Inquisitor Djarren Yal, feared by his detractors and respected by anyone not—oh how much he would give to see the era change!

Wrinkled his skin may be, offense would be had to compare him to his less-enlightened, “conservative” compatriots. Yes, the Inquisition stood as a pillar of Lyrica. Yes, the Inquisition must strike down infant threats to her sovereignty. Lest no one remember, however, that the Inquisition existed as a body firstly to inquire—to investigate, to learn. It planted its feet in a frontier between the known and unknown, and so it had no place for those who feared the unknown.

Fear of the unknown was unequivocable ignorance.

Hide not behind your guards, and shed your own blood—pursue, pursue, and pursue the truth with your own hand! He was younger when he’d said these words, and he’d done what he’d said. It didn’t amount to anything, however—and yet, until his body wasn’t destroyed by his own “foolishness,” he waded through waters muddied by the conspiracies of his supposed allies and the machinations of the gods and goddesses themselves.

To meet eyes with Kalender was, truly, a gift from heaven—or rather, the Goddess Minimine, as Kalender recounted.

Yal’s office was a hall of shelves, papers, desks, and tired secretaries. The first thing visitors would see upon entering was Yal himself, busied in the far end behind an admiral’s ornate table, hunched over, signing off on the latest, exciting findings, and maybe damning a minor Lord or two with the stroke of a pen. The window behind him glowed bright yellow in the morning, and at sunset, a window above the entrance allowed a gentle glow to land on Yal’s table, illuminating only his work hands, hiding the man himself in the shade.

At this end-of-day, most of the secretaries had already left, content with their work. The last one bid a respectful goodbye and closed the door behind her.

“M’lord, I have a report,” said his shadow. It was a nice and fluffy report, not two hours out of the baking oven.

“Mm,” Yal grunted. He was still going over a report about embezzlement in the region south of Poette. The shadow stood in the corner, away from the window and prying eyes.

“The party of Kalender claims that their mutated stats are capable of counting backwards under the influence of third parties.”

Yal stopped reading. He recalled that one suicide case from 9 years ago. The initial suspect turned out to be a Cursed One, and he claimed the Affection stat for the woman had been going backwards for no discernible reason.

“Additionally,” the shadow continued, “they also claim that a Maid Sherry, under the service of Lord Turner, confronted Page Turner to return to Poette at the behest of her father. Their party requests … intervention on this matter.”

Yal chuckled. Kalender had been driving him nuts these past few days. The fact that four cuffs weren’t enough to completely disarm his curse’s charm magic was already amazing in its own right. Just how strong is his curse, truly? The addition of two anti-charm cuffs should be good enough, he wagered. It was a pain trying to get the Logisticars to believe that a requisition of six anti-charm cuffs over the span of just one week was truly, honestly, and undeceptively necessary.

If anyone else were given six anti-charm cuffs, they might have indiscriminately sapped the MP out of the person. At least the Logisticars were now primed not to expect reasonable requests if the name “Kalender” was ever thrown around.

Of course, Yal also knew that Kalender had been flashing his endorsement plate around all willy-nilly. It had all been very reasonable, according to the shadow, but the frequency at which they were doing it remained mildly concerning.

“I will speak to Lord Turner,” Yal said.

“Truly?” the shadow asked. “Poette may be an important township, but I believe a polite emmissary should be sufficient—”

Yal held up a hand. “There is more than one matter I am interested in,” he said. “For me to see Lord Turner will be the fastest way to ascertain … several points of interests.”

The shadow nodded in understanding. The Inquisition’s foremost interrogator took his turn.

***

Among nobility, those of higher standing would not be bothered to move for the sake of those of a lower standing—this rule being expressly violated by the Inquisition at every turn.

It was the next morning.

Yal stepped off a carriage, thanking his merchant friend for the ride. His feet were on the cobbled ground of Poette’s high street—a place which ordinarily wouldn’t exist in a small township. The fact that a significant fraction of the south’s produce came through here before reaching the capital, however, also meant a large number of well-off merchants and nobles coming here for a rest stop.

