Chapter 588
Episode 152: Quall Ganesto (3)
Quall had a somewhat prickly personality, so I was a bit worried, but surprisingly, as soon as he arrived, he got along well with the others.
Sure, he had his gruff moments, but he showed a rough kind of kindness toward the kids, and the others quickly accepted him.
“Master, it seems everyone misses Murakan quite a bit,” Gilly said as she sat beside Jin. They were watching the kids teasing Quall, calling him a bandit or bandit leader.
“Murakan?”
“When Murakan was around, Tikan always felt lively and noisy. He’d shout and fuss, but he actually took care of everyone and played well with the kids. It seems Quall is filling that role now.”
“Well, he does play well with the kids, but hasn’t really looked after the others yet, right? Quall only arrived three hours ago.”
Gilly’s eyes widened at that. Thinking about it, Jin realized she was right.
In the past three hours, Quall had appointed Amela as his assistant, offered the same to Beris but got flatly rejected, and then they exchanged some colorful language. He even got smacked on the chin by Quikantel for messing around, but he didn’t seem discouraged or down.
“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” Gilly said.
Maybe she just missed Murakan… Jin understood it that way.
‘Thinking that those two might become a couple makes me feel kind of weird…’
To Jin, they were practically like parents.
So whenever there was some strange tension between them, Jin felt an inexplicable unease.
“Ahem, well then, I’ll get back to the work I’ve been putting off, Master.”
After Gilly left, Jin chuckled softly.
‘I wonder how Murakan’s doing.’
Murakan was currently away, filling in for Misha. He was acting as a deputy for Solderet.
Jin didn’t know exactly what that entailed. Since it was a divine matter, he assumed it involved maintaining the world’s balance and order.
Even Misha admitted she didn’t fully understand everything as she carried out her duties. It was beyond mortal comprehension.
“Lady Amela.”
Rolling over, Amela, dressed in her round bush-like outfit, tumbled toward Jin.
“My lord.”
“You were talking with Quall for a while earlier. What do you think of him?”
“About his abilities?”
“Yes.”
“Even if I had ten people, I couldn’t come close to Quall’s level.”
“Is that so?”
“Technically, he’s at least a few hundred years ahead. We just started looking at the all-weather accelerated wave cannon with magic absorption and injection today, and he already solved some problems I couldn’t figure out. It’ll still take time to perfect it, but surpassing Cozek’s main cannon won’t take long.”
“Wow…”
Quall’s confident claim that meeting him was the greatest fortune wasn’t an empty boast.
Amela, more than a mercenary, seemed to genuinely respect Quall as a researcher.
“Leaving that old man lying in the wilderness was pure madness. The biggest mistake they ever made.”
There was another reason Quall had been abandoned in the outlands.
Jipl had been under the illusion that they had exploited most of his abilities.
‘Not entirely wrong. Until recently.’
Quall had been a genius from the start.
But his engineering skills were still improving in real time.
Just as he had only recently realized he was a descendant of the ‘Ganesto’ bloodline, some of his ‘inherited memories’—sealed away after the Sword Emperor War—were now being unlocked as the story’s power waned.
‘The Tenth Knight, Lokia Ganesto, set up a mechanism to pass down memories to his descendants… something like that.’
Memory inheritance.
Jin had already experienced firsthand, thanks to the Pluto siblings, that this was possible. Hister was also leaving magic, mana, records, and memories to his descendants through a ‘heritage site.’
Ganesto was similarly passing down memories in some way. Jipl was completely unaware of this.
Still, Jipl should have either killed Quall or kept him under strict supervision. If he hadn’t been so badly hurt in the Sword Emperor War, he probably would have.
“They’ll come looking for Quall again soon. So, Lady Amela, keep a close eye on him. Absolutely no outings outside Tikan.”
“You want me to lock him up and make him study all day?”
“Basically.”
“Don’t worry about that. Even if I told him to go out, he’d just hole up in the lab. But I’ll keep a closer watch.”
There was much to be done through Quall.
And all of it had to yield better results than when Rosa chose the ‘Prophet.’
—I originally planned to use those through the Prophet. But after suspending Joshua’s Rider status, I changed my mind. I will postpone negotiations with the Prophet. During that time, prove to me that you have a better method than the Prophet.
—If I fail, then the acting head of the family will… hand those over to the Prophet. That’s what you mean.
Rosa still maintained the stance that she could hand over the machines and ship blueprints to the Prophet at any time.
‘If Jipl hadn’t suffered such heavy losses in the Sword Emperor War, Mother would have taken those from me immediately.’
