“Ahem. In any case, I have something I would like to show you as well, Commander.”
Keiras was still reluctant to reveal that he had taken a disciple.
For that reason, he planned to begin by showing the Commander the item he claimed to be investing in.
When Keiras said he had something to show him, the Commander asked,
“You have something to show me?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
“This.”
Keiras took a sheet of Hanji from inside his robe.
The Commander tilted his head when he saw it.
“Paper? Is it perhaps a page from a spellbook of the ancient Lost Age of Magic?”
If an Imperial Mage was going out of his way to show something to the Commander, he thought it should at least be something of that caliber.
However, it was merely ordinary paper.
No, it was not ordinary paper.
It was Hanji made by Aiman.
Still, in this world, it would simply be regarded as paper.
Keiras shook his head at the Commander’s question.
“Of course not.”
“Yes, it does not appear to be. It is completely blank. Then is it merely ordinary paper?”
It was not a page from some long-lost spellbook, so the Commander could not understand why Keiras wanted to show it to him.
Aside from its slightly unusual pattern, it looked like ordinary paper no matter how closely he examined it.
Keiras held the Hanji out toward the skeptical Commander.
“Would you like to touch it?”
“You want me to touch the paper?”
“Yes.”
“Give it here.”
Keiras placed the Hanji into the Commander’s outstretched hand.
“Here you are.”
After receiving the Hanji, the Commander rubbed it between his fingers and held it up toward the light.
Once he had finished examining it, an intrigued expression appeared on his face.
“Hmm. It is considerably smoother than the paper sold by Paper Farm. Ink should settle on it quite well.”
“That’s right.”
“Where did you obtain this?”
“This is the item I said I was investing in.”
“This paper?”
“Yes.”
The Commander looked over the Hanji once more.
Then he stared at Keiras with a displeased expression.
“Are you truly planning to become some sort of merchant despite being an Imperial Mage?”
Now that Keiras had reached the 5th Class, he should have been devoting himself to reaching the 6th Class and joining the ranks of the Archmages.
Instead, he was talking about investing in a business.
From the Commander’s perspective, the situation was utterly absurd.
Keiras understood his reaction and waved both hands dismissively.
“Oh, no. Of course not. Why would I become a merchant? An acquaintance made this and asked me to publicize it, so I brought some with me.”
“What sort of man is he?”
“What?”
“What sort of man could persuade an Imperial Mage who has reached the 5th Class to promote mere paper on his behalf?”
It was certainly natural for the Commander to be curious.
Who was Keiras?
He was an Imperial Mage.
Furthermore, he was widely regarded as the most likely candidate to become the next Vice Commander.
And that was not all.
He had now reached the 5th Class.
Excluding the Archmages, he could be considered one of the strongest forces in the Empire.
Yet someone had entrusted such a man with promoting a product.
The Commander could not help wondering what sort of person would do such a thing.
Keiras did not want to reveal that he had accepted Aiman as his disciple, so he offered a vague explanation.
“Ah, it simply looked promising, so I said I would help.”
“Are you being threatened?”
“Threatened?”
“If you are not being threatened, then you must have gone mad.”
“Oh, come now. Why do you keep calling one of your valuable members mad?”
“If it is neither of those, then there is no other explanation. What 5th-Class Imperial Mage in the entire world goes around promoting the sale of paper?”
Keiras pointed at himself with his index finger.
“There’s one right here.”
“You are unbelievable.”
The Commander pressed a hand to his forehead and shook his head as though Keiras was beyond saving.
Keiras smiled brightly at him.
“I’ve always been rather unbelievable.”
“That much is true. In any case, if you are not being threatened, why in the world are you promoting it?”
“Hmm, I received some help from him. Besides, the paper I gave you seemed better than the kind made by Paper Farm.”
“What in the world have you been doing out there……!”
The Commander raised his voice in exasperation.
The idea that a 5th-Class Imperial Mage could ever require another person’s help sounded utterly absurd.
