Chapter 016
Chapter 16: The Master and the Apprentice (10)
When I was young, my hobby was sneaking into my father’s library and stealing books to read in my mother’s room.
Whenever my father discovered I was reading, he would get furious, so I would hide in a dark corner to read the books.
“Poor thing.”
Every time, my sick mother would look at me and say words I couldn’t understand.
“Why?”
“Because you’ll never get what you want.”
“But I don’t really want anything.”
At that, my mother touched my hair and said:
“You need to become greedy, Cordelia. My daughter, will you be satisfied with just one book when you grow up? It’s human nature to want to know more and explore more places.”
“Huh?”
“Poor thing, your father will surely shackle you. If you had been born somewhere else, you could have lived a better life.”
“But I love you more than anything, Mom. I don’t want another place.”
When I said that, my mother hugged me tightly. It was one of the few beautiful memories I had.
My mother’s face began to fade gradually.
Her consciousness sank deeper.
A familiar ceiling appeared before her.
When she blinked, Emily was sitting beside her and said joyfully:
“Are you feeling better?”
“Ah…”
“It was really close to being something terrible. The doctor said if we had delayed even a little…”
As she spoke, Emily started crying. Her eyes were already red.
“Lady Helena said it wasn’t a big deal, but you didn’t open your eyes for four days.”
“Four days? Has it really been four days since I lost consciousness?”
“Yes. Fortunately, Lord Craig summoned all the doctors in the region and insisted on saving you.”
“What? Craig?”
The unexpected mention of Craig’s name made her blink.
She remembered his panicked face before she lost consciousness.
“Yes, the castle was in an uproar, and the doctors were trembling while examining you. Also, he argued with Lady Helena…”
As soon as Cordelia woke up, Leonard rushed into the room.
When Emily saw Leonard, she quickly left the room.
He stood by the bed where she lay and looked at her silently.
The silence lingered until Cordelia spoke first.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Are you stupid?”
“What?”
“You’re allergic to peanuts and ate them without checking? Is your head just for decoration? Why didn’t you use it?”
“Is that what you say to me as soon as I wake up?”
Instead of offering comforting words after what she went through, he was scolding her. But somehow, Cordelia wasn’t too bothered by his harsh words. She simply laughed.
“But I didn’t die, did I?”
“Didn’t die? Seriously?”
Leonard laughed mockingly.
“I’ve never seen anyone as foolish as you in my life.”
“Yes, yes. Of course.”
“Do you just eat anything put in front of you?”
“Lady Helena offered it to me; how could I refuse?”
“Don’t you have a mouth? Why didn’t you refuse? What if she had put poison in it? Would you just eat it and die?”
“If it was poisoned, I wouldn’t have eaten it. I’m not stupid.”
As Cordelia pursed her lips, Leonard shook his head slightly.
“You are stupid. Ugh, fine. Anyway, I’m going to clean up this place now, so don’t grovel to them anymore.”
“When did I grovel? Wait, clean up? What do you mean by clean up?”
“This castle. Your body has recovered a bit, so we need to get rid of the filth.”
Leonard’s face turned chillingly cold. He stood with his arms crossed over his chest, looking out the window.
It was clear that the “filth” he referred to included Helena. She was too afraid to ask how he planned to do that.
“Of course, we’ll start special training tomorrow.”
“What? Special training? I just woke up!”
“Is that important? What if you eat something with peanuts again and die?”
Leonard said gruffly, turning his back to leave the room. Cordelia grabbed the edge of his clothes.
“Wait.”
“What? Let go.”
“The letter?”
He looked at her with a strange expression, then pulled a crumpled letter from his pocket and handed it to her. Cordelia clutched the letter tightly, unable to take her eyes off it.
Nonchalantly, Leonard said:
“Tuition fees.”
“What?”
“You said you needed tuition fees for your brother. The money…”
“It was all a lie.”
Cordelia tore the letter to shreds without blinking. Contrary to expectations, Leonard seemed flustered.
“What are you doing?”
“I should’ve torn it up long ago. It was just an excuse.”
Cordelia ripped the letter with her teeth until it was in tiny pieces.
“Tuition fees? Hah, do they think Dennis can actually enter the academy? Dennis could barely write his name when he was ten. I’d believe it if they said a stray dog wrote that letter.”
“So, you think it’s just an excuse to ask for money?”
“I told you, to my father, I’m just a source of money.”
Cordelia looked at the scattered pieces of paper with a gaze full of disdain.
“And this isn’t the first time my father sent a letter like this. Since my marriage, he’s been sending these letters regularly, just two months after I got married.”
At first, she thought his letters were just asking about her well-being, but she was disappointed time and again.
