His usual playful tone, but the eyes looking down were as cold as ice. Well, it’s understandable.

The ‘betrayal’ of a comrade was a trigger button for this guy.

“Leighton Briat.”

He was even the second-oldest member on Ibaekho’s team after the destroyer elder.

“Damn, but I treated you well, didn’t I?”

Ibaekho muttered that and sighed deeply.

“Well, that aside... just say it. Why are you alive when you were supposed to be dead? What is this mask you’re wearing? And what the hell are you scheming behind the scenes?”

“......”

“Just so you know, every time you stop explaining, I’ll pull something out of your body. Keep that in mind.”

“......”

“Start.”

Ibaekho’s commanding voice marked the beginning. Of course, he wouldn’t suddenly spill everything after keeping silent for so long.

“......”

Rather, Briat looked up at Ibaekho with hostile eyes. Ibaekho showed no reaction. After about three seconds of silence,

Slowly extending his hand forward—

“Ah! Ah, aaaaah—!!”

He plunged a finger deep into Briat’s left eye and pulled out whatever was inside. Crunch, crunch, crunch... The sound of something breaking was distinctly audible.

Very slowly.

“Aaaaah! Ah!!”

Watching Briat collapse to the floor writhing in pain, Ibaekho said expressionlessly only one word:

“Start.”

There was nothing else. No threats, no coaxing, no separate interrogation. Just saying start and waiting a few seconds.

If the story didn’t begin, he repeated the process.

“Aaaaah—!!”

Pulling out eyes, tearing off ears, yanking organs. When it got serious, he used potions to heal. Sssshhh—!

Ibaekho’s unemotional continuation of this was striking, but Briat was also impressive. He didn’t seem to be numb to pain or anything.

‘He screams but doesn’t say a single word.’

Perhaps knowing it was useless, he gave no excuses, no curses or pleas.

A truly formidable mental strength, but continuing like this would yield no results.

‘Maybe it’s time to change tactics...’

I thought about stopping it but seeing Ibaekho’s expression, I decided against it.

He could change methods after calming down a bit. It’s not like I’m the one being hurt.

“Aaaaah!!”

Watching Briat get healed by potions, the rest of the party arrived.

“Oh, you’re here. Why so late?”

“...We got a bit lost. No one here knows the way.”

“So what’s the situation here?”

“Wait a minute! Briat? Isn’t that Briat over there?”

“Calm down, I’ll explain everything.”

Ignoring Ibaekho, who seemed uninterested, I gave a rough explanation to the arriving party.

“So... there was a suspicious person wearing a wolf mask, Ibaekho caught him, removed the mask, and it turned out to be Briat...”

“Lord Ruinjenes! What’s going on? Didn’t you say you saw Briat’s corpse yourself?”

“I was sure when I saw it. But seeing him alive and well... He must have used some power to fake death or special tools.”

“Likely. He was pretending to be dead as soon as he was caught.”

“Hmm... I can think of a few powers like that.”

Power or item, it doesn’t matter. The point is Briat pretended to be dead before the destroyer elder and secretly sneaked into this ruin.

“That makes things more suspicious. Why would Briat do all this...?”

“We’ll hear that soon enough.”

As the conversation went on, Ibaekho shouted at us.

“Old man! What are you doing? If you’re here, come quickly and cast that spell!”

Responding, the destroyer elder approached Briat and cast some magic.

“Do you know what kind of magic it is?”

I asked GM quietly and got a quick answer.

“Judging by the molecular structure of mana, it’s assumed to be a nerve stimulation and arousal type—.”

“Simply put, it helps with torture?”

“Yes... It will make pain feel several times sharper and clearer in that state.”

Unexpectedly useful knowledge. If I have to interrogate later, I’ll have to ask the mage for help.

“......!!”

Anyway, the magic’s effect was immediate. The screams grew several times louder, and tears and snot flowed freely. Soon the throat seemed to tear completely, and the screams turned into metallic sounds...

“......”

Watching Briat endure silently until passing out, Ibaekho finally muttered one word.

“Damn, this guy’s really tough.”

Honestly, while saying that, I thought the potion-giving Ibaekho was even tougher.

Sssssshhh—! After the anger subsided somewhat, Ibaekho paused the interrogation and approached us.

His usual gentle smile appeared, so I thought it was okay to talk now. Therefore...

“What happened?”

“How would I know if you put it like that?”

“Isn’t it strange? How did you find this guy who we all couldn’t find even while searching?”

I wondered if Ibaekho had been hiding a way to find him all this time.

But...

“Oh, that?”

Ibaekho shrugged nonchalantly and revealed an even more shocking truth.

“I deliberately drew a lot of aggro. Pretended to lose my mind all of a sudden.”

“That was... all an act?”

“Yes. If I acted strangely, I felt like someone would watch me closely. So I split off alone, muttered to myself, hit my head against the wall, drew even more aggro, and when the moment came... boom!”

Ibaekho spread his hands as if expressing an explosion ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ and continued.

“I used area attacks recklessly nearby. But someone really got hit. After that, it was just as the baron saw.”

“Uh... I see...?”

“How about it? My plan? Genius, wasn’t it?”

Well, I don’t know about genius. One thing’s clear: his mental state is not normal.

‘This guy’s truly crazy...’

