Conquering the Academy with Just a Sashimi Knife (Novel) - Chapter 113 - Daily Life at Castle Sigurdr

Chapter 113 – Daily Life at Castle Sigurdr

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Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Four days passed after arriving in Switzerland.

This was what daily life at House Nibelung was like.

Wake up at five in the morning.

Before the rooster could clear its throat, I wash myself with cold water to drive away drowsiness. The reason it’s cold water is that, thanks to the old pipes, hot water doesn’t come out.

Since the building was old, I understood.

From six o’clock onward, it’s breakfast.

Meals were simple, just enough to fill the stomach with rye bread or cheese.

It was a modest spread for nobles, but I let it pass.

Not every noble eats lavishly, and by now I had more or less realized that the Sword Emperor was a cheapskate.

After breakfast, seven o’clock.

We split firewood for use as fuel. Abel and I take turns doing it every other day.

Some people might wonder what kind of firewood was needed in August, when the heat had not even gone away yet.

To that, I also agree, if we were talking strictly about `the Republic of Korea.`

However, this place, Castle Sigurdr, lies directly below the Alps.

Even in late summer, the mountain peaks were draped in perennial snow like a white veil. Which was to say, it was cold enough to chill your bones in every season.

So in this place, where Korea’s ondol floor-heating system did not exist, they keep the brazier going with firewood. Like stoking a furnace in the old days.

Once again, I was quite literally feeling the advanced superiority of Korea’s heating systems with my own skin.

‘If it’s this cold before autumn had even come, how did the people living here get through winter……?’

To add to that, House Nibelung had only two employees.

They were a middle-aged male butler and a young female maid.

The butler’s name was Charon.

How should I put it, he looked exactly like a butler. Probably the very image that came to mind when you imagine a middle-aged butler. Even down to the monocle-bespectacled-butler cliché. It was perfect.

His role was chief administrator of Castle Sigurdr.

Food ingredients, cooking, garden maintenance, facility repairs, attending to guests, and so on. He handled most of it.

A butler so competent that it made you sigh in admiration. Yet the first impression Charon gave off was that of a Taoist ascetic engaged in a vow of silence.

The bare minimum of speech. Nods in response to questions. He could be called the very model of a taciturn butler.

Then there was Maid Shail. A great beauty with a bob cut that suited her perfectly, and she took charge of all the things Butler Charon did not handle.

Such as cleaning, laundry, hunting wild animals, security, and guarding the grounds.

If there was one unusual point, it would be that she wore a holster woven with steel skewers on her thigh.

On the first day after arriving, I asked Abel about how unusual she seemed.

-Shail? She’s the maid who took care of me ever since I was little, but she’s really young. Since she’s four years older than us, she’d be about twenty-one. …But why were you asking about Shail……? G-Geom-ma… d-didn’t tell me, Shail too?!

At that, Abel suddenly flew into a rage. I had only asked because I was curious, yet her reaction was absurdly oversensitive.

I had vaguely heard that in the West, asking about private information was considered a great discourtesy.

From Abel’s perspective as the employer, it was understandable that she would be displeased.

Anyway.

Shail’s attitude was chic, but in truth she was kind. The sort who silently took care of what needed to be taken care of.

If there was something I needed, before I could even say it, she would bring it to my door.

Knock, knock, knock, after letting me know with three knocks, she would leave. Even if I opened the door right away, she had already vanished.

As if she had no intention of giving me the chance to express my thanks, all she left behind was the aftertaste of her presence, like a ghost.

She was no equal to Auditore, but Shail’s presence suppression and footwork were no joke either.

‘The aura she gives off isn’t ordinary either. And did ordinary maids really also handle hunting wild animals, security, and guard duty……?’

Well, being a member of Nibelung, she would naturally possess martial strength. I did not know to what level, though.

Butler Charon and Maid Shail.

Watching the two for four days, their work was swift and precise.

After all, despite there being only two of them, this castle remained spotless.

But no matter how superhumanly good they were at their jobs, in the end each of them still only had one pair of hands.

With just the two of them, there was a limit to the range their hands could reach.

‘To think the estate employees of the noblest of noble houses are this few.’

If I had to guess, it was probably because of Sword Emperor Siegfried’s peculiar my-way shut-in temperament. He compulsively hated having many people around.

So for the rest of the work outside what Charon and Shail were directly responsible for, both Abel and I lend a hand without exception.

For example, chopping firewood and occasionally going out shopping.

