Visit to the Orphanage and Workshop

Visit to the Orphanage and Workshop

Visit to the Orphanage and Workshop

The day after returning to the temple from Spring Prayer, everyone cleaned the orphanage and workshop. The day after that, Sylvester and the High Priest were due to visit come third bell. Everyone was busy from the second that morning came.

“Sister Myne, got a second? Er, I mean, do you have a moment?”

“I certainly do, Gil. You’re making fine progress.”

Upon returning from Spring Prayer, I found that Gil had been slowly working on his speech in my absence. The gray priests who had formerly served as attendants were teaching the kids in the orphanage manners, and they would advise Gil on his language while in the workshop.

“Those kids keep on saying that since I’m an attendant, I need to hurry up and learn to talk better so I don’t embarrass you! Er... Ahem. I mean, I need to learn to talk more politely so as not to bring shame to you.”

I could appreciate that the kids wanted to try out the new way of speaking they had learned for themselves, but I could also understand why Gil was annoyed at them giving him a hard time.

“It is true that you would need to learn proper speech sooner or later to continue serving as my attendant. This is a good opportunity for you.”

“Sister Myne, I’m gonna work hard... I don’t want— Er, I don’t wish for you to replace me with someone else.” Gil knelt beside me and frowned, clearly frustrated at himself, but I didn’t understand where his fears were coming from at all.

“Hm? Wait a second, Gil. Why are you worried about that?”

“Because there are a lot of people here who are better than me,” he forced out, hanging his head sadly. He explained that a troublemaker like him who spent most of his time in the repentance chamber getting to be an attendant had motivated all the other kids to try and become my attendants too, since if someone like him could do it, there was no reason they couldn’t as well. He was worried that I would replace him, and was working hard to learn how to do things the other kids couldn’t.

...Is that why he’s been spending so much time in the workshop learning new jobs and treating Lutz as his rival?

I was sitting in a chair, which put me in the perfect position to pat Gil’s head as he knelt. I reached out and stroked his light blonde hair.

“I know how hard you are working, Gil. I may take on new attendants when necessary, but I will never replace you.”

“You really mean it...?” His expression softened with relief.

Attendants generally had very little job security; they could be replaced at the slightest whim of their master. But I had no intention of replacing Gil as long as he wasn’t massively incompetent.

“By the way, did you not have something to talk to me about, Gil?”

“Right. Should we start working in the workshop even though the priests are going to come?”

“Yes. They would like to see what kind of work we are doing there. I do know that even my presence is enough to make everyone nervous, and I imagine that the High Priest himself visiting with another blue priest will be nerve-wracking beyond belief, but I ask that you give it your all today. Could you tell everyone that?”

“As you wish.”

Fran and those from the Gilberta Company came in to see me not long after Gil left. There was Benno, Lutz, and Leon. Mark had stayed behind to keep the store running.

“Good morning, Sister Myne. It was an honor to receive your invitation on this fine day.”

I guided the three of them to the second floor, then had Rosina and Delia go down to the first. It was understood that they would pretend not to hear us speaking casually after being cleared from the room.

“Here, Myne. I got the clothes you asked for. And some shoes, just in case.”

“Thanks, Lutz.” I took the bundled-up clothes and shoes from him; I would need to give these to Sylvester later. For now I put them on my desk and returned to the table.

Benno, wearing clothes appropriate for meeting nobles, looked at me with his eyes gleaming sharply. “So, what kind of noble is this other blue priest?”

“No idea.”

“Seriously?” replied Benno with a glare. I knew he wanted as much information going into this as possible, but I couldn’t help what I didn’t know.

“Why would you expect me to know anything about Brother Sylvester’s family?”

“Because you could’ve asked him. Learn to gather information for yourself, idiot.”

It was true that a merchant would want to know all about a customer’s family, but what I wanted to know was how to avoid Sylvester entirely. Still, Benno would yell at me again unless I said something, so I tried remembering what I had learned over Spring Prayer.

