The Count of Holybell
The Commission Office was a place where all manner of people and information gathered.
Even if many of those who lingered there had no particular work of their own, they traveled the entire region solving problems, and so naturally came to know a great deal.
One such problem-solver—Andy, who had registered his name—visited the Commission Office. He had come to collect payment for the recent commission from Mrs. Welina.
Return with a confirmation slip bearing the client's signature, and the office would settle the fee.
That day he had needed to get back before night grew too late, so he had decided to collect later. Today he had come out again.
"Welcome. Ah, Master Andrew?"
"Yes. I've completed a commission and would like to collect the settlement."
"Ah… I believe that was a commission first refused by a Horizon Sect priest and then passed our way… And you're saying you completed it?"
"That's my understanding as well. Here—I finished it without incident. Please look at the confirmation."
"No, no, I'm not trying to doubt you, Master Andrew. Hmm… Confirmation complete. I'll settle it right away."
The employee, who had spoken with both hands folded politely over his stomach, returned with a coin purse.
"Ah, come to think of it… Hmm…"
"Please, speak freely."
"This is only my speculation, but… are you aware that a monster appeared in the park recently?"
"I am."
He knew all too well.
He had been right there, after all.
"Apparently a civilian dealt with that monster and then vanished—not the guard corps, not a cathedral cleric. One adult, one child. A young priestess came to the Commission Office looking for them, and asked us to let her know if we heard anything."
"A young priestess?"
"Yes. So I was wondering if that… pair might have been you, Master Andrew. You did bring a disciple with you recently…"
"Haha. What a coincidence. I'm flattered by the high estimation, but it wasn't us."
Andy said it with a bright smile.
If they find out, every coin I've earned so far goes straight to fountain repair costs!
Inwardly, he was anything but bright.
For a while, he would have to stay well clear of the cathedral.
After finishing the conversation, he turned to leave.
On the way out, Rick was waving wildly from the table of the perpetually drunk bearded men—the fellow whose face had been eaten away by Corruption, who had lived in a helmet until Andy restored it clean.
"Young man! Come over here! Drinks are on me!"
"Thank you, but I'll take the thought. I don't drink."
"Ah! Which denominations practice abstinence again?"
"It's not a matter of doctrine—it's not good for teaching my little— my student."
"That tiny little student who was eating waffles before?"
"Yes. She'll grow up in no time, though."
"Not a student—more like a daughter!"
Leaving the laughing men behind, Andy found that several others were greeting him as well, for some reason. Perhaps purifying Rick in front of everyone had left quite an impression.
It was a good direction, at least. All of them were potential clients and free advertising. Money was best earned when you could earn it, and training was best done when you could train.
Come to think of it, Mrs. Welina had also promised to put in a good word. It would be nice if two or three clients turned up.
I hope they give us safe commissions we can take together with the young lady.
The way she had lit up when he stamped her praise stamp was still vivid. She had filled only a single square, yet her eyes had sparkled as if she had been given a hamburger.
"…"
Thinking of that girl naturally brought something else to mind.
You cannot trust people, yet you yearn for them. The thirst intensifies.
Cream had leveled up, of all things.
As a level-up celebration gift, he ought to buy her a knife and a glass.
No—when he made the anti-accusation bite marks, she bit his wrist anyway, so maybe he should just tell her to drink then. But from what he had seen, she didn't particularly enjoy the act of drinking blood.
She was a stubborn, sensitive child who couldn't accept affection straightforwardly, and Andy found that truly regrettable.
Why did the young lady turn out this way?
While buying the things he needed on the way home, he thought it over.
A girl who was a mass of distrust, affection-starved and stubborn to the core.
If he had to name what set her apart from her first-cycle self, it would be the karma carried over when the world restarted—and the penalties that came with it.
In other words, Cream must have been born into this world with a sinful soul, and with the Vampiric Impulse and tainted blood from the start.
…Is the back-alley period the key?
Andy was bothered by those back-alley years she must have spent living with that penalty.
The time she had lived alone with her birth mother.
Come to think of it, even after spending a fair amount of time with Cream, he had hardly heard anything about that period.
"…Who do you think I lived with before I came here."
She seemed especially reluctant to mention her mother.
