"Professor, we found it."
As soon as Lucas returned to the Magic Research Institute, he reported some good news.
"Prima Materia?"
Lucas nodded. "The site in Ireland was an ancient ruin with extremely powerful protective magic. We sent many curse-breakers to undo it, but there was no Prima Materia inside—only a signal reflection caused by the protective magic."
"Germany was much the same. It was an unregistered wizarding school that had been abandoned, though some powerful magic still remained."
"After that, we had no choice but to send people to infiltrate the seabed of the North Sea. That was also an underwater ruin, inhabited by a tribe of mermen. They were extremely troublesome, but we discovered that a treasure they worshiped was the Prima Materia."
As they spoke, they headed toward the Spellcraft Research Group. Lucas continued, "It was a rainbow-colored pearl set into the Merman King's crown. We had to go through quite a bit to obtain it."
"That pearl possessed an incredibly miraculous power. It could grant the Merman King formidable magic—ordinary mermen did not have much magical power, after all. At most, they could use some instinctive special magic triggered by sound. But the Merman King could use that pearl to summon storms and tsunamis, and even control an enormous sea monster."
"A sea monster?" Murphy thought for a moment. "The North Sea monster? The Kraken?"
"I don't know whether it was that one, but it really was enormous," Lucas said.
"Then how did you get the Prima Materia?"
"We negotiated with the mermen, but they refused to give up the pearl no matter what. We had originally planned to attack and seize it, but we were worried that would trigger a war with the merman kingdom. Later, after investigating, we discovered that the Merman King had