Up until just a moment ago, Lydia, the acting president of Daily Calliora, had been speaking with a thoroughly businesslike attitude.
And yet, the instant I brought up the subject of paper...
“You! Do! Under! Stand! It!!!!”
With ink smeared on her cheek, she pounced at me like a beast that had spotted its prey.
I was so startled that I instinctively flinched and took a step back.
“Wh-why all of a sudden...?”
But Lydia paid no mind whatsoever to my flustered reaction and seized both my hands.
Her eyes were gleaming with a madness I had never seen before.
“Finally! Finally, someone has appeared who fully recognizes the value of this great paper! Those hollow, glittering fool nobles in the imperial capital never had the slightest interest in the quality of paper!”
She began rattling off words like a machine gun while pumping my hands up and down.
“Do you know how many nights I stayed up trying to find the perfect pulp ratio so the ink wouldn’t bleed? Do you know how heartbreaking it was to use this white paper, superior to that of any major newspaper in the empire, merely to print gossip?”
That’s your job, though. You’re the president of a newspaper.
I kept that tactless retort to myself.
“Lord Ian Ash! You are truly an artist who understands the aesthetics of pulp!”
What is with this intensity?
I had no choice but to nod blankly.
All I had done was say out loud what I had been thinking—that “for newsprint, the surface is quite smooth and the ink doesn’t bleed much.”
Who knew it would trigger a nuclear-level reaction like this?
When I glanced at Lydia’s expression, I could practically see her affection toward me blasting through the ceiling in real time.
At that moment
.
“Tsk.”
A chilly draft swept over me from behind.
A very short, concise click of the tongue—yet cold enough to chill the bone.
I didn’t even need to turn my head to know who it was.
Who else but Estelle, the head maid who followed behind me like a shadow?
She leaned her upper body slightly toward my ear and whispered in a low, frigid voice that had dropped below freezing.
“Young Master. Surely you are not seducing her in such a vulgar manner? Tickling a commoner woman’s professional pride to win her favor... I find myself newly impressed by that garbage-like idea of yours.”
I let out a hollow laugh in disbelief.
“Seducing? Who’s seducing whom! I swear to the heavens, I had no such intention at all!”
At my indignant protest, Estelle gripped the hem of her spotless maid apron tightly and gave me a look of utter exasperation.
Beneath her blue-black hair, her eyes trembled faintly with contempt.
“I would sooner believe that a cat can guard a fish shop.”
Just what do you think of your master, Estelle?!
But for now, I decided to ignore Estelle’s slander.
What mattered to me right now wasn’t Estelle’s prickling gaze, but those sturdy, high-quality rolls of white paper stacked neatly over there.
Because if I wanted to successfully mass-produce eromanga in this unfamiliar medieval Western fantasy world, that paper was as good as my lifeline.
‘In any case, even Estelle can see that the acting president is extremely excited.’
Then I’ll keep going like this.
I turned to Lydia with sparkling eyes and enthusiastically chimed in.
“Exactly, President Lydia. I may not look it, but I’ve handled a pen before, so I know. On rough paper, the nib catches and the ink spreads everywhere, cutting your work speed in half.”
“Kuuuh. Exactly! And when ink bleeds, it spreads in such an irregular way, doesn’t it?”
“That’s right! This is on a completely different level from the crap paper shoved into the trash cans of the Ash viscount family. This paper has the perfect texture for a pen to glide across it like ice!”
“Oooh! To think you even considered the correlation between the friction coefficient of the pen nib and the ink absorption rate!”
“How could I not, when faced with such magnificent paper? And with this density, even if I filled both the front and back with drawings, they wouldn’t show through. Durability that could withstand being run through a rotary press for mass production! It couldn’t be more perfect!”
“Ah...”
Suddenly, Lydia stopped speaking.
The smile that had filled her face vanished as well.
Her brow began to twitch and narrow.
‘Wh-what...?’
Did I touch on something wrong?
Why is she like this when things were going so well?
Before I could even grasp the situation...
Drip, drip.
Something began falling onto the table.
They were Lydia’s tears.
“Wh-why are you crying all of a sudden?”
“S-sniff. I’m moved. For the son of a family renowned for art to understand my work so perfectly...”
Ah.
Come to think of it, the Ash baron family was supposed to be poor, but deeply versed in art.
The poverty part was so overwhelming that I had forgotten the rest.
‘To think the family name would help me like this.’
I moved to the seat beside Lydia and gently patted her shoulder.
“Not every effort is rewarded, but excellent effort will be. Miss Lydia, you truly made an excellent effort.”
“Young Master Ash!!”
Lydia outright flung herself into my arms, so I patted her back.
Even families separated in a past life and reunited wouldn’t be this emotional.
‘Thank you, family reputation.’
You’re finally doing your job.
Completely unaware that Estelle’s face, as she watched us from the side, was freezing over like a northern blizzard, I grinned.
