As Clare had said, the Golding Merchant House was a long-established meat seller. Since the days of the previous head of the business—her late father—their profits had gradually declined. There were various reasons for it—from the growing influence of rival merchant houses to the farmers who’d supplied them going out of business, reducing the amount of meat they could sell.
To Clare, the biggest challenge was her father’s aversion to “new things.” So, after he passed away and she inherited the business, she’d decided to go into developing and selling magic items. Her plan had been to work on development while she had money to spare, but the endeavor turned out to be more of a money sink than she’d expected.
Few of the designs succeeded, and the business accounts had rapidly emptied out, forcing her to cut back on employees. Driven into a corner, she felt she had to find a way to succeed no matter what.
That was when she met Kett.
He was a drifter from a foreign land. Unable to find work in Central Fontain, he had been spending his days in taverns getting blackout drunk on cheap liquor.
Clare, realizing that tomorrow she could find herself in his shoes, felt sorry for him. Initially, she took him under her wing, giving him a meal and a place to sleep—she no longer had any staff living on-site, so the room was empty, and she had no shortage of food.
It was then he revealed he was an inventor.
Kett explained that he’d had a falling out with the master of the workshop where he’d used to work. He’d ended up leaving and making his way to Central Fontain, but because no one knew him, he couldn’t find anyone to hire him.
“Then why not work for me?” Clare suggested, not thinking much of it. Kett said that if she’d give him meals and a bed, he was happy to. “Though I’d be even happier if you’d throw in a glass of wine,” he had added.
Once he started work, he turned out to be exceptional at it. All those designs that hadn’t gone anywhere were forgotten as Kett produced one new product after another—and they all flew off the shelves. The better their products sold, the closer Clare and Kett became. Just when she thought that so long as she had Kett, the future was bright for the Golding Merchant House...
“...the trouble began,” Clare finished. From there, her expression became grim.
She and Astrid had gone out of the office into the customer-facing part of the shop.
“We’d just finished a new magic item and were about to release it...when someone else released an identical product.”
“What do you mean, ‘identical’?” Astrid asked.
Magic items weren’t sold in massive quantities. Examples included a heater the perfect size for a house, or an auxiliary power unit for a cart, or an oven tailor-made for a kitchen. Magic lamps were found everywhere, but they were mass-produced, so developing and selling them wasn’t much of a moneymaker. Inventing new magic items typically meant selling fewer products at high prices.
“And I suppose once this other magic item went on sale, it ate up all the demand before you could release yours,” said Astrid.
“It gets worse,” said Clare. “Everyone called us thieves!”
“Ah...”
Astrid could see why. Of course they’d be accused of copying when the other product had been released first. Clare had thought long and hard about what could have happened, and eventually, she arrived at an answer.
“You think someone bugged the Golding Merchant House?” Astrid asked.
“That’s right.”
Clare thought that someone had stolen her design. Even in the Freja Kingdom where Astrid was from, inventors were always stealing each other’s designs for magic items, so she could see how Clare had come to that conclusion.
But even so...
“Hmmm...” Astrid folded her arms, considering. The shop was supposed to open in half an hour, but since the sole employee was yet to arrive, she had time to think it over properly.
Based on Clare’s demeanor, she didn’t trust the shop assistant either—even though the assistant didn’t go anywhere near the workshop. She didn’t even want the inventors’ society to know of her suspicions, which was why she had put in a false request for the “repair of magic items.” On top of that, it seemed she’d specifically chosen an inventor who wasn’t from the Werther Duchy.
Clare mistrusted everything. And yet when Astrid, a female inventor from the technologically advanced Freja Kingdom, had shown up on her doorstep, she’d trusted her straightaway.
She only trusts the people she wants to trust... Astrid thought. That could end badly.
While part of her mind continued with its analysis of Clare, she said, “It’s unlikely that there’s a bug.”
“H-How do you know? You haven’t even looked yet.”
“First of all, while magic listening devices certainly exist, they can’t operate for long periods of time. Let’s say it’s about this big.” Astrid raised her hands to indicate an object about the size of a lunch box. “That’s as small as listening devices get at the moment, and anything larger would be easy to locate, right? Well, a device of this size could run continuously for about five days at the most. Then someone would have to replace the mana crystal that powers it, which means they’d be sneaking in here every five days, or come in pretending to be a customer. Can you think of anyone who comes here every five days, or at least on a regular basis?”
Clare thought about it briefly, then shook her head. She couldn’t think of anyone, then.
“Another possibility would be to attach a larger device to the outside of the building. We can check the exterior, under the floor, and inside the roof, if you like.”
“Th-Thank you!”
They did a once-over of the shop before the shop assistant arrived, then moved to the office and break room. When the assistant checked in on them later, she gave them both a confused look.
“What are you doing, ma’am?” she asked. “You’re all covered in soot.”
Having found nothing inside the building, the two of them headed outside. The shops of the other merchant houses were open and the street was bustling with people. Those who passed nearby looked curiously at Clare and Astrid as they peered at the walls and roof of the building.
“There’s nothing here,” Astrid said. Their search hadn’t uncovered anything.
“N-Nothing...?”
“I mean, I can’t say I’m surprised. If I wanted to steal information, I wouldn’t plant a listening device out here—I’d put it in the workshop. Or I’d just break in and steal the designs directly.”
“I suppose...” Clare said. “But Kett insists there’s no bug.”
“Didn’t he agree to let you investigate earlier?”
“Well, I begged him to let me take one look. Shall we go over?”
“Yes, let’s. Better now than later.”
The two of them headed for Kett’s workshop. Kett looked a little irritated—Astrid wasn’t sure if that was because they didn’t believe him when he said there wasn’t a bug, or because he simply didn’t like people coming into his workshop—but he let them in as he’d said he would.
“I’ll leave you to it,” he said. “I’ve tidied some things away so you’re free to look around, but only Clare touches the safe.”
“Thank you, Kett,” said Clare.
“It’s nothing... Besides, you won’t find anything.” With that, he left.
Astrid regarded the workshop.
It wasn’t very large. There was no second floor, but a ladder reached up to a hatch that opened onto the roof. It was bolted tightly from the inside, and nothing was up there but a heavy layer of dust. The workshop itself was rather different from Astrid’s own. She too had been burning through her savings for the sake of her research—while living in a house full of trash—but even she had better tools than this.
These are all way out-of-date, she thought. Everything from the experiment setup to the tools for carving out magical circuits was ancient. And on top of that...
Astrid stared at the well-ordered work space, pondering.
“Astrid...?” Clare asked. “Something the matter?”
“Huh? Oh, no... Say, Clare. All the inventing tools here look like they’ve had a long life.”
“Well, Kett does use them every day!”
Clare had interpreted “long life” as “well used.”
“How long has it been since Kett started working on inventions here?”
“Let’s see... It must be about three years.”
“Has he ever asked you to buy him new tools?”
“We did talk about it early on, but... Well, buying new magic tools costs money.”
“So this is what he’s done all his recent work with?”
“Yes. Didn’t I just say that?” Clare paused, then said, “What are you getting at?”
“Nothing, just double-checking.”