As soon as Elin entered the restaurant, she recognized the hunched figure of Panzi sitting in a corner. He nervously scanned the area in a fixed direction, his back bent, looking like a massive blot or a failed statue about to be demolished by a craftsman. He saw Elin but quickly averted his gaze. Maybe just a silk shirt isn't enough to declare myself as a big merchant, Elin thought, and then took a seat across from Panzi.
"Who are you? I'm waiting for someone," Panzi said, widening his eyes and attempting to hide the wine glass in his hand, as if ready to conceal it in his bosom.
"Elin? Elin Tias?"
"That's right, Mr. Panzi."
This morning, Elin had arranged for a simple message to be delivered to Panzi, and he showed up to the meeting right on time without any guards. However, the moment he saw Panzi, he started to doubt if dressing up as a merchant with a borrowed costume was worth it.
"You haven't ordered anything," Elin said. "We should eat and talk. I'm starving."
"No, I'll just have coffee."
"We're here to discuss important matters, right? Eating helps us think and speak more clearly. My treat."
"Well..."
Panzi signaled a waitress and ordered the most expensive lunch. Elin secretly rejoiced that this was a decidedly low-end restaurant – these expenses couldn't be claimed as business expenses. "Unfortunately, I already had a snack at the trade union club before coming here," he said, ordering a somewhat cheaper meal. They didn't speak until the food arrived. As the greasy dishes were placed in front of Panzi, he began to devour his meal, the utensils digging urgently into the meat.
Elin, who had lost her appetite, asked, "Did you bring Elaine on your own?"
Panzi didn't look up. "It was just me and her."
"What's your relationship with her mother? I heard Elaine calling you 'Uncle Panzi.'"
"Grenna is my cousin."
"You came from the town of Southshore?"
"From a ship in Southshore. It was quite the rough voyage. We landed and then it took us a month to get here. It cost me half a year's savings."
"Why did you do this?"
"Elaine needed to meet her biological father."
"That's a noble thought. But let's get to the point, Mr. Panzi. What do you want?"
"Mr. Elin, I raised your child." Panzi looked up, his eyes widening. "For her, I sacrificed opportunities for a better life. I had a chance to invest in a business that would have made me rich, but I couldn't afford it because every copper I earned went to Elaine. I deserve compensation."
"I understand, that's fair. So, may I ask..."
"Eight hundred gold coins, and I'll disappear from your life forever, Mr. Elin. It shouldn't be too much for you."
Let's give him a little scare.
"Eight hundred gold coins? That's enough to have you killed eight times."
Panzi dropped his fork into the plate.
"I'm just kidding, don't be so nervous. I'm a family man, and you're at least a relative by marriage to my daughter, so please don't mind. Since you raised Elaine..." Elin paused for a moment and then continued. "So, what about her mother?"
"I'm sorry, Grenna has passed away."
Elin was silent for a moment, so long that Panzi was prompted to check on him.
"Mr. Elin," he said, "are you okay?"
"I'm fine. I must admit, I don't have many recollections I can recall about her... but I should ask. Eight hundred gold coins is not a small amount; I need to understand."
"So, are you willing to pay then? Once I have the money, I will leave immediately, and you and Elaine will never see me again..."
"Don't rush; we still have time. At least lunch isn't over yet. How did her mother pass away?"
"Mr. Elin, in families like ours, it's often the case that people don't even know how they died. Overwork? Some strange illness? Who knows, but we couldn't afford doctors. We just hoped to sleep for a few days and naturally recover. But Grenna, she didn't get better... it was like that. Poor woman. A year ago."
"You mentioned earlier that you raised Elaine. But her mother only passed away a year ago."
"Grenna was always frail and couldn't take care of Elaine properly... so I..."
Elin was quite certain that only "Grenna passed away a year ago" was accurate. He thought it might not be wise to pursue this further in this direction for now. After all, the primary objective here was to find the best way to get rid of Panky— at least that was the original plan.
"You mentioned you took a ship from Southshore."
"That's right, for Elaine, I bought a second-class ticket from a scalper..."
"But I asked where you came from. Specifically, where you used to live. That's what I want to know, not where you boarded the ship."
"Not far," Panzi said, "right in Southshore."
That's a contradictory answer. I need to ask one more thing.
"Grenna likely became ill due to overwork before she passed away. Is that correct?"
"I think so."
"And then you immediately said her health was 'always frail.'"
"Well, Mr. Elin," Panzi chuckled awkwardly, "being frail and overworked aren't mutually exclusive, you know. In families like ours..."
"Then she must have had a job."
"Yes, she worked at an orphanage..."
"Orphanage?"
"Anyway, a laborer. A country woman with no education who couldn't do anything else... Really, I have no ulterior motive. I just want to return your flesh and blood to you."
"I just wanted to learn more about Elaine's mother," Elin picked up a bottle and poured a glass of wine, pushing it in front of Panzi. "After all... she gave birth to my child. Drink it."
"Yes, yes, I understand." Panzi drank the wine to the last drop. "We can discuss the amount of money..."
"Wait. Let me think about it."
"Sure."
Elin rested his chin on his right hand and looked out the window. After a while, he turned back to Panzi and said, "It's time."
"Time...? What do you mean?"
