Chapter 14
“Is he the new knight you hired?”
“Yeah.”
Lyo asked, pointing at Heter.
“I see. Come in, too.”
“…Yes.”
‘Huh?’
Heter looked as though he were answering reluctantly.
‘What’s with him now?’
I found his reaction puzzling as I sat in the chair Lyo had prepared.
“You don’t seem surprised at all.”
Instead of answering, I took out the paper the little boy had given me.
The piece of paper was folded lengthwise to one side, with the ends overlapped—the familiar shape of a note.
“There’s no one in Mugwort who knows how to fold paper like this,
Except Lyo, who learned the method directly from me when we were children.
“That’s true.”
“So why did you call me here?”
It would be nice to catch up after so long, but that was something we could easily do in public.
There had to be a good reason he had arranged such a secret meeting.
“My father ordered a knight to deliver instructions preventing you from selling the Snow Wyrm byproducts.”
“As I thought.”
Since I had already expected it, I wasn’t particularly surprised.
“…As expected, you’re quick to catch on.”
Lyo gave a small snort of laughter at my reaction and handed me a sheet of paper.
“It’s the order my father had a knight deliver to the merchants and blacksmiths.”
I took the paper and skimmed it, and the words saying that the Snow Wyrm byproducts could not be traded for the next several months immediately caught my eye.
More precisely… only until the end of this year.
“Ha! He’s really resorted to such a petty trick.”
It was so childish that I couldn’t help scoffing.
“I brought it to let you know, but this won’t be of any direct help.”
“Well, it couldn’t be helped.”
As Lyo said, even with proof like this, we wouldn’t be able to sell the byproducts.
This wasn’t a metaphor—Belphegor was the lord of this territory, after all.
Who could stop him if the lord himself ordered it?
“Exactly. Take the Snow Wyrm byproducts somewhere else and sell them.”
As he said this, Lyo placed a palm-sized device on the table.
“What’s this?”
“A freezing magical tool. This should be enough to keep the chunks of meat from spoiling.”
‘Oh?!’
This guy. How had he known I wanted something like this?
“Thank you, Lyo! I needed something like this.”
I thanked him with a broad smile at the unexpected gift.
“Heh. I only thought about what you would need most if I were in your position.”
“Oh, you’re pretty perceptive.”
“You said long ago that you disliked people who were slow on the uptake.”
“Huh?”
I vaguely remembered saying something like that to him when he had confessed and asked me to get engaged to him as children.
‘He still remembers that?’
When Lyo looked at me with a strange expression, his face reddening,
Crunch.
“?”
The chair I was sitting in shook, and a strange sound came from behind me.
“…Sir Heter?”
“Ah, I apologize, my lady.”
When I turned around, I saw Heter dusting off his hand, and the backrest had a hand-shaped hole torn through it.
“The wood must have been rotten. I only gripped it for a moment, but it crumbled like this.”
“…Rotten?”
The piece of wood he had just shaken off looked perfectly intact, though.
It was absurd, but apparently this guy was jealous after watching me talk to Lyo.
‘We were only talking. Is this really necessary?’
In any case, it seemed best not to provoke him any further.
“I’ll thank you properly later. I’m in a hurry right now.”
“Hmm? Oh, all right.”
I hurriedly took the magical tool and stood up to return to the inn.
“Are you leaving already?”
“!”
Creak, creak.
Along with the creaking of the wooden floor, a man with a vertical scar beside his eye came down from the second floor.
Shing.
“Who are you?”
“Eek.”
Heter pulled me behind him from my chair, drew his sword, and asked the man.
“Don’t you know that you should state your own name before asking another person’s? Young man?”
“My name is rather expensive, you see.”
“Ha.”
The man laughed, seemingly pleased by Heter’s attitude.
“What an interesting fellow.”
“Sir Theo. Why are you….”
Lyo asked in a trembling voice as he looked at the man who had come downstairs.
“It was merely a hunch. I thought a young master like you would try to help Miss Alice. And….”
Theo met my eyes behind Heter.
“It seems my guess was correct.”
“Sir Theo….”
“It has been a long time, miss.”
He placed his right hand over his heart and bowed his head.
“Do you know each other?”
“He is the captain of House Fridel’s knights and the head of the household’s right-hand man.”
“I see.”
He walked to the table at his leisure and sat down in a chair.
“It’s a little unfortunate to meet you in a place like this, Miss Alice.”
“The head of the household.”
“…Hmm?”
Heter, who had sheathed his sword, looked at Theo and spoke.
“She is not Miss Alice, but the head of House Fortune. Please use the proper title.”
“Ha ha, it seems you really are an interesting fellow.”
Theo looked at Heter, the corners of his mouth raised.
“In any case, I have something to discuss with Miss Alice, so would you step aside, young man?”
“….”
Seeing that Theo continued to call me miss despite his warning, Heter once again gripped the hilt of the sword he had just sheathed.
At the same time, Theo, who had been sitting comfortably, subtly shifted his posture.
