WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 38

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Unwelcome Guests (1)

How many noble houses existed on the continent?

No one could say for certain, but the number was likely staggering.

There were over a hundred kingdoms alone, and since inheritance didn't always go to the eldest son in one clean sweep, territories split apart often enough. Noble houses might well be multiplying at this very moment.

But among that great multitude, a select few stood out.

The three houses of Runtel Kingdom, famed for magic.

The five houses representing the Western Five Kingdoms, famed for the sword.

The Cesar Duchy, which produced an unusual number of Sorcerers, and the ducal house of the Holy Kingdom, which had produced fine paladins generation after generation.

Unless someone came from the most backward corner of the countryside, these ten houses were names everyone knew, true houses of renown.

Among them all, House Lindsay ranks as one of the finest...

That was exactly why the servant Marcus had recognized the tag on sight.

Platinum, an expensive metal to begin with, carrying House Lindsay's crest worked in with magic. There was no way it could be a fake.

So then, how had the young master gotten his hands on something this precious?

The answer turned out to be almost disappointingly simple.

"A friend... gave it to me."

"...A friend?"

Airen Farreira nodded.

Friend. Still an unfamiliar word, one that didn't quite sit right on his tongue.

But since the other party had called herself his friend, he couldn't very well deny it.

Of course, he understood why Marcus was so shaken.

The lazy young lord might be ignorant of the world, but he wasn't a fool.

Still, being too stunned to even speak properly... House Lindsay must carry far more weight than I realized.

Airen didn't know the details of the continent's ten great houses. He'd only heard the name in passing.

But judging by Marcus's reaction, he was starting to grasp just how much influence they held.

Come to think of it, the other kids' reactions when I first arrived at the hall were probably something like this too.

Of course, none of that applied to the lazy young lord anymore.

It didn't matter whether she came from a noble house or not. Just like it hadn't mattered that Judith was an orphan.

The boy took the platinum tag back from his servant and said, "Yeah. A friend."

"..."

"Sorry, but I'm going to close my eyes for a bit."

"Ah, yes! Young master!"

Airen used the excuse of resting his eyes to slip into meditation.

The reason wasn't the usual one this time. He was searching, instead, for a way to break free of the man's sword.

It wasn't easy, of course.

He'd never once thought about this subject before, and worse, it was a philosophical question with no clear answer.

Airen wasn't clever enough to solve something like that in one stroke.

If this were the old me, I probably would have run from it. Really fallen asleep, I mean.

But the current Airen didn't run.

He'd learned to take on hard, difficult things anyway. To keep trying, again and again. And that a path opened up eventually if he kept at it.

The problem was that all of it had come from the dream's help.

My sword... learning to push myself forward on my own strength...

The boy sank deep into his own thoughts, wrestling with the difficult question, and the servant Marcus watched him with a curious eye.

* * *

Several days passed. House Farreira's carriage rolled on and on, drawing close to the estate at last. Just one more town to pass, and they'd be there.

Through it all, the lazy young lord had spent his days much the same way.

Most of each day went to meditation and worry.

Young master, are you really alright?

The servant Marcus's concern grew heavier by the day.

At first, when he'd seen the young master again, he'd breathed a sigh of relief.

The boy's body had improved far beyond what it used to be, and Marcus had seen him talking with people outside the house.

Something once unthinkable.

He'd even become friends with the continent's famous genius, Illia Lindsay!

That alone was as significant as officially enrolling at Krono Fencing Hall.

Of course, the young master, simple as he was for his age, probably didn't grasp the full weight of what that meant. But it was bound to become an enormous asset for both him and the house.

Still, no matter how much good fortune had piled up, if the young master's own spirits stayed this low, it was bound to be a problem.

He does seem to have fallen into despair...

It felt terrible to think it, but the servant had never once believed Airen Farreira would actually pass the fencing hall's trial.

Probably no one else had believed it either.

He'd heard Krono Fencing Hall was a brutal place for a beginner swordsman to survive.

But that was everyone else's opinion. It was only natural that the young master himself would feel disappointed and crushed.

All the more so, since this had been his first real challenge in his entire life.

I need something, anything, to help the young master pick himself back up!

Sadly, no useful idea came to mind.

It couldn't be helped. If ideas like that came easily, the young master wouldn't have ended up in this state to begin with.

In the end, the servant spent the ride quietly agonizing over it, and somewhere in the middle of that, the carriage reached the last town before the estate.

