Chapter 24
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 24
Chapter Title: An Unpaid Debt
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The wife caressed her red, swollen cheek, while her son, clutching a guitar, watched her with a hollow gaze. A cold, heavy air, starkly contrasting the warm feeling of the shop's wooden interior, began to press down on my slender shoulders.
Rireu and I set down our cups and stared at the young lady and the shopkeeper's wife. What on earth had happened between them for that lady to have struck the woman’s cheek so mercilessly?
“...I’m sorry!”
To my surprise, those were the words that came from the lips of the woman who had staggered from the blow. Like a sinner, she kept her head bowed low, bowing her waist over and over.
“We will have the rent ready by the end of this week! So please…”
“Do you have any idea what my brother said to me, all because of you? He called me ‘a useless wench who can't even collect money properly from the lower class.’ Am I supposed to live with this kind of humiliation because of your mistakes?”
“I’m sorry! The price of wheat has been so high lately that our income hasn't been great. But the number of customers visiting our shop each week is steadily increasing, and word of mouth is starting to spread, so our business will surely…”
*Slap!*
The wife staggered as she was struck again on her already reddening cheek.
“We will definitely have the rent by the end of this week…! I’m sorry!”
Even as she stumbled, the wife bowed her head and repeated the same words.
From what I could gather, it seemed the ones at fault were the shop owners. Failing to pay rent on the contractually agreed-upon date was certainly a business error. Of course, the punishment for it was violent and barbaric…
“Is this the first or second day the rent has been late? Honestly, these commoners… words alone are never enough to teach them. They only learn when you inflict pain and instill fear. In that, they're no different from beasts.”
The world I now lived in was a medieval fantasy world where the class system was alive and well.
No one would punish a noble for striking a commoner a few times.
This was especially true if the commoner was already in the wrong for something like ‘late rent.’
“Oh, my lady…! What brings you here…?”
“You, come here too. What are you doing?”
The young lady spoke in a frigid tone to the owner of the cafe, who had just rushed out from the kitchen.
Rireu seemed to want to say something to the young lady for resorting to violence against a parent in front of their child. She stood up from her chair, then lost her nerve and sat back down, repeating the motion.
It seemed Rireu’s ethics were a bit different from those of the average person in this medieval world. She was an elf who had spent nearly her entire life cut off from society, interacting only with the mages of the tower and her master.
As intellectuals, mages generally didn't resort to blatant violence or insult others based on their status… so this kind of barbaric display was likely unfamiliar and uncomfortable for her.
After a moment, she muttered to herself, “I can do it, I can do it,” as if casting a spell, and then, having truly made up her mind, she slowly rose to her feet.
And I pulled on her slender arm, which she had only just steeled with resolve, and made her sit back down.
“Her methods are a bit extreme, but failing to pay rent on the promised date is clearly the shop’s fault. On what grounds do we have to stop her?”
“...That’s true, but.”
Rireu couldn’t offer a clear answer to my question.
One should not resort to violence without cause.
Such a proposition is only true when all people are ‘equal.’
“...This is hard to watch. Let's just finish up and leave. There's nothing we can do.”
And though they had to endure this humiliation now, this shop would soon be free of such hardships.
With the young dragon of the Enquer Highlands dead, the price of wheat would stabilize soon enough. When that happened, the shop's profits would increase, and they would no longer fall behind on rent.
On top of that, she said word of mouth was spreading and the number of customers was growing… all they had to do was grit their teeth and wait for this storm to pass.
There was no good reason for us, who had nothing to do with this, to get involved and stir up trouble. It would benefit neither them nor us.
“Yes, my lady… what brings you here in person….”
*Slap!*
The young lady greeted the chef who had rushed out to the counter with a slap as well.
“I am sorry, my lady. This week… no, I will have the rent ready by tomorrow. If you would please show us a little mercy…”
The chef, wearing an apron dusted with coffee grounds and flour, pleaded with the young lady, his gaze unwavering even after taking a sharp blow to the face.
“…”
And the young lady watched him with a cold, hard stare.
The owner of this shop was a tall man, over 190 centimeters. His arms and chest were built with muscles forged from long hours of kneading dough and baking bread, and his knuckles were dotted with burn scars and calluses.
The young lady glanced back and forth between her own reddened hand and the large man’s face, then clicked her tongue in annoyance.
“Doesn't seem to hurt much, does it?”
Her tone was incomparably colder than before, sending a chill down the spine of the chef, who had been enveloped in the sweltering heat of the kitchen.
“What? No, my lady.”
The owner shook his head and bowed deeply.
Like any other commoner, he seemed intent on simply lowering his head, gritting his teeth, and waiting quietly for the storm to pass.
Watching this whole scene unfold, I couldn't understand what part had angered the young lady.
Was her pride wounded because he didn't even stagger after being slapped? That was the only absurd guess I could make.
“Hey! Get in here!”
The next moment, she summoned the guards who had been waiting outside.
Three burly men with swords at their waists squeezed through the narrow door and stood beside the young lady, staring down the shop owner.
“Losing one leg shouldn't interfere with your work, right?”
“...Pardon?”
The shop owner asked back, bewildered by her bloodthirsty question.
“I don't like it. It makes me feel like I’m a nobody. A mere commoner should just crumple to the floor when I strike them.”
The young lady clicked her tongue in irritation, looking at her own hand, which had turned red from the slapping.
“If you're missing a leg, you won't be able to stand there so insolently next time.”
At her nod, the guards rushed forward in unison, dragged the shop owner out from behind the counter, and threw him to the floor. One tripped him while the other two pinned his shoulders and arms, suggesting this was not the first time they had done something like this.
