Chapter 17

Chapter 17

✠

“Kehehe! Die! Hai-yah! Yah!”

“Y-young master! Aagh!”

The delinquent son of Count Gilette only began to take an interest in swordsmanship after his instructor changed. This new instructor was more focused on practical experience. Thanks to this new teaching philosophy, Romdeo was in the middle of a “training” regime that involved thrashing the servants with a wooden sword. Slashing his way through the line of servants, one by one, made him feel like the strongest warrior in the land.

“Mwahaha! This is the way of my sword! Take this! And that!”

“Y-young master! Please, stop! Oof! Ouch!”

“Insignificant wretch! You’re no match for me! Next up! Who’s next?”

“Phew, finally done...”

The young servants played dead as they lay strewn across the floor before jumping to their feet and running away. The servants were also armed with wooden swords for the sake of appearing fair, but they didn’t dare raise them against the count’s son. All they could do was put on a show for the young master’s ego and wait for a good opportunity to leave.

Romdeo panted as he looked for something to drink. The table inside the training grounds was covered with all sorts of restorative potions. He selected one at random and drank it. “Yuck! It’s so bitter!”

He put down the bottle and began to search for his next victim. “Next up... You’re going to face me?”

“Y-young master. I look forward to our match.”

Prinz Rodeline. As soon as Romdeo caught sight of the handsome, pink-haired boy, he lunged forward with his wooden sword. From the moment Romdeo had first laid eyes on Prinz, there was something about the other boy that rubbed him the wrong way.

Prinz was just a whipping boy hired to serve him, but he had the audacity to be smarter and more handsome than Romdeo himself. Even his name was Prinz! The young noble seethed with jealousy, resenting him for the most absurd reasons, like having a classier name than he had.

“Here I come!”

“Y-young master! Ah!”

Romdeo swung his wooden blade at Prinz, full of malice. But Prinz was quick and agile, instinctively dodging the attack with ease. Romdeo’s swing was stronger than usual, thanks to the potion he drank earlier.

I-I’ll be in a world of hurt if I get struck by that! Prinz decided to abandon his original plan to humor the young master and take a few hits like the other servants. But even so, he wasn’t able to retaliate and was left passively parrying Romdeo’s strikes and dodging his blade.

Romdeo, incensed Prinz was evading his attacks, began to brandish his sword even more threateningly. The servants watching from afar gulped in fear for Prinz. The new instructor was oblivious to what was going on, slacking off as usual.

After several more failed attempts to strike Prinz, Romdeo fumed and threw a fit. “You little rat! Is dodging the only thing you know how to do?!”

“B-but young master, I couldn’t possibly attack you...”

“Hey! Who told you to attack me? I’m telling you to get hit! Is that so hard to comprehend? This is only gonna end when I hit you!”

Prinz could sense the danger in Romdeo’s murderous eyes and realized that he might die if a direct hit ever connected.

“You little... So that’s how you want to play this, huh?”

“Y-young master.”

Just then, Romdeo found an opportunity to strike a cowardly, unscrupulous blow. “Oh no, look out! Your sister’s falling off the guard rail!”

“What?” Prinz looked up, distracted. “Where...!?”

“Ha!” Romdeo jeered as he swung down his sword gleefully. “Gotcha!”

“Agh!” Prinz crumpled to the floor as he was struck by Romdeo’s dastardly blow. His body became paralyzed from the shock of the initial hit and was no longer able to evade the onslaught that followed. “A-agh...!”

Even as he took the furious beating, Prinz held onto his sword and never let go. The servants anxiously tried to get the instructor’s attention, but he remained unaware of his surroundings.

Instead of the instructor, a different individual showed up to stop the beating.

“You lousy rat! Die! I said die...!”

“What is this undignified behavior, brother?”

“Oh! B-Bianca!”

In his surprise, the wooden sword slipped out of Romdeo’s hands and clattered to the floor.

Ailette crouched down. She gingerly patted Prinz as he curled up in pain, barely holding onto consciousness. “Are you okay, Prinz?”

“A-Allie?”

“Sorry, I’m late.”

Prinz was about to reply but stopped when he noticed Ailette’s heartbroken voice as she held back tears.

Bianca defensively stepped in front of the Rodeline siblings and confronted her own brother and his sword instructor.

“How long are you going to keep up this juvenile behavior?”

“W-what do you mean! This is all part of my swordsmanship training!”

“Training? How about you weigh in on this, Mr. New Instructor? Is it your policy to have your students beat helpless servants? Do you condone one-sided assault despite there being an obvious hierarchy at play?”

“L-Lady Bianca. T-this was all a part of a plan to get the young master interested in swordsmanship!”

“If your swordsmanship involves harming people, I suppose it’s better off not being “interested” in it at all. I shall be informing my mother of this.”

“Hey, Bianca!”

“M-milady!”

Romdeo and his sword instructor looked as if they were about to cling onto the hem of Bianca’s dress, begging for mercy.

