Matabar

Book II. Chapter 16 - Harsh Medicine

As soon as the rust-speckled key scraped into the lock, Ardi felt a stationary Star Shield brush against his consciousness. It was so intricate and complex that only a specialist on par with Professor Talis an Manish could have set it up. Edward Aversky had possessed considerable knowledge of defensive magic (understandable, given his primary specialization), but he had never had such capabilities personally.

This construct was capable of instantly entombing an unwary Star Mage of up to the Yellow Star level—and of withstanding a barrage from if not a dozen artillery pieces, then certainly from several military detachments.

Ardi had a good guess as to what the abandoned stables had been used for. According to rumors, it was here that Edward had created the prototype of his testing grounds. And it was here, due to an unfortunate experiment, that his wife had died.

But would he really have erected such a monstrous feat of shield magic—clearly powered not by an ordinary generator, but plugged directly into the city grid—just to hide a prototype testing ground?

Ardi turned the key, removed the padlock and, grimoire at the ready, carefully pushed the gates open. Stepping inside the fenced-off grounds, he barely had time to register anything before the steel bars clanged shut behind him and the padlock reappeared—only this time, its clasp faced inward, sealing him in.

The young man glanced at the key in his hand. Even with his Speaker’s abilities, which had allowed him to sense the Star Shield over the building, he hadn’t realized that the key served as a kind of external seal—much like the one related to Irigov’s estate shield. Come to think of it, most stationary defensive magic worked on a similar principle.

Ardan inspected the “lock” closely. It was clearly not a physical mechanism at all, but an exceedingly complex Ley-construct capable of fooling not just Star Mages…

“I hope that you haven’t decided you’re lonely over there in the afterlife, Edward,” the youth hissed.

Using his free hand to secure the box containing his new grimoire to the strap of his shoulder bag, Ardan raised his staff. Attuning himself to the world around him, he sidled forward, moving nearly sideways, step by careful step, through the tall grass and weeds, heading toward the building’s entrance.

Such a spectacle might have surprised or even amused a passerby, but Ardi didn’t care, especially since there wasn’t a soul in sight on the street anyway.

No sooner had his shoes touched the creaking, weathered steps than he again felt the touch of a shield. This one was even more complex and—impossibly—even sturdier, positively saturated with the Ley.

Ardi couldn’t see where the Ley-cables led or how the building—masquerading so well as an old ruin—still functioned at all. But one thing was certain: Edward had poured not only an inconceivable budget, but also proportionally monstrous effort into this place. He’d done all of it just to ensure that even the most persistent trespasser would never get inside.

If the first shield could stop a Yellow Star Mage and a couple of artillery squads, then the second… Ardi doubted it could even be cracked or overloaded so long as it was fed by those cables. And given its direct connection to the city network, breaching this building would require generating a force exceeding the Metropolis’ entire peak power consumption.

Only two buildings in the city, as far as Ardi could recall, boasted a comparable level of defense: the Parliament building, and the Palace of the Kings of the Past.

“What, for the Sleeping Spirits,is going on here?” Ardan muttered through clenched teeth.

Perhaps he’d have been better off without his Speaker’s sensitivity, because it was only thanks to it that he could feel the magic around him. A normal Star Mage couldn’t perceive stationary shields at all except by using trial and error. And Ardi didn’t even want to imagine what would happen to someone who tried to tamper with or “test” this kind of defense the empirical way.

Snapping his grimoire shut, he placed his left hand on the steel front door’s slanted handle. The Star Shield brushed against his mind again, then probed to confirm the key was in his pocket. Only then did the door yield.

But not immediately.

First, thanks to his heightened hearing, Ardan caught the grinding of massive gears and flywheels, followed by the whine of taut steel cables and the dull clunking of heavy bolts. Only after all that did the door—which outwardly looked no sturdier than a simple plank—finally slide aside.

Ardan’s eyebrows nearly disappeared into his hairline, they’d shot up so high. The entrance door was around seven hundred millimeters thick. Seven hundred millimeters of top-grade steel. Even underground military bunkers didn’t use plating that thick—it was too costly.

