"…Huh? You're not playing us right now, right?"
I muttered the words while sprawled on the dorm roof, half-asleep under the afternoon sun.
Below me, Aldi—our homeroom teacher who usually looked like he'd aged ten years every semester—was practically vibrating with panic.
"No, listen!" he shouted, voice cracking. "The kids who went to cheer for you in the tournament finals, they never came back!"
I cracked one eye open.
The escort group—rich noble heirs and ladies who'd been dragged along as "character building"—had vanished.
Curfew-breaking wasn't new for that bunch, but disappearing entirely? That smelled like trouble.
"Even my detection magic can't find a trace," Aldi went on, running a paw through his already messy hair.
"Every teacher's been searching since yesterday. Nothing. Please, Jirei, you're the only one I can ask!"
I yawned.
A string of recent incidents flashed through my mind—someone extracting children's hearts for some sick ritual.
Bad feelings intensified.
"I'd rather not," I said, sitting up slowly, "but fine. Three high-grade magic tools as payment. Expensive ones."
Aldi's face lit up like I'd handed him a miracle.
"Done! Anything!"
Eve, who'd been standing silently beside him, gave me a flat look.
"You're seriously charging for this?"
"Rescue missions aren't charity," I replied, stretching.
"Besides, I like magic tools more than people."
Eve whispers, "You would've done it for free." She's not wrong, but Aldi can't know that.
Aldi tilted his head.
"But… how are you going to find them? Even I can't use large-scale clairvoyance properly."
I blinked.
Oh right. Normal people can't just copy top-tier spells on a whim.
I'd been casually borrowing Rafine's clairvoyance signature for months and forgot it wasn't common knowledge.
"I can use it just fine," I said, already standing.
"Give me a second."
I closed my eyes and spread my magic across the entire capital—searching for the unique wavelengths of the missing students.
Nothing. Not a single hit.
That left only two possibilities: either they were in a magically saturated zone that drowned out their signatures, or someone was using interference and disguise magic far above the average level.
Considering my own magical output was stupidly high, the second option felt unlikely.
Which meant…
"They're not in this world anymore," I concluded.
"Probably dragged into an 'Other World' pocket. There has to be a distortion somewhere in or around the city."
Aldi's face went pale.
"An Other World rift? Who could even—"
"Doesn't matter right now," I cut in.
"I can find the distortion with wide-range magic detection, but combing the whole capital that way would take days."
I scratched my cheek, annoyed at what I was about to suggest.
There was a faster, dumber method.
"I need something simple," I told Aldi.
"Round up every rat in Magicosmaia. As many as you can catch."
Eve stared at me like I'd lost my mind.
"…Rats?"
"Thousands of eyes are better than one," I said, cracking my knuckles.
"We're going to give them temporary vision-sharing magic and turn the city into my personal surveillance network."
Aldi opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again.
Finally, he just bowed ninety degrees.
"I'll have the sewers emptied by tonight."
I sighed and looked up at the sky.
Rescuing noble brats with a rat army.
My life keeps finding new lows.
"Make sure they're clean-ish," I added.
"I don't want fleas in my magic circle."
Eve muttered beside me, "You're absolutely insane."
"Yeah," I agreed, already sketching the spell array in the air.
"But insane gets results."