Yal didn’t wear the vestments of an Inquisitor, but rather just a brown suit and a walking stick to give him the look of an aging merchant.

He made for a slow walk toward’s Lord Turner’s mansion, looking left and right through the shops’ glass windows. There was a large vegetable cart by the side of the road—a bit out of place to be here, isn’t it?

He walked up to the woman leaning beside one of the cart’s wheels. Along the way, he took a gander at the contents of the cart. There wasn’t much in the way of produce.

“Good day,” he greeted. The woman jumped to her feet, just a bit surprised that someone as high class-looking like Yal would come and talk to her.

“G-good day. What might you need, sir?”

“I just noticed your cart here. The market is that way, so I couldn’t help but wonder what you might be doing here?”

“Ah, well, you see, a customer of mine is a chef, and she likes her ingredients fresh.”

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Sure enough, they were in front of an unmarked establishment. Yal hadn’t noticed it. It was probably an exclusive ladies’ club.

“Hm. Is the harvest still bountiful?” he asked.

“You noticed? The seasons haven’t changed, but prices for fertilizer from Chello have been going up, recently. My crops have been grumpy over it.”

The farmer chuckled. Yal thanked her, and they split ways.

The details remained stuck in Yal’s mind. They didn’t mean anything now, but they would definitely mean something later.

He reached the end of the street, which terminated in an intersection in front of Lord Turner’s mansion.

There were two guards, one on either side of a long gate meant for carriages—but Yal was an Inquisitor, so he went for the Inquisitor’s entrance. He walked along the length of the fence surrounding the mansion until he found a gardener working the hedges behind the fence.

“Oh, young lady, are you perhaps Cecilia Morail? Your mother has been asking about you.”

The gardener flinched. “Has she? Please tell her I’m doing well.”

The way she held the gardening shears in her hand told him where to go, and the way she snipped the air with it told him that there was a section of compromised fence specifically for him. “Then I will. Have a good day,” he said, smiling. He followed the fence a little further, and sure enough, there were a set of four bars held together only by magic.

He didn’t want bystanders becoming witnesses. “{Cast an illusion that freezes this image}.”

Then he held the bars. “{Release}.”

The bars were like spaghetti sticks in his hands, and he walked right through. With a {Weld}, the bars were back to as they were. He and the gardener from a while ago eyed each other from a distance, with the gardener retreating into a side entrance in the mansion-proper. He followed after her and entered some sort of tool room. There was another door that led deeper into the mansion.

“Inquisitor, to what do I owe the pleasure?” the gardener greeted, bowing with grace unbefitting of a blue-collar worker.

“I wish to meet with Lord Turner,” he replied.

“Of course. He will be in his personal study in 10 minutes.”

The gardener opened a secret passage in the wall, a door layered with a superficial crust of bricks. “Few in the Turner household know of these passages. You will not be heard through the walls, I assure you.”

Yal thanked her. As soon the door to the passage closed, the gardener went right back to her duties. I did it… I finally did the super secret thing! Her thoughts never leaked through her face.

***

Lord Derillian Turner was a busy man at age 39. Already, he was growing thick strands of white hair. Maybe he shouldn’t have married Syle, after all? The damned Lady passed her job off to him. On the other hand, she was really good-lookin’—and she still was, but the stress-in-exchange was starting to weigh a little bit more heavily on the balance scale.

He entered his study, closing the door behind him.

“Lord Turner—” “Huh?!”

His back slammed straight into the door, and he saw an old man on the other end of his study’s long table. Yal smiled wryly at the man’s reaction.

“Who are you!” he shouted, hoping someone outside would hear him. He couldn’t believe that someone would send an old man as an assassin, but what did he know about the underworld?

“I’m someone … interested in the state of things.” Yal put down a golden plate on the table between them, sliding it over. Never mind the fact that it slid for an incredible 10 meters, coming to a perfect stop near the edge, but Derillian couldn’t believe that someone from the Inquisition would drop by for him—

Wait, no, a Senior Inquisitor?!

“A-ah, t-to what do I owe the pleasure? Inquisitor, uh…”

“Djarren Yal.”

