Retire 454
by Cristae454 The World Is Peaceful (1)
Most magicians conceal the location of their domains.
But the location of Noah Michel’s domain, unlike most magicians, was no secret.
Perhaps it wasn’t what Noah Michel wanted. But if you use the top floor and the one below it of a building in the bustling center of Nantes—one of France’s major cities—as your domain, it’s bound to become public knowledge.
Of course, considering Noah Michel’s fame, even if she made her domain a remote country estate, it would be discovered soon enough. Perhaps she thought that staying somewhere so public would make it easier to be protected. After all, who would dare harm the Jewel of Nantes under the watchful eyes of the city’s citizens?
“What do you mean, Michel is missing?”
“Exactly what it sounds like.”
Noah Michel’s domain had exploded.
The top two floors of the building, which served as both her domain and private space, were completely destroyed by fire. The explosion affected the floors below as well. Those lower floors, according to the wishes of the building’s owner, Noah Michel, were either left empty or used by people who handled her various affairs.
Even at the time of the explosion, there were people working in the offices. Some were injured, but fortunately, no one lost their life.
And they testified that Noah Michel had been on the top floor.
Yet nowhere in the charred remains of the building was Noah Michel to be found.
Not even a corpse.
The magicians hurriedly dispatched from the European Magic Society found only the debris of the destroyed domain and traces of shattered magic. The Society seemed eager to conceal Noah Michel’s disappearance, but, as mentioned, everyone knew who owned that building in the heart of the city.
Noah Michel had vanished.
The first thought that came to mind?
“Isn’t this something Noah Michel did herself?”
The possibility of a staged incident.
“Noah’s too proud to fake an attack on herself like that,” Hope immediately denied.
Even if it wasn’t Noah Michel, any magician with that much pride would find it hard to admit their domain had been attacked. It had taken Kim Chaemin a long time to tell me that her original domain had been destroyed in an attack.
She’d been pretty wounded in her pride even as she told me about it.
The reason it took Kim Chaemin so long to tell me wasn’t because she didn’t trust me. It was because her pride was hurt by the fact that her domain had been attacked and her grandfather’s precious roses had been lost.
And as for Noah Michel?
If anything, she was even more prideful than Kim Chaemin—never less.
I didn’t need Hope to tell me that. The Noah Michel I’d seen in Marseille, and everything I’d heard about her since, made it clear.
If she were going to stage something, she’d have done it another way. Not by burning her own “domain” to the ground. More like disappearing while saving people after blowing up a dungeon, as in San Francisco.
“That would suit Noah’s tastes much better.”
“Hmmm.”
In the end, I nodded at Hope’s words.
Even I had to admit that sounded more plausible. Noah Michel had put a lot of effort into managing her image over the years.
“But Noah Michel’s abilities are the real deal,” Kim Chaemin objected.
It was less an objection than a clarification.
“Blowing away a grand magician’s domain like that—sure, maybe it hurt Michel’s pride or even her physically. But killing Michel?”
Kim Chaemin shook her head.
“That explosion alone couldn’t have done it.”
She added firmly,
“I met her in person in Marseille. Noah Michel is a grand magician.”
“She might act like a kid, but when it comes to magic, Noah is the best,” Hope agreed.
Hope was always harsh in her assessments of Noah Michel’s character, but even he couldn’t bring himself to disparage her magic.
Honestly, who was he to call anyone childish? The words were on the tip of my tongue.
But in terms of ability, Hope and Michel were cut from the same cloth. They’d both hate to be told so, too.
“Let’s look at it another way. Even if Noah Michel has some childish aspects…”
If she were truly a child, she wouldn’t have been able to do all this with dungeons and monsters.
The opposite is true as well. If she really had that kind of childish innocence, instead of coming to such an extreme, violent conclusion as destroying the world, she might have dreamed of something a little more hopeful—like enlightening European magical society.
From that perspective, I could understand a bit of Noah Michel’s way of thinking. I didn’t know how she’d ended up that way, but as for whether she’d caused the San Francisco incident…
Hmm.
Assuming, that is, that it really was Noah Michel’s doing.
She was simply annoyed. Henry Lehmann had done something to get under her skin, and Michel couldn’t just let it go. Even before Hope died, Lehmann had been needling Michel.
This was Noah Michel’s impulsive side.
She’d been trapped in a dungeon at an age when she could barely run. At the time, Mont-Saint-Michel was a tourist site. When the dungeon formed, nearly everyone trapped inside were tourists, except for a handful of awakened. Hundreds of civilians.
No one came out alive.
Alex Hope didn’t know exactly what happened in there.
Noah Michel said that most died during the escape, and her parents sacrificed themselves to get their daughter out.
But the fairy inside the dungeon told the fairy from outside that the human magician had sacrificed all the other humans in pursuit of wonder.
No one but Noah Michel and that fairy would know exactly what happened in the Mont-Saint-Michel dungeon.
Whether it was truly a bloodless, tearless awakening as a ruthless magician, or simply a child’s defense mechanism.
In some sense, Noah Michel was a child who had never grown up.
