Chapter 15
Chapter 15
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: Dietrich's Sprain
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Today, the person who had come out with me was Betty.
Betty and I exchanged a glance before we both bolted toward the sound of Dietrich's scream, neither of us waiting for the other to take the lead.
A few other servants who had been in the garden had already gathered around him, surrounding Dietrich.
That figure slumped on the ground in white clothes... that was Dietrich, right?
"What's wrong! What happened!"
"Oh dear, young miss, you've come too."
"What this?"
One of the familiar gardeners, his face flushed red, kept exclaiming "Oh dear!" as he examined Dietrich's ankle from every angle before answering.
"The young master twisted his ankle a bit..."
"Fell down? Hurt bad?"
"Yes. It's swollen badly, so we should probably call a physician to take a proper look. Oh dear, what a mess."
Fallen down?
It was already afternoon now, and there hadn't been any rain, so the path by the riding track was bone-dry.
His shoes were brand new, custom-made just a month ago and perfectly broken in to fit his feet.
The path wasn't slippery, and the shoes were in top condition...
"Detri, you okay?"
"This is nothing."
For something "nothing," he'd screamed awfully loud earlier.
Putting on a tough act in front of everyone.
"First, someone go fetch the family physician from the main house. Everyone else, carry the young master back to his room."
Betty quickly took charge of the situation, and the burliest man among them hoisted Dietrich onto his back.
I bit my lip and followed close behind them.
Only after laying Dietrich on his bed did I finally get a chance to properly examine his ankle while we waited for the family physician, who was out on a house call, to return.
I wasn't a doctor, but in my past life, looking after people injured during workouts had been my job.
Not only was it red and swollen, but a faint bluish tint suggested the bone might be involved too.
"I told you, it's nothing. My knee just hurt a little today, so I messed up."
Despite the cold sweat beading on his forehead from the pain, Dietrich stubbornly kept up the tough guy act to the end.
His knee hurt?
"Why hurt?"
"No idea."
"Did you fall or bump it somewhere?"
"No. I haven't gotten into any accidents lately. But my knee's been hurting for days."
No external injury, but his knee had been aching.
If he'd shot up in height, I might suspect growing pains, but Dietrich hadn't grown much lately.
I hadn't pushed him too hard with training either...
I glanced once at his knee, then at his unusually round, plump face.
'This has to be that, doesn't it?'
Only one thing came to mind.
"Detri, did you eat something behind my back?"
Lately, Dietrich's weight changes had been anything but normal.
I didn't have a precise scale or body composition analyzer, but by eye, he'd packed on at least 4kg in the past month.
'If he gained that much weight so suddenly, no wonder his knee hurts.'
For a seven-year-old to gain that much in a month, there was only one possibility.
He was sneaking food behind my back.
Something that would cause such rapid weight gain had to be full of sweet sugars.
"W-what are you talking about? I didn't eat anything!"
Caught him.
Dietrich flinched and tried to move his leg, wincing at the ankle pain, but I stood my ground with arms crossed.
Dietrich shot Betty a pleading look.
"Betty do it?"
"No, young miss! I've been by your side the whole time!"
True enough.
Maybe one of the servants assigned to Dietrich? Or from the kitchen?
Someone had taken advantage of lax supervision from the nanny to stuff him full of calorie bombs with zero nutritional balance.
"Won't tell?"
"Ugh... W-well... Yasmin gave me pie, cake, cookies... She said you're too young for this stuff, so it's just for me in secret, and to keep it that way..."
"When give?"
"Every night before bed. B-but I hid some cookies for you away from Yasmin! Check the drawer over there!"
I opened the nightstand drawer by his bedside. Inside were several chunks of dry, crumbly cookies.
Loaded with chocolate, marshmallows, and dried fruit— the kind that would spike your blood sugar just looking at them.
'Feeding him this every night, right before bed?'
No wonder he'd been so obedient to Yasmin lately.
He was a good kid, but not the type to meekly go to bed early.
"Nanny say no, right?"
"Yasmin said the nanny worries too much. The other cousins at the main house eat this stuff all the time."
"Kitchen servants give too?"
"Yeah. The new hires from the main house kept saying it's all the rage in Kalena Castle, tempting me with tasty treats before I knew it..."
Seems like the hires from the main house were a problem across the board.
Even knowing Yasmin had been warned by the nanny, they still tried sneaking treats to Dietrich behind her back.
"That's outrageous. This is outright defying the nanny's orders. We have to tell her right now!"
Betty exploded in anger before I could.
"Always going on about main house etiquette and looking down on us branch family staff! Even when Madam passed..."
Betty clamped her mouth shut mid-rant, gauging our reactions.
Come to think of it, something like this had happened before.
'Back when they came for Mother's coffin...!'
I remembered her saying something similar then, only to get scolded sharply by the nanny.
What had happened?
When Mother passed, both Dietrich and I were hit hard.
We left all the minor details to the staff. Grieving was burden enough.
All we vaguely heard from the other servants was that people from the main house came, took Mother's coffin, and interred it in the family mausoleum. We never got the full story.
"When Mother passed, what?"
"N-no, it was a slip of the tongue."
"Tell us. If it's about our mother, we deserve to know."
I'd never noticed because of his usual dopey expression, but with furrowed brows, Dietrich looked surprisingly fierce.
Betty rolled her eyes under Dietrich's sharp gaze before hesitantly speaking up.
"At the time... the staff from the main house were a bit rude."
"Rude how?"
"They said a few things disrespecting the master and madam. So... we branch staff don't care much for the main house hires."
I wanted specifics on what they'd said, but Betty wouldn't budge on that.
She desperately steered the conversation back to Dietrich's snacks to avoid further prying.
"Young miss, what should we do about this? Tell the nanny?"
Dietrich's face paled at the thought of facing the nanny, but it couldn't be helped.
If you'd endured the sweet sneaking, you'd endure the scolding too.
"Yeah. Tell her everything, no holding back."
As Betty and I turned away in unison, Dietrich realized no one was on his side. His shoulders slumped dejectedly.
"Everyone hates me..."
"Not hate that much."
"Is that supposed to be comforting?"
He messes up, then pokes my cheek like it's my fault!
As expected, the nanny was furious when Betty informed her.
She summoned Yasmin and the kitchen staff to the first-floor entrance hall. Her eyebrows shot up sky-high.
"Yasmin."
I watched from the staircase above.
"Giving the young master snacks I explicitly forbade, without permission. Was this your idea of getting close to him?"
"...I'm sorry. I didn't think it through."
"No. You didn't lack thought—you ignored me and schemed to ingratiate yourself with this house's little masters."
"That's a misunderstanding, nanny. I just wanted to bond with the young master quickly..."
"Yasmin, your duty is to attend the young miss as her nanny. Why the rush to bond with the young master?"
Exactly. Straight to the heart of it, just like our nanny.
My guess was Yasmin had originally aimed to get close to me.
She had tried excluding the other maids to monopolize my side.
'But I didn't want that.'
I'd clearly warned her not to ignore my personal maids and the nanny.