Keiras knew he would have reacted in exactly the same way if he were in the Commander’s position.
Unless the Commander personally met someone like Aiman, the situation would be impossible for him to accept.
For now, Keiras first attempted to calm him.
“Ah, don’t worry. I haven’t done anything that would tarnish the honor of the Imperial Mage Corps, as you seem to fear.”
Naturally, he had not.
Keiras had merely taken a disciple.
A disciple from whom he himself was receiving instruction, no less.
He simply could not reveal that yet.
Once Keiras went that far, the Commander’s anger subsided.
“Whew. Very well. You are not a child, so I am sure you can take care of yourself.”
“Haven’t I always taken excellent care of myself?”
Keiras shrugged as he spoke.
He looked somewhat insufferable, but the Commander could not criticize him for it.
Keiras truly was exceptionally capable.
The Commander had no intention of denying that fact.
Instead, he tried to use it to his advantage.
“Since you are so capable, perhaps you could handle more work for the Corps……”
He seized every opening he could find.
Keiras cut him off before he could finish.
“I already perform my duties for the Corps perfectly well, as long as no excessive position is forced upon me.”
The Commander looked displeased when Keiras preempted him.
“Why do you refuse a position that everyone else is desperate to obtain? I suppose the disciple truly takes after his master. Are you imitating that wild, reckless girl?”
“Good grief, Commander. There you go again. She is still my master, so calling her a girl like that seems rather inappropriate.”
“Tsk. She is twenty years younger than I am, so she is a girl! What else would she be?”
‘I wonder how he would react if he learned Master’s true age.’
For certain reasons, Keiras’s master lived while concealing her true identity.
Keiras was probably the only person in the Empire who knew who she truly was.
No, he had to be the only one.
That was his master’s wish.
If Keiras accidentally revealed her identity……
GULP.
‘Absolutely not.’
Keiras swallowed when the thought of his master suddenly crossed his mind.
The Commander stared at him in confusion.
“Why did you suddenly swallow like that?”
“Ha ha, it’s nothing. More importantly, what do you think of the paper I brought?”
Continuing the current subject would only force Keiras to hear the same complaints he had already heard countless times.
He changed the subject.
More precisely, he returned to the main reason he had come.
Promoting the Hanji on Aiman’s behalf.
Although the Commander disliked Keiras’s master, he did not disregard the fact that she was still Keiras’s teacher.
He merely complained about her from time to time.
Continuing to criticize her would only make the situation awkward.
Furthermore, regardless of the Commander’s opinion of her, Keiras’s master was also an Archmage.
The subject would only make him angry, so the Commander turned his attention back to the Hanji as well.
“It certainly is better than the paper supplied by Paper Farm.”
“Isn’t it?”
Keiras had felt the same way when Aiman first gave him the Hanji.
After examining its condition, the Commander asked Keiras a question.
“Then where is the man who intends to sell this?”
“What?”
He was asking where the person who had made the Hanji was.
‘He’s in our territory…….’
Naturally, Keiras had no intention of saying that.
While he considered how to respond, the Commander grew angry at his silence.
“Do not tell me that the man selling this pushed all the work onto you and is somewhere else?”
“Of course not. Unlike me, he also has to oversee production and sales, so he is busy traveling from place to place.”
If Keiras told him a specific location, the Commander looked ready to visit personally or send someone there.
Keiras therefore answered as though he did not know where the person was.
The Commander gave him a hollow look.
“You are wandering around promoting goods to help a man whose location you do not even know. Hah. What is this world coming to?”
Keiras had lost count of how many different assessments the Commander had made of him that day.
A mad 5th-Class Imperial Mage who went around promoting paper for some merchant.
After considering how the Commander now viewed him, Keiras asked,
“But honestly, isn’t it worth that much?”
At Keiras’s question, the Commander examined the Hanji once again.
He was displeased with Keiras’s behavior, but he was not unreasonable enough to deny the truth.
He assessed the Hanji objectively.