No one could have opened that door on their own, not even an orc. Sergeant Boad—the ogre guard from the Firstborn District—could’ve perhaps managed to pry it open a few millimeters, given a few hours of effort.

“And that’s in addition to the stationary shields,” Ardi whistled softly.

If the Star Magic shields were meant to prevent someone from getting in, this door—and the walls too, which were a little thicker than the door—had been built on the opposite principle. Judging by the technical apertures around the frame, when closed, it extended locking bolts as thick as a man’s arm. It and the walls were meant to ensure a reliable seal around whatever lay inside.

Ardan wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. In his mind, the beads of an imaginary wooden abacus were already clicking through calculations. The building was roughly ninety-five meters long, nearly twenty meters wide, and four meters tall, with walls that were about eight hundred millimeters thick, and all of it top-grade steel… Which had cost more to make, he wondered—the entire Castle Tower, or just this single structure?

Hard to say.

Sleeping Spirits… Edward’s casual approach to his expensive laboratory, his grimoire collection, all the complex instruments, and even his brand-new automobile had sometimes made Ardi forget that he had been talking to a man whose fortune had been only slightly smaller than the late Trevor Man’s.

But whereas Trevor Man had had assets with an appraised market value, Edward Aversky had possessed cold, hard exes. Not investments that would’ve had to be sold off (after finding buyers first), but readily-available money at his fingertips.

It was the difference between having actual Stars with rays in them and mere accumulators. One was your own power, and the other… Well, no one could use infinite accumulators for a reason.

Ardan stepped inside. Immediately, the door behind him began to grind shut, slowly but inexorably. The thick bolts scraped into place, locking the entryway down.

At the same time, lights flickered on. Dozens of Ley-lamps glowed along the ceiling cornice, allowing Ardi to take in the entire space at once.

Long and narrow, it resembled a shooting gallery divided into lanes. There were entire racks of training dummies resembling “Tony” and rows of various targets, including armored vehicle plates hanging from chains along with troughs with wheeled mounts on chain tracks, which were likely meant for practicing spells on moving targets.

All of it, and more besides, occupied the far end of what was less a mere firing range and more a fully-fledged training ground. In the center stood a plain copy of the room Aversky had made in his mansion’s basement.

Both practice areas were enclosed by a raised gutter running along the floor, through which ran the “grounding” cable that served as the basis for any testing ground’s stationary shield.

Directly opposite the entrance, outside the cable’s range, a lone table sat, collecting dust—a table that had clearly once been used as the foundation of an alchemical laboratory. Behind it was another table, much smaller and narrower—the sort Edward had used when working at home.

In the corner stood a cabinet for storing grimoires. It was empty. Well, almost. Through the glass of its compartments, Ardi spotted a few hefty tomes. And an envelope.

Leaving his staff in a special stand, Ardan removed his hat, unfastened his cloak, and, stepping carefully over the steel floor (much of it covered by a threadbare carpet), he approached the cabinet.

He opened the glass door and picked up the envelope first. The young man carefully unfolded the unsealed, unsigned envelope. Inside it was a sheet of paper covered in a familiar handwriting:

“I hope you did not waste your time on sentimentality, my dear Ard, and that instead of attending my funeral, you found a more worthwhile pursuit. For example, perhaps you spent a few hours practicing military magic, so that my decaying corpse doesn’t end up spinning like a top in its coffin each time someone recalls the fact that we used to train together!

I fear, however, that my hopes are in vain. You surely paid a visit to the cemetery, where you received my posthumous note. Or by some miracle, you truly did find something better to do? In that case, Cassara delivered the key to you wherever you were. Cassara can find anyone and anything.

Well then, welcome to my first practice ground, where I worked on my most, shall we say, unsafe creations.

As you may have already noticed, apart from the range itself, which, according to the terms of my will, shall belong to you for the next five years (any taxes, as well as Ley energy and water bills, are also paid up five years in advance), there is nothing else here. Several months ago, I arranged to have all the equipment and grimoires removed from here and delivered to my home.

I have begun to notice strange things, my dear Ard. Strange irregularities in the government contracts I receive, and in how much documentation I must submit for each set of blueprints.

