Paragon of Skills

CHapter 274

Jacob looks at Lyssaena and sighs.

“You want to become my student now.”

“At all costs,” Lyssaena replies with a straight face.

Everybody in the room is floored by her attitude.

What does she mean ‘at all costs’?! Wasn’t she calling Mr. Cabbage a fraud just until a moment ago?

Jacob sits down and drums his knuckles on the table, briefly looking at Lancelot, who has taken out more food from he doesn’t even know where.

“She’s the city lord’s daughter,” Maelin says, hoping to gain some more favor with Lyssaena, who looks pleased when the young man states her background for her, knowing it will pressure Mr. Cabbage to accept her.

“Oh, I see,” Jacob says in response.

Lyssaena can already imagine how hearing of such an important background, Mr. Cabbage, who just arrived to Ashenmere, is ready to do the impossible to get her as his student. Having the city lord’s daughter as your disciple, would, in fact, skyrocket Mr. Cabbage’s position not only among the Tutors in Ashenmere, but more broadly among everybody.

Lyssaena even briefly considers whether she wants to play hard to get now. Perhaps, she was too hasty before. Even though Mr. Cabbage seems to have incredible tutoring capabilities, wouldn’t he be more motivated to give her the best treatment if he had to work harder to get her?

But since she hears Mr. Cabbage speak, most certainly because he can’t believe she’s so eager to become his student, she decides to be kind-hearted and allow him to make her his student.

“Well then,” Jacob says, looking at her with a warm smile. “I’d rather die a thousand times over than have you as my student. Scram now, please.”

“Of course I accept—“ Lyssaena is ready to accept when Mr. Cabbage’s words reach her and her eyes go absolutely wide.

Everyone in the room is floored again.

Has their hearing stopped working?

Did the Mr. Cabbage guy, the unknown Tutor living above the Sleeping Goose Inn, just say that he’d rather die a thousand times over than have Lyssaena become his student?

They must certainly have heard it wrong.

What madman would refuse Lyssaena like this?

“You heard me,” Jacob says. “You will never become my student. Not in a million—no, not in a trillion years!”

Every one in the room, even Lancelot, is stunned.

Boss, a million years is already a long time. Did you really have to offend this Young Mistress and bump it up to a trillion? Lancelot groans internally.

“Everybody out of my room now, thank you. I’m not taking any more students.”

Doran and Maelon sigh, looking at Lyssaena, thinking that after such an offensive remark, she’s going to go back to being cold and haughty again and forget about Mr. Cabbage in order to get her dignity back.

“Absolutely not,” Lyssaena says shamelessly. “I’m not leaving until I can become your student.”

Jacob stares at the city lord’s daughter with wide eyes, “what do you mean you’re not leaving?”

Everybody is as stunned as Jacob. How can a city lord’s daughter be this shameless?

“Exactly what I said,” Lyssaena says. “I am not leaving.”

“You are,” Jacob says. “Preferably before you become even more of a headache.”

“I can pay.”

“My services are not for sale.”

Lyssaena, against everyone’s expectations, lunges for Mr. Cabbage’s sleeve and grasp it so tight that the robe starts tearing, “I WILL DO ANYTHING! I WILL PAY ANY SUM!”

The sleeve starts tearing when, suddenly, the doro slams open.

“What is she offering to pay for?” a cold male voice asks.

Lyssaena’s eyes widen. “Brother, what are you doing here?”

A tall, heroic-looking young man steps inside, one hand already on his sword.

Jacob can feel his headache only growing stronger.

Lancelot, on the side, has produced a bowl of popcorns from who-knows-where.

As he assesses the situation and sees Lyssaena, his sweet younger sister, having torn off the sleeve of this unremarkable Tutor, Janson Ashenmere feels his forehead’s vein about to burst.

“YOU PIG! LET MY SISTER GO!”

