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As the saying goes, people think of sixty thousand things throughout the day.

It’s hard to accurately count how many thoughts arise from what we see, hear, feel, or recall each day. However, it’s undeniable that the vast majority of these thoughts tend to lean toward worries, fears, and other negative emotions, though no one would wish to admit that.

Zigmund was no exception.

Up until the moment he placed his hand on the doorknob, countless thoughts had clearly occupied his mind.

A sharply torn can of beer. Just like a husband who drinks too much and is hated by his wife, Zigmund hid the can behind him as though it were his last lifeline.

The torn edge was remarkably sharp, prepared to slice through a throat or smash a face at a moment’s notice, just like any nagging wife would have it.

In the inside pocket of the trench coat, hung on the coat rack.

Like his second wife, a folding knife, who had been there through his shady life as an information officer.

What could he be hiding?

To be honest, yes. The moment the door opens, he thought he would be kidnapped.

Zigmund had spent decades of his life dedicating himself to a job and was a civil servant who traveled abroad, away from his family.

If he were to assume he learned one truth in the process, it would be that ‘the sooner you discard optimistic views, the better.’

Even when calling out the names of his daughters, his mind was a jumbled mess like seaweed tangled up in a flipper.

Who rang the bell? The Royal Intelligence Department? Or perhaps the Imperial Guard HQ? How did they know the room number?

In that fleeting moment where his hand reached for the doorknob, Zigmund repeatedly pondered and contemplated. It could have been Helen returning safely with their daughters, but such hopeful optimism had already been buried decades ago.

*Creeeak…*

As the door creaked open, the stillness of the corridor seeped through.

Zigmund revealed himself in the cramped space, aware that there were no prying eyes, yet the tension began to build as if someone might burst out from the opposite room to surround him.

“……”

Zigmund cautiously looked left and right, straining to listen to the sounds coming from the neighboring rooms.

The silence was so profound that even the faintest breath could be heard clearly. Firmly shut doors showed no signs of opening.

The musty smell of old cigarettes lingered in the air, mingling with the remnants of deodorizer. No suspicious presence was detected.

Was it a false alarm? Perhaps the excessive tension had made him misinterpret the doorbell sound from another room or floor. If he thought optimistically.

He was sure he clearly heard it. The footsteps of someone ringing the bell and then departing. That was why he had opened the door first and looked left down the corridor.

He couldn’t make out their face. But he could easily find the traces left by the mysterious visitor.

In fact, it was something that didn’t require much effort at all.

It lay conspicuously in front of his room.

Zigmund took the small envelope and phone inside.

It was a perilous act, as it could have been a bomb linked to sealing and a priest, or perhaps some unknown powder extracted from mold that could scatter upon opening. But Zigmund didn’t hesitate at all.

If it were the Inquisition hiding a dark agenda behind a priest’s robe, then maybe. But at least the Imperial Guard HQ and the Royal Intelligence Department wouldn’t be this kind to send something like this to kill someone.

Of course, the story would change if it were dealing with a traitor, but if the Royal Intelligence Department wanted him dead, there were many other methods. Much more convenient and straightforward tools than this tedious package.

And most importantly, wasn’t the phone there too?

“…Hmm.”

Picking up the phone, Zigmund rummaged through the schedule, diary, messages, and contacts. Everything was pristine. The phone was a dead end.

Wondering if something might come up in the pension record card contents, he thought, but that was already too neatly erased, impossible to recover even with a professional technician. The writings on the internal magic circuits and electronic components were even completely erased, making it impossible to trace back to the factory of origin.

Zigmund set the pristine white phone aside and hurriedly checked the contents of the envelope.

He cut one corner with a knife and pushed the light of a flashlight inside.

Carefully into the shimmering darkness.

“Oh dear.”

It was evidence.

Witnessing a couple vow simultaneously in days gone by.

A wedding ring crafted from emerald, painstakingly sourced from a work trip, symbolizing the wish for their child to be born with green eyes.

The ring once placed on Helen’s ring finger was inside the envelope.

Along with the unnaturally stiff three words from the severed finger.

—

Episode 20 – Who waved the knife in threat?

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Finding his wife’s wedding ring and a severed finger in the envelope, Zigmund picked up the finger without hesitation.

The cut was clean. There was no trace of having been sawed off with something like a saw. It was highly likely that a heavy and sharp tool was used to sever the skin, muscle tissue, blood vessels, and bone all at once. Perhaps an axe or a meat cleaver.

Zigmund tilted the finger to examine the cut edge closely. The end of the severed finger curled inward slightly.

This was a result of skin tissue elasticity, indicating that the cut area couldn’t withstand the elasticity and curled inward.

In short, it meant that a third party severed the victim’s finger while they were still alive.

“Ha….”

