We were running through the Crucible Street at dusk.
Just as the last chimes of the church’s bell were resounding, Tirnanog and I arrived at Turm Wand Store.
It was to meet Gilbert, not Harold.
The other person who noticed cobalt oxide was said to be Gilbert.
It was difficult to say whether or not he was going to be inside the wand store, but it was better than looking for him blindly.
『As usual, there is no sign of a customer.
The store owner doesn’t seem to be in the store, but there is a sign of the redheaded brat.』
“That’s rather convenient.”
Even when I went inside the store, no one came out to greet me.
Looking around, Harold was polishing the shelves quietly with an almost dead facial expression.
He shouldn’t have to clean anything at times like this.
No, perhaps it was more painful for him if he didn’t distract himself by doing something.
“Harold, are you okay?”
“Ah……? Aa, Erica, welcome.
What is it? Have you found a wand that match your taste?”
“You don’t seem to be fine. Unfortunately, we’re not here as a customer.”
『Is Gilbert in the back?』
“Aniki? Aa, Aniki came back a while ago.
It seems he was going to make something difficult that he couldn’t afford to fail, so right now he’s shutting himself inside the storehouse, but……”
After all, it was as we expected.
When I exchanged looks with Tirnanog, he nodded.
“Harold, this is something you also need to hear. Let’s go together, okay?”
『Even if you say no I will force you to come with us.』
“Eh, ah, wait……, the store! There is only me manning the store!”
“We are your only customers in these two days, right?”
“T-that’s true, but! Aah, jeez, let me lock the door first at least!”
As Tirnanog manhandled him, Harold was kicking and struggling.
We let him go to lock the store, then we headed to the storehouse in the back of the store.
☆
“Yo, everyone, what’s the matter?”
Gilbert seemed to have just completed the preparation, and was about to clear up the alchemy tools spread on the desk.
I glanced at the container placed on the desk.
Gilbert quickly hid it in his bag.
Again, Gilbert seemed to be keeping secret about the blue pigment that he had found.
Because Harold knew nothing, so somehow it felt like that.
In a sense, it could be said that we met him just in time.
It would be difficult to meet him after he went somewhere else to make it.
Tirnanog rolled an indigo blue glass bead on the table.
Gilbert reached for it with a relieved expression.
Tirnanog’s hand caught his stretched hand with a lightning-quick movement.
『As expected, I knew you would recognize it at a glance.』
“We come to talk about it.”
When Tirnanog and I pressed him, Gilbert cast his eyes down and laughed.
“Hahaha, you caught me. Even though I thought that I would be able to evade questions until the prototype was completed.
Not only you are aware of the identity of the smelt, you seem to be able to make the actual thing in just a few hours.
As expected from the daughter of the head of the alchemists. You cannot be measured by ordinary means.”
Gilbert muttered thoughtfully.
No, no, it was because my friend was a phantom beast, I myself was just an ordinary and mediocre girl.
But I couldn’t say that.
“W-wait, what are you talking about! Are you leaving me out of loop?”
『Wait, wait, Harold. Let’s explain it in order. I will let Gilbert explain it.』
“Mister, so you’re leaving it all to me.”
Gilbert smiled bitterly and lowered his hip back on the chair again.
When he put the container in his bag back to the table, Tirnanog released his hand.
Gilbert breathed a sigh while gazing at the glass bead through the light of the lamp.
“Aah, after all it’s a fine coloring.”
“Is it a blue glass? It’s certainly rare to see such a thing.
What’s up with this glass?”
“This was made of the waste inside the barrel that was kicked off by Botchan.”
『To be exact, I made a blue-colored glass rather than the glass itself.』
“Hee……?”
“This is a rather rare metal on this continent called cobalt oxide.
Far from a waste, it seems to be worth twenty times that of silver of the same weight.”
“E, eeeehhhhh—!?”
Harold cried out with his eyes wide open.
He had to be surprised because what he thought was just a waste turned into treasure.
“That……what a coincidence.”
“Indeed, it’s an amazing coincidence.
Surely the proportions of the metals contained in the ore deposit and the smelting method thought of by Earl Nibelheim have ended up producing this result.”
