Apprentice Shrine Maiden Volume 4

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Apprentice Shrine Maiden Volume 4 Page 21

by Miya Kazuki


  “Sir Damuel?! U-Um, Miss Freida, my apologies. I shall ask the head attendant about this.” The attendant, looking positively baffled, spun around and exited the room. Given that my things had been moved out, I could imagine that I had been given a separate room that nobody had been notified of properly.

  ...Goodness. What should I do? Unable to leave the room on my own to chase after the attendant, but feeling too awkward to just stand alone in a room with a man I didn’t know despite the fact that he was unconscious, I put a hand to my cheek and sighed.

  “My sincerest apologies, Miss Freida.” The head attendant hurriedly walked into the room.

  It seemed that while Lord Henrik’s younger brother now lived in the knight dorms, he had been badly injured on duty and taken to his home until a healer was available, since it was so close to the Noble’s Gate. But as he was unconscious and there was no time to prepare a room, he had been brought here instead.

  “We have prepared another room for you, Miss Freida, but it seems we were so surprised that we didn’t send word as we should have. My sincerest apologies.”

  “I can sympathize with how unsettling it must have been for your master’s younger brother to be brought here unconscious without warning. If the other room is ready, I do not mind moving there now.”

  Just as the servant let out a sigh of relief at my understanding, a ball of light flew into the room through the window and spun circles above Damuel, sprinkling a glimmering dust onto him. The falling light shining in the dark room looked brilliant and mystical.

  “...So this is magic, is it? How beautiful.” I reached out to touch the dust, but it avoided my hand as if on purpose.

  After a minute of me watching the dust, enraptured, Damuel suddenly shot up in bed. “Apprentice! Are you okay?!”

  “Eek?!”

  Damuel was gripping a shining wand in his hand, and scanned the room with a hard expression as though he was in the middle of combat, but after a second he blinked in surprise.

  “...Where am I?” he said in confusion. He must have become disoriented when he was knocked unconscious.

  As Damuel looked around the room again, baffled, the head attendant took a step forward. “Sir Damuel, how are you feeling? You were brought home after falling unconscious, and up until now you have been resting in bed.”

  “I’m fine. Judging by the remnants of light, there must have been some healing magic.” Damuel looked down at his arm, then shot his head back up. There was an intense look on his face. “I have to hurry back to the Knight’s Order!”

  “Sir Damuel, I think it would be wiser to wait and—”

  “There’s no time!” Despite having been groaning unconscious just moments ago, Damuel sprang up from the bed with ease, raced to the balcony, and flung the window open. “I’m in the middle of guard duty! If the apprentice shrine maiden is hurt again, I’ll...” He swung his arm, and that alone was enough for a large winged horse of pure white to appear by the balcony. He mounted the horse, his expression worryingly grim, and then flew off. It was dark out, but the horse’s large wings were such a radiant white that I could see them flapping through the air as Damuel quickly disappeared from sight.

  The ball of light appearing in the room and Damuel jumping out of bed had happened so suddenly that all I and the head attendant could do was stand in shock and watch him go.

  “...Miss Freida, I will guide you to your room.”

  “Yes, please do.”

  After helplessly watching Damuel go, the head attendant came back to his senses and guided me to my newly prepared room. I climbed into bed and thought back to what I had heard Damuel say. He had certainly yelled about needing to help an apprentice shrine maiden who was in danger. To my understanding, Myne was the only apprentice shrine maiden in the temple at the moment. If Sir Damuel had been badly injured while on guard duty, it was very likely that Myne had gotten wrapped up in whatever was going on as well.

  “What in the world has happened?”

  I could have asked Lord Henrik, but nobles did not give away information so freely. He might tell me if I explained that I was Myne’s friend, but depending on what mess Myne was wrapped up in, that opened up the possibility of putting myself in danger too. It would likely be safer to keep my relationship with Myne a secret.

  “I would at least like to make sure she is alive...”

