I was surprised as well.
It was my first time seeing Father like that, too.
&
The four of us sat down again.
“You say I ambushed him?”
“Y-you did!”
I spoke calmly.
“Then we can just have another match. There’s no way I’d win, after all.”
In that instant, Roderick’s gaze turned to his son.
Cedric flinched, then immediately avoided his eyes.
That brief reaction was enough.
Realizing that his son had lost, Roderick’s eyes shifted with astonishing speed into calculation.
“Not right now.”
He said it casually.
“My child was injured in an ambush, after all. He’ll need at least a month to recover. Isn’t that right?”
“Th-that’s right!”
Cedric hurriedly chimed in.
“However...”
Roderick slowly looked at me.
“What if you change your mind in the meantime?”
A hollow laugh escaped me.
True nobles really were like foxes.
How could someone calculate so quickly with a face like that?
“Are you going to draw up a contract or something?”
When I asked sarcastically, Roderick gave a faint snort of laughter.
“No. One never knows what may happen in life. A talent that never existed before could suddenly bloom, couldn’t it?”
It was a common method.
Delay things so no immediate conclusion could be reached,
then add other demands in the meantime.
It seemed petty and crude, but tricks of this sort were surprisingly troublesome and powerful.
That was when Father spoke.
“Then how about we do this?”
Everyone’s eyes turned to Father.
“I trust my son.”
Father spoke calmly.
“However, it is true that your son was injured, so I will purchase additional stone from you. If we do that much, can we end this matter here?”
Silence flowed for a moment.
Roderick’s eyes flashed.
He could preserve his pretext and gain practical profit.
“If it is that much, I will accept the apology.”
“It is not an apology. It is a settlement.”
Father corrected him at once,
and the corner of Roderick’s mouth twitched faintly.
“Ahem... Very well.”
The agreement ended like that.
I said nothing.
We were the ones who had been ambushed, yet now we had to buy even more stone we had never needed in the first place.
It would be a lie to say I did not feel wronged.
But if Roderick kept dragging this out here, things would become far more exhausting.
It was better to end it at this point.
At any rate, having secured their profit, they prepared to leave.
Then.
“U-um...”
Marsha approached.
I looked at her with slightly cold eyes.
After hesitating for a moment, Marsha spoke with difficulty.
“Sorry.”
It was only one short word,
but it was something she, with her strong pride, had brought up first.
Why?
I had never been kind to her.
If anything, I had treated her even more coldly and deliberately kept my distance.
If I had done anything, it was pressure her.
And yet she was lowering her head first.
I could not understand it, but I decided to accept the apology.
“Not ‘um.’ Oppa.”
“H-huh?”
“Now that I’m getting older, I do like hearing it.”
Marsha’s eyes went round, and then she burst out laughing.
“You’re unbelievable, seriously. Oppa, my foot!”
The stiff air loosened a little.
At least between the two of us.
“Now that’s the Marsha I know.”
“Hmph.”
Marsha pointlessly pouted, then spoke like a sigh.
“Still, be careful.”
This time, her eyes were different.
Her face showed a little genuine concern.
“I don’t know what Dad might do next.”
That was probably true.
But still.
It was only the Lynn family.
I had to make sure they could not do anything before they even tried.
If I could not even do that,
then there was no meaning in any of this.
“But, um... about that.”
Marsha’s voice trailed off.
“Is it true?”
“What is?”
“That you, no... that Oppa...”
She bit her lip briefly, then barely managed to continue.
“That you like people who like you.”
Wh-what was this all of a sudden?
I had not expected her to actually call me oppa, so I was the one who ended up flustered instead.
“Y-yeah, I... I guess?”
My answer came a beat late.
I even stammered a little.
“...I see.”
Marsha took a short breath, then immediately whipped her head away and quickly climbed into the carriage.
Unable to understand that sudden behavior at all, I scratched my head.
A little while later, the Lynn family’s carriage began to move,
and left the Brennan territory just like that.
As Father watched it go, he said in a low voice,
“If we had not ended it there, it would have become even more troublesome.”
“...”
“Roderick is the sort of man who will secure profit one way or another.”
“He’ll still poke at us again.”
“He will.”
It was a brief exchange, but it was enough.
There was a little self-reproach in it, too.
