Didn't Plan to Become a Companion (Completed Main Story) - Chapter 7

  1. Home
  2. Didn't Plan to Become a Companion (Completed Main Story)
  3. Chapter 7
Prev
Next

The day my confusion began, Sabrina was not lounging in her lavish room but rolling around on the bed in her shabby chamber in the East Wing.

“Big brother’s coming.”

“Really? With the Count?”

Count Fennel often sent Justin back to the manor ahead of his own return home. When the Count was present in the estate, it was far easier to shield him.

Apparently, the Count had merely instructed Justin to fetch the painting depicting the labyrinth and had not specifically ordered him to be mistreated. Justin had always sneaked into the East Wing, avoiding the Count’s gaze each time.

“No, Father seems like he’ll be a bit late.”

Sabrina and I sighed simultaneously. Well, I could understand my own sigh.

“Why are you sighing?”

“They said they’ll be staying longer this time.”

“Who?”

“Who else? Father and that bastard Justin.”

Sabrina abruptly sat up from the bed and walked over to the table where I was sitting. She plopped down across from me and idly tapped a finger against the sweets I’d been saving to give Ricardo later. Then she rested her chin on the table and let out another deep sigh.

I didn’t need to ask why they’d be staying so long. At this time of year, the seas grew rough. Since the Count managed a trading consortium as his main business, both he and Justin always stayed at the manor for an extended rest during this season.

“I’m worried Mother’s condition will worsen when Father arrives.”

Lately, Countess Fennel had been taking short walks in the garden during midday. She didn’t speak warmly to us, but sometimes she’d quietly watch us playing together.

As Sabrina said, the Countess might retreat back into her room again once the Count showed up.

“Oh, by the way—I saw something on my way here. That kid’s acting strange.”

To Sabrina, Ricardo was still just the nameless boy of the East Wing.

Yet on a sunny spring day atop a hill, Ricardo had told me his name first—as if revealing the name of a flower blooming in the field.

“What? He was fine even this morning.”

“He kept staring at me but didn’t acknowledge me at all.”

“He never acknowledges you anyway.”

“That’s not the point! He’s started at least saying hello now!”

Sabrina nearly got angry but then flopped back onto the desk.

“It’s not really about greeting or not—it’s just… his eyes had no focus. He looked like someone who’d lost their mind. When I spoke to him, he just kept drawing. Ugh… it was kind of scary.”

She shivered slightly, but I didn’t take my eyes off the book I was reading and answered absentmindedly, “Really?”

“And his drawing was super weird too. He drew something like an underground dungeon—twisting paths all tangled up like a maze.”

My hand, flipping through the pages, froze abruptly. When I looked up, I saw Sabrina’s ginger-shaped cookie, its arm snapped clean off by her fingers, crumbling into dust that scattered across the table.

“What?”

“You scared me! Why’d you shout like that?”

“Say it again.”

“Why are you getting so mad all of a sudden?”

“I said, say it again.”

“What I mean is, that East Wing kid drew a maze before, but it wasn’t nearly this dark. This one actually made me feel trapped in an underground prison. Just glancing at it made me feel like I’d been pulled right inside… Anyway, it gave me chills! Hey, where are you going?”

Ignoring Sabrina’s call, I ran off to find Ricardo.

According to Sabrina, what he was drawing was unmistakably a labyrinth.

Until now, my sole hope and relief had been that Ricardo only started drawing the labyrinth’s map after leaving the Count’s estate…

“Oh, no—it can’t be.”

By the time I found Ricardo, my breath was already catching in my throat. He stood before the largest window on the ground floor of the East Wing, facing the courtyard. Frowning deeply with an easel set before him, his mere presence conjured an otherworldly scene.

His raven-black hair darker than shadow, obsidian-bright eyes, a face so pale it verged on translucent, a long and straight neck, and a posture as noble as a crane—his beauty was enough to steal one’s soul at a single glance.

Yet his own eyes held nothing. The faint smile he used to give me when our eyes met was utterly gone.

“Why so soon…?”

I buried my face in both hands and sank to the floor.

“What’s wrong with you?”

Even as Sabrina, who had chased after me, panted noisily nearby, Ricardo remained motionless.

I immediately realized Ricardo wasn’t truly here. Taking a quiet breath to steady myself, I slowly stood up.

Even as I moved closer to examine his drawing, he didn’t seem to notice I was beside him.

The drawing was the labyrinth itself.

Though not yet fully complete, it wouldn’t take him long to finish the map.

“It’s still too soon….”

