“Miss!”
Elaine, who was lost in her thoughts as she looked around the large, sun-filled room, immediately turned when she heard a welcoming voice behind her.
“Emily!”
“Oh my god, is this really Miss Elaine?”
“Of course! Have you already forgotten my face?”
The two people hugged each other tightly and chatted for a long time.
Elaine was so happy that tears welled up in her eyes.
“I’m sorry I haven’t been writing to you often. My master has told me not to write to you.”
“If you’re talking about your master, are you talking about Sergey?”
“Yes. He said that if I sent letters too often, Count Newt’s family would keep an eye on Miss Elaine. Is that true?”
“Yeah…Well, a little bit…?”
Elaine smiled awkwardly and muddled her answer, but it was quite surprising that Sergey knew all about such circumstances.
“When I first heard that you were my master’s friend, I was so surprised. I thought, ‘What a small world.’”
“Yeah. But, I’m sorry about what happened to Emily’s father, but I think it’s fortunate that Emily came here and is doing well because of it.”
“You feel sorry about my father? That drunkard, he’s done for. He’s only going to be of help to his daughter’s life after he’s dead, he’s a damn fool.”
Emily groaned, then suddenly came to her senses and covered her mouth.
“I’m sorry, I said something rude in front of you.…”
“Speaking of Emily saying it’s a good thing, I thought the same thing as Emily.”
Elaine smiled and hugged Emily again.
“You’ve been through so much.”
“It hasn’t been hard, really. On the contrary, you’ve had a hard time. You knew all of Countess Newt’s intentions, didn’t you?”
Emily rubbed Elaine’s back, who just smiled silently, and thought about the malice the girl had to endure.
The cold stares of the countess and the maid looking down on her were still unforgettable to Elaine, and she had had to endure such contempt and disgust throughout her life.
“That won’t happen again. Count Lindell, he doesn’t have many servants, but they are all good people.”
“Really?”
“Yes. It can be a little strange at times, but I guess that’s because they have lived abroad for a long time.”
“Probably so. Then how about Sergey? He’s a good host?”
“Sergey?”
Emily pursed her lips as she thought of the young master of this house, whom she had a hard time meeting.
“I don’t get to see him much because he travels back home alone on behalf of the family, but he’s really handsome and treats his servants really well, but he gives me chills every time I see him.”
“Oh, why?”
“It’s not that there’s a particular reason, but I think it’s just his personality. He doesn’t even smile at other servants he’s worked with for a long time.”
“Hmm…I see.”
Elaine was a little surprised but then remembered her first meeting with Sergey, who wouldn’t even tell her his name.
If it were an ordinary person, they would have thought that Sergey was cold just by looking at him like that.
‘If they talk to him a little more, I think they will find out that he’s a warm-hearted person. If not, he wouldn’t have saved me, and he wouldn’t have bothered to be my friend.’
Some might say that it is rash to guess Sergey’s personality based on such facts alone, but Elaine is strangely confident.
But she had no intention of forcing that kind of thinking on others. Her feelings for Sergey were worth keeping to herself.
Elaine changed the subject.
“But what do you mean when you say that the servants of the Lindell family are a bit strange?”
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe it’s nothing, but sometimes they look into the air and laugh, or they flinch whenever I pass by. Some people mumble to themselves, and some draw something on the floor and play.…But what’s even stranger is that no one says anything while seeing that.”
‘From the way Emily talks, it sounds like Count Lindell is gathering people from all over the place and putting them to work.’
“Are they good at their jobs?”
“Yes. Even though they may look a little strange, they all work really well. It’s amazing. They look like they’re just having fun, but they clean up all over before you know it, and they look like they have no skills, but they make really great dinners.”
“Are they using magic or something?”
“Hahaha! Sometimes it really does seem that way.”
Emily and Elaine laughed carelessly as they talked about such trivial matters.
Elaine couldn’t remember when she had ever felt that peaceful.
There was no need to worry about food, clothing, or shelter, no need to worry about being harmed when she went outside, and no need to be consumed by sadness or anger, just happy thoughts.
‘It finally felt real that I had left the Newt and Temple.’
“Anyway, since I’m your personal maid, don’t worry about anything. I’ll take care of everything!”
“Really? I should at least thank Sergey.”
“No one knows when the master will come home. I don’t know where he’s staying…”
Elaine felt a little bitter at those words.
Sergey was her first friend and she didn’t know much about him, but Sergey was the heir to a great noble family.
Of course, there would be many people he knew, and even if it wasn’t where Elaine was, there would be many places to stay.
