Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume 4.9 - Chapter SS4

The New Children

“Wilma, Lord Hartmut is calling for you.”

“I thank you ever so much for going out of your way for this, Monika. I will go at once.”

Lady Rozemyne had departed for the castle after the new High Priest was appointed. From now until winter socializing began, her guard knights would be taking turns watching the High Bishop’s chambers to ensure that nobody else attempted to steal inside.

All nobles went to the castle for winter socializing and were exceedingly busy there, and the knights were no exception; they would need to leave when socializing season began. However, it seemed that Lord Hartmut, the new High Priest, was going to continue visiting the temple to give instructions to blue priests, summon Lady Rozemyne’s attendants for reports, and so on.

Lord Hartmut’s first Dedication Ritual was fast approaching, and Lady Rozemyne would not be returning from the Royal Academy to help. To accommodate her absence, Lord Hartmut planned to send her letters to keep her abreast with the goings-on of the temple. I truly appreciated his kind and considerate nature.

“Lord Hartmut, it is Wilma,” I said.

“I realize this is sudden, but new children are going to be brought here soon. How ready is the orphanage to take them?”

“The rooms themselves are prepared, but, as per my last report, we are still short on supplies like food, firewood, and bedding. I believe that Fran or Zahm might be able to give you a more thorough rundown of what we lack and what we have in excess.”

Lady Rozemyne had said that we needed only prepare the rooms and that they would bring the necessary supplies at a later date. Lord Hartmut recorded my report on a board that he had on hand.

“Understood. Now, these children are going to be anxious beyond words, having so suddenly lost their families. I imagine it will be a challenge to care for them all, but I trust you to do well,” Lord Hartmut said with a smile. He was Lady Rozemyne’s retainer and an archnoble, but he showed not even a trace of arrogance and was kind to everyone in the orphanage.

Back when Lord Hartmut had first started visiting the temple, he had often visited the orphanage with Lord Justus, the noble who had overseen both the orphanage and the workshop in the High Priest’s place during Lady Rozemyne’s long sleep. Lord Justus was exceedingly easy to speak to and lacked the natural haughtiness of the nobility, so all those in the orphanage and the workshop had come to admire him greatly.

Still, it seemed to me that the children preferred Lord Hartmut. He often told them how Lady Rozemyne was faring in the archduke’s castle and the Royal Academy, and they loved his stories so much that they asked him to tell them over and over again. I had started to worry that he would take offense, but he always agreed to their requests, his smile never faltering even for a moment. He was very kind and surely loved children with all his heart.

Everyone in the orphanage had rejoiced when told that Lord Hartmut was being assigned as the new High Priest. Normally, the role was given to a blue priest, so there had been a risk of someone being selected who would treat the gray priests and shrine maidens cruelly. We were grateful to Lady Rozemyne for having offered one of her retainers and grateful to both the archduke and the former High Priest for having let him take up the position despite him not being a blue priest.

“Now, Wilma... are you done with the task I gave you?”

“Almost. I wish that I had finished before the arrival of the children, but the circumstances have left me much too busy. I plan to continue working on it in place of winter handiwork this year.”

Lord Hartmut had ordered two illustrations depicting Lady Rozemyne. The first was to have her playing the harspiel in her blue robes, and the second wielding Flutrane’s staff as the High Bishop. I could only assume that Lord Hartmut valued both sights dearly, as the instructions he had given me were exceedingly detailed. The task had seemed daunting at first, but the illustrations were slowly but surely meeting my personal standards.

“I am afraid you will grow even busier once the children arrive,” Lord Hartmut said. “I, too, will be occupied for some time, so I may have to wait until things calm down to collect them. You wish to be paid in paint, if I recall correctly?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Money could not be used in the orphanage, so I was instead requesting what I needed to create more art. As well as the two illustrations of Lady Rozemyne that I was making for Lord Hartmut, I was also making an illustration of the previous High Priest, Lord Ferdinand, playing the harspiel for Lady Elvira. The spring and autumn had proven so wonderfully fulfilling—but also hectic and very challenging.

