Chapter 384: Attainment [3]

Chapter 384: Attainment [3]



"T-That..."

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I stared in silence at the results of my actions. The butler was a shell of the man he used to once be. He couldn't even look at me in the eyes as he started to tremble.

'....I'll need to handle this carefully.'

My problem with the situation was that he was closely tied to Julien's father who appeared like an extremely meticulous person.

I'd expect someone like him to notice the peculiarity.

But still, that was of no concern to me right now. I had other priorities.

"Were you the one to plant my obsession with the sword?"

"I... I..."

Despite being scared of me, Richard, the butler, was hesitant to speak. It looked like the fear that I had engrained deep into his mind was still not enough to push him to talk.

But that was fine.

I raised my hand and his eyes visibly constricted.

"Hiek....!"

He screamed, covering his face.

I didn't care and prepared to slap him in the face.

"I'll talk!"

...Or at least, attempted to. I stopped right at the last moment as he shouted in desperation.

"Haa... haa... haaa... I'll talk! I'll taaalk!"

"That's good."

I smiled, shifting my hand away.

'Looks like the slaps were the trigger.'

I had made sure to closely emphasize the slaps during the dreams. I didn't just slap him whenever he got something wrong.

I also injected 'fear' whenever that happened.

....The goal was to directly influence his mind into associating extreme fear with the slaps. The plan was flawless with the results right before my very eyes.

"Speak."

I lowered my tone, bringing my face closer to his while carefully studying his face. While I couldn't see if anyone was lying, under such extreme stress, they were more than likely to slip.

If he so dared as look away, stutter, or start tapping his foot...

"Haa... It's, yes."

He licked his lips.

"....I was the one who did that."

"Why?"

"It was... It was to-Hiek!"

Richard hurriedly covered his face as I raised my hand. His entire body trembled as he covered his face.

He looked pitiful, but he wasn't worth my pity.

"You were about to lie just now. Think carefully. You make one mistake and you know what will happen, right?"

"Ah, yes, yes..."

Richard hurriedly nodded his head.

"Look at me in the eyes as you speak."

"...Okay."

Richard visibly swallowed before opening his mouth to speak once again.

"It was to convert you into the Inverted Sky... The Evenus Household recently showed a lot of promise, and the organization tried to implant several spies in order to get to your father, but..."

Richard paused, taking a deep breath.

I frowned at the sight.

"But what...?"

"But your father managed to find each one and get rid of them."

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His words took the words right out of my mouth.

He managed to find each and every one of them before getting rid of them...?

Then...

I suddenly shuddered.

'He probably knows about the butler as well.'

I felt my skin crawl at the realization as my heart started to speed up. A lot more questions started to arise from deep within my mind as I processed the situation.

'No, does he actually know about the butler...? There's a chance that he doesn't know, but there's a higher chance that he does know.'

I thought back to the plan that we were about to execute and felt my heartbeat drum inside of

my head.

Ba... Thump!

Aldric Evenus.

I didn't know the man very well.

However, from what I had seen, he was an extremely ruthless individual who waited for the most opportune time to strike.

For him to keep the butler who was involved with a powerful organization that was planning

on taking over the Household... His plan became clear to me.

'He was probably waiting his time before striking at them.'

.... And I feared that he probably knew about the fact that they had tried to manipulate the

previous Julien.

He knew and yet did nothing.

"Y-yes... Y-yes...!"

His body shuddered uncontrollably upon hearing my words, and only after a brief moment

did I let go of his shoulder as he started to breathe heavily.

"Haaa... haaa... haa..."

I let him have a few minutes to recover before forcing him to speak.

"....The time after you returned from the gold mine. T-that was when I noticed your strength

increase. Your brother also experienced a small breakthrough, but it wasn't anything

compared to you."

'Bingo!'

Finally some key pieces of information.

'....The time after Julien returned from the gold mine.'

So something happened in the gold mine. Perhaps that was where he found the liquid.

'Good, I'm about to go there anyway. I'll check it out once we resolve the situation.'

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, formulating a plan in my head. Once everything

became clear to me again, I opened my eyes to stare at the butler who looked at me with a pale

face.

"I previously thought of keeping you like this, but after everything that you told me, it looks

like it's no longer possible. With everything that you've told me, he'll probably notice that something is amiss."

By 'he', I meant Aldric Evenus.

...After our talk, it became obvious to me that he was a man to be feared. He was someone who

picked up on the smallest of details so I couldn't afford to keep Richard in this state.

He'd probably notice within a minute.

'It's a pity, though.'

.....I did spend quite a bit of effort to do this.

I rubbed my index finger where a ring rested and raised my hand.

"W-what are you...!" Richard's face grew pale at my actions, but before he could do anything, I pressed my hand

against his head.

A faint glow manifested over the ring as his entire body grew still.

"Stay still..."

I mumbled, looking down at the butler.

"....You'll thank me late."

Mana drained from my body.

"If you can even remember..."

***

"How long is he going to take?"

Standing in the back garden with several dozen soldiers, Evelyn turned her attention towards

Leon who looked a little worried.

"....Julien's reputation is already pretty bad amongst the soldiers. If he doesn't show up soon,

they'll start ignoring his every words."

"I know."

Leon mumbled, his brows furrowing tightly.

"I told him to take a shower and come down quickly. I didn't expect him to take so long..."

"He's taking a shower?"

Evelyn blinked in surprise.

"For so long? What is he...? A girl?"

"Ye-"

Leon stopped, his mind growing blank as he processed her words. Then, turning his head, he

looked at Evelyn.

"Wait, aren't you also a-"

"Yes, and I also know that we take a lot of time changing. This is just how we are so stop

acting as if I said something out of the norm."

Evelyn crossed her arms while looking back.

The vassals were looking extremely displeased at the moment, all of them sporting frowns as

they murmured amongst each other. Though she couldn't hear what they were saying, Evelyn could tell from their body language that it wasn't anything good.

This was not good.

They were about to embark on an important mission and if the vassals weren't on the same

page as Julien, then things could very well go wrong.

Leon understood this as well as his face tightened.

He was just about to address the vassals himself when a figure finally showed up at the

entrance of the garden.

His back was straight and his expression was calm.

Noticing their presence, he looked towards them before looking at the vassals.

Leon sighed in relief then, but his face grew stiff shortly after as his steps paused.

"This is good."

Julien said, his voice reaching the ears of everyone present. Immediately all eyes fell on him.

Nudging his head at the spot in front of him, he addressed everyone calmly, "....Come here."