“He was the most expected person sponsored by the family of Rudimna until he went missing. He used to be a nameless wizard himself,” Edith added.
“Pardon?” Azriel was astonished. Seeing her face, Edith smiled bitterly. “Isn’t it amazing? You have no idea how much hope I had when I first found out about him.”
“How did he become a wizard if he was a nameless wizard? Was there a cure?”
“No, there wasn’t. He was a special case.”
“Then, how did he…”
“I brought this. I thought it might help,” Edith took out a book with a thick cover. “It’s a book of reports sent to Rudimna by the people who researched about the excessive mana disorder. There is one by Tarbo Tameion, too. Here.”
Azriel looked into the page that Edith opened. It was the very first page. “About the innate nature change of internal mana?”
“All people are born with different mana. Do you know the theory about that?” Edith asked.
“I know about it. It’s the Theory of Mana Individuality. Isn’t unnamable mana also a kind of individuality?” Azriel replied.
“That’s right. You know it well. It is known to be impossible to change such innate nature. However, the nature of Tarbo’s mana changed in the middle. It was a very special case,” Edith explained.
It had always been possible to change the nature of mana because it was the beginning point of magic. However, Azriel kept quiet and listened to her carefully instead of correcting that part. Edith continued. “Tarbo had a big accident caused by his magic which was randomly invoked. The nature of his mana changed after that.”
“Did it become possible to name his mana after it changed?” Azriel asked.
“Yes. But because his magic was randomly invoked, he did not know which magic caused such a phenomenon and led to his cure. So, he studied that all his life,” Edith replied.
Azriel scanned the report. She read it roughly but still could grasp the content. “…It looks like he didn’t make much progress.”
“No,” Edith’s face darkened as she said. “We searched his house after he went missing and… found that he even bought people with unnamable mana and tried human experiments on them.”
“Human experiments? With slaves?”
This was something she did not know about. The scope of information Maylie could acquire by inquiring around was limited. Looking at Azriel’s face which turned pale, Edith said bitterly. “There are quite a lot of people with unnamable mana, if not excessive mana. It seems he found them by visiting slavers personally.”
“How can he? Then what happened to those people?”
Edith quietly shook her head. Azriel groaned. She shuddered in horror to recall Tarbo Tameion’s eyes which stared at her piercingly when he grabbed her in Colte.
“He couldn’t find out even with such a horrific deed,” Edith added.
“…”
“I thought there might be no such thing as a cure for nameless wizards. Not just my daughter, but there must be countless kids who are suffering now.”
Sophinea, who had been sitting down quietly, lowered her head and clasped the hem of Azriel’s robe.
“Because this is the case, how miraculous is it that someone like you exist…,” Edith murmured in a shaking voice and took a deep breath. She seemed to be holding back her tears. At the same time Azriel felt grave pity, she was suffocated by an assumption that suddenly came to her mind. Rhema killed Tarbo. Him killing Tarbo was related to the duty of a watchman. Tarbo Tameion was a nameless wizard. Rhema had never attempted to kill other wizards as far as she knew.
‘Could the duty of a watchman possibly be killing nameless wizards? Why…?’
He said that he could harm wizards among the people she knew. He also told her not to give affection to wizards. Did he mean nameless wizards when he said ‘wizards’? Azriel unknowingly looked back at Sophinea. Sophinea, who was grasping the hem of Azriel’s robe like a lifeline, noticed her gaze and lifted her head. The girl beamed shyly. If the presumption Azriel thought of was true, Rhema might try to kill this child.
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