Chapter 87
From far away in the lobby, Miel, Soya, and Teacher Ann came running.
“Your Highness! Oh my, I thought I would die from wanting to see you, Miel says!”
“So, did you have a good trip?”
Teacher Ann was quietly smiling at me from behind the two of them.
I gave her a brief nod in greeting, then turned to Soya.
“Soya.”
Soya’s eyes went wide.
“Could we have a glass of juice with Ria right now?”
Now that we had arrived at the dukedom, it was time to choose the first aide I had in mind.
“Ugh, the smell!”
As soon as they entered the barracks, Burmard twisted his face in disgust.
He then glared at the makeshift bed on one side of the room.
“Really, can’t people be more careful in a shared living space?”
On the bed lay a woman with a large injury on her left thigh, and next to her stood a tall, broad-shouldered man.
The large man, Jen, answered with a troubled expression.
“…I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? Is that all? Just how frail is your wife? Everyone who came with you has already healed.”
Burmard huffed as he sat on a simple chair, and the dozen or so people in the barracks looked at him.
He shrugged at their gazes.
“Maybe your wife has a body that doesn’t respond to medicine?”
The others exchanged surprised looks.
“No, isn’t it true? I heard Princess Abner who made the medicine is only five years old.”
“……”
“And judging by how they give it to creatures like us, maybe it’s not that effective after all.”
Finally, one person spoke up.
“Hey, young man! This is the precious medicine given to us sick and pitiful folks. Isn’t that harsh to say?”
“Seriously. Then why is that frail woman still not healed?”
At those words, the elderly man who had been raising his voice fell silent.
Where his gaze fell, Jen’s wife Shelby was sweating and groaning in pain.
Shelby had been a kind woman who ran a small fried food stall with her husband at the edge of Longton Territory.
One day, a worn-out pot stand broke, and boiling oil spilled onto her thigh.
Jen and Shelby tried to treat the wound, but in the burning pain, there was no way to get medicine.
At that desperate moment, Jen heard a rumor from a neighbor.
A newly developed, incredible medicine was being distributed for free in Abner Territory.
Jen immediately put Shelby in a cart and headed straight for Abner Territory.
Thanks to his size and athletic ability, it took less than three days to get there.
But…
“It’s strange. Why is it that only this girl’s wound won’t heal?”
An old man clicked his tongue pityingly, and Burmard replied,
“Ah, obviously! She just has a body that doesn’t respond to medicine!”
Jen’s expression grew even darker.
Upon arriving in Abner Territory, they were directed to a temporary barracks for immigrants.
They received two bottles of medicine from Burmard, the temporary barracks manager.
One was Rubarina for healing wounds, the other Rubawen for infection prevention.
Shelby began taking the medicine immediately, and for the first few days, her wound seemed to improve.
But the problem began after that.
“The wound stinks! I can’t even bear the smell of the bandages!”
Burmard slammed the chair handle in frustration.
The people around him protested.
“Hey! You were sick too. Watch your words in a room full of patients, okay?!”
But Burmard, with a frightening expression, was shameless.
“Funny, huh? Everyone else healed in three days and never smelled rotting flesh. That smell is disgusting, got it?”
“That… that man!”
Amid the tense atmosphere, Jen remained silent.
He no longer had the energy to argue or get angry at Burmard.
He only wished for Shelby, groaning beside him, to feel even a little relief.
“I knew the moment I saw her. Your wife looks like medicine won’t work on her.”
Burmard said with a mocking tone, then looked at Jen.
“You know you’re the only ones still taking medicine in this barracks, right? I’m also a middle manager here, so I have to be careful, you know?”
Jen pressed his lips together and finally replied, unable to hold back.
“So what should we do? Stop the medicine when the wound hasn’t even healed?”
Burmard flinched instinctively.
Jen, tall and broad, with sun-tanned skin, looked twice his size.
Burmard cleared his throat and answered,
“No, no. I’m just a little… embarrassed, that’s all.”
He averted his gaze, crossed one leg, and frowned nervously.
Inside, he was scheming hard.
‘Damn, should I finally give the real medicine and end this?’
His pocket was full of Rubarina bottles he had been secretly keeping for Shelby.
He had also taken a few from the warehouse before.
‘I shouldn’t have refused her.’
He remembered the first day Shelby arrived at the barracks.
While Jen was away for paperwork, Shelby was left alone in the barracks.
That was when Burmard had approached her.
‘Wow, what a sight for sore eyes. How old are you, hmm?’
Her pale face, hair damp with sweat, and flushed cheeks from the fever were exactly his type.
He wanted to wipe her body gently with a wet cloth.
‘…She won’t back down?’
Despite her innocent appearance, Shelby had a surprisingly sharp side.
‘A potato stamped in stone, huh. Who does she think she is.’
Even while groaning, Shelby pushed Burmard’s hand away disdainfully and cursed him.
He had only wanted to compliment her because she looked pretty!
‘She brought this on herself. Stupid girl.’
At first, it was just a minor venting of frustration.
Burmard swapped Shelby’s medicine with some old ointment he had.
He didn’t touch the infection prevention Rubawen.
He knew that if an infection progressed, her life could be at risk.
As a result, Shelby’s wound would swell and then temporarily improve with Rubawen, over and over.
She wasn’t dying, but she was in extreme pain—a nasty situation.
‘I was thinking of slowly giving her more medicine around now…’
He wasn’t confident enough to fully heal her yet.
Recently, he realized that the Rubarina he had taken without thinking could be quite useful.
‘To nobles, one bottle costs 100,000 Terra.’
And that was the official price; on the black market, it could sell for more than twenty times that.
‘I’ve already collected fifteen bottles. If I sell them all…’
He could make more in one deal than a year of work.
Burmard twitched his lips.
‘Ah, what should I do?’
Should he finally heal Shelby and then find someone else to steal medicine from?
He was making these plans when suddenly—
“P-Princess?”
“Princess, what are you doing here…?”
The barracks outside erupted in commotion.
“Workers for the greenhouse?!”
I stared at the man grinning from ear to ear.
His face was so mischievous that I couldn’t help but look.
‘But I shouldn’t judge by appearances.’
I quickly steadied myself and nodded.
“Yes. Is there anyone who wants to apply to this barracks?”
“Of course! Absolutely!”
The man rubbed his palms and scanned the line of Logrio and the guards behind me.
Then he turned to Soya beside me.
“My name is Burmard Paki. I walked up from the south for a week. I was the first to arrive at this barracks!”
I tilted my head.
“Ever since I was young, I’ve been amazing at managing and organizing things! I was so good at it that people lined up to take me elsewhere…”
Burmard, the man, was enthusiastically selling himself—not to me, but to Soya.
As if speaking to a child like me wouldn’t make sense at all.
