at the office and settled into his seat, and when he was offered tea, he ordered warm coffee. Like that, time passed, and when the coffee came out and he was bringing it to his mouth to drink, knock, knock, knock, with a knock and the words that followed, he could tell that Viscount Rubingston had arrived.

‘Didn’t he leave work? I did not expect him to come this early.’

“Come in.”

“Excuse me.”

Viscount Rubingston opened the door and entered. For some reason, his eyes were bloodshot, making him look as if he had stayed up all night. Before long, he stood in front of Ian. Looking at him, Ian asked with a puzzled expression.

“Did you not leave work at all?”

“There was work that had piled up, so I was spending time in the royal palace until dawn.”

“Oh dear. No matter how much work has piled up, shouldn’t you sleep at home?”

“It is all right. I am more comfortable here than at home.”

“Isn’t your family greatly resenting the day I kept you in the royal palace?”

“They would never dare think so. Besides, this is not the first or second time I have done this, so my family will understand.”

“You are getting older now too, so do not overdo it too much. You should think of your body as well.”

When Ian had first met him at the age of twenty, Rubingston had been in his late thirties. But now, his appearance had changed to that of a man in his late forties. Just as Ian himself had gone from his early twenties to his late twenties, Rubingston, who had once been young, had now changed to a figure with gray hair visible here and there, as if showing that he had aged before anyone knew it.

“I am not yet at that age, so it is all right. More importantly, about the explosion accident that occurred this morning.”

“Yes, what was it? Was it an accident? Or was it terrorism?”

“I think you can regard it as a kind of accident.”

“If it was an accident, something must have exploded, but is there a place that handles such dangerous materials?”

“I think it can be said to be something one individual committed.”

“One individual committed it?”

“It is said that the police officers who approached the location where the explosion occurred discovered something astonishing.”

“Something astonishing. What exactly did they see for you to say that?”

“A biological weapon.”

“What?”

“To be exact, they had gathered a large number of fragments of biological weapons.”

“Even if such things could be obtained, can they really be obtained?”

“It is difficult, but I do not think it is impossible if one pays money. If the black market is used, then even if biological weapons themselves are impossible, detached fragments can be obtained.”

During the Great War, battles had taken place in many areas, and there had been many cases where body parts had fallen off then, so there were many people who had secretly taken them away, and containers holding parts of biological weapons had been circulating in many places in secret.

“It is astonishing that they can be obtained, but what did he do with such things? More than that, is there anything among those that could explode?”

Even though they were fragments of biological weapons, Ian thought there should not be any properties capable of causing an explosion. What had he been trying to do with those fragments?

“What do they say that man’s identity is?”

“We still do not know his exact identity. However, we should be able to find out soon. One thing is certain: he appears to be a scientist.”

“A scientist. Are you saying he had been conducting such experimental research alone, purely out of curiosity? But I cannot understand exactly what he was researching. Surely he was not researching biological weapons?”

“Would that not be the case? That must be why he secretly gathered fragments of biological weapons.”

For now, Ian thought they needed to find out exactly who he was and understand the situation.

The incident at dawn made the morning noisy for a short while, but things were quickly returning to their original daily routine. Meanwhile, the person who had caused the accident at that moment was immediately arrested and had no choice but to be locked in jail.

He was in his early forties, with brown hair that had become very disheveled, and even while locked in a detention cell, he kept muttering to himself as if calculating something.

“…What went wrong? Should I have reduced the intensity of the light? Or should I have adjusted the spread of the light through an octagon instead of a hexagon? Or is it a problem with the material itself? Then what should I use? Gold? Silver? No. Those would melt quickly. Rather, something much harder, with glass-like properties, and containing powerful energy. Yes, mana stone would be good. But can I obtain mana stone? I probably cannot…? Then this becomes hopeless…”

At the sight of the man continuously muttering to himself, the rough-looking man in the cell beside him yelled at him to be quiet. It seemed he had been irritated by the constant muttering from earlier.

“Hey, old man! Be quiet! I can’t sleep because you’re so noisy!”

“Ah, I am sorry. I had something I failed at, so I must have started talking to myself without realizing it because I had to think of a solution.”

At the sight of him apologizing with a completely calm appearance, the man’s expression became dumbfounded. Just as he was about to yell something more at that sight, someone approached the place with the bars. A person in a police uniform stood in front, and behind him, a person in a black suit was waiting.

“Salosa von Benzin.”

“That is me.”

“We have received a message that you are to be transferred elsewhere immediately.”

“You mean me? Where are you trying to take me?”

“I cannot tell you that right now. Just know that this person will take you.”

After saying that, he began opening the barred door of the detention cell. In this situation, the middle-aged man named Salosa examined the person dressed in a black suit once, then said, “Aha.”

“Judging by the atmosphere, are you perhaps a person from the Mauter?”

“Ahem, be quiet and wait.”

“It seems I am right. Where are you trying to take me? You are not going to torture me or anything, are you?”

“Be quiet and come out.”

