The Light of My Life, the Flame of My Life
The investment proposal she held out to him was nothing short of extraordinary.
The initial sum alone came to more than three thousand gold.
Blow fought to keep the shock from his face. Jane, who had once worked at a trading house, pressed her lips tight and swallowed hard enough that he heard it. Three thousand gold. Set beside the seven hundred his father, Slot Deblique, had once put up for him, the figure was staggering—and she had called it only the first investment. Whatever came after would blow past even his imagination.
So he tried to make the problem simple. In the end, the only conclusion he had to reach was whether he would take this unimaginable sum from her, or not.
Once his thoughts were in some kind of order, Blow turned back to the papers. Yulia, who had been watching him with a faint, unreadable smile, added in a calm voice:
"Well? Young Master Blow."
"The amount is so startling I'm still giving myself a moment to absorb it."
"It ought to be at least that much."
"I finally understand the look on your face back then, when Lady Rachel called it buying at the bottom."
"Yes, exactly. I was rather flustered when she brought up investing out of nowhere. I was meant to be the one offering first, and I was afraid she'd steal the initiative from me."
Remembering the banquet, Yulia looked faintly embarrassed, then added one more thing.
"If I find it this attractive, other people will too."
"......"
"Lady Rachel isn't the sort to say something like that lightly. If Greig weren't tangled up in it, she would have told you on the spot."
"Surely not."
Blow pictured Rachel breaking into that easy, unguarded laugh and tilted his head, but Yulia went on, utterly certain.
"She would. Lady Rachel might well say it the very next time you meet. House Campbell has been diversifying its ventures lately, you see... which is why I wanted to show you how serious I am, Young Master Blow. I put a great deal of care into this, you know."
Looking back, everything Yulia had done yesterday and today was riddled with oddities. She had skipped class to come to the monastery. She had listened to his story. She had offered to arrange a reconciliation with the Saintess. She had even handed them a hotel suite.
There was no doubting that she thought well of him. At the same time, Blow was reminded all over again that nothing in this world came free. So he decided to plate his heart in iron. He would simply tell himself the corn cheese had been very, very good.
With that settled, he smiled at his ease and looked her straight in the eye.
"It's a more generous offer than I deserve. Even if I were to accept, I think I'd need some time to think it over."
"I understand completely, Young Master Blow. You may not have time to spare later, so ask me anything you like today."
"Aside from the capital, it says you'll cooperate as fully as you can wherever cooperation is possible. I'd like to know what that actually means."
"For the time being, I manage the hotels of House Edfolk. We could feature your restaurant's dishes in them as promotion, and I can also set aside space around the hotels for you."
"If you mean Hotel Edfolk in Caipol, that's right in the heart of the city, isn't it?"
"Yes. Hotel Edfolk in Caipol stands on Whittaker Street."
A truly extraordinary offer. And precisely because it was, it weighed on him. Something about it caught.
"There's something that gives me pause."
"What is it, Young Master Blow?"
"To begin with, the prestige of House Edfolk is simply too great..."
"That..."
Yulia's House Edfolk. One of the four great houses currently steering the center of the Empire. Her father was Deschamps Edfolk, a mage who had already written his name into history, and her mother was Karen Edfolk, one of the knights the late King of Serdia had cherished most. After the Unification War the two of them had thrown themselves into enterprise more vigorously than any other house, and the hotel business was one of those ventures.
Blow's House Deblique, by contrast, was nothing more and nothing less than a provincial nobility that had grown quickly by serving as a wartime stronghold. House against house, they were not in the same weight class.
Yulia's face said she understood him deeply. She went on in a measured voice.
"This choice is mine alone. What I wrote down is only a portion of the funds I can mobilize myself."
"I see."
So the houses themselves would not be bound together completely. That, at least, was a relief. Blow glanced at Jane beside him. She was poring over the figures with fierce concentration, while Hervena, seated on his right, watched their exchange and swallowed dryly.
