368 - Leonardo's Perspective / The Identity of the Bodies and the Sedovara Church
As the night grew deeper, the kinds of information gathering at the fortress also changed.
During the day, information about the carriage runaway incident at the Harvest Festival was easier to collect.
Or rather, since the main work regarding Chadwick's carriage runaway was confirming and sorting out the damage at the scene, it was mostly just routine labor.
Completely different from searching for clues leading to the culprit from the traces of a fire, this was merely a matter of compiling the damage that had already occurred, calculating the losses, and processing compensation and the like for recovery.
Though the problems were piled high, if you worked through them one by one, they would eventually be resolved.
The problem was the fire at the pier and Tina's kidnapping.
The only clues that seemed promising were the finger and ring that Kalisa had left behind, which seemed to belong to the culprit, and since the invasion and escape had been carried out using the waterways, there were no real witnesses.
The pier manager and the warehouse keeper, who might have witnessed the culprits, had already been killed.
As for what else remained, there were only the unidentified bodies of four people, two men and two women.
One of those, a female body, had yet to be confirmed, but I was convinced it was Kalisa's.
...If the body had been Giselle's, I could have been reassured that Kalisa was near Tina.
I shook my head lightly at the thought that maybe Kalisa was the one who might still be by Tina's side.
That would have meant it would have been better if Giselle had died.
Giselle was unreliable as a guard in terms of combat ability, but I could not wish for her to die in someone else's place.
If it was Kalisa, if it was Kalisa... I could not help thinking it, but it was all meaningless.
Kalisa was already dead, and she had left behind the greatest results she could.
The best way to repay her efforts would be to correctly interpret the clues she had left behind and get Tina back.
"The identities of the three men in the warehouse have been determined."
All collected information was once delivered to Alf, where it was sorted into useful and not-so-useful information.
The news that the bodies' names had been identified arrived after midnight, so Alf must have been buried under a mountain of information.
I had to deal with the immediate matters first, so I was handling the aftermath of the carriage runaway incident, and I imagined Alf's burden was considerable.
All matters related to the pier fire were currently being directed to Alf.
Still, neither job could be postponed, so the two of us had no choice but to divide the work.
Alf was better than me at organizing information, so I left the pier fire and Tina's kidnapping to him.
I would finish the work that could be done first, and keep myself ready to move at any time.
"If their identities have been determined, does that mean they were locals?"
"Put simply, they were thugs from the lower town."
To listen to the conversation and glance over the report Alf had brought, I cleared the surface of my desk, which was covered with other reports.
I reached out to take the report Alf was holding, but before I could spread out the new document, two servings of light refreshments were set on the desk.
"Both of you, please take a break first."
My orderly Arnold shot me a reproachful look, as if to say we had been working nonstop without proper breaks.
We had eaten dinner, so I did not think it warranted a scolding, but I knew that working nonstop reduced efficiency, so I complied.
The refreshments were sandwiches heavy on the meat, designed to be eaten with one hand and provide plenty of nutrition quickly.
Surrendering to Arnold, Alf brought over a chair while hot tea was prepared in the meantime.
A simple cooking area had been set up in the orderlies' waiting room so that hot food could be served at any time.
Heating soup or boiling water was always possible.
"The bodies in the warehouse were a trio with a bad reputation in the lower town."
The conversation about the bodies' identities began with this opening.
Though it was compiled in the report, an oral report was also necessary.
Arnold probably would not complain if the topic came up while we were eating, I thought, and ended up continuing to work while bringing bread to my mouth.
Apparently, the men whose bodies had been found had been the talk of the neighborhood lately for being flush with money.
Originally men who drew attention for their poor behavior, they would hang around taverns drinking and causing trouble from daytime during festivals, but apparently they had not shown their faces at any tavern on the day of the Harvest Festival.
It seemed each establishment had just thought, "They must be drinking at another place tonight."
Though they were customers, they were the type who caused trouble in the shops when drunk, so it seemed the establishments actually felt relieved they had not come.
But when the Black Knights came around asking questions today, it became clear that the men had not shown up at any tavern last night.
After that, they found people who had associated with the men, and had them view the bodies to confirm their identities.
The bodies were blackened and burned beyond recognition, with no way to tell their features, but from old scars on their arms and marks barely remaining on their skin thanks to their clothes despite the burns, confirmation that they were likely the men in question was obtained.
"According to the tavern owner's testimony, a man who looks like Jasper was apparently seen with those men."
"Again with Jasper..."
