🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 13
“…What?”
“Why? If the tea is fine, then there’s no problem, right? So you drink it. Right now!”
Elisha’s eyes flickered wildly, as if dancing.
‘Surely there’s something in that tea!’
Hugo gripped his sword with his gloved hand and spoke fiercely.
“Well, tea can be drunk with one hand.”
It was a terrifying threat implying he would cut off that hand.
‘Of course, he doesn’t really intend to.’
There was no special reason — Hugo just had a weak stomach.
Even the scent of the air freshener in the pawnshop was enough to make him nauseous.
‘But that girl wouldn’t know that. Looks like she spiked it with a sleeping pill or something, trying to slip away while I’m asleep.’
If it was a sleeping pill, that would make things easier. He could just grab the sleeping Elisha’s arm and force her to sign.
“…Alright. I’ll drink it.”
Hugo watched with satisfaction as Elisha finally drank the tea.
After finishing it, tears welled up in her large eyes.
“Last time…”
Was she about to apologize for her previous mistake?
Hugo scoffed.
“She got scolded a lot for serving guests on the street, so this time she prepared tea…”
Hmm?
Hugo doubted his own ears.
“What did you say?”
“‘Didn’t I teach you how to treat guests? I told you to always have a teacup ready so you can splash it in their face if things go wrong!’ That’s what he said.”
The strange policy wasn’t important.
Who said it was mattered.
“You got scolded? By whom?”
“You’ll get scolded again today. I’m soft-hearted, so instead of splashing it on the Count, I drank it all.”
“Y-Your uncle knows about that day? I heard he’s sick? That he’s bedridden? No, more importantly — ‘you’ll get scolded again today’?”
‘Could it be that uncle is here?’
Hugo hurriedly looked around.
Thud—
A loud noise echoed from upstairs. Hugo jumped on the spot.
“W-What’s that?”
Another thud came again.
What was strange was that Elisha remained calm, as if she hadn’t heard a thing.
“Why are you so calm, Count?”
Hugo’s face turned pale.
He knew what the thunderous noise was.
When Michele was a duke and Hugo was just a child, Hugo was curious when he heard news of a new weapon and went to the duke’s estate practice yard.
From afar came pounding sounds, and Hugo thought maybe they brought a cannon.
But as soon as he opened the door, he froze.
“Who goes there!”
Michele wielded an enormous iron mace, swinging it at armored knights.
Bang. Bang.
The knights were knocked down like paper dolls the moment they were hit by the mace.
Michele turned with fierce eyes, and terrified Hugo fainted.
After waking, he found out those “knights” were actually practice dummies, but the memory remained vivid.
‘But that sound…!’
Wasn’t it coming from right above?
“Is uncle testing weapons?”
“Oh. So our grandfather did that too?”
Elisha propped her chin, her pale purple eyes strangely cold.
“If you have ears, you should know! That’s the sound of iron maces colliding!”
“Ah, so that’s why you’re afraid of grandfather? I knew you were scared, but not why. Now I know. Good info.”
“What are you saying…!”
Just as the panicked Hugo jumped up, a loud shout rang in his ears.
“Who goes there!”
The voice was exactly as in his memory, and Hugo’s legs gave out.
He collapsed and hurriedly said:
“Y-You should answer quickly.”
“Hmm? Why? What did you say?”
Elisha pretended not to hear despite being right there, making Hugo more anxious.
“You’re asking who it is! Hurry and say it’s nothing, okay?”
“But something is going on, Count. You came, and didn’t you tell me to stop lying earlier…?”
Was she genuinely clueless or brilliantly pretending? Elisha tilted her head.
But there was no choice. Michele looked like he was about to come bursting down, and Elisha was the only hope.
“Please, I beg you. You’ll listen to your granddaughter, won’t you?”
Hugo pleaded.
“There are good lies in the world! Like the ones you said in the mountains. I won’t press you about the past anymore…!”
“So,”
Elisha cut through Hugo’s babbling in one sentence.
