Chapter 48
Chapter 48
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 48
Chapter Title: 5. Orphan Awakening System Open
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After Ulfric and I stopped the Snow King's army.
Our treatment changed quite a bit.
“Thank you for saving the Beril Family, benefactors!”
“If there's anything you need, please let us know anytime.”
“You two will always be friends of the Beril Family!”
Perhaps because these people had only repeated battles in this cold, barren land. The Beril Family's goodwill was frank and intense.
Just as Laila had shown her fierce spirit before everyone, once you earned their recognition, you could receive endless favors and help.
The family members, who had initially regarded us with suspicion, wariness, or concern, now sincerely admired and praised us, treating Ulfric and me with utmost hospitality.
‘That knight named Hexon is completely different.’
Hexon, and the knight captain now bowing his head in gratitude to us—they were both proper lesser nobles. Yet unlike the arrogant and overbearing Hexon, these people kept expressing thanks to a mere orphanage director and an adventurer.
It was a highly satisfying situation. Given their disposition, even if Laila were adopted and became the Margravine, they wouldn't cast suspicious glances her way.
On top of that, donations would steadily flow into my benefactor Orphan Leap Account. All in all, it was ample reward for venturing onto the battlefield.
Margrave Richard also welcomed me with eyes full of admiration. Ulfric had tactfully excused himself, saying he found it bothersome to face lofty figures like the margrave.
In truth, it was consideration so I could speak freely. That was one of his good points.
“You really... did it. I was agonizing over what to tell Laila if you didn't return.”
“I wouldn't leave one of my orphanage's children behind and go first. My life is precious to me too. I only went because I was confident.”
“To block the Snow King's army with just two people. This shames our family.”
“Please don't say that. What Ulfric and I did was nothing but a trick. The Snow King will probably prepare countermeasures, so it won't work next time.”
“You seem to know quite a bit about the king. Is that thanks to your experience?”
“......Let's say so. But right now, my past isn't what's important, is it?”
Perhaps sensing I didn't want to talk about that topic, Margrave Richard cleared his throat and shifted his gaze out the window.
At the end of that gaze were monsters and beasts retreating in disarray from the distant snow mountain.
“Anyway, thanks to you and Branch Chief Ulfric, the Beril Family has gained incredibly precious time. In the meantime, we must rebuild the barriers, reorganize the knights, and complete our preparations.”
“.........”
“And, time for you and Laila to talk has been created as well.”
We had bought time, but Margrave Richard's intentions remained unchanged. He still wanted Laila to contract with the mountain spirit.
If the Snow King reorganized his forces and sent them again, the supply-strapped Beril Family couldn't hold out forever. It was understandable to seek the power of the ice spirit slumbering in the snow mountain as a solution, and to cling desperately to Laila, who had miraculously appeared.
I too hoped for Laila and the spirit to contract.
“Margrave, that ultimately depends on Laila's choice. She's still not your adopted daughter—she's temporary staff at our orphanage.”
“......I'll keep that in mind.”
I haven't forgotten you tried to snag our prospective 4-Star orphan for free. Why act like you've already bought the merchandise?
Confirming my will, Margrave Richard backed off readily. It was true Laila had returned to the Beril Family, but at the point she hadn't accepted the adoption proposal, she was still very much an outsider.
The hand trying to push the previous deal amid renegotiations on the contract and payment had been dealt with for now.
What remained wasn't persuading Laila.
“Laila.”
“Di-Director! You're safe, right? You're not hurt!?”
“Of course.”
What remained was just one thing.
[……….]
Settling things with that arrogant spirit who had tried to pickpocket our temporary staff on his own.
Spirit, you want to get hit?
*
For Laila, time in this cavern had been terribly uncomfortable.
Because she feared being with that massive ice spirit? No. On the contrary, Laila even felt a sense of comfort and familiarity from the mountain spirit. Was this the spiritist's talent?
If so, was it guilt for rejecting Margrave Richard's earnest plea? That might be true. When the carriages north were cut off, she had rejected Galen’s request to stay in the capital and instead asked the Director—it was Laila's own choice.
She had wanted to help the Beril Family, yet now rejecting the spirit contract they desired could feel uncomfortable.
But the biggest reason Laila felt discomfort and unease was the Director, who now occupied such a huge part of her life.
‘Because of me...’
