Chapter 116: Leca’s Harvest (VII)

Translator: Adel

Editor: Evelet

QC: AdCaelum

Translator’s Note: Hi everyone. Things have been wild for me this November. My mother had surgery, and my dad had to go through an intense round of chemotherapy. I promise I haven’t forgotten about all of you, or Mendacity. I have my JLPT coming up in December and I’ve been studying for that. Thank you, Cael and Eve for being patient with me. Also: We have a Discord! There is a link at the bottom of the chapter. We love to hear from you and hear your feedback, it really keeps us motivated. Now, on to the show.

“Well then, young master, I will take care of these papers for you,” Jill said to Vio.

“Oh, thank you for your hard work.”

At the breakfast table, Vio asked Jill to give Gary the documents he had corrected the previous night. Jill had told him that he would take care of any corrections that needed to be done, except for the ones that needed Vio’s judgment. 

Just as Jill left, Legion walked in to replace him.

“Good morning, Lord Violant.”

“Oh, good morning. I’m sorry for keeping you up late last night.”

“It’s no problem. Don’t worry about it. I was happy to be of help,” Legion replied as he stood by the serving cart.

“Gary is a nuisance, but he is good at this job… I’ll consider this a learning experience. If I can work with a man like him, then I should be able to work with anyone.”

In Vio’s opinion, Gary was not as strict because he was still a servant. If Gary had been a member of the royal family, Vio would have been confined to his bed in illness every time he came to the castle.

Legion couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.

“Please excuse me. It’s not just royal matters; even in the knighthood, I would encounter bosses who were as troublesome as him. I remember one of my seniors saying the same type of things to me.”

“I see.”

Vio concentrated on eating his breakfast while smiling wryly at the thought that this was a universal sentiment. After finishing his scones and soup, he drank tea before he excused himself and left his seat.

“Legi, once you’ve finished up with those documents and put them away, come to the back. We’re going to the store room.”

“There is a storeroom?”

“I’ll leave the door open, so you’ll know it when you see it.”

It was a small room tucked away on the second floor behind Vio’s room. It was the room where his grandfather’s collection was kept, but Vio had not been in it since he moved in.

Opposite that room, from front to back, there was a dressing room, a catering room, a maid’s room with a guest room, and a large guest room.

At the end of the corridor was a door, behind which there was a servant’s staircase.

Since the mansion was used for summer retreats, it was small in scale and there were not too many rooms.

As Legion finished cleaning up, Vio left the room and entered the store room.

“It’s been a while since I’ve been in here. It’s so dusty…”

Vio opened the curtains and windows to ventilate the room. As the dust floating in the room refracted off the sunlight, it looked like glitter in the air.

Among the many musical instruments collected by his grandfather, several were in boxes while a majority were covered with cloth to prevent dust buildup.

“Lord Violant, are you here?” Legion asked uncertainly, as he looked around the room in surprise.

“I didn’t know a room like this existed in the mansion.”

“Yeah, this is the first time I’ve been here in a long time. Let’s see. There was a lute somewhere in here.”

When Vio awoke this morning, he remembered the promise he had made to Legion on a certain rainy day. So he decided to use this occasion to look for the instrument as a distraction from the overwhelming and exhausting paperwork.

He flipped a dustproof cloth over and peeked inside. Legion pulled the box out, opened it, and looked inside. Then he suddenly raised his face.

“It’s here, Lord Violant.”

“Oh, it’s here after all. What do you think? Do you think it’s usable?”

“Let’s see… Well, the strings are loose, but it looks to be in good condition. I think it should be fine.”

Legion was just about to tune the lute when he realized that he had no place to sit down.

“Could we take this somewhere else?”

“Ah, sure. Of course.”

Vio and Legion worked together to close the curtains and windows in the room, and they took the lute out of the room along with the box. Vio locked up the storage room to keep it secure.

The room held many other expensive items, not just musical instruments, so it had to be kept secure. Although, without seeing what was inside each box, Vio wouldn’t be able to tell anyone what was actually inside this room.

When they both returned to Vio’s room, Vio recommended Legion use the couch. Vio sat down across from him.

Legion wiped the lute with a handkerchief and adjusted the strings by turning the screws that held them in place. Vio looked at him, filled with curiosity as Legion flicked his fingertips over the delicate instrument, producing the most minute of sounds.

Perhaps it was because the Lesserhain family was a family of warriors that Vio’s father and brother shied away from musical instruments. However, Vio’s mother liked music, so the family had a small musical ensemble. Vio’s father and brother had never attended these small little concerts because they found that the sound of the music was too loud.

Still, there were exceptions to every rule. When Vio’s mother and Flora got together to sing, the two of them seemed to enjoy listening to them.

Vio’s mother was not only beautiful in figure but also in timbre.

