Chapter 163: The Servants And The Founder's Effort

About a week ago.

Lucius had just left his lab when he spotted a young teenage boy that was likely about fourteen or fifteen years old. That was the first time that Lucius had seen someone younger than him in the mansion and thus, he was quite interested. 

Lucius looked at the other servant who always stood near his lab, the one with the sticky touch gift. By now, Lucius had learned that this servant's name was Neta. He was one of the servants that had been in the same batch as that of Kiana and thus had come under her authority.

Kiana knew his work discipline and had thus assigned him here near the Lab, so that Lucius would always have a servant to call to while also having privacy in his lab. According to Kiana, Neta was a reserved man that kept to himself and didn't really make any mistakes.

Lucius approached Neta, making the servant straighten his posture.

"Who's that? A new servant?" Lucius questioned.

Neta followed Lucius's gaze and saw the teenager.

"Ah, him? He's Rio, a trainee servant from the academy. He's one of the best ones till now and will probably be finishing it early." Neta answered.

Lucius had once been confused about why the Inanis family needed so many servants that they made an entire academy. It was later that he learned from Kiana, it was a bit different from he had thought. 

The academy was started by the founder of the Inanis family when he was assigned this land upon being made into a noble. The people that lived here at that time didn't have as many skills and thus couldn't do that many jobs.

Thus at that time, he had made the academy to train the commoners and teach them skills that would allow them to make a living. Later on, the people grew and the town grew into the size of a city.

The commoners didn't really need the academy as much as before as the elders could teach the newer generation. But even then the academy existed and took in some students if they wanted to learn.

More time passed and the Inanis family increased in rank, eventually needing more servants. And thus that academy ended up becoming an academy to train servants, though it was still quite lucrative to a lot of people.

After all, the Inanis family was the ruler of the land and paid a lot more than any other noble or business would usually pay them. Plus, there was a level of honor that came with working for the Count's family and thus people still liked to work for them.

Of course, the academy still had the other functions and they actually taught the servants everything from reading and writing, to etiquette, to cooking to even combat. Although the levels that they learned varied depending on what they wanted to do.

This way, even if one day they wanted to stop being a servant, they would still be able to do other jobs. Plus, this gave the Inanis family an extra advantage that a lot of other nobles didn't have… a steady supply of competent people.

In the recent years, the number of servants graduating from the academy and the number of servants retiring from the servitude of the Inanis family were nearly the same. Every year a couple of servants would choose to stop working for the family and would resign.

They were free to do so and would even receive a parting compensation. This had kept a good image of the Inanis family in the eyes of the commoners and because of this, whenever someone badmouthed the Inanis family outside, they would either be met with a slap or kick to the back.

Lucius was rather impressed by this decision made by the founder of the Inanis family. He had sowed this seed hundreds of years ago and now it was him and his family that were reaping the benefits.

Lucius knew that maintaining a reputation and public image was one of the pillars of power. If one could grasp that, and make their reputation great, then even if they were weak as an ant, their words would still be able to topple kings!

Hearing that the boy named Rio was graduating early, Lucius felt a bit interested. After thinking for a bit, he didn't decide to talk to him but just used nexus on him. By now Lucius had understood that he could use nexus on anyone as long as they were within the range of his vision.

As long as he could see them, even if they were a dot in his vision, nexus would work. Thus, he used it on the boy named Rio and the information about his gift appeared in front of him.

Gift Name: Mushroom Master

Description: The owner can make mushrooms grow from their body and the places they touch.

Rank: Rare

Type: Physical 

Seeing this rather percussive gift, Lucius was surprised. This was the second servant with a rare gift that he had seen, and it was also rather unique. Lucius poured more Aether into nexus and made it show more information. 

A second later, the rest of the information also popped up.

Evolution: Possible

Evolution Requirements: 10x Aether Crystals, 2x Swamp Stool rune crystal, 100 mushrooms of different types.

Even the requirements of the evolution were strange to Lucius as this was the first time he was seeing something that like mushrooms, being the requirement. Though when he thought about the ability of the gift, it should have been apparent to him.

"Now that's a gift that is the strangest I can think of…" Lucius muttered to himself.

Though when he thought about the possible uses of the gift, Lucius smiled. There were many ways that he could think of, but since he didn't know the current limits of the gift, he didn't go further.

Though Lucius did end up adding Rio to his list of investment worthy candidates.