Chapter 15
If she wakes up, it'll be chaos again.
I sighed as I looked down at the unconscious Eri.
When we arrived at the mansion in Sanctum Hill, the maids took Eri and carried her to the annex.
I left the rest to the head maid.
Bathe her, dress her in new clothes, and feed her.
In the meantime, I prepared fifty reasons why we needed to raise this child in our family's annex so I could persuade my father and mother.
- Because she's clever, because she has talent as a mage….
They gave me permission before I could even list the reasons, though.
— “At long last, Julian is letting himself be spoiled…!”
I could thank Mother a hundred times over and it still wouldn't be enough for taking that as me being spoiled.
*
The next morning came.
I received a report from the head maid.
“She woke up last night, ate, and went straight back to sleep.”
“She didn't cause a disturbance?”
“No. However…
“However?”
“She kept rustling around, as though the comforter was uncomfortable.”
Ah.
It was probably because it was her first time using a cotton comforter.
I'd taken things like this for granted since birth, but normally they were only something one could touch after becoming a wealthy member of the middle class, even among commoners.
For Eri, an orphan from Limbus Pit, this must have been the first comforter she'd ever slept under.
“Shall I wake her, young master?”
“I'll wake her.”
“Pardon?”
Again.
The head maid was looking at me strangely again.
It was the same look the servants gave me whenever I appeared in the kitchen.
“I have something to explain early this morning. Ah, could I ask you to prepare a lunchbox today?”
“Ah… yes…”
The head maid looked somewhat confused.
A man who made his own lunch every day was asking her to do it because he was busy today, so she must have experienced a different kind of cognitive dissonance.
Leaving the confused head maid behind, I headed for the annex.
Hmm. My sweet home, seen again after so long.
It was technically in the past tense now, since I lived in the main house.
I opened the door to the room I used to occupy.
A cotton comforter puffed up like a boa constrictor that had swallowed an elephant came into view.
The thing was writhing, which meant Eri was tossing around inside.
Or maybe the comforter was in the middle of digesting Eri.
I pulled back the comforter and said,
“Get up.”
At my voice, Eri rubbed her eyes and raised her head.
And the moment she saw me, her eyes went round.
"…Who are you?"
Eri glared at me irritably.
It was a perfectly natural reaction.
I wasn't wearing my crow mask right now.
Eri's gaze swept over me.
Wariness appeared on her face.
She was measuring me up.
In the Red-Light District, it was important to determine which people you could pick a fight with and which you couldn't, so it was probably a habit ingrained in her body.
“Hey.”
Having finished her assessment, Eri tugged the comforter closer and asked,
“How long have you been here?”
Judging by the results of her assessment, she seemed to think I was either someone who had been dragged here along with her or a servant.
This blasted power of misunderstanding keeps barging in out of nowhere.
She probably assumed I was some senior who had been dragged here with her and was trying to establish the pecking order in advance.
‘Does she think Teacher Schnabel is some kind of orphan collector?’
It would have been fun to pretend to be a servant, but unfortunately, my schedule was packed today.
Since I didn't have time to play around, I told her the truth right away.
“It's me.”
“When did I ever see you—”
“Didn't I tell you yesterday that your mouth is the gateway that determines your worth? Be careful with your words and actions. This is your last chance.”
….
Silence.
One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.
“…Bweh?”
Eri's mouth fell open.
“N-no way. Teacher Schnabel is a gnome over 150 years old whose face was burned after he was driven out of a ducal household….”
“You actually believed that?”
“That's what everyone says?”
“I never admitted that any of it was true.”
Eri's pupils wavered.
[A gnome healer with 150 years' experience.]
[He failed to treat a patient from a ducal family, had his face burned, and wears a crow mask to hide the scars.]
[He was subsequently driven to the Red-Light District, where he now lives a life of service.]
(+He has recently started riding around in a limousine from Sanctum Hill.)
Still only half awake, Eri needed some time to accept that this entire backstory was a lie.
“…Wha? Teacher? Did you trick me?”
“I've never lied to you.”
She had the face of a child hearing for the first time that Santa Claus didn't exist.
Somehow, I felt guilty even though I hadn't done anything wrong.
“How could this be…? You were my age… Aaaah!! That makes no sense!”
Eri pulled the comforter over her head and screamed.
What kind of fantasy had she been harboring about me to react like that?
Just then, the door opened and a maid entered.
"Young master, breakfast is ready."
Eri's head slowly turned toward the maid.
Then she looked back at me.
Me. Maid. Me. Maid.
“Y-young master…? Not the physician…?”
Eri's voice cracked.
Apparently, she had thought I was a resident guest of this baronial family or its physician.
Well, what young master in the world would come all the way down to Limbus Pit to see patients at this age?
From a common-sense perspective, it was only natural for her to think that way.
“So I'm not the one getting eaten…?”
“If you want to be exact, I'm the one doing the eating.”
I sighed and pulled the comforter completely off Eri.
“Eat and get ready. Since it's the weekend, we're going somewhere other than the clinic.”
“S-somewhere else?”
“The merchant guild.”
“The mer…chant guild…?”