“He’s very weird. I’ve been told that although he has a rotten personality, he has something of a good heart buried deep within him.”

“Look, I don’t care about that. I need to know the size of his family, what connections they have, what kind of a presence he has, and other stuff that will help get my goods in his hands and his money in my pocket.”

“Oh, right. My bad. I spent the whole trip trying as hard as I could to avoid him, so I don’t know anything like that at all.” I spoke from the heart without really thinking about it, and Benno slumped over in disappointment. “You can just learn this stuff for yourself when I introduce you to him at the workshop, Benno. That would be a lot more reliable than trusting me.”

“Yeah, no point in expecting that much from you. I’ll consider you not forgetting to introduce me as a big enough win. This is a lot better than you panicking over their visit and then not giving me a heads-up at all,” said Benno, nodding to himself. The fact that I couldn’t really dispute him made me a little sad about myself. “Right, I’ll see you then. Try not to mess things up.”

Benno, having obtained little in the way of information, departed with Lutz and Leon for the workshop.

Third bell started to ring while I was practicing the harspiel. I stood up, tense with anxiety, and after Fran grabbed the clothes Lutz had brought me, he took the lead walking outside. I walked behind him with Damuel beside me.

“Rosina, Delia, I entrust my chambers to you.”

“As you wish, Sister Myne. We await your safe return.”

When we arrived at the High Priest’s room, we found him writing something on his desk with Sylvester lounging about nearby, ready to go.

“I apologize for the wait,” I said.

“Sure,” Sylvester replied. “Let’s get going.”

I couldn’t understand why he looked as excited as someone heading off on an adventure or a quest of some kind. As far as I knew, visiting the workshop and orphanage probably wouldn’t be all that much fun. Maybe he was excited to see the workshop because there weren’t any in the Noble’s Quarter.

“Brother Sylvester, before we leave... Here are the clothes you asked for, as well as some wooden shoes commonly worn in the lower city, just in case.”

“You got those pretty fast, huh? Not bad.”

“They’re secondhand. There was no need to have them made to order or anything.”

Fran handed the clothes and shoes to Sylvester’s attendant, who took them with a conflicted expression.

I understand that you probably don’t want to be holding secondhand commoner clothes, but your master’s the one who requested them.

“You all, stay here. We’ll be fine with just Fran and Damuel tagging along. Having too many of you accompany us will just make the smaller rooms cramped,” Sylvester announced to Arno and his own attendants. The orphanage probably wouldn’t have been too bad, but the workshop would definitely get a bit cramped if too many of us went inside at once.

“There. Let us go.” The High Priest finished up his work, and with that we left.

Fran took the lead. Sylvester and the High Priest followed behind him, while Damuel and I trailed at the back.

Along the way to the orphanage, Sylvester seemingly ran out of patience for my slow walking. He spun around and pointed at me. “Damuel, snatch her up and walk. She’s the slowest thing I’ve ever seen.”

“...Could you at least phrase that as him embracing me in a majestic carry?”

“Normally a bodyguard should keep their hands free at all times, but I’m stronger than Damuel so that shouldn’t be an issue this time.”

Despite how it may have seemed, I was in fact doing my best to walk as fast as I could. The problem was that Sylvester and the High Priest were so tall that not even my running speed was enough to keep up with their brisk walking. Honestly it was kind of a relief when Damuel picked me up, since I had been running out of breath.

“This is the orphanage,” Fran said as he pushed open the creaky doors leading to the dining hall of the girls’ building.

Waiting for us inside was Wilma, two gray shrine maidens, and two gray priests, all of whom were kneeling. It was a bit hard to see them behind the adults, but the pre-baptism children were also gathered and kneeling. Benno had advised us not to have them working during the visit, since in the lower city it was generally forbidden to make pre-baptism children work.

“Welcome to our humble abode. We are honored beyond words by your visit.”

“High Priest, Brother Sylvester. This is my attendant Wilma. She manages the orphanage and takes care of the pre-baptism children all by herself.”