I don’t know, perhaps I’ve caught a touch of excessive suspicion and paranoia from you and that oaf, Captain Pnev, but it seems to me like I’m being watched.

If so, then let our adversaries think that all my research has fallen into the hands of the Guild. And, moreover, if moles have burrowed pathways into the Black House, then there are surely not just one or two in the Guild itself. After all, strategic magic has always been a target of espionage…

As for the key, don’t worry—once you take it up, for the next five years, no one besides you, even if they possessed this key (I trust you won’t lose it or allow it to be stolen), would be able to open the practice ground. After the five-year term expires, please deliver the key to the Black House. The range is to pass into the Second Chancery’s possession for use by our colleagues.

As you may have already noticed, aside from this letter and a few grimoires, there is nothing else here.

I am sincerely convinced, my dear Ard, that you lack motivation. You dislike war magic, and indeed anything related to the potential for violence.

I truly admire this trait of yours. But it is also your chief impediment.

Therefore, I intend to motivate you through simple necessity. I left you nothing but the grounds themself, because everything else you will have to obtain yourself—whether by selling your inventions or your alchemy, it matters not.

I hope that your relationship with the daughter of Reish Orman will likewise spur your motivation.

My apologies if I could not attend your wedding, but know that I feel heartfelt joy for you.

In the grimoires, you will find my main research of the last ten years. It was on its basis that the Black House signal medallions were made—the ones our adversaries so successfully interfered with.

I believe that this research is far more important than Dagdag’s and my attempts to revive a technology that is clearly deceased (in the military sphere, at least): namely, the Analyzers.

I was never able to complete this work. Alas, however skilled I may have been in terms of strategic military magic, this research is fundamentally an engineering challenge at its core.

I leave it to you.

If you manage to finish it, then don’t forget to add your own surname to the publication’s cover page—because knowing you, my dear Ard, you might well neglect to acknowledge your own contributions.

Perhaps that, too, is why it was so easy for me—working with you, teaching you, and likely, to some extent, befriending you.

For the glory of the Empire, dear friend!

Farewell.”

Ardan sagged against the edge of the table. In his slightly trembling hand, the letter fluttered, stirred by the stream of air from an intake vent set in the floor.

His heart clenched into a tight knot, and a vise gripped his throat.

“Farewell,” Ardan whispered, finally voicing the words he hadn’t managed to say at the funeral. “Farewell, my friend.”

He slid the letter back into its envelope and set it on the shelf beside the grimoires. Perhaps he ought to throw it away, or on the contrary, take it with him. But Ardi did neither of those. He now understood why his mother had kept photographs of Hector and his grandfather at home.

Standing there in silence for a few minutes—broken only by the droning of the ventilation—Ardan waited for his heart to calm. Then he reached up and removed both grimoires from the shelf.

One was older, an out-of-production model. The other was brand new, likely made by the same manufacturer that had created Ardan’s new grimoire.

After just a glance at the titles, Ardi nearly gave in to the urge to immediately burn them to ashes. Burn them so thoroughly that not even a memory of them remained. He almost did so simply because if Edward was right, and his death had indeed had something to do with what lay on the dusty pages of these records, then…

Ardi didn’t even know which was potentially worse: for these notes to fall into the hands of foreign militaries, or for the demon the Grand Magister had fought to be unleashed in the very heart of the Metropolis.

In any case, the damage from the demon would be far less.

The writing on the spines of the grimoires read:

“Gr. Mag. E. Aversky.

Research and Development of a Method for Long-Distance Data Transmission.”

Ardan, with the jittery speed of a startled hare, leapt back after properly reading these titles, nearly tripping on the edge of his own cloak. This time, something worthy of Milar or Arkar burst from his chest—a sincere, heated:

“Shit!”

Ardan didn’t even bother to scold himself for the crude language that neither his mother, nor his father, nor any of his forest friends would have approved of.

“Profanity is nothing but the sign of a lax spirit.” Ergar had always said, and a hunter had to stay in control.

But how could he stay calm when something that made any other strategic magic look like a student’s childish project was sitting right there on the table?