Eri's eyes lost focus.
Thinking she was about to faint again, I quickly clapped my hands right in front of her face.
Clap
“Mommy!”
“Wake up. Eat and come out.”
I left the room and instructed the maid,
“After breakfast, dress her for going out and bring her to the entrance.”
“Yes, young master.”
***
An hour later.
The Eri who appeared at the entrance looked like a completely different person.
Her red hair was neatly combed back. She wore a white blouse, a navy vest, a knee-length skirt, and leather shoes.
She looked like the daughter of some merchant family, not a vagrant from the Red-Light District.
“…This is weird.”
Eri tugged at her collar as if she was uncomfortable.
“I didn't know clothes could be this uncomfortable.”
“You'll have to get used to it. They're your clothes now.”
“Huh? These are mine?”
I took the malfunctioning Eri outside.
A black sedan was waiting there.
“Get in.”
Once we were in the car, Eri asked cautiously,
“…Where are we going? No, where are we going, Young Master?”
Her form of address had changed.
Now that she knew I was a young master, speaking informally had apparently become uncomfortable for her.
“You don't have to speak formally. I'll be wearing my mask when we're outside anyway.”
“…Okay.”
The car set off.
On the way, Eri cautiously asked me a question.
“By the way, why do you wear a mask?”
“To protect me from evil energy.”
“Not to hide your identity?”
“I've never hidden it.”
The level of security surrounding my personal information hadn't changed much since my days in twenty-first-century South Korea.
If I gave a few coins to an informant in the Red-Light District, they'd probably be able to tell you everything from what I look like to who I am.
Most people seemed to stop investigating the moment they learned I was from Sanctum Hill, though.
There was also the rumor about a healer whose face had been burned after failing to treat a patient from a ducal family, so they were probably afraid of getting caught up in something like a succession struggle.
Well, to the poor, nobles were basically Celestial Dragons, so I could understand it.
‘Still, learning what I look like isn't going to get you eaten.’
The car continued on its way.
Unlike yesterday, we weren't climbing. We were going down.
We left Sanctum Hill and headed toward Civitas Square.
The white marble outside the window gradually changed into gray brick.
“This is… Civitas Square.”
“Yeah.”
“Isn't this the commoners' district?”
“It is.”
“Why would Teacher be in a place like this… ah.”
Remembering that I was a young master who also traveled to Limbus Pit, Eri stopped herself.
In the meantime, the car came to a stop.
We had arrived in front of a five-story building in the middle of a bustling district.
The building's facade bore a sign engraved in brass.
[Mercure Merchant Guild]
Eri murmured as she looked out the window.
“…The merchant guild?”
Instead of answering, I opened the car door and got out.
Eri followed me out.
The moment we entered the building, the employees in the lobby all bowed at once.
“…Director?”
She looked up at me.
“Bweh?”
“You'll get used to it.”
This treatment had been burdensome to me at first too, but after experiencing it for several years, I'd gotten used to it.
“Let's go in.”
Eri followed me with stiff, creaking movements.
*
The guild master's office.
When I opened the door, a plump middle-aged man sprang to his feet.
An oily face, gleaming eyes, and a flashing gold tooth.
He had the typical look of a nouveau riche.
But I knew that this man was actually a pretty decent person despite his appearance.
He had no shady dealings and handled every transaction honestly—a guild master overflowing with conscience, utterly out of place in this world.
'He was so conscientious that the guild nearly went bankrupt just before I brought him quinine and insulin.'
In fact, that was precisely why I liked him even more and had chosen him as a business partner.
Saving such a ridiculously good-natured merchant was the protagonist's duty, after all.
However, after the guild underwent explosive growth thanks to those two medicines, the guild master's image had been changing day by day into that of a corrupt nouveau riche.
His words and actions played a part, but his physiognomy had an even greater influence.
Still, he hadn't been this fat when we first met.
‘Should I make a weight-loss drug later?’
If I kept working hard on diabetes medicine, I might get lucky and make one.
I'd heard that's how drugs like that had been developed in my world too.
Well, let's leave stories of the distant future aside.
“Oh! Young master! Welcome!”
The guild master rubbed his hands together as he approached.
“Would you like some coffee?”
“I'm only twelve.”
“Ah, you said you'd have it at eighteen. I keep forgetting! Haha! Then tea it is. We have some Darjeeling brought in this year.”
“Thank you.”
The guild master gave the secretary a meaningful glance.
While the secretary prepared the tea, the guild master brought over a stack of documents from his desk.
He sat on the sofa across from me and handed me the copies.
“These are our sales figures for the last quarter. Quinine rose twelve percent over the previous quarter because our military supply orders increased, insulin rose fifteen percent after we successfully marketed it to nobles with diabetes, and colchicine rose eight percent because of the high repurchase rate among gout patients….”
Numbers poured out of his mouth.
I didn't think Eri would understand much, but I passed her the documents I'd finished reading, as if telling her to study too.
“One, two… uh… uhh….”
I could see Eri counting the zeros on her fingers before giving up because there were too many.
Once I finished checking the documents the guild master had handed over, it was my turn.
I took my research journal out of the leather file.