Trending

No matter how desperately I pleaded, he gave no reaction. I turned slightly toward Sabrina and asked sharply,

“When did Justin say he’d arrive?”

“In a week.”

I quickly gathered Ricardo and his drawing and hurried away from the spot.

He followed me silently and lay down on his bed in his room. As soon as he lay down, his breathing quickly evened out—he’d fallen asleep.

I brushed aside Sabrina’s incessant chatter and returned alone to my room. Only after shoving his drawing into the blazing fireplace could I finally catch my breath.

“I have to stop it.”

But why on earth had he started drawing the map already?

Rochester is the pillar of the Empire.

Everyone in the Empire openly claims that Emperor Schneider’s throne exists solely atop that very pillar.

Ricardo, who hadn’t even manifested his powers—let alone awakened—would lose not only the labyrinth’s map but his very life to the Emperor.

Manifestation was an unmistakable force; once Ricardo manifested, he’d immediately gain the protection of the Dukedom. Then, not even the Duke and Emperor, no matter how absolute their power, could easily harm him.

I closed my eyes for a moment, recalling the day I was executed in beast form.

Every moment on the way to the scaffold existed only in fragmented images like paintings, but the burning death itself was vividly imprinted even behind my shut eyelids.

There had been nothing in Ricardo’s eyes when we met just before I was bound to the rack.

If only there had been the tiniest trace of warmth in those eyes—if only I could be completely erased from his life once he returned whole to the Dukedom—

I had clung irrationally to just that one belief: that I wouldn’t die—and thus endured the horrifying future approaching me and the painful past behind me.

“We’d only just begun… he’d only just started smiling at me again….”

Soon after returning to the Dukedom, a Saintess would appear to assist his manifestation.

To steady my wavering heart, I took a deep breath and stared into the fireplace, where only ashes remained.

Any moment now, the Duke’s carriage would cross the Pernelle manor gates.

“What went wrong?”

I couldn’t understand why he’d started drawing the labyrinth, but one thing was certain: Ricardo and I still lacked the strength to protect the map. Until he gained that power, I had to stop him myself.

[This is the timeline separator]

Beneath the deep blue sky hung a bizarre drawing.

Standing incongruously against the manor’s opulent scenery were a gaunt little girl and a hulking man locked in an argument.

“What I’m saying is, just bruise the wrist—very lightly, just enough that he can’t hold a brush to paint precisely.”

Every day had been spent solving one immediate problem after another. But everything around us was moving far too quickly.

“There aren’t many people in this world capable of such perfect swordsmanship.”

“Don’t go shouting that where anyone can hear! It’s wooden sword practice, not actual swordsmanship!”

Harold, a knight of House Fennel, shook his head and clicked his tongue.

“It’s all the same.”

“How is that the same? Anyway, it has to be the right wrist. Got it? No need to do anything to the left.”

“Please stop talking. The more you say, the more confused I get.”

If only Harold were a bit smaller, I’d consider taking him on…

“Alright, fine. Just go easy—make it painless. Understand?”

“How can you possibly make it painless when you’re slicing open a wrist?”

Ugh, he really doesn’t get it.

“I said, I’m not cutting it open—just bruising it slightly. Enough that his wrist swells and he can’t paint. How many times do I have to say it?”

“To swell so badly he can’t hold a brush, you’d at least need to crack the wrist bone.”

“R-Really? Well, we have no choice. But absolutely nowhere else can get hurt.”

“I can’t promise that.”

“You have to promise that!”

“Anyway, as the future finest knight of the Resotia Duchy, I find this order deeply shameful—but since I’ve been given it, I shall obey.”

In truth, it wasn’t an official order he’d received—just someone stepping forward to help another.

“Good, good. I’ll count on you. I’ll go lure Ricardo over.”

For some reason, Harold furrowed his brow even deeper at my words.

“Again? What’s the problem now?”

“What do you mean, ‘lure’? Didn’t you clearly say this was a good deed? Although I do question whether crippling a child’s wrist can truly be called ‘good.’”

Harold was normally a taciturn man with sharp judgment—but the man before me now seemed like a completely different person, especially with his habit of twisting others’ words.

ads

“I’ve told you how many times—it’s not crippling!”

Rather than keep defending myself, I decided to brazen it out.

“If you don’t want to see the wrist of the thief who stole the bread get cut off, you’d better listen to me. Understood?”

Most Commented This Week
Prev
Next

YOUR COMMENT

1. Please write comments in English.
2. Inline comments are now available. Tap the end of any line in a chapter to share your thoughts instantly.