“Who is it?”

The scarred man lowered his arm and checked the face of the soldier who had just entered the mine.

Seeing the soldier wearing armor engraved with the Lambarda family crest, the man frowned as if displeased.

“You’re from that family?”

“Someone like you, a mere mercenary, doesn’t need to know!”

The soldier spoke as if even talking to a mercenary was unpleasant.

“Why don’t you just do your job properly? This child was wandering around the mansion. How are you handling things that this happens!”

At the soldier’s scolding, the man showed a disrespectful attitude and answered halfheartedly.

“Ah, yes, yes. I’ll be careful.”

The soldier openly showed his displeasure and turned around as if his business was finished.

After the soldier left, the man with severe scars spat out a crude curse.

“This XXX! I’m just doing what I’m told because they’re paying me, XX! Who do they think they are treating me like a babysitter for these brats!”

The man spat on the ground with a ‘ptooey!’

Then, as if to take out his anger on the child the soldier had brought, he roughly grabbed the child’s arm.

“You! Were you loitering around the mansion? When did you go out? What a nuisance!”

The man growled.

But the child paid no attention and instead looked around with sharp eyes like a hawk.

“…!”

And as soon as he spotted Dino and Philip lying on the ground, he ran to them.

“Dino! Philip!”

“Huh…?”

Dino and Philip, startled by their names being called unexpectedly, raised their heads in confusion.

Philip’s coughing had subsided after coming outside and breathing fresh air.

“Are you alright? I came to find you.”

Aiden went close to Dino and Philip and checked on his younger brothers’ condition.

“Elder brother Aiden?”

“Brother…”

Dino and Philip burst into tears upon seeing Aiden’s face.

“Waaah!”

“Brotherrr!!!”

Dino’s crying was louder than Philip’s.

“That’s why I told you to always be careful and not follow strangers!”

Aiden scolded them fiercely.

But at this moment, Dino and Philip were so glad to see Aiden.

Dino said while crying loudly.

“Elder brother Aiden! I was wrong!”

Aiden hugged Dino, who was bawling, and Philip, who was sniffling.

Thus, the emotional reunion of Aiden and his younger brothers took place.

And behind them, the man watching the scene asked.

“Oh my? What’s this. Elder brother came to save his little brothers? Elder brother?”

The man mockingly imitated Dino and Philip’s way of speaking.

“You came in here on your own to save your brothers? What a crazy little brat.”

At those words, Aiden glared at the man.

The man, chuckling, raised his club threateningly at Aiden.

“Now that the great elder brother is here, you can work hard for your brothers’ share too! Right?”

The scarred man grinned with a vile smile.

“…”

Contrary to Dino and Philip’s expectations that Aiden would magnificently save them, Aiden asked the man.

“What do I need to do?”

“Oh. I’m glad you understand so well. I was thinking of beating you up as an example if you didn’t, but you’re quick-witted, huh? I like that about you.”

“Brother…”

Dino looked at Aiden with anxious eyes.

“Well then, you can start working right away. Go in there.”

The scarred man made Aiden, Dino, and Philip go deep inside the mine shaft again.

“Use this to break as much soil and rocks around the red stones as possible. Don’t break the red stones.”

What the man gave Aiden was a long iron nail with a blunt end and a heavy hammer.

Dino and Philip received crude hand shovels.

At the innermost part of the mine shaft, the three children had to dig out firmly embedded rocks.

There, Aiden whispered quietly to Dino and Philip in a low voice.

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything, so you two just pretend to work. Cover your mouths and noses well with your scarves so you don’t breathe in dust. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Uh-huh.”

Dino and Philip nodded, saying they understood.

Karina, who had followed Aiden, was appalled.

“It looks like they just sent children into the mine shaft… Did I see that right?”

Karina doubted her own eyes for a moment.

She had been hiding to avoid being detected, so she was far away, and it was dark at night.

She wanted to believe it was a misunderstanding.

Karina rubbed her eyes and opened them again.

“I saw the same thing.”

But contrary to Karina’s hopes, Heistine confirmed the fact.

Mikhail also nodded in agreement with a regretful expression.

“They’re making those little kids do mining work?”

Karina lamented at the unbelievable situation.

“This doesn’t seem much different from being kidnapped and sold into slavery.”

Heistine continued with a grim expression.

“Taking young children, abusing them, and exploiting their labor until they die is something that happens frequently in unseen places.”

“…”

Karina was momentarily lost for words.

Forcing young children to do hard labor and exploiting their labor was prohibited by imperial law.

“This is clearly a crime.”

To Karina’s words, Heistine shrugged and said.

“You think they don’t know that? They brought the children on such a dark night to avoid being seen by people because they know.”

“No, where did they put the miners and why are they overworking such young children?”

“I’m not sure, but I heard that part of the mine shaft owned by the Lambarda family had collapsed. Perhaps the shaft of this mine collapsed and the passage narrowed? Just enough for small children to barely enter.”

Heistine guessed the situation almost accurately.

Mikhail added with a fierce look in his eyes as he stared at the mine shaft.

“If the children get hurt or sick and can’t work, they’ll be thrown back on the streets. Then they’ll die silently, suffering without receiving treatment.”

“…!”

Karina’s expression involuntarily grimaced at the horrific words.

Karina felt deep disgust towards Revals Lambarda for using children in this way.

“I’ll make sure Lambarda is punished for this.”

There was anger mixed in Karina’s voice.