“Long-Distance Data Transmission” was the subject of a gold rush among countless Senior and Grand Magisters not just from the Empire, but the entire world. Even Mart had mentioned it out on the steppe. And Ardi had heard more than once during his first year of studies about how someone had, once again, failed their trials for some prototype of it.

“Edward… Sleeping Spirits… Could the Harvest truly be tied to this…?”

Ardan’s face went as pale as the first snow. His hand shook as if he were once again about to undress a childhood sweetheart by the stream for the very first time. He dragged a chair over and plopped down onto it, his legs suddenly drained of all strength.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

For the past month and a half, he had indeed often returned to the question of the Puppeteers’ motives. The thing that had continually bothered him was the discrepancy between the resources they’d employed to kill the Grand Magister and the potential profit from accomplishing that task.

It didn’t add up.

Just as plainly as, say, the gray accounting at “Bruce’s” so often failed to add up.

But once he added an important parameter in the form of this research into the equation, everything fell into place.

Any nation on the planet would give its entire treasury—borrowing as much again from its neighbors—to buy a working long-distance communication device. And considering the existence of the signal medallions, Aversky had been on the right track.

The crux of the issue was that electricity (discovered almost half a century ago) and radio waves (similarly defined by non-Star scientists thanks to chambers isolated from the Ley) did not function in the outside world. Or, as Senior Magister Parallax had hypothesized in his notes, they functioned on a different fundamental level, which to the naked eye and modern instruments appeared as mere anomalies.

In other words, Parallax had theorized that electricity and radio waves did not mesh with the Ley field. As for transmitting the data itself, there had been many attempts.

One Magister from Castilia had even received a Grand Magister’s medallion for inventing a special cable and receiving device. Through that cable, the Ley-current would be sent out in pulses, and the duration of each pulse corresponded to a specific letter. The receiver would then translate the interruptions in current into sounds, which decoders would then transcribe into legible text.

The problem was that a message could not be sent farther than a kilometer this way, because after that, the current dissipated due to the cable’s very small cross-section. And if the cross-section was increased, sensitivity to fluctuations would be lost and the message would end up tangled in random “noise.” Not to mention the fact that the cable didn’t meet range requirements (beyond a kilometer, the current once again dissipated), plus it wasn’t hard to attach a tapping device to the cable. And the system only allowed communication between two apparatuses, each of which required delicate tuning.

But even that limited prototype—trumpeted by all the magical journals of the last decade—was hailed as a real breakthrough and had brought its creator considerable renown.

And there had been a lot of other attempts. Many attempts. And along with them, a lot of dashed hopes, squandered money, ruined scientific careers, and wasted lives crushed against the rocky shoals of the harsh reality known as “Ley-communication fever.”

Mart had even warned Ardi to never meddle in such research, because it had driven more than one generation of outstanding Ley-engineers mad.

“Empty dreams,”

Senior Magister Borskov had called them.“But if these empty dreams made the Puppeteers kill Aversky for his legacy…” Ardi mused.

Then, at the very least, it became clear that the Grand Magister’s last will and testament had been known to the Puppeteers in advance.

And where were the notarial documents of a man like Edward Aversky stored? And what was it that had been blown up not so long ago?

“Ahgrat,” Ardan drawled, no longer even trying to hold back.

The explosion in the Archive. Once again, the Puppeteers, like the masters of a chessboard, had pursued several goals with a single move. Moreover, they’d achieved those goals.

Ardi wouldn’t even need to request clearance a second time to confirm this. Even if he tried to search the Archive for any traces of a possible leak, everything that might have pointed to a problem had surely perished in the flames.

“Though I’ll still have to pay it another visit,” Ardan decided.

But if he was right, then the Puppeteers had known ahead of time that all of Edward’s research would go to the Guild and…

Ardan suddenly straightened, narrowing his eyes slightly.

If he was right in his conjecture, then for the first time in half a year, his quarry didn’t know something that Ard did, rather than the other way around.

Perhaps the Puppeteers weren’t yet aware that Edward had left his research not to the Guild, but to his temporary apprentice. And in that case, naturally, they would try to find it there.

“What does that get us?” Ardi whispered to the Tony mannequin.

Alas, it shared none of its wooden wisdom with him.