“Let’s call it even?”
“Yeah! That’s it!”
“So you want me to tell grandfather?”
Hugo nodded desperately.
“Fine, Count Hugo Lionet. You suggested this first and delegated authority to me, right?”
“Alright! Don’t make it sound so hard that I’m trying to cover up for uncle! Just somehow, please!”
Then Elisha clicked the pen tucked in her apron.
It was as if she had been waiting for that.
Hugo was trembling, not even guessing what she meant.
She looked at him and said indifferently:
“It’s fine, grandfather. Nothing’s happening on the first floor.”
Her tone was very lifeless, but the upstairs fell silent.
Before Hugo could sigh in relief, Elisha sat beside him.
“Are you okay?”
“Do I look okay?!”
“Grandfather was raring to go anyway. I tried to stop him, but it’s lucky you didn’t meet him today.”
Her worried expression was more like an urgent warning with no time to breathe.
Imagining an iron mace flying at his face, Hugo stammered:
“You tried to stop him?”
“I don’t know the whole story, so I’m just doing what grandfather says. But the Count doesn’t seem like a bad person.”
“Uh…?”
“After all, he’s the only relative who visited when you were sick. And he gave me allowance too.”
His mind, which had been blank, started turning.
So, all this trouble…
‘Was it uncle’s doing?’
“Though he’s miserly enough to give only silver coins instead of gold, quick to yell, and pretends to be tough carrying a useless sword…”
After that, Hugo stopped listening.
‘So I was fooled by uncle? Not her? She really is a clueless innocent?’
It was a matter of pride.
If all this was a plan by uncle, not that mountain girl he’d always dismissed…
Then he wasn’t a fool to have been tricked — uncle was just smart!
“He tries to write a fraudulent contract himself, then blames others for being swindlers — a weird logic that if I do it it’s romance, if others do it it’s adultery — but whatever…”
Hugo looked again at Elisha muttering something.
‘She can’t be that clever.’
So her completely naive face really was real?
“Still, the fact that grandfather will come soon doesn’t change…”
“What?! You mean he knows I’m staying at the No. 2 Street hotel?”
“Oh, he knows very well.”
Elisha covered her mouth quietly and glanced around.
“He was so angry saying, ‘Unless the Forest of Colonia returns, I’ll never forgive that Hugo guy!’”
“…Did you say ‘Forest of Colonia’?”
The Forest of Colonia — just a meaningless painting.
“Yes.”
“Is that all he wants? Just that?”
“Yes. Grandfather wouldn’t be angry just for the sake of anger. If that returns, I can talk to him properly.”
Hugo grabbed the Property Transfer Contract he had brought to get Elisha to sign, and spread it on the table.
It felt a little thick but he didn’t care.
After scribbling vigorously with a pen, he signed his name and ‘Forest of Colonia’ in large letters.
“Here! Give this to uncle! Send the Forest of Colonia right away!”
Hugo was about to say more to Elisha.
He’d shown many shameful moments today.
Just as he opened his mouth, he noticed Elisha’s eyes rolling upward again.
What was that? Before he could think—
Bang!
A loud noise came from upstairs again, and he fled in panic.
“I-I’ll go check it out!”
Hugo’s assistant jumped and sat down in confusion, then whispered to himself before running after his boss.
“Count?”
He had brought a sword, but where did all his bravado go?
“Aaah!”
He seriously wondered if Hugo had eaten something bad.
‘Why is he acting like this? Like he heard thunder or something?’
The pawnshop was quiet.
After watching Hugo’s assistant peer around cluelessly and leave,
I lowered my hands from covering my mouth.
“I saw Hugo begging too.”
A barely suppressed laugh escaped.
Ha, this is what living is.
“Emma is the best.”
Emma was a mage from the Gray District.
The security magic she cast was amazing.
“Ah, about the last spell you requested. You know it can only be used once, right? I have no idea what you want to use it on, though.”
The spell I requested was the Worst Memory.
