Part 2: A Debate Risking Life, Death, and Every Penny to My Name

“Magic flows in everything, whether it be dead or alive. This world is made of magic. This is why those with little to no magic are more rare than a melon turtle chugging water at first sight.”

—Robin Benz

I eventually settle for pointing out the weakness in Mayor Crank’s proposal. “Then how do you propose we indirectly caused the sandstorm?”

“Your presence upset the natural ley line flow.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I retort. “You’re ignoring another possibility— that the hiccup in ley line flow actually brought us here.”

While I can’t explain why the sandstorm came when it did, I know the details of Mirei and I’s arrival. I motion for Mayor Crank to hand me the scroll. He does not.

“Hand it over,” Hans Belostrer says. Mayor Crank huffs before tossing it to me.

I roll it out, searching for the text that delineates when the ley line hiccup was. I keep rolling the scroll out further, anxiety building. “Doesn’t this scroll cover more than a week’s worth of activity?”

“Speed it up, Haruki Takahashi,” Hans Belostrer demands after a mere handful of seconds after I opened the scroll. I gulp, frantically searching for what I need.

Mirei’s finger lands on the center of the page. “It’s there.”

I grin and squeeze her hand in thanks. Then, I return my attention to Mayor Crank. “The ley lines destabilized an entire… two hundred ninety degrees… before Mirei and I arrived in this world.”

This is close to about one day.

“Can you prove the exact time you arrived?”

I close my eyes, take in a shaky breath, and nod slowly. “I’d like to call a witness in.”

Hans Belostrer’s severe gaze falls upon my face, heavy and suffocating. “Who?”

“Roo Benz, son of Chief Pons.”

Mayor Crank’s chin slips off his clasped hands, Hans Belostrer’s eyes widen, and the trio of adjudicators jolt in their seats. One could hear a pin drop in this breathless silence.

“…So it was you who listed him as a witness you’d call,” The moderator at length remarks, shocked.

Part of preparing for trial is submitting letters of participation from the witnesses. They themselves send it in order to ensure that they’re doing so of their own will. Once the deadline for submission passes, a scroll of all the approved witnesses is sent to the moderator, the prosecution, and the defense. That scroll is part of what Roo made us memorize— “A tactic for intimidation,” he’d explained. “Anyone who remembers the full scroll of names would be interpreted as having superior memory and intelligence.”

It’s clear that no one in this room expected a pair of outlanders less than half their age to whip out the son of their chief as a witness, much less from their memory.

“…Alright. I’ll ping him.”

The moderator snaps his fingers, causing a small flash of magic to spark from his hand.

While we wait for Roo to open the double doors nestled behind the rows of empty seats, Mirei whispers in my ear, “How does he know we requested Roo to put in a letter?”

I whisper back, “Roo told us that throughout history, people tend to call in their own requested witnesses. I guess the moderator knows this too and assumed it was us. Not that he’s wrong, though.”

Mirei makes a small noise of understanding and leans away.

The seconds tick by agonizingly slow. Hans Belostrer taps his finger against the table, creating an incessant tap, tap, tap noise. Mayor Crank leans back farther into his seat, arms crossed. My leg starts to bounce.

A minute passes.

What are you doing, Roo?! I scream internally. The adjudicators shift in their seats awkwardly, unsure whether to order that Hans Belostrer ping Roo again or to stay silent. The moderator himself appears conflicted on this point as well. Pinging the Chief’s son more than once could attract his ire. The truth is that those who have never met Roo have no clue about his true nature. After all, they’ve never seen his face. He could be a heartless spit-screaming monster for all they know.

At length, it is Mayor Crank who boasts his disapproval. “What is that child doing? Ping him again.”

The moderator’s words are strained. “I… suppose.”

Hans Belostrer weakly snaps his fingers to ping Roo magically, sweat rolling down his neck. He looks blue in the face.

Instantly, the double doors snap open with a deafening crack. The man himself strides into the courtroom, a beaded necklace with a wood pendant jingling around his neck. That pendant still illuminates magic from when the moderator pinged him. His hair, interspersed with thin braids, billows out behind him. He wears the same outfit he had donned after our shared time in the baths. The only difference is how his face hides behind an elaborate full-face mask made of porcelain and jeweled with gems. Threads of gold web on the mask like kintsugi.

Roo’s narrowed eyes survey the adjudicator’s box, the moderator, and Mayor Crank. He never spares a glance at me nor Mirei. My leg continues to bounce.

Roo’s words surface in my mind: “You should know that I don’t particularly care for your fate, as we hardly know each other.”

Flippant, emotionless words. But his eyes had hidden something else, something warm behind a veil of green.

I have no clue how Roo will navigate this trial. But whatever he does, it will irrevocably affect Mirei’s fate. I care about her more than anyone else in this world, including myself.

