Chapter 148

Although the Imperial family officially lumped unlicensed mages and black mages together, everyone knew the two were fundamentally different.
The former were persecuted purely for political reasons, while the latter were enemies of all by their very existence.
In other words, a true black mage was someone upon whom any atrocity could be inflicted without repercussion.

I’ve already been exposed for swindling a duke. And now, if I’m branded a black mage on top of that…

Cold sweat poured down Dominic’s entire body like a waterfall.
At this point, wealth or even his life was no longer the issue.
In the worst case, he could end up neither alive nor dead, subjected to months of torture.
Unable to endure the horrific future he imagined, Dominic rubbed his forehead frantically against the floor.

“Y-Your Highness, this is—this is not black magic, no—mercy, please…!”

He opened his mouth to explain himself somehow, but no proper sentences came out.
No matter what words he cobbled together, they would be useless if Lucian had no intention of forgiving him.
Just as Dominic, crushed by despair, was about to roll his eyes back—

“Hm. But now that I look again, something seems odd. Is this really black magic?”

At Lucian’s voice—like a ray of light—Dominic lifted his head.
Lucian smiled coldly and, in a theatrical tone, swept his gaze over those around him and spoke.

“It resembled the black magic I know, so I spoke without thinking—but there are countless kinds of magic, after all. Now that I look again, it may not be black magic at all, but another spell with a similar effect.”
“T-That’s right! This is from the Metal School—!”
“So then.”

Lucian cut Dominic off and bent forward slightly, a cold smile on his face.
Meeting those beastlike eyes, Dominic swallowed hard and waited for what came next.

“I’d like you to explain everything in great detail—so thoroughly that no one could possibly misunderstand. Explain how you came to use such magic to deceive me.”

Only then did Dominic understand what Lucian truly wanted.
To prevent him from escaping later with some other excuse, Lucian intended to make Dominic confess every one of his crimes with his own mouth.
And to have Dominic himself honor the oath and personally hand over all of his wealth.

“Ah…”

Realizing he had been driven into a corner, Dominic closed his eyes.
Now there were only two choices left: the worst, and the lesser evil.
Which one to choose was obvious.

“In my younger days, I once received help from a certain mage…”

***

The head of the Dominic Trading Company was famously known by the nickname ‘Dominic of Steel.’
Among the great merchants, he was especially involved in military supply contracts.
With all manner of weapons and armor being provided through him, the moniker steel had come naturally.

For a merchant, it was a rather stylish nickname.
However, after the age of chaos began, that nickname was no longer used.
So many curses had replaced it.

Seven-Tongued Liar.
The Man Cursed with Every Breath.
The Target of All Assassins.

Half of the continent’s lords cursed Dominic with hatred and resentment.
It reached the point where even a rural peasant might not know the emperor’s name, but had heard Dominic’s at least once.
The reason Dominic drew so many curses was simple.

“Because he went around swindling people, claiming he’d discovered a metal manufacturing method that didn’t even exist.”

Tenebrium.
This metal, whose name in the ancient tongue meant “Stone of Darkness,” sent shockwaves across the entire continent the moment it was revealed.
It possessed strength similar to adamantium, yet could be produced at a far lower cost.

How this mysterious alloy was made was never disclosed.
That was because Dominic, who unveiled Tenebrium, kept its manufacturing method under absolute secrecy.
Despite threats from countless lords, Dominic permitted only the sale of Tenebrium.

—“I am a merchant. If you want it, buy it with money. I will gladly sell it to anyone who pays.”

The lords cursed the unyielding Dominic as an insolent peddler, but they had no other options.
In an age of chaos where everyone was busy stabbing each other in the back, kidnapping Dominic to monopolize the rare metal’s production method?

It was obvious that other lords would seize upon any excuse to form a coalition army and come charging in.

