I Became the Magic Tower Master's Experimental Mouse - Chapter 74

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Cassian bolted straight down to the Lobby.
“What—what is it?”
“Is that Cassian? No—the young Prince Behemoth?”
Those who recognized him murmured among themselves.
Cassian pushed through the crowd and came to a halt before Bedel.
“What happened to Epiphany? Where is she?”
Bedel looked down at Cassian with a bewildered expression. The boy’s face was terrifying.
Just nine years old, yet radiating an aura so sinister it chilled the air.
“Young Master. Epiphany and Liz have disappeared.”
The moment Bedel spoke, Cassian lunged toward the door.
“You mustn’t!”
Bedel hurried to block the threshold.
“If the Tower Master learns of this—and the streets are dangerous now. We don’t know who took them. If something happens to you as well—!”
For Bedel, who understood Cassian’s situation, this chaos unfolding in the Tower Master’s absence felt like a nightmare.
“I’m going to find Epiphany.”
“Please wait a moment. I’ve already contacted the Guards—”
As Bedel stammered, trying to hold Cassian back, someone across the Lobby touching a Communication Device called out that the line had connected.
Bedel grabbed Cassian and moved closer to the device.
“This is the Poison Tower. This afternoon, a six-year-old girl was kidnapped from the Eastern Shop District General Store. Her name is Epiphany, nickname Epiphany. She has short honey-brown hair and distinctive crimson eyes. There is also another victim—a twenty-four-year-old woman named Liz, with shoulder-length bronze hair, green eyes, and wearing a long yellow dress today.”
He relayed the detailed circumstances through the Communication Device.
The Guards confirmed they would dispatch immediately and cut the connection.
“The report is done. I’m leaving.”
Cassian jerked his hand free from Bedel’s grip.
“Take me to where Epiphany went.”
This was no longer the hybrid beast cooing affectionately at Epiphany—it was unmistakably the bearing of the young Prince Behemoth.
Bedel spoke as if trying to soothe him.
“Young Master, we will certainly find Epiphany. If you join the search and get lost yourself, it will only make things worse.”
“You might not be able to, but I can find her.”
Cassian’s golden eyes gleamed with clarity.
His words were no exaggeration.
His heart was being pulled in an odd way, as if it were telling him where Epiphany was.
‘I have to find her quickly.’
In truth, Cassian’s body had felt strange since waking.
Ever since he’d opened his eyes, it was as though his heart had split into two. The unfamiliar terror rising in his chest felt unmistakably like hers.
Epiphany was somewhere right now, frightened.
The thought sent white-hot rage blazing through him.
He’d only been sent out for a change of scenery, and the moment he was gone, she’d been taken.
‘They didn’t take me because—they saw my hybrid form.’
Self-recrimination flooded through him.
If he’d been there beside her, she wouldn’t have been spirited away so helplessly.
At the very least, he could have fought to protect her somehow.
‘Just because I wanted to act spoiled—’
It felt as though his own selfish desire to stay close had put her in danger.
‘I have to be there. I think I know where she is.’
Cassian looked up at the unreliable adults surrounding him.
Much as he hated to admit it, with the Tower Master absent, there was no one he could lean on.
“Bedel. Take the Young Master with you.”
“First Elder!”
“If you’re careful in attending him, what’s the harm?”
At this unexpected help, Cassian’s expression brightened slightly.
Bedel ended up gathering a few more people and set out to search with Cassian.
After dividing the area into sections, centered on where Epiphany and Liz had vanished,
the search party departed from the Magic Tower, maps in hand.
As Bedel unfolded a map beneath a lantern and pointed out their assigned zone, Cassian ignored the map entirely.
Instead, he closed his eyes and moved, following the strange pulse within his chest.
That pulse rang clearest not from the East where Epiphany had disappeared, but from the North.
“It’s this way.”
“Young Master? But that’s not within our search area—”
“This way.”
Cassian opened his eyes and moved forward without hesitation.
Bedel glanced between the map and the boy’s back, then finally folded the map away.
* * *
“What’s your name?”
“……Didn’t Marie tell you?”
“You only need to answer the questions I ask you.”