“Like Konrad, the children coming this winter were living as nobles,” Lord Hartmut explained. “Lady Rozemyne wishes for them to be educated, with those who show promise being returned to noble society—but will the orphanage be able to educate them?”

“We should not face any difficulties teaching them to read, write, do math, and use proper etiquette. Lady Rozemyne seems confident of this as well. Our greatest challenge is going to be teaching music; the orphanage does not have the necessary instruments.”

Rosina had once helped teach the children to play instruments, and my familiarity with music meant that I could also provide some assistance, but there was very little that we could do without the instruments themselves.

“You will not need to worry about that. We will provide you with the instruments from their homes,” Lord Hartmut said with a smile, then indicated that our business was concluded.

I returned to the orphanage with Lothar, an attendant working in the High Priest’s chambers. Lord Hartmut had so considerately instructed him to accompany me to keep any blue priests from getting too close.

“It appears that you really do trust Lord Hartmut, Wilma.”

“Indeed. He is Lady Rozemyne’s retainer, and truly kind. Everyone in the orphanage trusts him as well. We are all so glad to have him as the new High Priest.”

The orphanage had struggled with the news of the four gray priests serving as guards being kidnapped. Lady Rozemyne and her retainers had ended up fighting so hard to save them, but in truth, it would have been entirely normal to leave them to their fates. With that in mind, Lord Hartmut understanding Lady Rozemyne’s determination to protect the orphanage and making considerations to keep us safe proved just what a wonderful person he was.

“How do you feel about Lord Hartmut, Lothar?”

“He prioritizes Lady Rozemyne in all matters and works diligently for her sake, rather than for the sake of the temple. This is fine for now, as Lady Rozemyne is set on supporting the temple, but I must say that his actions and mindset are nothing like those of Lord Ferdinand.”

Lothar was evidently struggling to understand what his lord was thinking and act accordingly. It was common for attendants to have a hard time when assigned to serve someone else, so I imagined that all the attendants of the High Priest’s chambers were feeling the same way.

“During his time here, Lord Ferdinand expertly balanced traditional methods with Lady Rozemyne’s new ones,” Lothar noted. “Lord Hartmut, in contrast, intends to push through only Lady Rozemyne’s methods. I expect the temple will change even more than it has already.”

The ways of the temple had changed dramatically in the few years since Lady Rozemyne had accepted the role of orphanage director and then High Bishop. I couldn’t fathom what even greater changes would entail.

“No matter what happens, Lady Rozemyne will not change the temple or orphanage for the worse,” I said. “We can be certain of that.”

“You really do trust her, Wilma...”

“Indeed. She is the Saint of Ehrenfest, after all.”

Lothar chortled. Apparently, Lord Hartmut always said the same thing.

“Delia, Lily—we are soon going to have an influx of new orphans,” I said. “I am told they are the children of nobles.”

Delia already had experience with infants, having started looking after Dirk when he was still at breastfeeding age, and Lily was the only gray shrine maiden in the temple with experience giving birth, so they had inevitably ended up spending more time with the youngest children than anyone else.

“What could have happened for so many children to be coming to the orphanage at once, I wonder?” Delia said.

Security had increased ever since Brother Egmont allowed a noblewoman into the temple, the gray priests were kidnapped, and Lady Rozemyne was targeted. The orphanage itself was the same as ever, but the atmosphere in the nobles’ section of the temple was said to have changed completely. Fran had said that, whenever Lord Hartmut spoke of winter plans, he was always highly concerned with the movements of the blue priests. Lord Hartmut wasn’t even allowing their attendants to go near the orphanage.

“Gray priests and shrine maidens cannot refuse orders from blue priests, so in many cases, it is better for us to not know these things. We will also be able to look after the children without any bias if we do not know the reason they ended up here.”

We had taken in a noble child—Konrad—once already. He had chosen to leave his home after receiving terrible abuse, so he had adjusted to life in the orphanage without issue—but I wasn’t sure whether these other children, who had so abruptly lost their homes, would welcome the new environment so readily. I was a little worried about them.