That was when something unusual caught Marcus's eye.

An orc?

Green skin.

A frame thicker than any grown man's.

Large teeth jutting slightly past the lips.

No mistaking it. That was definitely an orc.

I heard they're only seen now and then in the northwest of the continent. What's one doing all the way down south?

They lived far from Hale Kingdom and rarely mingled with humans, so seeing one here was a rare thing.

And this wasn't just any orc.

The pentagram pendant hanging from its neck and the tattoos marked across its skin suggested someone with real skill in spirit magic and astrology.

That's it!

The servant clapped his hands together.

He hurried back to the inn and called on Airen politely.

"Young master? Are you asleep?"

"No. What is it?"

"If it wouldn't be too much trouble, would you like to go get your fortune told, just for fun?"

"Fortune told?"

Airen knew what that meant.

A bit of folk superstition passed around, something to check a person's luck, fortune for the day, what lay ahead. That sort of thing.

"Might be fun, but I don't really need to..."

"This isn't just any fortune teller. There's an orc fortune teller staying in town right now."

Airen had been lukewarm about the whole idea, but this time he couldn't help but be surprised.

There was no way a boy who'd never once set foot outside his own house had ever seen a real orc in person.

Pure curiosity won him over, and he agreed readily. The two of them got dressed and set off toward the orc fortune teller's spot.

The servant smiled to himself, secretly.

Orc fortune tellers are famous for only ever saying nice things.

Even a fellow human giving bad news could sour someone's mood, so no one was going to sit there and tolerate an insult from a creature of a whole different race.

That's exactly why orc fortune tellers, no matter what the reading actually showed, always found something pleasant to say.

Of course, people knew that too. But good news was good news, wasn't it?

The young master's case would be no different.

If he hears some good news about his future, maybe he'll forget the sting of failing and cheer right up!

With that hope carrying him along, Marcus soon found himself standing in front of the orc fortune teller.

Fortunately, the line wasn't long. Airen's face lit with surprise.

"It's real."

"That's right. A real orc. And did you know? Among fortune tellers, orc fortune tellers are said to be the most accurate."

"Yeah. I've heard that just meeting an orc fortune teller brings good luck."

"Exactly."

In truth, that reputation had only come about because every orc fortune teller told nothing but good things, but the servant kept that part to himself.

A short while later, it was Airen Farreira's turn.

The boy sat down in the chair with a flutter of anticipation he hadn't felt in a long while, and the servant stood attending beside him.

The orc fortune teller greeted the two of them with a bright expression.

"Welcome, guests! Is this the one getting the reading?"

"That's right."

"Wonderful! What would you like to know? Today's fortune? This year's fortune? Love? Wealth? Health? Ask me anything! This humble, incredibly accurate orc fortune teller will tell you every single..."

Both Airen and Marcus were marveling at the orc's impressively fluent Continental speech when something changed.

The words, which had been flowing like a river, gradually slowed to a stop.

Marcus glanced back, wondering if something had happened, but nothing had.

No, in fact, the orc fortune teller had been staring intently at Airen Farreira alone, the whole time.

"..."

"..."

"...Um, is something wrong?"

Their eyes met, and silence stretched between them. Airen felt sweat break out along his back, and the servant, pressed by some unspoken tension, urged the fortune teller on.

After a long pause, the orc fortune teller, now wearing a serious expression, asked quietly.

"Forgive me for asking, but... how old are you?"

* * *

"Never get a reading from that garbage fortune teller again! Let's go, young master."

The servant stormed off in a fury, and the young noble followed behind him with a heavy expression.

Watching the two of them leave, the orc fortune teller, Kubharu, let out a pained groan.

"Damn it. I can't do business here anymore."

It couldn't be helped, really.

Truth be told, his fortune telling was terrible.

He'd only ever gotten by on flattering words, sharp observation, and quick thinking on his feet.

That skill set was enough to satisfy ninety nine percent of customers, but every so often, he hit a sour note.

This had been one of those times.

That kind of ridiculous muscle, and he failed the trial? What is that supposed to mean?

He'd felt it the moment he laid eyes on the man. Just how brutal the training standing before him must have been.

The body told the story. Development far beyond anything an ordinary person could reach.

Not simply bulk, either, but a dense, efficient build honed for real combat.

Someone like that, trailed by an attendant besides, could only be a noble of high standing, or maybe the son of a wealthy merchant.

And that had turned out to be true.