‘Even though we were bound together under the name of ‘friend’, I felt that he and I were on completely different levels.’
‘I understood why Sergey had told me not to fall in love with him…’
‘Don’t be greedy. It’s enough to just be someone I can greet by calling their name. I’m grateful just to be able to have a light chat.’
Elaine calmed herself by imagining a relationship like the one she’d had with Debbie’s group, where it was a pleasure to meet and not sad to part ways.
Anyway, she had someone more precious to her called Rabes, so even when she thought about it, she didn’t feel the loneliness that pierced her bones like before.
‘By the way, is Rabes okay?’
Rabes, who had left the temple saying he needed to increase his power, returned to Elaine around the time she left the temple, but he was still rarely seen during the day.
The dragon’s food was mostly the magical cores of monsters, and since monsters usually lived in places with few people, such as forests or caves, they were not places that could be visited quickly.
[Don’t worry too much, I’ll teleport over when you call.]
Although Elaine was grateful and reassured that he would leave such words every time he went out, she knew that even teleportation required a lot of magical power, so she rarely called Rabes.
‘I didn’t want to interrupt Rabes’ power replenishment time either.’
‘But now that I’m out of the temple, I’m sure Rabes will feel a little more at ease, right?’
‘No more prying eyes, no more Lorina, no more Lark coming to visit, and Rabes will be at ease, so everything is better.’
Elaine spent a peaceful afternoon organizing her closet with Emily’s help and drinking some warm tea.
* * *
While Elaine was enjoying peace of mind, Rabes had transformed into Sergey and was taking care of some annoying tasks.
“Haha, Count Lindell has quite a talented son. I didn’t know you could communicate so well.”
“You are too kind. You must be very understanding, Viscount Mornon.”
“Hahaha! How humble. Anyway, I ask for your continued support. I also hope you deliver the letter to Count Lindell.”
“Of course. I have some letters and parcels to send next week anyway, so I’ll send them then.”
“Thank you. Hahah!”
After finishing the boring conversation and leaving the place, Sergey pulled on his cravat and took a deep breath.
“It’s easier to just wipe out all the monsters, what is this?”
“Would you like to stop now? Tsk. You need to learn the art of flattery.”
Sergey ignored Hubert, who was nagging at him and headed toward the carriage.
“But even for a Viscount like Mornon, he is a very conscientious person. Think of Viscount Grain, whom we met a while ago. He didn’t really give anything in return, but he just wanted a lot. And he even said careless things about Sergey because he was young.”
Hubert said, shaking his head.
Although Sergey had been humanized to look like a twenty-year-old so that he would not seem too young to lead the Count of Lindell while being close to Elaine, he was still far too young to be the representative of a noble family.
The sly nobles, judging from Sergey’s outward appearance, assumed that he knew nothing and tried to beat him up by making ridiculous demands.
Of course, Sergey had only been alive for twenty years or so, and his tutor, Hubert, had been doing that for five hundred years, so he was able to outmaneuver them and negotiate with them, but it still made him feel bad.
“Those kinds of people will experience the bitterness of natural disasters.”
Serge said nonchalantly as he got into the carriage.
Hubert was not surprised by his outrageous remark but instead asked with sparkling eyes.
“Oh, do you intend to destroy the wheat fields of Count Grain? By flood? By lightning? By hail?”
“I plan to bury his land in a landslide.”
“Isn’t that a bit excessive?”
“If you make me angry, you deserve to pay for it.”
Sergey smiled coldly and crossed his legs.
Every time this happened, Hubert realized that the man he was dealing with was a dragon.
As fearsome as the dragon was, there was a way to appease it.
“Miss Elaine will be concerned about the people of the Grain estate. She is a kind-hearted person.”
“That fool, that fool. How much longer must she endure the ugliness of humanity before she can stop worrying about such foolish things?”
Sergey grumbled as he thought of Elaine, who hated killing, let alone hurting anyone.
However, as Hubert had predicted, his grudge against Viscount Grain had subsided.
“The fool’s whining in front of me makes me sick to my stomach, but I’ll just do as you say and burn the wheat fields.”
“Okay. Then let’s take that into account and proceed with the business. Should we proceed with the trade-in beast skins with the unknown maker as we negotiated earlier?”
“Let’s do that. I won’t benefit from raising the price by a penny or two.”
* * *
Hello everyone, i just want to inform you that chapter 72 has been fixed. I just realized that chapter 71 and 72 are the same. I’m sorry for that. you can re-read it, so you can know what happened in chapter 72 🙂
