Chapter 62
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 62
Chapter Title: Too Much Debt
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My debt to the Ashen Hand.
When I calmly tallied it up, this wasn't the sort of thing that could be counted with mere numbers.
It had started the moment I'd first possessed this world.
The miraculous water said to be usable only by the imperial family of Abellan.
The Water of Life.
I'd received it as a welcome gift upon joining the organization and used it to save Piel.
That was the beginning.
Next came the Proxy Blood Fate with Syl Argent.
To ensure Piel's victory, I'd borrowed one of Princess Evelyn's direct guard knights for a full month.
A person on the level of protecting a princess.
Someone who would normally be impossible to even approach, no matter how much money you had.
And then Aira.
The massive sum spent to secretly buy her up had all come from Princess Evelyn as well.
In the process, using the Water of Life once more had been a bonus.
The artifact she'd shoved into my hands as a "personal weapon" was low-grade.
But that was only "low-grade for an artifact"—its value was incomparable to any ordinary steel sword.
Finally—
The private training facility set up in the Ashen Hand's underground.
A space built specifically to train this child, and since this world didn't even have the concept of a "gym" to begin with.
The dumbbells and weights placed inside were all custom-made, one by one.
And since I'd rushed the order, there was no way extra costs hadn't piled on.
As I tried calculating each one, I eventually gave up.
'How much is all this even...?'
Even by my previous life's standards, this wasn't the level that could be settled with a few surgeries.
You'd have to run outpatient clinics nonstop for years and take responsibility for dozens of high-risk operations just to cover it.
The problem was how many doctor lifetimes it would take to endure all that.
Of course, I was of the Argent bloodline, the family that ruled the underworld.
The issue was that even within that family, I was closer to a "blemish"—an illegitimate child—and the scale of money I'd used so far far exceeded what that blemish could handle.
The funds coming into the annex had been increasing little by little lately, but it was nowhere near enough to bridge the gap.
"L-Lucas... sir..."
Aira cautiously opened her mouth as she looked down at the ledger.
"I've calculated it right now, under the assumption that not a single penny of the annex's living expenses is spent..."
I felt a bad premonition.
"Roughly, 1542—"
"1542 days?!"
Piel shouted reflexively.
"D-Do we have to hold out that long, Aira?!"
"No."
Aira shook her head as if even that was laughable.
"1542 years. That's the amount we could repay without spending any of the annex's money at all during that time."
"Wha..."
"......"
That was an age where even a long-lived elf would die of old age, wasn't it?
When I thought it over carefully, the cause was obvious.
The Water of Life.
I'd used an item that couldn't be bought with money or seized with power—not once, but twice—for treating slaves.
Most of that amount had probably gone to it.
Especially since the Water of Life didn't even have a "market price" to begin with.
The symbol of Abellan's imperial family.
An item that didn't even enter the realm of trade.
If it had a price?
It would be whatever the seller demanded, not any market rate.
And so, I had suddenly become a debt-ridden master, along with my two slaves who now shared that burden.
Piel and Aira's eyes reddened as they looked at the annex—or more precisely, at me, the one who would live inside it—as if gazing at someone even more pitiful than themselves.
"M-Master! Even so, I'll stay by your side to the end! We'll pay off the debt together!"
"That's right! I'll build my skills more... and later, even if I have to sneak out the elf kingdom's wealth...!"
"Th-Then I'll resort to thievery if I have to...!"
"Even if it means destroying the kingdom!!"
Hey.
Kids.
Stop.
You're the hero party that's supposed to save the world in the future.
Please don't go dark for my sake and ruin the entire worldview.
I swallowed a sigh and placed my hands on their heads.
Slowly, calmly.
"It's okay."
I spoke in a voice mixed with laughter, worried it might get too serious otherwise.
"No need for thievery or destruction. I'll handle repaying the debt myself."
Even so, their expressions didn't brighten in the slightest.
If anything, they grew more sorrowful.
Like people left standing there, unable to offer even a single helping hand after hearing a story that was already over.
Piel wiped at her eyes, and Aira bit her lip hard while lowering her head.
It felt unfair.
Honestly, what I'd just said wasn't only to soothe them...
About a week after becoming a debtor.
"Princess Evelyn is arriving!"
The herald's cry echoed through the annex.
I slowly drew in a breath.
It was as expected.
The chance to repay all these debts—
Or more precisely, the moment to pay the price—had finally arrived.
Over the past week, Evelyn had been in an excellent mood.
It was a bit crude to put it this way, but—
If she had to compare, it felt like months of groaning and clutching her stomach had been washed away all at once in one refreshing burst.
The forces rotting away at the Abellan Kingdom.
Ones with no visible traces, impossible to even pin down no matter how deeply you dug.
Then, out of nowhere, a man had appeared in her secret organization—the Ashen Hand—that she'd secretly built and operated to deal with them.
