Kaine shuddered slightly at the sight of those eyes.
'I feel it every time I see them…'
'They're really bizarre eyes.'
They were eyes as beautiful as the boy's appearance, but it was as if unknown minerals, not human ones, had been carved like eyes and set in place.
Perhaps that was why, when he made eye contact, he was overwhelmed without realizing it.
And this was by a boy who was only in his late teens.
'Well…'
What did age matter?
What mattered was that the boy in front of him had founded a guild at a very young age and grown it to be one of the strongest in the empire.
'At first, I couldn't believe it.'
Now, belief was not enough; he revered him like a god.
In fact, if he were to order him to give his life, he would choose death without hesitation in this place.
Lost in thought for a moment, Kaine quickly regained his senses and began to report in a straight posture.
"As requested, I placed the magical device that causes explosions inside the library. A knight was guarding the front of the library, but I was able to avoid their gaze and enter easily."
As Kaine reported in chronological order, the boy's gaze returned to the book.
The boy was always like this.
He showed a detached attitude in the face of any request.
To be precise, nothing could shake the boy.
It was as if throwing a stone into a calm sea would not create a significant ripple.
"After installing the magic device in the innermost part, I immediately left the building. Then, to check if it was working properly, I headed to the high ground. And as I watched…"
Kaine's expression became subtle as he recalled the time.
He continued to speak slowly, as if describing something he had seen in a dream.
"An aurora, yes, an aurora appeared."
A sense of rapture filled Kaine's eyes as he recalled the time.
"A very beautiful purple aurora appeared above the library. And then, after a while, a fierce purple storm engulfed the building."
At the time, Kaine thought it was the power of the magic device.
But on second thought, the magic device only caused explosions; it had no power to create an aurora or cause a storm.
Then what on earth was it?
"Soon, Lord Bell's soldiers and the Duke arrived. Oh, before that, a girl arrived first. She had black hair…"
"A girl with black hair?"
The boy, who had shown no particular reaction as if listening to a boring story, showed interest for the first time.
He put down the book he was reading, made eye contact with Kaine, and said.
"Tell me more."
"Yes?"
What was he supposed to say more about?
Kaine quickly figured it out. There was only one thing in this story that he might be interested in.
"The Knight Commander and the Mage Commander gathered around the Duke-"
"No, not that."
However, the boy mercilessly cut off Kaine's words.
Kaine's eyes widened.
It was the first time he had interrupted someone else's words.
"Tell me about the black-haired girl."
"Oh… oh, ah? Ah, yes."
Kaine, who had been넋이 나가 out of his mind at the sight of the boy's new appearance, belatedly realized what he had heard and made a foolish expression.
So, the one he was interested in was…
'Not the Duke, but the girl?'
Surprised by the unexpected fact, Kaine was more bewildered than surprised, but his lips moved obediently as ordered.
"She was about… nine years old."
As he said that, Kaine subtly gauged the boy's mood.
The boy was still sitting upright, listening intently to Kaine.
For some reason, Kaine felt a strange feeling of facing a different being than the boy he knew, and he spoke about the black-haired girl he had seen at the scene.
"…The aurora and the storm disappeared, and the Duke came out of the building holding the girl. That's all I saw."
"I see."
Feeling a little empty at the plain reply he received, Kaine had expected an additional reaction.
But soon, he raised his head sharply at the boy's next words.
"You've worked hard, Kaine."
"No, not at all!"
Kaine scratched his head in embarrassment and waved his hand at the boy's praise.
But he couldn't help but smile.
"Thanks to Master's detailed knowledge of the structure of the Lord Bell mansion and library, I was able to carry out the mission safely!"
Even Kaine, who knew the imperial nobles inside and out, did not know much about Lord Bell.
'The client did draw the internal structure for me, but…'
It wasn't very detailed, and the map didn't show a route to secretly infiltrate the mansion.
Before installing the magic device, it was almost impossible to infiltrate the mansion in the first place.
That's when the boy handed Kaine a map with a detailed structure of Lord Bell's mansion. It included a route to secretly infiltrate the mansion and a detailed structure of the library's interior.
Thanks to that, he was able to complete the mission without difficulty.
How did the boy know the route that even the client, who was deeply involved with Lord Bell, didn't know?
Curiosity arose, but…
'Let's not be curious.'
From the start, Kaine knew almost nothing about the boy.
Where he came from, what his real name was, how old he was.
All he knew was that he was a being that transcended humans.
It wasn't just because the boy had become the master of the empire's best guild at a young age.
The boy was hiding an even bigger secret. A great secret that only a small number of guild members knew…
'That's enough.'
The rest was not very important to Kaine either.
The moment he thought that, he met the boy's eyes.
His gray eyes seemed to see through his thoughts, and Kaine flinched for no reason and hurriedly blurted out anything.
"But come to think of it, isn't it really funny?"
As he said that, his lips twisted because it was so funny.
"Even the brilliant and great Lord Bell is rotting inside."
The guild does not investigate the identity of the client.
But sometimes there were clients who revealed their identity without being asked to.
This client was the same.
Even though he wore a carriage without a crest and wore a black hood to cover his face in order to hide his identity.
'Anyone can tell it's Lord Bell.'
The client knew the circumstances of Lord Bell well enough not to be an outsider.
In addition, he knew the structure of the Lord Bell mansion and clearly intended to attack the library.
'It's a power struggle.'
Disillusionment filled Kaine's eyes.
Why were the nobles so obsessed with such things?
Couldn't they be satisfied with living in a moderately warm house, eating delicious food, and sleeping in a cozy bed?
Even animals wouldn't be that greedy.
"If they're going to fight like that, it's better for them to self-destruct together…"
Kaine, who was talking carelessly, soon came to his senses and shut his mouth.
For a moment, he was so immersed that he had overdone it with unnecessary noise.
He was about to bow his head and apologize.
"That place was always like that."
An unexpected word was heard.
"Yes?"
He raised his head, wondering what he meant.
In the meantime, the boy was reading the book again.
He wondered if he had misheard, but the boy's lips parted.
His gaze was still fixed on the book.
"On the surface, it pretends to be prosperous, but in fact, the inside is more rotten than anything else."
The calm tone was like reciting a passage from a book.
At the very contrasting content, Kaine doubted his ears for a moment.
At that moment.
Thud-
The boy closed the book.
The dull contact sound seemed to declare the end of the conversation.
The boy, who made eye contact, smiled gently and said.
"Come to think of it, it was your vacation starting tomorrow."
"Ah, yes, that's right!"
Kaine's face brightened at the two words 'vacation'.
He talked about his plans without being asked.
"I'm going to pack my bags and go home. Last time I rode a horse, my back hurt, so this time I'm going to take a carriage. I'm going to buy some dolls that my younger siblings like on the way."
He smiled as if he was happy just imagining it.
"Oh, come to think of it, I think I'll be bored on the way, so I'm going to read a book…"
Kaine's gaze went to the boy's book.
"Could you recommend something?"
Kaine had never bought a book before.
He was going to buy a few fairy tales as gifts this time, and he was going to buy a book for himself, but he had no idea what to buy.
He had no one to ask for advice, so he plucked up the courage to ask him.
But for some reason, he felt embarrassed to ask such a favor, so Kaine added a rambling explanation.
"Well, Master likes books so much, so I thought it would be nice if you could recommend a book that you enjoyed reading, something like that…"
"I don't like them."
Comments
Post a Comment