The High Priest raised an eyebrow and nodded to himself. “You are the one responsible for the excellent art in Myne’s books, as I recall. Your efforts are commendable.”

“I-I am honored,” Wilma responded in a shaky voice, having not expected the High Priest to praise her; she had probably assumed that the High Priest would know nothing about a gray shrine maiden. Thanks to her hair being tightly bound behind her head, the fact she was blushing all the way up to her ears was readily visible.

“I thought the orphanage would be a mess with all the little kids, but I see it’s actually pretty clean.” Sylvester walked to the middle of the room and twirled as he looked all over.

“That’s because everyone works hard to keep it clean,” I answered, my chest proudly puffed out. The orphanage was kept so clean thanks to Wilma taking the lead in cleaning while instructing everyone on the importance of keeping the place where you eat clean.

“All the kids are as small as you, huh? There aren’t any kids younger than this?”

“...Not right now.”

There were no kids younger than those kids because they had been given no food or care and died as a result. Sylvester should have known that, and him playing dumb angered me, but yelling at him here wouldn’t bring them back.

“More importantly, Brother Sylvester, please remember that I have in fact been baptized.”

“That doesn’t change that you’re as small as them.”

Despite the fact that I was probably shorter than many of them, once summer came it would be one full year since I was baptized. Sylvester ignored my puffed-cheek pouting and wandered over to the side of the dining hall, his interest seemingly piqued by the boxes stacked in the corner.

“Myne, what’re these?”

“Those are books and toys for teaching kids to read. Everything there was made by the workshop, more or less.”

Sylvester took out a children’s bible and flipped through a few pages. He then looked at the karuta and playing cards with a frown.

The High Priest, who had been watching from the side, picked up a karuta pack and glared at me. “Myne, you did not inform me of these.”

“Those are karuta. They’re a useful toy for learning letters. I made them for one of my attendants who wanted to learn to read, then made more for the orphanage to use. They can’t be commercially produced yet since Wilma has to manually draw the art for each card, so I didn’t think reporting them would be relevant,” I explained.

The High Priest fell into thought, a hand resting on his chin. “...Just to confirm, you have not been commercially producing these?”

“Right. I did sell the rights to Benno, but I haven’t heard of him producing them yet.” Benno had said they would sell, but as far as I was aware he hadn’t actually made them into a product yet. Perhaps he was struggling to find an artist. “In any case, I read the bible to make these, and thanks to them I was able to learn the names of the gods and the divine instruments. The orphanage children are quite skilled at the game, having memorized both the text and art cards completely.”

“That so? I wanna see them in use. Come on.” Sylvester’s sudden demand sent the children nervously looking between me and Wilma. I had more or less predicted what Sylvester would say, so I calmly took the karuta and smiled at the kids.

“Shall I read the cards and you all do the rest, then?”

“As you wish, Sister Myne.”

The kids all looked tense due to the unfamiliar blue priest, but once they started focusing on the karuta their eyes grew more serious and the anxiousness melted from their faces.

“This child took the most cards, which means she won this game.”

“Good on you,” said Sylvester to the winner after hearing my explanation.

The High Priest, who had been watching the kids clean up the karuta cards, looked down at me. “Myne, you have these all memorized? And the children can read all of the text cards?”

“Yes. The orphanage children can all read the text cards as a matter of course, and they can even read the children’s bible. They learned over the winter.”

“...Over the winter? Seriously?” Sylvester’s eyes widened in shock.

I puffed out my chest again and gave a big nod. “Indeed. There is not much to do while snowed in over the winter, correct? The larger kids could help in the workshop, but the younger kids had little to do but spend their time reading and playing karuta. They know their numbers thanks to playing with the cards over there as well, and they can do a little math now.”

I described the impressive results of the winter school with my head held high, but for some reason the High Priest cradled his head.

“Myne...” he said, his voice heavy with exasperation despite the fact that Fran had for sure reported this to him before.

“What is it, High Priest?”

He paused for a moment, then sighed and said “It can wait.” His expression made it clear that he had mustered all of his willpower to swallow whatever it was he wanted to say.

