Chapter 61 : Chapter 61

Chapter 61. Take Them All Out (3)

But that wasn’t what needed to be said here.

“Ahem, even we do not know the limits of the Young Master’s talent and abilities. Even the word ‘genius’ is too trivial to be attached to him.”

This was a fact.

Regardless of Patrick’s personality, no one could deny his abilities.

April, who was much stronger than Sanson in the fiefdom, was a formidable warrior who had reached the realm of 6-star.

She was now just one step away from the 7-star realm, the stage of a transcendent being.

But when Patrick sparred with such an April, he would yawn and play around with her.

Even the soldiers who lived and trained with Sanson had no idea what level he was at now.

The moment such a Patrick stepped out into the world, the world would begin to change drastically, centered around the great typhoon named Patrick Schneider.

Whether he would become a hero or a villain was unknown, but Patrick’s existence itself was certain to remain a legend on the continent.

“That Young Master told us. That he would make sure we wouldn’t regret it.”

“……”

“If you accept the offers from other nobles now, you could become knights right away. You’d be promised good pay and excellent treatment. But in return, the opportunity to join that great legend will disappear forever.”

The soldiers who heard Sanson’s explanation began to stir greatly.

They, too, thought Sanson had a point.

Then, Sanson bowed his head to them and spoke.

“I ask this not as the captain of the guards, but as a brother born and raised in the same hometown. Please, refuse the offers and remain in the fiefdom.”

“Captain… no, Big brother. Didn’t the Young Master say that those who want to leave can leave?”

“That’s right. Detaining you now is my own arbitrary decision.”

“Why? Why are you, Big brother, holding us back?”

“Because I can’t just stand by and watch.”

“Watch what?”

“Watch you, who are like my own brothers, throw away a lifelong opportunity with a wrong choice.”

“……”

At Sanson’s words, all the soldiers fell silent as if they had been struck.

And Sanson, still with his head bowed, spoke to them.

“I beg of you. Please trust the Young Master. If you can’t do that, then at least trust me. I will never, ever let you regret it. I swear it on my entire life.”

The soldiers gave no answer.

Each one of them simply remained silent with a deeply contemplative expression.

* * *

A few days later.

“Alright, time to go home. But…”

Patrick looked at the lined-up soldiers of the fiefdom and said nonchalantly.

“Something’s off about the number of people?”

Before Patrick’s eyes, the soldiers were lined up in a perfect single file line.

Not a single spot was empty.

All 100 members of the Schneider fiefdom’s expeditionary force had decided to remain in the Schneider fiefdom.

Seeing this, Patrick smirked and said.

“You gullible, idiotic bastards.”

“Hey, why?”

“What else do you call guys who kick away their own good fortune? You gullible idiots.”

At Patrick’s words, the soldiers protested vehemently.

“You said you were thankful, didn’t you? You said you were thankful to us.”

“Right, right. He said it with his own mouth.”

“Say it now. Now!”

Then, Patrick pointed at himself with his finger and said as if he had never heard of it.

“Meeeeee?”

“……”

“I don’t think I ever did thaaaaat?”

At that expression, which was bound to infuriate anyone watching, the soldiers threw a fit.

“Argh, seriously…”

“How can he have such a rotten personality? Really?”

“We were the idiots for having expectations in the first place.”

“Just one punch. I just want to hit him once.”

“I want to hit him twice.”

Watching the soldiers’ extreme backlash, Patrick smirked and said.

“Enough of that, let’s just go home. The luggage over there is expensive, so be careful, got it?”

“Yes, yes. Got it.”

“What can you expect from that guy?”

“Let’s just get Big brother Sanson later.”

“Why me?”

And so, the party packed up all their luggage, and Patrick led the troops to depart.

“Let’s go then. You thankful bastards.”

He did say it, at least.

You find the ‘bastards’ attached at the end bothersome?

‘Like I give a damn?’

Patrick chuckled and set off.

* * *

Strictly speaking…

The plan that Patrick and Baron Schneider had made before leaving the Schneider fiefdom had completely failed.

They had left saying they would just hold their position and return without making a presence, but that might have been impossible from the start.

In fact, the problem started when a Black Mage appeared in what was supposed to be a simple bandit subjugation.

The moment that Black Mage caused a scene at the banquet, Patrick stood out for the first time, and before that, the soldiers had already beaten the crap out of another fiefdom’s innocent soldiers.

