"Why have these logs been wiped?" Commander Wren demanded.

After arriving back in the outpost, the commander headed straight for the control room to check the logs with Damion. Unfortunately, when they arrived, they found the event logs for the last hour had been deleted.

"Is there a backup? Or can the logs be recovered?"

"The logs are always sent in real time to headquarters, so if an outpost comes under attack and suddenly wiped out, as much information for a response is available as possible. But it will take them a while to sort through their records and send a copy back here. And that is assuming that the person who deleted the logs in the first place did not prevent the real time transfer."

"Well, since it is obvious that this was an intentional attack on me, might I view your roster? If I see a name that is familiar to me, or a family that is, it could help narrow your field of suspects."

"Here," Commander Wren said, handing Damion a tablet.

He quickly scrolled through the list. Looking for names of families he had angered. There were a few possibilities, but one name stood out. Richard Thorn. The former dean of Silver Spire Magic Academy had been sentenced to the Crimson Order due to his falsifying Damion's magic test results.

"Only one name stands out. But I have a hard time believing he would be foolish enough to actually attack me when it would be clear to anyone investigating what happened and that he would be the prime suspect."

Commander Wren looked at the name Damion had singled out and felt the young mage was right. Even if Richard Thorn wanted to take revenge on Mage wells, there was little opportunity for him to. As an A Rank mage working off a punishment, he was assigned to frontline or scouting duties. Mage Thorn would not have access to the control room and should not have sufficient knowledge of the control artifact to be able to clear the logs.

"I agree with your assessment. We will of course speak with Mage Thorn with a detection artifact, to be absolutely certain, but it is doubtful he is the perpetuator of this. Most likely he is just someone's hopeful scapegoat."

"Sir!" A Crimson Order knight greeted as ran up to Commander Wren with a tablet in his hands. "We have just received the backup log."

"This doesn't make sense," the Commander said after looking at the logs.

"What is it?" Damion asked.

"Take a look for yourself."

Damion took the tablet and scrolled through the data. Despite knowing what he was looking at, he had no idea how to interpret the information in front of him.

"I don't understand," Damion finally said, he looked through every entry in the log, but nothing stood out to him, so he had no idea what is it that did not make sense to the Commander.

"Nor do I. The backup logs say the cannons were never fired at all."

"It must have been quite the dream I was having," Damion quipped.

"I assure you; I will get to the bottom of this."

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"Don't go out on a limb Commander. The only people that could have sent those logs back falsified are powerful enough that you don't want to antagonize them."

"No doubt. But the Crimson Order does not tolerate corruption. We are the frontline of humanity against the hordes of Demonic Beasts out there. Sitting and doing nothing will betray the oath I took. I will not stop until I uncover the truth."

"If you want to investigate this, you have two choices, either do it quietly or do it loudly. I'm not sure if either way will succeed, but at least one way will probably keep you alive longer."

"What do you mean?"

"If you start a quiet investigation, you may very well find out the truth, but there is no telling when whoever did this will find out about your investigation and silence you. A loud investigation means you make sure everyone knows you are seeking answers about this event and how horrible it was a prodigy was almost killed and that someone higher up is covering it up."

"Won't that just anger who did this?"

"Any investigation will anger them. But if everyone knows what you are doing, they can't just kill you to make you stop investigating. If you are making enough noise about getting answers, silencing you will confirm your beliefs to everyone else."

"You don't want me to investigate, you want me to turn public opinion."

"By all means, investigate. But I don't think you will get anywhere. The backup logs were sent through very quickly and I am sure the trail ends there. Public pressure will hopefully keep who ever tried to kill me from trying again. That is all I particularly care about."

"I can't fault you for that," Commander Wren told him with a sigh. "I just wish I could do more."

"Who is over the Crimson Order?"

"In principle, we are an independent Order, that works with the Mage Association and the S Rank Assembly to counter the threats of the Yellow and Red Zones. But in practice, we are basically support to both of them. The Crimson Order does not have enough manpower to do much on our own, not with how spread out we are. That leaves us in the position where we have to follow the Mage Association's orders and of course everyone follows the Assembly's requests."

"Is there anyone in particular that can think of who would know your control artifacts well enough to fire the cannons at me and fake the logs?"

"There are a few dozen potential people. All high Rankers in the Mage Association."

"Then that is your pool of suspects."

Commander Wren's eyes went wide when he heard Damion's assertion. His pool of suspects were the top figures in the Mage Association! Even hinting at their corruption would be enough to get himself sentenced to a punishment tour in the Crimson Order.

"Don't look so shocked. You said yourself it takes a certain level of knowledge and access to be able to cause the cannons to fire and supply false backup logs."

"Yes. But I can't just go and accuse A Rankers of attempted murder."

"Then don't."

"What do you mean?"

"Ask them to investigate themselves."

Commander Wren considered Damion's suggestion for a moment. If all he did was bring to light the suspicious circumstances around the magic cannon firing on Mage Wells and the fake backup logs, then he would not be accusing anyone of anything. He just had to clamor loudly enough that the Mage Association would have no choice but to investigate themselves.

"I suppose your plan could work. I am guessing you have no desire to stick around here for long. You mentioned missions before, are there any particular missions you are looking to take?"

"Ones that I can handle alone as a B Rank mage," Damion told him. "There wouldn't happen to be a way for me to take missions without having to come to an outpost would there?"

"Since you are a high Ranker I can arrange it. We can set up on your tablet a connection to the mission boards for the Crimson Order and Mage Association. You will be able to accept any mission just like if you were at an outpost. Many missions overlap, and you can only take either the Crimson Order mission or the Mage Association mission. The other drawback is payment for missions is delayed until completion can be verified."

"How does that process work?"

"If the mission was to clear an area of Demonic Beasts or to kill a certain Demonic Beast that has been causing trouble, normally you would return to an outpost and show your kills and that would be enough. You can still do that, or you can mark the mission complete on your tablet and wait until someone from the Order can be dispatched to verify you were successful."

"I'm in no rush to get credit for missions. I want to get more experience. I have no issue with waiting for verification."

"I thought you would say that. Let me get you set up."

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