This really is strange. Why did the backdoor I left appear on the gift Sherry gave me?
Looking at the ring on his finger, Cid could not help wondering.
A crystal that looked both diamond-like and gold-like was set into a special metal band. Under the sunlight, it gave off a strange golden glow. Just being bathed in that light made his body feel energized, and that was no illusion.
Cid shifted his steps, moving out of the sunlight and into the shade. After scanning the area and confirming no one was paying attention to him, blue-purple flames rose in his eyes.
His vision changed, rapidly zooming in on the ring. Once again, Cid confirmed the true nature of the strange crystal. It was a crystallized mass of extremely high-purity light-elemental energy, and for some reason, the backdoor unique to him had appeared on that energy crystal.
Last night, when Xenovia took out the Holy Sword Durandal, the Holy Sword had suddenly begun to glow. After investigating for less than a second, he found the reason Durandal was glowing. The Holy Sword had resonated with the ring Sherry had given him.
Originally, he had planned to check what exactly was wrong with Sherry's ring on the spot. Would a normal farewell gift resonate with Xenovia's Holy Sword? No matter how he looked at it, that felt suspicious.
But because Doggie had barged in afterward and interrupted his train of thought, he had only remembered now. He took a little time to examine the ring, and the result left him baffled. How had the technical backdoor he had left behind ended up on this ring?
Just like how the upgraded basic magic tutorial recorded in the "Library" had been left with a backdoor by its developer, he also left a few backdoors in the things he made. Those things were not particularly useful to him, but whether to leave one or not was a separate matter. Surely there was no developer who would not leave a backdoor in something they had developed, right?
Cid stared fixedly at his dedicated backdoor inside the crystal, unable to figure out when he had ever made a ring like this.
"Cid-sama, the information you requested last time is ready. Is there anything else we need to do?"
"No, thank you, Victoria-chan."
Taking the documents Victoria handed him, Cid thanked her and walked toward the street outside. At the same time, he glanced at the notification Rias had sent him that morning on his phone screen.
"Cid, Leviathan-sama asked whether you can take out the information you provided last time. This afternoon, she'll be negotiating with the Church about this incident. I'm really sorry."
That was the situation. Because the Church had suddenly decided to lay everything out openly with the Underworld, Serafall had been caught off guard. She had been worried that the three heirs on her side might genuinely have problems, so she had been stalling the investigation, planning to first privately settle each side's responsibilities with the Church before looking for the mastermind. Now, she could only bring out the investigation results she had previously halted to deal with the situation.
The problem was that, back in the conference room, after understanding Serafall's implied meaning, Cid had torn up the investigation report on the spot to show his loyalty. Now he had no choice but to write another one.
Damn stupid Underworld. They could not even trust their own heirs. As expected of Devils, they had a very clear understanding of themselves. If they had just let him clear everyone's names earlier, this would have been over already. Now he was stuck working overtime.
Fortunately, in a certain sense, he was actually a super invincible workaholic. By contacting the remaining people one by one on his phone and asking about their movements, he had managed to get alibis for everyone except Yuuto Kiba.
Now, aside from Yuuto Kiba, who seemed to be busy and could not be reached for the time being, every Devil present when the Church attacked had been cleared. Cid was already thinking about how to wash away the dirty water Shadow had splashed onto the Devils.
"Hmm! An aura where light and darkness are mixed together..."
Cid's nose twitched slightly. He stopped, suddenly turned around, and stared sharply at the figure who had just brushed past him, his narrowed eyes opening.
Beneath that bright and gorgeous exterior was rotten darkness. Like a decayed flower, it gave off a thick fragrance. This was the aura unique to Fallen Angels.
It was not anything worth paying attention to. There were all kinds of races on the island, and the other party's strength could only be called average, the sort Rias could handle ten of by herself. So... there was no need to care.
Yes. No need to care.
With that thought in mind, Cid wrapped himself in a presence-ignoring barrier and followed the unknown Fallen Angel into a base.
As everyone knew, Vali, the White Dragon Emperor who knocked away his wallet yesterday, was the adopted son of Azazel, the Fallen Angel Governor General. As the adoptive father of the White Dragon Emperor, it was only reasonable for Azazel to compensate him for the damage Vali caused. So it should be perfectly reasonable for him to take things from this base worth no more than the amount he had lost at the time.
