Volume 3 Chapter 27 (1/2)

Chapter 27 – New Life

Lute, age 12.

The Demon Continent was in the exact opposite place from the Fairy Human Continent.

There were no four seasons, the weather was always cloudy.

The soil was so barren it was hard to grow crops.

By necessity, legumes that had high nutritional value and can be grown even in barren soil had become the staple crop.

Unlike the Fairy Human Continent, they only have 2 meals here: breakfast and dinner.

The food was simple, consisting of bean soup, salad, simple meat dishes, and sometimes fish.

For seasoning, it’s mostly just salt.

Maybe because the Demon Races didn’t have any interest in food, even the high n.o.bles had mostly similar menus to the common rabble.

However, they poured their souls into their afternoon tea parties and nightly evening parties.

Demon Race people of all ages just love sweet snacks.

So almost all of the flour, sugar, and fruits they imported were turned into snacks. They also imported scented tea leaves in large quant.i.ties.

“Rather than baking flour into bread, make cakes!” was their national motto.

In exchange for importing flour and sugar from the Fairy Human Continent, the Demon Continent exports minerals like iron ore, coal, gold, silver, copper, magic stones, and gems.

Their soil is barren, but to make up for that, numerous resources were buried within.

This was a land not unlike Arabia in my previous world, that was rich in petroleum.

But there were no such things as “countries” in the Demon Continent.

Whenever there was an important matter that needed to be settled, representatives from each family would meet together and decide on a course of action.

Even if they wanted to consolidate into a country, the Demon Races themselves were made up of a wider range of clans compared to other races, so it was difficult.

Mermen and birdmen can’t possibly be expected to adopt the same way of living. It was also impossible to force them into the same way of thinking and doing things.

For those reasons they could not come together as a country.

In the eyes of the other races, they were uncivilized barbarians.

There are even those who look and act similar to monsters.

Then perhaps it was inevitable that discrimination progressed into war.

About 1000 years ago, a war between the union of the Fairy, Human, and Beast races and the Demon Race broke out.

At the start, the Fairy Human Beast alliance dismissed them as disorderly mobs, but when push came to shove, the Demon Race had a higher sense of unity than they imagined.

The war finally ended in a draw, but considering the Demon Race’s high individual skill and magic power, it was possible that the Fairy Human Beast alliance could have lost if the war dragged on.

Moreover, the Demon Continent is a country full of resources where minerals like ores, precious metals, magic stones, and gems were buried in great amounts.

They were discriminated against because their appearances were similar to monsters, but the Fairy Human Beast alliance came to know that they were a race that should not be made enemies of.

After the war, it became bad manners to treat the Demon Race with discrimination.

Because there were no countries in the Demon Continent, the t.i.tle of Count Dan Gate Vlad who bought me―”Count” was given to him by a small Fairy Human Continent country together with a plot of land for his services there.

Right now that land seemed to be under the management of master’s acquaintance.

Just what kind of services did he do….

Count Dan Gate Vlad was born as the third son of a vampire family head.

He couldn’t hope for an inheritance.

But thanks to the magic talent he was born with, he became an A ranked magician.

Then once he graduated from magic school, master immediately registered with the Adventurers’ Guild, br.i.m.m.i.n.g with frontier spirit, and rushed out to the Demon Continent.

He went around the world, embarking on all sorts of adventures―like slaying monsters, hunting robbers, getting into fights with dragons, destroying Legions that made an enemy of him all by himself, and exploring dangerous dungeons.

At first people around him took their distance because he was a Demon Race.

But because of his sociableness, strength, and gentlemanly conduct, the animosity that was there at the beginning was quickly blown away, and he made many friends and colleagues.

That master was going hunting for pirates when he met madam.

Mrs. Seras Gate Vlad was well known as the former female captain of a pirate-hunting s.h.i.+p.

She was a competent person with a B+ rank in magic.

Those two met, and immediately fell in love at first sight.

