Chapter 77 : Chapter 77
Chapter 077
I went to see Young Lady Sapiela straight away. This matter needed to be handled quickly. There was no way of knowing how Young Master Prah’s side would respond.
“It seems you have been absent from your post rather often these days. Surely you have not forgotten your proper duty?”
I had been trying to enter the Young Lady’s residence quietly, but Sir Lorenz decided to pick a fight with me. I had been wondering why he had been so quiet lately. Turning toward him, I smiled with easy composure.
His eyes flew wide open. It was the sort of expression that said, This bastard is smiling?
Of course, I did not flinch.
Before long, I intended to find the right opportunity, strip off my glove, and throw it in his face. A man like this did not even need to be dragged into a private room and set straight. All I had to do was make it clear to him that he was weaker than me.
“You make it sound as though I’ve been loafing around.”
“What a tongue you have. And with that mouth, you still claim you mean to attend upon the Young Lady?”
“I am carrying out special assignments not only for Young Lady Sapiela, but for Young Master Hamel as well. I am not an ordinary Butler Apprentice.”
“What a ridiculous thing to say. A mere apprentice, and not ordinary? Even a dog passing by would laugh.”
I deliberately curled my lips upward. Sir Lorenz scowled at once and strode toward me.
“You little wretch, do you need a beating to come to your senses?”
“If you ever have the time, why don’t you spar with me?”
“What?”
Caught off guard by the unexpected proposal, Sir Lorenz halted and twitched. Smiling, I continued,
“After crossing blades with Arthas, I realized my skill might not be quite as poor as I thought. I’d like to spar with you and learn a thing or two, Sir. What do you say?”
“Hrmm.”
Lorenz drew in a stiff breath. He seemed to be thinking it through in his own way. To be honest, there was not much for him to gain from sparring with me. At best, he would be able to say he had corrected my insolence.
But what if, by some remote chance, he actually lost to me?
He would probably find it difficult not only to rise through the Knight Order, but even to make a living afterward. If word spread, he might even have to leave the Territory entirely.
That was how impressive the Martial Prowess I had shown in my spar with Arthas had been.
“Unfortunately, I do not have the leisure to entertain an apprentice. Instead of wasting time with foolish talk, why don’t you swing your sword a few more times?”
“I see. Understood.”
Grinning, I brushed past him and knocked on the Young Lady’s door. I could hear his rough breathing behind me, but he would not dare draw his sword here.
“Come in.”
The order was given, and I carefully opened the door and stepped inside.
There were two maids in the room besides the Young Lady. The weather was starting to turn warm, so they were fanning her with large hand fans. Arwen was nowhere to be seen. She was probably over at Rosetta, cooking.
“Have you been well, Young Lady? It seems the weather has grown rather warm.”
“Dilen.”
Sapiela’s welcome was plain to see. Her expression had not changed much, but she set down the tea she had been drinking and rose to her feet.
Considering the Young Lady’s status, that was something that should never have happened. Even the maids looked startled, their eyes moving back and forth between me and their mistress.
I smiled pleasantly, but I did not act arrogantly. I maintained proper decorum.
“I had rather an ill-omened dream last night.”
She left the rest unsaid, but I had enough sense to guess what she meant. Smiling brightly, I bowed my head even deeper. It seemed she had dreamed that I was injured.
“Please do not worry too much. Everything is proceeding smoothly.”
“That is a relief.”
“More importantly, would you have a moment? There is something I wish to tell you.”
“Is it important?”
Without replying, I merely lowered my head again. At that, Sapiela turned to the maids standing nearby.
“Leave us. Do not come in again until I summon you.”
“Yes, Young Lady.”
The maids withdrew. Now only Young Lady Sapiela and I remained in the room. I could have relaxed a little, but I still kept my formal bearing.
The Young Lady invited me to sit in the seat before her, but instead I remained standing at her side and reported as though making an official briefing.
