Chapter 118

“…!! Wow, holy shit, you scared me… ah.”

Sera started in surprise and almost screamed, but after confirming my face, she quickly regained her composure.

With a scowl and her arms crossed, she spoke in a tone laced with annoyance.

“Belita, why are you here?”

“For the same reason as you.”

“Why are you?”

…? What is that supposed to mean?

I had assumed she received a blank paper like me and came here to find ingredients to check the contents.

‘Was I wrong?’

Cold sweat streamed down my back, but she nonchalantly continued.

Fortunately, she didn’t seem suspicious.

“Someone incompetent like me, sure, I could say I came to scavenge materials here since I ran out. But why did you come here? You can just use mana, can’t you?”

Pardon?

“Or is there something else you need for another task? What kind of stunt are you trying to pull? Ah, if it’s related to the mission, you don’t have to tell me. I don’t feel like listening to you grumble about meddling uselessly in other people’s business.”

Thank you so much for jumping to conclusions and handing me the information.

Deferring any deep thoughts, I slowly nodded.

Ah, so that was it, Sera thought to herself, before losing interest in me and starting to inspect the labels on the drawers.

“Ugh…”

Though it didn’t look like it was going well.

Perhaps sensing my gaze, she flared up in anger.

“Hey, why are you glaring? Just find your own stuff and get the hell out!”

What a twisted personality. Anyone would think she rented this place out.

Turning my gaze away as desired to find my own stuff, I heard an unpleasant notification sound.

Ding!

Repairing a relationship with someone whose affection was minus eighty might be a waste of time, but trying it couldn’t hurt.

Having received unexpected and meaningful information from Sera, I chose the first option with a relieved heart.

“You? What’s gotten into you? You always drew a line saying other people’s business is none of yours and we should handle our own work. Did you finally decide to change that individualistic attitude of yours?”

Apparently, there was a somewhat valid reason behind the background of why she had become hostile toward Belita.

Guessing what on earth Belita must have done in the past, I replied to Sera, who was looking at me with a perplexed expression.

“You could say… that.”

“To think you’d actually say something like this. I guess I must have misjudged you a bit all this time.”

She seemed quite surprised by my answer, but quickly brushing it aside, she began to rush me.

“What are you doing? Why aren’t you helping already? You said you’d help, so you’re not just going to get in the way, right?”

So even someone you hate to the point of wanting to kill them can have their affection increased.

‘Are these people insane?’

In a way, Sera was starting to look different to me, too.

“As expected, once you reach that level of proficiency, you find things in the dark in no time.”

I hadn’t realized it because it was my own body and it felt natural, but generally speaking, even with a lantern, finding ingredients this quickly in the dark wasn’t an easy feat. Even I was inwardly impressed.

“I can skip saying thank you, right? Since it doesn’t seem like it was all that hard for you anyway.”

Wouldn’t it still be better to say it? As I winced, Sera burst into a triumphant laugh and walked out of the room without even looking back.

Left all alone in the room, I packed up the remaining items I needed, grabbed a few experimental tools, and returned to the bathroom.

‘Taking a couple won’t even be noticeable anyway.’

Thanks to the place being such a mess.

I sat down appropriately, diligently manufactured the potion, and with a trembling heart, used a dropper to carefully drop the liquid drop by drop onto the fountain pen’s decoration.

Drip…

The greenish potion spread across the gemstone.

And a moment later.

‘It worked!’

The fountain pen’s gemstone began to shimmer with a purplish hue that looked just like Belita’s eye color.

Indeed, this gemstone really was a magic stone.

‘First step completed, at least.’

Next, I needed to press this gemstone against the paper…

‘Ah, come to think of it, Sera mentioned that I could just use mana.’

Actually, knowing this didn’t help much with my current situation.

Since I didn’t know how to use mana.

I had confronted Ilian and even taken down a bear, but in truth, I had never used mana either time. I had just managed it somehow with sheer physical strength.

‘I can’t even go ask someone to teach me.’

Regrets welled up—I should have asked Ilian or the protagonist back in the first playthrough—but it was already too late.

I’d just have to look for related books later or try training properly.

Anyway, for now, I needed to check the contents of the secret message. I brought the fountain pen into contact with the paper.

‘It’s appearing.’

Starting from the part where the gemstone touched, letters gradually began to appear like spreading paint!

They looked like the alphabet, but different—resembling a more swirling, ancient language. As they entered my field of vision, characters I clearly had no business knowing began to be read with the system’s help.

[ I heard you went through a lot. Still, I’m glad you pulled through. Making an opportunity out of that was also brilliant. Robert must be letting his guard down having just inherited the title. You must make sure to pierce through that opening. Minor things don’t matter. Do not forget the purpose for which you set foot in that place. ]

‘……’

I stood there blankly for a moment, momentarily speechless.

‘What is this supposed to mean?’

Minor things. Opening. Purpose.

‘Are they telling me to dig up information that could serve as a weakness?’

Oscar had said Jeffrey was trying to bring Robert down.

And this secret message seemed to contain instructions to find the justification for that. Putting these two facts together, things added up. However…

‘Strange.’