  At breakfast that morning, Lord Henrik apologized for the incident the night before. “I was so concerned about my younger brother that I didn’t send proper word out about it. My apologies.”

  “Think nothing of it. I myself got to witness the magic of the nobility for the first time. It was beautiful, mystifying, and very worth seeing.”

  After breakfast, Lord Henrik returned my bracelet; all of its feystones were now black again. Shortly after, Grandfather and I returned home.

  “Grandfather, there is something I need to research. Please lend me the key to the inner document room.”

  I hurried and changed before going to the Merchant’s Guild. There existed a room that compiled documents related to magic contracts, and this room could only be entered by the guildmaster and those who had his permission. I went there to search for copies of the contracts that Myne had signed with Benno. Unlike those in the document rooms that could be browsed by anyone, the contracts here would change when someone who had signed them died.

  Magic contracts were used rarely enough that it didn’t take me long to find the documents concerning Myne.

  “...‘Rozemyne’?” The document I found said that the contracts had been signed by Benno, Lutz... and Rozemyne. There would be no need to change the name of a Devouring child who had signed a submission contract, so this was almost objective proof that Myne had been taken by nobles. She had no doubt been adopted by one, in the same way that others had offered to adopt me in the past.

  A noble had learned of Myne’s knowledge, seen the value in it, and made it his. It was hard to imagine the impact of such a move would be felt only in Ehrenfest. I gripped the documents and raced to Grandfather’s office.

  “Something important has happened. Look at this.” I showed Grandfather the magic contracts with Myne’s name changed to “Rozemyne.” His eyes widened.

  “...Myne signed with a noble? It isn’t unheard of for a Devouring girl to be adopted, but Myne?”

  Myne had actively refused to sign with nobles, wanting to live with her family for as long as possible. She had said she would choose death over being separated from them, and yet now she had let herself be adopted by a noble.

  I myself didn’t want to be a noble; I wanted to be a merchant. I wanted to spend my time doing business and counting money. When I told Grandfather that, he had found the ideal noble for me and signed me with him. Thanks to that, I would have a store in the Noble’s Quarter when I came of age, and until then I could live at home with family. I was satisfied with my choice.

  ...But what about Myne?

  “Grandfather, please call Benno over. I am sure he knows something about this.”

  Sylvester—Cleaning up the Mess

  “We will take our leave, then.”

  “Please take care of yourself, milady.”

  “...Farewell.”

  I just convicted my mother, then ripped apart another family with my own two hands. I could honestly do with some reassurance here. Someone lavish me with compliments. If I didn’t have people assuring me that what I was doing was the right thing, serving as archduke would be way too much for me, I thought, looking at the two parents kneeling in front of their own daughter.

  “Thank you for coming today. I pray from the bottom of my heart that we meet again one day.” Rozemyne, while still standing, bent forward and lowered her head deeply as she said goodbye to those who used to be her family. It wasn’t a gesture I recognized. When showing gratitude to the gods, one would get on both knees and lay prostrate. I had never seen someone lower just their head while still standing. This was indeed a girl who held mem
ories of living in another world.

  Still, even though I didn’t recognize the gesture, I could feel the emotion it expressed whether I liked it or not. Anyone could tell that she was showing her gratitude for her family. I knew what I had done—I knew I had ripped a loving family apart—so seeing their heartfelt goodbyes sent a sharp pain through my chest.

  The door closed, and Rozemyne was left standing alone, wavering unsteadily. I lowered my eyes in discomfort at the same time that Ferdinand abruptly stood up beside me. He quickly walked over to her, as if having predicted this, and embraced her just as she fell to the side. Then, he sharply shouted toward the door:

  “Fran, inside!”

  A gray priest who had been waiting outside promptly rushed in. I recognized him as Rozemyne’s attendant who had been so badly wounded by mana that just moving had made him twitch in pain.

  “Sister Myne!”

  I could see remnants of the blessing dusting his figure as he rushed over to her. Given that his wounds were gone, I could guess that Fran had received the same blessing Myne’s father had. The panic on his face showed just how much he cared about his master.