I was speechless, and Ibaekho smirked and turned away.

“Anyway, I’m calm now... time to test the center.”

Then he walked over to the unconscious Briat and started searching his clothes.

“Damn, seems all the important stuff is in the subspace.”

“No bow in sight. Isn’t that a Numbers item? A pretty high number too.”

“Ha, if he doesn’t cooperate, we can’t even loot properly... Hey, old man! Any ideas?”

“I’ll take a look.”

The destroyer elder approached, bent over, looked closely, and shook his head.

“The ritual is complex; it seems impossible to open the subspace fully or transfer the seal intact.”

“Then no way?”

“You can forcibly open the subspace by destroying the ritual itself, but that will cause loss.”

“What kind of loss?”

“About thirty percent of items inside the subspace will vanish into multiple dimensions.”

“Oh, simply put, there’s a 30% chance the bow will disappear?”

“What will you do?”

“Do it. This guy won’t open it willingly anyway.”

“Then we need to move to a bigger space.”

Following the destroyer elder’s advice, we took Briat to the main hall and laid him down neatly. Then...

“Let’s begin.”

We immediately started dismantling the subspace ritual. Whooosh!

At first, the red seal on the back of the hand heated up, then at some point, white light started flowing out.

How much time passed after that?

Flash! A small portal opened on the back of the hand.

Then—boom! With an explosion, items presumably inside the subspace scattered wildly in all directions.

“Wow...”

Like treasure goblins, really.***

How big was Briat’s subspace?

“This is the 30% loss amount...?”

Everyone was dumbfounded by the amount of items pouring out.

Roughly, more than half the main hall seemed covered with dropped items...

“W-wait!”

As the items came out chaotically, the hall quickly turned into a mess. Clang! Broken potions, ceramics... Boom!

Some explosive consumables apparently exploded as soon as they came out.

Swooooosh! A cloud of poison powder scattered, and everyone had to sweat it out casting antidote spells. Still, the rewards were definite.

“Yeah, we trusted you!!!”

The intact drop of No. 696 Reindris’s Imperial Palace.

Also, expensive equipment could be seen scattered everywhere.

As a long-time ‘raider’ in the top ranks, he had amassed a lot of gear...

‘Seems he didn’t get to dispose of much after being outside the walls for so long.’

Besides, storing expensive equipment is a habit of Noark raiders. Noark frequently trades goods.

They prefer swapping goods of equal value rather than selling cheap.

“Everyone, don’t stuff things in your back pockets, gather everything properly! Distribution will be fair.”

Afterwards, everyone worked together to gather and sort items, finding many suspicious objects.

“What the hell is this wolf mask?”

“Why did Briat carry so many of the same masks?”

“They’re not the same mask. This and that one. Can’t you tell the sizes differ?”

There were an oddly large number of wolf masks, and also strange medals as sister items.

“This medal has a wolf engraved too.”

“It’s too coincidental to be loot picked up randomly.”

“Let me see for a moment.”

The destroyer elder took the medal abruptly, inspected it carefully, and made a strange expression.

“Do you know this item?”

“I vaguely remember hearing about this medal a long time ago.”

“What kind of item? Doesn’t seem to be a magical tool with special function.”

“This isn’t a magic tool, but a symbol indicating membership in a group.”

“A group?”

“This is the first I’ve heard of such a group using this emblem.”

“It probably is. It’s an ancient group from when Rafdonia was founded.”

“An ancient group? What’s the name?”

GM’s eyes sparkled with curiosity as the destroyer elder looked at the medal and replied.

“Hirkmuta.”

“Translated, it means ‘White Wolf’ in an ancient language.”

“It’s named after the epithet of the figure they followed.”

“An epithet?”

“The White-robed Mage.”

GM’s eyes widened. It was inevitable—there was only one person called the White-robed Mage in Rafdonia’s history.

“The White-robed Mage was the last great sage, Diphlun Groundel Gavrilius. Hirkmuta was a group formed by those who followed him.”

Hirkmuta. An ancient group formed by followers of Diphlun Groundel Gavrilius, known as the White-robed Mage and last great sage.

“But isn’t it strange? They say the masks are white wolves, so why are all the masks black?”

“Hmm... I don’t know either. Briat, I don’t think you’ll tell us either. What do you think?”

When asked, Ibaekho muttered vaguely.

“Hmm... I even boosted his pain perception, so if he’s going to speak, maybe we just have to beat him. No other way.”

Seeing Ibaekho shake his head at how tough Briat was, the destroyer elder casually said.

“...Maybe a ‘gag’ is placed on him, and even if he wants to speak, he can’t.”

“A gag? What do you mean, old man?”

“When I researched Hirkmuta, I read that members take a vow of secrecy.”

“A vow and a gag are a bit different, no?”

“That’s why it’s speculation. But there was an ancient magic that forced vows to be binding, so it’s not entirely impossible.”

“Hmm... I see.”

When the conversation reached that point, Jaina suddenly called us urgently.

“Hey! Everyone come quick! Briat is dead!”

“...Huh? Oh, that? Don’t mind it, he’s probably just flipped over and pretending to be dead again—”

“No, I think he’s really dead!”

Jaina’s serious reaction made Ibaekho approach Briat with a doubtful expression.

Tap, tap. He shook Briat’s shoulder with his toe, but there was no reaction.