In the original story, mother and daughter had gotten along rather well. That was why Cream, alone at the mansion, would cry for her mother every night.
A time that had been poor, but good because they were together.
How had those two—mother and daughter—fared in this world?
Judging by the fact that she had taught Cream arithmetic and reading and writing, she had at least done a mother's job.
If I ask, will she get angry?
Back at the mansion, Andy went first to the kitchen garden.
There, a cotton-candy-haired girl was plucking spinach leaves one by one—pluck, pluck. Wearing a wide-brimmed hat against the early summer sun, she made for a strangely peaceful scene.
"Young lady?"
"Ahem."
"I did say we should harvest today. Have you been doing it alone?"
"Praise… ahem… stamp… ahem."
Squatting and picking spinach, Cream kept glancing his way and clearing her throat.
Her expression was blank and indifferent, yet her gaze held a quiet expectation. She was working hard while pretending not to—all for a stamp.
But Andy was a professional teacher.
He had built up a tolerance for good deeds of that level.
She thinks I'm far too soft.
Of course, taking the initiative to tend the garden was admirable—but at this rate, the stamp card would be full in less than a week.
You couldn't indulge a child's cuteness without limit. Andy intended to raise Cream into a self-reliant adult, not a spoiled brat.
"Wooooah—"
"Eek! Why are you running at me!!"
"Just once—please let me pick you up just once."
"I asked for a stamp, not to be picked up!!"
Only after a long game of tag with the leaping young lady did Andy calm down.
"Whew. Well then, young lady. Shall we have today's lesson?"
"Hic… huu… I got got again…"
They left the freshly picked spinach in the kitchen and headed together to Cream's room. Today's lesson was scheduled for the kitchen, but there was something to do first.
He put half of the payment he had just collected into another pouch and handed it to Cream.
"This is… what? Money?"
"Half of the commission fee from the job we did together recently."
"…"
"From now on, whenever we go on commissions together, I'll give you half."
"Hmph…"
Cream looked startled for a moment, then her eyes narrowed again.
"That's funny. Really."
"What is?"
"All that grand talk about purifying the heart and whatnot—in the end, you did it for the money. I thought you were monitoring me while carrying out a mission from the Order. Turns out it was just a paid job from the Commission Office."
She crossed her arms and spoke cynically, and Andy's expression turned rueful.
"Well. That can't be helped."
"What can't be helped?"
"I have to save up for our future, you see."
"…What?"
Cream's pronunciation slipped.
Even after she had stopped acting like a good child in front of Andy, she still occasionally let her pronunciation slip on certain words—"teasher," or "hambugi," and the like. She usually spoke carefully, but when she let her guard down, it happened.
"What—what funds did you say?"
"Funds for our future."
"Teacher and me and… future… what?"
"A house to live in together, living expenses… If I'm going to feed you delicious things and dress you in pretty clothes, that all takes money. There are a lot of places money will go, so I have to earn hard while I'm still young."
He had no idea how much money it took to raise a child. Andy wanted to raise Cream not as an ordinary child but as one who wanted for nothing, so it would cost even more.
And above all, marrying her off would take a great deal of money too. He had to earn plenty so she wouldn't be looked down on by her groom's family.
"Wha…"
"Wha?"
"Wh-wh-what nonsense are you talking!!"
But she didn't understand that heart at all—Cream only leapt to her feet.
Her soft cheeks flushed bright red, and she furrowed her brow so hard he worried she might get wrinkles between her eyebrows at that young age.
"Wh-what are you to me? I'm a person of this mansion, you know? The young lady of House Holybell. And a witch. You're a cleric. Th-th-this is complete nonsense. Now that I look at it, you're not a cleric—you're a real pervert. How can you even think of living with me. Honestly."
She fanned her reddened face with both hands, fluttering.
Her eyes darted this way and that, unable to settle anywhere, as she chattered on.
"Th-that's right!"
"Yes."
"Lesson. Let's get on with the lesson. This isn't the time for useless talk."
She hastily tried to change the subject, and the content of it was a little concerning.
Kind Andy decided to go along with it.
"Did something happen?"
"The butler grandfather came by earlier—he said the head of the house is coming today."
"Today?"
