The gymnasium, which Cyan had sprayed vomit all over yesterday, was now clean and tidy. Of course, the one who had cleaned it all up was Nina.
“What are you doing here?” Eugene asked.
“I was waiting for you.” Ciel was standing in the gymnasium. She smiled as she waved a hand at him and said, “You’ve come here after eating, right? I can still smell the meat.”
“But I brushed my teeth.”
“What’s the point if you only clean your mouth? The smell is coming from your entire body.”
“Not the smell of cow dung?”
“That’s something my brother said. I never said that your body smells of cow dung. Also, I wouldn’t even know what cow dung smells like.”
“What else could cow dung smell like? It’s dung. If you don’t know, you can get a whiff of your own poop.”
“How filthy.”
“So why were you waiting for me here?”
Nothing at all had happened yesterday, but could she really have come here after only a day just to banter with him? Eugene narrowed his eyes and stared at Ciel.
“I came here to train with you,” Ciel replied, giggling. “I even wore my training uniform, see?”
“It looks cool,” Eugene casually commented as he looked at the clothes Ciel was wearing.
Her training uniform had the Lionheart embroidered on its left chest, declaring her descent from the direct line.
‘And of course, there’s no lion on the clothes they gave me to wear,’ Eugene thought before saying, “Did you just leave your brother alone somewhere to come here?”
“My brother is training with Hazard. Did you know? Yesterday, my mother became furious because of you. She slapped my brother more than ten times.”
“She really hit him?”
“Mhm.”
Eugene blinked his eyes at this news, and he’d been so sure that the boy had grown up without experiencing any tough love.
“But why hasn’t she tried to slap me?” Eugene asked.
“Why would my mother slap you?” Ciel seemed confused.
“Didn’t you say that she hit your brother because I made her angry?”
“Ummm… That’s right, but my mother is angry because my brother challenged you to a duel, and then you just happened to defeat him.”
“No, but… in the end, it’s because of me that she got angry, right?”
“You could say that.”
No matter how precocious, a child is still a child; Eugene now deeply understood this fact.
“...Does your mother also know that you’ve come here?” Eugene changed the subject.
“She knows. My mother said that I should try to get closer to you,” Ciel confessed without hesitation.
‘Why would she say such crap about trying to get closer when I’m the one who made her so mad that she actually slapped that brat in the face?’ Eugene barely stifled a shout before it could leave his mouth.
After all, how could such a young child like Ciel know what the Second Lady of the main family was really up to?
“...Is that right,” Eugen finally acknowledged.
“Didn’t you say yesterday that we can be pals since we’re the same age?” Ciel brought up Eugene’s words from the previous day.
“But your brother said that just because we’re the same age, it doesn’t mean we’re friends.”
“That’s just what my brother said. It’s not like I agreed with him. So, don’t you want to be friends with me?”
“...Fine, let’s be friends. Well then, friend, since I’m going to be training, why don’t you go and play over there instead of bothering me?”
“Will you play with me?”
“Nooo, I’ll be training.”
“Then I’ll train as well.”
‘Let’s just give up and ignore her. I should have done that from the start,’ Eugene thought with a click of his tongue as he headed for the gymnasium storeroom in the corner of the hall.
“You swung a spear yesterday. Will you be swinging a spear again today?”
“Nope.”
“Then what? A knife?”
“For starters, I’m going to work up a sweat.”
Eugene slammed the door to the storeroom open. The inside of the storeroom, which had been covered in piles of dust just yesterday, had been thoroughly cleaned overnight. It was obvious who had done it. It looked like Nina had spent the entire night cleaning.
“That’s just what I like to see,” Eugene repeated with a mutter as he entered the storeroom.
Not only had all the dust been swept away, but everything had also been organized and cleaned. That went especially for the sandbags, as their surfaces were smoother and they looked heavier than yesterday. In addition, it seemed that their leather had been polished and even the sand inside had been refilled.
‘...Still, there isn't that much in here to begin with, so there’s nothing that really catches my eye.’
For some reason, he was getting an urge to do some ax-work today. Even though there weren't any axes here. Eventually, Eugene left the storeroom, only carrying a heap of sandbags.
“What about your weapon?” Ciel asked.
“I’m going to be working on my body instead,” Eugene explained.
Eugene sat down on the floor and began tying sandbags to his limbs. Ciel looked at him for a moment before heading to the storeroom and returning with some sandbags as well.
“I want to do it with you,” Ciel said.
“Why would you want to do that?”
“Because it’ll be boring just watching you.”
“Do whatever you like.”
Eugene stood up, his body covered with hanging sandbags. Then he suddenly started running around the gymnasium’s interior.
‘...it’s heavy,’ Ciel thought as she staggered to her feet.
The mana she generated at the core of her body began circulating throughout her body, boosting her strength in the process. Ciel was only able to move her body in the way she wanted to after doing this.
‘So how can he run like that using just his body?’
Ciel’s disbelieving eyes followed Eugene around the room. Eugene had just started running but was already finishing one lap of the gymnasium even as he breathed deeply. Ciel stayed where she was for a few moments, waiting for Eugene to return so that they could run together.
“Have you really not trained your mana?” Ciel felt she had to ask.
“I’ve told you already that I haven’t. Stop talking to me.”
“How amazing… How can you run with all that on you when you haven’t trained your mana?”
“Stop. Talking. To. Me,” Eugene snapped at her with an angry glare.
