Inquisition

. . .

At the zeppelin...

"That's everybody right?" Zero asked.

"The survivors we can account for, yes." One of the protector mages replied.

"What about the recon team?" Zero asked.

The mage hesitated before replying "We haven't been able to reach them since then."

Zero nodded and then turned towards the students. The fact that their tokens had been unresponsive already concluded that they were dead. Zero asking the question was only for formalities' sake.

"Many of you might be confused and wondering what's going on. So many students, more than the average risk factor, had died during this test which is something that shouldn't have happened. This in turn raises the question 'what happened?' in your minds." Zero spoke up.

"To be frank with you, we don't know either. But we're currently looking into it. It's for his reason that I'm announcing an early stop to the test as we will begin our retreat back to the academy while the academy's special unit will take over this area. An unexpected event has happened which in turn, sadly, has affected your test. Nonetheless, we will make the most out of things and won't write off your progress throughout the past day and a half. That will be all."

After saying this, Zero turned around and headed back to the control room while the students broke out into a frenzy. They began exchanging information amongst themselves to better understand the situation. Many of them didn't know what had happened and had only heard screams or explosions. Only some of them had encountered men of the mysterious organization and survived. It was those survivors who were now questioned by the others.

Another group in a similar situation was the five groups that had survived the experience in the cavern, with Wendel's and Aurora's teams taking the lead. Some members of Asher's team were also approached by the other students who wanted to listen to the retelling of their experience. As for Asher, he left straight away for his room.

Asher knew that he could get nothing useful from these children and that those who could truly provide him with valuable information were all dead. In that case, there was no reason to stay behind.

'I need to spend most of my time getting stronger. I've delayed for quite a bit just to be cautious, but now, that's pointless. What use is caution if I'm already dead?' Asher thought.

However, before he could go far, a protector mage approached him.

"Asher Arnhaunt, please come with me."

. . .

When Asher arrived at the destination, he was made to wait a bit before entering the room. Asher then found out that he wasn't the only one there. Noah, James, Melissa, Owen, and Luna were also present.

'So they're doing it one group at a time, huh?' Asher thought.

Asher already knew why he was called in, especially since the test hadn't gone as planned in many ways. One of which was the appearance of the ancient cave and the other was the attack by the mysterious organization.

In all of this, the six teams that had gone into the cave were involved at the centre of all these, and to be even more specific, Asher had close relations to the root of both events. While they might not know that he had a connection with the desiccated hand, all the five teams present had witnessed that Asher was Fenrir's main target. As long as Zero investigated what had happened below, he would realize this obvious fact and would call Asher in for questioning.

"I don't intend on wasting your time. Simply explain to me what happened down there." Zero's cold eyes gazed at Asher from behind the mask.

Asher pretended to be scared and pressured a bit before answering. He told the truth in most cases, excluding anything related to the orb, including how it could sense the desiccated hand and how he had utilized the two to beat Fenrir. Instead, Asher had claimed it was merely an intuition, a desperate attempt to turn the tables around that had forced him to do such.

This wasn't difficult to believe as Asher had already proven himself to be a smart child and although he had a null physique, he knew a lot about mana more than the other students. Even excluding that, anyone would sense that the hand was a special object and maybe a treasure, and the most common way of activating such items was by imbuing it with mana.

In summary, Asher's reaction back then could be termed common sense but required great courage and a calculative mind to pull off both of which Asher had already displayed before.

As for his killing of the protector mages, it was a given that Asher wouldn't mention that.

"Hmm. Alright." Zero nodded after Asher was done telling his side.

"Do you have any idea who those guys were?" Zero asked.

"Not a clue, sir. As you may know, my father already has a lot of enemies but I don't know which of them would have the guts to carry out such an operation on the kingdom's grounds. I suspect that they might have borrowed a knife to do so." Asher replied.

At the moment, he couldn't say what he knew about the mysterious organization as that would put him in too much trouble. Nonetheless, Asher didn't want to let this opportunity go. If he could create a problem for the royals or borrow the might of the kingdom and the academy to investigate and pressure the mysterious organization, Asher would do so. If he could start a civil war or even a territorial war, create a drop in faith in the royal household, and force the mysterious organization not to make any moves in the nearest future, only then would Asher would be satisfied. And that was exactly what he wanted to do now.

Zero frowned at Asher's reply. As a dean of the academy, he was aware of the state of the Arnhaunt family so he knew what Asher was talking about. However, Zero didn't consider this to have been an act of the royals as, no matter how spotless they think their plot would be, they would never attack other students. Chances were that this was an outside hand with the aid of an inside job; a borrowed knife used to kill.

Thinking from this perspective, the list of suspects would still be wide and even the royals would be put under suspicion. However, there was one other party that could have been involved in this act; one that might be hoping to sow discord amongst the upper powers of the Great Dawn Kingdom and they were the most likely culprits here.

The Kingdom of Terra.

Zero sighed inwardly. If his suspicions were correct, then this would be a huge diplomatic issue that could affect the standings of both kingdoms. It could even lead to another war and for that reason, Zero didn't push for any conclusions yet.

"Did you happen to encounter the team of mages down there when you returned?" Zero suddenly asked.

"No sir." Asher replied.

"I see. You all can leave now. You might be called back again when we return to the academy so remain in school premisses for the week at least." Zero sent them out.

In truth, Zero was never suspicious of them for having a hand in the mages' death and had instead presumed that they were attacked by the mysterious organization or the Terreans. What he wanted to clarify was Asher's relationship with the mysterious organization.

'Plotting against smart people is too easy because they end up over-thinking.' Asher smirked inwardly once he was outside the room.

Although Zero didn't show it, Asher knew that he had sown a seed of suspicion within him and that seed would lead to certain clashes in the dark which would eventually come to light with massive reactions. As for the sides that would be involved, it would either be the royals against the academy and the other nobilities, or the Great Dawn kingdom against the Kingdom of Terra. No matter which confrontation occurred, Asher was confident that he could enable the Arnhaunt family and himself to reap the greatest benefits.

'The royal family would surely be busy in the coming weeks. I need to get home as soon as possible and proceed with my plans while also growing my strength.'

. . .

Three days later, the zeppelin arrived at the academy once again. This time around, a lot of influential figures of the academy were waiting for them. One of them was the dean of their division while the other, surprisingly, was Roland, the academy's director.

Right when Zero and One came off the zeppelin, Roland only spoke one sentence to them before leaving.

"Come with me."

The two, as well as the other influential figures of the academy, followed Roland. Dean Alfos took his time in following them as he intentionally slowed down to glance at the teams that returned alive.

'Hmm?'

When he saw Asher's group, he was a bit surprised but not too much. In fact, one could say that he had expected the group to have survived. The only reason for the little reaction of surprise was because Asher's team was entirely complete; a sharp contrast to the previous opinion he had thought up after hearing the news of the mysterious attackers. Dean Alfos had thought that they would have lost one or two students before returning, but seeing the entire team complete was what grew his interest a little bit.

"Oh yeah," Dean Alfos suddenly stopped and spoke to the students.

"The other segment of the test is cancelled so the test is now officially over. Your official rankings would be compiled after submitting all the tokens in your possession. The rules remain the same as before but this time around, your ranking would be comprised of both your performance in the written test and this 'excursion'."

Right after saying so, the dean picked up his pace and caught up with Roland's group.

Hearing the good news, some sighed with relief while others were feeling disappointed. It was easy to know those confident about their performance with those who were worried. Asher, however, was neither. His only focus now was on getting stronger.