The wedding ring had always been kept by Helen. So, was the finger’s owner Helen?

Zigmund tried to firmly grasp the fraying threads of his confused mind. His fist, clutching the severed ring finger, violently swept across the table.

Whose doing was this?

The Royal Intelligence Department? Those sharp-suited individuals who like to play it too clean wouldn’t engage in such things.

They were a group that pretended to be gentlemen while breathing in sewage. Even if they were to eliminate a traitor, they would surely try to cover it up by making it look like a neat suicide or accident. They wouldn’t engage in messy scuffles.

Zigmund knew this very well.

The Military Intelligence Agency? The defense intelligence officers he knew well wouldn’t be the type to do such things. True, the Military Intelligence Agency was as ugly as the Royal Intelligence Department, but at least Colonel Clevenz Hendrick was not the type to favor such extreme measures.

He was a carriage leisurely riding down a country lane, not a runaway train, and his gentlemanly demeanor was widely known among foreign agents.

Moreover, there was no chance of Clevenz involving himself in the matters of the Royal Intelligence Department.

Even if Clevenz Hendrick showed enthusiasm for the investigations regarding the security incidents of the Royal Intelligence Department, the Military Intelligence Agency Chief, who valued the balance amongst information departments, would never allow it.

Leoni Risha? Yes, she might be capable of it.

The first-ever female chief of the branch since its inception was notorious within both the Military Intelligence Agency and the Royal Intelligence Department. Zigmund could attest to that from a year ago.

It was still vivid in his mind. When rumors spread about the elderly mages in the Magic Tower plotting some sort of conspiracy, without any hesitation, she had suggested assassinating the Oracle.

Leoni, who held the position of Deputy Director of the National Operations Bureau, presented options for eliminating the senior members of the Magic Tower without even a hint of discomfort.

Her nonchalant attitude was so brazen that even the head of the National Bureau resisted, saying it was a plan that couldn’t be contemplated at the moment. Yet, Leoni didn’t even flinch. Instead, she went to meet the Intelligence Chief, summoned for an entirely new plan.

No one knew how Leoni managed to convince the Chief of the Royal Intelligence Department. The Deputy Director merely stated that her second plan was more “constructive.” Thus, Zigmund and, certainly, the senior officers of the Royal Intelligence Department expected her new plan to be “less aggressive and surely a more peaceful proposal.”

Yet, when the project began, the news that the intelligence agents from the Magic Tower had been blown to pieces well exceeded twenty shocked everyone. Zigmund was one among many who received word at their usual pub.

It was a violent incident that could easily spark a war. However, the planner, Leoni Risha, appeared at the meeting room as if nothing happened.

The briefing about how the eliminated members of the Magic Tower were turned into mere pieces of meat in that explosion didn’t make the Deputy Director blink once.

Instead, he merely chastised the Chief for the unseemly handling of the operation as to why the surviving targets were still on ventilators in the hospital and whether it wasn’t their role to deal with those before the traitors were escorted to the secure ward.

No one knew how the cabinet had launched such a violent operation. However, it was rumored that Leoni had unearthed a collaborator amongst the high-ranking Magic Tower officials and handed them over to the dispatched agents.

Attempts were made to find out who the high-ranking collaborator was that the Deputy Director supposedly unearthed in the Magic Tower and which department’s agent was operating that collaborator. The truth was that it was Zigmund’s doing.

It hadn’t been a request from the Imperial Guard HQ, but if Leoni Risha had handed over such assets, they must surely belong to some senior officer within the Royal Intelligence Department. Personally, he was intrigued.

Given Zigmund’s authority as the Chief of the Major Intelligence Division, hints of the mystery would soon unravel within a few days—maybe weeks at most. As the Head of Major Intelligence, Zigmund had access to numerous pieces of information, granting the Imperial Guard HQ unlimited trust in him.

However, despite all inquiries made, no clues could be found within the Royal Intelligence Department regarding the name circulating.

The interest that seemed to be fading was quickly rekindled by a message received and an unexpected visitor.

To be more precise…

“Finger.”

Zigmund’s previously bent head snapped up. Memories thought lost within his mind suddenly resurfaced.

“Yes, a finger. It was a finger.”

On a day when tumultuous waters swept everyone away, Leoni, Deputy Director of the Royal Intelligence Department, had come to visit the office of the Major Intelligence Division.

“Zigmund, can we ask you for a favor?”

“What kind of favor could you need? You must be busy with the Magic Tower operation… Why on earth are you here at the Major Intelligence Division?”

“I’m here because of the Magic Tower situation. It seems one of the field officers is caught up in a troublesome problem due to the Empire folks.”

“Is it the Imperial Guard HQ or the Reconnaissance Command? Or perhaps the Counterintelligence Department? It could also be the Empire Police.”

“I think it’s likely from the military side. The data has already been uploaded to the company network, so let’s check it out.”