“In any case, I must finish the illustrations of Lady Rozemyne for Lord Hartmut before we grow busy with the new children,” I said. “Please keep an eye on things so that I’m not distracted.”

“Understood. Lord Hartmut certainly loves Lady Rozemyne, doesn’t he?” Delia replied, sounding exasperated. It was an understandable opinion to have, considering that he seemed to segue into talking about his lady whenever he came to the orphanage, no matter whom he was speaking to.

Though Delia loves Lady Rozemyne too, I’m sure.

Delia certainly appreciated how much Lady Rozemyne cared about Dirk; she had worn a genuine smile for quite some time after Lady Rozemyne expressed her concerns about Dirk generating too much mana. Delia was quick to deny it, so I decided to hold my tongue and watch her with a warm smile... but Lily showed much less restraint. She gave a mischievous smile and giggled with a hand over her mouth.

“Oh my, Delia... But do you not always join him in his conversations about her? I seem to recall the many, many occasions on which you’ve told him about the time Lady Rozemyne used a shield of Wind to save Dirk.”

“Th-That was just... Aah, geez! Is there anything wrong with that?! As an apprentice gray shrine maiden, I can’t just refuse to answer when he asks me about the moment I found Lady Rozemyne the most beautiful and divine! And it’s not like I can give him any more recent examples, since I’m stuck here in the orphanage!”

Delia had turned bright red.

“Ahaha. You really do throw politeness to the wind when someone points out the truth and you get all flustered. Isn’t it cute, Wilma?”

“No, I don’t!” Delia protested, now becoming teary-eyed.

The very question made me giggle; Delia really was adorable when she was expressing her emotions. I gave Lily a very light scolding for teasing her before heading off to work on my illustrations for Lord Hartmut.

Because I was Lady Rozemyne’s attendant, I had a private room where I kept my art utensils and such. The number of personal belongings I owned had grown considerably. I switched into clothes that I wouldn’t mind getting dirtied, put on an apron, and picked up my brush. Then, after taking a slow breath, I looked down at my illustrations in progress. As an artist, this was the most important part of my day.

I searched the depths of my soul, trying to unravel which colors I should use and how I should use them, delicately applying one layer after another to convey Lady Rozemyne’s beauty as neatly as possible. Trying to figure out how to show the glossiness of her hair, which was as deep and mysterious as the night sky, and how to color her golden, gently smiling eyes was ever so much fun—but at the same time, it required complete seriousness. I felt that it was important to show the contrast between her days as a blue shrine maiden, when her eyes had been so emotive, and the present. She had grown used to disguising her emotions, so her expressions were now so much more reserved.

Is the distinction clear enough, though...?

I set down my brush, put the two illustrations on an easel so that they were side by side, then stepped back so that I could properly compare them. The one depicting her as the High Bishop exuded a more muted innocence than the other and made her come across as more of a fine young noblewoman, both in her expression and in her posture.

Lady Rozemyne’s long slumber meant that it was difficult to gauge her growth, but a closer inspection proved that she had matured so much to protect her family, the orphans, and now Ehrenfest as a whole. According to Monika, who served her much more closely than I, she had started to mature in other ways as well, particularly since the end of summer. The ceremonial robes that Lady Rozemyne had worn during the autumn coming-of-age ceremony apparently now looked noticeably shorter on her. Naturally, it was beneath Leidenschaft’s bright rays that children grew the fastest, so Monika was thinking of suggesting that Lady Rozemyne be remeasured next spring so that her clothes could be adjusted.

And she will only continue to grow. I cannot wait to see how beautiful she becomes.

Of course, there was a second reason for me to keep a close eye on Lady Rozemyne’s growth—I was certain that Lord Hartmut would order more illustrations from me in the future.

A short time later—not even ten days after winter socializing had started—the attendants of the High Priest’s office began bringing children to the orphanage. Lord Hartmut wanted them registered as orphans about as quickly as the knights were arriving with them.

