Shepherd Wizard (Novel) - Chapter 33
Chapter 33
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Discord
After enjoying flight until late at night, Turan returned to the Dirmin family palace.
Having entered as a guest, it was proper etiquette to quietly receive hospitality for a few days.
Perhaps because he was a customer who disposed of troublesome merchandise?
Upon returning, his lodgings had somehow changed to a larger, more luxurious room.
There was even something like a nest made with smaller cushions beside it, presumably the black eagle’s bedroom.
“Please call anytime if you need anything, my lord.”
After dismissing the servants with a light gesture, Turan looked at the black eagle already lying in its bedroom and asked.
“Is it good?”
The creature nodded while making a small “peep” sound.
Turan smiled at that sight and lay down on the bed to sleep.
After spending such a comfortable night, the next day.
Formal letter education began between person and animal.
The education place was a small open space in front of their building.
“Well, want to try copying?”
When he wrote letters on the ground with a tree branch, the black eagle scratched the ground with its talons to copy.
Turan pointed out several parts it wrote incorrectly.
“This stroke goes down, and this one should be raised like scratching at the end.”
The black eagle wasn’t exactly a brilliant student by human standards, but among animals it could be considered a genius without reservation.
Watching it tilt its head and rewrite letters several times brought back old memories.
‘I wonder if Mother taught me like this too.’
In childhood, he learned letters from his mother using this method too.
Since processed parchment couldn’t be made in their small village, and there was nothing else usable.
‘You remember well, Turan. Our son is really smart, isn’t he?’
His mother’s voice he thought he no longer remembered seemed to come as an auditory hallusion.
While reminiscing in a strangely sentimental mood, he sensed someone approaching him.
“Teaching letters, I see?”
“Yes.”
The family head’s daughter – was her name Irid?
The woman whose name he barely remembered was looking at him with an expression mixed with jealousy.
Probably unhappy seeing an animal that had ignored her obeying someone else.
Especially since that someone was a fallen noble she had looked down on.
“Do you know what the black eagle likes?”
“I know it eats animals.”
“This one especially likes fish. Among them, horse mackerel from the sea here is its favorite.”
Glancing aside, the black eagle nodded.
After that, she recited everything from its preferred diet to sleep time needed for health maintenance – things one needed to know for daily care.
She seemed quite knowledgeable about animals, surely due to being born with beast tamer bloodline.
“You’re impressive. That was very helpful, thank you.”
When Turan readily expressed gratitude, the family head’s daughter flinched then shook her head.
“I already have a fiancé.”
What was this woman suddenly saying?
After pausing briefly, Turan realized she had taken his praise as a kind of expression of interest and smiled wryly.
Well, at least having a fiancé meant there wouldn’t be uncomfortable situations like at the Baltas family.
“I see.”
Though he indicated understanding, somehow she seemed even more displeased than before.
“Well, never mind that… do you have lunch plans?”
“Nothing particular.”
“Then would you like to dine together? The other guests are all curious about Mr. Brahms. Unless you’d rather not.”
“Other guests are asking about me?”
“Yes. Since anyone who visited the breeding grounds coveted that one at least once, they can’t help but wonder what kind of amazing person became its master.”
Of course, Turan wasn’t the only traveling noble in this world.
While it might be different in frontier regions where nobles were hard to find, any decent major city would have several nobles staying during pilgrimage or wandering.
Even at the Berk family where he had stayed, several such people had come and gone, though Turan hadn’t gotten along well with them then.
They had been jealous of an unknown wanderer of unclear origins being close with Asiz, the second son favored by the family head.
Though he briefly considered refusing due to those memories, Turan soon changed his mind.
“Alright. Shall we go now?”
He was in a position where he needed to gather even a little more information about the Zahar family.
From that perspective, there was no need to waste an opportunity to converse with nobles.
* * *
“Pleased to meet you. I am Turan Brahms.”
“Brahms? Haven’t heard that surname around here.”
“I heard he came from near Karmaine?”
“Then isn’t that quite close to Arabion?”
As soon as the last person finished speaking, everyone shot sharp glances in that direction.
The family head’s daughter, Irid, spoke coldly.
“Let’s not associate our guest with those sparrows.”
“I apologize.”
As the atmosphere instantly turned chilly, the one who spoke bowed in apology.
Though he hadn’t thought it was particularly taboo to mention, clearly the hatred for Arabion ran deep here too.
Turan memorized the faces of the three nobles staying at the Dirmin family while exchanging greetings.
A relatively young couple and one middle-aged man.
The first two were a married couple from a family called Gashub who came on pilgrimage doubling as honeymoon from nearby, with the husband being the heir apparent and the wife from a Zahar branch family.
And the remaining one was, like Turan’s disguised identity, a fallen noble.
“Dolf Meren. Mr. Brahms. Warrior bloodline.”
Warrior was a bloodline specialized in close combat like guardian, but while guardian specialized in defense, this one specialized in physical strength.
“Pleased to meet you.”
While shaking hands, Turan felt the other applying force and quickly activated the guardian magical device to maximum.
As expected, tremendous grip strength pressed his hand.
“As expected of guardian bloodline, you’re sturdy. Though your grip strength is lacking.”
Having confirmed his superior strength, Dolf smiled with superiority while showing off.
Instead of getting angry at such harassment, Turan smiled as if unbothered.
“I hardly train that aspect.”
“Heh, true that hardly any of us have inherited proper physical training methods. Still, looking at your body, it’s not completely untrained?”
“I put in some personal effort.”
“You trained that much on your own? Indeed, I envy weak people! No matter how big a boulder I lift, I barely feel any stimulus.”