On the same day, master delivered a bracelet to madam and married her.

All their friends at the time could not keep up with their speed, and everyone was surprised.

Then the two returned to the Demon Continent, and set up a trading company.

Thanks to madam’s sailing skills forged in her pirate-hunting days and Master’s knowledge of language and also connections and intermediaries built with his sociable att.i.tude, the company soon reaped huge profits.

What earned them a particularly large amount of profit was hiring Dwarves to process raw gemstones, gold, and silver in the Demon Continent and exporting them.

The company handled everything from mining the raw materials, processing, and transportation.

To that extent, it was possible for them to establish a system that can achieve high quality, implement designs the customers like, and respond to orders no matter how small.

Thanks to that they had a good reputation with their customers and orders keep coming in.

The other Demon Race people tried to copy master, but they couldn’t do what he did, and caused cultural friction with the Dwarves.

They also didn’t have connections to the upper crust of the Fairy Human continent like master did.

Thus they could not sell the goods even if they could make them.

If that’s the case, then it doesn’t matter how much they could produce.

That way, contrary to other people’s struggles, master’s business kept on growing rapidly.

Right now, the two were all but retired.

The business was mostly left to their subordinates, and they only came in to check every now and again.

What do they do on the days they’re not at work―

Madam would throw tea parties, a.s.sembling n.o.ble wives in similar situations for all kinds of gatherings. She was a person with such tastes.

Master would be busy, earnestly training.

Generally speaking, he seemed to like building his muscles.

When I met master while working in the corridor, he would instantly take of his clothes and pose.

“Lute! What do you think of my muscles! Strapping, aren’t they!”

“Y, yes. They are very strapping. I think they are very well trained.”

“That so! Hahahahahahaha!”

Satisfied with my reply, he vanished behind a corner.

Then from behind the corner, the sound of Mercè-san saying “they are very strapping, magnificent” was heard, and once again master’s laughter resounded.

He didn’t have to be so loud that everyone can hear…

Also, master and madam would go on trips with just the two of them several times a month.

They looked to be intimate, cuddly trips, not unlike newlyweds.

It was everyone’s ideal slow life.

However, there were those who are jealous of master’s success and graceful days, they were the main family’s eldest and second sons, in other words, master’s older brothers.

The main family was an ancient house, they had land, and generally they were also considered the upper crust of society.

But the sum total of their a.s.sets were totally dwarfed by master’s.

It seemed that at any rate, they couldn’t stand it.

Once upon a time, the eldest and second brothers, coming up with a suitable excuse, started a war with master.

The enemy was from the vampire clan’s main house, numbering 1000 people. This includes 50 magicians.

On the other hand, the Vlad house’s fighting force, including master and madam, comes to under 50 people if you take them together.

But it ended in the Vlad house’s complete victory.

The Vlad house’s allies were madam’s former subordinates and master’s adventurer colleagues who were indebted to him. They were heads and shoulders above the main vampire house’s subordinates in terms of battle experience and loyalty.

And the most critical thing of all is master himself.

Master’s A rank magician t.i.tle was not just for show.

A rank magician is a t.i.tle that only a handful of talented magicians can reach after much effort.

During the time of the war, master trampled down the main vampire house’s subordinates, bathed in all kinds of magic, without even getting a single injury.

Yet despite this, there was not a single casualty.

It was something he can do precisely because he had overwhelming difference in power.

The eldest and second brothers immediately apologized for causing a war out of their own accord.

Master just laughed and forgave them.

Furthermore master did not demand money or anything besides an apology out of them, for one reason.

That reason is―”It was fun to have something make my muscles shake again after a long time! But I couldn’t give my muscles the joy of exercise unless you had a little more spine! Hahahahaha!”

At these remarks of master’s, even madam seems to have let out a strange laugh.

Not sure if it’s their caliber as people, or if this couple was just a pair of huge idiots….