"The truth is, I raised the amount today. Marchen and I revised it earlier."
"You did?"
"Young Master Blow. Earlier, you let me hear your dream, didn't you?"
"Yes."
He remembered her at the monastery, eyes bright as she listened when he spoke of the department store.
"Originally I meant to propose a collaboration on the restaurant side. But the idea of selling everything under one roof appealed to me so much that I changed course entirely, toward a full-scale investment."
"I'm still a small merchant in the Dusk Block who hasn't even properly opened. The scale is tiny."
"That's true. But, Young Master Blow Deblique, I'm not looking at your background or your past. I'm looking at who you are now, and that is why I'm making this offer."
"When you say you've seen me..."
"The corn cheese, the bacon soup, Red and Yellow—all of them were creative. Selling potatoes to students out in the Dusk Block was striking and fresh, too. And I saw drive in you."
"......"
"That creativity, that freshness, is what moved me. And I had truly never seen the Saintess show her feelings like that."
Yulia spoke in a clear voice, and Jane nodded beside her. But the claim that she was looking at him only made Blow think harder.
Blow Deblique knew himself well. He had known people would love roasted potatoes, corn cheese, and bacon-and-onion soup, and that they would enjoy them. But that was only knowledge borrowed from another world. What had moved her heart was closer to a trick than to any freshness or creativity of his own.
Of course, he knew perfectly well how tremendous that knowledge was as an asset. It wasn't that he lacked confidence. Someday he really would open a department store. He simply didn't yet have the experience to unfold it fully, and there was still too much he needed to learn. He meant to learn by colliding with the world head-on, stacking it up one piece at a time.
The offer Yulia had just set before him was on a scale that could twist even that resolve out of shape.
"Young Master Blow. If I may be a little practical—if your idea is not to end as a daydream, you'll need a great deal of money, and a great many people."
"You're right."
"And though you're starting small now, if you mean to compete with House Ropert and the merchants of the middle class, you'll need the name of House Edfolk."
"......"
"My name, and the name Edfolk, can be a sturdy pillar for you from here on."
For some reason, the more Yulia spoke, the more tangled his thoughts became. On top of his earlier caution, another worry welled up.
He knew well enough that she was a good person, and that there was a great deal he could learn from her. She was one of the finest mages at the school, and from the way the wind was blowing, she looked very likely to become student council president. And that was precisely why he might end up being led around by her for good. Even person to person, not only house to house, they were not in the same weight class.
"...It's giving me rather a lot to think about, in more ways than one."
"Hm. Is it the question of who holds the reins?"
She seemed to see straight through him. On this point, Blow decided to be honest.
"If I'm honest about how I feel, yes."
"I intend to leave the direction entirely in your hands."
"......"
"If I take any part in the management, it will only be to fill in the details of the sketch you've already drawn."
"Give me a moment to think."
"Of course. Take your time, Young Master."
If it went well, he could give Hervena proper support, and send Jane to school as early as next year. His parents would surely be pleased. This was nothing less than forging a tie with House Edfolk. He could offer Hans and Megan, who worked so devotedly, a better environment and better treatment, and for Melo he could keep most of what he had promised Romang.
Even so, more reasons to refuse were rising in his mind than reasons to accept. He had known Yulia a long time, but they had only grown this close recently. And so, calling on a patience that felt almost superhuman, he set down an offer someone else would have snatched up with both hands.
"Senior, for now I'll hold off. It's too much for me as I am."
"So it isn't a yes, then? Young Master."
"As the terms stand, it's difficult for me to say."
At his words the tension strung through Yulia loosened. She leaned back for a moment, took a sip of tea, then smiled at him and spoke in the same soft voice as always.
"Young Master, I think I've been letting my greed get the better of me. Looking back, it must have felt burdensome in all sorts of ways."
"Pardon? What kind of greed...?"
It wasn't only Blow who startled at that. The people at his side did too. Hervena, especially, clutched the skirt she was wearing hard enough that it showed.
