Never Mind the Heir, I’ll Focus on Healing — Chapter 199
Never Mind the Heir, I’ll Focus on Healing — Chapter 199
And in a situation like that, Varg would be a considerable help.
Wasn’t there a ‘special guest’ staying with House Asteri at the time?
‘One Varg absolutely detests.’
A guest from the Underworld.
Its leader, no less.
Varg, who was normally so gentle he almost seemed a little simple, changed somewhat when he encountered a figure from the Underworld.
The docile, vacant quality vanished, and a beastfolk’s innate sharpness and instinctive wariness came to life.
No one had told him outright that the merchant Jade was the leader of the Underworld, but the mere association was clearly enough to put Varg on guard.
‘And he has good reason.’
It was only a fleeting moment, but hadn’t Varg once nearly been caught and sold by an Underworld slave trader?
‘If anything unusual happens, the odds are highest that he’ll be the first to notice.’
With the instincts of a beast, after all.
Knowing Jack’s personality, of course, he wasn’t likely to threaten my brother inside the Asteri mansion.
No, it would be the opposite.
Until he had practically groveled like a dog to win my brother’s favor, he would stick close without a peep.
At least until he’d branded the message ‘I will never harm you’ deep into their minds.
‘There’s no way my brother would be taken in, but…’
My brother had never dealt with anyone with a tongue as cunning as Jack’s.
If Jack was determined to deceive him, he could be fooled without realizing it.
And Jack was a person who could exploit that
brief opening to land a blow on my brother.
But— If Varg was there?
No matter how much a wild animal fawned before that terrifying, absolute loyalty…
‘That fundamental difference can’t be helped.’
For a while, it would be best if my brother and Varg kept close.
As a younger brother, I judged this much assistance was permissible.
* * *
Much as Rickshel worried and Lion anticipated, Jade continued to hover near Lion from that day forward.
Not through direct contact, of course.
He merely watched from a distance where Lion was visible, as if observing, and occasionally offered a greeting when their eyes met.
His demeanor was warier than it had been in the reception room.
One could even call it dispirited.
‘He’s observing.’
Lion saw through Jack’s state immediately.
He was merely watching from afar, like a predator assessing its prey before the hunt.
It wasn’t as if a man who’d grown up in the Underworld would suddenly reform.
‘Well, let him do as he pleases.’
Lion only had to maintain consistent indifference.
He returned a greeting when their eyes met and ignored him completely when he was far away.
So that it was clear he would offer the courtesy due a guest but had no particular interest.
The other side might interpret it as a battle of nerves, but for Lion…
‘It was comfortable.’
If Jack left without finding an opening, that was a gain. If his behavior was properly corrected so he wouldn’t climb up and act out, as Lion wished, that was an even greater gain.
There was no need to hide his daily routine.
Hadn’t they already investigated everything anyway?
‘To hell with it.’
Truth be told, flatly ignoring someone like that wasn’t really Lion’s taste, and someday he would need to get his hands on the main character’s belongings that Jack possessed.
‘But he overplayed his hand trying to improve things right off the bat.’
So Lion had no choice but to respond in kind.
In his own way, of course.
‘And besides…’
Lion averted his gaze from Jack, who was watching him from a distance, and faced forward.
Because at that moment, something far more bewildering than that guy was planted squarely in front of him.
“…Whoa.”
Lion couldn’t hold back an exclamation.
Sitting quietly before him was an enormous wolf with red fur.
He couldn’t tell by appearance alone, but this was unmistakably Varg.
‘So this was why he’d changed the location?’
The moment they’d arrived at the agreed meeting spot, Varg had proposed it might be better to relocate to Mimir Forest.
At the time, Lion assumed it was because of Jack, but now he saw this was the reason.
However…
“Why did you come like this?”
At Lion’s question, Varg, still in wolf form, gently picked up a pre-written letter in his mouth, placed it before Lion, and wagged a gigantic tail the size of Pooch’s body.
His appearance was unmistakably a wolf’s, but his behavior was that of a well-trained large-breed dog.
Moreover, his fur was even fluffier than that of Endairon, the high-ranking water spirit he’d met before, so much so that Lion’s hand moved of its own acco—
‘No. Get a grip.’
Even if he currently resembled a wolf, that was Varg.
Beastfolk were, strictly speaking, closer to humans.
Even for Varg, this was a discourteous act.
Lion smoothly lowered his hand and picked up the letter.
Its contents were as follows:
“He thought this form would be better, for educational reasons, and Rickshel approved?”
It wasn’t wrong.
In fact, Lion himself had considered casually broaching the subject one day.
But he hadn’t done so for a single reason.
Asking a beastfolk to return to their original form was a significant breach of etiquette.
Comparable, perhaps, to casually touching an elf’s ear or asking a dwarf his exact alcohol limit.
So he had planned to ask, just once, sometime later…
Thump.
Varg went further and rested his forehead against Lion’s knee.
Then he gazed up at Lion with eyes that were too bright and sparkling for a wolf.
“Pant, pant.”
…Was he really a wolf?
Wasn’t he a dog?
