A few days later, a report came from the director.
The spy in question had apparently met a sudden death.
The content was unexpected, and it surprised even me.
They had shown no signs just moments before, passing away peacefully in their sleep.
This was a situation that could not simply be ignored.
To confirm the truth, I immediately headed for the laboratory.
Upon teleporting underground, the director rushed over at once.
She kept bowing her head apologetically.
"I'm truly sorry, My Lord Demon King! I was watching without letting my attention slip for even a moment, but...!"
"Don't worry about it. Even I likely couldn't have prevented this."
I calmed the director down.
This was not a consolation, but a pure, factual statement.
The director's constant surveillance meant that all defenses were already perfect.
There was no more stringent security measure possible.
Even if I had personally managed the spies myself, the result would likely have been the same.
This failure was almost unavoidable.
There was no reason to blame the director.
Rather, given the unknown circumstances, I should praise her spirit and effort in agreeing to the analysis.
Guided by the director, I moved to an isolated room.
She led the way, looking a bit discouraged.
"This is the room... please, go in."
In the center of the room we were invited into, the intelligence agents lay arranged side by side.
I could feel no sign of life.
They were undoubtedly dead.
Surprisingly, their expressions were peaceful.
The last time I'd seen them, they'd been frantic with terror and urgency, but not a trace of that remained.
If judging by appearance alone, they looked as though they were merely asleep.
The Director stood beside the agents.
She placed a hand on the neck of one of them.
"There are no external injuries, nor any trace of disease or curses. This is, without question, a sudden death."
"Hmm..."
I crouched before a corpse.
Indeed, there were no external injuries.
I sensed no abnormal flow of magic energy either; it was simply a dead body.
Next, I examined the eyes of the corpse.
As before, no irregularities were apparent.
Even staring intently, I felt no psychic contamination.
There was absolutely no sensation of being watched back.
(No traces of a spell, and the cause of death is unknown. This is troublesome.)
I contemplated as I examined the bodies one by one.
It was unnatural precisely because there had been no anomalies up to this point.
We didn’t know why they had died.
It was all too baffling.
Every corpse was in the identical state.
That made it all the more troubling.
“We’ve been had. It seems the caster judged the operatives expendable.”
The sudden deaths were most likely artificial.
Whoever had tampered with the spies’ eyes must have remotely disposed of them via that alteration.
Though the specific sorcery remained unknown, it was certain something had been done.
“Has analysis yielded any results?”
“Indeed. A summary has been prepared as documentation.”
From the entryway, a different director entered.
She handed me a stack of papers.
What they contained was the analysis of the spies.
The director’s findings were detailed within.
It seemed she was attempting to unravel the mystery from various perspectives.
According to this, a caster apparently did exist.
They had been watching us through the spies’ eyes.
When our gazes had met, I had nearly suffered spiritual contamination.
There were no other special effects noted.
The intelligence agents had been treated like little more than surveillance devices.
Someone must have deployed them for reconnaissance of the Demon Lord's domain.
Unfortunately, this had yet to yield any definitive leads, but we were making steady progress.
The volume of information had grown considerably.
Eliminating extraneous possibilities was valuable work in its own right.
Of course, no excessive human experimentation had been conducted either.
It was unlikely that the director's analysis had directly caused anyone's sudden death.
"When our eyes met, there was definitely some kind of buzzing sensation... If only I could have pinpointed their coordinates, it would have been perfect."
"Any disturbances in your mental state?"
"None at all, sir! I'm in peak condition, as you can see!"
"...That's reassuring."
Something indescribable stirred in me as the director answered with a smile.
According to the records, the director had stared intently into the agents' eyes on multiple occasions.
There were even entries noting that the director had locked eyes with them for an entire day and night without blinking.
This was no exaggeration—it was fact.
It was clearly far outside the bounds of normal behavior, but the director had always been this way.
This was not the result of mental contamination.
For the time being, we had grasped everything we currently could.
There was no point in lingering any longer.
It was troubling that the adversary's identity and purpose remained obscured, but fretting over it would accomplish nothing.
As I organize my thoughts, I issue instructions to the Director.
"Leave the bodies in your custody for now. I'd like you to continue the analysis. Contact me if anything comes up."
"Understood! I will deliver results, no matter what!"
Though the spy is dead, the analysis itself is progressing.
There is nothing to do but continue searching.
Leaving matters to the Director, who responds with resolute energy, I return to the audience chamber.