Jemel Bais (3)
Jemel Bais. In this era, he was considered a genius among doctors—an outstanding physician. Yet he was not exactly a welcome sight inside the lord’s castle. Not unless you counted the weight of the Bais name.
“Thank you for receiving me so graciously, My Lord.”
“Not at all. How could I fail to entertain a guest from the Duke Bais family?”
To the nobility, doctors were a useless breed. With priests serving as the ultimate cheat code, why would anyone need quacks who cauterized severed arms to stop the bleeding? That was the general opinion of the medical profession. And Jemel Bais was the eccentric of the Bais family. He had run away from the ducal house to live among commoners and study medicine, after all.
‘Of course, Jemel isn’t even his real name.’
To Wellington, Jemel Bais’s behavior was nothing more than a fleeting whim of youth. Nobles were meant to rule from above and dominate their subjects. The idea of mingling with commoners and replacing priests as their healer was simply foolish. Still, he could not voice such thoughts aloud. After all, Jemel was a direct descendant of the ducal line.
“So what brings you here?”
“I was hoping to meet a man named Alpha.”
“Why are you looking for Alpha?”
Wellington ground his teeth. That damned Alpha! Alpha!! Why did it have to be his own daughter, then Elisa Soryu, then Helen Wagner? He could not understand why every woman ended up entangled with that bastard.
‘He’s not even that handsome.’
That was just Wellington’s bias talking. In truth, Alpha was an exceptionally handsome man. No—he was the pinnacle of male beauty. He was an Alpha Male, after all. Though other men might not see it that way.
“I wish to become his disciple.”
“!!!”
Wellington pondered for a moment. What was he supposed to do with this eccentric young lady? Alpha already had two nobles by his side that were difficult enough to handle. And now the daughter of the Bais ducal family wanted to join them? Wellington felt his stomach turn.
“Very well.”
“Thank you.”
But he could not refuse. What choice did he have? Even if Wellington acted like a king inside his own territory, he was still just a baron, not the real thing.
*
While I was deep in the middle of sorting documents, I received word that a doctor had come looking for me and sent Elisa to deal with it. I wasn’t sure why the doctor had shown up. Ever since I had stripped them of those blood-stained clothes—something they treated as a point of pride and honor—our relationship had been sour. They were probably here to lodge some strange complaint. Or maybe they were trying to cozy up to me now that I was sitting on a literal money cushion thanks to the soap business.
Either way, I had no intention of meeting them. I was currently squeezing out every last ounce of my resources to wage war against the black plague.
Elisa Soryu had been an infuriating, high-strung bitch at first. But after I disciplined her a few times, she had turned into an utterly obedient female. Soon enough I would train her to spread her pussy for me anywhere, not just inside the breeding chamber.
At any rate, since I had sent the commoner-hating Elisa, the doctor was sure to get cursed out thoroughly before being sent away.
…….
“This person is none other than one of the direct descendants of the Duke Bais family! The very individual who comes to mind when speaking of the greatest doctors alive!”
Contrary to what I expected, however, Elisa did not drive the doctor away. Instead she fidgeted restlessly and kept shooting me meaningful glances. The Bais ducal house must carry quite a lot of influence if even Elisa was acting so cautiously.
“My name is Jemel Bais.”
Despite being from a great noble family that made even Elisa tread carefully, the plague doctor wearing the distinctive mask bowed to me without the slightest hesitation. Jemel Bais.
‘…It’s a woman?’
She had wrapped her entire body in layers to hide her figure and was using what seemed to be magic to produce a masculine voice, but the doctor standing before me was unmistakably female. Even the name was not truly Jemel Bais.
Name: Gemini Bais
Traits: Swordsmanship LV19, Cooking LV14, Exploration LV15, Vigilance LV21, Magic LV7, Medical Arts LV52, Midwifery LV34, Administration LV33, Mana LV7, Mana Manipulation LV6
Gemini Bais. A distinctly feminine name. It seemed that traveling alone as a woman was too burdensome, so she had altered her voice with magic, hidden her body beneath an oversized robe, and even changed her name.
‘She’s fucking talented.’
Upon checking her, I saw that her swordsmanship surpassed Erika’s, and her administrative skill exceeded even Elisa’s. On top of that, her Medical Arts level was monstrous. Considering that Master Leona’s swordsmanship level was just over fifty, Gemini Bais’s medical skill had clearly reached the master rank.
“What brings you here?”