In any case… his meaning was unmistakably, It’s perfectly fine, so please, go ahead! So, hesitantly, Lion slowly raised his hand and awkwardly stroked Varg a few times.
As expected, the fur was wonderfully soft.
Perhaps because he wasn’t in human form, the visual difference was unmistakable.
“Your condition really has improved.”
To explain, the fur Lion had found back when Varg had devoured all the barley seed was in poor shape.
Split and stiff all over, it was clear at a glance that he hadn’t been well.
But seeing him now…
“That’s a relief.”
The Moonflower Honey must have been quite effective.
Lion ruffled Varg’s head indiscriminately, like he was vigorously patting a younger sibling, and nodded.
“Then I’ll ask you, in that form.”
Having finished speaking, Lion opened the bag at his side.
Pooch, already restless to get out, was scratching at the bag with its front paws when it stopped short.
It swiveled its head around, sniffing the new scent in the air.
And then discovered it.
The gigantic Varg…!
Gulp.
Lion swallowed dryly.
How would Pooch react? Or perhaps the sheer size would frighten it?
Pooch scrambled out of the bag and…!
“Kyi-ing!”
It bounced around excitedly, circling Varg.
It seemed to feel a strong affinity for a creature whose form most resembled its own, neither human nor bird.
“Phew.”
Lion and Varg each let out a relieved sigh, exchanged a glance, and nodded.
“Pooch, play with your big brother. Understood?”
As Varg followed after a furiously bouncing Pooch, he briefly turned his head to glance at Lion.
Probably because of Jack, who had followed them here.
“You don’t need to worry about that.”
Lion gently waved a hand, smiled faintly, and sent Varg on his way. Then he settled himself on a suitably raised tree root.
He took out the paper and pencil he’d brought, observed Pooch playing with Varg, and began to sketch, his pencil moving in smooth strokes.
“…”
And Jack, watching all of this from a distant tree…
“Ha ha. This is a bit of a problem.”
He muttered it with forced cheerfulness. He was finding himself at a loss against Lion’s wall—if it could even be called a wall.
Only a single day had passed, but Jack had already grasped just how thick Lion’s barrier was.
Lion Asteri responded to things he had no interest in with utter indifference.
In other words, he had a tendency to act as if he simply hadn’t seen the situation and move on, no matter what Jack did.
“I might have to settle in here for quite a while…”
Having already infiltrated the place under the guise of a merchant guild master, it wasn’t impossible.
Jack was not one to give up like this.
With any tree that refused to fall after being struck, Jack would simply keep at it.
So was the answer to strike it ten or a hundred times until it fell?
‘No.’
If Jack struck it once with all his skill and it still didn’t fall, that alone marked it as a sufficiently valuable tree.
He had no choice but to calmly and slowly form a plan to lift that tree, roots and all, and transplant it exactly where he wished.
With the utmost care, so the tree would not be damaged or lose its worth.
He could respond to indifference with indifference for a week or a month.
But a year? Ten years?
No matter who it was, if they clung that close to Lion Asteri for that long, Lion would eventually engage with them, if only for his younger brother’s sake.
So if Lion Asteri persisted in his indifference, Jack would simply grit his teeth and become the cicada glued to the tree beside him!
“Hm?”
Jack, who had been fixated solely on Lion, felt a gaze upon him and turned his head.
There, playing with a small fox that had multiple tails, was the enormous wolf.
More precisely, it was Varg, Rickshel Asteri’s kindness.
Even while playing with the little fox, he was constantly aware of and vigilant toward this spot.
‘He’s turned into a complete guard dog.’
Though he had been… quite ferocious back when he was with the Underworld’s slave traders.
“Is it because he’s a prodigy of spirit magic that he handles beasts so well, too?”
Well, no matter. It was a good thing.
That dog seemed to be carrying out a different mission anyway, and for the moment, no one was bothering Lion Asteri.
So wouldn’t it be fine to hover a little right now?
Jack descended lightly from the tree, walked over to Lion without making a sound, as was his habit, and sat beside him.
“May I sit here?”
“Yes, sure.”
Lion answered without even glancing Jack’s way.
‘As expected, he isn’t surprised.’
He must have already known Jack was there.
But Jack also had no intention of approaching Lion immediately.
If he tried to cling now, did he even have anything that might pique Lion’s interest or win his favor?
And so…
“…”
Jack planned to simply follow Lion’s line of sight from beside him.
He had to understand the world this eccentric saw in order to attempt anything.
Jack sat at a suitable distance beside Lion and looked out at his world with him.
The very first thing he felt was:
‘…Peaceful.’
That moment was genuinely comfortable and tranquil.
The leaves blocking the sun, the beasts frolicking in the distance, and Lion Asteri watching them while sketching something.
The graphite scratching against the coarse drawing paper, producing a soft rustling sound, and the gently blowing breeze.
Wasn’t it as peaceful and fantastical as a dream?
If he lived in a world like this…
‘Of course I’m nothing but a foreign contaminant.’
At the same time, that thought abruptly crossed his mind.
If Lion Asteri had the power to protect this peaceful world…
Then maybe it would be better for Kyle to be here, too.
It was a soft, weak thought he had never once entertained in his life.