“Pig?!” Jacob is absolutely in awe of how someone could call him pig since he’s the one being assaulted. “Tell your sister to get her hands off me, instead!”

“ARE YOU INSULTING MY SISTER’S HONOR!?”

“Oh no, Janson is very strong,” Doran tells Maelin. “This is going to get ugly.”

A Diamond-rank aura erupts from the man and Jacob is about to lose it all and tell Lancelot to take care of this buffoonery when Lyssaena throws herself in front of her brother.

“Do not misunderstand, Janson!” Lyssaena screams. “Mr. Cabbage is a supreme-grade Tutor capable of anything!”

“Capable of anything?!”

Those words don’t seem to calm down Janson, who’s clearly, once again, misunderstood the situation.

“He’s truly capable of anything!” Lyssaena nods her head. “He bared naked my core and then, with his hands, remolded—”

“Alright!” Jacob says, stepping forward, putting Lyssaena aside, and, with Janson barely seeing his movements, appearing in front of him. “Her words are easy to misunderstand. I helped your sister with her Movement Skill. I am a Tutor and nothing more. And I was in the process of refusing to take your sister under my tutelage because, as you might imagine, sir, she’s of too noble birth. My lowly service would never be able to serve her properly. And I can guarantee you, even swear an oath if you need me, that I did not lay hand on her in any way.”

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Janson Ashenmere seems slightly appeased by that, but still eyes Jacob darkly as he nods and takes Lyssaena’s hand, “let’s go, sister. We’ll have a chat at home about the kind of people you seem to be meddling with. This is below your station.”

To Jacob’s delight, the young man manages to drag away the stubborn girl.

Moments after, Maelin and Doran follow.

Jacob looks for a few seconds at the quiet room, letting himself exhale in contentment and then telling Lancelot, “we’re buying something to reinforce that damn door.”

***

Two days later, Jacob walks into Lily Hall, ready to buy reagents in order to heal Thalric, which will, in turn, grant him access to the mines without having to sneak in.

His shoulders are slightly narrowed by the Primordial disguise, and a hood low enough that nobody should have looked twice at him.

This would have worked better if Ashenmere had not apparently spent the last forty-eight hours talking about him.

Lancelot walks at his side in a plain traveler’s coat, chewing on a wrapped flatbread with the serene focus of a man born for difficult missions and casual eating. Korim trails half a step behind.

Lily Hall is chaos.

The long covered market has been transformed into something halfway between a festival and a battlefield. Reagent stalls line both sides of the stone path under green-painted beams. Drying herbs hang in bundles from crossbars.

At the far center of the hall, under a hanging banner embroidered with a silver flower and a drop of blue liquid, a raised platform has been assembled for Master Velnaris’s arrival.

The line for appraisals already snakes halfway around the building.

Jacob takes one look at the line and decides he hates this city.

“Boss,” Lancelot says around a mouthful of food, “I have bad news.”

“I have eyes, Lance,” Jacob frowns. “Do you think we’re going to wait that long?”

“No, the other bad news. Listen.”

Jacob does.

“…and I’m telling you, it was him,” one merchant whispers to another at the nearest stall. “The one above the Sleeping Goose. The one who made Davren lose face.”

“The vegetable?”

“Mr. Cabbage, yes.”

Jacob closes his eyes.

Lancelot starts laughing into his wrap, shoulders shaking.

“Don’t,” Jacob says.

“I’m not saying anything. You’re just very famous.”

Korim, who had insisted on coming because he “knew the hall” and could “help identify local sellers,” tries not to smile and fails.

Jacob turns on him.

“If you laugh too, I’m sending you home.”

Korim immediately straightens.

“I would never, Master.”

Jacob stares at him.

“Stop calling me that in public.”

“Yes, Master.”

Jacob pinches the bridge of his nose.

They start through the stalls.

He keeps his attention on the reagents and not on the whispers. The Grimoire remains quiet as they pass dried emberleaf, cracked moonseed, three grades of marsh resin, and a stall that appears to be selling powdered bone under at least four different names.

