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"Thank you for your patronage. I\'ll let you know if I gather more."

One sunny afternoon, along a dark alley in one of the streets in the Imperial Capital, Sergei just handed a few silver coins to an information broker as payment for providing him with the information Sergei needed. After their transaction, Sergei got out of the alley and blended in with the crowd by the street.

Sergei had been fulfilling the mission that Raphael tasked to him several days ago. Though not that much, he had progress and gathered some information through listening to rumors and asking locals and information brokers.

(If what he said was true, I need to go to that place to investigate.)

Aside from the words regarding the current situation of Edith Felsvorder, Sergei had been gathering information that might relate to the case.

Just now, the broker told him that there was a significant increase in security around the warehouse sector. He also mentioned that the most guard building was owned by the House of Aethel. Sergei knew that the Archduchy was involved with Edith\'s issues.

It could mean that there was something else going on there. Sergei could not just guess what was up there, so he decided on planning to go there later, and then he would report what he could find to Raphael.

◆◇◆◇◆◇

At night, past midnight, when most of the citizens were already resting, Sergei was in the warehouse sector of the Imperial Capital, silently walking between the tall warehouses to investigate.

A number of warehouses had guards roaming their vicinity; some did not. Although his Concealment was not making him fully invisible, Sergei activated it to increase his chances of not getting detected.

As his source said, Sergei confirmed that the number of people guarding the warehouse owned by the Aethel family was suspiciously large. Not only the numbers, but the individual strength of the guards was not to be taken lightly.

Sergei would be having a hard time passing them without getting noticed. If he were to be caught, he surely did not stand a chance against them.

Thankfully, knowing that Sergei would initiate an infiltration somewhere, Raphael kindly provided him a few data crystals containing some useful abilities. Sergei took a crystal from his trouser pocket and shattered it between his fingers, immediately activating the Perfect Concealment. Find your next read at m_v l|e-NovelBin.net

Shatter.

"Hm? I think I heard something over there." A guard\'s ear jolted before he muttered in a direction.

"But I can\'t see anything. Maybe it\'s nothing."

"Might be. I am probably tired."

Without the guard\'s knowledge, Sergei just passed through them. The doors to the warehouse were closed, but luckily, a guard came out so that Sergei managed to slip through and successfully enter the building.

Inside, Sergei could see wooden crates nearly lined up in multiple rows. He estimated that there were hundreds of them. The crates were stacked by three, making it so tall. Due to the arrangement, the crates created a maze-like setup inside the warehouse.

There were still guards inside, so Sergei still had to keep himself invisible. He was going to check the contents of the crates. He could detect that the crates in the outer ring were most storing common items, such as flour. If there was something these guards protected, it must be hidden deeper; therefore, he went in the maze.

However, there was a guard roaming between the stacked crates. But Sergei silently lunged at him from behind and swiftly struck his hand on his nape. The karate chop was so fast that the guard was not able to react and immediately went unconscious. Sergei then caught his body before gently laying him to the floor.

After that, Sergei went deeper until he reached the center of the crates. Each crate was fastened with nails, and Sergei could not afford to make any noise to just them.

Conveniently, one crate was already opened, and he was able to take a look inside. But the items he saw inside were something he was familiar with.

(Wait, these are...)

As soon as he grabbed one of the items, a noise suddenly rang out nearby.

"Traces of data crystals were found in the vicinity! A possible intruder alert! Search the area!"

It seemed like he had been found out, and a few guards were coming to his spot. Needing to escape, Sergei took a crystal from his pocket again. It was a data crystal containing the ability to instantly teleport to a certain location. As soon as Sergei broke it, he instantly disappeared on the spot with an item in his hand.

◆◇◆◇◆◇

One day Sergei contacted me days after giving him a mission, saying that he had something to report. Since it was the weekend, I decided to include Big Sis and Iris as well, and we met up with Sergei at the Lavender manor.

"—So this is what I have found."

After his brief initial report, Sergei placed something on the table. Big Sis, Iris, and I immediately recognized what Sergei just brought, which made us baffled.

"Wait, isn\'t this a karabiner?" My sister raised her brow.

The thing in front of us was the sniper rifle, a Kar98k specifically, that Sir Rick Wesley, one of my clones, invented. The karabiner was one of the key components for the revolutionaries to win the civil war in the Kingdom of Astley.

Due to its effectiveness in the war, the karabiner easily replaced the muskets as the Astley\'s standard military weapon. Many nations took interest in them, and Rick\'s company had been making the karabiners commercially available.

Our queendom had a good relationship with Rick, so we were able to buy them in bulk and distribute them to our military. The empire was also importing the karabiner and had been slowly replacing the muskets.

The production could not keep up with the demand, so the empire had limited stock of them, and the government had permission to purchase them. That raised the question of how the Aethel Archduchy had their hands on them.

"You said that there were crates of these in the warehouse?"

"Yes," Sergei affirmed. "I think there are also boxes of its ammunition."

"But how was the archduchy able to get them?" Iris asked. "Are they smuggling them?"

"I don\'t think so."

"How can you tell, Raphael?"

To prove my point, I grabbed the karabiner and unclipped the magazine.

"Look. This is not a product of Sir Rick as all. It\'s an imitation. The powder inside these cartridges is not smokeless powder. I\'ll give it a shot and hear it."

After clipping back the magazine, I deployed an Anti-Physical Barrier on the wall before I aimed the muzzle at it and then pulled the trigger. A deafening, loud sound rang out, and a flattened bullet dropped to the floor after being stopped by the barrier.

"Oh, this firearm indeed produces more smoke than an actual karabiner, and the bullet was flying slower and was less powerful. The smoke is better than what a gunpowder produces, so I could say they somewhat developed a better weapon than a musket, but never to the level of the karabiner."

"Nice observation, Sister. They can be copying the structure of the gun with minimal issues, but they could not figure out how to make the smokeless powder."

"Yeah. But what is the archduchy going to do with all of those weapons?"

"I don\'t know, Sister. But I am sure they are plotting something. Let\'s see what they will do. For now... Sergei."

"Yes, sir."

"They knew that someone broke into the warehouse, so refrain yourself from going out much in the meantime."

"I understand."