Above all, the Dominic Trading Company was a massive merchant house with branches spread across the entire continent.
It might not be able to stand up directly to a lord, but slipping away and fleeing on its own if things turned dangerous was hardly difficult.
And if truly wronged, Dominic might even run straight to a rival lord and divulge the method for producing Tenebrium instead.

—“Damn it! Fine, how much is it? I’ll buy everything you have!”

In the end, the lords had no choice but to purchase Tenebrium at full price.
Fortunately, Tenebrium was unbelievably cheap considering its performance.
Naturally, the lords didn’t hesitate, scraping together every gold coin in their vaults and pouring it out.

Why hesitate when they could make a profit just by reselling it?
The Dominic Trading Company worked nonstop, producing and supplying Tenebrium to meet the flood of orders.
Then, after a year had passed and a considerable amount of Tenebrium equipment had entered circulation—

—“C-Commander! The Tenebrium sword we bought recently snapped!”
—“What? That’s impossible! What on earth did you do to break it?”
—“I just tried to cut a rock, and it broke! Its strength has weakened!”
—“That can’t be…!”

The lords and knights who had purchased Tenebrium equipment began to sense something was wrong.
As time passed, the strength of the equipment gradually diminished.
If that had been all, they might have dismissed it as mere defective goods—but what truly became a problem was its reaction with saltwater, discovered by chance afterward.

The moment it touched saltwater, the once-indestructible equipment crumbled into dust in an instant.
Only then did the lords realize they had been deceived, but by then Dominic had already fled under the protection of Marquis Bernhardt.
The lords hurled curses and demanded Dominic be handed over, but Marquis Bernhardt flatly refused.

“Rumor has it he offered up half his fortune and obtained a noble title—but who knows if that’s true.”

At the time, Lucian was merely a mercenary, with neither reason nor time to verify the truth of the rumors.
What was certain, however, was that Dominic went on to enjoy a peaceful old age under the protection of House Logran.
And that House Logran somehow managed to expand its army using funds of unknown origin.

“I don’t know about the noble title, but it’s certain he offered up a vast fortune in exchange for guaranteed safety.”

Otherwise, there would have been no reason to protect Dominic, who had earned the hatred of so many lords.
When Lucian first heard the rumors back then, he couldn’t understand why Dominic had carried out such an outrageous scam.
As one of the foremost great merchants, why not simply continue trading—why sully his own name so thoroughly?

But now, thinking back on it, he felt he could at least somewhat understand why Dominic had made that decision.

“…And that is how I came to commit such a sin. This lowly old man was blinded by greed and crossed a river from which there was no return.”

While Lucian was revisiting memories of his past life, Dominic’s confession was nearly finished.
In short, he had formed a connection with a certain mage in his youth, learned a method of temporarily reinforcing metal, and used it in this scheme.
Having confirmed there was nothing else worth listening to, Lucian finally spoke to Dominic.

“Dominic.”

“Your Highness! Please, I beg for mercy…!”
“Do you resent the nobility?”

Midway through his plea, Dominic froze at Lucian’s words.
Without waiting for an answer, Lucian continued, murmuring as if to himself.

“In times of chaos, a merchant’s life is as fragile as that of a fly. Without power, no contract is ever truly upheld. It’s no exaggeration to say that becoming a court merchant under the protection of a specific lord is the only way to survive.”

“So I can understand the idea of making one huge score at the end and offering the profits to gain a good position… but no matter how I look at it, you went too far. You earned resentment many times greater than what you gained.”

That Dominic’s later years had been peaceful in Lucian’s previous life was, after all, merely hindsight.
Having incurred that much hatred, he must have lived the rest of his life under constant threat of assassination.
On top of that, he had destroyed the trust he’d built as a merchant and earned nothing but contempt.

And yet, Dominic had still gone through with it—trading a paltry gain for the chance to thoroughly spite countless lords.

Wasn’t it far too shortsighted an action to say that profit had been the true goal?