So when it sounded like the man was heading off to test into some prestigious knight order, Kubharu had offered to make him a lucky charm... only to learn he was already coming back from a failed exam.

Not even a knight order, but some fencing hall? Ugh. Are the people running that place all blind?

The muscle wasn't the only remarkable thing about this customer.

The orc fortune teller Kubharu had no real gift for astrology. But spirit magic, that he could actually do.

If he was allowed a little bragging, he'd never met a human who could match him at it.

And by that measure, the golden energy packed into this customer's body was almost unbelievable.

Nothing built up over a year or two could ever compare.

This was the kind of energy that only came from a lifetime of hammering and hammering again, like tempered steel.

Someone with energy like that, and he's only sixteen? Who'd believe that.

Part of the mistake came from the fact that he was a different race and had trouble judging a human's age, but that was exactly what made the blunder land as hard as it did.

His excellent spirit magic had turned into poison this time, tripping him up twice over.

"Well... getting to see something that rare and mysterious was still a good trade, I guess."

That much was true. He hadn't earned a single coin, but Kubharu genuinely felt good about it.

Seeing a human who'd built one of the five elements up to its very limit, and a human not even twenty years old at that, had been a fresh kind of shock.

That's why, even while getting cursed out, he'd given the boy a parting gift.

Not a reading from him, the con artist, but a slip of paper carrying the power of his own great master, a true fortune teller.

His master's blessed note would give the boy exactly the guidance that fit him, guided by providence.

"Wonder if our paths will cross again. Hmm..."

Well, if the chance came, it came.

Kubharu scratched his head, pulled a bottle from his waist, and headed off to squander the day's earnings at the nearest gambling den.

* * *

"I'm so sorry. I had no idea he was such a fraud..."

The next day, inside the carriage headed for the estate, the servant bowed his head.

The day before, he'd been too mortified to properly apologize at all.

His eyes were brimming with genuine regret.

Of course, Airen was fine with it.

"You don't need to worry about it."

"But..."

"It's not like he said anything bad, right? Sure, plenty of it was wrong... but it wasn't all completely wrong either."

"Is that so..."

Wasn't it completely wrong, though?

That was what Marcus thought.

Asking a sixteen year old boy his age, and telling a man walking back from a failed exam that he'd surely pass whatever knight order he was applying to, when he didn't even know which one.

I should have given him another mouthful of curses.

That thought washed clean away the moment Airen spoke again.

"I didn't fail, by the way."

"Sir?"

"I passed. Sorry for only saying it now... I got caught up thinking about something else important and forgot. Sorry about that."

"..."

"Ah, though it's not final yet, not right away. The Hall Master gave me an assignment, so... it's a conditional pass. If I finish the assignment within a year, I get to go back."

"Uh, uhh..."

The servant's mind went into a tailspin.

Should he ask why Airen was only telling him now? Should he offer congratulations first? Or maybe, since it wasn't a full, clean pass, he should hold back on saying too much and just quietly cheer him on?

Wait, he actually passed? An official pass into the great Krono Fencing Hall itself?

His thoughts refused to settle into any order. Marcus struggled hard just to untangle the mess in his own head.

Meanwhile, Airen Farreira was turning over the message from the orc fortune teller's note in his mind.

To stand fully on your own, you don't necessarily need to stand alone.

It sounded like some vague, thrown together bit of advice meant to seem profound, but Airen couldn't quite bring himself to dismiss it.

That orc fortune teller calling it my age... he must have meant the man in the dream, right?

Now that he thought about it, the orc had mentioned something about five elements, and gold energy too. Words he'd heard often enough at the fencing hall.

Steel like resolve. That one had to be about the man too, not him.

"Hmm."

The small details had missed the mark, but the broad strokes had landed true.

Even more striking, that second point was something no one else had ever picked up on. Not even Hall Master Ian, whose eyes seemed to see straight through people.

...I won't just dismiss it.

That was the conclusion Airen settled on.

He didn't need to blindly rely on other people's words, but he didn't need to ignore them either.

For now, that was enough. Just as the boy finished sorting through his own thoughts...

One of the soldiers on the driver's bench spoke, his voice tight with tension.

"Up ahead... House Gairon's carriage is coming this way."

At those words, Airen Farreira snapped back to full alertness. The servant Marcus, equally startled, leaned to look out the carriage window.

House Viscount Gairon.

The house whose lord quietly kept House Farreira, a baron's house, in check.

And the house with two sons who openly looked down on the eldest son of House Farreira.

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