Viscount Carnel

Spring break ended along with the month of March, and it was now early April.

Mihai had boarded a magic ship and had headed back to Academy City. Allen valued the match with him very much, as it allowed him to directly experience the difference in growth between Normal Mode and Hell Mode.

In light of that, Allen had asked him for another match when he came home again next spring. He thought these fights could serve as a regular way to confirm his own strength.

***

"Good morning, Mr. Rickel."

"Good morning to you too."

As always, Allen had woken up, groomed himself, and gone down to the servants' dining hall. He grabbed the seat across from Rickel, the head manservant, and greeted him.

Almost half a year had passed since Allen came to work at the Granvelle mansion, and there was a marked difference from back then: a meat dish was now added to everyone's breakfast in addition to the previous menu of only soup and bread.

The extra dish even used different meat from what was inside the soup. After becoming a huntsman at the end of the previous year, Allen had started bringing back meat two days each week without fail. Thanks to his efforts, the diet of everyone in the mansion, from the baron's family all the way to the lowest servant, had seen drastic improvement. Seeing young Thomas heartily chow down always brought a warm smile to Allen's face.

Rickel suddenly said, "Keep your wits about you tonight, Allen."

"Are you referring to Viscount Carnel coming for dinner?"

"That's right. Can't imagine what our neighbor is coming over for, but it can't be for anything good. Don't treat him too well—do only your minimum best when serving him."

The Granvelle house had been told that the Viscount was coming only a few days ago. In the scheme of how nobles usually went about these things, this was considered very short notice.

Up till now, Allen had had the opportunity to interact with a large number of guests through his work as a server. The vast majority of them had been influential people here in Granvelle City, such as the local guildmasters of the Adventurer's and Merchant's Guilds and the owner of a high-class inn. Once in a while, this would even be nobles coming over from the royal capital.

Thanks to the magic ships, travel between Granvelle City and the Royal Capital turned out to be much easier than Allen had previously imagined.

"He even made a magic ship wait for him."

Of course, there were other routes besides the Granvelle City-Royal Capital one. There was one connecting the Royal Capital with the capital of the Carnel fiefdom too, which was located right next to the Granvelle fiefdom, separated by the White Dragon Mountains. And of course, there were established flights connecting fiefdom capitals with each other.

According to Rickel, Viscount Carnel had adjusted the schedule of a ship on the Royal Capital-Carnel City route for the sake of his own return this time. Then he got onto a Granvelle-Carnel magic ship, which needed to make a large detour to the north to circumvent the northern edge of the mountain range.

***

Viscount Carnel arrived in the afternoon.

Soon after, he was guided to the dining hall on the second floor.

The Viscount was in his late thirties and had a long face with a rather wide forehead. He gave off a dazzling impression, but this was not because of his forehead—rather, it was because he was wearing a sparkly, ostentatious outfit. Someone who appeared to be his butler was standing behind his seat.

Whereas at least one or two other members of the Baron's family would usually be in attendance whenever a guest came, the Baron was alone this time.

"Welcome, Viscount Carnel. I heard you went to a lot of trouble for this visit."

Although Baron Granvelle's voice was warm, his smile did not reach his eyes. The two men were sitting at opposite ends of a rather long table.

"Oh, it's nothing you need worry about. My capital's always so clamorous, probably because it's thriving so much! Coming to a place like this every once in a while does me good."

"Is that so! I'm glad to hear it. Ha ha ha!"

The Baron chose to let the Viscount's sarcasm slide.

'If I remember correctly, these two families have been at odds for generations now.' Allen continued serving, making sure not to meet Viscount Carnel's eyes.

He had heard that one large reason these two neighboring realms were so antagonistic to each other was the White Dragon Mountains Range that separated them. There were veins of mithril deposits in the mountains, and both realms held the mining rights for their own side. The ore was bountiful on both sides; however, because the White Dragon currently resided on the Baron's side, only the Viscount could mine the mithril. Carnel was flourishing thanks to this mining while Granvelle was barely scraping by with agriculture.