“All right. Let’s say it wasn’t Michel’s own doing.”
But at the same time, she was a magician clever enough to deceive people for decades and throw everything into a single goal.
“Then who attacked her? It can’t really be a gas explosion, like the French authorities announced.”
“Who would believe that….”
“They couldn’t very well announce in broad daylight that a grand magician had been attacked,” Hope grumbled, his face showing utter disbelief. Most of his muttering was curses directed at the French government for treating its citizens like idiots.
“In this situation, isn’t there only one real suspect who would attack Michel?”
“Henry Lehmann? But how?”
“He must have some ace up his sleeve. Even if he used Michel’s own puppet magic, the guy who picked a fight with me was that bastard.”
Kim Chaemin spoke with a sullen face. A magician’s grudges last a long time.
I folded my arms and took a moment to organize my thoughts.
“If it were you, Ms. Kim—”
“Yes?”
“How would you act?”
“…Who am I supposed to be? Henry Lehmann?”
“No, Noah Michel. Say a fly was bothering you, so you swatted it, but now the fly is coming right at your face. What would you do?”
“Why a fly, of all things… Well, I’d have to catch it, wouldn’t I? If it had just died after being swatted, maybe I’d let it go, but if it keeps bothering me, I’d have to catch it.”
“How?”
“…If the attack was Lehmann hitting Michel in the face, then—well, any magician wouldn’t let that slide.”
Coming from a magician whose own domain had been attacked and who had sworn revenge, her words rang true.
“I don’t know about Michel, but if it were me…”
Kim Chaemin’s eyes darkened.
“I’d see it as an opportunity.”
“An opportunity?”
“She made a big scene, after all. It’s the perfect way to hide.”
Even her voice had taken on a chilling edge.
“No matter how unexpected the attack, an explosion like that wouldn’t even injure her. In Marseille, Michel had multiple layers of defensive magic on her.”
“So?”
“Yes.”
Kim Chaemin nodded.
“She disappeared at the same time as the explosion. It’s the perfect way to avoid public attention and take care of some secret business.”
Alex Hope had done something similar.
The only difference was that we hadn’t been able to take advantage of it—unable even to leave the school.
“…Huh? Why are you looking at me like that all of a sudden?”
Maybe it was finally time to put Hope, who’d been wasting electricity watching dramas, to use.
Well. To be honest, I just really wanted to give that annoying guy some work.
I shrugged as if it was nothing.
“Honestly, who caused the explosion isn’t really the important issue.”
“The fact that Noah Michel disappeared is what matters.”
“If she hid herself like this, she’ll probably stay out of sight until she achieves whatever she wants….”
“If people ask why she’s hiding, she can just say someone was after her.”
“Admitting that would hurt her pride, but… her pride’s already been wounded once, hasn’t it? And as long as she’s a magician, if she’s decided to use something, she’ll use it to the end.”
Now, what worried me was—
Alex Hope let out a series of heavy sighs.
“The problem is what Noah’s going to do next.”
“Any guesses?”
“Torment Henry?”
“That’s a given. But how?”
“…Blow up a dungeon?”
“…….”
“…….”
A cold silence settled over the table.
“Well….”
Unfortunately, there was nothing we could do.
“Let’s just wait and see if Daniel finds out anything.”
“The world feels unsettled lately,” Lee Miseon said, her expression blank, as if she knew nothing about the situation.
“The world’s a fascinating place,” Hong Seokyoung murmured, grinning, offering the exact opposite sentiment.
And me?
“The world sure is entertaining these days.”
Complicated as my thoughts were, I couldn’t help but find the situation amusing. Think about it objectively: if Noah Michel and Henry Lehmann fought each other, who would benefit?
Obviously, we would.
How great would it be if those two destroyed each other?
Of course, the odds of things working out that conveniently weren’t high.
The disappearance of a grand magician had drawn all sorts of attention. With things getting noisy at home, Robinson and Funes, as well as the remaining French hunters, eventually decided to return to France. Eva Robinson wanted to stay in Korea until the end of the year, and after some thought, I agreed. There was no real reason to refuse.
Compared to the adults walking around with serious faces, the children’s faces were as bright as ever. If Han Taekyung or Hope had been acting that way, I’d have been annoyed, but since it was the kids… well.
It didn’t make me want to say something like, “We must protect those smiles,” the way a classic movie hero would.
I was just going about my daily life as usual.
Whether in Europe or America, there was nothing we could do to intervene directly.
It was a peaceful, stifling routine.
But even in the midst of that, good news arrived.
“Mr. Wu!”
Daniel, who had realized that the teachers had been acting strangely lately, hadn’t planned to say anything but had been quietly watching. Now, suddenly, he raised his voice.
I glanced at Daniel, wondering if he’d found a way for Noah Michel to blow up a dungeon. But his face was unexpectedly bright.
“It’s all over!”
“What?”
“Hunter Hong! He’s not fully recovered yet, but now that all the causes have been removed, he’ll be back to normal soon!”
At long last, my father’s stubborn injury was finally over.