Up to here, it was all fine. I had come here planning to at least earn my meals anyway, so I was prepared for the sort of work a hired hand would .

There was such a thing as eating while reading the room. If I just sat around doing nothing and ate their food, that would only make things more uncomfortable.

‘A person should have some shame.’

Besides, it wasn’t just me, Abel and the Sword Emperor did it too, so I felt neither injustice nor complaint.

For someone like me, who had been thrown into society from the age of seventeen, chores like this did not even count as menial labor.

Up to now, they had been satisfying days.

Breathing clear air instead of stale fine dust felt like even my lungs had been cleansed.

Above all, the eyes were pleased. Wherever I turned my gaze, there was a magnificent view. At a glance, it was easy to understand why Switzerland was counted as such a great place to live.

But there was just one thing.

There was one part of the daily routine I absolutely could not endure-

* * *

Castle basement, the Sword Emperor’s private training room.

A dreary atmosphere and a suffocating silence descended together.

“……”

It was so quiet that ringing seemed to circle inside my ears.

What was I doing here, you ask? Sitting cross-legged in friendly companionship with the Sword Emperor, meditating.

And not just that, I’ve been doing this for four hours straight since breakfast.

My knees were beyond numb and felt completely paralyzed, and my lower back spasmed in tiny jerks.

I narrowed my right eye and glanced sideways.

The Sword Emperor, meditating sternly. His posture was as flawless and unwavering as it had been four hours ago.

I watched him for a while, then soon let out a small sigh.

In the suffocating stillness, the sound of my breathing made an echo.

‘To come all the way to Switzerland just to do meditation of all things.’

If you trace back the root of me sitting here like this, it lies in the first reason the Sword Emperor brought me to Switzerland.

‘He said he’d guide my training and cultivation for the succession to the Seven Stars.’

The personal instruction of the Sword Emperor, who had ruled as the strongest of humanity for decades.

To anyone hearing it, it was a shocking and unprecedented privilege.

And as a fellow swordsman, as a senior who had eaten more rice with a blade than I had.

I secretly expected that I might be able to learn many things and gain many realizations from him.

Because I had already learned from my first master how valuable the teachings of a fine teacher could be.

So I had been secretly looking forward to the contents of that instruction……

But in reality, what I did every day was sit formally with the Sword Emperor and meditate.

For four whole hours, until before lunch.

The Sword Emperor’s explanation on this point was as follows.

-The very foundation of your blessing should already be complete. However, the power was so great and so primal that it cannot be handled easily. In this situation, increasing raw martial strength was of no use. What came first was adjusting the blessing so it suits you through conversation with yourself. The first week of your stay here would be spent on that.

To summarize the explanation, refine and shape the nearly raw `Blessing of the Sword God` through `meditation.`

The purpose itself was good. No, it could be called right.

Since the potential already existed inside me, and it was a matter of controlling that through meditation. But still……

“Ugh-”

A groan slipped out through my teeth on its own. Without opening his eyes, the Sword Emperor cut it off.

“Do not exaggerate. If even an old man at death’s door like me can endure this, then how can it do for a young man to be like that?”

“…Yes.”

“Bear with it just a little longer. Only thirty more minutes.”

“……”

‘I have to do thirty more minutes?’

I lamented inwardly. It was unbearable.

Sitting cross-legged for hours on end, I could feel my kneecaps wearing away.

My entire body ached, my pelvis trembled faintly, and my backside, pressed against the cold stone floor, kept twitching.

‘Ah, damn it. My leg cramped.’

Forget dialogue with myself, all I wanted was to get out of this situation as soon as possible.

But the Sword Emperor was holding firm beside me far too resolutely.

When a seventy-year-old man sat there without moving, how could someone young like me start whining?

Knock-knock.

Two knocks broke the silence of the training room.

The Sword Emperor’s two eyes opened low and slow. He quietly got up and headed toward the door.

I tried to rise as well, but at the Sword Emperor’s cold glare, I immediately kept my cross-legged posture.

No exaggeration, this was as painful as the very first manifestation of the Blessing of the Sword God.

The Sword Emperor opened the door.

Creeeak.

In the gap filled with the noise of the old hinges stood Butler Charon. There was no small amount of bewilderment on his face. It was clearly different from his usual blank expression.

“Sword Emperor, I must ask for a word.”

Charon whispered something small to the Sword Emperor. I wondered what it was about, but withdrew my gaze.