Because she rejected the contract, the Director and that giant warrior stepped out to buy time. On the way here, Laila had seen the horde of monsters and beasts. They were on an entirely different level from the wild boar beast that had invaded the orphanage before.
To face such a horde alone. No matter how much the Director told her to trust and wait, it would be strange not to worry.
If she truly cared for the Director, for the Beril Family.
Of course she should contract with the mountain spirit.
‘Why?’
Laila felt comfort from the spirit. But if it turned into a contract, that comfort became a sense of crisis, an instinct warning of danger that made her tremble.
The massive tiger spirit's gaze on Laila hadn't changed. But precisely because of that, it made his true intentions unknowable, leaving Laila hesitant.
‘You will regret it forever... keep regretting... and in the end, be unable to protect anything.’
Her instinct told her. If she accepted the contract as is, she would gain power, but in reality, she wouldn't be able to protect anything. Not the Beril Family, not her siblings, not even the Director.
It was ironic. The power she had so desperately wanted, the power she envied seeing in Karen, was right before her eyes. If she just accepted the contract, she could physically protect the Director like Karen.
So why?
Why this instinct?
“Stay behind me, Laila.”
“......Director.”
If the Director had returned injured.
If, instead of returning unscathed and smiling at her like now, he had crossed an irreversible river.
Could Laila have forgiven herself?
As she unconsciously reached out toward the Director, he stepped forward in front of her, facing the mountain spirit.
“Spirit, you understand human speech, right? It's my first time seeing a spirit who can handle human language.”
“Then you've met one. That's why I know well. You spirits have no interest in humans except spiritists, and even responding to me like this is unusual.”
[………….]
“You know I'm Laila's guardian, right? Understanding the concept of a guardian in the first place means you're quite a special spirit. If you know humans that well, you could talk with me too.”
“What's that supposed... Ah, you think I'm coveting you? That I'd contract with you instead of Laila? Sorry, but that's way too self-important. I'm plenty satisfied with my life as is? I don't want abilities I can't handle.”
“It is precious. But Laila is just as precious.”
Hah.
Laila, who had been silently listening to the mountain spirit and the Director's conversation, swallowed hard. It felt like a sudden blow. At the same time, from the Director's back, she recalled past events.
Not long after meeting the Director. When the two had come to this snow mountain on Galen's suggestion.
When Laila awoke in the cave after being caught in the avalanche, the same back had been before her eyes.
A back that protected her, cared for her, enveloped her.
‘Ah...’
She didn't know her parents' faces. Surviving day by day in the back-alley slums, she couldn't even think of relying on anyone.
To her, life was something to endure alone. Caring for her siblings and being relied on by them was Laila's sole solace.
But there was an adult who told her she was just a child, an orphan. An adult who said she was still a child who needed protecting, who would suffer in her place.
Even as she shed her childish ways and approached adulthood, to Laila he remained an adult, a pillar she could trust and lean on.
‘Karen called the Director “Father.”’
But Laila didn't want that. Doing so would make her just a child protected by an adult.
Laila wanted to be special to the Director, and so she became temporary staff. And all of that wasn't merely to be protected.
Rather, she wanted to go further───
‘I want to support that back.’
Not just be protected by that back, not just follow it.
She wanted to push that back, stand beside it and support it. To stand shoulder to shoulder as equals.
Only then could Laila become special to the Director, truly help him, and become a “staff” who worked alongside him.
That was why Laila...
“Yeah?”
“Hey.”
“Shut up.”
She stood not behind the Director, but beside him.
Still lacking, but to be of help to the Director.
And.
“I get that you like me, but don't call me contractor yet. I already rejected the contract with you, didn't I?”
“You only say nice things to me. Like the con artists from the back alleys.”
“I felt it when I got close to you earlier. You're not making this snow mountain your home...... you're trapped, aren't you? In that ice. You can't leave it, and you don't even want to. That's why you need me.”
At Laila's words, the mountain spirit froze without response.
“Why would I contract with a spirit hiding his true intentions? Don't get it wrong. It's not that I need you—it's you who needs me.”
[……….]
“Above all, you...... insulted the Director. That, I absolutely can't overlook.”
Laila turned her back to the mountain spirit. As if the contract wasn't urgent for her, but entirely his whim.
For Laila, the way of life was only the back-alley way.
“So, if you want the contract, change your attitude.”
In the back-alley way.
“Make me want to contract.”
She absolutely couldn't be taken for a sucker.