The Vanished Ledger
“Get out of the way! Move, you bastards!”
Eric came charging down to the North Wing Cellar with five knights in tow, like a madman. The hem of his precious coat caught on the edge of the stairs and tore with a rip, but he couldn't have cared less right now.
The footsteps of the five knights trailing behind him echoed messily off the narrow stone steps.
The cellar door was slightly ajar.
'No way… no fucking way? Nooooo!'
Eric burst inside and dropped to his knees in front of the third oak barrel. His hand trembled as he groped for the brick.
The brick slid inward.
And there, in the space behind it, sat a single metal box, all by its lonesome.
The ledger was gone.
“...Wh-what…?”
Eric's mouth gaped open, sucking in empty air.
He pried open the box lid. The gold coins were untouched. Not a single one missing. And that terrified him more. This wasn't some thief after money. They'd ignored the cash entirely and taken only the ledger—precisely the ledger.
The names of the territory's people sold into slavery, Ophilia's—his mother's—personal signatures, the exact dates of sale and profits earned. All of it, now in someone else's hands.
The blood drained from his head. He felt aged in an instant, his dark brown hair—unbefitting a Kraus—turning white before his eyes.
That ledger should have been burned from the start. Eric knew that much. But he couldn't do it.
His mother Ophilia, always lurking in the shadows, tightening the noose around his neck.
She was his mother, sure, but that snake who'd weathered every storm—when would she cut off her own tail and sacrifice him? That bone-deep fear had always strangled him.
Ophilia's handwritten signatures on that ledger were his sole lifeline. If Isabella ever found out, they were his leverage to drag her down to hell with him if needed.
And that was just the start. The Kent faction grunts handling the bloody fieldwork—who knew when they'd snap their leashes and turn on him?
To keep that illiterate hunting dog loyal, he needed a perfect collar: a detailed record of every filthy deed the Kent crew had committed.
So he'd hidden it here.
He couldn't trust the bedroom safe, wiped spotless daily by maids like Lia.
This place—under his sole control, the wine cellar—no one would dare search it. He'd believed it an untouchable sanctuary.
But… but… but!
'Gareth… you fucking traitor bastard…! I even let you dip into the slaves first!'
Eric's teeth clacked together.
Gareth had been the go-between for the slave caravans and Kent, counting heads and hauling the blood money. It wouldn't have been hard for him to guess what Eric obsessively checked in the third barrel every night, waiting outside the door.
'I never thought that dumb beast would dare touch my box!'
“This, fuck—this is insane—”
Foam bubbled from Eric's lips. Still on his knees, he clutched his head with both hands, yanking at his hair like he meant to rip it out.
Then heavy footsteps echoed from the cellar entrance.
“...What's all the commotion, Young Master Eric?”
It was Kent.
One hand on his sword belt, he sauntered in with his usual oily arrogance.
The honorific was polite: “Young Master.” But his massive frame blocked the entrance, and his gaze looking down held zero respect for a superior.
Like an adult staring at a tantruming child.
The moment Eric saw that face, something inside him snapped.
“You bastard!”
Eric shot to his feet.
He grabbed Kent's collar with both hands, yanking the chest of the man a full head taller than him down to shove his mad face right up to the knight's nose.
“It was you! You and Gareth stole my ledger! That's why he hasn't come back! You two siphoned it off and played dumb!”
The five knights who'd followed Eric flinched as one, hands drifting to their sword hilts. But none dared step forward. Before the sight of the acting lord and knight captain snarling nose-to-nose, their feet stayed rooted to the stone floor.
Kent's expression flickered—a genuine beat of confusion.
Then, in the next beat, his massive hand clamped down heavily over Eric's wrists.
“Lower your hands, Young Master.”
A low voice.
Surface-level courtesy. But the pressure on Eric's wrists was anything but. His bones creaked audibly in Kent's palm.
“Agh, aaack! Let—let go, you fucker!” “Young Master.”
Kent called again, a faint irritation finally creeping in.
“What did you just say? 'My ledger'?” “......”
Only then did Eric realize what he'd blurted. His face drained to a sickly blue.
“Th-that was just… a general accounting copy…” “Hiding an accounting copy behind an oak barrel in a wine cellar? First I've seen.”
Kent's voice sank calm and steady. That was scarier.