There were children of all ages, from toddlers still struggling to walk, to children as old as Dirk and Konrad. They were wearing rather elegant clothes made to fit them, but this nicety only made their tragic situation that much more apparent. Some were in tears, while others were glaring at us warily—but they were all visibly scared. Four out of every five were clutching beautiful magic tools.

“There are seventeen in total, Wilma. This is the last one,” Lord Hartmut said as he brought the last child to be registered. Lothar, Gil, Fritz, and Monika were with him.

The children recoiled in fear upon seeing Lord Hartmut, but he simply regarded them with his usual bright smile and said, “From today onward, this place is your home. Being in the orphanage means that you are no longer nobles, and your lives will change drastically as a result. Be grateful to Lady Rozemyne, for her compassionate heart is the very reason you were given this opportunity.”

Lord Hartmut went on to introduce those of us who would be looking after the children in the orphanage, then called over Dirk and Konrad. Before speaking to them, he crouched down such that he was on their level. He always did this with the orphans; it was one of his many good points.

“Dirk, Konrad—the children here have all just lost their families,” Lord Hartmut explained. “I want you to teach them how things work here in the orphanage. Lady Rozemyne has resolved to save them, and your task is to help with that.”

Dirk and Konrad responded with firm nods. “Lady Rozemyne already saved us. We want them to be saved too.”

“You’re both such good kids,” Lord Hartmut said, mussing their hair with a gentle smile. “They’re feeling scared right now, but I want you to teach them the vastness of Lady Rozemyne’s compassion—and just how much they owe their lives to her.”

“Right!”

Lord Hartmut turned back to the new orphans. “Everyone, Konrad was once a noble as well. In that sense, he is the same as you. He understands the differences between living here and in the Noble’s Quarter better than anyone. You can ask him any questions you may have. I will return during the Dedication Ritual to see how you are all doing.”

From there, the gray priests were instructed to help move the luggage. Fritz and Gil gathered together those who were used to doing manual labor in the workshop and started at once. Meanwhile, the knights were going to be bringing in furniture and such for the children.

“If we had Lady Rozemyne’s highbeast, then we could have moved all this in one fell swoop,” Lord Hartmut remarked. “Instead, we must resort to using wagons. My lady truly does create one splendid thing after another.”

After extolling the virtues of Lady Rozemyne’s highbeast, Lord Hartmut left the orphanage with Lothar. Gil and the others returned not long after with the first pieces of luggage. We would need to divide the work between the gray priests and the children, using the contents of the boxes to begin setting up the new orphans’ rooms. For now, however, Lily and I embraced the young children who were crying for their families.

“Now, now,” Delia said. “There is no time to cry—we are preparing spaces for you to sleep. Please set them up yourselves.” She directed the children while Dirk moved to demonstrate.

“We can start with this mattress. Someone take the other side.”

“You can leave your magic tools here for now. You won’t be able to eat while holding them,” Konrad told the children. He was best suited to guide them, since he knew what noble life was like, but they showed no signs of moving—some even tightened their grips on their magic tools. Konrad sighed, looking especially troubled, and added, “As Lord Hartmut said, we are no longer nobles. You are going to be living here, so you need to learn to follow our rules.”

The children stared at Konrad with wide eyes. One girl in particular looked positively incensed. I moved to shield Konrad from her glare, then knelt down so that I was eye to eye with her.

“I am aware that nobles do not think highly of the temple,” I said, “and it is only natural that you would feel uneasy about living here. However, there is no avoiding that you must adapt to how we do things. All we can do is help you.”

The girl glared at me as well, radiating the dignity of a noble despite being so young. Her face then twisted in anger, as if she had at last found an opportunity to vent her frustrations. “You will ‘help’ us? What, do you mean to say that you will assist us in returning to noble society? Do not lie to us...”

“Oh, but that is precisely what I mean. Such is the job that has been given to me.”

My response caught the girl off guard. She stared at me for a moment and then muttered, “What...?”