After that, on the battlefield, he played a decisive role yet tried to hide his traces by giving the credit to Viscount Preis, but…

Later, in a duel between soldiers, Oliver played around with the opposing knight, and Patrick crushed the face of Viscount Balson, who was acting rudely out of indignation.

On top of that, he created a spectacle where all 100 soldiers emitted aura in front of all the eastern nobles.

“When we unleashed our auras all at once, the jaws of the surrounding lords just dropped.”

“I know, I know. I heard they offered you guys to become knights after that?”

“I’ve already heard it more than ten times.”

“Ten times? Is that enough? You should hear it a hundred times. Baron Helsing over there told me…”

“Aaaargh! Someone shut this bastard’s mouth!”

At Oliver’s bragging, the other soldiers covered their ears and screamed.

They were the soldiers who hadn’t been able to follow the expedition, and they were inwardly regretting having missed out on this one.

‘Tsk, if we were going to have a brawl anyway, we could have gone too.’

‘Che, what a shame.’

‘Now that it’s come to this, I’m definitely going next time.’

The soldiers who couldn’t go were bound to be disappointed.

While those guys were fooling around on the battlefield, they had been undergoing hellish training.

Who would create hell for them when Patrick was away?

Who else could it be but one person?

[Wake up. The Young Master’s training menu isn’t over yet.]

[Wa… wait a moment. Miss April.]

[The Young Master isn’t even here, so let’s rest a bit….]

Kuuuung!

[How dare you disobey the Young Master’s orders?]

A clear footprint was stamped onto the training ground floor, which was so firmly packed that even a hammer strike wouldn’t leave a scratch.

And April, with a murderous glint in her eyes, said.

[Disobeying the Young Master’s orders is no different from committing treason against him. You know that, don’t you?]

[No, it’s not that far….]

[We were just….]

[Just what?]

At April’s cold gaze, the soldiers hurriedly wrapped sandbags all over their bodies and started training again.

[Let’s train. Train.]

[Ugh-aaaaah!]

[I love training the most.]

In a way, April was a more fearsome opponent than Patrick.

Patrick would at least go easy on soldiers who had truly reached their limits, but April had no such thing.

Limits or not, if anyone failed to complete the training manual Patrick had ordered, she was ready to treat them not as stragglers but as traitors.

Every time the twin swords in her hands glinted, the soldiers, in a state of crisis, feeling that their necks might genuinely fly off, got up and transcended their limits.

Can limits be transcended that easily, you ask?

When a person’s life is on the line, they’ll do whatever it takes.

“If the Young Master says he’s going somewhere next time, I’m definitely following him.”

“Me too, me too.”

“I’m just going to go wherever April isn’t. She’s a bit scary.”

“A bit? A biiiit? Didn’t you see the crazy look in her eyes when she mentioned treason?”

“I saw it. Haaah… I really thought I was going to die.”

“If you hadn’t gotten up, you probably would have died, right?”

Anyway, the fearsome April returned to her main job (?) as a maid and disappeared from the training ground.

After that, Patrick was supposed to be nagging them at the training ground, but…

“The Young Master hasn’t been seen lately either. Where is he?”

“I think he went to the Orc tribe’s village to do something.”

“What is he trying to do?”

“It’s obvious, isn’t it?”

Everyone turned their attention to Oliver at the last remark.

Receiving the collective gaze of ‘What kind of bullshit is this guy going to spout now?’, Oliver spoke.

“He’s either researching ways to torment us, or he’s thinking of ways to make money. It’s one of the two.”

“Hmm…”

“That makes sense.”

Even though the words came from Oliver’s mouth, they made quite a bit of sense.

* * *

Patrick had gone to the Orcs to do something.

It wasn’t a task that only the Orcs could do.

However, since the security of the job was important, he decided to carry it out in the village where the Orc tribe lived.

“You just have to guard it so no one can approach? Can you do it?”

“Of course, we can do it.”

The chieftain of the Red Rock Tribe, Turanta, thumped his chest firmly and said.

“But what is this that requires such measures?”

“It’s something that makes money.”

“Hoooh. Money, money is good.”

“……”

“With money, we can buy human food and alcohol. Money is excellent.”

The Orcs of the Red Rock Tribe, persuaded by Patrick to join forces with humans.