...It feels like I’ve got a big lecture waiting for me, but why? Why? I cocked my head to the side in confusion just as Sylvester grabbed my shoulder.

“Alright, take me to the workshop.”

“Certainly.”

Walking at my usual pace, I headed to the back exit, which was down the stairs of the girls’ building.

“Sister Myne, I do not believe we should bring a visitor there...” said Wilma in a troubled tone.

I snapped back to my senses, stopped where I was, and spun around. The back exit certainly was no place to bring a visiting guest. But my sudden change in direction seemed to make the two priests think I was hiding something from them, and their expressions hardened a bit as they looked at the stairs.

“Wait. What are you hiding down there?” asked the High Priest.

“It’s just a back exit we usually use to reach the workshop. But as you and Brother Sylvester are both visitors, I should take you there the proper way,” I explained. “I wasn’t thinking.”

The High Priest furrowed his brows. “...A back exit in the orphanage? I have never heard of such a thing.”

“Take us there.”

At their request, I followed Wilma down the stairs as I usually would. The basement of the girls’ building was a kitchen, and they were in the middle of preparing lunch. We could hear the girls chattering as nice smells drifted into our noses. But the talking stopped the second Wilma came into sight, hurrying down the stairs.

By the time the priests and I reached the kitchen, the large soup-filled pot had been abandoned mid-boil, and everyone was kneeling down by the wall.

“Huh, so this is where you’re making food for the orphans?”

“Yes. Though generally only soup is made here.”

I explained how we were filling the gaps between divine gifts with soup we made ourselves. The two priests had likely never even looked into their own kitchens, and both of them peered into the bubbling pot with great interest.

“This stuff looks like the soup we shared back during Spring Prayer.”

“That’s because I taught them the same recipe.”

Sylvester glared down at me with narrowed eyes. “Isn’t that a little much for orphans to be eating every day?”

That annoyed me. The orphans had been forced to earn money by themselves and cook their own food due to there being fewer blue priests and shrine maidens to offer them divine gifts. No way was some simple soup “a little much” for them. But of course, I couldn’t state my frustrations to a blue priest like Sylvester.

“Speaking of which, do they not make some kind of commoner sweets here? I recall Damuel reporting something of the sort,” said the High Priest, making Sylvester’s eyes shoot wide open.

“Sweets?! Now that’s too much!”

“You say it’s too much, but unlike the sugar and honey that nobles can purchase themselves, the commoner sweets in question rely on fruit that can only be gathered on sunny winter mornings. They are not eaten every day. Furthermore, there are so many in the orphanage that each individual gets only a small portion. Although it is well worth it as a nice winter flavor. Isn’t that so, Sir Damuel?”

Damuel bobbed his head in a nod while looking between Sylvester and the High Priest, both of whom were staring daggers into him. Sylvester in particular glared with a particularly envious look in his eyes.

“You sure have had it nice here, huh, Damuel?”

“Only on a rare few occasions. I think there has been more suffering than anything here.”

Guarding me was hardly an easy job for someone like Damuel, who had a heart attack whenever I collapsed and struggled when archnobles were glaring at him like this.

“The soup will burn if we stay here, so I suggest we hurry on to the workshop.” I urged us toward the exit, since I didn’t want to deal with Sylvester asking to eat a parue cake. We then passed by the chapel as we made our way to the boys’ building.

“This is the Myne Workshop,” Fran stated as we entered. The boys inside stopped their work and moved to the wall where they knelt down just like the girls had, accompanied by the three from the Gilberta Company. “We have started producing plant paper now that it is spring again. Once we have a large supply of paper, we’ll start making more picture books.”

Those in the workshop seemed to have been swishing pulp and drying the paper since they couldn’t go to the forest today.

Sylvester looked around, then gave a snort. “Myne, where are you making those toys?”

“Those were made over the winter. It’s past their time now. We could easily make more if we ordered the materials, but our priority here is making paper for picture books,” I explained.