“Oh my. Has Lord Hartmut not mentioned this? Lady Rozemyne intends for you all to be taught to read, write, do math, demonstrate etiquette, and play the harspiel at least at the level expected of a mednoble. Furthermore, I have been told that the most promising of you will be baptized as nobles, with the archduke himself as your guardian.”

The older children’s eyes flashed with ambition. I could only assume that the most enthusiastic among them were already close to reaching their baptisms. It was better to have an objective to work toward than wallow in sadness, even if that objective was simply to leave the orphanage.

“It is up to all of you to work hard,” I said with a smile. “Lady Rozemyne and Lord Hartmut will of course be receiving reports on your progress.”

A child standing behind the wide-eyed girl suddenly looked up, brimming with determination, and placed his magic tool where Konrad had indicated. “I’m going to get this education and go back to noble society,” he declared.

The boy then grabbed the opposite end of the mattress that Dirk was holding. The others had been too daunted to act, but now that somebody else had made the first move, they gradually began to follow suit. Only the youngest children remained frozen to the spot, unsure what to do.

“Let’s play once we finish getting the mattresses in place,” Dirk said to the boy who had moved to help him, his voice bright. “We have karuta, playing cards, and a lot of books.”

The boy merely pursed his lips in response; he wasn’t quite ready to open up to the idea.

Dirk laughed, unfazed. “I haven’t even lost to Konrad yet,” he continued. “If you can’t beat me, then you’ll never get to be a noble again.”

“I... practiced with my older brother. I would not lose to you.”

“We’ll see about that. I’m Dirk. You?”

“Bertram. I will ensure that my talents are recognized as the best of all those here and return to noble society as soon as I can.”

The older children who had decided to play along in the hope of returning to noble society began mimicking Dirk and Konrad, and their time in the orphanage started to progress smoothly. There were quite a few surprises, of course, but they did their best to assist us with work and took their studies very seriously. Our limited resources meant that the children had to share instruments during harspiel lessons, but they worked their hardest all the same, since they needed to know how to play for their debuts.

Dirk and Konrad were in turn being influenced positively by the new children, who had such clear goals in mind. They had started practicing music despite not having been very interested in it before, made friends to play karuta and playing cards with, and were now cycling through victories and defeats. Konrad had finally experienced winning after so many losses against Dirk, and it was clear how much this was motivating him.

According to Delia, who was looking after the oldest of the new orphans, there were still nights when some of the children cried quietly into their pillows. She hadn’t been able to speak to them about it—whenever she would go over to check on them, they would pretend to be asleep—so she had settled on just carefully watching over them the next day.

The oldest children had it best, since their baptisms were so close. Meanwhile, the youngest were still crying for their families almost each and every day. Lily and I did our best to embrace and comfort them all, but we didn’t have enough hands between us. In truth, I was a little sleep-deprived... and no sooner had that thought crossed my mind than Lord Hartmut appeared. He had with him six gray shrine maidens and five gray priests—the attendants of blue priests who had apparently been arrested along with their families.

“The blue priests were not involved in any crimes themselves, but they cannot live as blue priests without support from their families, and we needed to bring them in for questioning either way,” Lord Hartmut explained. “Of course, we gave any attendants who wished to be arrested with their lord the opportunity to go to the castle, but nobody expressed an interest, so we have brought them back to the orphanage instead. Their food will arrive from the rooms of the blue priests later on.” He then gave Lily and me a small grin and said, “The number of children has grown considerably. You will need as many helpers as you can get, no?”

That’s... exactly right.

Lord Hartmut’s profound kindness washed over me. I expressed my gratitude, then went to my room to fetch the illustrations of Lady Rozemyne.

“Lord Hartmut, here are the pictures you ordered. How are they?” I asked upon my return, spreading them out on a table in the dining hall.

Lord Hartmut peered at the illustrations. His orange eyes suddenly began to sparkle, and a sigh of awe passed his lips. “Absolutely splendid. It is clear to see how much her divinity has increased since her days as a shrine maiden,” he said, confirming that they met his expectations. It was such a relief to know that even the harshest judge of all was pleased.

