Red considered for a second that Reinhart could be lying, but that was impossible after he was bound by the blood oath.
“Are you working for the imperials?”
“Not directly,” Reinhart said. “I’m still working for Gustav, but he promised his imperial contacts to keep an eye on the girl.”
Even though the man was now forced to tell the truth, he didn’t seem the least bit hesitant to reveal this sensitive information. It was clear he had no loyalty to his superiors.
“Did the imperials not capture you?”
“I didn’t give them the chance. As soon as I was out, I could guess they would come for me, so I asked Gustav to arrange a meeting that wouldn’t get me killed or brainwashed,” Reinhart looked Red up and down. ”You were also inside the trial, right? Were you the one who won?”
“You seem to be under a misconception. This is an interrogation, not a conversation.”
To make a point, Red formed small wind blades around his fingers - a variation of the Wind Blade spell he often used. Reinhart, however, threw his hands up with a smile before he could do anything.
“I get it, I get it! Ask away.”
“How did this meeting with the imperials go?”
“It wasn’t so much a meeting. I met one of their priests, and as soon as they looked at me, they lost interest. I guess he had some way to tell that I hadn’t won the inheritance.”
Red frowned. “They just looked at you?”
“That’s right.”
This was a troublesome revelation. If the priest used some technique or ritual to discern whether Reinhart had the truth, then it would be something Red could easily avoid, but if all they needed was to look at him to know if he had the inheritance? Then there was not much he could do to escape their notice.
“It seems unlikely they would just let you go,” Red said.
“They didn’t want to. One of their soldiers was very adamant about interrogating me, but thankfully, Gustav stepped in and helped mediate. He negotiated with the imperials and arranged for me to become an informant for them in the capital. They are always eager for more of those, so it didn’t take much convincing.”
“You have imperial contacts in the capital?”
“I don’t doubt they are in the capital, but I don’t have direct contact with them. The only way to talk to them is through that,” he pointed at the talisman on the table.
“That message you sent…?”
Reinhart smiled. “It was for them, yes. And I know what you’re thinking - they’ll probably notice something strange from what I sent them about having captured someone. I can just explain to them I was trying to draw someone out - which, of course, I failed to do.”
Red didn’t dissuade him from this course of action. He still was undecided about what to do with Reinhart, but if he could at the very least clear the imperial’s suspicion, then he could live until then.
“What exactly did the imperials ask you to do?”
“Until recently, mostly to keep an eye out for rumours and ongoings on the city underbelly. After the little… accident with your home down south, they told me to look for survivors from the attack and gave me their descriptions. Obviously, as soon as they told me, I could guess immediately who they were looking for.”
“Who exactly were they looking for?”
“Three people - a red-haired young adult, a scruffy-looking rogue, and a noble young master… Do we need to keep this charade up?”
Red stared at him in response, and Reinhart sighed.
“Fine. Well, since I knew one of them was Rimold, I told them about his sister and suggested setting up a trap around her, since I couldn’t imagine they would just abandon her. Unfortunately, they seemed convinced that none of their targets would appear in the city,” he shrugged. “I guess that goes to show they should have just listened to me.”
‘There’s something strange about this.’
“…Why did they seem convinced?” Red asked.
“Well, they told me two of their targets were hiding in a place from where they couldn’t leave and the imperials couldn’t reach. The other, well, they told me they were currently chasing that one up north, though they didn’t seem to have caught him yet from the sounds of it.”
‘Huh?’
For a second, Red was confused. He assumed the ones trapped somewhere referred to both Allen and Rimold, who were sequestered in the Crystal Sky Sect, so by process of elimination, the one being chased up north could only be referring to him. Was this the work of his anti-divination spell?
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
“You said they were chasing someone up north?”
“That’s right.”
“So they saw him?”
“Wait…” Reinhart seemed to realize something as well, as a knowing smile grew on his face. “Yes, red hair and everything. I hear they even fought him at some point, but… that doesn’t make any sense now, does it?”
Red was well and truly puzzled. As far as he understood, creating fake copies of himself wasn’t something the hawk’s anti-divination spell could do.
“Aurelia, do you know if an anti-divination spell can do this?” Red asked with his expanded awareness.
The woman, previously annoyed by his sudden change of plans, now was taking the conversation seriously. “None that I have ever heard of. Anti-divination spells can either trick or block divination attempts, but they aren’t able to alter the world to make fake visions a reality.”
‘If that’s the case…’
Eliminating the impossible only left Red with a single possibility - someone was pretending to be him. His first thought was that such a person had malicious intent, but that didn’t seem to match up with what was going on, either.
‘The imperials chasing a fake version of me in the north means that all their attention is turned away from the city and from Yrsa. It’s a tremendous aid to me.’
Anti-divination spells could trick and block divination attempts. Red was sure the hawk’s shield was likely tricking the imperials, since blocking their divinations would be announcing there was something suspicious about him. Yet, tricking a divination attempt wasn’t perfect either. After all, couldn’t they verify the findings of the divination in real life? If they then noticed the information wasn’t matching up, they would be able to tell he had some technique to trick them.