“Allie, you go on ahead with Prinz and get him checked out.”

“Yes, milady... Prinz, can you walk?”

“Y-yeah.” Prinz winced in pain with each step he took, legs trembling. Despite his obvious agony, he still began to walk.

Ailette gave Romdeo a fierce look as she walked past him.

Romdeo became flustered, but instead of expressing remorse, he indignantly challenged her. “W-what do you want? It was a fair match! What did I do wrong?!”

Bianca didn’t so much as spare him a single glance.

“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?! Hey! I was going to make you my henchman but I take it all back!”

Ailette ignored his nonsense and continued to put distance between them and Romdeo.

✠

She was furious. This clearly went beyond the scope of childish squabbling. It was assault! That good-for-nothing brute was the root of all evil for sure.

“A-Allie.”

“What?”

“I-I think I can walk by myself now. I can take a beating pretty well, it doesn’t really hur— Ouch.”

“Let’s walk like this, Prinz. I’ll help you.”

“Okay...” After a moment Prinz spoke again, “You’re not mad at me, are you?”

“What?”

“You haven’t said anything since we left the practice grounds.”

“I’m not mad at you.”

Don’t talk to me. I’m gonna cry if we keep talking. I helped Prinz slowly make his way to our father’s lab. Besides the fact that it was close by, alchemists were medical professionals commensurate to physicians, so I knew he would be able to help.

Unfortunately, when we arrived at the lab, he was nowhere to be found. Where did he run off to when his son is hurt like this?! I was only able to find this out later, but Dad had been called out to take care of some issues with incompetent herb merchants.

“Dad isn’t here? That’s great! Now we won’t have to worry him. Hehe.”

I could feel my insides burn up as I watched Prinz laugh innocently with his battered face. “Wait here.” I began to furiously whip something up, driven by the sight of my brother’s awful injuries. I couldn’t be satisfied with just applying some slow-acting ointment to Prinz’s bruised body, as was surely his plan. It just so happened that I had plenty of raw material from the dungeon farm to make the potions I needed.

“Are you making medicine? I don’t like bitter stuff...”

“You won’t get better unless you take this stuff. Don’t complain now.”

“Okay...”

At my level of alchemy, brewing up your run-of-the-mill healing potion was like boiling a pack of instant ramen. I whisked and beat and squeezed and wrung out the ingredients, adding only the very best, and was left with a flask full of murky liquid.

⟬«System» [Tongue-Numbingly Bitter, Highly Enriched Healing Potion] has been successfully created.⟭

Maybe I overdid it a little with all the ingredients... I ended up with some unexpected results.

⟬«System» Congratulations! You’ve now reached the necessary proficiency level and have awakened Alchemy Lv.8. Skills [Great Increase in Alchemic Efficiency Lv. 5] (Passive) and [Creative Inspiration Lv. 1] (Passive) are both unlocked.⟭

I had leveled up in the midst of all this. Creative inspiration? What the heck is this? I guess I’ll have to take a closer look after I feed Prinz his medicine— Wait, hold on a sec.

The glass jar my dad kept filled with candy caught my eye. I suddenly felt the urge to make some adjustments to the potion for Prinz, since he said he hates bitter medicine.

Like cold syrup for kids! I took out a few pieces of candy and a few pieces of dried herbs to put my idea into action. I repeatedly cooked the ingredients sous vide and distilled the leftovers until they became a purplish treacle. I mixed the product into the healing potion.

Poof!

“Allie! Are you okay?!”

I coughed hoarsely while trying to reassure my brother, “It’s okay. Don’t worry about me, I’m perfectly fine. Just drink this.”

“I-is this medicine? It’s pitch black! It looks a little suspic...”

“It’s the fruit of my labors. Please, drink up.”

“U-urgh!”

As he brought the flask to his mouth, Prinz looked like he was going to cry with anticipation of a foul flavor. I could see him holding his breath to avoid tasting it. But by the time he had finished about half of the potion, his expression had changed.

“Huh? This stuff is good!”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah! It tastes like grapes! It’s almost like juice!”

I could also see his cuts and bruises healing in real-time, so it seemed to be functioning as intended as well.

“Wow, whoever heard of a good-tasting medicine? This stuff is going to sell like hotcakes!”

“You think so? I guess we can sell this stuff to afford to send you to a military academy.”

“What?”

I grasped Prinz’s hands with mine. “Prinz, I’ve thought long and hard over this.”

“Y-yeah?”

“But I think revenge is best when served by the victim.”

“Revenge?” Prinz scanned my face with a startled look.

But I wasn’t looking at Prinz. I was looking at the inverse triangle icon floating atop his head.

⟬«Target» [Prinz Rodeline]

Possesses immeasurable swordsmanship potential to awaken an aura. The future of a sword master with the potential to be revered by the world is in your hands. A guaranteed successful investment! For the low low price of 11 million cash!

Use 11,000,000 cash to purchase gift?⟭

What more was there to think about?