Chapter 44
Chapter 44
I answered Luka, who had sparkling eyes while holding Yeppi, with a shrug of my shoulders.
“Yes, take it. But please take good care of our Leonardo too.”
“Of course. Thank you.”
Luka, feeling it would be against his conscience to just take something so precious, rummaged through his lab and handed me a bundle of cloth.
“What’s this?”
“A cloak.”
“Suddenly?”
“It’s a magician’s cloak. It has magic on it, so it’ll be warm in winter and cool in summer.”
As soon as he finished speaking, I received the cloak with both hands, bowing deeply in gratitude.
“It seems valuable. Is it really okay for me to take it?”
“Yes. It’s fine, I can contact my family home and they’ll send another.”
“Family home? Luka, are you a noble?”
Cassis answered for him.
“Healer Luka’s surname is Humbly.”
I opened my eyes wide.
This was because Humbly was one of the most famous magician families in the empire.
Among magician families, the Humbly family, specializing in alchemy, was also a member of the Magic Tower.
“Surprisingly, Luka is a direct descendant of the Humbly family.”
Luka added, as if to say, why bother with such trivial talk.
“I’m the youngest. I have two older sisters and two older brothers above me.”
“But why are you a healer in the North instead of a magician?”
If it were me, with all that money, I’d just buy a mansion in the capital and live a life of leisure without working!
No matter how nice this greenhouse and house are, they can’t compare to a mansion in the capital.
“Well, I have no talent for magic. And I find family interference annoying. I ran away from home”
“……”
Luka casually dropped this shocking story and took the cloak from my hands.
Then, as he draped it around my neck, he said,
“Since it’s a magic cloak, ownership designation is necessary. I’ll transfer ownership to you now.”
“Okay!”
He placed both hands on my shoulders covered by the cloak and said,
“Close your eyes.”
“Okay.”
He spoke in a monotone voice.
“Think that you control temperature.”
“I control temperature.”
“You control winter.”
“Control it.”
“You control summer.”
“Control it.”
As soon as this strange procedure ended, he quickly moved away from me.
All the while, he was still holding the flowerpot containing Yeppi.
“It’s done now.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
Ding-!
Just then, a quest notification sound rang from the system.
[SYSTEM | ‘Letter Starting from 1 Jurang Commemorative Coin’ has been updated.]
[SYSTEM | (Completed) 03. Exchange ‘Unnamed Weed Flowerpot’ for ‘Humbly Family Magician’s Robe’.]
I already feel warm.
Feeling good, I kept smiling and adjusting the cloak that flowed down to around my ankles.
But then I heard Cassis’s slightly sharp voice from beside me.
“The length seems quite long for Irina.”
“It’s a bit long, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll have to get it altered.”
“It’s going to drag on the ground now.”
I was a bit puzzled by his seemingly displeased tone.
But it seems I wasn’t the only one who felt this confusion.
Luka, who had been listening to my conversation with Cassis with a puzzled expression, immediately called out to Cassis when there was a brief pause in the conversation.
“Just a moment, Your Grace.”
“What is it?”
“Don’t tell me…?”
[Hehe]
Luka stared at Cassis’s face for a long time.
I followed his gaze and looked up at Cassis too.
There was the face of the Northern Grand Duke with the winter wind blowing.
However, Luka soon burst into laughter.
“Haha. This is interesting? I can clearly see your path of hardship, Your Grace. Hang in there.”
* * *
The return journey was pitch black with complete darkness having fallen.
Still, the Leknes city center was nice with the soft atmosphere unique to night standing out due to the lights from shops and streetlamps.
The orange light reflecting on the white snow was also pleasant.
It was enjoyable to watch the white smoke rising from chimneys of buildings, and to smell the food aromas leaking from somewhere.
“You look happy.”
As I was sniffing around, smelling spicy meat stew sauce from somewhere, Cassis blurted out beside me.
I stopped in my tracks and looked up to check on Cassis.
Looking up at Cassis from far below was a bit strange.
He seemed a bit confused, and maybe awkward.
[More than awkward, a bit of envy.]
[Or jealousy?]
‘Of me? Why?’
[Hmm, figuring that out is Irina’s job.]
At the system’s words that it was my job, I immediately asked back.
“Aren’t you happy?”
“Is there a reason to be happy?”
Is that so?
I tilted my head slightly.
I think I might have been like that once too.
“Then aren’t you enjoying yourself?”
“What is enjoyment?”
The casually thrown question came back as quite a philosophical one.
That’s right, what is the emotion of ‘enjoyment’?
“It’s when you just start smiling, your mood lightens, you forget about your current circumstances, and so you focus on that moment’s emotions.”
I spoke slowly, matching Cassis’s pace, explaining my definition of ‘enjoyment’.