“But a month and a half has passed since Edward’s death,” Ardi folded his arms over his chest. “In that time, they may have already realized that they haven’t achieved their goals. If that’s indeed what they were after. How can I be sure?”

In truth, it wouldn’t be so hard to find out if Ardan was right. He only needed to check whether the Guild was being overly scrupulous regarding the Grand Magister’s estate. And after that, he would watch the late Edward’s house—which had been turned over to the Second Chancery—very closely. The Puppeteers might conclude that the Guild had failed to find some secret cache or another, which would lead to the mole trying to sniff out the research in the old mansion.

“And when they don’t find it, sooner or later, they’ll figure out that the stables aren’t exactly regular stables,” the youth exhaled, covering his face with his hands.

He felt like they’d been handed a fleeting chance to beat the Puppeteers at their own game at least this once. That by some stroke of luck, the departed Grand Magister had proven himself to be the cleverest of them all and—even after his death—had outmaneuvered the mysterious conspirators.

But how exactly should he take advantage of this?

“I’ll have to inform the Colonel,” Ardan admitted reluctantly. “And he’ll definitely call Milar back from leave, which the Captain will not appreciate. Not in the slightest.”

But Ardan saw no other way to do this. They’d already lost a month and a half. By now, the chance to flush out the mole or upset the Puppeteers’ plans seemed rather faint. About as faint as the light of the Ley-lamps flickering near the ceiling.

“But the Second Chancery isn’t the most secure place for documents like these,” Ardi reminded himself. “So they can wait a couple more days…”

Without a second thought, he flipped open his grimoire, thumbed through a few swollen, well-worn pages, and found the seal he needed. He tore a corner off one page and struck his staff against the floor, relinquishing a few Red and Green Star rays. Both of Edward’s grimoires were momentarily wreathed in an orange haze, and a symbol from the Fae alphabet appeared on the tiny scrap of a page.

With that done, if Ardan ever sent a single red ray into that symbol, the two books would become charred ash.

Edward, for all his virtues, had had the same flaws as most prominent scholars—pride and vanity. Because if that weren’t the case, then the moment he’d started suspecting that enemies had an interest in his grimoires, he wouldn’t have left the research to Ardi at all, but would have created a seal to destroy the grimoires the instant their author died instead.

“History knows no if,” Ard reminded himself of Mart Borskov’s favorite saying.

Silence hung over the proving ground. Ardan stared quietly at the two books, unsure of what course of action was right.

Should he try to use their existence against the Puppeteers? Or, much more safely and prudently, destroy them immediately without so much as a peek inside?

It was hard to overstate the impact that successful “data transmission” research would have even on the notorious Fatian Front. If the Fatians could maintain communication with their units not by means of messengers and magically created “postal spells” (which were easily destroyed or intercepted, since they took the form of an “animated” bird), then Shamtur would fall within a week. And after its fall, mutants and chimeras from the Tazidahian Brotherhood would flood through Fatia into the Empire, and then…

Ardi didn’t even want to imagine it.

One thing was clear—under no circumstances could these books be allowed to leave the “abandoned stables.” More than that—no one, absolutely no one, aside from Ardan himself, should ever see them.

And not because Ard fancied himself some beacon of engineering thought, but simply because Edward hadn’t entrusted them to anyone else, even though the Second Chancery was staffed by minds far brighter and more knowledgeable than that of his temporary apprentice.

Edward must have had his reasons.

Ardi reached out toward the books, but still couldn’t bring himself to open them. Instead, he lifted the grimoires and returned them to their shelf, placing them beside the Grand Magister’s letter.

For a moment, his gaze lingered on Edward’s message.

Motivation…

What could possibly motivate Ardan to become stronger in a martial sense more than the necessity of defending revolutionary research? And what could drive him further in an engineering sense than working on that same research, one whose foundation was laid by one of the brightest minds of the age?

“That’s underhanded, Edward,” Ardi grimaced. “But entirely your style, my friend.”

Closing the cabinet doors, he retrieved his staff, lifted his hat from the rack, and pressed the door’s handle. Once again, gears and chains clattered and whirred, while Ardan reflected on the fact that once again, he had more tasks lined up than time to do them in.

