Chapter 38
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Violet's First Words - Episode 38
"I started out as a specialized mercenary. Now I manage several mercenaries under me and take on fieldwork myself."
"So... it's like a Guild?"
Cyril had a sturdy build and was in good health. But his physique wasn't that of an active warrior in his prime.
I could tell from the calluses on his fingers and the gleam in his eyes.
Of course, mercenaries come in many varieties. Even specialized mages like spirit summoners work as mercenaries.
"I'm a barrier breaker. In other words, a barrier specialist."
"I see."
The Mana Stone Mine, or the Ancient Ruins where treasures lay hidden.
Those places were all filled with countless barriers and curses set by demons.
A profession where one is dispatched to such places to dismantle barriers for clients.
Barrier specialists were as rare a profession as spirit summoners.
'He truly is self-made. The more I learn about Uncle, the greater my admiration for him grows.'
I marveled at this.
"Why are you looking at me like that? It's creepy."
Cyril flinched.
"Uncle, you're truly impressive. You're so different from my Father, who's basically a con artist."
Whenever I said things like this, Ash would always laugh in exasperation.
But Cyril's ears merely flushed red. He gestured to Olive to pour fresh wine.
"Let's eat."
"Yes."
I nodded.
"...Drop out of the Academy and do whatever you want for a while. Forget about assignments and such. If it makes you happy to give your family a taste of their own medicine, then that's enough for me. I have enough money saved up to support you for at least a few years while you find yourself. It's honestly earned, so don't worry about it."
My throat suddenly felt tight. It was moving in a way I hadn't anticipated.
"...Thank you, Uncle."
"As for training, I'll arrange a proper teacher for you. At your current level, they should be quite competent."
"Yes, could I ask where they work and what they do?"
Cyril's head turned slowly. He looked at Olive with an expression tinged with slight disillusionment.
Olive ate his food with an expressionless face.
"...Olive?!"
This time, I was genuinely shocked.
* * *
"Focus your mind and strengthen the circles around you."
Olive pressed down on my shoulders and whispered. I did as she instructed.
"From now on, I'll help by moving my mana. Feel the flow of mana as I move it, and expand your circle. You've already completed one circle to the point of overflow. If you don't reach the second circle, your body will be damaged."
"Understood."
I replied. I did exactly as she told me.
"Good. After that, we'll do basic training and then spar with me hand-to-hand. Since you learned the fundamentals at the Academy, let's focus on practical application."
Olive said.
After the sparring session, Olive was a monster. It felt like colliding with steel itself.
'I never realized—until now, Olive had always worn a maid's outfit that covered her from head to toe.'
It turned out that seemingly thin frame was composed entirely of well-defined muscle.
By the time Olive said "training is over," I was practically sprawled on the ground.
"Olive, I think I'm going to die...."
"Don't be dramatic. This is just the beginning."
"I'm serious. I've already endured the grueling Academy training."
"Training is about quality, not quantity. One real sparring match where your life is on the line tenses your entire body far more than swinging a sword alone hundreds of times."
"That's true."
I nodded in agreement.
Olive barely broke a sweat. She brought me the water she had prepared.
The water was sweet. I gulped it down eagerly.
After sitting down to rest, my body felt somewhat better.
"Where did you learn swordsmanship, Olive?"
"It's complicated."
"Then in the past... were you a mercenary? You seem more skilled in hand-to-hand combat than swordplay. I've heard that's common among mercenaries."
"So you're curious about my past."
"Honestly, yes."
"When I was young, I was deeply involved in a cult."
I nearly dropped the water bottle.
"...What?"
"I was caught up in a cult and lived a life stripped of free will and communal existence. I spent half my life that way until my early twenties."
Olive remained composed throughout.
"That's not what I'm curious about—how did you get entangled in something like that?"
"Simply put, I was a victim of employment fraud."
"You don't seem like the type to fall for a scam so easily, Olive."
"You're observant. The ones who were scammed weren't me, but my poor parents."
Olive continued calmly.
"I came from a poor family with many children. In such households, they want to reduce mouths to feed. So they sent me away to literally anywhere. Specifically, to a place that claimed to teach the way to become a knight without payment."
"I've heard of that kind of scam before. Anyway... that place turned out to be a cult organization?"
The talent of a great knight is simple.
The skeletal structure called boneless, and the constitution capable of handling mana.
The profession of knight, if done well, could seize both fame and fortune. So many parents would be tempted if their young child showed talent.
It was a method used in human trafficking, and it was also a common fraud scheme employed by knight academies.
"That place was also impossible to escape from."
"Did you learn swordsmanship there?"
"Yes, I underwent hellish assassin training. And I was fortunate—despite the training, I didn't kill many people."
"Oh... that's... good?"
Olive spoke so matter-of-factly that my sense of reality began to numb.
A respectable butler could very well have originated from an evil cult.
Well, as long as it wasn't happening now, it didn't matter.
I could have easily become a ruthless killing machine had I fallen deeper into the Cult, but as long as he'd repented by now, that was enough.
"The cult selected me and tried to raise me as a sort of elite. They wanted to make me part of the cult leader's personal guard, or something like that. So they never sent me into actual combat. Instead, I trained extensively."
According to Olive, the people there learned to refine and use aura through special methods.
Thanks to that, he could handle mana skillfully enough to teach me.
That was Olive's explanation.
"... But Olive, how did you meet Cyril Uncle?"
But was this peculiar manner of speech his original personality?
"In my early twenties, I finally tried to stab the cult leader and escape. But I was caught, and they bound my limbs, inflicted serious wounds on me, and abandoned me at the Ancient Ruins."
"Cyril Uncle saved your life!"
"That's right. Cyril, who came to work as a barrier mage, rescued me."
"So you began working for Uncle after that day."
He rescued Olive from dire straits and took him in! Cyril truly was a good person.
My eyes sparkled.
"He's a businessman and mercenary who operates on profit. So it's only natural that I repay my debt through labor, since I had no money to offer. Of course, he doesn't agree with that arrangement."
"Uncle... did he approve of Olive working here?"
The sparkle faded from my eyes.
"No, he strongly objected at the time and still occasionally has fits where he begs me to leave the house. He's surprisingly fragile-hearted, so he even gets angry sometimes, pleading with me to please accept a salary."
"...."
Suddenly, I felt sorry for Cyril.
'At first, I thought Cyril Uncle was an eccentric.'
Yet an even stranger person had settled in as our butler... Indeed, one cannot judge the world by appearances alone.
Normalcy was merely a relative concept.
When I included Ash and Marin, Cyril seemed the most mentally sound person I'd encountered recently.
"At least Olive does the work of ten people. It must be a blessing for Cyril Uncle."
I offered that blessing to preserve peace in the household.
"This environment is favorable for me as well. If I'd remained there, I would have eventually died miserably—either caught by the Heresy Inquisitors or captured by another military force. That religious facility was an illegal operation, after all."
Olive spoke.
'Wait, I feel like I've heard this story before...'
A sinister premonition suddenly gripped me.
'An evil cult, a cult leader-level figure, and the result was execution.'
It was exactly the story of me in that future vision—my own tale.
'Wh... at?'
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