The atmosphere turned murderous, stretched taut like a thread about to snap.
“Sir Heter. It’s all right.”
“My lady?”
Since it really looked as though a fight was about to break out, I stepped in.
“If he has business with me, shouldn’t I hear him out?”
“…Understood.”
Heter stepped back behind me, and the murderous tension eased.
“Just as I thought, Miss Alice. What I wanted to say to you was….”
“The head of House Fortune.”
Twitch.
When I said exactly what Heter had said earlier, the skin around Theo’s eyes trembled, and he stared at me.
“Yes?”
“I am here not as the Alice you knew, but as the head of House Fortune. Address me properly.
I crossed my legs and met his gaze without flinching.
“Did you not sit down because you wanted to have a conversation?”
He seemed determined to treat me as a noble young lady rather than the head of House Fortune until the very end.
“Ha!”
Unable to stand it any longer, I slammed my hand down on the table with all my strength.
Bang!
“I won’t say it twice. If you sincerely wish to speak with me, show me the proper respect, Sir Theo.”
“…Understood, my lady.”
Drip… drip.
Blood flowed from the outer edge of the palm I had slammed against the table, but I felt relief before I felt pain.
‘At least I didn’t hurt my fingers.’
If I had injured my fingers, I would have had to receive another punishment.
“What I wanted to say to you, my lady, was… that you should simply accept it.”
“…Accept what?”
“Yes.”
Theo nodded.
“You must have defeated the Snow Wyrm this time thanks to that fellow.”
He continued speaking while casting a sidelong glance at Heter.
“I understand the urge to swing a powerful weapon once it falls into your hands, but if you aren’t careful, you may provoke a lion.”
“Ha! Are you comparing House Fridel to a lion?”
“From House Fortune’s perspective, it would be an apt comparison.”
‘You fucking bastard.’
So what he was saying was that I shouldn’t antagonize him by trying to repay my debt, but should obediently become his concubine, wasn’t it?
“That doesn’t sound like something you should say to a noble of another territory.”
“Even so, what else can we do?”
Theo looked at the hand from which blood was dripping and spoke to me with pity in his eyes.
“The head of House Fortune has no power, after all.”
Crunch.
I tasted blood from my tightly clenched lips.
His tone made it clear that he was genuinely worried about me, which only made me angrier.
“There are times when one must exercise caution so as not to offend the powerful. You are intelligent, my lady, so I trust you understand.”
“Ha.”
Heter let out a hollow laugh, drew his sword once more, and pointed it at Theo.
“Are those your last words?”
“You’re an amusing young man, but you know nothing of manners.”
“That’s enough, Sir Heter.”
I turned my head and met his eyes.
“Don’t make me tell you twice, either.”
“….”
Shing.
“You are indeed intelligent.”
Seeing Heter sheathe his sword, Theo gave a sardonic smile.
“Yes, I understood you perfectly. In short, you’re telling me to prostrate myself and crawl because I’m powerless, aren’t you?”
“It was not quite so vulgar in tone.”
Did the tone matter? The meaning behind it was what mattered.
“Let me express my gratitude first. Thank you, Sir Theo. Thanks to you, I can decide exactly what course to take from here on.”
“You are most welcome, my lady.”
“Go back and tell Lord Fridel.”
I glared at Theo and spoke slowly and clearly.
“Tell him to wait, because I will repay my debt by the end of this year.”
“…Pardon?”
Theo listened to me with a bewildered expression.
“Surely you don’t mean that you trust the young man beside you, Miss? Think rationally. If our house were to make a serious effort, he alone couldn’t stop us. Give up such an absurd notion.”
He scolded me in a stern voice, as though admonishing a child who refused to listen.
“Is that so?”
I raised my head and looked at Heter.
“Sir, is it an absurd notion for me to say that I trust you and can repay the debt?”
“Hmm….”
After considering it briefly, Heter gave a small laugh, held up three fingers, then folded one of them back down.
“What does that mean?”
Theo asked Heter as he looked at the two fingers left extended.
“It means I think I could beat you using roughly twenty percent of my strength.”
To say that he could defeat the captain of House Fridel’s knights using only twenty percent of his strength was no different from saying he could fight and defeat all of House Fridel’s knights by himself.
Crunch.
This time, the sound had not come from us.
“You really are an entertaining young man.”
The table Theo had gripped tightly crumbled, leaving the imprint of his hand.
He stood up, took off his glove, and threw it at Heter.
“You understand what that means, don’t you? Follow me to the training ground. I’ll show you the gap between us.”
“Hmm.”
Heter caught the glove thrown at him on the tip of his sword and flicked it upward.
“Come to think of it, you just called the head of the household ‘miss’ again.”
He swung his sword at a speed invisible to the eye.
Slash.
Theo’s glove was cleanly cut in half.
Tap, thud.
The glove fell to the floor, and Heter said with a curl of his lips,
“I’ll be the one to show you.”
Who’s stronger.