“Inquisitor Yal!” Derillian stood tall, hoping to recover some of his dignity. “My charge is but a humble town. I am, uh, unsure what you might be interested in.”

“Of course, of course.” Yal smiled. “For now, please, sit with me.”

Derillian nervously took a chair beside Yal, who took the seat at the head of the table.

“First, what … interesting things can you tell me about the south?”

Derillian gulped. “W-well, I heard that Chello’s fertilizer supply has been encountering difficulties lately. O-of course, less produce means less trade coming through here, so it’s also terrible for me!”

He was overreacting by putting down the ‘I can’t possibly have anything to do with it!’ card. Yal didn’t need his deception detection skills to tell that the man was much too nervous. Nothing he said was new to Yal, however.

“Let me ask differently. Have you met any fellow nobles lately who … feel unseemly to you?”

“U-um, well…” Derillian didn’t like talking behind people’s backs, but no one ordinary could say no to the Inquisition. “I do not mean to accuse, b-but I can say for a fact that the Governor of Sterring has been acting snobbish as of late.”

“Snobbish? Do explain.” Sterring was a large town south of Poette, and northwest of Chello. Yal would have to look into its industries later.

“R-right. Lady Palem used to proudly invite many nobles, even until Violentum, to the parties she hosts. Lately, however, she has only been inviting individuals from a smaller circle.”

This didn’t say anything. Not yet. This Lady Palem might have simply found better reprieve in limiting herself to closer friends.

“… She has also found herself at odds with Lady Tiril of Jitter. I-I did not find myself curious enough to know why, however, please forgive me.”

Jitter was a collection of three villages northeast of Chello. Yal knew nothing of it other than that.

“That will do,” Yal said. Derillian breathed a sigh of relief, but Yal continued. “Next, I must speak about one of your daughters. Page Turner.”

A look of shock painted over Derillian’s face.

“For reasons best that I not speak of, consider the right to her guardianship effectively transferred to the Inquisition—”

No way…

“—Fear not, however, as she is and will continue to be in good health under our supervision—”

I-it can only be that can’t it? The Inquisition dealt in many things, but most common among them, in recent years, was the curse.

“—but I suppose it wouldn’t leave a good taste in my mouth not to let a father see his own daughter at least once. Hmm. I will find a way to make it work in your favor, Lord Turner.”

“P-please, tell me,” Derillian quavered at every word, “is she… was she charmed?”

“You feel to question the Inquisition, Derillian Turner?” Yal glared.

“N-no!” Derillian scrambled to get on his knees. “I-I merely—my daughter!”

The words weren’t forming, but Yal already had a good gauge of what the man was feeling and trying to say. This Derillian Turner might just be a rare specimen of noble father who cared to monitor each and every of his myriad children—sparing loose change in attention, but attention nonetheless.

“Listen well,” Yal started. “Imagine not your daughter in a gilded cage, for she is free to roam.”

Derillian looked up to him. Yal continued. “For as long as she is free, she shall live long, and it is her will to be free. If you force her to return here—will be contrary even to her own wishes.”

Free to roam. It could only mean, to Derillian, that she had finally become an adventurer—an existence that did not live very long. Yal had been cryptic about why she had to be one in order to survive, but it was the Inquisition speaking. Bizarre events followed in their wake, and little about common sense could be said if conventional wisdom led to death.

My daughter will live longer as an adventurer. What an irony. Of course, she wasn’t to become one, but let the man comfort himself with his own stories. It was close enough to the truth.

“She had always been a strange one,” Derillian muttered before turning to Yal. “Would she see me? One day?”

“If she wills it,” Yal answered. He stood up and left through the door, leaving Derillian wondering in amazement if he had been a good father, hoping to himself that his child would come one day—even just one day—to assuage his concern.

If she wills it. Had he done right by her? Hopefully, she would be kind to the outside world.

Yal walked along the corridor, expertly weaving through the gaps in the mansion’s attendants’ paths. “Attach a combat asset of nearest convenience to Kalender’s group,” he told his shadow. The world was already moving, and his pieces were not yet in place. How troublesome.