Chapter 48 - A Softie Inside

I shooed him away like chasing off a pesky fly and said, “Axion. If you’re trying to join the special unit for your personal growth, I’d like to tell you that it’s utterly pointless.”

“Why?”

“Because going to dungeons that’ll help you improve is impossible for me at my current level. I’d probably die before you even gained a level, I think? And I doubt going around low-level dungeons will help you any either.”

Axion’s shoulders dropped and he pouted, crestfallen, putting his intellectual face to waste. “Will you please level up quickly, then?” he grumbled like a child. “How can the vice-captain not even be level 50…?”

“I’ll catch up in no time, don’t worry.”

“Are you playing cat-and-mouse with me?” Despite his complaints, Axion looked happy at the prospect of me leveling up quickly and going on dungeons alongside him. That was my secret purpose in creating the special unit, to begin with. While I also aimed to develop outstanding corps members, improving my reputation and securing a place within the Dark Knights in the process, my most pressing concern was raising my level. Of course, it would be fine to let Mayer carry me, but the downside was the same as with Axion: high-level dungeons suitable for them were too dangerous for me, and going around low-level dungeons was a waste of time for them.

In any case, at this rate, we’d continue to discuss the special unit. Although it didn’t matter what we spoke about, it wasn’t the most important topic at hand so I tried changing the subject. However, Mayer took the initiative to break the silence he had maintained thus far and abruptly declared, “Then it will be announced that the crimes of Wipera and his men were committed out of jealousy at seeing their juniors climbing the ranks. Murdering talented rookies… Something along those lines.”

“It’s not far off from the truth.”

Wipera’s status as a support mage would be kept among us since making that known to others would only cause unnecessary prejudice. Plus, it’d be an additional hindrance to me. Thus, under everyone’s agreement, the Blue Flames incident was concluded.

* * *

It was late after the meeting ended when Mayer summoned me alone to his office. In the dimly lit room, he lifted an unopened bottle of wine and asked, “How about having a glass as a commendation for a job well done?”

I immediately answered without giving it much thought. “I like drinking. One glass won’t be enough.”

Nothing that belonged to Mayer was inexpensive. Needless to say, his wine was no different and I wasn’t stupid to miss an opportunity to taste expensive liquor. Usually, drinking with a superior of the opposite sex so late at night would pose a problem, but the situation changed when the superior in question was Mayer Knox. The man was famous for having no interest in such monkey business.

Hordes of women had attempted to seduce the famed grand duke, also titled Dark Knight. I could hardly count the ones I knew the names and faces of, even with all my fingers and toes. Of course, all those women suffered a bitter rejection, which was why the rumors of me and Mayer being lovers or whatnot made even less sense. The only potential risks in drinking with him were that it might worsen the rumors or I could get drunk enough to say what I shouldn’t. If I unconsciously revealed that this world was actually a game world and that Mayer was the core of the Demon Lord…

But surely that wouldn’t happen, right? I was quite capable of holding my liquor, having never gotten drunk, and Jun’s body (now mine) also had a high tolerance for spirits. I didn’t know whether alcohol tolerance was a trait of the soul, or if it was something Jun and I shared, but it was fortunate that I didn’t need to abstain or hold back from drinking.

We started by having a glass of wine each, and then another until we drained a bottle in no time and Mayer took out a new one. It was just as expensive and delicious as I had anticipated. We downed glass after glass for a long while, and eventually, Mayer began to open his tightly closed lips. “Wipera… I did not know he was that kind of man in the past.”

The drink must’ve gotten to him as his murmuring voice was more relaxed than usual, although his complexion was perfectly fine. I would’ve thought him a rock-hard drinker immune to liquor if he hadn’t started talking. I wet my lips with wine and replied, “It’s not surprising that you didn’t know.”

“He was a man who cared for his comrades, back then,” he murmured. “The Wipera I knew… was that kind of man.”

This answered my question of why he had invited me for a drink; he wanted to share his feelings with the aid of alcohol. I could understand why he could only invite me; he couldn’t talk about the first playthrough and so on with others, after all.

Still, I was surprised. Mayer was ruthless in cutting down Wipera and the Blue Flames. He was so merciless that I thought he wasn’t at all bothered by the incident. Thinking back on it, he hadn’t looked good throughout the entire meeting. I had naturally assumed he was matching the atmosphere, according to the gravity of the matter, but it showed then that he was brooding over it more deeply than I thought. I could only down more wine, somewhat lost for words at finding this unexpectedly compassionate side to Mayer.