As he said, though Dolf had good basic frame, he was far from a harshly trained physique.
This was actually one of the main reasons most close combat bloodlines had fallen.
The 4-week intensive training Turan had achieved was only possible with all three elements – skilled teacher, training magical devices, and student with persistence and passion.
If even one of those three was missing, training period instantly extended to months or years, and most lacked patience to abuse their bodies for such long periods.
The robust physique itself made training far more painful than for knights or ordinary people too.
“Hey, we get that you’re strong so stop there. Where did you leave that black eagle? I came wanting to see it.”
When the Gashub wife spoke in an openly dismissive tone, veins bulged on Dolf’s face as he had been showing off, but he grit his teeth as if enduring and stepped back.
Well, how dare a mere fallen noble talk back to a noble from a great family.
Turan pretended not to notice this and answered.
“I told it to fly around nearby. It must have felt stuffy from writing practice this morning. Shall I call it?”
“Please do.”
At least the husband maintained more polite manners when asking.
Turan stretched his hand toward the sky and thought inwardly.
Come here.
Shortly after his thought transmitted through the soul bond, the black eagle flew in from far away.
“Wow, it’s real…”
Landing on Turan’s arm, the black eagle looked warily at the nobles surrounding it, then when Mrs. Gashub reached out to touch it, refused by clacking its beak.
Seeing this, she muttered with a deeply furrowed brow.
“Damn bird-brain! What exactly am I lacking? I could raise it much better than some fallen noble.”
An incredibly arrogant attitude not even caring that the person in question was right there.
Though he had seen several nobles from great families before, this level of arrogance was a first, making it almost refreshing.
Not that it made her likeable though.
The black eagle also glared, seemingly unhappy at being insulted, but recognizing the power difference, didn’t actually attack.
Turan could feel its urging in his mind asking him to take revenge on its behalf.
“D-don’t say that, Sila. It’s rude.”
“What’s rude about it? Did I say anything wrong?”
Though the husband’s side at least had some common sense, perhaps due to innate personality and family status differences, he seemed completely unable to control his wife’s rampage.
Well, even Irid, the Dirmin family heir who could be considered this gathering’s host, was only frowning at such tyranny without actually stopping it.
Just this showed what kind of status the Zahar family held in the Enril Desert.
Despite the ruined atmosphere, the meal that followed was excellent.
From spicy roast chicken seasoned with imported eastern spices to herbed lamb ribs on flat bread, steamed fish and lobster – it was a course that seemed to perfectly capture Komad’s culture between sea and desert.
After finishing the meal, they had tea and chatted, with Dolf bringing up the first topic.
“The west is quite noisy these days.”
“The west, you mean the grey zone?”
“Further west than that. Dark elves causing trouble, so Arabion – that is, the sparrows – organized a large subjugation force.”
From what he said, Dolf seemed to have lived near where the dark elves rose up before recently coming to the Enril Desert side and hearing about it.
Turan quietly listened, wondering if there might be any latest news.
“Did you hear who’s commanding?”
“I heard it’s their young lady heir.”
“Ah, that skeleton they say is skin and bones? What was her name? Masa?”
“I heard it was Meredith.”
“If I didn’t mishear, it should be Meisa.”
It was a very strange feeling hearing others, especially criticism, about his friend.
The four nobles except Turan poured out all kinds of curses, saying that woman was a horrible monster with only bones and skin left, so whoever marries her will have to keep their eyes tightly shut on their wedding night.
“Couldn’t we assassinate her while we’re at it?”
“Assassination? We Zahar don’t do such vile things. Though some nobles might coincidentally go on pilgrimage that way.”
“True, right? Ah, if we just killed that woman, the sparrows’ expressions would be worth seeing…”
Mrs. Gashub glanced at Turan and Dolf while sneering as if openly lying.
During this, the conversation shifted in an interesting direction, exactly the topic Turan wanted.
“Still, they have it easy with their heir decided early. Who knows how many years we’ve waited for one of the three to be chosen.”
Judging by Mrs. Gashub’s lamenting words, unlike Arabion, Zahar didn’t have a decided heir.
Given how freely she spoke even in front of fallen nobles, it probably wasn’t particularly secret, but such talk was hard to hear except in settings with high-ranking people present.
After all, commoners and knights could hardly dare discuss noble affairs freely.
“Could I know those three people’s names?”
When Turan asked, Mrs. Gashub briefly made an expression as if it was preposterous, but then readily answered.
She seemed to want to show off her knowledge to put him down.
“Lord Rahman, the family head’s cousin brother, Lady Alma, his fifth cousin’s daughter, and Lord Ferga, his grandson. All powerful nobles who distinguished themselves in the last war too.”
Given how she addressed all three respectfully, despite her showing off, her own position within the Zahar family didn’t seem particularly high.
Well, that’s probably why she ended up marrying into another family rather than bringing in a husband.
Anyway, it was somewhat disappointing that there was no name Talis among the three.
Just then, Irid muttered in what seemed like a lamenting tone.
“I wish Lord Talis would just decide clearly.”
At the unexpected name that popped out, Turan’s eyes widened for a moment before he desperately tried to calm himself.
He was worried Mrs. Gashub with Zahar bloodline would smell the scent unique to surprised people.
After desperately calming himself, Turan casually threw out a question.
“Who is this Lord Talis?”
Fortunately his control of emotions must have been effective, as no one found his question strange.
“He’s the family head’s brother and current second-in-command of Zahar. You could say he’s the one actually leading the family.”
The identity of someone who resembled Turan was an even bigger figure than he had thought.