If I had endured just a little longer, we would not have needed to suffer a loss.
In the end, if I wanted to move as I pleased, I needed power to match.
The me right now still lacked strength.
Even so, I had crossed a line I should not have touched, and today was the result.
“Still, Father.”
I looked at Father and smiled.
“You were really amazing today.”
Father gave a small laugh.
“Was I?”
Father slowly nodded.
“Then it was not a loss.”
I smiled too and continued.
“Besides, that stone. There will be a use for it.”
Father narrowed his eyes with interest.
Stone from the Lynn family’s mountain range.
Until now, it had been used to build village houses or repair walls,
but there was far more of it than was actually needed.
Piles of stone stacked in warehouses, taking up space.
But from now on, that stone would become quite necessary.
I only hoped we would need even what we bought today.
“By the way, son.”
Father suddenly looked at me.
“Did you truly subdue Cedric with a sword?”
“Yes.”
Risel, who was beside us, had her eyes shining.
“Really, Oppa? I heard he’s training hard as a knight aspirant.”
Mother also looked at me with a surprised face.
“I was lucky.”
I answered as if it were nothing.
“He must have let his guard down too.”
Father stared at me quietly.
“You were such a frail boy, yet you’ve been running quite well lately too. Did you perhaps eat some miraculous elixir in the capital?”
“Eek!”
Risel immediately cut in.
“If you had something like that, you should have given it to Dad and Mom first!”
Risel’s fist lightly thumped my side.
“Haha! Sorry. If I find more next time, I’ll be sure to give it to you.”
“You have to give me some too!”
Everyone burst into laughter.
Father did.
Mother did.
Risel did.
That laughter filled my chest to a strange degree.
***
I was currently leveling the ground by myself.
This place had originally been used as a field as well.
But because the farming tools were so poor, it had never been fully cultivated,
and recently it had been left almost in a natural state.
So I worked the land again.
I shaped it like a paddy field and tamped the floor evenly so that water could remain.
The waterway was not a problem.
A river flowed right beside it.
However, if I drew river water in directly, there was a risk of flooding, so I first dug a small channel.
Before the water was brought in.
This moment was the most important.
The mountain stone we had been half-forced to buy from the Lynn family.
That stone contained quite a lot of lime,
and the key was to crush it finely and scatter it like powder.
Lime was essential to adjust the soil quality of the paddy.
This land, in particular, was close to acidic.
If it was not neutralized, the yield would never increase.
That was probably one of the reasons rice cultivation had failed time and again until now.
But the true core lay elsewhere.
Transplanting rice seedlings.
Instead of sowing seeds directly, it was a method of growing seedlings first and then moving them to be planted.
It was a method that would only come to light twenty years later.
And three days later.
The moment I saw the evenly sprouted shoots, I smiled.
This would work.
It was not a complete success yet.
In the end, it had to succeed consistently.
But the direction was correct.
If I repeated this a few more times, it would be more than enough to carry through to harvest.
At that moment, Father, Mother, and Risel, who had come out to watch, saw the sprouted seedlings and smiled brightly.
“It really succeeded!”
“We’re proud of you, son!”
“Wow, Oppa!”
Risel’s eyes sparkled.
“Then can we eat white rice every day now too?”
I smiled at that expectant face.
“We’ll be able to before long. Still, we have to watch it a little more for now.”
“Hehe. Then we’re going to get super rich, right?”
This time, I shook my head.
“No, this isn’t something we can completely possess.”
“Why? We could become rich!”
I lightly stroked Risel’s head.
“If we did that, the surrounding territories would not stay still. No,
not just the surrounding territories. Far more territories than that would come rushing in.”
I continued calmly.
“The moment we monopolize this, conflict will definitely arise.
So we need to sell the cultivation method to the kingdom and have only our official cultivation rights recognized.
In return, we should receive compensation at a fixed ratio.”
“Rayon is right.”
Father said in a low voice.
“It would be almost impossible for us to protect this completely, Risel.”
“Hing.”
Risel’s lips jutted out.
“I wanted to brag to my friends.”
If only it were possible for us to monopolize it.
We might have been able to gain a vast wealth that could, if only a little, rival the Deharmont family.
It would be a lie to say I was not tempted.