The five years spent with Patrick were enough to dye even the simple Orcs with the colors of capitalism.

Humans were weaker than Orcs, but they were good at making things they wanted.

Delicious food, and alcohol.

They also used other small items usefully, but the first two were things that made the Orcs go crazy.

When the Orcs caught monsters and the humans exchanged the monsters they caught for money, the Orcs would then exchange that money for food and alcohol in the human villages.

As this process repeated, the Orcs, too, had recently become completely immersed in the magic of money.

[Oh, a Goblin. Let’s catch it.]

[That one’s not worth much money. Let’s look for other monsters that are worth money.]

[Ah, right. Let’s catch a Troll. A Troll.]

[Grizzly Bears also sell for a high price.]

Such conversations were now common among the Orcs who went out to hunt, so what more needs to be said?

“If we raise this for you, will we get a share of the money too?”

“Hahahahaha… Well, a little bit.”

‘I’ve corrupted a person… no, an Orc.’

As Patrick felt a pang of regret, Turanta’s sharp eyes glinted as he spoke.

“Alright. Then our Orc tribe will do its best to raise this worm.”

“You can feed it mulberry leaves. Please raise it well.”

“Understood. But what is the name of this worm?”

“It’s a silkworm moth. This one is a larva, but please raise it well and increase its numbers.”

This was what Patrick had picked up while looting the Black Mage’s base.

The silkworm moth.

It was a very, very expensive insect that was the raw material for none other than silk.

For the merchants of the Central Plains, the most certain way to make money.

Was the silk trade.

Once the goods were secured, there was no difficulty in selling them at a high price.

Silk was that much of a high-priced and popular product.

If one could transport high-quality silk far away to the Western Regions and sell it, one could make a fortune.

Even without going as far as the Western Regions, distributing it internally was profitable enough.

Silk was treated as a precious item, so much so that the emperor would bestow it as a gift when high officials achieved great deeds.

Depending on the region, silk itself was so expensive that it served as a high-value currency.

When Patrick saw the collection container wriggling with the larvae of these silkworm moths while looting the Black Mage’s base, the silk trade immediately flashed through his mind.

‘The Orcs have been hunting so diligently that monster hunting has become harder than before. I needed a specialty product that could be consistently sold externally, and silk would be perfect.’

He had in his head the method of increasing the silkworm larvae, extracting the thread from the cocoons, and the process of weaving silk.

This was because he had once seen a merchant guild that traded silk at work.

‘Though there will probably be some trial and error when I actually try to do it.’

That’s why for this kind of work, a smart person needs to be put in charge to proceed.

And so, the person Patrick called was….

“Mother, could you please do it?”

“You want me to raise these worms, extract the thread, and make fabric?”

“Yes. Can you do it?”

“Well. I’ve never done it before….”

Ava sighed.

She, too, was a commoner before becoming a Baron’s wife.

Like other commoner women, she had done all sorts of household handicrafts before.

She knew to some extent how to extract thread, weave fabric, and make clothes. But….

“I’ve never done it with worms like these.”

“You can do it. By boiling the larva’s cocoon….”

Patrick briefly explained the process of making silk.

Since all he had was what he had seen a few times in his past life, he could only explain the general process.

Anyone would show reluctance if asked to produce silk with just this explanation, but….

“Hmm, that makes sense. It seems plausible.”

Ava nodded her head as if she understood to some extent. Seeing her, Patrick smiled.

‘As expected of the Nine Yin Severed Meridians. Her insight is on another level.’

In the old days, people who suffered from and were cured of the Nine Yin Severed Meridians always became smarter.

That’s why he could entrust the silk production to Ava.

“It’s a job that no one can do but you, Mother. But there’s something you must keep in mind.”

“What is it, dear.”

“Absolutely. Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely.”

“Absolutely?”

“You must not tell Father.”

“Ah….”

Ava understood.

Of course, she loved and respected her husband. But….

‘He’s a bit… difficult to do a profitable business with.’

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Thank you, Mother. If you need anything while you’re doing it, please let me know.”

“Alright. I will.”

Having finished the groundwork for the silk business, Patrick let out a sigh of relief.

Since it was entrusted to the Orc tribe, security was sufficient, and if his mother personally took charge, it would not fail.

Just then, April appeared silently in front of Patrick.

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