Report

Report

 

I KNOCKED ON THE DOOR and got permission to enter, so I entered the room to meet my doom. I pushed a tea cart with a pot of herbal tea and teacups on it before me.

Johan chuckled humorlessly as I approached his desk. “You seem prepared.”

“I thought we might be talking a while.”

“Do we have that much to discuss?”

All I could do was let out a strained laugh as Johan hung his head. Although he had heard a bit about what my transgressions were already, he hadn’t thought it would warrant a full tea service. Johan doubtless suspected that the length of this talk would directly correlate to the amount of time he’d have to devote to cleaning up my mess. Unfortunately, I was about to confirm his suspicions.

I’m sorry!

Today, I had come to Johan’s office to debrief him on my trip to Klausner’s Domain. Albert had already told him about how I purged the black swamp. Albert had also told him there were some other things he needed to hear about, which was why I had been summoned today.

I poured the tea and placed the cups on the table. Johan then came over to sit on one of the two sofas facing each other. His eyes softened when he spied the pound cake the chefs had given me. It wasn’t much, just enough to make a good snack before lunch.

As soon as I sat down, Johan jumped to the main subject. “So? Just how much do you have to confess, then?”

“Well…”

Quite a bit, even just off the top of my head. Despite the steps I’d taken to fly under the radar, I’d cooked for Lord Klausner and suspected I had kind of overdone it with the potion making. Also, I definitely had to tell Johan about the potion recipes I had learned at the brewery and about the rare herbs that needed blessings to grow properly.

I counted these events off on my fingers, each of which made Johan’s expression gradually stiffen more and more.

“You must be kidding me,” he moaned.

“Which would you like first, the good news or the bad news? Maybe the bad news?”

He hung his head again. “There’s bad news, too?”

“You didn’t hear from Lord Hawke?”

“I heard that you’d have some things to tell me, but no details.”

Eep. He wasn’t the least bit prepared. I winced, but I figured I might as well get it over with. After I finished, Johan looked weary. It made me feel super guilty, especially when I thought of how hard he had to work to smooth things over after I charged through.

“Um, Johan?”

“Is that all?” he asked weakly.

“Yes, for the bad news.”

His head continued to hang, held in his hands. I drained my cup of herbal tea and glanced away. Hey—was he mumbling?

“Johan?” He was speaking so quietly I couldn’t make it out.

“Did you cook something new while you were there?”

“Ah, yes.”

“Can you make it here?”

“Oh, sure, if I can get the ingredients.”

Johan raised his head a little and looked at me reproachfully.

Yeah, yeah, I get it! The ingredients weren’t all that unusual, so it probably wouldn’t take too long to round them all up. I would ask the chef later.

As I nodded in confirmation, Johan’s expression grew less demoralized than lightly tired, and he straightened. “So, now for the good news?”

“Uh, I think so,” I replied with a strained smile, which made his mouth twitch. I mean, probably the rest won’t give him any further headaches. It’s all just about herbs, after all.

And indeed, when I described the herbs we would now be able to cultivate with blessings, his expression lit up. He did work at the research institute, after all. He was reliably invested in anything to do with herbs and potions.

“Of course there would be so much to learn at a place known as the alchemist’s holy land.”

“Yeah, I definitely learned a lot.”

“This business about the Saint-related growing conditions for certain herbs—that’s especially interesting.”

“It is! It was such a lucky coincidence that I learned about that.”

“It’s a bit problematic that the alchemists of Klausner’s Domain know about it, but you made sure that they’ll keep quiet, right?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Good. I suppose the palace will have to send directions to Lord Klausner to ensure he doesn’t disclose this information either.”

“I’m really sorry about that.” I bowed in apology.

Johan sighed before he said, “Well, it’s fine.”

I couldn’t tell him the whole truth, so I apologized to him again in my mind.

I had to pretend to be the one who had discovered how to grow herbs with blessings using the Saint’s power. Corinna had suggested this, actually. It had been her condition for allowing me to grow the same herbs at the institute. After all, Lord Klausner and Corinna didn’t want anyone to learn the truth about the Great Alchemist’s diary. Having me take credit for discovering the technique helped them cover their tracks. More than anything, they were grateful that they would once more be able to grow those valuable herbs and thereby save their domain’s economy.

I still felt phenomenally guilty whenever I thought of taking credit away from the person who had actually developed the technique, but I was too captivated by the opportunity to grow new herbs at the institute. I’m really sorry, Great Alchemist…

“I suppose that gives me plenty to do for the time being, but at least there are some things I’ll be looking forward to as well.”

“Y-yeah… I’m sorry, but could I ask you to help me with growing those rare herbs?”

Johan beamed. “Of course.”

He really did have the same passion for herbs that I did.

Now that I was done with that report, we were able to start happily discussing what was to come.