Just As I Thought, You Really Haven’t Changed

“Just as I thought…”

White grains lay in her hand.

A grain not very familiar in this country. Karis.

“White rice…”

The words slipped from the corner of Lady Shitoen’s mouth.

“Hm? What is it?”

I tilted my head slightly. It was not a word I had heard before. Wasn’t that grain called karis? White rice? But Lady Shitoen did not give a clear answer, and instead looked up.

“I think this is beriberi.”

“Beriberi?”

Vandel’s elegant brows drew together.

Beriberi?

Everyone, me included, wore that same expression.

Lady Shitoen straightened her back and looked around at us.

“It is an illness caused by a deficiency of vitamin B1, and it brings on whole-body fatigue, loss of appetite, numbness in the legs, swelling, and sensory paralysis… But if it worsens, it can also cause heart failure and brain damage.”

She rattled it off, but surrounded by several puzzled looks, Lady Shitoen bit her lip and said, “Umm…”

“This food called karis is hulled and milled, is it not?”

Vandel asked Lord Marder with his eyes whether that was true. Not only Lord Marder, but Ligo too nodded vigorously.

“When that happens, the nutrients the body needs are stripped away in the process. This grain has, um, in the bran part, vitamin elements… Um. Important nutrients and such are contained there.”

“Then even if you eat your fill of that food, nutritionally it is still unbalanced?”

When I tilted my head, she pointed a finger at me and said, “Exactly.” I was probably being praised, but it felt like I was being accused, which was a little scary.

“They kept eating karis, and while chronically deficient in vitamin B1, they upset their stomachs with dried fish and ended up expelling even the nutrients they still had stored in their bodies. Their strength fell, and they could not eat properly. But the nutrients they needed did not come in. And so the symptoms of beriberi progressed, until finally they developed cardiac beriberi. As a result, people began dying one after another of heart failure, and even now there are people whose condition continues to worsen.”

…To be honest, I really did not understand what she was saying…

And it was not just me. The men were all wearing more or less the same bewildered look.

Leaving us all behind, Lady Shitoen turned to Ligo.

“But you were able to replenish vitamin B1 by drinking the soup your wife made.”

“The soup…”

Natalie murmured, “Pork and onion…” Lady Shitoen nodded firmly.

“Pork is rich in vitamin B1, and by combining it with onion and garlic, the absorption rate rises considerably. At the very last moment, your husband’s body managed to hold on.”

“…Will he recover…?”

Natalie threw down the burlap sack and clung to Ligo. Lady Shitoen smiled.

“Let us work hard together.”

At once, Natalie let out a sob and began to cry. Ligo too wrapped an arm around his wife’s back, tears in his eyes.

“So it does not spread, then?”

Lord Marder asked to make sure.

Yes. That was the important part.

“It does not spread.”

Lady Shitoen answered firmly.

With that, Vandel more than anyone let all the strength drain from his body and let out a sigh.

“Thank you. On behalf of my people, I offer my gratitude.”

His voice trembled slightly.

No, yes, of course. If you thought an infectious disease might have broken out in your territory, it made sense to be that distressed.

“No, not at all. I merely did what I could do. More importantly—”

Lady Shitoen looked steadily at each one of us.

“I wish to express my respect to you all. You must have been frightened… And yet you believed my words and came with me. Prince.”

“Huh? Me?”

She addressed me so suddenly that I was startled, but behind me Natalie and Ligo cried out in shrill voices, “A prince!?”

“Though it came from empathy… it is not something just anyone could do, to take the hand of a patient showing unknown symptoms and encourage him.”

I started to feel happy, thinking maybe she was praising me, but Lady Shitoen looked at me with the slightest hint of a glare.

“That said, it was reckless.”

I immediately deflated. Sorry about that. Seeing my reaction, Lady Shitoen let out a soft laugh.

“I may be able to cure illness to some extent, but I cannot cure a person’s nature. I truly admire your kindness and generosity.”

…So I was being praised after all, I wondered, and looked at Vandel.

He had a look on his face that said, “Tch.”

“Save the lovey-dovey talk for outside. Come on, let’s get out of here already.”

I laughed at Vandel when he said that, but behind him, Lady Shitoen said in a small voice,

“Just as I thought, you really haven’t changed.”

I turned around, wondering what she meant, but

Lady Shitoen averted her gaze and said nothing more.