“I have good news, Guild Master.”
“Oh? A new drug?”
“If an improvement counts as a new drug, then I suppose it is.”
The guild master's eyes lit up.
I opened the research journal and showed him the results.
“I've succeeded in improving insulin purity. The method uses zinc crystallization, and its purity is about thirty percent higher than before.”
“Th-thirty percent?!”
Thirty percent was a conservative estimate.
I majored in medicine, not alchemy.
That was probably why I still wasn't accustomed to the technology of this world.
If even I could improve it by thirty percent, then people familiar with alchemy would obviously achieve even better results.
The guild master sprang to his feet when he heard that.
“Th-then the problem of inflammation at the injection site…!”
“I believe it will be almost completely resolved. The risk of hypoglycemic shock should also be greatly reduced, and the duration of its effects will be longer.”
I said this while pointing to the conclusion in the research journal.
Zinc-crystallized insulin was also absorbed more slowly, which meant fewer injections per day… Anyway, it was simply revolutionary.
The guild master's hand trembled as he held the journal.
“Sob…! Young master… no, Director, you really are…! Sniff…!”
Before long, the guild master could no longer contain his overwhelming emotions and burst into tears.
It was a little gross, but there was a reason for such a reaction.
Because of impurities in existing insulin, injection sites often swelled badly, and patients frequently collapsed when the concentration was improperly adjusted.
As a result, it had gained the disgraceful reputation of being 'a deadly medicine for a deadly disease.'
And despite being a revolutionary drug for treating diabetes, its market response had been lukewarm because of those side effects.
Nobles were extremely conservative people, after all.
But this improvement would solve most of those problems.
It would probably become another star product standing alongside quinine.
The guild master had already tasted quinine's glory, so he instinctively understood that and reacted like this.
“How long until it can be sold on the market?”
At my question, the guild master, who had been clenching his fists, began counting on his fingers.
“If we lock the factory doors and work the alchemists to the bone… five months… no, three months should be enough!”
“The development period will take four months. Add another six months on top of that.”
“Pardon?”
The guild master blinked.
Why did I have to wait before bringing out this lovely golden egg?
The resentment in his eyes made that question perfectly clear.
But there was one line I wouldn't compromise on.
“It's the clinical trial period. We need to administer it to at least fifty patients and collect data on side effects. It can't be released to the market before then.”
I didn't want a drug I'd made to go down in history as one that left behind terrible side effects.
I wanted to be the perfect protagonist in a misunderstanding novel, after all.
But the guild master, unlike me, was not a man with such lofty aspirations.
He was a man who operated entirely according to money, profit, and the logic of this world.
“Ah, well… young master. To be honest, the other guilds don't do that. Once a drug is finished, it'll sell out immediately—we won't be able to keep it in stock….”
The guild master was right.
In this world, morality was honestly a luxury good.
In my previous life, a pharmaceutical company could go under if a side-effect scandal blew up, but in this world, you could hush it up and cover it over.
A patient who suffered side effects? Where was that patient, exactly?
Oh dear! The witness took a wrong turn on the way here, wandered outside the Wall, and disappeared!
How strange! Why were the missing person's belongings found outside the Wall?
With the size of our guild, that was possible for us now too.
But I didn't want to do that.
That wasn't something a protagonist in a misunderstanding novel would do.
“I know. That's why we should set ourselves apart.”
But in this world, persuading people with morality took too long.
They often pretended to be convinced, only to try something strange behind your back.
So I had to persuade him using the logic of money.
“Guild Master, who are insulin's main customers? Commoners?”
“No. Noble lords.”
“Exactly. They're suspicious people. They even use slaves to test anything that goes into their bodies.”
“Ah, don't tell me…!”
“We need to show them how much care we put into this so the nobles will feel safe using the drug. They won't complain even if we raise the price.”
I persuaded him with a kind of premium-branding strategy.
Even when the world changes, this kind of show still works.
“So that's the deeper meaning!”
The guild master applauded in admiration.
I gave him one final warning.
“But don't conduct the trials carelessly. The moment the nobles think this is all a show, it will backfire.”
“I'll remember that, young master!”
The guild master bowed deeply.
I nodded and moved on to the next matter.
“And I'd like to introduce someone.”
I pointed toward Eri, who had been sitting there like a sack of barley someone had left there throughout the entire meeting.
“My personal assistant.”
“Oh. So you're finally taking someone on.”
The guild master's gaze turned toward Eri.
A timid girl who still couldn't shed the air of someone from the slums.
The guild master could probably guess where she came from.
The smell of Limbus Pit didn't disappear overnight, after all.
But he didn't show it.
“May I ask why you hired her?”
“I brought her in because she has mage talent.”
“A mage! As expected of your discerning eye, young master…!”
…
I gave him a look that said he should stop flattering me.
At this rate, he'd wear his lips out.
The guild master cleared his throat and straightened his clothes.
Then he politely extended a hand toward Eri.
“I'm Gustav Mayerne, guild master of the Mercure Merchant Guild. I look forward to working with you, little miss.”
Eri merely nodded blankly.
She still looked like she hadn't grasped what was happening.