"Since I'm already here, I can't leave without taking something."
Cid stuck out his tongue and licked the corner of his mouth, looking up at the base that could only be called luxurious. He felt that after looting the Sacred Gear spaces of Vali and Bikou, the money that had still only barely covered a tenth of the art collection he had his eye on might finally climb back up to one-fifth.
...
Watching another group of patrol personnel pass beneath the window, Sayaka Kirasaka struggled to shift her body and began crawling. Suppressing her aura with all her might, she took a deep breath and began to move.
She pulled open the ventilation duct cover and landed cleanly on both feet without making a sound. Moving briskly, she passed through intersection after intersection, firing a single arrow to disable the surveillance camera overhead before finally stopping in front of a door.
Only after completing that series of movements did Sayaka Kirasaka let out a breath of relief. Looking at the door in front of her, she took out a radar-like device and pressed it. A blinking red dot appeared in front of the center of the radar.
After confirming the general location was correct, Sayaka Kirasaka did not rush straight in. Instead, she first pressed her ear to the door and listened. Hearing no movement inside, she crouched down and looked through the gap under the door. Only after seeing nothing but darkness inside did she place her hand on the doorknob.
Click!
The door did not open, but Sayaka Kirasaka did not panic. She calmly took out a talisman, stuck it onto the doorknob, and channeled Spiritual Power into it to activate the spell written on it.
After a flash of light, the talisman disappeared. Sayaka Kirasaka tried opening the door again.
Click!
When she heard that sound, Sayaka Kirasaka froze. The calm expression on her face shook noticeably.
She took out another talisman and pressed it on.
Nothing.
One, two, three...
One strange talisman after another disappeared, but after dozens of talisman attacks, the doorknob remained completely intact.
What the hell!
Sayaka Kirasaka stared blankly at the door in front of her, unable to understand. Even if it were alloy metal, its internal mechanical structure should have been destroyed after so many talismans. What kind of metal could remain completely undamaged?
Tap, tap, tap...
"Oh no!"
Footsteps came from both ends of the corridor at the same time. The shadows of the patrol personnel had already appeared in Sayaka Kirasaka's view under the lights. In another dozen seconds at most, she would be exposed.
Sayaka Kirasaka kept twisting the doorknob and had already begun using Spiritual Power to forcibly destroy the lock, but for some reason, even though it looked like an ordinary lock, she could not break it no matter what she did.
"Shit!"
The footsteps grew closer and closer, and the surroundings were completely open. There was nowhere to hide. The situation seemed hopeless, and Sayaka Kirasaka had already prepared herself for stealth to fail and for having to fight her way out by force.
She sighed, took out the huge silver sword on her body, and moved along the wall toward the left, preparing to strike first and take one down.
Her vision suddenly went completely dark. Her back, which had been pressed against the solid wall, was suddenly hit by a sense of weightlessness, and her body lost its balance.
Reacting quickly, she put her hand to the ground and adjusted her center of gravity. Her agile body used that point of support to flip through the air, then landed silently and crouched low on the floor. Instinctively, she looked toward the only source of light in the room, a door-shaped opening several meters tall and wide cut into the wall. It was the direction she had just fallen in from.
At that moment, the patrol personnel Sayaka Kirasaka had intended to ambush appeared in front of the opening, yet walked past as if they had not seen it at all. They even greeted another patrol group when they ran into them.
It was pitch black all around her, impossible to make out her surroundings. Sayaka Kirasaka froze in place, nervously listening until the footsteps of both patrol groups faded away. Only then did she let out a breath of relief.
"What kind of thief dares trespass on my turf?"
Just as she was about to check her surroundings, a voice rang out from the darkness. For some reason, it sounded familiar to Sayaka Kirasaka, and her heart, which had only just begun to relax, jumped in fright.
She kicked off the ground, intending to escape through the opening in front of her. At the very least, she needed a place with some visibility. But the whistling sound of something slicing past her ear immediately set off alarm bells in her mind. She swung the massive sword in her hands toward the source of the sound.
Clang!
I hit it!
The thought flashed through Sayaka Kirasaka's mind as the sound of metal striking metal rang out. But in the next second...
