Volume 3 Chapter 15 The Tale of the Black Knight
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
”Sir Hero, please save my daughter.”
Before me, Mr. Mauro, the scribe, and his wife are slumped over.
Mr. Mauro is a handsome man in his fifties with salt-and-pepper hair.
He looks a little haggard. Is it from suffering?
Then again, maybe that’s just how he always was.
His wife should be in her early thirties, but she looks much older, likely from the stress.
She must have been quite beautiful, but there’s no trace of it now.
I listen to their story. Apparently, Shea-Shea has gone wild since Alex forced a kiss on her.
I feel responsible for what happened.
If I’d been braver, maybe I could have stopped Alex (the arrogant Hero) before things got this bad.
Even after winning the trial, I’ve asked myself over and over again.
Were there better choices I could have made?
In the end, I and the other villager took down Alex, but it was like Shea-Shea was used as bait.
The Mauros asked me to counsel Shea-Shea, and I couldn’t refuse.
I thought, “This isn’t my thing,” but I wanted to do something, anything, for the Shea-Shea I couldn’t save back then.
No, the truth is, I just wanted to escape my own guilt.
Right after Alex stole her kiss, Shea-Shea was so shocked she took to her bed.
Ms. Lucia and Ms. Erin apparently tried to counsel her to heal her emotional wounds, but Shea-Shea shut down.
Now, she’s shut herself in her room, and apparently, she’s even become violent if her parents try to enter.
I know Shea-Shea as a quiet, well-behaved girl. I can’t imagine her getting violent, but she’s become as wild as a mountain cat. Even her father, Mr. Mauro, can’t handle her.
This is my first time in Mr. Mauro’s mansion, and it’s quite a place.
As the only scribe in the village, he seems to have no shortage of money, with all the paperwork that comes his way.
* * *
Now, a maid guided me to Shea-Shea’s room.
She wasn’t wearing an apron dress, and her arms were strong and not exactly young, but I could tell she was a top-tier maid in skill and strength.
Doing housework without any modern appliances is pretty tough.
I’m somewhat confident in cleaning and cooking, but laundry──yeah, that stuff always trips me up.
Ms. Nina and Mr. Zenom were even worse at laundry than me, so until recently, I struggled doing it all alone.
Thanks to Ms. Ann from the Antfolk who came to help, it’s gotten easier now, and this maid right here clearly matches Ms. Ann’s laundry skills.
You can tell just by her roughened fingertips from water work, the spotless crisp clothes of the Mauro couple, and the curtains and tablecloths inside the mansion.
The way she brewed the tea earlier gave me a run for my money──she’s exactly the kind of maid the Baron family would have.
The dishes were meticulously cared for, and even the silver spoons were perfectly polished without a single spot.
Plus, the faint smell of morning soup still lingering in the kitchen hinted at celery and bacon.
Celery grows wild near the canal, and I had been thinking about using it myself, but someone here clearly knows how to handle it right.
She’s basically doing the work of 3 regular maids by herself──a true super maid.
You never know where you’ll find talent like this.
”Milady, I’ve brought Sir Hero of the Quail.”
The maid knocked on the door.
The stain on the carpet in front of the door caught my eye, and there was a faint scent of soup too.
On the other side, I could sense Shea-Shea hurriedly fixing her clothes.
She had been lying around the bed in her underwear, lazily reading a book until now.
These days, I can see through a wall’s thickness without even using a skill.
Not with my eyes, though──more like reading sounds, presence, and smells instead of light.
If bats, dogs, and electric eels can do it, there’s no reason humans can’t.
It’s like a mind’s eye, almost like an image close to actual sight. It’s a strange kind of strength.
”Come in.”
After a few minutes of waiting, I was greeted in the beautifully organized room by none other than the beautiful girl I knew, Shea-Shea.
Maybe she looked a bit different because her long, straight black hair had slight waves in it?
Her eyes looked a bit weary, as if she had been crying, but there was still an allure about her.