“No invigorating brews,” Ardan said sternly to himself. “And no skipping lectures at the Grand unless absolutely necessary. I just need to stop trying to tackle everything at once.”

The Colonel could wait a day, and Oglanov didn’t inspire much trust to begin with, which meant that Ardi wouldn’t go over there without Milar, no matter what notions the old detective had gotten into his head. Ardan had no intention of sticking his head in the same noose twice.

Today, according to his plan, he was supposed to acquire a new grimoire, visit the “stables,” then purchase ingredients for his alchemy and survey the prices and stock of the Ley-shops. So that was exactly what he would do.

He’d had enough of running around the capital.

He was getting married soon, which meant that he would have a family of his own. A family whose bank account contained nothing but cockroaches that had hanged themselves to avoid dying of starvation. Ardan would handle his problems strictly in descending order of priority from now on.

***

Ardi stepped off the tram directly across from one of the city’s largest Ley-pharmacies. The two-story building occupied an entire corner at the intersection of two streets. It was clearly old, having survived a whole series of fires from the days when most buildings in Old Town had been wooden, and it now flaunted bulging bay windows covered with granite panels, and several caryatids with lush, rounded forms supporting tiny, decorative balconies.

One of those balconies hung over the entrance, and two marble maidens flanked the doorway, subtly hinting that the building hadn’t always housed apothecary goods. Most likely, in a time of unrest and lawlessness, it had been home to an establishment of the Crimson Lady.

On a wooden sign hanging overhead, burnished brass letters spelled out a simple name:

“The Spraus Brothers’ Ley-Pharmacy.”

The “Ley” prefix, truth be told, had long since lost any special meaning, since one could find mixtures containing Ley-plants or alchemical components in any such shop. The law that had required a shop to obtain a special license to trade in Ley-products—and to renew it regularly—had been repealed by Pavel IV even before he’d become Emperor.

According to his History lectures, that initiative had reduced the cost of medicines by almost ten percent and granted the broader masses access to Ley-medicines, making them affordable for purchase by state clinics, which had greatly suffered under tight budgets up until that point.

If Ardi had had any interest in politics—like, say, Boris Fahtov—he surely would have noticed a certain pattern in the direction Pavel IV was steering things. But to be honest, he didn’t much care.

His forest friends had taught him to take responsibility for himself, relying on and counting on no one but his own claws and fangs. He was gradually working to temper that mindset, but had no intention of shedding it entirely—only softening it to the point where he could calmly “turn his back” to the likes of Milar or Tess.

Adjusting his hat, Ardi stepped inside and immediately wrinkled his nose. A whole bouquet of disparate odors assaulted him, ranging from lavender and thyme to crushed mold and something purely chemical.

The spacious room with a tiled floor peeking out from under long carpets was almost empty on this summer afternoon. Though if you counted them all up, a dozen people wasn’t so few; it was simply so roomy inside that they were scattered among the shelves of vials, the stands of powder jars, the long rows of medicinal suppositories of all sorts, and everything else related to the treatment of various ailments.

Medications, by Imperial law, were sold to the public without prescription, apart from the most specialized and expensive ones. Another one of Pavel IV’s reforms.

“I’d like twelve grams of omraiol, please,” an older man stood at the counter, where several pharmacists in white uniforms were busy weighing out remedies on scales and clicking the keys of cash registers.

Omraiol, if Ardi remembered Professor Nathan Kovertsky’s lectures correctly, was used to treat stomach ulcers. It was a mundane medicine, though there was a Ley-omraiol variant with added ground root of Screaming Swamp Cudweed and blossoms from Sleepy St. John’s Wort—two hardy plants that one could even cultivate at home… provided they knew the art of the Aean’Hane and could do everything properly.

In the case of Star Magic, an artificial growing environment required a constant feed from low-tension Ley-cables.

“Certainly,” a girl briskly ran her fingers over the wooden abacus beads. “That comes to eighty-four kso.”

Seven kso per gram? Once again, Ardan was forced to admit that Mart Borskov’s conclusions about the cost of treatment had been spot on.

“Alright,” the man muttered, already reaching for his wallet, when the pharmacist offered him an alternative:

“We also have Ley-omraiol, if you’re interested.”