This was a worry on the back of his mind since he learnt how divinations worked. Yet, even after this long, it seemed the imperials still weren’t sure he had the inheritance. This would be explained if a fake Red was running around, corroborating their faulty divinations and making them believe they were on the right track.
It was too much of a coincidence for Red to think this wasn’t someone’s plan to help him.
‘Then who was it?’
Only three beings in this world knew about his inheritance. One of them was always by his side, and another was stuck inside the blessed land. That only left one reasonable suspect.
‘The necromancer.’
Red thought back to the last time he talked to the being - or more specifically, their clone. It said it was cut off from the main body by the hawk and left to wander the world without a purpose. It also claimed the hawk had let it leave, which Red didn’t believe back then.
‘The necromancer said the hawk wouldn’t be able to stop them from leaving clones on the surface even if it wanted to, but… Was that true?’
Would the spirit leave behind such a dangerous being for Red’s future? Even if supporting him was in the necromancer’s best interest, would they trust them? It seemed unlikely the hawk would overlook such a matter, so what if that clone was telling the truth after all?
‘The hawk allowed them to leave a clone behind to help me trick the divination attempts?’
This seemed like a reasonable theory. If Red could tell the shortcomings of an anti-divination spell, wouldn’t the hawk be able to as well? In that case, it suddenly didn’t seem unreasonable for the spirit to allow the necromancer to leave clones behind despite the potential danger they represented.
“Did you realize something?” Aurelia asked after his prolonged silence.
“That necromancer might be behind this.”
“The necromancer? Why would he do that?”
“I have some theories, but I’ll share them with you later.”
“Why are you just standing there? Are you talking to someone in your head?” Reinhart asked.
Red was taken aback before he realized the man meant it as a joke.
“Tell me about the imperials and the Golden Hand’s involvement with them.”
Reinhart went into as much detail as he could. The imperials kept him at an arm’s distance, so he wasn’t able to tell Red much about their operation, but the same couldn’t be said about the Golden Hand. Being so close to Gustav, Reinhart knew a lot about the operations of the guild, mainly those centered around the underworld of the city.
The list of crimes and contraband he revealed was enough to fill out a book, but none of it was outside of Red’s realm of expectation. Yet, one thing caught his attention.
“You know who their contact with the Shadow is?”
“Yes, it’s Guild Master Anton himself.”
‘Of course it is.’
Guild Master Anton was the Spirit Core cultivator from the Golden Hand Temple. This also meant that the highest authority within the organization had potentially hired the assassins that targeted Red.
He questioned Reinhart further, learning a lot about underground routes and secret warehouses that the guild used. Eventually, though, it seemed the man couldn’t offer any more relevant information.
“How long does it take for your imperial contacts to respond?” Red asked, pointing at the talisman.
“A day at least, unless it’s informed through the urgent channel. They are very careful to make sure their communications are not intercepted.”
Red frowned after learning this, thinking to himself.
Reinhart noticed his silence and laughed. “Are you troubled by the fact you will need to wait a day to kill me?”
“…It’s fine. It gives me more time to come up with a plan.”
“That’s right. If you want to get rid of me without raising suspicion, you will need to set a very convincing scene. Anything short of a perfect scapegoat might make the imperials suspicious. Think you can manage that?”
“What I think doesn’t matter. It’s something that I have to do.”
This was his conclusion - Reinhart needed to die. Even if he was under a blood oath now, his connection to those powers meant they might find out any strange actions or changes in his body. When Red took action, this was the ultimate outcome he was prepared for.
“What if I offer an alternative course of action?” Reinhart asked.
“Are you trying to plead for your life?”
“Yes, I am. Though I was hoping this would be more like a negotiation that would benefit both of us.”
“Your life is in my hands. What do you have to bargain?”
The man smiled as if he was expecting this question. “Well, as far as I understand, the blood oath punishes any ill-will against its master. I can’t lie or act against you or I will be punished, but… It doesn’t seem as if the contract can compel me to act, correc-?”
As soon as Reinhart said that, he let out a scream of pain and spit a mouthful of blood. He grabbed his chest, panting in agony as he struggled to stay conscious.
Red frowned. He wasn’t the one that had attacked him. This was a backlash from violating the contract - as Reinhart seemed to think or act against his self-interest.
“N-Now,” the man spoke between breaths as he struggled to sit up. “You are smart enough to see what I’m suggesting, right?”
Reinhart’s meaning was obvious. The contract couldn’t compel him to act, which meant that if he wanted to, he could still try acting against Red and then die in the process. If that happened, how would he possibly respond to the imperials or disguise his death?
‘In the end, I was right not to underestimate him, but I still acted too rashly.’
The man was recklessly gambling with his own life, and Red had no choice but to hesitate.