The old Shea-Shea was polite, always greeting me with a smile when we met, but she was the type of girl I found difficult to talk to unless I was the one initiating the conversation.
Looking at her brings back memories of a side heroine from a dating sim I used to play.
I had ignored her in the game because her difficulty level was marked as “absolutely hellish,” but she was a typically quiet librarian type who, if neglected, would turn into a yandere and come crashing in, leaving me traumatized.
The horror when a dating sim suddenly turns into a horror game is real enough that it got turned into a movie titled “School Library Girl.”
And of course, it was made as a horror film.
I don’t think my trauma from dating sims has anything to do with it, but despite being undeniably one of the most beautiful girls I know, I found myself avoiding Shea-Shea for some reason.
Ms. Nina doesn’t talk much either, but there’s a comforting silence when we’re together.
With Shea-Shea, though, if you don’t speak up, things get awkward fast.
It’s not that Shea-Shea is at fault; I think it’s about compatibility… but I really can’t stand awkwardness.
”So, what brings you here today?”
Her voice was beautiful yet cold.
I didn’t remember the old Shea-Shea being like this.
”Um… well, I came to visit.”
I had initially thought about apologizing, but that felt a bit off too.
”You’re just like everyone else, pitying me as a sinner whose lips have been tainted.”
Miss Floria told me that in this world, a first kiss carries significant weight.
Apparently, there used to be an era when kissing an unmarried woman meant engagement, and legally, it’s still considered that way.
Shea-Shea seems to have traditional views, so this could be more complicated than I expected.
The bookshelves that dominate half of Shea-Shea’s room are completely filled with books.
At a glance, most of the books on the back cover looked like cheap paperbacks.
Even calling them cheap, a new one would set you back about a thousand gold.
In the capital’s used bookstores, tales of chivalry and romance novels were piled up for around a hundred gold each.
It seemed like Shea-Shea’s bookshelf was filled mostly with similar titles.
I can’t read much yet, but I know what the popular romance novels among women in this world are like, thanks to Miss Floria.
Most of the characters are psycho paths, and about 80 percent of the heroines are yanderes.
Every time you turn a page, there’s a murder case, and the deaths are arbitrarily beautified.
If Shea-Shea’s favorite reads are all like that… this is the worst-case scenario.
”Aieeee!”
Shea-Shea suddenly let out a scream and lunged at me.
The weapon she was holding like a knife was a poison needle, commonly used by magicians.
It looks like an ice pick, but the tip is embedded with a poison needle from a giant wasp. One prick and it’s almost certain death──a brutal weapon.
A weapon with an instant death effect is perfect for someone without strength to fight a strong enemy, but I never expected Shea-Shea to have such a wild thing.
I never even considered being attacked by her in the first place.
Nonetheless, my body, somewhat trained over the past few months, moved reflexively. I managed to grab her arm and take away the weapon.
And, at the same time, I slammed my elbow into her chin.
Damn it, I impulsively went too far.
Shea-Shea fell to the ground and stopped moving.
It was self-defense, but did I overdo it?
I don’t think she’s got any serious injuries.
I picked up the fallen poison needle.
The inside of the amber-transparent, sharp needle was filled with liquid.
Just a tiny amount of this terrifying poison could mean instant death.
Thanks to the combat training I got from Ms. Ant, I might have just saved my own life.
Shea-Shea groaned and got back up.
”I thought I could finally have an enemy for that person”
Shea-Shea’s tears were dripping onto the floor.
Could “that person” be Alex?
There were no signs of her using any subjugation skills, but could she have fallen in love just from having her lips stolen so roughly?
Ah, in romance novels from this world, the popular trope features a bad boy stealing the heroine’s kiss, while she selflessly adores him.
As the story unfolds, it often turns out that he’s actually a good guy, he gets inspired by the heroine and reforms, or he’s still a scoundrel, and she keeps devoted to him anyway──there are lots of variations.
Please bookmark this series and rate ☆☆☆☆☆ on here!
Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
Thanks for reading.
Leave a Reply