“Some time ago, I happened to hear His Excellency the Marquis say that there had been no contact at all from the House of Count Astria regarding the marriage talks. The same was true of Young Master Otto. Have you perhaps received a letter separately?”
Sapiela shook her head. Then she looked up at me with an expression that said she could not understand where I was going with this.
“What exactly are you trying to say?”
“I dislike the way the House of Count Astria is behaving. All the more so when I think of the pride of a noble lady such as yourself. Of course, if the marriage talks quietly come to nothing, that would be fortunate.”
I lifted my head, looked directly at Sapiela, and continued in a clear voice.
“That is why I wished to ask how you would feel about leaving the Adeline Marquis House for a while and going to the Royal Capital.”
“You want me to go to the Royal Capital?”
“To be precise, I mean enrolling in the special program at the Royal Academy. If you spend a few months in the Royal Capital, resting and devoting yourself to study, it will surely do you good.”
If Young Lady Sapiela had cared only for socializing and had no taste for study, it would have been difficult to make such a proposal. Fortunately, however, she was gifted in scholarship.
Young Lady Sapiela turned her head, picked up her teacup, and took a sip.
“But Father would not grant permission for a trip to the Royal Capital so easily. Especially after that incident......”
She was referring to the attempted kidnapping.
But just because she had nearly been abducted did not mean it was right for her to shrink back. If anything, that was when she needed to step forward all the more boldly.
Those were words she herself had once spoken.
Besides, what they had wanted was not her life, but a bargaining chip.
“Young Master Hamel will persuade him on that point. All you need to decide is whether or not you wish to go to the Royal Capital.”
“So something happened that I do not know about.”
It would have been nice if she were only good at studying, but unfortunately she was quick-witted as well. I deliberately acted awkward and said nothing, and just as I expected, Young Lady Sapiela let out a sigh and began pressing me for an answer.
It needed to look like this if I wanted to avoid Young Master Hamel’s wrath later. He had told me not to say anything to Sapiela. But if she asked, then answering her was a servant’s duty.
“In truth, while investigating the people behind the kidnapping attempt, I ended up becoming entangled with an unexpected person.”
“And who would that be?”
“Secretary Weiss.”
“Sir Weiss?”
Her expression turned grave. Had I omitted too much of the explanation? I had not even brought up Young Master Prah, yet this was already enough to alarm her.
I quickly added more so that Young Lady Sapiela would not be startled further.
“Secretary Weiss has absolutely no connection to the kidnapping attempt. However, in the course of investigating a few businesses, I happened to earn his displeasure.”
“If it is Sir Weiss, then I understand he is a man of considerable influence within the Butler Corps. You must have ended up in a rather difficult position.”
Sapiela repeatedly referred to him as Sir. In truth, he did hold the title of Baronet.
If that was the case, then his collusive ties might run even deeper than I had thought. As a noble before he was a butler, he would be able to involve himself in all manner of business interests. Put simply, the Black Pig Gang might not have been the only source of money he had been using.
I intended to expand the Avengers and eventually unify the entire Underworld. If that happened, I would have to absorb various organizations, and in the course of doing so, friction with Secretary Weiss would be unavoidable.
Of course, he would not be able to identify me immediately, but the recent Tax Audit had at least given him a foothold to start suspecting me.
“I do not know yet how things will turn out. Still, it is best to be cautious. In my hometown, there is a saying: Even when crossing a stone bridge, tap it first.”
Young Lady Sapiela seemed to ponder for a moment, but unexpectedly, she made her decision quickly.
“Then I will go to the Royal Capital. You saved my life before, so I suppose this time it is my turn to help you.”
“Did you not already repay me in full with the meals you treated me to before?”
“The value of my life is not so small.”
At those words, I smiled and bowed my head. If she wished to bestow her favor upon me, I was not foolish enough to refuse it.
***
After leaving the Young Lady’s residence, I made my way to the Knight Order. Their building stood outside the mansion, so I first went down to the lobby and stepped out.