The talent standing before me made my mouth water, but I could only click my tongue. She had not strutted around acting arrogant about her nobility like Helen, Elisa, or Ertia, so I had no justification to treat her roughly. The females I forcibly claimed were only those who did not recognize me as an Alpha Male and dared to challenge me. Therefore, unfortunately, once I resolved the reason this doctor had come, I would have to send her away.
“I heard that the person who discovered that washing the body with soap is effective against the black plague is the head of this department.”
“Yes, that’s correct. To be precise, it doesn’t cure the black plague—it helps prevent one from catching the disease.”
“!!!”
Inside the plague doctor mask, her white pupils visibly trembled.
“I see. So it’s not about curing the illness. Another realization. Could you possibly explain the principle behind it?”
Ah. This was that kind of woman. Looking into those eyes burning with intense desire, there was no mistaking it. She was not merely an eccentric from a ducal house who had left home to pursue medicine as a hobby. It was clear she had come here with a genuine passion for treating people and learning the art of healing.
“Ahem. It’s not particularly difficult, but I’m rather busy at the moment…”
“Ah… I apologize. I forgot that I came without scheduling an appointment. Could we set a new one on a day that suits you?”
Staring into those earnest eyes, I laughed inwardly.
“As you can see, our department is severely understaffed. Even our investor, Miss Helen, is assisting us as an external advisor. You can see that, can’t you? We have knights as well, but…”
I put on the most pitiful expression I could manage—the face of a man forced to work alongside two meatheaded knights. Anyone looking around could tell that the only people capable of handling paperwork in this department were Helen and Elisa.
“To think a department handling such critical work has so few personnel… I’m sorry. I’ve been wasting the time of people who are clearly very busy.”
“No, it’s fine. We’re on break right now.”
“?? Department Head. Break ti— mmph!!”
Luzenda quickly clamped a hand over Ertia’s mouth before she could say anything stupid. She had already acted without tact in front of Helen, and now she was making the same mistake again… I would have to punish her properly later.
“What a shame. I came hoping to learn things I didn’t know from the department head.”
“Ahem, ahem. Ah… If only someone could help us, we could finish this quickly and be done with the work!”
I shouted loudly right as Gemini was about to bow and take her leave.
“…….”
She couldn’t have missed the meaning behind my words. Gemini stared at me.
“I’m sorry. I am someone who must save patients. I don’t have time to fight with documents here.”
As expected of someone obsessed with medicine, she had no interest in wrestling with paperwork. She turned to leave for the field.
“What if handling the documents here faster could lower the incidence rate of the black plague even further? My goal is to reduce the outbreak rate of the black plague to under ten percent.”
“Is that true?!!”
She spun around instantly and asked if I was serious.
“Yes.”
I answered confidently. I had already sold the soap. Now all that remained was removing the root causes of the black plague. That would require not only funds but a massive workforce. Naturally, the administrative workload that came with it was staggering. Even with some assistance from the administrative department, the volume of documents we had to process was beyond imagination—managing personnel, distributing tasks, and so on. The sooner we finished, the fewer people would die from the black plague.
“How exactly?”
“First, do you know why the black plague occurs?”
That was why I absolutely had to secure the talented Gemini Bais who had appeared before me. Making her too curious would only frustrate her. It was time to satisfy that curiosity.
“I understand that the black plague is a seed sown by the devil and spreads from the first infected person to others.”
The devil, huh… In a fantasy world, the origin might truly have been a seed planted by a demon…. But since it was ultimately a disease and not a curse, there had to be a mechanism by which it spread.
“Look at this graph. The wealthier the neighborhood, the more sharply the incidence rate drops.”
“Yes.”
“On the other hand, the majority of black plague cases occur in slums or ordinary residential districts.”
Gemini looked at me as if to say, Obviously. No matter how high her medical level was, identifying the correlation here did not seem easy. Still, the fact that she had reached this level through self-study alone was impressive.
“Here are photographs of two different streets.”
Surprisingly, photography existed in this world. The cost was high, but not prohibitively so. I held up two images captured by a magic camera.
“As you can see, in the slums and regular residential areas, human excrement and trash are scattered everywhere. But the districts where nobles and wealthy merchants live are clean.”
“Yes.”
“All kinds of diseases thrive in such filthy environments. When rats or fleas transmit those pathogens to humans…”
“Ooh—!!”
I did my best to explain the mechanism behind the black plague in a way that was easy for Gemini to understand. By the time my lecture ended, she had willingly appointed herself as my graduate student. In other words, she had become an administrative slave I could exploit for practically nothing.
You… have become a grad student.