After Legion had restrung the loose strings, he began to strum them one by one. He adjusted the pitch of the strings as he went.

“Amazing, you really know what you’re doing?”

“I’m not as skilled as a true musician, but I do know what I’m doing to some extent. It would be better if I had a tuning fork.”

“A tuning fork? What’s that?”

“It’s a metal rod shaped like this, and it produces a very specific tone when you ring it.”

“Huh, a metal rod…? Is this one of those by any chance? It was lying around in the box.”

Vio took a small metal rod from the wooden box that had contained the lute.

“Thank you.”

Legion took it and tapped it lightly on the corner of the wax table. The crystal-clear tone echoed throughout the room.

“Oh is that how you use it? I think I’ve seen Mother use one before. So it’s called a tuning fork.”

Vio rang the tuning fork that Legion had placed on the wax table several times as he commented on how beautiful he thought it sounded.

“Ha ha, thank you very much, Lord Violant. Thanks to you, I was able to get in tune.”

“Eh? I see.”

Vio had become addicted to the crystal-clear tone and was ringing the fork nonstop, forgetting the original reason they even started. Puzzled, once he remembered what they were doing, he felt ashamed of his childish behavior. He kept quiet and waited for Legion to speak again.1

A short time later, Legion seemed to have finished tuning every string. Holding the lute, he plucked some strings with the fingers of his right hand.

“I can only play simple songs. Do you want me to play something for you anyways?”

“I’m unfamiliar with the instrument, so I can’t really say. I only know songs that are just for dancing…. How about a song for a good harvest? A harvest hymn.”

One song that everyone in Istiah knew was the song of praise for the Verdant Spirit Yuglena.

“I don’t know. I haven’t played that in so long…”

Legion cleared his throat and then began to play the harvest hymn.

“Oh…”

He was being humble. He played quite well.

Vio let out a sigh of admiration.

He had never thought he would see the day when a musical instrument would ring out through this mansion.

As the song came to an end, Vio applauded.

“Amazing! You’re so good, Legi. Did you practice a lot to get this good?”

“Yes, but I learned it when I was a child, so it’s very easy to build on what you already know. When I worked as a Knight’s Apprentice, a nobleman taught me that I should learn a musical instrument in order to make my master happy.”

“I’ve never heard of such an expectation from my family. Where was this nobleman from? He must’ve been from an elegant background.”

Legion replied to Vio’s question, “He was Count Franzister. Have you ever heard of the name ‘Brave General Theodore’?”

“Aaah, I’ve heard of him before… Isn’t he the former general who loved to travel? If I remember correctly, he fought quite valiantly in the battle that led to Mother marrying into our family.”

“Yes, he reached out to me during one of his travels.”

“Is that so? It’s funny how everything in life is connected.”

As Vio replied, he remembered that there was a rumor that the count was rather eccentric. But the way that Legion talked about him made him seem like he was a pretty nice guy.

Wait, no, hold on a second. Sometimes Legi’s common sense is a little bit off. Is that the count’s fault? Vio thought.

“Hey, can I ask you a question?”

“Anything.”

“One time, you said that lightning magic is easy to deal with if you get used to it. The one who taught you that was—.”

“Yeah, it was Sir Franzister. He said, ‘Since I can do it, you have to be able to do it too.’ I worked really hard and trained, thinking that was just the way it was… It wasn’t until I joined the Royal Knights that I realized this was far from the truth, but I still look back on it fondly.”

Legion stared off into the distance. Perhaps he was lost in his nostalgia.

He’s so pure…! Vio thought.

Legion must’ve been this serious ever since he was a child. It made Vio a little bit sad.

“Well, but I guess it’s thanks to that that you’re here now. So isn’t that a good thing?”

“Yes that’s true, but… Forget about it. It’s nothing.”

Legion’s face had a troubled look on it, and he ended his sentence by shaking his head. Vio thought maybe Legion had a bad history with him.

“Lord Violant, if you teach me that rain hymn that you talked about before, I’d be happy to play it for you.”

“I would like nothing more than to teach you, but let’s do that another time. Today is the day I finally get to meet Legi’s family.”

Vio looked out the window and noticed that the sun was hanging almost overhead, so he decided they should wrap things up.

“I see. It looks like more time has passed than I thought. Shall I help you get ready?” asked Legion.

“I’m thirsty, so I think I’ll get a glass of water first. What should I do about a coat? Do you think I’ll need protection from the sun?”

“Yes, it’s very sunny today with no clouds. Perhaps a cloak with a hood would be a good choice.”

“Sounds good. You can put the instrument back in the box and leave it there. You’ll have to get ready too. If you need to bring anything, go get it. I’ll be in the dining room,” Vio said.

“Yes.”

After quickly cleaning up and seeing Legion leave the room, Vio also got up to get ready.

1Translator’s Note: Peak cinnabun levels have been reached.