Chapter 28
Chapter 28: Do I Look like the Kind of Bad Guy Who Knocks on a Girl’s Door in the Middle of the Night?
"Viktor!!! Do you enjoy getting yelled at that much!"
A roar rang out from within the Manor, echoing across the entire Courtyard.
The Maidservants outside the door heard it and instinctively hunched their shoulders.
They whispered to each other in hushed tones: "Mr. Viktor and Miss Leah are at it again."
"A good old argument—it's been a while......"
The 2 of them shook their heads. They had long since grown used to it.
Whenever Viktor was home, Miss Leah was guaranteed to get into an argument with him.
Leah pointed a furious finger at Viktor's nose and unleashed her fury: "I waited for you for so long, and the very first thing you say when you walk in the door is to ask me if I'm hiding someone in the room?"
"Just how narrow-minded do you have to be to even think of something like that!"
Viktor stood in the doorway, face as blank as ever, listening to Leah's tirade without a single word in return.
After venting for a while, with the irritation inside her released, Leah rubbed her forehead and sighed.
She had been perfectly fine not explaining—but for some inexplicable reason, she went ahead and added 1 more sentence anyway.
"That was a subordinate from the Territory, who had just come to report on some matters. By the time you walked in, they had already left long ago."
Viktor gave a nod.
"Understood."
From the moment he had stepped inside, he had caught the faint trace of a delicate, clean fragrance drifting through the room.
That was clearly not the kind of scent that would come off a man.
He had originally intended to follow up after saying "you're hiding someone" with a couple more words, to spare Leah any unnecessary misunderstanding.
Unfortunately, Leah had launched into her scolding with the speed of pure reflex. He hadn't even had time to react before the verbal assault was already underway.
And then?
Then he had simply let Leah scold away.
If letting her yell at him was how she vented her anger, Viktor naturally didn't mind taking a few words on the chin.
This was their way of talking to each other. He had long since gotten used to it.
Viktor made his way back to the desk and sat down. He didn't bother asking Leah whether anything difficult had come up recently.
He trusted that Leah could handle everything herself.
If something came up that she couldn't resolve, Leah would bring it up on her own.
True enough—even though Viktor hadn't asked, Leah brought up the matter of the shop herself, a little reluctantly.
"The item shop hasn't been doing very well."
"The explosive boom you were expecting never came."
"Hm? What happened."
Viktor tapped the desk. That was somewhat unexpected.
He was curious to hear Leah explain what had gone wrong.
Leah ran through the financial report of the item shop.
"Other than a few sales on the first day, no customers came in the days that followed."
Viktor was puzzled. Looking at it from the standpoint of his marketing strategy, this outcome shouldn't theoretically have occurred.
Because there would always be discerning people who would come to buy.
Leah had also confirmed that potions had sold on the very first day.
Word of mouth from those who had used the potions should have produced a viral boom.
A problem with the player potions themselves?
That was almost impossible.
An issue with how the shop was being run?
Also impossible—if Leah couldn't manage a shop this simple, she would never have been able to develop her own Territory this well.
So there was only 1 possibility: something unexpected had happened.
"So—what actually occurred?"
Leah began to explain:
"On the first day the shop opened, the Duke's daughter bought some potions."
At that particular phrasing, Viktor's gaze shifted ever so slightly.
"Erika du Chloe?"
Leah shot Viktor a sideways glance and said with a cold smirk:
"Oh? Still pining after your precious little sweetheart?"
"You remember her name so clearly, too."
"That joke isn't funny. Keep going."
Viktor shut down Leah's jab before it could go any further.
Leah crossed her arms and pursed her lips.
"I had assumed that before long, given Erika's reputation, word of the potions' effects would spread quickly, and a flood of Mages would come flocking here."
"But then, the very next day, the situation at Mount Vesuvius erupted."
At that point, Leah noticed that Viktor's hand—which had been tapping the desk—went still.
A few of her private guesses had found some answers.
Still, she patiently continued on for Viktor's benefit.
"A large number of Mages departed for the volcano, and the only ones left in the Royal Capital were some ordinary 1st-Tier Mages."
"Setting aside whether they could afford it—even if they could, these items would be completely wasted on them."
To put it plainly, 1st-Tier Mages were not worthy of using these items.
"Then a few days later, those Mages all came back—and promptly banded together to collectively impeach the Duke."
"The Emperor even appeared in person, summoning the Duke and those noble Mages to prepare for a final verdict."
At this, Leah let out a helpless sigh.
The primary target customers for the potions were Mages, and with the Royal Capital in turmoil lately, every Mage had been occupied—who had the time to visit a shop?
Viktor listened to all of this with an expressionless face.
He had been inside the volcano the entire time, fighting Gulton, and naturally had no idea what had been happening in the outside world during that period.
No wonder—after finishing with Gulton and emerging at the Crater, the very first thing he had seen was Erika.
He had initially assumed he was hallucinating. After all, he had no memory of anything following that moment.
When he had regained consciousness, it was Weija who had explained to him the reason for his loss of awareness.
Weija's power—I should try to rely on it as little as possible in the future.
Viktor thought to himself.
After this battle ended, he had been unconscious for a full 4 days.
Add that to the 3 days spent fighting Gulton, and it came out to exactly 1 week.