My teacher smiled faintly as she spoke.
There was a look about her that suggested she wouldn’t tolerate any further defiance.
‘I don’t want to get hit for nothing.’
There was no point in needlessly resisting and bringing pain upon myself.
I decided to answer obediently and lull my teacher into complacency.
“It’s Epiphany…….”
“How old are you?”
“Six years old.”
“How did you come to the Magic Tower?”
“I saw a notice board. So I went to apply for work…….”
After that, my teacher continued firing off tedious questions.
Most of them were things I couldn’t help but wonder why she’d even ask.
‘……She’s establishing a baseline.’
I realized she was laying groundwork for an interrogation.
She was asking questions she already knew the answers to, memorizing the sound of my voice and my physical responses when I told the truth.
That way, when I lied later, it would be easier to spot the difference.
It was a technique she herself had taught me before the return.
‘So I have to be as honest as possible.’
Lies are a resource to be rationed—saved for when they’re truly necessary.
“Has anyone sick come to the Magic Tower recently?”
Now I understood why I’d been summoned here.
What they wanted was information about Cassian and Aquila.
‘For now, I’m still not entirely sure why they picked me instead of Liz…….’
Either way, the Guild had used poison, so they’d want to know the outcome.
If I answered well, I could prevent any additional threats that might befall the two of them.
‘The problem is Liz.’
Daeri had been Liz’s friend for weeks. How much had Liz already told her?
If I feigned ignorance and it contradicted information Liz had already shared, I’d be in serious trouble.
But if I told her everything, I’d be betraying everyone.
Liz probably kept the Magic Tower’s secrets, but in casual conversation, she might have unknowingly revealed important details.
‘It’s frustrating, but…… I can’t even handle Daeri alone, let alone my teacher.’
To seize an opportunity, I had no choice but to obey meekly and wait for circumstances to shift after this conversation ended.
“I heard there was someone sick in the basement.”
I offered only half the truth.
“You haven’t seen them?”
“I saw someone pass by from a distance. They were on a stretcher, so I couldn’t see their face…….”
I was recalling the time Aquila had been brought in on a stretcher.
Continuing to look frightened, I read my teacher’s expression and movements.
Not yet. I hadn’t been caught yet.
“There haven’t been any secret visitors at night?”
“I sleep at night. I get punished if I’m not asleep by nine.”
She seemed to be asking about Aquila, but here it felt right to deny knowing anything outright.
It was likely just a probe anyway.
“Did you happen to see any animals in the tower?”
“Poison experimental subjects? Not anthropomorphic beings like me, but there are some experimental animals around, I think. Though I’ve never seen them.”
I noticed my teacher ask about Cassian in an offhand tone, and I suppressed the chill that threatened to run through me.
Since Cassian had never been exposed to outsiders, she couldn’t be certain whether he’d become a Hybrid Beast or not.
So it seemed she wanted to confirm the possibility through my reaction.
“What did you mainly do with the Tower Master? Were you there next to her when she met with people and performed detoxifications?”
I instinctively realized this was the moment to lie.
“Me……?”
I widened my eyes and let my tail and ears droop limply.
“I just…… only have the role of experimenting with poisons. I’m a test subject. I can’t go into the Tower Master’s laboratory…….”
My teacher didn’t respond.
She simply stared at me, unblinking.
The room had grown so quiet I could hear the Lantern crackling.
After a moment, she withdrew something from her robe.
A Glass Vial no larger than a thumbnail.
“There’s a simpler way than asking questions.”
The liquid caught the Lantern’s glow, sloshing darkly inside the glass.
“Bring her.”
“Yes.”
Daeri moved swiftly toward the entrance and pulled the door open.
Then she signaled upstairs.
A moment later, multiple footsteps echoed down the staircase.
Light, nimble footfalls of Assassins interspersed with a halting, dragging gait.
‘……No. Not her.’
That dragging sound I’d been hearing intermittently from upstairs all this time.
I’d forced myself to ignore it—refused to believe it meant another hostage.
Please. Please let me be wrong.
The figure being dragged into the room was…….
“Ngh, nngh—!”
Liz.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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