Panzi didn't finish his sentence and felt a sudden dizziness in his head. He shook his head, scratched his eyebrow with his fingernail, then stared blankly at his fingertips. He glanced at Elin, as if he wanted to say something, but he fell onto the table with his eyes tightly closed. Elin figured that with Panzi's intelligence, he probably wouldn't realize that Elin had drugged his drink.
The drug wasn't intended specifically for Panzi; Elin had it on hand for emergency situations. He hadn't planned on using it, but after recalling those three things, he changed his mind: there was no orphanage in Southshore; he had met Grenna when she was doing temporary work at the hospital; and he had heard from Jorgen the story of the orphanage being attacked on a stormy night. It would be a bit troublesome to carry the unconscious and dirty Panzi out on his own, but Elin planned to find someone to help.
When Mardias entered the room, he saw Jorgen's young subordinate standing in the middle of the room.
"You can go now, Aved," the old man behind the desk said, "you've done well."
"Thank you very much, Lord Shawl," Aved replied, turned to briefly acknowledge Mardias, and left the room. Mardias stepped forward, taking Aved's place. He slightly raised his head and noticed a spider in the corner where the wall met the ceiling. It remained still. Mardias knew he shouldn't be staring at the spider, so he lowered his gaze.
"Mardias," the old man looked at the heir. "He said Jorgen ordered him to stand guard at your mother's house."
"I've heard about it."
"Do you want to see her?"
"No."
"Not the right time, or just 'no'?"
"I have no reason to see her right now."
"Jorgen has always been protective of your mother. What's your take on this?"
"Maybe he wants her for himself. You didn't bring me here to discuss this, did you?"
"Aved has already told me all the details of the incident."
Mardias furrowed his brow. "Why didn't you wait for me to report?"
"You can go over it again. But what I want to understand from here is not the sequence of events. I want your assessment of Jorgen's actions."
"Jorgen behaved very aggressively toward the boy he subjected to violence on my behalf. He didn't hide his displeasure with me at all. But despite that, he still tried to verbally stop my actions using your name."
"And he succeeded."
"...I let him succeed. I judged that the situation had reached the point where it could be ended. If your intention in having me do this was to probe whether he's loyal enough, then I can say that Jorgen's loyalty to the MI7, especially to you, is beyond doubt. Even...
"...Even what?"
"...Even beyond my understanding."
The old man didn't say anything, just stared at Mardias. In the corner of his eye, Mardias faintly saw the spider on the wall move slightly downward. But he didn't remember seeing it move.
"Grandfather," he said, "why did you make me do this? There are countless ways to test Jorgen. But you deliberately made me uncomfortable."
"Since Jorgen didn't notice, even if you were uncomfortable at the time, you didn't show it. That's commendable."
"But I don't feel right. What I mean is... Jorgen should respect me. And seeing something like this will only make him..."
Mardias stopped.
"Finish your thought."
"Hate me."
"Do you wish he didn't hate you? I mean, after all, he saved your life."
"No. I just feel my self-esteem is damaged."
The old man placed his hands on the table, interlacing his fingers. "You may not understand his loyalty, but you should at least know how to earn it – otherwise, you're not qualified to be my heir."
Mardias remained silent. He glanced upward for a moment and then back down. The spider had moved again. When was this?
"Jorgen is different from anyone else," the old man continued. "He hates me the most, but he's also the most willing to be loyal to me. You've seen it with your own eyes. He's been bound to the Shawl family his whole life... to the point where the only effective way to resist him is to show loyalty. Do you understand?"
"Not... not entirely."
"You will in time."
"But doesn't it risk letting his negative emotions accumulate? We don't know when he might lose control."
"He'll find enough comfort from your mother."
"Did you make them...?"
"No, I didn't force your mother to do anything. It's the woman who is difficult to control, not Jorgen, so we just have to watch. Mardias, you seem anxious. Is the topic of Dalia bothering you?"
"No, not at all." Mardias raised his head. "But I think you're trying to transplant Jorgen's feelings towards you onto me. You want Jorgen to hate me as much as he hates you."
"The conclusion is somewhat crude, but the direction isn't wrong. Any questions?"
"I believe as the heir, I shouldn't just be a part of you... or, in other words, a replica of you," he added quickly. "This isn't conducive to the future of the MI7."
Mardias uttered this sentence when he saw the second spider appear on the wall. One, two. The second one appeared on the opposite wall, facing the first. Two immobile spiders. He stared directly at his grandfather, waiting for a response. The process was longer than he had anticipated, but he had no intention of averting his gaze.
"Where is the boy who was distributing the flyers?" the old man asked.
"I don't know, Jorgen sent him away at the time."
"Name? Address?"
"I'm sorry, I... he seemed to be mentally unstable, so..."
"So, you chose him because you thought he was safer, but didn't bother to find out his background."
"I was about to..."
"Until you learn to manage these small matters, don't speak about the future of the MI7. Now, get out."
"Yes, Grand... Shawl, sir."
Mardias left the room. He saw thousands of spiders crawling down the wall from the moment he heard "get out," or even earlier, from when they began discussing the boy's whereabouts. The wall seemed to be covered with crawling black veins and tumor-like growths in an instant. As he tried to escape his grandfather's gaze and started counting the number of spiders, he couldn't seem to finish counting. This illusion lasted only for a second. In the end, there were still only two spiders on the wall. Identical, and completely still.