“You mean, if we sell this rare metal called cobalt oxide, we can regain even the loss of the fraud!?”
“I wonder about that.”
“Well, that’s what one would think. That’s why I couldn’t say it.”
Harold who recovered from his shock raised a voice full of joy.
Gilbert and I shrugged and exchanged glances.
“It’s not about how much you can sell, the problem is how to sell it.
For example, if you sell it as a material for blue glass, there is only a limited demand.
If you sell it to the temples, churches, and part of the aristocrats and merchants, the consumption will reach the limit.”
“If they know that cobalt oxide can be made as long as the silver ores in the northwest areas haven’t been exhausted yet, its value will be lower than it is currently.”
“No way……”
“You shouldn’t sell the cobalt oxide itself, but the added value born by it.
Just as how the Nibelheim territory isn’t just selling a mass of high-purity silver, but a high-quality silverware.”
“Hahaha, you are still a child but you sure know your stuff, Ojou-san.
That’s why I also thought that I want to pitch in and help my important younger brother.”
『After all, what kind of person are you, Gilbert.
You are not just an ordinary youngest child of a wealthy merchant.』
“I’d like to return those words to mister as it is.”
Gilbert smiled wryly at Tirnanog’s pointed question.
“To begin with I didn’t collect the smelt for some insight I had.
When I used analysis magic because I was worried whether harmful substances were mixed, I discovered it by chance.
But mister, you didn’t use any magic or anything.
You are not just an ordinary escort of a duke’s daughter.”
『I am a very ordinary guardian. And my old friend was a famous alchemist.』
Tirnanog continued to sidestep the question without lying as usual.
Gilbert shrugged his shoulders at his response.
『What were you doing before you returned to this place?』
“I was pursuing my dream. It took me ten years for that dream to come true halfway.”
“Specifically, what is that dream?”
“That is……well, I will show you. Keep it a secret, okay?”
Gilbert took out the white silk packet from his bag.
He gently put the somewhat flat packet on the table and carefully unwrapped it.
What appeared from the white silk fabric was a white plain dish.
It wasn’t pure white, it was tinged with a faintly pure and translucent bluish color.
When it was looked under the strong yellow-colored light, the whiteness felt more prominent.
“Is this porcelain?”
“Correct. As expected from the duke’s daughter, you can recognize it at a glance.”
No, it was just that in my previous world porcelain was not unusual.
I couldn’t say it though.
“Ooh~, certainly, this is similar to the dishes Master is collecting!”
“Right, right, this is similar to that dish.
There is a broken one in that collection, right?”
“It is a dish with a picture of a beast.”
“Actually, the one who broke it was me.”
Harold was frozen in shock for a moment, his chair moved back a few centimeters.
I understood his surprise.
Even if it was a used item in pristine condition, it was at least worth a castle.
When he saw our reactions, Gilbert laughed with an expression like a mischievous boy.
“Uwah……that kind of thing……Aniki, I guess you were very angry?”
“You’d think so. But actually it was a bit different.
Maybe because I was a child that born when my old man was already old, I was very spoiled.”
Gilbert murmured in nostalgia that he was a brat in those days.
It seemed that he felt a sense of satisfaction by feeling cherished from the reaction, as he did various mischiefs to attract his father’s attention.
At some point, he himself forgot the reason why he broke a dish that was the Turm elder’s precious dish.
He would only know about it after a long time had passed, but it was a dish that was expensive enough to be able to buy a small southern island with one piece of it.
Nevertheless, there was no wrinkle between the eyes of the Turm elder.
“Instead, he was worried whether or not I got hurt.”
From the eyes of Gilbert who was only a child at that time, he also found that the eyes behind those lenses were sad.
Although he was trying hard to care about his child, Gilbert seemed to have received the impression that he had somewhat emptied a hole in the heart of Turm elder.
Perhaps, it might have been a dish that had been cherished next to his thirteen sons.
Thinking so, Gilbert became frightened and thought to apologize again.
“So, I said it clearly.
‘When I become an adult, I will make the same dish’, I said.”
Turm elder was furious when he heard those words.
You don’t have to risk your life to make that kind of thing.
Use your time and talent for more meaningful things.