“For example, don’t you smell really delicious bread right now? With such a rich and savory butter smell, it must be freshly baked bread, right?”
“Yes.”
“Imagine bread just taken out of the oven. Warm, soft, when you cut it in half, fluffy bread comes out, and white steam will cross the air.”
At some point, my male protagonist was quietly looking at me.
“When you take just one bite of that bread! How do you think it would feel?”
“…I’m not sure.”
“That’s exactly what an enjoyable feeling is.”
He was silent again.
He just stood still with a much more composed face than before.
However, I felt like I could strangely read that expression.
That emotion that seemed just as confused as before, and maybe a bit envious.
But that emotion intensified by confusion because he himself didn’t understand it well.
“You don’t know?”
“…No.”
So I grabbed Cassis’s hand.
“…?”
“Then we should try it directly!”
“What?”
Now Cassis’s face was filled with bewilderment, the confused emotion gone.
Regardless, I dragged him along following the smell of freshly baked bread into a small bakery that seemed to cater to commoners.
“Hello!”
“Welcome to Rina’s Bakery… Oh my. How could such noble lords come to such a humble place…!”
I entered the shop with a bright smile, pulling along the awkward Cassis.
With the warmth enveloping my whole body, and the butter smell filling the shop, it felt like both body and mind were naturally melting.
“The bread smells so good. Could we see some freshly baked bread?”
The owner repeatedly apologized saying it was nothing special, and brought out golden-brown baked bread.
Despite the warm interior, steam seemed to be faintly rising from the bread.
“What kind of bread is this? It looks unfamiliar.”
“It’s, it’s bread baked with a lump of salted butter kneaded into the dough.”
Just hearing about it made me imagine bread with butter dripping, slightly salty.
I bought five pieces of bread in a crude brown paper bag and grabbed Cassis again to go outside.
With the tinkling sound of the door closing behind us, I immediately took out a piece of bread from the warm bag.
“Here, look at this.”
I split the bread with both hands.
As soon as I slowly split it, the texture of the bread was visible and white steam puffed out between the cracks.
“Doesn’t it smell good?”
“Yes, it does.”
When I held out half of the bread to Cassis, he hesitated for a long time before taking it.
“It’s warm, right?”
“…Yes.”
“Just try one bite.”
Saying that, I took a big bite.
The soft bread and butter aroma were good.
“This is what I enjoy.”
I enjoy these little things you encounter in winter.
Such things make me happy.
It doesn’t have to be big or grand.
I like anything that makes me excited and expectant.
“…Is that so?”
Cassis said that as he took the bread bag from my arms.
I was about to feel a bit disappointed just hearing his words, but I found myself smiling brightly at the faint smile forming at the corners of his mouth.
“What are you smiling at?”
“Ah, Cassis, you’re so simple.”
I always thought it was good to be able to smile at small and trivial things, but seeing him smile at a piece of bread in the middle of winter made me feel a bit sorry.
It felt like I had made the great Luwin like the humble Seike from the South.
But what can I do?
Right now, enduring and surviving is what’s important.
“How am I simple?”
At his immediate rebuttal, I pretended not to notice and ran towards the carriage waiting for us in the distance, smiling.
Anyway, I’m heading to the capital tomorrow.
Time left until the New Year’s ball: 2 weeks.
* * *
Cassis stared blankly at Irina’s back as she ran ahead.
Her golden hair spilled out as the hat she had put on because of the cold came off.
“Ah! My hat!”
Irina stopped running to pick up the hat rolling on the snowy ground and crouched down to brush off the snow.
Cassis just watched this picturesque scene.
The bread bag he was holding in his arms was still warm, and the rising butter smell was still savory.
Irina said she enjoyed these small and trivial things, that they made her happy.
Then she handed him bread too and looked up with expectant eyes, asking how it was.
Honestly, things like bread or winter were meaningless to him.
Bread was something to be taken to survive, and winter was something that accompanied him for more than half the year.
<Ah, Cassis, you’re so simple.>
Therefore, what made him smile wasn’t just a piece of bread.
What made him smile was Irina in front of him.
“Cassis, why aren’t you coming?”
He could see Irina waving one arm from a short distance away.
When Cassis didn’t move, she came trotting back to him.
“Cassis?”
“Yes, Irina.”
“Aren’t you cold? Let’s go back quickly.”
Irina showed a bright smile with her cheeks flushed red, then started walking next to him.
He thought as he walked along with Irina.
How can a person be so positive?
How can they endure like that?
How can they move forward without suffering or feeling lonely?
How can a person shine so brightly?
“…I hope Irina doesn’t get hurt.”
“In the capital?”
“Anywhere.”
“It’s okay. I tend not to place much meaning on careless words spoken by meaningless people.”
I wish she would shine forever.
So he is not simple.
The reason he burst into laughter was because of the shining Irina Seike.