The more information gathered, the more suspicious Jasper seemed, and I ran my hand through my hair to mask my irritation.
My hair had been neatly styled with product during work, but perhaps it was getting a bit tired, as a stray strand fell across my face, annoying me.
"Jasper was from the same Mey Village as Tina, was he not? Would someone from her hometown harm Tina?"
"It is true that Jasper is from the same village as Tina... but before coming to the city of Grenore, he spent a long time in other countries. Just because they are from the same village does not mean he would have a sense of kinship toward Tina as a fellow villager."
"Having been in other countries is not that unusual for a pharmacist."
It was not uncommon for pharmacists to move between countries.
Some, like Aurelia, became pharmacists in a somewhat unusual way, but most pharmacists first studied under someone already working as a pharmacist, learning medical arts and compounding from them.
If recognized by their master as having talent, they would be introduced to the Sedovara Temple in the Divine King's Domain of Quebia, where they would undergo further training.
Only after being recognized by the Sedovara Temple as having mastered medical arts and compounding techniques could they begin calling themselves pharmacists, even if only half-trained.
After that, they would be dispatched to various Sedovara Churches throughout the region as a training period to become full-fledged pharmacists.
The assignments took into consideration the pharmacists' own wishes, such as wanting to work in their hometown where pharmacists were scarce, but for the first few years, it was entirely determined by the Sedovara Church's instructions.
It was possible Jasper had requested to work in the Ivizia Kingdom, his home country, but being dispatched to the Grenore branch of the Sedovara Church was probably just a coincidence.
Just because Jasper had a past of being in other countries did not immediately make him part of the kidnapping gang.
"...It could still be a different person who just looks like him."
"It is possible, but since Jasper has also vanished, we need to investigate."
It was dangerous to assume from the start that Jasper was suspicious, but we could not afford not to suspect him at all.
The fact that he had disappeared at the same time as Tina, and the fact that similar sightings had appeared in the gathered information, made it hard to believe Jasper was unrelated to this matter.
"When morning comes, I will demand the Sedovara Church disclose Jasper's background."
If they thought the suspicion was unjust, they might resist the knights to protect a fellow pharmacist, but this time, they would probably disclose the information obediently.
For the Sedovara Church, Tina, who could read Japanese, was far more valuable than a mere pharmacist like Jasper.
And they themselves were suspected of being involved in the disappearance of that Tina.
They would likely cooperate eagerly, trying to clear themselves of suspicion.
Past noon, two pairs of knights who had pursued the boat that disappeared right after the fire the previous day returned.
The knights who had worked in pairs to search upstream and downstream on the river apparently found no results from the group that searched upstream.
They had traced the river as far as a boat could go and found nothing.
They then joined up with the group that went to investigate downstream, wondering if the boat had been carried that way, and there they found the boat caught on rocks by the riverside.
After that, they apparently searched both upstream and downstream from that boat as a starting point.
To state the results simply, there were no footprints left around the boat indicating anyone had boarded or disembarked.
They considered the possibility that the abandoned boat had been carried away from where the culprits had disembarked, and searched the surrounding area for a day, but to no avail.
The knights who had pursued the boat concluded that it had been deliberately set adrift to throw off pursuers.
I felt the need to increase personnel and expand the search area, but I could not be fixated solely on the possibility that Tina was taken by boat.
At this point, sending word first to the Lugmilama Fortress and Mell Fortress on the border had probably been the right decision.
It would be impossible to force a break through the border with Tina on horseback.
That meant the culprits were transporting Tina by carriage or some other means, and their travel speed would be reduced accordingly.
Since I had sent a fast horse to the border fortresses, there was a chance of recovering Tina before she could be taken out of the country, by strengthening border checkpoints, inspecting luggage of travelers crossing the border, and so on.
...If she was taken out of the country, the search would become much more difficult.
Pursuing Tina was a race against time.
Having already fallen behind due to extinguishing the warehouse fire, I could not afford to make a wrong decision at every turn.
I could not afford to, but three days had passed since Tina's kidnapping with no significant progress in the investigation, and my patience was nearing its limit.
I wanted to grab the culprit by the scruff of the neck and break it, but I did not even know which direction to run in, let alone the culprit's identity.
"Regarding the Adorutoru crest, it is impossible to investigate within the bounds of the Ivizia Kingdom."
"It is a crest of a foreign noble, after all. For families connected to royalty or powerful noble houses, records remain, but for newer houses that have branched off in fine detail, they do not become documents circulated abroad. If you want to investigate further, you would have to go to the Saenard Kingdom or capture a Saenard noble."