“Tell me, Dominic. Was deceiving me—and deceiving the northern lords—really done for profit? Did you stage this whole fraud just to gain something so paltry?”
“…H–heh, hehehe.”

A strange laugh leaked from Dominic’s bowed head.
After laughing quietly for a while, he lifted his head with an expression that seemed to have cast off everything.

“At this point, what does my motive matter? I committed a crime, everything has been exposed to the world, and all that remains is to receive my punishment.”

“As promised, I offer up everything I possess—so please, do as you will.”

With those words, Dominic closed his eyes and said nothing more.
It was a sign of complete resignation, as if nothing mattered anymore.
Lucian watched him for a moment, then issued an order to the soldiers.

“Imprison the criminal Dominic. And bring in the heads of the other trading companies who are waiting outside.”

***

Dragged in by the soldiers’ rough hands, the merchant heads were half out of their minds with fear.
They had thought Dominic would take the fall and that they would be released as a group—but to think it had all been a scam.
At this rate, they wouldn’t be freed at all; they’d be the ones left holding the bag.

“Y–Your Highness! We knew nothing! We’ve been wronged!”
“At least investigate us! We’ll prove our innocence!”
“If you keep babbling, I’ll start by cutting off the head of the loudest one for fraud.”

At Lucian’s single remark, the merchant heads who had been chirping like a flock of chicks all fell silent at once.
After glaring at them for a moment, Lucian finally brought up the main point a few minutes later.

“You all know about the wager between Dominic and me.”
“Y–Yes, of course.”

“Then this will be simple. It’s been proven that the ore said to rival adamantium does not exist. According to our agreement, all of his property now belongs to me. The problem is that it’s difficult for me to grasp the full extent of his assets. There are surely considerable holdings he has concealed rather than declared honestly.”
“T–That possibility… can’t be ruled out.”
“Therefore, in exchange for my specially forgiving your crimes, I intend to entrust you with tracking down the assets he has hidden. Will you accept?”

The merchant heads snapped their heads up at the unexpected proposal.
If this offer were genuine, it was an unimaginably light punishment compared to their crimes.
Whether hidden assets existed or not, as long as they did the job properly, they would be forgiven.

If there were none, report that there were none; if there were some, report what existed—finish the task and leave.
And if, during the investigation, they happened to discover truly hidden assets, they might even gain a tidy bit of extra income.
After all, minor discrepancies during asset investigations were hardly unusual.

“We’d be honored to take it—!”
“However, if the amount of hidden assets falls below a certain threshold, I will have no choice but to suspect you. You understand what that means, don’t you?”

The merchant heads, who had been about to accept Lucian’s proposal with smiles, froze at his next words.
They didn’t even know yet whether any hidden assets truly existed—yet he spoke of suspicion?

Damn it. This is basically telling us to pay a fine as the price of our sins.
 And it’s not a one-time fine. If he feels like it, he could find us ‘suspicious’ dozens of times.
 In other words, he’s warning us not to try any tricks while carrying out this assignment.

Tracking down hidden assets was merely a pretext.

The real purpose was a warning: as long as the dealings continued, he could put a leash called “suspicion” around their necks at any time—so they’d better behave themselves.
For the merchant heads, this meant that so long as they didn’t know when that leash might tighten and kill them, they had no choice but to continue making deals favorable to Lucian.

Faced with this utterly unreasonable arrangement, the merchant heads all shouted in unison.

“Of course! You’re free to harbor suspicions as much as you like!”
“If we find any insolent fool, we’ll bind him ourselves and present him to you!”
“No—if need be, we’ll even compensate you out of our own private funds!”

So what if a leash was placed around their necks?
Say the wrong thing now, and instead of a leash, a cold blade would slice straight across their throats.
For merchant heads who had effectively deceived a duke alongside Dominic, it was fortunate that things ended at this.

For some reason, their eyes felt hot—but surely these were tears of joy at having survived.
No matter how much money one might lose, there was nothing in the world more precious than one’s life.