But in the end, what mattered was
holding only as much as we could protect.
A month passed,
and I boarded the carriage headed for the capital.
“I’ll be off.”
“Have a safe trip.”
“Son, take care of yourself.”
“Oppa, don’t forget my present!”
During that time, we had also transplanted the seedlings and checked on them.
In truth, as long as the transplanting itself had succeeded properly, the chance of failure was now far lower.
After saying goodbye to my family, the carriage left the mansion, passed through the village, and headed for the territory gate.
Beneath the entrance in the wall surrounding the territory, Redek and Denzel stood waiting.
The boxes the two of them were holding were naturally loaded onto the carriage as well.
After all, there was not only one thing to apply for a patent for this time.
“Get in.”
“Oh my, Lord Rayon, I’m fine riding in the luggage carriage.”
“There is a lot I need to explain on the way.”
I pointed to the seat inside.
“Please sit here. Denzel, you too.”
“W-would that really be all right?”
How many chances would commoners have in a lifetime to ride in a noble’s carriage?
The two climbed in with excited faces, and the carriage began to move slowly.
It would take several days to reach the capital.
From here on was the real beginning.
***
Albarest, the capital and royal city of the Kingdom of Elstragard.
Just seeing the dense buildings beyond the enormous outer wall and the crowds endlessly coming and going
was enough to make me realize that this was the center of the kingdom.
Since it was Redek and Denzel’s first time in the capital, they could not close their mouths.
“Oooooh...”
“Wow...”
With the window lowered, the two kept looking outside without pause and did not take their eyes off the view until we arrived at the inn.
Even after entering the inn, they kept looking around here and there, unable to stop marveling.
Though it was not a particularly good inn, compared to the places they had lived in, it was far more orderly and the facilities were better.
“You may rest, or look around nearby if you like.”
I handed the two of them a coin pouch.
“And use this money to buy yourselves a set of clothes. Especially you, Sir Redek. If we are to register Serena’s armor for a patent, you will have to participate directly, and dressed as you are now, you may be stopped from the entrance.”
“Gasp! Thank you!”
“Th-thank you, Lord Rayon!”
I moved before they did.
I headed straight to the institution that received patent applications.
The building was fairly large, topped with a round roof,
and if one submitted an application here, it would be reviewed, after which one would undergo a patent test.
And the moment a patent was recognized, whether commoner or noble, one could establish a foundation sufficient to never worry about one’s livelihood for the rest of one’s life.
That was why countless people flocked here every year.
But in reality, only about ten patents were granted each year.
Recently, the review standards had become even stricter, so that number was gradually decreasing.
Even the application fee alone was one gold.
It was not a light sum even for a noble from the frontier,
and for a commoner, it was practically a fortune.
Once a patent was registered, the kingdom took half the profits from that item,
so there was a reason people said the kingdom’s finances could not possibly be lacking.
A short while later, I handed the clerk the applications I had prepared in advance.
There were two patents I submitted this time.
Serena’s armor.
And the rice cultivation method.
The clerk skimmed through the documents, then nodded without any particular reaction.
“Yes. Please come at this time tomorrow with the actual items.”
I could understand his indifferent attitude.
Armor was an extremely common item,
and rice cultivation was impossible.
The reality was that most applications failed at the review stage.
Suddenly, I grew curious.
What kind of things did other people submit for patents?
On one side inside the institution, there was a space where patented items registered so far were displayed.
When I went to look around, there were more interesting items than I had expected.
Then, suddenly,
one of the technologies that would spread through the world in the future came to mind.
But I immediately set that thought aside.
Because it was not something I could make myself.
Specialized technology did not become possible just because one knew about it.
Without experience in design and production, it was difficult to even imitate it properly.
At that moment, another thought flashed through my mind.
Then shouldn’t I just form ties with such technicians?
It was not a bad idea.
If an opportunity arose at the party, it might be fine to build some connections.
As I was looking over the patented items a little more, it happened.
I felt a gaze from behind me,
so I naturally turned my head.
“Huh?”
A sound slipped out before I knew it.
“Oh?”
The other person also looked slightly surprised to see me.
Then they immediately smiled.
It was a dazzlingly bright smile.
That smile, which had always been directed at others from afar,
was now aimed straight at me.