That said, the battle with Gulton having affected the real-world volcano was also something he hadn't anticipated.
Although the volcano had not erupted, the ripple effects of the incident had reached all the way to the Royal Capital.
At this point, Leah was still grumbling beside him: "Other people are even saying that Duke Livi stopped maintaining the Magic Formation because his daughter had gone missing."
"It's laughable, really. Setting aside whether the War Magic would have torn his daughter apart—if the volcano had erupted, Erika, still up on that mountain, would have died all the same, wouldn't she?"
Viktor said nothing, but inwardly he agreed with Leah's assessment.
At that point in time, Erika climbing the volcano had been, without question, walking straight toward her own death.
The only difference was—under the War Magic, only Erika herself, who had appeared at the Summit, would have died.
Whereas if the volcano erupted, every single Mage, along with the civilians at the mountain's base, would have been buried alongside her.
He didn't believe for a moment that the Duke failed to understand this.
Leah finished speaking and gave a shrug.
"Oh right, there's 1 more thing."
"The Emperor's decree has already been delivered to our door. On the day of the summons, you are also to appear at the palace."
"Your timing in returning was perfect. Had you come back 1 day later, you would have missed it."
"Why?"
Viktor asked with a hint of curiosity, though he already had a fairly good guess forming in his mind.
"You want a reason? Fine."
"Who was the only escorting Mage who vanished without a trace before the volcano erupted?"
As expected.
Viktor's expression remained entirely unchanged as the answer confirmed his suspicion.
Seeing this, Leah asked no further questions. She stifled a yawn and walked toward the door.
"It seems you already have a plan. In that case, I'm going to sleep."
"I'll be keeping my bedroom door properly shut—don't you go sneaking into my room in the middle of the night just because we haven't seen each other in so long."
Slam!—the door was pulled forcefully shut.
Viktor: "......"
Do I really seem like the kind of scoundrel who goes knocking on girls' doors in the middle of the night?
Come to think of it—he had actually done exactly that before.
Maybe Gwen had said something to Leah.
Viktor didn't dwell on it. More than that, he was curious about why the Duke had done what he did.
Then, without warning, Weija's voice cut in.
"If the volcano had erupted, everyone there would have died—including Duke Livi himself."
"The only exception was that little girl. She was the only one who could have survived."
"But if the great Magic Formation had descended, she would certainly have died."
Viktor narrowed his eyes and asked in an even tone:
"If I had failed and the volcano had erupted, Gulton would have been released."
"Do you think a 2nd-Tier girl, gravely injured on top of that, could have survived a Natural Disaster caused by the Calamity of Fire?"
Weija looked up, its gaze deep and penetrating as it regarded Viktor:
"She can converse with the Calamity."
Hearing Weija's words, Viktor went very slightly still. This time it was his turn to be puzzled.
Weija immediately seized on Viktor's reaction, and it was pleased.
"First time I've ever seen you this surprised."
Weija clearly knew something—because it was certain Erika would not have died.
"I'm actually quite curious—who exactly did her Duke father couple with to produce a daughter like her."
"By the way, have you ever seen that girl's mother?"
Viktor fell into an even deeper silence.
In the game's Storyline, this Duke's daughter had likewise been a staggering genius.
If nothing went differently, she would be 19 years old—that is, 2 years from now.
After Viktor's death, she would cross into the ranks of 3rd-Tier Mages, shattering Viktor's genius record to become the youngest 3rd-Tier Mage in the Empire's history.
And it was precisely because of this that, when the Empire's political power shifted and a new Emperor ascended—
Erika du Chloe, by virtue of her talent, had preserved the Duke's family, who had supported the first prince.
For the time being, this was the extent of the Storyline Viktor could recall.
But hearing Weija say this, he was genuinely noticing it for the first time.
This particular NPC, who had a reasonably well-known name—not a single player had ever encountered her mother.
There wasn't even a trace of it anywhere in the Background Story.
Was she dead? Or was she......
The information Viktor could piece together was far too sparse. There was simply no way to make any further guesses.
Weija observed his expression with some satisfaction. So there were things even Viktor didn't know.
It opened its beak and began chattering away:
"So then—what do you plan to do?"
"Tomorrow's summons involves not only the Duke but you as well. You might want to think first about how to get through this."
"There's no one who can help you."
Viktor gazed out the window. Moonlight spilled across his cold, strikingly handsome face, and there was something faintly contemplative in his expression.
"Those who walk the right path have many to aid them; those who do not, stand alone. That is perfectly normal."
"All things considered—as a father, Duke Livi is remarkable."
Indeed—he had halted the Formation. He had been willing to let himself and every Mage perish beneath a Natural Disaster, and had even been prepared to abandon innocent civilians.
All so that his daughter could live.
That said, the Duke's actions were also genuinely infuriating from another angle.
"The Emperor will not let ministers who have served him for so long feel a chill in their hearts. But he must also give everyone an answer."
"The worst outcome is nothing more than having his title stripped and retiring to the countryside."
"And that is assuming I do not step forward."
Weija heard Viktor's last sentence and let out an intrigued "Oh?"
"You want to help him?"
"This is what they call—offering aid in times of need."
In Viktor's eyes, a cunning light flickered—the gleam of a seasoned merchant.