I woke up after a short yet refreshing nap.


    I patted my hands around, but couldn''t feel Maria anywhere. I thought we had ended up sleeping after drinking the night away.


    "Young master?"


    I sat up and turned toward the door to see my dearest ck-haired maid standing at alert, lifting the hems of her skirt in a curtsy.


    "Where''d you get that?" I asked, scooting off the bed.


    "Work clothes?"


    Iughed and went to the bathroom to wash up.


    My clothes wereid out perfectly when I came back out. The time on the clock was already reaching noon.


    As I put on my shirt andbed my hair, my gaze hardened. With the Maria problem solved splendidly, or should I say turned into a booming investment, one of the things I had to care of was gone. Now only Raum''s agent was left.


    I checked my outfit again. A lot of new nobles wereing and going from the castle which made it even more necessary to look good. The ck suit and trousers with whitecings fit me perfectly, I probably looked good enough even without anything on. That must be the case.


    "Then, I''ll be going," I said, moving toward the door.


    "Bye, young master."


    "Yup," I waved my hands and stepped out.


    I rushed my way down the stairs and to the garden again. It was almost the time to meet up when I left, so I thought the others must be present there already, but that wasn''t the case.


    Confused, I then moved to the stables but my carriage was still inside.


    What in the world?


    As my feet dragged me to the knights'' office which was near the prison fromst time, I kept my eyes out for them. Unfortunately, the number of people here made it tough to understand who was around. In the first ce, why the hell were these nobles walking near the knights'' office?


    It didn''t take long to realize that a lot of them were normal citizens as well. With the crowd so big and the air so heated, of course, troubles would flock to the knights more than usual.


    "Lord Eugene?"


    I turned to my side at the voice.


    "I was just about to go look for you."


    "Lady Sophia," I smiled. "Have you been well?"


    "I had a lot of fun hearing you y yesterday, I slept well after that."


    "I await the time you let me hear your cello, mydy."


    "Most certainly, I''ll keep a show just for you."


    "So," I asked, looking around as we stepped into the building. "What are we doing here?"


    Lady Sophia''s voice grew exceedingly chipper as she spoke. "We have great news. The knights were able to locate fourteen of the people and have retrieved the same number of bombs."


    Fourteen?


    My head nked away.


    A demon that could get glimpses of the future, one that helped this ''agent'' escape the sly and cunning Sophia, was being caught this easy?


    "It was all thanks to your interrogation, it would—"


    Lady Sophia continued speaking, but my mind phased her words out.


    It seemed as if time had slowed down as everything moved slowly. Extremely slowly, like a snail racing against a rabbit, the world itself couldn''t keep up with my processing speed.


    A mage, a Ki user, a hunter, before all of those, this was my strongest weapon. My greatest asset.


    Tens, hundreds, all kinds of situations and hypotheses were drawn up in my head before being scratched out. The memories of people''s demeanor, their postures, and minute gestictions, all of them made me push them into a list of suspects and people who were safe. I scourged through everything that had happened in the past few days to remember what could be wrong.


    "Our... Fur...nace..."


    My eyes shot pastdy Sophia and toward a person moving as slow as a clown in front of another equally slow knight. My head was heating up intensely.


    Furnace.


    The Iron ore and smithy.


    I remembered the fleeting lecture that the employee had given back there.


    ''And so, we are shifting to thetest manabustors to heat it up rapidly in the st furnace.''


    Getting in touch with an alchemist and nting fake man bombs. Only to direct the attention away from the real thing.


    The pieces clicked rapidly in my mind. The overheating of my head made it cave under pressure as things started moving normally all at once.


    "Ah? Lord Eugene, you have a nosebleed...?"


    I took in a deep breath.


    "Oh? W-what!? That is quite intense bleeding! Are you alright—"


    "—Lady Sophia," I muttered as I took a firm step toward the smithy employee. "We may have a problem."


    One that I wasn''t going to let by.