When he raised his voice as he said this, Turm elder gazed at Gilbert with eyes that had a deeper anguish than when the plate broke.
“That was the only time my old man yelled at me.”
I guessed he was probably worrying about Gilbert’s future.
However, on the contrary, Gilbert’s heart was captured by the existence of porcelain.
He wanted to triumph over his old man by any means. And then, he wanted Turm elder to laugh as he saw the dish that he made.
“That’s why, I purposely chose a porcelain collector that was particularly on bad terms with my old man, and got myself a patron.”
It was said that the noble was a powerful aristocrat from Ignitia.
Without telling anyone, Gilbert got on a ship to the South and left Knot Reed.
“I used that noble’s connections and enrolled in Lindis under a pseudonym.
It was a short and exciting free time to learn the minimum necessary knowledge and skills.
After I got a personal laboratory in Ignitia, it was a life that would make me wanted to say that it was a confinement.
Well, I thought that it was not bad, since I finally able to make this, with my youth as the compensation price.”
“Wait, Aniki……don’t tell me, the white porcelain alchemist that is rumored to be fleeing an Ignitia aristocracy is……?”
“Because I was nearly killed. What is it called, research policy disagreement?”
Gilbert was wearing cordovan shoes.
According to Harold, those were the Ignitian aristocratic shoes.
I didn’t notice until I was told, but the hint had been there forever.
“I wanted to reproduce the blue in my memory, but he wouldn’t let me.
That person wanted to have a collection of levels that he could appreciate.
But, I wanted to reproduce the technique in its complete form.
I wanted to revive the ancient colors on this one. I wanted to make the real deal, not an imitation.”
Gilbert looked towards the South in nostalgia for a moment.
He seemed to be feeling some respect and sincerity for his Ignitian aristocratic patron.
It might have been a strong feeling to the degree that it wouldn’t go away even if he got killed.
“Just a little bit longer, and I might have to say goodbye to my neck and torso. But it seemed that my luck had not run out yet.
I was able to escape due to the great chaos caused by the prince.
When I was desperately running away, I had no destination in mind, but for some reason I reached my hometown, Knot Reed.”
The rumors about the white porcelain alchemist seemed to have been true.
He was able to escape by taking advantage of the massive mental interference because he was Gilbert, whose blood was a mix of the eastern mage and the Visitor’s Clan.
One never knew what will change things for the better in which ways, huh.
Gilbert picked up the blue glass bead that was rolling in the corner of the desk and held it up to the light.
『That blue is the blue that is in your memory, right.』
“Aa, that’s right, mister……if this is the case, it can be reproduced.”
『The blue you were looking for was in your hometown this whole time.』
“It’s an ironic thing……”
Gilbert closed his eyes and placed the blue glass on the table.
Taking a deep breath, he opened his eyes with a serious look.
“Say, Aniki, can this be produced in our territory?”
“Aa, it can. As long as one knows how to handle the furnace. I have spent my life for that.”
“Then, if this story spreads, there will be no lenders that will withdraw their money from the Nibelheim family!?”
“No, you need the actual things, not just lip-service.
Just as how I resigned to talk when confronted with Ojou-san’s blue glass.”
Harold’s bright voice and expression finally came back, and Gilbert backtracked.
“I wanted to make money for furnace and pigments somehow and tried to sell the white porcelains that I had.
But, not even one was sold.
It seems that a scam aimed at an antique art dealer was rampant some time before I came.
The scrutiny for artworks in the northwest area has become considerably severe.”
“No way……”
“Oi, oi, Botchan. Don’t be looking like that. I didn’t say that I cannot do it.”
“But, Aniki. Even if you start making porcelain from now, ultimately you won’t be able to make it in time……”
“No, that’s not true.
Oops……it’s going to be done heating up soon.”
Gilbert murmured so and stood up.
Huh? Didn’t porcelain take more weeks to make?
Harold looked up at Gilbert with an absentminded blank expression.
I was certain that I was making a taken aback face that wouldn’t lose out to him.
“This is just right. Everyone, follow me.
I will show you the magic that I……no, we assembled over a decade.”
That said, Gilbert laughed a lot with confidence.