The information passed on from the National Operations Bureau reached Zigmund’s desk.

That very same day, identical information was conveyed through another channel.

《Five operatives of the Reconnaissance Command lost contact. Presumed dead. Data required from the Royal Intelligence Department officers in the Magic Tower. Urgent.》

The note left by the contact book.

Zigmund, upon noticing the yellow thumbtack stuck on the fifth street tree of Gaby Road, realized that instructions had been issued from the Imperial Guard HQ. He vaguely sensed something while looking at the note left by the contact in a nearby shopping district’s parking lot.

An information officer attacking the Oracle inside the Magic Tower after receiving a high-ranking position from Leoni Risha. That officer had eliminated a reconnaissance command team.

If the head of the National Operations Agency’s second division entrusted the information network directly to someone, that person could also be considered by the head should there be issues with enemy intelligence agents.

Naturally, that was to be expected since they were high-priority information officers.

Using the authority of the Director of Intelligence, Zigmund could not find anyone among the Royal Intelligence Department staff related to Leoni Risha.

So, he began to trace the information officer’s whereabouts over the course of several months.

Even during meals with Helen, sending his daughters to school, in soundproof meeting rooms, and while lying in bed staring at the ceiling, that thought never left his mind.

What started as a curiosity branched out through the note into an investigation, and by the time the issue with the Magic Tower began to calm down, it had evolved into a collection effort.

The Imperial Guard HQ no longer sought the information officer.

Whether it was because there was no need to be considerate of the military’s circumstances or the approaching visit of the hero’s empire kept them busy, it was unclear. Regardless, the Guard’s interests had shifted elsewhere, and the missions assigned to the ‘Domoboy’ followed suit.

Zigmund was different. His mind was solely focused on the puzzle he had yet to piece together.

Several months later, as he discovered the markings left by the Imperial Guard HQ’s contact book in a subway locker, he captured a new clue as if by destiny.

《Frederick Nostrim. Officer of the Military Attaché at the Embassy of the Kingdom of Abas in Petrogard. Currently meeting with three traitors. Presumed attempt to defect. Requesting information. Official internal personnel records of information officers at the Ministry of Defense. Urgent.》

An information officer he could not find with the authority of the Director of Intelligence. An information officer he could not find within the Royal Intelligence Department.

If it was the Ministry of Defense, that would explain why he had been unable to find them until now. Understanding why Leoni Risha had handed over an associate to a different company and why they attempted to resolve the information officer’s issue personally.

If the person in question was someone among the military intelligence officers active at the Magic Tower at that time.

All questions would be resolved.

A year ago, Zigmund had found material he had forgotten in the special records and archives. Documents about the reconnaissance command team believed to have been killed by a military intelligence officer that year.

The record keeper had meticulously noted how much evidence the field minister had left behind regarding the enemy agents they personally eliminated.

Live teeth with nerve and gum tissue attached, fingerprints extracted from all ten fingers, hair that had not fallen out from the roots, photographs of ears that could not be altered by surgery or magic, and so on.

And today, Zigmund finally recalled a memory he had forgotten.

The information officer who clashed with the reconnaissance command team on site kindly sent evidence to the Royal Intelligence Department.

Teeth that looked as if they had been severed, clumps of hair pulled out, dozens of film photographs.

Fingers treated with preservatives to preserve fingerprints.

“…Yeah. It was a finger.”

At that moment, as Zigmund absentmindedly fiddled with the ring finger on the table—

*Ding ding ding!*

The phone jarred him from his thoughts.

*

When the bell began to ring, instead of reaching for the phone immediately, Zigmund first checked the time.

A call came about 15 minutes after an unexpected visitor rang the doorbell and left. It was enough time for a suspicious person to check the contents of the envelope, but far too little time to prepare for post-event measures and planning.

Zigmund took a deep breath, holding the phone in his hand. He inhaled deeply and exhaled.

“Hello?”

It was as if all his senses were hyper-focused on hearing, and he pressed the call button, beginning to listen intently to the voice on the phone.

-‘Domoboy?’

Kien.

The reply heard through the phone was undeniably in Kien.

Though he had asked the question in Abas, the other party responded in Kien, using Zigmund’s codename.

Surely this isn’t a prank. Maybe it’s a taunt. If the intention was to establish dominance, just coming to find the ring and the finger in the envelope, ringing the doorbell would have sufficed. Or perhaps it’s an attempt to disorient him by invoking the codename at the end.

“Is this the headquarters?”

Zigmund replied firmly in Abas, asking if it was something that came from the Royal Intelligence Department.

The voice on the other end responded.

This time, it was in Abas.

-‘It’s no longer the company you work for.’

“Of course it isn’t.”

Narrowing his eyes progressively, he concentrated on the voice of the Royal Intelligence Department employee.