  Even her attendant being blessed begged the question of just how far her lights of blessing had gone. As I had just seen myself, Rozemyne didn’t hesitate to recklessly wield an enormous amount of mana when those she cared about were involved. I would have to investigate and see just how many people her blessing had reached.

  “It is nothing to worry about. She has simply used too much mana,” Ferdinand said, grabbing a nearby potion from his well-stocked cabinet and pouring some into Rozemyne’s mouth. That was probably the terrible, foul-tasting one. It was as effective as it was vile, but if you asked me, it was downright cruel to pour any of that junk into the mouth of an unconscious child. Ferdinand was once again proving to act more on logic than emotion.

  Poor girl.

  “Fran, take her to her room and get her in bed. I will come by tomorrow afternoon to explain what the future holds. Gather all of her attendants for me when the time comes.”

  “Understood.” Fran picked up the limp, unconscious Rozemyne and left the room. That somehow reminded me of something I had seen before.

  “Arno, some tea. That will be all.”

  “As you wish.”

  I eyed Ferdinand, who was giving an order to his trusted-yet-forgettable attendant, while murmuring to Karstedt in a low voice. “Hey, Karstedt. Is it just me, or is Rozemyne like the spitting image of Blau? Seriously.”

  “Blau? Aah, the shumil you once kept as a pet.”

  Shumils were easily domesticated feybeasts that made cute “pooey” noises. Plenty of nobles kept them as pets, myself included, but Blau was about the weakest creature I had ever seen. She had fur that was a color between black and blue, big round golden eyes, was always very weak, and seemed to like Karstedt more than me. In other words, she was exactly like Rozemyne in animal form.

  I sought Karstedt’s agreement, but he just let out an awkward grunt. “You say she liked me more than you, but that’s entirely your fault. She was constantly on the verge of death from all of your teasing. You could say she only grew attached to me as a desperate measure to stay alive.”

  “Hey, it sounds real bad when you put it like that. All I did was give her the love a pet needs.”

  “You were even less delicate and considerate as a kid than you are now. With the way you chased it around and crushed it with hugs, any small animal would’ve been at risk of an early death,” Karstedt sighed, rubbing his temples.

  Woah, what? Blau getting tired so quickly back when we used to play together was because of me, not because she was weak? Huh.

  “Learn to control yourself better this time. If I understand Ferdinand’s reports correctly, Rozemyne is a lot weaker than that shumil.”

  “Weaker than Blau? I’ll believe it when I see it.”

  Seriously, I’m blown away here. I thought Blau ran away from me because, as a feybeast, she understood my true might, but really she was just scared for her life. I can’t believe it.

  “...I’m sure Rozemyne’s already forgiven me for all that teasing. I just saved her life, after all.”

  “You were messing with her as hard as you could to see how much patience she had with strangers, right? Well, she wasn’t amused by that. And you just ripped her apart from her family, remember?”

  “Ngh...” I held my tongue, having noticed Ferdinand’s attendant pushing a serving cart carrying drinks this way. The cups made a light clink as he lined them up on the table, and I shook my head in disappointment.

  I’ve never seen a more boring guy in my life.

  All of Ferdinand’s attendants were men, and probably thanks to how strictly he trained them, they always blandly did their work in the most efficient way possible. They were skilled at their jobs, but there was nothing fun or interesting about them at all.

  “Ferdinand, how about you get a shrine maiden as an attendant for a change?”

  “I have no need for women attempting to seduce me for status, and a single woman would be out of place and make it harder for everyone else to work.” Ferdinand immediately shot my idea down, pretty much saying that he didn’t need a spark in his life at all.

  “Arno, clear the room. Don’t let anyone near.”

  “As you wish.”

  The arrival of the outsider noble, the imprisonment of the High Bishop, and Rozemyne’s name change and adoption had all happened so abruptly; we would need time to discuss things before he informed her attendants and the other priests.

  Once the presence of people outside the door faded, Ferdinand let out a slow sigh. “And so, our plan worked. We’ve accomplished our goals.”