◆
‘Truly, truly beyond saving garbage.’
Estelle pressed down the emotions boiling inside her and tightly clasped her white-gloved hands together.
The sight before her was not merely disgraceful—it was a catastrophe.
Young Master Ian Ash, the second son of the family and essentially no different from an unemployed layabout, was now embracing the acting president of some small newspaper he had just met, wearing a foolish grin on his face.
A man who, only moments ago, had been trying to haggle over scrap paper at a low price with the most pitiful expression in the world because he was short on money, was now smoothly talking about pulp this and density that, stealing a woman’s soul with his fluent tongue.
Estelle was certain.
That was not a negotiation. That was an attempt to seduce someone.
‘He’s seducing another woman while I’m standing right behind him, watching with both eyes wide open?’
Was this not the kind of behavior befitting a truly beastly noble?
An inexplicable fit of pique rose within her, and one corner of her chest throbbed as if pricked by needles.
Just then, she recalled that shocking bundle of papers she had found in the wastebasket beneath his desk while cleaning the young master’s room.
A clear and elegant sketch of a woman wearing the exact same maid uniform as Estelle herself.
That vulgar and depraved drawing of a woman with her clothing in terrible disarray, twisting her legs around some unseen person’s hand, blushing with a yearning expression.
There was not a single line of dialogue in that sketch, but anyone who was not a fool could tell what the situation implied.
The shameful image of a maid being violated by a vulgar, beastly noble, yet enduring it with a flushed expression, as though she were enjoying it.
That scene was undoubtedly the worst kind of fiendish scene, but Estelle had still been able to pretend she had not seen it and let it pass.
After all, anyone could see that the protagonists in the drawing were the young master and herself.
But now, the young master was...
‘As expected, you truly are garbage beyond saving.’
Estelle secretly ground her teeth.
There was at least some hope.
That drawing, for one, was the very embodiment of male fantasy.
There was no way normal women in reality would enjoy such violent, oppressive treatment!
A blockhead, an idiot, a pervert who knew absolutely nothing about a woman’s delicate heart!
That was why he had never once had a proper girlfriend and always shut himself in his room, scritch-scratching away at something.
Even when the young lady who was his childhood friend occasionally visited the estate, smiling with her eyes and openly wagging her tail at him, he had failed to notice and ignored her obvious affection. Estelle firmly believed that this, too, must have been because his understanding of real women was completely shattered.
To be honest, Estelle had felt inwardly reassured by that pathetic and foolish side of the young master.
‘Because a hopeless, irredeemable piece of trash like him could never be handled by anyone but a patient and capable maid like me.’
Taking comfort in that thought, she had silently protected the Ash viscount family, even without receiving her overdue wages, even though it would not have been strange for them to end up on the streets tomorrow.
Perhaps that had been Estelle’s small sense of superiority and possessiveness amid harsh reality.
And yet.
“Hahaha! Compared to President Lydia’s splendid craftsmanship, my eye is merely superficial!”
“What humility! Young Master Ian, you are the true ruler of pulp!”
‘Why is he so good at seducing that woman?!’
Like a fish in water, the young master was perfectly winning over the woman named Lydia.
Estelle had thought he was an awkward fool who knew nothing of women’s hearts, so what was with that relaxed skill, naturally breaking down the walls around someone’s heart by precisely scratching where they itched most?
“Uuuugh...!”
For no reason, the pit of her stomach grew tight, and her irritation worsened.
The crude phrase used by back-alley commoners—having one’s guts twisted with jealousy—was the most accurate description of Estelle’s mood right now.
With a gaze as cold as ice, Estelle glared back and forth at the backs of the two people’s heads as they laughed foolishly together.
The oblivious young master still had not noticed her expression hardening as ferociously as an executioner holding an axe.
The young master’s bright, innocent, beaming smile was one Estelle had never seen before, not even when Miss Amelia had served him plain cabbage-water soup for dinner.
It was then.
Lydia, her face flushed with emotion as she panted excitedly, suddenly took a deep breath and made a bombshell declaration.
“Very well! I’ve decided! If you are someone who understands the true value of paper like Young Master Ian, then I will gladly help you! I’ll give you all the leftover paper and scrap paper piled up in the warehouse for free, and if you need more, I’ll hand over the rolls as well at a bargain price below cost!”
“What did you say?”
Even Estelle, who always maintained a perfect poker face, lost her usual composure this time and muttered aloud.
“A-are you serious?!”
The young master, too, opened his eyes so wide they looked ready to pop out, as if he could not believe this absurd miracle.
She would hand over those expensive, high-quality papers for free and at a dirt-cheap price?
All because he had recognized the value of paper?
‘No. That can’t be.’
Surely, she had been enchanted by the young master.
The corners of Estelle’s mouth sank endlessly cold.
Her chilling gaze was directed beyond the back of Ian’s head, toward Lydia.