Arthas and I had led the last Tax Audit together. If I left for the Royal Capital and abandoned him behind, things could become unpleasant for him.
Just as I was about to enter, the Gatekeeper blocked me by crossing his spear in front of me.
“And what brings you here? This is not a place where just anyone may enter.”
He clearly did not think much of me. I could have overlooked it if it were a knight or even an apprentice, but having a mere soldier bar my way did not put me in the best of moods.
Still, I let it slide. Ever since Arthas had lost, the Knight Order had been itching for a chance to get back at the Butler Corps.
“I’ve come under the orders of Young Lady Sapiela. But if just anyone cannot enter, perhaps I should simply turn back.”
“......Just don’t go in there and try anything stupid.”
“Are you saying the Young Lady’s orders are something stupid? Bold of you.”
“That’s not what I meant!”
What annoyed me was that even though word had spread that I was attached to the Young Lady, there were still bastards like this everywhere treating me like dirt. At this rate, maybe I really did need to walk around with a Pass hanging from my forehead.
“Work hard in the heat.”
Letting out a quiet laugh, I patted the Gatekeeper lightly on the shoulder. I had briefly considered taking a look at his Status Window, but as expected, it did not appear.
For the first time, I stepped inside the headquarters of the Adeline Marquis House’s Knight Order.
The inside was utterly bleak.
It was a stone building, but there was not a single decorative flourish to satisfy my sense of beauty. Aside from the Knight Order’s banners and a few decorative weapons, that was all there was. It felt more like a barracks made of stone than anything else.
Based on the information I had gotten from Rohanpedia, I headed for the quarters where the apprentice knights were waiting. Before coming here, I had asked Sir Paramela, and he had told me that Arthas was on standby duty today.
“It was the last room on the fourth floor, wasn’t it?”
I climbed the stairs to the fourth floor under the stinging glares of knights and apprentices alike. When I reached the room at the end of the hall, the door was already open, so I did not bother knocking.
Several apprentices had taken over a table and were chatting noisily. Arthas, on the other hand, sat off to the side with his arms crossed, leaning crookedly in his chair and thinking about something on his own.
“Hey, Arthas.”
“Huh? What are you doing here?”
“Come outside for a moment. It’s a message from Young Lady Sapiela.”
I invoked Young Lady Sapiela’s name so the other apprentices would not start causing trouble. As expected, Arthas followed me out without complaint.
We left the Knight Order’s headquarters and moved to a quiet place.
It seemed he had changed weapons with the money I gave him, because he now wore a rather fine Longsword at his waist. Seeing him grow stronger by the day pleased me more than I cared to admit.
Still, I did not ask him when he had changed weapons. It would have sounded too much like I was fishing for credit.
“What kind of message is it that you had to drag me out here for?”
“There is no message. That was a lie. I just made the first move so your comrades wouldn’t pick a fight.”
“You’ve got some nerve. You had nothing else to sell, so you sold the Young Lady’s name?”
“That’s not the important part right now. Things have gotten complicated.”
“Complicated how?”
“You remember that Tax Audit from before? It went wrong.”
From Arthas’s point of view, that was only natural. After all, he had gained a reputation then as the excellent apprentice knight who had saved the wounded soldiers of the Third Guard Unit.
Lowering my voice so that only he could hear, I whispered into his ear,
“Secretary Weiss was receiving Protection Money from the Black Pig Gang.”
“What?”
“To put it simply, two nameless apprentices blundered in without realizing it and cut off one of Sir Weiss’s revenue streams.”
Arthas’s expression darkened. He might have thought he was safe because he belonged to the Knight Order, but Weiss was the Dedicated Butler to Marquis Chronos himself. In other words, he was a man who could do just about anything.
“So in short, we’re screwed.”
“That’s why I came up with a good plan. Want to give it a try?”
“Is this really the time to be picky? If you’ve got something, we have to try it. What is it?”
“Become Young Lady Sapiela’s Guard Knight.”
At those words, Arthas’s mouth fell open.