When the police officer who had opened the iron door said that before long, Salosa had no choice but to come out of the detention cell. At the sight of him, the man locked in the next cell could be seen keeping his mouth firmly shut. Apparently, the moment the word Mauter came out of Salosa’s mouth, he had definitely become frightened.

Like that, Salosa left the police station, and soon, after getting into another vehicle that had been waiting, he began to be transported somewhere else. There were two more agents inside the car, and since all of them were taciturn, the atmosphere could not help but be heavy.

The place they arrived at like that was the headquarters of the intelligence department Mauter, a place no one living in the capital could fail to know. Since it was a large building whose entire outer wall was black, it naturally made people’s hearts shrink.

However, Salosa simply entered with an expression as if thinking, “So a place like this exists?” The agents transporting him saw his calm appearance and wondered whether he still did not know what situation he was in, or whether he was a madman.

After entering the interior like that, the place he was guided to was not a prison with iron bars, but a certain room. Of course, even this door was made of metal and could be locked from the outside, so it could be called a place like a prison.

“Stay here for a while.”

“Oh, there is a bed and a wardrobe too.”

At the sight of Salosa admiring the interior, the agents thought again that he was an unusual person and closed the door just like that. Clang! When even the lock was fastened like that, Salosa paced around the rather narrow place, which had a bed and wardrobe, for a short while before sitting on the bed.

Since it was not made of particularly good material, it felt slightly hard, but he actually thought it was good to sit on. At the same time, he kept muttering something to himself, and as expected, it was his thoughts about a new direction for the research he had been conducting.

“First of all, even if I set everything else aside, how am I supposed to obtain biological weapon tissue again? There is a lot to extract from it… I can really do well this time. But I do not have the money to make the tools?”

Mana stone. He thought he needed mana stone, just as he had said earlier. However, mana stone was so rare and required so much money that it could not be obtained unless something on the level of a state stepped forward. Since it was something that a person like him could never obtain even if he died and came back to life, he could not help but feel regretful.

“Then, is my research going to stop here?”

There was disappointment in his tone, as if he felt considerable regret.

Five days later.

Click! The door opened with the sound of the lock being released. At this sound, Salosa, who had gotten up from the bed, looked toward the door as if puzzled. Soon, the door opened, and the person who had brought him here appeared. He immediately gestured for Salosa to come out and said,

“Come out.”

“Um, am I being released now?”

“That is not for me to decide.”

“I see. Understood. I will go out.”

Salosa, who had not washed for several days and scratched at his disheveled hair, stood up and was able to leave this room for the first time in five days. Along with the sight of the corridor that appeared before him, he moved on as he was, and only after going down through the stairs did he arrive before the door of some new room.

“You must not open your mouth carelessly before the person you are about to meet.”

“It seems I am meeting someone very high up?”

“That person is the head of our Mauter. So you must absolutely not act carelessly.”

“Huh, someone like that is meeting me?”

Viscount Rubingston was a famous person known as the head of the Mauter and one of the king’s closest aides. In some ways, he was also a person at the center of power in the Polia Kingdom. Salosa felt puzzled that someone like that was waiting to meet him.

Before long, the door opened. And he was able to see the person seated inside. Salosa thought he was the person with the sharpest gaze of anyone he had ever met. Somehow, when meeting his eyes, he felt as if he would have to confess everything without realizing it.

As expected, he thought that because he was that kind of person, he could hold the position of head of the terrifying Mauter.

“Are you Dr. Salosa von Benzin?”

“I am indeed that doctor.”

“I heard you graduated from the prestigious Idnis University in the capital and later completed graduate school as well. Is that correct?”

“That is also correct, of course.”

“I know that after moving through various research institutes for a long time, you have had personal time in recent years, and you have even obtained a doctorate in physics as your major. Why did you do that?”

“What do you mean?”

“I am asking why a physicist became interested in biological weapons and researched them.”

“Well, that is because I became somewhat interested in them?”

At the sight of him asking as if nothing was wrong, Viscount Rubingston wondered if this fellow was playing a prank in front of him. If he did as he wished, he wanted to show his fearsome side immediately. However, he had to calm himself because of what His Highness had said.

‘He told me to find out exactly what kind of research he had been doing.’

“I will ask once again. Why did you conduct research with fragments of biological weapons? And what are the broken devices at the place where the explosion occurred? I heard they were too severely damaged to properly identify.”

“Ah, you mean that. I failed, but I discovered a rather interesting phenomenon, so I made a device and tried carrying it out.”

“What was that?”

“Light.”

“Light?”

“I discovered that although it was extremely faint, some component of light was present in the fragments of biological weapons. I was trying to extract that and use it to find out what kind of phenomenon would occur.”

“…And the result?”

“A failure. It exploded like that because I failed, did it not?”

Salosa looked completely unconcerned, wearing an expression as if the explosion that had occurred from his failure was nothing special. At that sight, Viscount Rubingston thought he did not seem to be an ordinary fellow.