“My lady, what is this… My lady! Tomorrow… no, I’ll have the money by this evening! Please, just give me one chance!”
His desperate voice hit the ceiling and fell back to the floor. The shop owner, for all his massive build, didn't even think of fighting back against the guards threatening him.
All he could do was look at the young lady and beg, and beg again.
“You still don't know what you did wrong, do you? The reason I'm giving you this punishment isn't because you were late with the rent. It’s because you made me feel like a nobody. You mocked me. Tearing you limb from limb wouldn't be enough, but I know you need to work to pay the rent, so I'm letting you off with just an ankle, aren't I?”
This young lady was far more insane than I had thought.
“…”
While I was speechless, the guards drew their blades and placed them against the shop owner's ankle. Despite the sudden turn of events, the owner clenched his fists and gritted his teeth.
But for him, there was nothing to do but accept the fate that had found him.
This was the medieval period. There was a reason Western historians called it the Dark Ages.
“At least, the place… could you please not do it here!”
“No. We’ll do it here. Your family needs to watch and learn, don't they? They need to see what happens when you break a promise with our family.”
The young lady smiled coldly and approached the son, who was sitting in the corner of the shop, clutching his guitar.
The young boy, who looked to be no more than thirteen or fourteen, could only blame himself for his powerlessness, his eyes welling with tears.
“...Close your eyes.”
Faced with an unavoidable reality, the owner took a breath and desperately told his son.
The young lady went over to the son, pulled up a chair, and sat down beside the boy. She moved in close, draping her arm over his small shoulders.
“If you close your eyes, what happens to your father won't end with just an ankle.”
Hearing the young lady’s whisper, the boy must have felt as if a viper’s tongue had pierced his ear and was churning his brain.
“Watch closely. And understand. Stupid beasts like you can only learn something when something is taken away.”
The boy’s hands, trembling with fear, gripped the neck of his guitar.
“I don't want to do this either, but what can I do when you commoners are so stupid. Hmm?”
The young lady smiled benevolently as she smoothed the trembling boy’s bangs with her slender fingers.
“…”
Across from me, Rireu was, for once, making no effort to hide her emotions.
The emotion she was displaying now was sheer fury.
“I suppose we can’t just watch this and walk away, can we?”
I asked as I slowly rose from my seat.
“...But I don't know how.”
An unexpected answer came from Rireu.
She was hesitating.
Hesitating?
Just a moment ago, wasn't she about to stand up and intervene over a noble slapping a commoner a few times? And now she was hesitating in a situation where a father's ankle was about to be cut off in front of his son?
“Why?”
“The castle is quite far from here. I can't stay by these people's side forever, and stationing elite soldiers here is out of the question. Just as you said, Bin, if we step in to protect them, we might get them through today. But what about tomorrow? And… the day after that?”
She was right. If we helped them now, they would escape harm for the moment. But in the long run, it could bring about an even greater disaster.
She slapped him, but he didn't fall.
The kind of people who would try to cut off a man's ankle for such a non-reason were that young lady and the family that raised her.
“Next time, it might not end with just one leg. It could get to a point where their lives are truly in danger…”
We were just passing through, while they and that young lady would have to keep seeing each other as long as they did business here.
If we humiliated that young lady and her guards now, a terrible retaliation, one that a commoner could never withstand, might befall them.
“So you’re saying we should just leave?”
“That's not it! I just, I just… don't know what to do.”
Defeating those guards and humiliating the young lady now would be nothing more than simple self-satisfaction.
A self-satisfaction that would bring a great disaster upon the family that ran this shop.
“Then, just wait here a moment.”
I stood up from the table and gave Rireu a faint smile.
On the outside, she was so introverted she seemed a bit gloomy… but her inner self was far more righteous than I had thought.
“I’m going to go change the situation a bit.”
I walked away from our sunny window seat and slowly pushed my way through the crowd of burly men led by the young lady.
The guards with swords at their waists and the massive shop owner all wore bewildered expressions as my frail body suddenly squeezed between them.
“Hey, who are you?”
“Don’t you have eyes? Can’t you see what’s going on?”
I ignored the guards who threw words at me and walked straight to the counter.
“The bill, please.”
“What are you?”
As I held out my money pouch to the wife, who was standing dazedly at the counter with a bruised and swollen cheek, a sharp voice pierced my right ear.
“Could you hurry up with the bill? There's a bug crawling around this cafe, and I've completely lost my appetite.”
I muttered in a low voice, looking over at the young lady as if I couldn't believe my eyes.
For a moment, the young lady’s face contorted.
“...Hey. You said that for me to hear, didn't you?”
“No.”
I replied without even bothering to look at her.
“Is this little shit taking me for a fool? Do you have any idea who I am? I am Vinen Guinere, the eldest daughter of the Guinere family! Do you think you can get away with this attitude towards me?”
Originally, I had planned to just leave a little extra money on the table and slip out of the shop quietly.
After all, the shop was the one at fault first, and there was a clear difference in status… I didn't want to get mixed up in this kind of dispute and waste my first day off.
But that young lady had crossed a line.
No matter that they were at fault, and no matter that they were commoners, to order a father’s leg to be cut off in front of his son.
Rireu was an elf with a righteous heart who couldn't just stand by and watch such a situation, and I, too, still had a modern person's sense of common sense and ethics.
“...You get pissy even when I say no. Why ask if you weren't going to believe me?”
“What did you say, you bastard?!”
“Characters that don't even show up in the setting book, having the gall to call themselves nobles…”
I scowled and grumbled as I looked at the young lady from the Guinere family, who was shouting at the top of her lungs.
As an added touch, I made a show of digging in my ear with my pinky, even though it wasn't itching.
And the next moment, my vision flipped upside down.