If Jeffrey was the mastermind who ordered Robert’s assassination, that didn’t make any sense.

He would be telling me to take advantage of the opening and try a second assassination.

Does that mean the real culprit of Robert’s murder case actually isn’t Jeffrey?

‘Could it really be Duchess Rachel?’

The truth is something only Sera would know…

While the identity of the person who threatened my life had become uncertain, I did gain one thing.

‘Even if I stick close to Robert from now on, I won’t arouse Jeffrey’s suspicion.’

If anything, it’ll just look like I’m working hard.

That alone is good news.

Now, the things I need to do have become crystal clear.

1. Raise Robert’s affection.
2. At the same time, find a pretext for divorce.

Number 2 is highly likely to overlap with Jeffrey’s special mission of finding Robert’s weakness.

The fact that I can hit two birds with one stone makes this an ideal situation.

‘I could even use Jeffrey to force Robert into a divorce.’

Perhaps this perilous tightrope walk isn’t entirely impossible after all.

I was starting to feel a bit motivated.

[ Mo Je-won: Hey, looks like the Exiled Scholar is going for the Saintess route? ]
[ Mo Je-won: Fascinating. If it weren’t for you, I probably would’ve taken this route too, right? ]
[ Me: How could you have taken it when you didn’t even meet the conditions? You would’ve just headed straight for a bad ending. ]
[ Mo Je-won: I could’ve ended up on a different route, why are you so sure! ]

Checking Mo Je-won’s chat, I watched the Exiled Scholar’s live stream screen.

On the screen, Ivanke was unleashing divine power toward the sky right in the middle of a familiar village square. As holy white light covered the sky, the magic beasts that had been threateningly trying to attack people dropped like flies toward the ground.

When the divine power touched the people, the shivering villagers regained their composure, knelt, raised both hands to the sky, and began to shout.

Calling her the Savior!

[ Mo Je-won: A real Saintess is something else. What on earth was I looking at? ]

‘This is tricky.’

It wasn’t that I had completely given up on the route to becoming the Saintess in this playthrough.

It just meant that if I ever needed power, I hadn’t entirely ruled out the idea of bringing up my knowledge of the future and snatching that position back once again.

And yet…

The Exiled Scholar was picking choices much better than I expected.

“Oh, it lets me leave the tent. But where on earth are we supposed to go?”

“Eh? Who is this again, why is it letting me talk to them?”

“Good goodness! It’s dangerous, young lady. Why would you come out here at this hour of the night?”

“Ahem! As a matter of human decency, how can one turn a blind eye to people in danger? We must save all of them, of course!”

Choosing the options leading to the hidden route one by one with calm precision, they smoothly went and rescued Ivanke.

‘…’

Honestly, having the title of Saintess snatched away from me was not a welcome development.

However, a far bigger problem was…

“We m-must go to Garain County.”

“Saintess-nim, you cannot!”

“D-don’t worry. I will p-protect you all. Ralphican is speaking to me. If we simply l-leave that place neglected, a greater trial will befall us.”

“But it is far too dangerous! It is not too late to send an investigative party first before going. Saintess-nim, please make a prudent decision…”

Ding!

“Isn’t obeying the words of the Saintess the ultimate truth of this world? I say going is the right call!”

I couldn’t stop them because I didn’t have any money either. Donations using Belita’s salary were completely out of the question.

The hush money the Duchess gave me had also been completely cleared out through Sera.

While that meant I didn’t have anything uncomfortably weighing on my mind anymore, it also left me a penniless beggar with not a single coin to my name.

“I, too, agree with the Saintess-nim. In the name of the Berha Knights’ Commander, our knightly order shall share the Saintess-nim’s resolve.”

If the Exiled Scholar, riding the Saintess route, went to the county and rode that very momentum straight through the mini-game, the ledger would end up falling into their hands.

That ledger containing the weaknesses of the Rubel ducal household.

Of course, it was structured so that a single mistake would make it impossible to open ever again, so unless they looked up a guide or scum-saved, they wouldn’t be able to get it…

‘Should I at least drop a hint to Jeffrey to be careful?’

But if they asked where I got such information, I’d have nowhere to go with the answer.

And even if I told him, it was uncertain whether he would actually move the location of the hidden ledger. Since he had even built a secret room to hide it, the probability of him thinking nobody would find it was much higher.

At the same time, talking about the ledger out in the open was dangerous. I didn’t know whether Belita was someone who knew about the hidden ledger or not.

“You seem to have a lot on your mind. The teacup is full.”

Oh dear. The small teacup was overflowing and wetting the table. I hurriedly straightened the kettle, grabbed a towel to wipe the table, and brought a new tablecloth to lay it back down.

Watching the series of events with apathetic eyes, Robert opened his mouth in a dry voice.

“How are things going with Noah?”

…I almost knocked over the newly refilled kettle.

‘The wrong first step is still making its ripples…’

The fact that he kept trying to link me and Noah like that meant he wasn’t even considering me as a romantic interest in the slightest. This was becoming very troublesome.

“Haha, you seem too shy to talk about it.”

“I could practically see honey dripping from Noah’s eyes. It’s quite nice to see.”

Ding!