“Please sit in the empty chair opposite of me,” Hans Belostrer says, motioning to the side of the table. Roo pulls out the chair and gracefully sits, the picture of elegance. The moderator nods at me to begin speaking.

“Roo Benz, how did we meet?”

He closes his eyes. “I met you and your sister by a small pond at the outskirts of the city. It was the dead of night, the moon at its highest peak.”

The rock in my throat subsides slightly. He’s answering my questions without bias, as I expected. “How did we look at the time?”

“Objection,” Mayor Crank hisses. “Line of questioning is irrelevant to the topic.”

Hans Belostrer allows it. “Rephrase and get to the point, outlander.”

I see it in the corner of my eye: Head Adjudicator Ohma’s eyebrow ticks upward. She is displeased.

I smile. Mirei frowns in confusion upon seeing it, the only one in the room able to perceive the slight grin on my face. She knows my minute expressions best, after all.

“How long do you suppose we were out in the wilds, Roo?”

Roo hums, contemplating. Then, he replies, “The two of you appeared extremely unkempt and malnourished. I saw your little sister guzzling the water like a melon turtle, so I would say two or three days.”

Nice, Roo! I praise internally. His guess is quite accurate. I knew I could trust Roo’s observation skills. We hadn’t gone over any of these questions together, only the rules of questioning witnesses. I’m grateful that Roo’s answer is close to what I expected him to say.

I lean forward across the table, tapping it with my finger as I summarize my point. “There you have it. Roo was the first person who came across us, and he says he thought we were in this world for three days maximum. Therefore, Mayor Crank, I think your supposition that we cause the ley lines to goof up is simply without basis. Rather, there seems to be an underlying force that is destabilizing the ley lines.”

“Yeah, what he said,” Mirei pipes up. “Honestly, I think the sand is what’s messing them up.”

Hans Belostrer shakes his head. “Enough. We’ll get our Masters of Magic and magic scientists to research this matter.”

“I have one more piece of evidence to show that me and my little sister are peaceful,” I squeeze in before the moderator can move on. I can tell he notices that Mayor Crank’s point has been refuted by us, so he wants to prevent us from speaking more on the matter.

He sighs at length and motions for me to continue.

“While this can’t be proven, my little sister and I come from a world without magic. We don’t even know how to use it. However, Roo Benz looked into our magic as soon as we met, and found we had some inside.”

“You carry magic yet don’t know how to control it?” Mayor Crank bellows, voice laced with anger. “And you dared to enter the city?!”

I freeze. Memories of getting lost in the crowd of people at the entrance of Chonti Village assault me.

“If I may interrupt you, Mayor Lio Crank,” Roo’s voice is cold, slicing through the heat of Mayor Crank’s accusation. “It was I who brought them in.”

The mayor’s mouth opens and closes like a fish’s, shocked fury making him quiver. Then, he slams the table with his fist. “How dare you! You, of all people, would ignore the risk—“

“Calm down,” Hans Belostrer booms, completely horrified. This is the Chief's son, for god's sake!

The mayor groans and falls back in his chair with a whump.

“…As I was saying,” I stammer. “I would like to prove my claim that we’re harmless by showing you our level of magic.”

I unzip my school bag beside me. It takes several tries (thanks to the fish that decide to eat my bag for dinner) but eventually it opens. I haul out a humongous ticking metal machine. Cogs spin and tubes spurt a puff of smoke when I press the on button. There is a small rectangular window with four numbers, all zero, at the base of the Magic Measurer. They range from black, meaning low level, green, for average level, and red, for high level. At the top of it is a steel handle meant for a hand.

Roo only told me how to use it. We never actually measured our magic because Roo needed to find one in the depths of the library. He said he’d tossed it somewhere mindlessly, and that’s why it took forever to dig up.

Regardless, I slam it onto the table (because it’s heavy, I’m not mad, I swear) and spin it around so that everyone at the table could see the numbers. The average number is a score of five hundred. As long as I get below two hundred fifty—a black number—I’ll be fine.

“I-I’ll go first,” I stutter. Looking at the ticking machine before me, nervousness crawls up my neck. What if Roo was wrong? What if I’m actually overpowered and everything I’ve said so far gets discredited? Unconsciously, my eyes connect with Roo’s. He stares back, blankly.

How reassuring, I sigh inwardly.

Just like Roo told us a few hours ago, I grip the steel handle.

Instantly, the cogs spin wildly and steam pipes puff out steam. I hear the numbers rotate quickly, filling the courtroom with incessant clicking. Finally, the machine releases a triumphant ding!

Everyone’s jaw drops. My body clams up and cold fear trickles down my throat. Even Roo looks deathly shocked. Oh no.

“…”

Mirei, who had been gripping onto my haori under the table since I let her hand go to grab the Magic Measurer, shakes me. “What does it say?”

I bite my lip hard enough to draw blood, and then turn it around.

My jaw drops, too.

______________

0002
______________

Holy crap, that’s fucking low!