“Even if they’re accused of exploiting children’s labor, the level of punishment for the Lambarda family won’t be that high. Because nobles are nobles even if they do such things.”

Heistine said calmly.

Karina tried to calm her anger.

“We need to get the children out right away.”

She thought that getting the children out first was the priority, regardless of what happened afterwards.

But unlike her feelings, getting the children out didn’t seem easy.

“There are too many guards around the mine. Given how tight the security is, they must have already prepared for intruders. And we don’t know if these are all the children, or if there are more elsewhere.”

Hearing the accurate explanation of the situation made it even more of a headache.

‘He was more meticulous and nasty than I thought.’

Karina pondered.

She wanted to make sure Revals couldn’t do such foolish things again.

But thinking about it, she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was similar to the situation with Croana poison.

‘As long as the mine exists, they’ll bring children back again using whatever dirty methods.’

“This won’t do.”

A fierce light shone in Karina’s eyes.

Karina opened her mouth with a determined look.

“Let’s blow up this copper mine.”

“What…?”

Mikhail and Heistine looked at Karina with surprised faces.

“Didn’t you say the mine shaft here collapsed once already? Let’s disguise it as a landslide or something and bury it deep in the ground. Make it so they can’t even dream of digging tunnels and mining again. Completely crumble it!”

Karina emphasized the word ‘crumble’.

“That’s a good idea.”

Mikhail agreed with a smile.

“What?”

Heistine was even more flustered by Mikhail’s agreement.

“If the mine explodes, the losses the Lambarda family will suffer related to mining will be enormous.”

Mikhail said with satisfaction.

“No… How are you planning to cause an explosion here now? We don’t know how big the mine is, what the inside is like…”

Heistine started listing the problems he could think of from his complicated thoughts.

Mikhail simply solved the problems he presented.

“You haven’t forgotten that I’m a magician, have you?”

“Ah…”

“With my abilities, that’s no problem at all.”

Heistine looked doubtful at Mikhail’s attitude of speaking as if it was too easy.

“If causing an explosion is possible, then there’s definitely potential. What do you think of this plan?”

At Karina’s question, Heistine grunted and then fell into deep thought.

Then he opened his mouth again.

“It’s certainly a bit reckless and rough method… but it’s not impossible.”

Karina raised the corners of her mouth and grinned.

“Good. So what should we do first?”

Mikhail answered smoothly.

“First, we need to evacuate the children, so we should meet Aiden and find out where the children are staying and how many there are.”

“Got it.”

“And we’ll need to identify the points to cause the explosion, so we should examine the inside of the mine shaft as well.”

So Karina’s group carefully made plans.

And they waited for an opportunity to secretly join up with Aiden and move.

Meanwhile.

Jeremiah had come down to his office and was in the middle of dealing with backlogged work.

His mood was very low due to being coldly turned away by Karina.

Despite it being late at night, the papers on Jeremiah’s desk showed no signs of decreasing.

And as always, whenever new information came in, Ron would come to the office regardless of time to report.

“There was an accident recently where part of a copper mine located near the southern village collapsed.”

“Copper mine?”

“Yes, at first we overlooked it since tunnel collapses in mines are common occurrences and didn’t seem to be a big problem, but the owner of that mine is the Lambarda family.”

“…”

“So we secretly investigated separately to see if there was anything strange, and there were odd rumors circulating among the miners working there.”

“What is it?”

“They say a mineral other than copper was discovered inside the mine. Apparently, there was quite a stir internally about it for a while.”

“Another mineral?”

“Yes, but one day an order of silence was issued about this fact, and they started recklessly widening the tunnel to mine the mineral in question. That is presumed to be the main cause of the accident that caused the mine tunnel to collapse.”

“So what is this newly discovered mineral?”

“According to the miner who witnessed it, it was a red stone. It shimmers as if there’s a burning flame inside, but when you actually touch it, it’s not hot. Judging from the description, it’s presumed to be flame stone, one of the magic stones.”

“Flame stone, huh.”

“If that really is flame stone, it seems the Lambarda family is secretly mining magic stones without permission and smuggling them somewhere.”

Jeremiah’s eyes sank deeply.

“How much of the magic stone is estimated to be deposited?”

“It seems to be quite a lot. Apparently, after the mineral was discovered, several experts secretly visited multiple times. From what the miner overheard, it’s estimated to be about 50,000 tons.”

When magic stones are discovered, it must be immediately reported to the imperial family to inform them of the fact.

The moment magic stones are discovered, they all become property of the imperial family.

Therefore, to mine magic stones, one had to receive mining rights from the imperial family, and the amount that could be mined was limited by imperial law.

Violating this was considered disobeying an imperial order and was an extremely serious crime.

And the greater the amount, the heavier the weight of the crime became.

“To think such an unsavory incident would occur in the North.”

“I apologize for not noticing earlier. It might cause unnecessary trouble, so it would be best to investigate thoroughly and resolve it.”

“I see. I should go and check the situation myself. The date…”

Jeremiah trailed off uncharacteristically.

Jeremiah calculated the time to return without being late, recalling the time Karina would eat breakfast.

“I’ll go right now.”

If he calculated the time to go to the southern village, assess the situation, and return, leaving now was right.

“Pardon? Now?”

Ron, who thought his night shift would end after just reporting, was shocked.

“Is there a problem?”

Ron realized that Jeremiah really intended to leave right away and bitterly gave up on going home.

“No. I’ll prepare right away.”

It was a late-night emergency call that came like a bolt from the blue for the knights as well.