“And is it better?”

“Yes, sir,” the pharmacist nodded. “Much better. The first symptoms will ease off by this evening, and by the end of the treatment course, you’ll notice marked improvements in your overall well-being. The ulcer itself won’t vanish, of course, but it will cease to bother you. And if you stick to the diet, in half a year, you’ll forget about it entirely.”

The older man hesitated, suddenly looking self-conscious. On his feet, work boots—a bit too heavy for the season—peered out from under pants flecked with dried mud, and a well-worn jacket sat on his shoulders.

He likely didn’t have money to spare.

“And… how much would that be?”

“Twelve grams, was it?” The pharmacist clarified.

The man nodded, and once again, the young woman’s slender fingers clattered over the abacus beads.

“Three exes, thirty-six kso.”

Ardan wasn’t sure who choked first—the customer or himself. The price per gram of Ley-omraiol, a fairly simple drug, was four times higher than its ordinary counterpart!

And yet the cost to produce a gram of it was probably no more than six, maybe eight kso at most.

Sleeping Spirits, this was daylight robbery! Even factoring in the building’s rent, the cost of all the licenses, the pharmacists’ salaries, transport costs and taxes, the price still shouldn’t have exceeded fourteen or sixteen kso at most! There was no justification for it to cost twenty-eight!

“No, I… I’ll probably stick with the regular omraiol,” the man said after clearing his throat, declining the upsell.

He counted out the required coins while the pharmacist weighed twenty-four tiny, compressed tablets and slid them into a labeled envelope.

“Take one in the morning on an empty stomach with a glass of warm water.”

“Understood… thank you.”

As he departed, the man was grumbling under his breath that at those prices, he’d join the Eternal Angels way before he managed to recover. Ardan couldn’t have agreed more.

Even assuming the manufacturer knew nothing of the art of the Aean’Hane (which, of course, they didn’t) and adding in the cost of Ley-energy, the math still wouldn’t come to a price higher than nineteen kso per gram.

Where was the Mage Guild looking?

Even Timofey Polskih—the stingiest man in all the Foothill Province, someone downright obsessed with money—would never dare set such a brazen markup.

While other customers dealt with the pharmacists, Ardan continued wandering among the aisles.

Since his return to Evergale, on the rare occasions a family member had fallen ill, Ardan had prepared the medicines himself. The only malady he hadn’t been able to handle was Erti’s illness, because Fae didn’t suffer from anemia and, consequently, didn’t know how to treat it. So he’d had no idea what medicines cost to buy from a shop. He only knew that a year of treating his brother—what with doctor visits from Delpas—had cost nearly two of Kelly’s monthly wages.

Ardi, ears open to the shoppers’ requests, scanned the price tags of their Ley equivalents.

“Asfartanet, please,” a young woman was saying. “Thirty-two grams.”

It was a specialized medicine for treating a rather delicate women’s ailment, one usually caused by wearing unsuitable, overly-thin clothing that would let the body get chilled and upset the fragile balance of the female physiology.

“Four exes and forty-eight kso,” the pharmacist said.

On one of the displays, Ardan found the Ley-asfartanet. It was priced at an eye-popping forty-six kso per gram! That would be almost fifteen exes for the course of the medication—even though, in this case, only about two-thirds of the normal dose would be required. The price was still nearly triple even then!

Yet again, a ridiculous markup.

“I need one vial of five-percent ultafol solution, please,” requested another customer.

Ultafol was used for treating dermal infections.

“Certainly, that’ll be one ex and thirty-five kso,” the pharmacist said.

Each of those vials contained one hundred and fifty milliliters of the solution. Meanwhile, the Ley-ultafol Ardi spotted—of the same volume and concentration—cost an astonishing six exes and seventy-nine kso!

Ardan could hardly believe his eyes. Even if one assumed that all the greenhouse and nursery engineers who mass-produced Ley-plants were totally ignorant of average yield calculations (which Professor Erik Convel had pounded into all his students ruthlessly), and that their equipment delivered only minimal efficiency, even then the prices were, at the very least, forty percent higher than what one could call a healthy ten-percent profit.