“Please let me see, Lord Hartmut,” Konrad said, excited. “They’re of Lady Rozemyne, right? Wilma draws in her room, so I haven’t been able to look at them yet.”

Hartmut thought for a moment, then said, “You may look, but only if you stand back and vow not to touch them under any circumstances.”

Dirk and Konrad agreed, and soon enough, they were showering my illustrations with praise. This must have drawn the attention of the other children, as they all came over to look as well—albeit from the agreed-upon distance.

“The kids who have just joined us have presumably not had the chance to see Lady Rozemyne. This is an excellent opportunity,” Lord Hartmut said. “These illustrations depict the Saint of Ehrenfest, who is beloved by Mestionora the Goddess of Wisdom and reflects the purity of Flutrane the Goddess of Water. Her hair sparkles like the night sky, as if draped in the God of Darkness’s cape, and her golden eyes sparkle as though containing the Goddess of Light herself.”

The new orphans listened with their mouths agape. Lord Hartmut’s speech had become so poetic toward the end that I could imagine the younger ones had struggled to understand him.

“Of course, Lady Rozemyne’s wondrousness does not end with her beauty,” Lord Hartmut continued. “Her deeply compassionate heart is nothing short of divine, and she has the exceedingly rare qualities of a true saint. Or, at least, that is what I used to believe, but something occurred quite recently that has forced me to reconsider. Perhaps she is not a saint but a genuine goddess.”

“The Goddess of Mercy?” Dirk replied without missing a beat.

“She did save the gray priests, so she surely is a goddess,” Konrad noted.

The other children were completely lost—but Lord Hartmut was now invested in his preaching and wouldn’t allow something as small as the confusion of others to stop him.

“It was on the day that Lord Ferdinand left for Ahrensbach. She cast a rainbow blessing upon our three departing associates. Do you understand now? Do you realize how special it is to pray to all of the gods, and earn blessings from them all in turn?”

“I don’t really understand...”

“Very well. Then I shall explain.”

And so, Lord Hartmut began a gleeful explanation of magecraft. He spoke at great length, but to summarize: Ewigeliebe was on bad terms with all of the gods except Geduldh, so forming a prayer with them all was very difficult indeed.

And yet Lady Rozemyne had accomplished it with relative ease.

“Lady Rozemyne’s incandescent eyes sparkled with a divine rainbow, as if all the gods were contained within them. Then, with her schtappe in hand, she drew in the air a magic circle that none had seen before. Light followed the twists and turns of her schtappe until the circle was complete, and from her beautiful lips, a blessing was woven. The circle shone with the divine color of each god as their names were called, and we were all struck by the sheer beauty of the sight. It was akin to witnessing all of the gods gather in one place. Light of various colors spilled from the edges of the circle until, at last, a rainbow blessing flew out. All those gathered watched in awed silence, while Lady Rozemyne quietly smiled. What humbleness! What superiority! It was more divine than anything. And at that moment, I wished to pray to Lady Rozemyne herself.”

In the end, Lord Hartmut sang Lady Rozemyne’s praises for an entire bell. When he eventually finished, he exhaled in satisfaction and then looked across all those gathered in the orphanage.

“Now then, everyone—let us offer our prayers to the mighty King and Queen of the endless skies, the mighty Eternal Five who rule the mortal realm, Flutrane the Goddess of Water, Leidenschaft the God of Fire, Schutzaria the Goddess of Wind, Geduldh the Goddess of Earth, Ewigeliebe the God of Life, and finally Lady Rozemyne, the Saint of Ehrenfest.”

Everyone shot up their arms and raised their left knee into the air—that is, everyone except the new orphans. They recoiled at the sudden movement and started looking around. We had been so busy with handiwork and studying that they had not yet been taught how to pray.

I will need to teach them before we begin our daily studies.

My intention was to do all that I could to help the new orphans adjust to the temple’s ways as soon as possible.