"If the sum is too much, you can reduce it. Please, reconsider. All right? Young Master..."
It felt as if their positions had somehow reversed. Once he had sorted his thoughts, Blow spoke.
"This much, I think I can say for certain."
"What?"
"If I don't take an investment from you, Senior Yulia, I don't think I'll take a large investment like this from anyone else either."
A smile rose on Yulia's face before she knew it, and she answered in a pleased voice.
"That's enough, Young Master. Thank you for thinking well of me. Then... may I revise the terms and bring them to you again?"
"Yes. I'll think it over carefully as well. And I'll talk it through with Hervena and Jane here."
"I'm glad."
"Not at all, Senior. An offer like this is welcome anytime. I am running a business, after all."
"I only thought I might not have been to your liking."
"Senior... there's no way."
The two of them smiled at each other. Today's conversation, it seemed, would end there.
A little regret remained for Yulia, but Blow's caution—his refusal to grab the offer on impulse—only made her like him more. Blow Deblique would surely reconsider. Until then, she only had to adjust the proposal to suit his taste. Confident she could do exactly that, she addressed them in a rather bright voice.
"You've had a long day, Young Master. How about the hot springs now?"
"Sounds good."
"You may take the proposal and review it. Just be careful it doesn't leak outside."
"I will. Shall we meet once more before the next Black Bridge Gathering?"
"Ah, I thought before then would be better too. Let's meet sometime next week. I'll come for the corn cheese."
"Perfect."
With that, they all rose. Complicated as his head was, Blow still felt good. It seemed someone had recognized him. As if she had read the thought, Jane wore a bright smile, and at last they set off for the next item on the schedule: the hot springs.
The hot springs of Edfolk Rothen occupied a separate building beside the hotel. Sunlight poured in warm through a domed ceiling built with care for the light, and because of it the interior felt astonishingly open to anyone who stepped inside. Beautiful, old-fashioned marble sculptures and tiles lent the place an added elegance. The baths themselves were divided by size, and a cold bath had been set apart for cooling the body.
Blow had stepped into the main spring with Hans.
"Haa..."
"You've worked hard, Young Master. It's been nonstop since the monastery."
"Next time, let's not bother with a vacation."
"Pardon? Did something happen?"
At the blinking question, Blow let out a thin sigh.
"This doesn't feel much like a vacation, does it, Hans?"
"Well, no. But it's fun in its own way."
"True enough. You seemed to be having a fine time with Yulia's people."
"They were very easy to talk to."
"Meaning we aren't?"
"Oh, come now, Young Master. Of course not. They treated me with a great deal of consideration. I liked that."
Even with the gap in standing between their houses, they had treated him so he wouldn't feel the difference. Blow thought he ought to thank Yulia for that later.
"It feels wonderful once you're in. My whole body is warming up."
Blow nodded. A languor was spreading through him, as if every bit of fatigue he had piled up were coming undone. Yes. The details can wait. For this one moment, I'll give my whole body over to the water. That was what he was thinking when a tickling sensation made him look at the surface of the bath.
Tiny bubbles, no bigger than millet grains, were popping against his skin. Blow's eyes doubled in size as he stared, and he all but shouted at Hans beside him.
"Hans!"
"Yes? Young Master. What's wrong?"
"The water keeps prickling—popping against me. Is this place...?"
"Yes, it's a carbonated hot spring. This is Roten, after all."
"Carbonated?"
The moment he heard it, color rushed into Blow's face. He scrambled out of the bath and began wiping himself dry.
"Young Master, why all of a sudden..."
Hans looked utterly lost. Blow was already throwing on the robe that had been waiting outside.
"I'm heading out, so soak as long as you like and come when you're done!"
"Young Master?"
"Carbonation! Carbonation!"
Before Hans could get another word out, Blow was already shouting his way through the door. Hans hesitated for only a moment, then, tears brimming, had no choice but to chase after him.