  “...Yep.”

  We’d secured Myne, who had refused to sign with a noble and tried running away for as long as she possibly could; secured just cause to execute the High Bishop, who had been breaking the law in increasingly visible ways; put Mother, who was protecting the High Bishop, under house arrest; and taken into custody a noble with connections to the High Bishop, which would serve as a powerful trump card against the archduke of Ahrensbach. All in all, the events of today would no doubt serve to quiet the faction of nobles supporting Mother over me.

  “Not too shabby. I’ve got a real bad taste in my mouth, though.” If you ignored how awful it felt to purposefully lead my mother into a trap and then rip apart a happy family, then sure, today was a pretty good day.

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Sylvester. This was the best possible outcome.”

  “The end doesn’t always justify the means, y’know?” Whenever something happened that led to me getting called black-hearted or cold and calculating, you could bet that Ferdinand’s plots were to blame. Most of the time, anyway.

  “I have no love for Bezewanst or your mother,” Ferdinand said, wrinkling his nose dismissively. They were family to me, but to Ferdinand, they were just obstacles. I knew that, but it still hurt to hear him say it to my face.

  “What about Rozemyne, then? You don’t feel anything about erasing Myne from existence and turning her into Rozemyne?”

  “...I think this is the fastest and most efficient means of giving her a brighter future.”

  So he said, but his expression was a little more concerned than it had been a moment ago. The warmth and love in Myne’s family was unthinkable among nobles, who prioritized glory and the continuation of their house above all else. Even Ferdinand felt some guilt over ripping apart a family that sincerely cared for each other.

  “She will be emotionally unstable for some time, I believe,” Ferdinand said with a troubled grimace. He had said that even just staying in the temple over the winter had led to her being so unstable that he could see her mana stirring, which meant he’d had to keep his eyes on her at almost all times. It was rare for the emotionally distant Ferdinand to be so considerate of others; maybe having Rozemyne around would be good for the man obsessed with results over everything else.

>   “I’ll leave comforting Rozemyne in these trying times to you two. I can’t get involved here.”

  “Sylvester?”

  “I am Aub Ehrenfest. Just as I do not spoil my true son, I cannot spoil my adopted daughter.”

  Spoiling Rozemyne will just make me want to start spoiling my own son, who will one day have to bear the heavy burdens I carry now. But I’m told that I mustn’t pamper the future archduke so often that it’s exhausting. Unlike Ferdinand, I’m not so great at cutting off my feelings and acting rationally. There’s so much I can’t do thanks to the position of archduke binding me.

  “Clumsy as ever, I see,” Karstedt said with a wry smile. It would have been better for a cold and calculating man like Ferdinand to be the archduke.

  Yet another day where I curse that Ferdinand was born to a mistress instead of the first wife.

  “More importantly though, is Rozemyne alright? She called on the Father, Mother, and Eternal Five all at once—that’d be enough to knock out even a healthy person. Are we sure she’s not dead?” Karstedt asked, glancing at the door.

  I crossed my arms and followed his gaze. One didn’t normally pray to multiple gods at once; it required more mana, and the chances of success dropped hard, especially since the God of Life was disliked by his brothers and sisters for hiding the Goddess of Earth every year. I hadn’t heard of a single case where a prayer to all of the gods at once had actually worked, let alone one where multiple people received the blessing.

  “That prayer actually working is what’s weirding me out. I thought for sure it was gonna fail,” I said, and Karstedt—who would now be considered Rozemyne’s biological father—looked up at the ceiling with a frown.

  “That was unprecedented, but I don’t think Rozemyne fully understands what she did, nor how significant it is.”

  “Indeed. Not at all,” Ferdinand agreed.

  “You got hit with the blessing yourself, didn’t you, Ferdinand? Did you teach her to use magic?” While the lights of blessing had avoided Karstedt and I, they did reach Ferdinand. They had probably gotten close enough to justify that, but missing a blessing that significant kind of ticked me off.

 

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