A little earlier than scheduled.
He immediately checked Cream's expression. Fortunately—or perhaps not—she didn't seem greatly disturbed.
It was the face of someone discussing the everyday: today's lunch menu is this, and so on.
Her cheeks were still a little red from earlier, and her brow was slightly creased, but that was all.
"Then we'd better hurry with the lesson."
"R-right?"
Together with the stammering Cream, they went down to the kitchen.
Today's schedule for young lady and tutor was a lesson in dining etiquette.
With the head of the house soon to return to the mansion, they set about reviewing.
They took a corner of the kitchen where the servants were bustling about preparing to receive the master—and the servants had grown used to them enough not to pay them any mind.
Andy pulled out a chair first, and Cream sat down slowly. She placed the napkin from the table across her lap and straightened her back with elegance.
"Order of utensil use?"
"From the outside in."
"The knife?"
"Right hand."
"Bread?"
"Tear off small pieces with the left hand. Butter or jam is spread with the knife in the right hand."
"Excellent."
After that, Andy prepared food for practical practice.
A full course would take too long, so he kept it simple: bread, a main dish, and dessert.
While Cream nibbled at the bread, he seared hamburger-patty meat in butter. Alongside it he grilled pineapple and tomato and other garnishes, and the main dish was complete.
A hamburger steak with a glossy surface and a rich aroma.
Cream swallowed hard at the sight, yet demurely took up her fork and knife. She cut a bite-sized piece and slipped it into a mouth opened just wide enough that her fangs wouldn't show.
It was a world of difference from the way she usually opened wide—waaang—when eating a hamburger. The way she nibbled without making a sound with the utensils was a model of noble refinement.
Grace : +1
"You did wonderfully. You pick things up so quickly."
"Ahem."
"As an educator, teaching you is truly rewarding, young lady."
"Oh, you don't have to go that far."
She recoiled from excessive praise, but seemed rather fond of this moderate kind.
Cream puffed out her chest as she ate the pudding that had come for dessert.
Andy smiled warmly at the childlike sight, then quietly closed his mouth.
In the kitchen where the servants bustled about preparing for the master's return, young lady and tutor spent time alone together in one corner.
There was something he wanted to ask while he had the chance.
To understand Cream's nature—so innocent yet mature, so averse to people yet yearning for them. To understand why she had become different from the first cycle.
Don't you miss your mother, by any chance?
He was just about to open his mouth to pose such a question when—
"Young la—"
"—The master has returned!"
In an instant the kitchen erupted in noise.
At the news that the head of the house had returned earlier than scheduled, everyone moved in perfect coordination.
Andy and Cream watched the scene in a daze.
The two of them occupied a peculiar position in the mansion. They were neither ordinary members of the family nor ordinary servants.
When the two of them peeked out of the kitchen, they saw a man in noble attire of about thirty, and servants laden with armfuls of gifts. Butler Albet and the head maid stood beside him as well, receiving the master.
"Where is my sister? Which room was she assigned?"
A large voice that paid no mind whatsoever to those around him.
The precise diction of a man who had never needed to watch anyone's face—and who was the master of this mansion.
"Ah, no need to look."
The man who had been glancing about spotted Cream's soft pink eyes and white hair and came straight toward them.
From behind, the kitchen servants could be heard swallowing hard.
"Well then, little sister. Have you been settling into the mansion well?"
"Yes, my lord!"
"Here—gifts for a member of our family. I didn't know what you'd like, so I picked out a bit of everything. It reminded me of Petunia when she was little, and I got a little choked up. I do hope you like them."
He gestured to the servants, and they handed every last gift to Cream.
The small girl took on a tower of presents tall enough to hide her face, so Andy quickly shared the load.
"Oh, so you're Master Andy. First time seeing your face."
Turning from Cream, he looked at Andy this time.
The master of the Holybell county, and Cream's half-brother.
Blue-purple hair completely unlike Cream's.
"Duncan Holybell. A pleasure to meet you."
He held out his hand for a handshake, and in that brief moment Andy scanned Cream's expression.
She was simply smiling sweetly, saying nothing.
"…Andy. It is an honor to be received by you."
Andy, too, smiled as he slowly took his hand.