Master was willing to forgive and forget in good faith, but the eldest and second brothers still held a grudge from this war.

It was rumored that they were restrained from asking for a rematch by the people around them.

It was for master and madam’s only child Chrisse Gate Vlad’s 10th birthday that I was bought to be a blood bag and steward by mistake.

For vampires, blood was a luxury good, like coffee, tea, or tobacco.

Human blood had an especially good flavor.

The concept of birthdays doesn’t exist in the Fairy Human Continent.

At best, there was only a coming of age celebration when one reaches 15 years of age.

But the Demon Continent did have the idea of birthdays.

It ends at the age of 10.

At age 15, they celebrate their joining the world of adults.

After that there were not really any birthday celebrations.

On one occasion, I asked master and madam.

Concerning ojou-sama’s being hikikomori.

“Why didn’t master and madam do anything to solve ojou-sama’s hikikomori problem?”

It’s not like they didn’t do anything, that much I understood.

They bought and gifted me as a blood bag for her birthday, helping her with a chance to change for the better.

But they built a bath and toilet in her room, as if to say it’s fine if she didn’t come out of there, nor were they any signs of them giving her treatment to heal her trauma (though I don’t know if such a thing exists in this world).

From my point of view, they seemed to have an att.i.tude as if they didn’t have an interest in ojou-sama.

That sweet, gallant ojou-sama having parents that don’t care about her―I don’t think that such a thing was possible, but I won’t be satisfied unless I asked them.

Master and madam exchanged glances and sunk into silence.

“…. Lute, do you know of a bird called a Continental Sea Swallow?”

Madam suddenly asked me a question I didn’t understand.

I shook my head.

“The Continental Sea Swallow are migratory birds, they go back and forth on the Central Sea between the Fairy Human Continent and the Demon Continent. But the Continental Sea Swallow aren’t always in flight. In my pirate-hunting days, I often saw them stop on masts, resting.”

Madam took a sip of scented tea.

“I think of Chrisse right now as like one of those swallows that are taking a rest. She’ll take a rest for a while, then some day she’ll fly again. So in that time, we give her an environment where she can rest to the fullest.”

“….. Madam really believes in ojou-sama.”

“No, that’s not it. It’s just that I have confidence in my daughter.”

“Hahahahahahaha! She’s my and Seras’ daughter! Sooner or later, not to mention her room, she’ll fly off, away from the Demon Continent!”

“Just like you and me long ago, right. It looks like she’s really going to be like that. She can’t fight what’s in her blood.”

Then the two laughed happily.

They had faith in their daughter.

“……”

I became a hikikomori back in my previous life.

Just like ojou-sama, I stayed inside, afraid of being bullied again by the world outside.

That time, my parents didn’t say anything and let me shut myself inside.

Perhaps they believed in me, their son, just like master.

They believed that one day I would summon my courage and come out of the room on my own.

But in the end, I kept on staying home like that, and finally had to be thrown out by my parents.

Either go work at an acquaintance’s metalworking factory, or receive 1 million and leave the house.

At the time they said that, I resented them, saying “Some parents they are! Isn’t it their job to take care of the son they gave birth to!?”

But I wonder how my parents felt at that time.

I was only thinking of myself, and didn’t think of how my parents felt.

At best, I sulked and said―I have a more accomplished younger brother than myself so excuse me if I don’t do my job.

If I could go back to my previous life, j.a.pan, I want to face my parents and talk to them.

Telling each other our feelings while drinking sake.

Then I want to know what they were thinking at the time, what they wanted, even if it’s too late.

Then before I realized, one year had pa.s.sed since the time I met with master, madam, Chrisse ojou-sama, Merry-san, Mercè-san, Gigi-san―with everyone.

Recently I’ve been living as Chrisse ojou-sama’s guard, steward, and blood bag.

Now that I’ve turned 12, my daily living schedule was like this….

The day starts by me firstly getting out of bed and changing into my butler clothes.