Several black tentacles shot out from the darkness, binding her limbs at a speed Sayaka Kirasaka could not react to. The weapon clutched in her hands was instantly snatched away, and the overwhelming force lifted her into the air.
"I... mmph, mmph..."
Even her last chance was taken from her. A black slime tentacle covered Sayaka Kirasaka's mouth, forcibly sealing her voice.
"Good grief, Sayaka-san. Last time, I gave you a chance to live for Yukina's sake. Why couldn't you just leave well enough alone?"
The voice sounded utterly invincible. A figure slowly stepped out of the darkness, and a face Sayaka Kirasaka knew all too well appeared before her.
...
How do you convince a girl you barely know, who you have hanging in midair, that you're actually a good person? Asking online. No rush.
After infiltrating the Fallen Angel base, Cid had failed in the very first room he searched. Could someone please explain why failing to open an ordinary door would trigger an alarm?
Fortunately, he was one step ahead. He instantly reduced the entire door to dust, then used optical principles to create a barrier and fool the patrols. He could figure out how to restore the door later.
After that, he stayed inside the room and watched as Sayaka Kirasaka threw more than a dozen talismans at the doorknob he had installed. In the end, looking ready to fight for her life, she moved beside the real door and fell inside.
Cid reached out and turned on the white light he had switched off just one second before Sayaka Kirasaka entered. Then he took a step back, sat on the hospital bed like a boss, and looked at Sayaka Kirasaka hanging in the air with a classic villainous smile.
"Now, I ask and you answer. Your fate will depend on your replies. Do you understand?"
Seeing Sayaka Kirasaka nod, Cid snapped his fingers and released the tentacle covering her mouth.
"First, why did you come here?"
His blade-sharp gaze fell on Sayaka Kirasaka, placing immense pressure on her. Some inexplicable feeling inside her forced her to tell the truth against her will.
"To... find the Fourth Primogenitor."
What does this have to do with Kojou?
Cid's body suddenly stiffened. He stopped playing with the slime ball in his hand, and the slime tentacles wrapped around Sayaka Kirasaka tightened at once.
"Looks like my friend created something quite incredible. What else do you know?"
"I don't know anything else. I only found out that the Fourth Primogenitor was here, so I came to investigate."
She spoke with difficulty. The slime tentacles tightened slowly, yet no matter how she used her Spiritual Power, she could not stop them. The fear of waiting for death rose in Sayaka Kirasaka's heart.
"Hah. You barged in without knowing anything. How foolish."
Cid put on a thoughtful expression. After estimating that it was about enough, and that any tighter would stop her from breathing, he released the slime tentacles and let Sayaka Kirasaka drop to the floor.
"Cough, cough, cough..."
A little more than ten seconds of breathing difficulty would not seriously harm her, but the experience of waiting for death left Sayaka Kirasaka's pounding heart unable to calm down.
"You just picked your life back up. Leave this place while you still can."
Cid looked down at Sayaka Kirasaka with a cool gaze and spoke coldly.
"No. I can't leave. I still have to investigate."
"Oh? Has your desire for that legendary power crushed your reason?"
"There's something seriously wrong with this place. Even if the Fourth Primogenitor isn't here, I still have to investigate and report it."
"Even if you die?"
"Even if I die."
Thinking of what she had accidentally discovered earlier, Sayaka Kirasaka had already prepared herself for death.
"But if I hadn't helped you just now, you would've already been discovered."
"If you hadn't put a fake door next to the real one, I would've gotten in long ago."
After calming her restless heart a little, Sayaka Kirasaka met Cid's gaze without fear. Under the light, she took in the destroyed wall and the information Cid had just revealed. In her mind, she had already formed a rough guess about Cid's relationship with the owner of this place. She might actually survive this.
"Hah. Interesting. Then stay beside me and take a good look at the malice this world hides in the darkness. Try not to die too quickly."
Leaving behind that cool line, Cid reached out to Sayaka Kirasaka, who was sitting weakly on the floor, then stood up and looked around.
Think, Cid. What line fits this scene?
His pupils swept across the room as his mind raced. Finally, he noticed a slip of paper on the cabinet, and his eyes lit up.
"What a shame. You and I arrived one step too late. The person has already been taken away."
Speaking regretfully, he slowly walked to the counter, picked up the slip of paper, and read the name on it.
"Poor child. Tosca."