“See you inside,” not “Take care.” The tension eased considerably. Leonardo curved his eyes and nodded slightly.
It seemed one could observe the trial even without voting rights. Thanks to that, his steps toward the waiting room exit weren’t heavy.
Creak, bang—
Leaving behind the heavy door that shut firmly with a loud noise, Leonardo walked forward surrounded by seven escorts. He glared at them once when they tugged at his arms as if to hurry him along, but he still moved at a calm, unhurried pace.
The long corridor stretching before him was dark and quiet to the point of being eerie. The fact that there were no windows on the walls made it feel quite different from anything he’d seen until now.
Mana...
Unfamiliar mana could be felt through the stagnant air. And yet, the number and presence were somehow unusual.
The mana, concentrated and tangled in one place, brushed his shoulders and the back of his neck with a chilling touch. He didn’t know what the situation inside was like, but the energies were sharp enough to make his skin tingle. Moreover, the portraits lined up on both sides of the corridor stared intently at his profile with glowing eyes.
Feeling watched, Leonardo scanned left and right with cool eyes. The atmosphere was such that it wouldn’t have been strange at all if the eyes he’d already passed were now shooting daggers into the back of his head.
Tap—
At that moment, two unfamiliar figures stepped out of the darkness ahead.
The member at the front stopped with the click of boot heels. The rest—and Leonardo—halted as well. As he took in the situation, he saw the approaching individuals holding something in their hands.
A blindfold?
Frowning as he sensed something was off, Leonardo watched as one of them leaned close to an escort and whispered in his ear. The listener’s expression shifted subtly before he turned around and briefly explained.
“This passage ahead cannot be disclosed to outsiders. It will be uncomfortable, but you must wear a blindfold and earplugs while moving.”
“What?”
Leonardo shot back, dumbfounded.
“Hey—if you know it’ll be uncomfortable, don’t make me do it. What kind of nonsense is this?”
“The courtroom is a sacred place, strictly controlled so that third-party forces or outlaws cannot influence the verdict by barging in. Therefore—”
“You didn’t say anything about this beforehand.”
“...I apologize for that, but even if you are the subject of deliberation, outsiders cannot directly see the passage leading to the courtroom with their own eyes. We will safely escort you inside, so please cooperate with internal regulations.”
The member delivered those ridiculous rules with a calm that suggested he’d expected this reaction. Leonardo sneered coldly. Did they really think he’d meekly comply with that nonsense, not knowing where these people might take him?
He planted his feet and refused to budge. The burly men gripping his arms on both sides showed their true colors and tried to haul him forward.
But Leonardo took one step—and didn’t move an inch after that. Instead, he twisted his shoulders, making the men clinging to his arms stagger hard.
“Don’t rush me. We’re not done talking yet.”
“...”
“And try pulling my arm one more time. Then your arm will come off.”
Leonardo turned to the member on his left and warned him evenly. The warning worked: the grip loosened at once.
“S-Sorry.”
Leonardo glanced at him as he bowed his head, then asked again, looking straight ahead.
“If you cover my eyes and ears, I’m practically defenseless. How can I be sure you won’t harm me?”
The leading member stared at his face for a moment, then answered formally. “There’s no need to worry about that.”
Leonardo snorted and jerked his chin toward him.
“Then let’s do this. In exchange for following your instructions, undo one side of the handcuffs. And cuff the other side to your wrist. That’s fair, right?”
Everyone present knew it wasn’t actually fair. If Leonardo Blaine threw even one fireball with one hand, most of the people here would have their lives threatened.
The members looked to their leader with troubled expressions. The one at the center of it all frowned in displeasure, stayed silent for a moment, then pulled out a pocket watch.
*****
The procession—now ten people with the addition of two more—moved through the maze-like passage with slightly hurried steps. That was because Leonardo’s scheduled entry time was almost upon them. Feeling the flow of air with his now-free fingertips, Leonardo gave up on trying to map the route in his head after the seventh curve and the ninth door.
Even the path to the Council’s underground prison hadn’t been this complex. It was a perverse structure, one that naturally impressed upon you just how solemn trials were meant to be.