Though she hadn’t told Jin, Rosa actually wanted to negotiate with the Prophet right now to complete the machines and ships. Like Quall, the war had changed her internally.
Yet she was postponing negotiations for one reason: the family’s power had weakened, and if something went wrong in talks with the Prophet, they’d have fewer options to respond.
No one really knew how much military power the Prophet held. Since they hadn’t directly influenced the Sword Garden yet, it was assumed they couldn’t overturn the family at will.
“But for now, disguise Quall with products from the Gold Seal tribe. Lady Amela, prepare to go out as well.”
“Where to?”
“There are some who need to pay for their crimes. If they try to cheat again, I won’t be able to track it alone. I’ll need your help.”
Kinzello Headquarters.
As always, Kinzello’s executives watched Ainas and Bubar playing with troubled eyes.
“Ron Hiran… I never thought he’d ascend to Creation.”
Even Marjiela, who usually wore a cheerful smile, looked worried.
She had foreseen Dante’s death before the Sword Emperor War began. Not only that, she knew how the world’s balance would shift after Gliek awakened from the White Stone.
But every future she predicted was completely overturned by Ron reaching Creation at the last moment.
“I don’t like this feeling. Making Lord Jin one of us seems impossible now.”
“Did you see that future with your powers?”
When Zephyrin asked, Marjiela shook her head.
“I can’t see Lord Jin’s fate at all. But since things have gone this way, it feels like he’s drifting further from us.”
“That demon was already far from us.”
“That’s not wrong either.”
“And even if the fate you saw had played out, Lord Jin would have distanced himself from us.”
“Maybe in heart, but he would have needed our help regardless.”
A member of the Red Lake tribe came running breathlessly to the executives.
“What’s going on?”
Berakt glared at the Red Lake tribesman who rushed in without caution.
“Lord Jin Runkandel has come to the Beastmen’s territory! Huff, huff. He says he’s here for the meeting we talked about last time…”
The tribesman was out of breath from running. The reason was clear.
“If he doesn’t show up at Yukayuka Market by noon, he says the meeting’s off and he’ll leave!”
All eyes turned to the clock on the wall.
Only two minutes remained until noon. Even if Zephyrin transformed into his true form and flew straight through the ceiling, he couldn’t arrive in time.
“Hah! That arrogant bastard is mocking us again? This won’t do, Berakt. Send a message to Tikan. If he doesn’t return to the Beastmen’s land today, we’ll attack Tikan immediately!”
Jo shouted fiercely, and for once, Berakt tried to respond positively.
But the moment Marjiela shook her head, Berakt silenced Jo.
“Shut up, Jo.”
“That’s right, Uncle Jo. Lord Jin never makes empty threats. If not now, we’ll never see those machines and blueprints again.”
The ship blueprints and machines were crucial to Kinzello as well. They had risked heavy losses in the Sota Desert to seize them in the first place.
Marjiela made a quick decision.
“I’ll open the door. Sorry, Captain!”
She waved her hand in the air, and suddenly a massive steel door formed in the middle of the conference room. Unfortunately, the Kinzello captain lying in the headquarters’ inner chamber coughed up blood once again.
“Every time that demon gets involved, my master’s recovery is delayed…”
“Let’s all go!”
All the executives passed through the steel door Marjiela opened. As soon as they arrived at Yukayuka Market, they found Jin holding a pocket watch.
“11:59:57 a.m. What a shame. If you’d been four seconds later, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Seems like the things you got from the Sota Desert are just as important to you as they are to me.”
“Hmm, it’s been a while. Jin Kyung! How have you been?”
Margiela forced a smile.
“I don’t think we’re exactly on friendly terms to be exchanging pleasantries, Margiela.”
“I agree, Jin Kyung. Since I came in a hurry, I couldn’t bring the engineers along. I trust you’ll understand that—otherwise, it wouldn’t be fun for either of us.”
Zeppelin ground his teeth as he spoke, and Jin scoffed.
“Fine, I’ll let that slide. But you’re all guilty of insolence. You knew Gliek could awaken, didn’t you?”
“Even if we did, what’s the problem? It just means our intelligence was better. Like you said, we’re not close enough to exchange greetings, let alone be allies, so there was no need to share that information.”
“True enough. Since we’re not allies, I’m just going to pin the charge of insolence on you. Honestly, there’s no reason to share what we found in the Sota Desert with you. So, there’s one more condition for this meeting. If you want to see the goods…”
Jin’s expression hardened as he continued, “Tell me how Biment came to find Temar’s body.”