TSSAH 31

Chapter 31

So happy was he that his pale cheeks flushed, and his light brown eyes trembled with emotion as they looked at me.

I hadn’t realized when he was slumped over his desk, but Noah Benton was about a span taller than me.

He seemed delighted at the arrival of a new rookie, but I felt a bit uneasy.

‘Is there some kind of hazing here too?’

Being the youngest is tough everywhere you go, but the fact that he was cheering, “I’m finally escaping!” made me wary.

Even if there wasn’t any pecking order among the crows, it was clear they worked the youngest pretty hard.

“Nice to meet you. My name is Runelk Ains.”

“Nice to meet you too! But this isn’t our first meeting!”

“Have we met before…?”

This time, I was fairly flustered too.

I rarely forget a face I’ve seen once.

Unless it was an extremely common appearance—but with distinctive looks like Noah Benton’s, there was no way I’d forget.

“Hmm, I wonder if that counts as meeting? You were brought to the infirmary before! Little hero!”

“Ah, that time.”

That must have been when I was hospitalized due to the poison used by the Green Merchant Guild master.

“I was on duty back then. Ah! I’m a doctor. Officially, my assignment is with the infirmary.”

My reaction to Noah Benton’s introduction was twofold.

That job sure suits him.

But how did a doctor end up becoming a crow?

A healer who saves lives and a member of a secret intelligence organization—those are completely different roles.

Though there’s an unwritten rule not to ask how someone became a crow, I made a mental note to subtly find out when the time was right.

“But you were unconscious back then, Ains, so… I think it really is our first meeting!”

The second crow I’d spoken to was yet another new type of person.

Gisela Loth was honest with her emotions, clearly had her likes and dislikes, yet was subtly hard to read.

Unlike her, Noah Benton seemed to have a very timid personality.

Even now, he was glancing at me nervously, worried he might have offended me.

“I heard from Dr. Heinschel that Barga is such a potent poison it nearly cost you your life. So you’re the benefactor who used a good antidote on me, Benton.”

“B-benefactor…”

Noah Benton’s face turned as red as a ripe tomato.

“I was just doing my job. Ah, um, but…”

He hesitated, clenching both fists, clearly having something he wanted to say.

“When I saw Runelk’s file at the infirmary, I think it said you were eighteen…”

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“Then can I speak to you casually? I’m twenty-four, you see.”

Twenty-four—that was the same age as my original self.

But he was six years older than Runelk Ains, and I was the rookie, so I had no objection to being addressed informally.

“Of course. Please speak comfortably, sen—”

Noah Benton had been so thrilled that a new rookie had finally joined beneath him.

So I tried to use the title “sunbae” to make a good first impression.

“Rookies have a whole lot of things to do.”

But Gisela Loth cut me off and butted in.

“Meaning, there’s no time to be chattering like this.”

Then, just as the man called Konrad had done to her earlier, she waved one hand dismissively at Noah Benton.

“You finish up what you were working on and head back to your quarters. Hurry, hurry.”

“Ah, okay…”

Like a bird caught pecking at grain, Noah Benton nodded sulkily, chased out of the conversation.

“Rookie, you follow me.”

“Yes, Loth.”

As I followed Gisela Loth, I glanced back at Noah Benton and gave a slight bow.

I should at least say goodbye.

“Bye!”

At that alone, Noah Benton’s face brightened fully as he waved back.

He seemed so innocent that I wondered if he really was twenty-four.

“What are you doing? I said follow me!”

“Yes, yes. Coming, coming.”

Where was she dragging me off to now?

Pretending to be unbothered, I followed the urging Gisela Loth and thought.

‘She deliberately separated me from Noah Benton just now.’

Given the flow of our ordinary conversation, there was only one reason I could infer.

‘Does she not want me getting close to Noah Benton?’

The place Gisela Loth pushed me into looked like a storeroom at first glance.

The only differences from the storage room in the annex—the one with the fireplace that led to the secret passage—were that it was a bit larger, less worn-down, and had a soundproofed door in good condition.

The only items of any apparent significance were a few large bags stacked in the corner, all firmly locked with very sturdy padlocks.

“What is this place?”

“This? An empty room.”

So it’s a storeroom after all.

Today was effectively my first official day with my mentor, and I was very curious why she’d suddenly brought me to a storage room, but instead I asked something else.

“I noticed earlier that there seemed to be many rooms accessible from the office space—aren’t you going to show me more of the Nest?”

When a friend moves and you go to a housewarming, they at least show you around the place first.

Even if it’s a tiny shoebox where you can see everything from the front door.

Of course, I have no friends, so this is just something I picked up somewhere, but still, that’s common sense.

So I’d expected her to show me around the Nest so I could familiarize myself with new information, making it easier to use me later—but Gisela Loth showed no sign of doing that.

“You’ll naturally learn the Nest’s layout over time. For now, the only places you can enter are that office and this room, rookie.”

So access is divided by security clearance.

I nodded calmly and asked.

“Then what happens if I try to open other doors?”

“Heh, try opening them if you can.”

Gisela Loth snorted and pulled out a small desk and chair from the pile of furniture.

Then she pointed to it with her chin and said.

“Sit down. I’ll tell you what you need to do today.”

An item pulled out of a dusty pile couldn’t possibly be clean.

I looked for a moment at the desk and chair, which might have once been white but now had an odd gray tinge, then silently sat down.

When I was running missions as an assassin, I’d crawled through garbage dumps—this much was nothing.

“Wait here quietly.”

Gisela Loth stepped out of the storeroom for a moment and returned with several thick books in her arms.

*Thump!*

They were so heavy that dust puffed up around them as she set them on the desk.

“Memorize these.”

“All of these?”

I picked up each of the five books one by one and checked the titles:

*The History and Genealogy of Knox*

*The Vassal Records of the Ducal House of Knox*

*Comprehensive Geography of the Bernheim Empire*

*Emblems and Seals — A Guide to Identifying Major Houses of the Eastern Continent*

*Practical Illustrated Guide to Poisons and Herbs*

No wonder they were thick.

I casually opened the topmost book, *The History and Genealogy of Knox*, and found it was not at all reader-friendly.

Meaning the text was incredibly tiny.

‘At this rate, just reading through each once would take several days.’

The volume was excessive, but I could understand why Gisela Loth had chosen these books.

Without knowledge, information cannot become intelligence.

It would just pass by as one of countless meaningless noises.

These thick books she’d given me were well-curated foundational knowledge.

Fortunately, most of the content was already familiar to me, so it wouldn’t be too much trouble.

But exercising my life wisdom, I put on a thoroughly fed-up expression and said to Gisela Loth.

“All… all of this?”

“Of course not.”

She smirked, then pointed to the top two books as if doing me a favor.

“A crow should know Knox inside and out. Just memorize these two for now.”

“By memorize, you mean…”

“There will be a test.”

“Hah.”

I sighed in defeat, then looked at Gisela Loth pleadingly.

“Could I at least study in a more comfortable environment? There were plenty of empty desks outside.”

“You learn better in a quiet place with no distractions.”

After tapping the thick book covers one last time, Gisela Loth turned on her heel.

“Call me when you’ve memorized everything.”

And with that, she really did close the door and leave.

“Hmm.”

Left alone, I rested my arms on the desk, propped my chin on my hands, and flipped through the pages of *The Vassal Records of the Ducal House of Knox*.

The handwriting was fairly neat, but the letters were just as tiny as the others.

As expected, there wasn’t much new material I actually needed to memorize.

But that wasn’t the problem.

‘She doesn’t seem to have any real intention of teaching me properly.’

What on earth is the issue?