Chapter Three Hundred and Forty-Four: Lessons and Punishments
“Sepl, these kids are ordinary children—you can’t treat them the same way you’d treat an adventurer where everything short of death is a scratch! Well… except for Teresa.”
“So I’m the exception, huh?”
Teresa laughed. The children who had been brought back were now lined up before Karen in the study that Harald used in the annex. Karen sat in the chair that was supposed to be Harald’s, looking imperious, with Harald and Ottilie standing at her sides.
After hearing the full account of what had happened, both Harald and Ottilie had gone solemn. Harald could surely feel the children’s emotions as though they were his own, while Ottilie was shaken to find her brother even more complicated than she’d imagined.
“Mark, I’m sorry. I did tell him to stand by until the last possible moment, but I never expected him to keep watching until you were critically injured.”
“O-Okay…”
Mark nodded absentmindedly. His wounds had been healed by the potion, but he’d been dazed ever since he woke up. He was clearly in shock. Karen trusted Sepl’s judgment, and if he had chosen to use a medium healing potion, it was likely that Mark had suffered something in the range of internal rupture. There was simply no ordinary life that would leave you needing a medium healing potion.
“Nah, nah. In that condition, he would’ve survived another few dozen minutes even if we’d left him alone—ow!”
“Idiot! Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!”
Lily, who had been listening, started pummeling Sepl. Sepl grimaced despite it not likely hurting much. He was making a show of looking pained—or rather, the situation of being scolded and beaten by Lily seemed to be painful in a different way. Emotionally.
“If it happened to Cyril, I wouldn’t be able to bear it—that means it shouldn’t happen to anyone else’s child either!”
“Yes, ma’am! I’m sorry! I was an idiot!”
Sepl was being dealt with by Lily, so that was fine, and Karen turned her eyes to the children lined up before her.
“Karen, didn’t you call us here to scold us?”
Teresa said it as though she could see right through Karen’s hesitation.
“You’re right that I had intended to scold you when you came back. Though I’m not angry.”
“…You’re not angry?”
“I’m not. As you understood, I noticed and let it happen. If anything, I was surprised—I hadn’t expected you to not even make it out of the capital.”
“I mean, obviously we couldn’t… the Adventurers’ Guild would see straight through us and refuse any escort request, and the kind of adventurers who would take it are obviously dangerous—kids like us would just get robbed and killed before we got anywhere, right?”
“Overcoming obstacles like that is exactly what would make the goddess recognize the trial as completed. …You know, Teresa, you’re more cautious than I expected.”
“And you’re way more out of your mind than I expected.”
Teresa said it with a look of exasperation. She had apparently anticipated that Karen would have someone watching and guarding them—but hadn’t been willing to risk anything as dangerous as actually leaving the territorial capital. That said, if she had trusted that assumption enough to feel completely safe, it probably wouldn’t have qualified as a trial in the first place.
“I’d scold you if it would serve your futures, but I think each of you has already learned quite enough from this on your own.”
Honestly, they were all so thoroughly miserable that she felt reluctant to pile on further. The children had already served their punishment. Even Teresa seemed unusually low on spirit.
“Harald, what do you think?”
“…Well. Yes. They’ve clearly been made to face reality as it is. Enough that there’s nothing more we need to add.”
Harald and Ottilie looked quietly down at the children. Neither of them felt like scolding anyone further either.
“Even so, punishment should be given.”
“I agree with you, Harald. I also believe punishment is necessary.”
Mark and Michael flinched. Though Teresa, and remarkably, Lena as well, didn’t react in the slightest. Lena stood where she’d been placed, colorless, eyes hollow, moving only as she was directed.
“First—as punishment for leaving the estate without permission and causing trouble for Lady Karen, you will all have your afternoon snacks withheld for the next six months.”
“No waaaay!?”
“…Is that really what surprises you?”
Mark stared at Michael’s dramatic wail with exasperated eyes.
“We’re getting off easy if it’s just snacks…”
“It’s not just snacks.”
“Eeeeeek.”
Harald and Ottilie layered punishment upon punishment, and at each one Michael yelped and jumped as though he’d been burned. Mark accepted each one with a sad but resigned expression, his face gradually crumpling—which was starting, somehow, to look just like Michael’s faces.
Teresa had the expression of someone who believed none of this applied to her. And indeed, no ordinary punishment would faze Teresa.
“I suppose I have no choice but to give you punishment myself, Teresa… then I’ll just let Thor know what you got up to.”
At Karen’s words, Teresa’s expression transformed instantly.
“No! Stop! You can hit me all you want, just not that!”
“No amount of hitting bothers you—this is a punishment, after all.”
“No no no no no—!”
She apparently very much wanted to be on her best behavior in front of Thor. Karen watched Teresa roll around on the carpet kicking her feet like a small child, and said with a wry smile:
“Teresa, you’ve never been in a party, have you?”
“…So what?”
Teresa stopped thrashing immediately and glared up at Karen. The glare was there, but unlike before, she was actually listening. Karen looked down at her and laid out the terms.
“If you form a party, go into a dungeon, and clear the first floor, I won’t tell Thor anything.”
“Are you serious!? There’s no way anyone would let someone like me into a party! You want me to dangle items or money from you in front of them?”
“No items, no money. The trial is to get yourself into a party of similar age and similar skill level using nothing but your own social skills, and learn how to build human relationships.”
“…That’s a terrible trial.”
Teresa was not the sort of person who would stop acting like a lone wolf just because someone told her to. Some adventurers were genuinely not cut out for group work. But watching how Teresa had handled Lena, Mark, and Michael today, Karen suspected she wasn’t actually incapable of working within a group. Teresa stood up with a look of deep displeasure.
“Fine. I’ll do it. Just don’t say anything to Master Thor.”
“Do your best.”
“Drop dead!”
“Thor would actually be quite angry about that one.”
“I just said, ‘Guess I’ve got no choice but to do it,’ really fast, okay? Geez! There’s no way I’d say something weird to the sister of Master Thor!”
A strained excuse, and she promptly made her exit before she could dig herself any deeper.
The only problem left was Lena, who had become so empty that she no longer reacted even after hearing she would be punished.
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