However, that was only the current state of affairs. This relationship between the two fiefdoms would flip every so often, as the White Dragon would move to the other side every one or two hundred years. This very thing had occurred over a century ago; back then, it was Granvelle that prospered from mining mithril. Even now, there were four mines on the Baron's side of the White Dragon Mountains that were supposed to still look the way they did back then.

Because of the White Dragon's capricious movements, the Granvelle and Carnel families were constantly in a state where one side envied the other.

According to Rickel, the current generation Viscount had a particularly nasty personality and constantly sought out ways to harass Baron Granvelle.

Allen carried a dish of horned rabbit to Viscount Carnel.

The kitchen now had much better meat available, which meant the horned rabbit had been someone's conscious choice.

"Hm? Is this great boar meat?"

The Baron's face twitched once before he replied vaguely, "Well, we do have skilled hunters in our realm."

"Ah, I was correct!" Viscount Carnel smirked. "So this is the meat that you were concealing."

"Wh—?! I have no idea what you are talking about. I have concealed nothing."

'I can see the Baron's doing his best to rein in his anger. It was this Viscount 's fault that we ended up having to hunt more great boars, right?'

Before the Viscount's arrival, Allen had heard quite a lot about him from Rickel. Supposedly, during an audience with the king, Viscount Carnel had reported, "There is a fiefdom with gains that it is not reporting." When the king asked which one it was, Viscount Carnel had pointed the finger at Baron Granvelle and said, "Despite his realm regularly producing a large amount of great boar meat, Lord Granvelle has yet to report this to the royal family. He is concealing his profits, which counts as an act of treason!" The Baron, who had indeed been amiss in reporting the great boars, was left in a very precarious position during the audience.

Allen recalled how the Baron had been shaking with rage from the memory during the feast held in his honor at Krena Village.

"So, what is the reason for your visit today?" the Baron asked in an effort to hurry the conversation so that he could kick the man out as soon as possible.

"Oh right! This boar meat is so delicious I totally forgot! Ha ha ha!"

"I'm glad to hear it. Well? Why are you here?"

The Baron once again refused to rise to the provocative sarcasm.

"I came here to tell you that my youngest daughter just underwent her Appraisal Ceremony the other day and was confirmed to be Talentless."

"What?"

'Oh right, the Ceremony takes place in April. We had it in mid-April in Krena Village, but I guess nobles have theirs slightly earlier? Which means, in less than ten days, Mash will also get Appraised. Aww, I really wanted to be there for him and see what he gets. Should I send a letter to ask? Oh wait, no, my parents don't know how to read and write.'

Every year in April, all children who had reached five years of age within the past year—everyone from royalty to serfs—had to undergo the Appraisal Ceremony. Viscount Carnel bringing it up prompted Allen to remember his younger brother Mash, who was also supposed to take it this year.

'I see, so the Viscount's daughter is Talentless. Hold on. But he sounded happy about it.'

"I see," the Baron said simply with a disinterested "So what?" look.

"Another one of my children turned out to have a Talent, so I was worried for my youngest daughter. But it turns out that she's Talentless! What a relief, eh?"

"Good for you."

The Baron's face was growing increasingly fierce, his eyes looking more and more like those of a hawk's.

"My heart goes out to you, Lord Granvelle. You have three children and two of them have Talents."

The Viscount was clearly referring to Mihai, who was currently in Academy City, and Cecil, who was a Wizardess.

"Well, all they have to do is fulfill their noble duty!" Anger finally crept into the Baron's voice.

'What's going on? Us serfs and commoners are super happy about having Talents, but it's a bad thing for nobles? What's that about fulfilling a "noble duty"? Is there something they have to do? Or is the Academy's tuition really high? Nobles really are different from commoners and serfs. How strange.'

The moment it was announced that Dogora had the Ax User Talent, his father had immediately bear-hugged him out of sheer joy. The same had been true of Pelomas and his father Deboji. Rodin had also strongly wished for Allen to have a Talent. In contrast, Viscount Carnel had gone to the trouble of riding a magic ship to come all the way here just to brag about his child being Talentless. Clearly, nobles and non-nobles viewed Talents in very different ways.

'I guess, I will try asking Rickel if he knows anything about it.'

In the end, that really was the only thing Viscount Carnel wanted to say. He soon left in very high spirits.