It was not a man. Anyone could tell that the high-pitched, delicate voice was clearly female. He could be certain it was a flawless unaltered voice.

A psychological warfare officer? Most likely. From the fact that they made the call, it would seem to be a staff member dispatched from that side. Information officers who take charge of expression and psychological state analysis during negotiations or interrogations.

There was no way to find out exactly which department they were from, but Zigmund thought the other party was a skilled orator.

-‘Don’t worry, Zigmund. Your wife and children are safe. Henya asked me to send her regards to you.’

“Are you sure? That they’re safe?”

-‘Your daughters did get a tummy ache from eating too much ice cream. Other than that, they have no external or internal injuries.’

Neither too slow nor too fast.

A suitable pace. A gradually calming voice. Like a soothing counselor, it eased the listener’s tension while not easily relinquishing control.

Indeed. This was clearly the speech of someone trained. The psychological warfare officers from the Royal Intelligence Department’s Social Investigation Bureau, which sneered with the ridiculous sign “Social Cultural Center,” often spoke in such tones over the phone.

Zigmund recognized the voice from the voice recordings he had once released for intelligence work. Calls where the other party’s number was automatically recorded as soon as they dialed in. The woman contacting Zigmund felt exactly like someone who would come from such a place.

Zigmund spoke clearly.

“At the very least, shouldn’t I be allowed to have a conversation? I want to hear the voices of my family.”

The sound of shoes padding across the rug was swallowed, and the voice on the other end released the curiosity.

-‘If you want, we can talk right away. However, I can’t connect you yet because we need to maintain stability.’

“Stability while keeping a severed finger. Are you giving me poison and now a remedy too?”

-‘As I said earlier, your wife is unharmed and safe. If you examine the finger that was sent, you would realize it doesn’t belong to a woman, but a man.’

Indeed, the finger was not Helen’s. In fact, after checking its contents, Zigmund felt a bit uncertain, but the finger in the envelope was somehow different from how he remembered his wife’s.

There was a familiar feeling to it. But it wasn’t his wife’s hand.

This was something he verified while meticulously examining the ring he had placed on the palm of his hand before receiving the call, deducing the owner’s identity.

So Zigmund asked for confirmation.

“Is William safe? My contact.”

-‘He is still alive.’

William. The contact person designated by the Imperial Guard HQ, William. A former Foreign Ministry official who would play chess while nursing a cigarette at the cafe daily. The finger, scarred from oil splatters, looked just like that scar he had seen multiple times when moving chess pieces or dealing cards.

Should he call it fortunate, or should he call it unfortunate?

At least if he was alive, they would surely meet again someday.

After confirming the contact’s status, Zigmund demanded to speak with his family. Although the people he was dealing with were known to stretch the truth, in a situation like this, there was no reason for either party to deceive the other.

The transaction involves taking something from those who have nothing, and what the Royal Intelligence Department desired was to prevent information leaks. If they were to harm the family they had taken as hostages, they should know that Zigmund could strike back at any time.

-‘If there are no significant issues, you should be able to talk soon.’

“Then what about seeing their faces? When can I meet them?”

-‘That’s not possible for now. There are a few requests you need to fulfill for us to assist you.’

“Of course that makes sense.”

Zigmund muttered as if he had predicted that. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, leaning against the wardrobe, and let out a low chuckle.

“You took my family as hostages, so of course you have something you want in return. Yeah, that’s a given.”

They were not hostages. Such flattering words would surely not return. Protecting citizens from enemy territory or not intending to harm innocent relatives were all words that were nothing but rubbish. Zigmund knew this, and the Royal Intelligence Department knew it as well.

They could not be unaware. Especially Zigmund. Once, he too had been in a position to comfort someone, but even during such moments when he smiled and told them everything would be fine, he knew that was a lie.

The desires of the citizens towards the Republic were growing, the general who had tipped him off of such information, and the bureaucrat who had aired their disillusionment with the secret police of the royal regime all felt the same. Some envisioned a new life as exiles, while others dreamed of a second life in the Republic as repentants, but all those dreams ended up nothing more than unattainable illusions.

And as people who knew everything usually do, it was important to cut the preface and get to the point.

“Tell me what you want.”

Zigmund asked for the requests, and the woman responded readily.

They were all people who knew everything well enough to avoid wasting time on trifles.

-‘If you go to the 25th floor of the annex, there should be a spa. Make a reservation.’

“What time, course, and location?”

-‘9:30 PM. Reserve for 90 minutes and enter room 3.’

“What’s the signal for safety?”

-‘Brown slippers indicate safety. If it’s green slippers, that means danger.’

“What am I supposed to do there?”

-‘You’ll find out when you go there.’

The woman answered.

-‘I hope you arrive safely and on time.’

 

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