“Hmm. If the price were the same, I believe I would use this instead.”
“Would you?”
“Yes.”
The Commander was saying that if the prices were equal, he would choose Aiman’s Hanji instead of the paper produced by Paper Farm, which had monopolized the market until now.
Keiras grinned.
“What if it were cheaper?”
“What?”
The Commander stared at Keiras in considerable surprise.
He had said he would use the Hanji if the prices were identical, but in truth, he thought it might still be the better choice even if it cost slightly more.
Yet Keiras was not saying it would cost more.
It would actually be cheaper.
In that case, there was no reason to hesitate.
There would be no problem with using this paper from now on.
“The merchant who makes and sells this told me that if he wants to overcome Paper Farm’s monopoly, he must also remain competitive in price. He intends to sell it for less than Paper Farm’s paper.”
“Oh, is that so?”
“Yes.”
The Hanji was better than the paper produced by Paper Farm, yet its maker even intended to sell it at a lower price.
Upon hearing that, the Commander placed the sheet of Hanji on the desk where he handled his work.
“Then a considerable number of people will take an interest in it.”
“Do you think so?”
“I am already interested in myself.”
“Then would you help publicize it, Commander? I’ll give you five sheets for your own use and ten more to distribute as samples, one to each person you introduce it to.”
Keiras took out fourteen additional sheets of Hanji as he spoke.
The Commander stared at him in disbelief.
“Hah. It was not enough for you to promote it to me, so now you want me to promote it as well?”
“If it succeeds, the price might become even lower.”
“How admirable of you.”
“If you don’t want to, then it can’t be helped. I still have to promote these elsewhere, so I’ll be leaving.”
Keiras began putting away the Hanji he had taken out to give the Commander.
The Commander spoke brusquely.
“Leave them.”
“What?”
“I said leave all fifteen sheets here, you brat.”
“Heh heh. Understood.”
The Commander did not explain himself, but Keiras understood exactly what he meant.
He intended to publicize the Hanji as Keiras had requested.
Keiras placed the stack of Hanji he had been about to put away on the Commander’s desk.
After receiving it, the Commander looked at him curiously.
“Are you going to see your master now?”
“I should ask her as well. I also plan to speak with some of my acquaintances in the Capital.”
“Just how many sheets of that paper did you bring?”
Keiras had given him fifteen sheets.
Five were for the Commander himself, and yet Keiras apparently had enough remaining to ask his master to promote it as well.
The Commander became curious about how much Hanji Keiras had brought with him.
In truth, it was not that much.
“What? I only brought thirty sheets.”
When Keiras said he had brought thirty sheets of Hanji, the Commander looked puzzled.
“Then is it truly all right to give me five sheets?”
“You’re the Commander. Naturally, I should give you that many.”
Hearing that Keiras was taking care of him, the Commander’s expression filled with curiosity.
“Then what about your master?”
“My master?”
“Yes.”
“If she knows anyone willing to promote it, I’ll give her however many she needs. Otherwise, I’ll probably give her a single sheet.”
‘She isn’t the sort of person who would promote it anyway.’
Keiras knew his master well.
She was absolutely not the sort of person who would do something like this.
She might become curious about Aiman, the person who had made the Hanji, but she would never promote the product.
There was no reason to give her many sheets.
The Commander, meanwhile, heard that Keiras had given him five sheets for himself but intended to give his master only one.
His lips trembled.
It looked as though he was struggling to control some powerful emotion.
In that state, the Commander asked Keiras,
“You gave me five sheets, yet you intend to give your master only one?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm. I see. Very well. You may go.”
“Yes, sir!”
When the Commander dismissed him, Keiras had to leave immediately.
That was the best way to avoid further trouble.
Keiras promptly left the Commander’s Office.
Left alone, the Commander looked at the Hanji resting on his desk and smiled with satisfaction.
“Ho ho. It seems he is more grateful to me for looking after him within the Corps than he is to that master of his who constantly wanders off.”