It was a document that collected crests of powerful noble houses from across the continent, but the crest left on the gold ring seemed similar to all of them yet slightly different from each.
If there was a matching crest, we could predict where Tina was being taken, track her movements, or set up checkpoints ahead of time, but since there was no matching crest at all, it was hopeless.
As expected, we might need to go to the Saenard Kingdom for information about the Adorutoru.
"...Would the royal castle's library have more materials?"
"It probably would... but we do not have the manpower to spare. No, actually we do."
For the failure of Tina's kidnapping, I needed to go to the capital once to report.
I did not want to leave the scene, and if I caught any clue, I wanted to ride out immediately, but matters concerning Tina were my responsibility as her guardian, and the incidents that had occurred in the city of Grenore were also my responsibility.
I had to go to the capital and report the situation.
"I will investigate while I am there making the report."
"No, I will go make the report to the capital."
At Alf's words, "I am the one in charge of Tina," I blinked for a moment.
The one in charge of Tina within the royal family should have been Alfred, I thought, then remembered.
I had just heard the other day that Alf himself was the third prince of this country.
Between a prince and the lord of a fortress, the one with greater responsibility would be the prince.
"...Tina's kidnapping is my failure. I cannot let you bear that responsibility."
"Don't misunderstand. This is not about protecting you."
The Sedovara Church, which had been asked to disclose Jasper's background, had documents prepared as if they had been waiting for the messenger knight.
And to prove their own non-involvement, they had even prepared "Wawarabera's Miraculous Drug."
This miraculous drug, bearing the name of the god of dreams Wawarabera, caused those who used it to be lured into a dream world with their eyes open, stripping away all their wariness.
And then, they would divulge their secrets as asked.
If the dosage was mistaken, the person subjected to it would become a vegetable, so it was normally a prohibited drug.
It could only be used on criminals who had confessed to being the culprit, or those caught in the act with no doubt whatsoever about being the perpetrator.
When the head of the Sedovara Church said they would use the miraculous drug on themselves to prove their innocence, Alf acknowledged their sincerity and calmed the head, skillfully coaxing the drug away from them.
"As expected, using 'Wawarabera's Miraculous Drug' on royalty would be problematic."
"He is a criminal caught in the act with no doubt whatsoever. Do not worry about it."
Incidentally, Alf said that since they had already removed him from the royal register at the time of capture, there was no need to treat him as royalty anymore.
Under the supervision of the head of the Grenore branch of the Sedovara Church, Chadwick, who had been carefully administered the "Wawarabera's Miraculous Drug," apparently talked to an astonishing degree.
They needed to record every detail without omission, and to gather evidence of what Chadwick had done so far, it seemed Alf needed to return to the capital once.
This was not about going to the capital to protect me. It was purely because it aligned with his own schedule, and also because having both the commander and vice-commander away from the Grenore Fortress at the same time was not feasible in the current situation.
"I will get all the command authority for Tina's kidnapping investigation while I am at it. I will shelve your failure for now so you can prioritize getting Tina back."
"Sorry. I am in your debt."
"No need to apologize. It really just happens to work out for me. Also, when I am at the fortress, you feel safe enough to start running wild."
"...Sorry."
I was trying to hold myself back, but I was aware that I might soon run off anyway.
With Alf here, I would feel reassured and start running wild.
Even if they called me the commander of a knight order overseeing four fortresses, the truth was that the fortresses ran without me most of the time.
My presence was not strictly necessary.
Knowing that, I was tempted to take advantage of having someone I could trust with my back and charge off to find Tina.
"Tina might be your sister, but she is also a treasure that cannot be lost, both for our country and for the Sedovara Church. Acting to recover Tina serves the national interest. Since it benefits the nation, do not hesitate to use the knight order. There is nothing to feel guilty about."
"I know. Even if I ran off alone, the range I could see would be limited to my own field of vision, and the distance I could travel would be limited by my own legs."
"If you think of the entire knight order as your eyes and legs, you can imagine how much range you could cover and how far you could move."
Alf told me to cool my head a bit while he was in the capital, and headed off.
The carriage journey that brought Tina here took a month one way, but Alf's travel was not royal travel.
A knight carrying urgent news to the capital travels on horseback.
Even counting the round trip, it would not take a month.
The air is heavy, and my pen will not move forward...
I have things to do today, so I will be taking tomorrow's update off.