Heck, Arkar had once complained that “Bruce’s” profit margin was only around four percent—if you generously rounded it up.

Four percent!

And that was at a well-known jazz bar in a great location—one with a somewhat shady reputation, true, but usually packed to the rafters.

“Third year?”

Ardan spun around. Next to him stood a man in a very expensive suit, wearing polished shoes of fine leather. The man’s fingers were each adorned with a white gold ring set with black diamonds. He was idly rolling a cigar between his fingertips. It was the same brand favored by Arthur Belsky, better known as the Dandy.

“And you are…?” Ardan prompted.

“Torad Nivov,” the man introduced himself, extending a hand. “Manager of this branch.”

Ardi shook it.

“A firm handshake for a student,” the manager said with a crooked grin, showing off perfect teeth. “Let me guess—you’re a third-year at the Ley Faculty of the University of Metropolis?”

“Close.”

“Ah, forgive me, I-”

“I’m moving into my second year at the Grand.”

The manager visibly brightened.

“At the Grand?! My apologies, sir Mage—looks like I’ve lost my touch. I didn’t realize that I had the honor of speaking with a future luminary of science.”

Ardan took an instant dislike to this man. He didn’t like the man’s oily gaze, or his ostentatious air, as if he wanted everyone around to marvel at his importance. Even his voice, dripping with cloying, fake amiability, grated on Ardan.

“Allow me to save both of us some time, sir Mage,” Nivov went on, moving as if to take Ardan by the elbow. Ardan stepped aside, but the clerk’s ingratiating demeanor didn’t falter. “Every so often, a student or a graduate—sometimes even somebody from the Magisterium—drops by. Inevitably, they’re outraged by the prices and promise they’ll produce the medications far cheaper. But alas, the moment they try, the Mage Guild learns that our ambitious young gentleman or lady lacks the proper permits, or their production site fails to meet regulations, or perhaps the mage doesn’t have the competence, or something of the sort. So, to save everyone the trouble, we can simply agree straight away that you will receive a discount—say, thirty-five percent on all your future purchases with us. Does that suit you?”

Thirty-five percent. It was approximately the amount of bloat built into these Ley-product prices. And throughout Nivov’s little speech, he had been guiding the two of them ever closer to the pharmacy’s exit.

To say Ardan was surprised would be a gross understatement—like trying to pass off a Kargaam elephant as an ordinary Metropolis sewer rat.

“You do realize, Mr. Nivov, that this all sounds rather like a threat.”

“You’re free to feel that way, student,” the clerk said with a shrug. “I’m only trying to save you from a headache and not waste your time. You’re far from the first bright mind with Star epaulettes I’ve had this chat with. By the way, congratulations on that impressive number of rays. Studying at the Healing Faculty, are you? Talk to your professors. They’ll tell you the same thing. I’m sure many of them, in fact, have sold their recipes to the pharmacies—including ours—because, for some reason, they can’t manage to produce at a large scale on their own.”

For the first time since arriving in the Metropolis, Ardan felt the temptation to abuse his position. He wanted to grab this smug fop by the collar and haul him off to the Black House in order to pry every last detail about what he’d meant by that out of him.

Instead, Ardi did something else.

He simply drew out his credentials and flipped them open for the clerk to see.

Nivov’s face changed in an instant. But instead of fear, it showed… contempt.

“Oh, Corporal,” the clerk remarked, suddenly cold and haughty. “Send any inquiries through our lawyers, if you please. And do secure a warrant from the courts should you decide to show up here on duty. I’ve got nothing more to say to you. And you can forget about that discount.”

With that, the manager slammed the door right in Ardan’s face.

“Sleeping Spirits…” The young man exhaled.

It was now obvious to him why Pavel IV had pushed through yet another healthcare reform and created a state insurance fund for citizens.

With prices like these for Ley-medicines, and with a mere branch manager so confident that nothing could threaten him or his “owners,” it was a wonder the Empire even managed to sustain any sort of population growth rather than having a constant spike in mortality.

It seemed that, in addition to visiting Peter Oglanov and the Colonel, Ardan would also need to call on Bazhen Eorsky, the top student of the Grand’s Jurisprudence Faculty.