Lucas Argent.
From the Argent family.
That alone made him a target for suspicion, yet the moment he showed up, he pinpointed drug distribution routes that couldn't be found anywhere in the kingdom, as if he'd known them all along.
And he casually joined the Ashen Hand in exchange.
That wasn't all.
As an imperial princess of the empire, Evelyn prided herself on her medical knowledge, but even she had never heard of the treatments he used without hesitation.
And the effects were undeniably certain.
Each time, Evelyn had clicked her tongue inwardly more than once.
Honestly, at this point, there were few people as useful as him.
A talent that absolutely had to be utilized if available.
A card too valuable for the empire to let slip.
However.
That was purely a professional evaluation.
Her personal feelings were entirely different.
Not that she disliked him, but precisely his attitude.
"Acting like he doesn't know while doing everything..."
Evelyn ground her teeth.
"It's not like he's just teasing for fun. Think about how it feels to be the one getting dragged along!"
She didn't hate it.
Nor was it particularly good.
Setting that aside, he was just someone she wanted to flick hard on the forehead at least once.
Yes, to Evelyn, Lucas Argent was like a mischievous brat who needed a good scolding to soothe her irritation.
It wasn't for nothing that she called him a sly fox.
On the surface, he seemed carefree and thoughtless, but when you looked closely, he'd anticipated every situation without a single gap.
So, by the time she snapped out of it, she was always the one a step behind, being dragged along.
But things were different now.
He was a member of the Ashen Hand, and she was its leader.
Above all, he had a "debt" to the organization.
A debt she wouldn't normally bother collecting, but because he was such a useful card, she'd deliberately let it slide this time.
To make him a little anxious.
To let the guy who always gripped and shook situations feel the pressure of being on the receiving end for once!
So, over the past week, she'd been subtly picking on him.
'You're a debtor now.'
She hadn't said it outright, but her attitude had made it clear.
"Heh heh heh..."
A sly smile spread across Evelyn's lips inside the carriage.
"Lucas Argent. He's probably been crushed under that mountain of debt all week, barely eating. Not chomping on hard, cheap bread every meal, is he?"
She knew it was an expression unfit for a princess, but the grin wouldn't fade easily.
The carriage was already heading toward his annex.
Arrival was imminent.
What face would he make?
Would he rush out in a panic, begging to reduce the debt a bit?
Or bow his head with a face that finally realized his place as a subordinate, apologizing for his past arrogance?
Either way, it wasn't bad.
A very welcome change.
But then.
Just before the annex came into view, a sudden thought crossed her mind.
"No way..."
He wasn't touching Piel or Aira's shares too, was he?
Of course, Lucas Argent was different from other nobles.
He treated his slaves not like objects, but like people.
No, it wouldn't even be an exaggeration to say like family.
That's how he'd treated people from the start, which was why he owed her so much in the first place.
Even so—
Was it because she'd seen too many such scenes as an imperial?
The downfall of nobles turned debtors.
And the slaves beneath them crumbling along with them.
The master falls into despair, and the price is always paid by the weakest.
If they were waged slaves, it might be different.
But for those forcibly taken and turned into possessions, the situation was far more miserable.
Ownership didn't vanish just because the master broke, and instead, they were often pushed into even harsher work as a means to repay that master's debts.
Especially for female slaves... selling their bodies wasn't even uncommon.
"...No way."
Evelyn muttered to herself as if scolding her own thoughts.
Nah, no way.
Even so, for that Lucas Argent to do something like that?
Even as an Argent—
...Wait.
Come to think of it, that guy was an "Argent" after all, wasn't he?
What if that blood suddenly awakened?
What if he made those two, who only had eyes for their master, move under the pretext of repaying the debt?
In her mind, horrific scenes played out on their own.
'Don't think you can rest now that it's done. Tonight, you'll serve in my chambers!'
'No...'
'Hng... It hurts... Stop...!'
A chill ran up her spine.
"Th-This is insane..."
Evelyn ground her teeth.
"No. There's no way he'd actually do that."
The thought itself was repulsive.
And at the same time, the fact that this world was so rotten she could imagine it so casually was even more disgusting.
Maybe that's why.
The moment the carriage fully stopped, Evelyn flung open the door and jumped out without even calling for an escort.
No time to worry about tangled skirts or a princess's dignity.
If there was even the slightest sign of something wrong, she had to save Lucas Argent and those two beside him, no matter what it took.
She practically burst into the annex's dining room.
And there—
"Oh? Princess Evelyn?"
"When did you get here?"
"...Eh?"
Evelyn's gaze froze.
On the table steamed a lavish lobster dish.
Silver platters.
Butter sauce.
Grape juice on the side—a scene utterly distant from any "debtor."
And three people eating it as if it were the most natural thing in the world.