There was surely a private reason he was speaking in such a low voice. As an outsider, there was no need for me to pay attention.

More than anything, that was not the immediate problem anyway.

‘I can’t feel anything below the waist.’

Everything below my dantian felt hollow. The numbness had completely seized my lower body. How was I supposed to get up……? I couldn’t put any strength into it.

At that moment.

“What?! That madman Richard?!”

With his brows deeply furrowed, the Sword Emperor suddenly shouted. It was the first expression of his I had ever seen like that.

“M-master. Mr. Kang Geom-ma is still here behind us.”

“Ah, ahem. I got a little carried away for a moment.”

The Sword Emperor coughed into his fist and lowered his tone again. But his complexion was still stiff and hard.

I stared blankly at the two of them, then soon rolled the name the Sword Emperor had uttered over in my mind.

‘…Richard.’

He had omitted the family name, but it was easy to guess who that person was.

There was only one man in this world who used that name and could make the Sword Emperor this angry.

Rachel’s uncle, and the giant who occupied one of the seats of the Seven Stars.

The Spear Saint, Richard de Muir.

Though his standing fell somewhat short of the Sword Emperor’s, people said there was none who could match him in raw strength. The logic was that he made up for lacking technique with brute force.

They said that with a single punch, the head of a B-rank demonic beast would burst like a watermelon.

If you only heard the rumors, he sounded like a lion wearing human skin. Since he was a person I had never even seen in the game, I did not really know how true it was.

Still, if such rumors existed, then among the Seven Star Heroes, his physical perfection was probably the greatest.

‘But why is the Spear Saint’s name coming up?’

The Sword Emperor said to Charon.

“I have urgent business, so I will be stepping out for a while. I may return at dinner, or even a little later. So have the children eat first.”

“Yes, Master.”

After saying that, the Sword Emperor hurriedly left the training room.

The sound of him climbing the basement stairs echoed. Once the sound could no longer be heard, I pressed my hand to the floor and tried to rise.

Or rather, I was about to.

“……”

My eyes met Charon’s, who was standing there with his hands behind his back.

His half-lidded gaze sank even lower.

“There are still fifteen minutes left.”

“……”

“Mr. Geom-ma.”

Heh. I laughed weakly.

Then I immediately straightened my back. A perfectly formal meditative posture.

Only then did Charon nod.

That inflexible streak of theirs, employee and master alike, was exactly the same.

…Damn it.

* * *

“Ugh……”

A groaning sound slipped out from between my teeth on its own. After crossing my legs like that for four straight days, it felt as though even my organs had twisted.

I skipped lunch too. I was hungry, but more than the emptiness in my stomach, my legs hurt and throbbed.

I dropped my back heavily onto the bedspread. The unfamiliar ceiling filled my sight. As I stared at the empty air, suddenly a thought flashed through my mind.

“Wait a second, come to think of it, if this is Switzerland, then it’s close to that dungeon.”

My upper body shot upright. Then I threw open my suitcase and took out Murasame.

As I looked down at the half-unsheathed blade, a smile rose to my lips.

“The timing’s good.”

A purpose was given to what otherwise would have been a vacation spent just drifting through training.

However, in order to enter that dungeon, prior preparations and party members were absolutely indispensable.

“The entry condition was at least three people, wasn’t it……”

Not only the entry conditions, but the defenses had to be solid as well.

The path there was steep and treacherous, and above all, that demonic beast hidden in the concealed space……

If it were up to me, I wouldn’t even want to set foot near it, but what could I .

Since I had placed weapon enhancement as the highest priority, I had no choice but to swallow my tears and did it anyway.

‘It’s one of the very few mana stones that exist in this world setting, after all……’

While I was letting out a murmur tinged with concern.

Knock-knock-knock.

As always, the sound of three knocks came from the door.

“I guess it’s already time for dinner.”

Thinking it must be Maid Shail, I didn’t bother answering. Even if I spoke to her, she never replied anyway.

Knock-knock-knock.

But then the knocking came again.

Tilting my head, I opened the door.

An unexpected person was standing there awkwardly in front of it.

“…What? Why are you here?”

It was Abel. She was holding a glossy blanket in her arms.

“I-I had something to return.”

“……?”

Abel raised only her eyes slightly. Her golden irises glittered brightly between her brows.

“And I also had something I wanted to say……”

As she brushed the hair at the side of her face behind her ear, Abel asked.