He was used to having his senses blocked from repeated training back in his Armsilver days, but once he gave up on gauging direction and let himself be dragged along, there was only darkness and chaos before his eyes.
For about ten minutes, he barely moved his legs, relying on the center of gravity of the two on either side. Then they stopped, and he felt two touches on the back of his left hand.
“Is it here?”
Leonardo straightened his hunched back even though he couldn’t hear an answer. Even like this, he wanted to make a dignified entrance. Intense energies pressed in nearby, as if he had indeed arrived at the right place.
But he felt a faint tremor under his feet.
...What is this?
Since he couldn’t be trembling, it had to be vibrations coming up through the ground. Unease crept in: had they brought him somewhere strange, some place with torture devices running?
Woong—
He couldn’t hear it with his ears, but a wind strong enough to feel like an auditory hallucination shook his hair as it swept past. At the same time, a searing heat, different from before, spread over his face and across his whole body.
Leonardo sensed the final door into the courtroom open. He lifted his chin and drew a deep breath, expanding his chest.
The shoulders of the two people on either side rose slightly, and they guided Leonardo forward in a straight line.
Have I entered?
The floor material seemed to change—the feeling underfoot shifted from solid to resonant, like stepping onto a wooden platform. In that state, when two more touches brushed the back of his hand, Leonardo—counting his twentieth step—stopped.
His body suddenly tilted. When he stiffly resisted, his knees were forced to bend, and he sat awkwardly in a chair he hadn’t known was there.
The chair was unexpectedly soft and comfortable, wrapped in smooth fabric. As he leaned back against the backrest and sank into it, both wrists were tugged a few times before all presences withdrew.
“...”
Leonardo sat still like that for about thirty seconds. His vision was still pitch-black, and he heard nothing but his own breathing and the rustle of clothes.
Why aren’t they removing the blindfold?
Puzzled, he kept his neck stiff, unwilling to look flustered. He held his breath and strained his nerves, trying to assess the situation with his other senses. Then the vibration that had been tickling his feet gradually intensified.
The atmosphere was strange. His heartbeat quickened, and his breathing turned uneven.
He knew everyone in the silent room was looking at him, yet instead of feeling dignified, his shoulders felt like they were shrinking.
Just as an unidentifiable anxiety began to creep over him, the blindfold was yanked off before he had time to prepare himself.
“...!”
Light flooded in, his vision abruptly bright. Leonardo winced at the brutal glare, squeezing his eyes shut. Even so, everything beyond his closed lids was red. The earplugs that had been blocking sound with magical power also fell away under someone else’s hand.
A ringing filled his ears from the sudden change in pressure. Then an enormous wall of noise mercilessly pierced his eardrums.
Waaaaaah—
Thump, thump, thump, thump—!
“—!”
“—!”
“Everyone, please be quiet—!”
Information too sudden for his mind to process poured in through every sense. The excited shouts filling the room—the crowd’s roar that was definitely not cheers—made his whole body tremble.
The urgent, cracking sound of the gavel, unable to calm them, reverberated through the vast courtroom. That sound made Leonardo’s eyes snap open, even though he still couldn’t properly raise his head against the glare.
As he let out the breath he’d been holding ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) and stared ahead, the ant-like crowd swayed like a threatening wave, rising from their seats.
“If you continue to disrupt the proceedings, you will be removed!”
Despite the judge’s stern warning, amplified in volume, the heat hardly subsided. Worse, he caught sight of the man who claimed to be the lawyer he’d met the day before, protesting vehemently near the judge’s bench.
His skin crawled, and his hair stood on end. Leonardo, looking up at the audience from the center of the semicircular room, let out a sigh through quivering lips.
“...Ah.”
He instinctively sensed that something was going wrong. His arms twitched under the pressure constricting his heart.
Clink—
But the handcuffs on his wrists were fixed to the chair, leaving only a little slack. Leonardo realized then why they had brought him in with his eyes and ears covered. If he’d known the situation was this bad, he wouldn’t have walked in willingly.
Pale, newly aware of where he stood, he looked around unsteadily—left, right, front—his eyes unfocused.
A moment later, undisguised fear faintly surfaced in his pupils.
His tension-strung instinct told him:
Agrizendro isn’t here.