Sylvester blinked his deep green eyes in confusion. “Why focus on the paper and picture books when the toys are more fun and would sell better?”

“Because I want books.” Was there anything wrong with using my own workshop to make the things I wanted? No. I wanted books regardless of whether they would sell or not. The Myne Workshop existed for that very purpose.

Sylvester’s jaw dropped, as though he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Man... You sure do whatever you want, huh?”

“Um, I don’t want to hear that from you, Brother Sylvester.” Nobody embodied the concept of doing whatever you wanted more than Sylvester did.

As both Sylvester and I stared at each other in disbelief, the High Priest rubbed his temples. “The truth remains that both of you are a source of endless headaches for me.”

“Ngh...”

“Anyway, Myne. I wanna see the workshop actually running. Everyone! Get back to work.” Unlike me, Sylvester ignored the High Priest’s barbed words and instead ordered the gray priests to return to their work. They all smoothly stood up and went back to their positions. There was no denying it—Sylvester was wilder and more uncontrollable than I was.

With the gray priests back at work, only the three from the Gilberta Company remained kneeling by the wall.

“The High Priest already knows these three, but I will introduce them to you, Brother Sylvester. This is Benno from the Gilberta Company, and his leherl apprentices Lutz and Leon.”

“Right, the merchant that sells the stuff from here.” Sylvester, who was glancing at the now-moving workshop, looked down at Benno and the others.

“Correct. Most everything made in the Myne Workshop is sold through the Gilberta Company. The restaurant you’re interested in is also being established by the Gilberta Company. They would love to have your business.”

“Oh yeah? Benno, raise your head. I permit you to speak to me.”

“I am honored,” said Benno as he looked up. Then, all of a sudden he froze. No words of greeting passed his lips, and I heard him swallow hard.

“Benno?” I asked, confused.

“Blessed be the waves of Flutrane the Goddess of Water who guided us toward this meeting,” Benno choked out before lowering his head again.

Sylvester, looking down at him with a contemplative hand on his chin, grinned.

Why does he look like a carnivore that just found some new prey?

“Benno, that restaurant you’re making sounds pretty interesting. I’ve been wanting to have a nice, long discussion about it for a while now. Let’s go to another room and make that a reality. Follow me.”

“Understood,” replied Benno, standing up shakily. He looked so ill that I instinctively called out to Sylvester.

“Brother Sylvester, remember your promise not to steal our chefs.”

“...The thought didn’t even occur to me. This is just a business discussion.”

“Good, then.”

Business discussions were Benno’s specialty; there was no need for me to get in the way.

“Myne, what manner of machine is this?” asked the High Priest, drawing my attention away from Sylvester, who was taking Benno away. He was looking at the normal press we were turning into a printing press.

“This is a new printing press. It is not quite done yet, but it is looking a lot more complete than it was before I left for Spring Prayer. I cannot wait for when it is finished.”

“How is it used? I received a report on it from Damuel, but it was rather hard to understand.”

To answer the High Priest’s question, I called Gil over and decided to demonstrate the process. “Gil, please prepare the ink. High Priest, these are called metal letter types, and you line up the letters to form the text.”

“...Letter types? They look like tiny stamps.”

As the High Priest looked over a letter type in his hands, I had Fran fetch the types for me so I could organize them into a short sentence. Gil then put those into the forme, locking them in place by sliding in boards on either side.

“Sister Myne, it is ready.”

“Would you print a sheet, then? Please use a discarded piece of paper so as to not waste any.”

Gil put the forme on the printing press, then smeared it with ink. He then placed the paper on top of that.

“Normally you would move this part of the printing press to literally press the paper against the letter types and distribute the ink equally, but since the press isn’t ready yet we’ll have to rub a baren against it instead. Once that’s done, we set the paper aside to dry and print the next sheet, though in this case we’ll just print on a different part of this same sheet to save resources.”

Gil printed the same sentence on the sheet of paper over and over again. As the High Priest stared in astonishment, I explained with pride that, when completed, the press could distribute the ink much faster than the baren.