The list for Thalric’s treatment is simple in theory and deeply irritating in practice.

Powdered Ashfire Root.

Crystallized Vein Moss.

One drop of Silvered Marrow Oil.

Simple if one lives in a capital.

Much less simple if one lives in a mining city where half the local herbal trade is built on confidence, family connections, and aggressive lying.

“This place is packed,” Korim says softly.

They stop at the first serious-looking reagent stall. The woman running it has white gloves, neat labels, and the expression of someone who enjoys telling people they cannot afford things.

Jacob nods politely.

“Ashfire Root,” he says. “Powdered, if you have it. Vein Moss, crystallized. Silvered Marrow Oil.”

The woman’s gaze flicks across him. Then to Korim. Then back.

“We have all three,” she says. “Depends on your budget.”

“Reasonable quality.”

“Everything here is reasonable quality.”

That, in Lily Hall, means almost nothing.

Jacob leans closer to the trays.

Then the Grimoire opens.

[Grimoire Analysis.]

[Ashfire Root.]

[Contamination detected.]

Jacob goes very still.

The tray in front of him looks perfect. Clean slicing. Strong color. Dry without being brittle. If he did not have the Grimoire, he would have bought it.

[Asmodeus-linked trace detected.]

His heartbeat slows.

Not the vendor, then.

The root itself.

He does not move.

“Boss?” Lancelot asks quietly.

Jacob does not answer.

The Grimoire keeps unfolding.

[Ashfire Root.]

[Foreign infernal trace embedded at the intake layer. Distributed through the reagent structure itself.]

[Effect: unknown under normal consumption. Potential corruption vector.]

That is worse.

That is much worse.

Because if the corruption is in the reagent itself, not just on a shady seller or a single hidden stash, then this has already traveled.

People have bought this.

People have brewed this.

People have swallowed this.

“Boss,” Lancelot says again, no humor left in his voice now.

Korim sees Jacob’s expression change and swallows.

“What happened?” he asks.

Jacob straightens slowly.

He looks at the merchant, who has started looking offended in advance, perhaps because she mistakes his stillness for bargaining.

“We’ll come back,” Jacob says.

“We have paying customers now,” the woman says coolly. “If you walk, the lot may be gone.”

“Then let it be gone.”

He steps away.

Korim hurries after him.

“Master,” he says before catching himself. “Mr. Cabbage. What is it?”

Jacob stops.

He looks at Korim. Then at the wrapped food in Lancelot’s hand.

Then at the long market around them, full of cooked snacks, decoctions, herb powders, half-ground roots, traveling brews, candied nuts, and every other thing people in crowded halls put into their bodies without thinking.

“Do not eat anything from the market,” Jacob says.

Korim blinks.

“What?”

“Anything,” Jacob repeats.

Lancelot, who can recognize when Jacob is serious, nods and says nothing, just patting Korim’s shoulder, “just do as told.”

Korim nods back even if he doesn’t understand.

Lancelot slowly lowers his wrap.

“…Boss?”

Jacob turns his head toward him.

“Yes. That includes you.”

Lancelot looks down at the food in his hand as though betrayed by a trusted companion.

“I already ate half.”

Jacob ignores him and moves forward, toward the queue.

“Public appraisals for Master Velnaris begin at midday! Serious cases first! Reagent verification to the left queue! No pushing!”

Jacob’s eyes narrow.

There are at least two hundred people in line.

At the very front stand two men, and one immediately jerks his finger toward Jacob.

“That’s the imposter!” He shouts with a shrill voice. “That bald-headed vegetable bastard stole my student!”

The man who just shouted is bald himself, which makes Jacob frown.

Don’t you have some manner of self-awareness? He thinks. But then, he sees the other man, much taller, built like a tank and wearing expensive True Diamond armor walk toward Jacob with narrowed eyes.