In response to this, Ciel stuck out her tongue at him once and then proceeded to stay silent.
* * *
Nina returned from the main house, having followed Eugene’s orders. She had secretly prepared herself to receive bitter criticism from the other servants of the estate, but surprisingly they hadn’t treated Nina harshly.
—Did Master Eugene tell you to ask this?
—Yes.
—Understood. Today, once noon has passed….
Although they showed some signs of wariness, they still politely answered all of her questions. While feeling puzzled by this fact, Nina headed over to the annex’s gymnasium.
“...Miss Ciel?” Nina asked, her jaw dropping at the sight in front of her.
“Oh, hey servant,” Ciel casually greeted her.
“Her name is Nina,” Eugene informed Ciel.
Ciel corrected herself, “Hey, Nina,”
Ciel smiled as she balanced on top of a rocking body. She was currently sitting on Eugene’s back while holding an armful of sandbags.
“G-Good day Miss….”
Nina belatedly bowed her head. But even as she did so, she secretly peeked upwards to look at what Eugene was doing. As sweat dripped from his body like rain, he was intensely focused on doing push-ups.
“...What number are you at now?” Ciel asked.
“Ninety-Eight, Ninety-Nine, One Hundred,” Eugene grunted. “Now get off.”
Boom!
Ciel threw the sandbags aside and got down from Eugene’s back. Eugene then collapsed onto the floor, lying face-down as he caught his breath.
Once he had stopped gasping, Eugene asked, “...Did you find out?”
“Yes!” Nina replied, nodding her head. “Sh-should I get you some water first?”
“No. Just tell me now,” Eugene insisted, still lying on his front.
“Masters Deacon, Hansen, and Juris are expected to arrive sometime afternoon today,” Nina responded quickly. “Also, Masters Gargith and Dezra will be arriving by warp gate at around dinnertime.”
“And to think I was curious about what you were looking into,” Ciel said with a giggle as she poked Eugene in the back. “You could have just asked me, so why didn’t you?”
“I had already sent Nina to find out, so if I heard it from you first, that would mean I had sent Nina on a pointless errand,” Eugene justified his decision.
“Why does that matter?” Ciel asked.
“And we were also in the middle of training,” Eugene continued, ignoring her question.
He was too lazy to argue with her. Eugene gathered up his splayed-out body and pulled himself into a sitting position.
“So you’re saying that three people are arriving by carriage, and then two will be arriving by warp gates?” Eugene confirmed.
“Yes,” said Nina.
Starting with how they got here, the last two were receiving a marked difference in treatment. But even Eugene knew the reason for this. Those two were the scions of high-ranking families among the collateral lines.
“You don’t know who Gargith and Dezra are, do you?” Ciel piped up.
“I know their names, but I’ve never met them before,” Eugene revealed.
“Those two are pretty strong for being collateral descendants.”
“I know that their families are quite powerful. What about the other three?”
“I don’t even know where they’re coming from. They’re similar to you in that way. Ah, but of course, you’re much stronger.”
It seems that those three also came from small families in the collateral lines.
Setting those three aside, Eugene asked, “...How about Gargith and Dezra? Have you met them before?”
“They came here for my brother and my tenth birthday party.”
“What kind of people are they?”
“Gargith is no fun. He’s a year older than me…. Dezra is younger than me, but she isn’t much fun either.”
By them being no fun, did she mean that she wasn’t able to tease them?
Eugene took a moment to organize his thoughts, ‘Three from the direct line and six from the collateral lines, including me.’
Even though he’d been told that everyone would be arriving by the fourth day at the very latest, it looked like everyone would be gathering earlier than he’d expected.
“Do you know when the Bloodline Continuation Ceremony is starting?” he asked.
“Since it starts when we’ve all gathered… maybe today?” Ciel answered.
“Probably tomorrow. Because it’s not like they would really start it right away. So, what form will this year’s Bloodline Continuation Ceremony take?”
“Don’t know,” Ciel said with a shake of her head.
“Don’t lie to me,” Eugene growled.
“I really don’t know,” Ciel pouted. “It’s a tradition that the head of the family decides how the Bloodline Continuation Ceremony will be held. But because my father isn’t here right now…. Hmmm…. But my mother said that he would be returning soon. Anyway, I really don’t know.”
Eugene couldn’t believe her words completely. Since she was the direct descendant of the main family, shouldn’t she at least have heard something?
‘...Father said that during his time, twelve people competed in a tournament,’ Eugene recalled. ‘And in the last Bloodline Continuation Ceremony, the participants were made to wander through a forest for ten days.’
Each time the form of the ceremony changed, but the essence remained the same. The Bloodline Continuation Ceremony was meant to fairly judge the quality of the future generations who would inherit the name of Lionheart. But unfortunately, although that was what it was meant to be, life wasn’t fair. In the end, the children of the main family, who had trained their mana since childhood, were the ones who excelled during the Bloodline Continuation Ceremony.
Ever since Eugene had first heard about the Bloodline Continuation Ceremony, he had thought that it was an odd tradition.
As such, he had vowed to personally turn the tables on the main family during the Bloodline Continuation Ceremony.
‘Vermouth, don’t feel sorry for them once I’m done messing with your descendants,’ Eugene spoke in his head to Vermouth, who was probably already in heaven, as he pulled his stiff body up off the floor. ‘After all, it wasn’t like I asked to be reincarnated as your descendant.’
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