It had been three years.
Knight Captain Kent Garcia had done Eric's dirty work on command. He'd stained his blade with the screams of territory folk, dragged one of Isabella's retainers to the execution block, even tried to smear monster bait on second young master Werner's clothes—the true blood of the house.
All because he trusted Eric.
But.
'My ledger.'
This rat-like slimeball had kept one hidden away in the wine cellar depths, clutching Kent's weaknesses behind his back.
Even after drunkenly swearing he'd die before betraying him.
A vein slowly pulsed under Kent's neatly trimmed mustache.
“Young Master Eric.” “......” “What have you been doing behind my back?”
Kent reversed the grip, hoisting Eric by the collar. Eric's toes barely scraped the floor. The pitiful sight of the already short man dangling like a child made the knights behind them avert their eyes.
“I-I don't owe you reports, you…!”
Eric thrashed, kicking at Kent's shin. The armor absorbed it harmlessly, but Kent's brow finally furrowed.
“...This little shit.”
Kent raised one hand. As it whipped toward Eric's cheek, the youngest knight gasped.
Kent's hand hung mid-air a beat. Reason held—for now. But that was it. He shoved Eric roughly back and stepped away.
Eric crashed back against an oak barrel and slumped down. His silk coat shoulders were crumpled with Kent's handprints.
The cellar filled only with the two men's ragged breaths.
The brotherhood Eric and Kent had shared over three years.
It tore apart now, so simply, by this wastrel's schemes.
Afternoon sunlight slanted through the curtains.
Under that glow, my legs spread wide, I held a freshly brewed cup of tea.
Monsters pressing right up to the walls outside, and yet this afternoon felt downright peaceful. Well, not for some folks.
I took a sip of the tea Lia had poured with such care. Damn fine aroma.
“A maid with zero flaws—except being a non-virgin.” “Mmph? Mmmph?”
I muttered to myself, and a voice came from under the table.
I tapped my foot on the floor. That alone silenced it, replaced by the noisy slurps on my cock.
Schlurp, shluuuurp, sluuuuurp.
“Kh.”
Desperate service. She must really want to impress me.
I glanced down.
Lia sat primly between my thighs, maid cap straight, hands folded neatly on my knee. Her lips never stopped swallowing and licking my shaft.
I peered into the cheeky, desperate non-virgin's mind with Mind Reading.
[Just a bit more... I have to make it so Master can't last a single day without my lips. No other bitch can touch him—I'll be his perfect woman. So deeper, yes... more perfectly...!]
A far cry from obedient Anna.
But right now, that cunning inner scheming was a plus. Her brazen ambition to monopolize me entirely added sticky heat to her tongue's tip.
I rested a hand on Lia's crown, stroking slowly along her part. No demand, no pressure—just silent praise: 'Good girl.'
That alone made her shoulders quiver under the table. Her nape flushed pink above her maid collar, followed by a loud glurk as she swallowed me deep into her throat.
I savored Lia's devoted tongue work while unfolding a parchment from my lap with my free hand. A hit list I'd compiled from Eric's ledger and seal.
First: The slave trader's secret camp.
Second: Birke, the usurious moneylender at the market.
Third: The manor of Baron Albrecht, collateral Kraus branch.
The rotten sores of the territory. Rats fattened under Eric and Kent's protection, funneling their funds.
I skimmed the list, chuckled, and lifted my teacup. The warm liquid slid down my throat, mingling exquisitely with the hot pleasure from below.
“Gonna be a busy night.” “Mm?! Mmph?” “Not talking to you. Shut up and suck.”
At my firm command, Lia started bobbing her head vigorously.
High-level cocksucking skill on full display: swallowing from tip to base, then releasing, over and over, all for me.
“Mmm, yeah, mmm.”
Feeling damn good, I groaned and gripped her hair tight. Thrust hard forward, shoving my glans past her throat.
Even choking, her tongue never stopped lapping my balls—pure submission.
I shook her head up and down wildly by the hair, using her pretty face like a pussy.
“Glurk, glurgh, gleeeerk, gluuuuurk.”
Listening to Lia gasp around my cock, I crumpled the hit list in my other hand with a crunch.
'The dog bastards rotting my virgin sister's territory…'
Looks like the Unicorn Knight would be working overtime tonight.