As it repeated, Cordelia felt pity for her father, then anger, and finally shame. She felt pathetic and miserable.
“I ignored them all. I never talked about this with Lady Helena.”
“Why?”
He asked sincerely. Cordelia laughed weakly.
“I didn’t want to become more miserable by mentioning money when I was already humiliated here. I didn’t want to make things worse.”
“…”
“I felt like I’d been sold for money. And to be honest, that was my reality.”
Cordelia laughed bitterly. A breeze came through the slightly open window, tousling her hair.
Leonard reached out toward her unconsciously but pulled back. He felt as if Cordelia might disappear at any moment.
“Right. Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Just, for how you acted in the dining hall… it felt good to see someone get angry on my behalf. No one but me has ever fought for me.”
“Hmph.”
Leonard lifted his chin and turned his head away. Then he brushed his hand lightly. Cordelia lay back on the bed and yawned.
“But I’m so tired. Master, later, my assignments, I’ll finish them…”
Cordelia fell into a deep sleep before finishing her sentence. Leonard looked at her sleeping face with a complicated expression, then left the room.
***
“Oh, how is Lady Cordelia? Has she regained consciousness?”
When Leonard left the room, the baron was waiting eagerly and asked with urgency. Ignoring his question, Leonard said:
“Summon Bellucci.”
“What? That madman—I mean, that person?”
The baron responded with shock upon hearing Bellucci’s name.
“That person causes a lot of trouble. Even though I came here, I haven’t been caught by Maximilian, but if Bellucci comes to the Abrams castle…”
“Sooner or later, Maximilian will notice my presence. I can’t hide forever.”
“If you need help, it would be better to summon Sir Mervan.”
“If that rigid noble shows up here without reason, Maximilian will get suspicious. But Bellucci is like a stray dog, so he won’t raise suspicions.”
“But if Bellucci comes…”
The baron, knowing Bellucci’s volatile personality, couldn’t finish his sentence.
Bellucci was known for his aggressive, impulsive nature, and he would surely turn the castle upside down.
But despite the baron’s objections, Leonard was determined. He looked at the long corridor with a cold face.
“This cursed castle needs to be cleaned quickly. There are too many obstacles to remove.”
“Alright, I understand.”
“And also…”
Leonard paused for a moment. The baron held his breath.
“Get some information on Vasquez.”
“Vasquez? Why? Do you still suspect Lady Cordelia has a connection to Maximilian?”
The baron’s expression immediately turned serious. Leonard was about to say something, then shook his head.
“No, not for that reason. Just… I want to know everything about them. Starting from the current head of the family to their wealth and children.”
“Alright. I’ll do it.”
As always, the baron bowed respectfully and disappeared.
***
Since that day, the castle became eerily quiet.
Helena, Lily, and Arnold never appeared before Cordelia again.
When she asked Emily about it, she answered with a mocking tone:
“That day, the lord got extremely angry and threatened them.”
“Threatened them? How?”
“If any of you dare touch Cordelia again, your head will be cut off and hung at the castle gate. In fact, the cook who put peanuts in the soup already had his head hung at the castle gate.”
“Oh…”
Hearing this, Cordelia felt immense gratitude toward Leonard. It seemed he truly cared about his apprentice.
“Not like that. Again.”
“Again.”
“…”
“Again.”
That feeling of gratitude quickly faded.
No exaggeration, she was training in magic from morning till night.
She spent over ten hours a day with him, to the point where she could guess Leonard’s words from his glances or the slight movement of his lips.
“Like this…”
“Stop it and use your head? I know, but my body isn’t responding properly.”
“Stop talking and do it? Just shut up.”
Leonard looked at Cordelia with a very strange expression, but she was so focused on magic that she didn’t notice.
After immersing herself in magic obsessively for over two weeks, she finally managed to produce a small magical flame.
“Look, look at this! Master! Quick, quick!”
“Yes, alright.”
“This is right, isn’t it? I succeeded, didn’t I?”
“Yes.”
While Cordelia jumped with joy, Leonard was completely indifferent.
“That’s exactly the magic I mastered when I was five.”
“So that means I’ve reached my master’s level at age five, right? That’s not bad for a first try, is it?”
“If you’re satisfied with a five-year-old’s level, it’s not bad.”
Oh, if only she could punch that rude mouth of his.
But her joy at succeeding in magic quickly overshadowed any other thoughts.
“I think I’m starting to understand what you meant, that the body needs to remember, not the mind.”
“Yes. You need to repeat it multiple times until your body remembers it in any situation.”
“Yes, I’ll do that.”
She smiled at him joyfully.
Suddenly, he turned his face quickly to avoid her gaze and added in a sharp tone:
“Don’t celebrate too much. You’ve only just shed the beginner title.”
