Even after he returned to his own tower, Grand Magister Zaza Ryl of the Twisted Horns still harbored a roiling displeasure in the pit of his stomach. He had been called to the Keybinder’s tower because the sakuhrm that lived in his own domain had swarmed toward her city in great numbers.
“It wouldn’t do for us to lose our merchandise, would it?” Danna Ryl had asked him, her lovely eyes drawn down in concern. “Now the delegation from the Forbidden Land has penned them in for us, and within the safety of those walls I intend to breed and raise them. So I’d like you to take appropriate measures on your end to ensure the pen is not destroyed.”
Feh, easy for you to say!
“The mana has dried up, and the land with it! Without fresh water, the sakuhrm will go elsewhere in search…along with all the other monsters! She must know there’s no way I can do anything about it without a source of mana!”
As he walked, Zaza Ryl stripped off the finery he’d put on for his meeting with the Keybinder. A beautiful feline beastservant followed quietly behind him, picking up the garments as they fell to the floor.
“That’s why I keep asking her for more Nurabehn! But now she’s using them for trade?! In exchange for these mana potions?! There’s something wrong with her…! Use those things once and they’re gone! And what if the supply gets cut off, what then? Does she intend to make us slaves to the Forbidden Land?!”
“Yes, truly. If their land is so wonderful, why not simply invade it and take everything for ourselves?”
“Quite right! Danna is far too naïve! They’re from the Forbidden Land? They can make potions that restore mana? Who gives a damn! Why should we be letting them choose the terms of this trade agreement, letting them pick and choose to their hearts’ content? If they’re going to be so stingy, we should simply overwhelm them and take what we need! It’s thanks to such weak-kneed indulgence that a mere Ignas can be allowed to show such disrespect!”
“Yes, yes. Truly so. Oh, if only you were Keybinder, Lord Zaza. You would never suffer such foolishness. Lady Danna Ryl is not fit to hold the position.”
Zaza Ryl stopped, and the beastservant behind him instantly did likewise. She raised her eyes, expecting perhaps to be stroked, but Zaza Ryl caught her roughly by the neck.
“L-Lord Zaza…!”
“Silence, animal. Danna Ryl the One-Horned is the illustrious chief Grand Magister, the ultimate authority who binds us ‘keys’ together. We can have no other leader─it can be none but her.”
“I’m…s-sor─”
With a dull crack, Zaza Ryl snapped the beastservant’s neck. He sucked the mana from her limp body, which withered and turned to dust, leaving nothing but a pile of clothes on the floor.
“You. Clean that up.”
More catlike beastservants appeared as if from nowhere to sweep up the fine particles that had been one of their own mere moments before, dumping the little pile out of a nearby window.
Once there had been a great lake here in Ligumuox, and a dense forest that seemed to stretch on forever. But now the green trees were withered, and the lake was all dried up, leaving only patches of muddy bogland in its wake. Just ten years ago there had been tens of thousands of Nurabehn residing in nearby towns, but those now stood ruined and abandoned, and the few survivors lived in hiding from Zaza Ryl.
Nothing could be more galling! Let them alone and they multiply endlessly, yet they balk at the idea of offering their lives to their masters, the Exinov─?!
There were more Ignas than Exinov, of course, and vastly more Nurabehn than Ignas. Even if one culled half their number, as long as enough breeding females were left alive, the population would double or even triple in a few short years. There was no better source of mana in all the world.
For years, Zaza Ryl had been trying to impress upon Danna Ryl the benefits of mana processing factories in order to properly utilize Nurabehn as a natural resource. Half the “keys” who controlled the other towers had already begun to dabble in setting up their own such operations. Gather a thousand females and set aside a hundred males, have them reproduce, and harvest the male offspring─this would reliably provide a substantial source of mana every year.
Just when I thought Danna Ryl was finally coming around to the idea of breeding Nurabehn, she wants to trade them for mana potions?! Mana potions can only be used once and then they’re gone. But Nurabehn multiply! Husband them carefully and the stock can last forever.
To soothe his rage, Zaza Ryl left the tower and made for one of his factories. He had three in Ligumuox, the management of which he left to the Ignas. Each was a square four-story building, the first story being given over to the harvesting floor.
“Give me this year’s numbers.”
The moment the Grand Magister entered, an Ignas with dog ears rushed over and handed him a ledger. Glancing at it, Zaza Ryl saw that four hundred females had been born, and five hundred males.
“How many child-bearers need to be put down this year?”
“There are around a hundred we can make no further use of.”
“Harvest them. Then select two hundred infants with high levels of mana and take them to the breeding room.”
“What about the males?”
“Retain ten and harvest the rest.”
“Understood.”
Zaza Ryl had turned his hand to this operation two decades ago─it was the first idea he landed on when the mana shortage started to become severe, and it had taken fifteen years to get the factory on track. For the past five, however, he had finally succeeded in turning Nurabehn into a stable source of mana. The use of thaumaturgical devices made the process even more efficient. No blood, no screams, no suffering─harvesting was a calm and peaceful process. The Nurabehn were laid on comfortable beds and returned to a state of pure mana while they slept. Thanks to the resulting magical power, shriveled trees sprouted new leaves and dried up lakes swelled with water.
“If all the ‘keys’ worked together, I know someday mana would return to this land. We have no need of these potions…!”
The “pen” that Danna Ryl spoke of simply involved waiting for the Nurabehn to multiply naturally, without doing anything to spur them along. But leaving the process to the dictates of free will was far too inefficient. Unless properly overseen by the Exinov, the foolish and inferior Nurabehn race would fall ill, even fight amongst themselves. Not to mention that trading in Nurabehn as a source of labor meant waiting until they were sufficiently grown.
Why doesn’t Danna Ryl understand that it’s far more efficient to process children into mana than it is to deal in full-grown Nurabehn? That placid, generous heart of hers is to blame─!
“Lady Danna Ryl is still opposed to the factories, then?” asked one of the Ignas overseers.
Zaza Ryl hung his head. “It is troubling… Yet it is precisely because she is the sort of benevolent ruler who concerns herself even with the well-being of livestock that she enjoys our love and respect.”
“Word of the delegation from the Forbidden Land had all the merchants on edge… But now we hear that fully half of the foreigners are Nurabehn? I hope Lady Danna Ryl isn’t being deceived by the wrong sort.”
“I hope not…” murmured Zaza Ryl, stroking his horns. “I gave her what advice I could… But it worries me. How far will she be willing to go, kind as she is?”