NOVEL NEXT Chapter 370
<370 - The Third Lady>
The second lady couldn’t endure the wealth of sensitivity and just zipped away, which made Jonnas feel a bit worried as he brought the third lady, who was definitely a different character right from the start.
━━━
# Day 1 at the Academy.
*Initiating the butler’s long-term plan [Survive at the Gift Academy].
*Mapping out travel routes and campus facilities.
*Basic communication with roommates in the shared dormitory.
# Day 2 at the Academy.
*Discovered 0 points [Food Waste] at the snack bar.
*Attempted to save on food expenses; results in stomachache.
*Tried natural healing by taking herbal medicine to aid digestion to save on treatment costs.
# Day 3 at the Academy.
*Natural healing successful.
*Gathered information for a smooth herbal collection; received a scout offer from the Alchemy/Chemistry Club.
*Sacrificed three roommates to become a higher-ranked member.
━━━
What the third lady left behind was a record of activities disguised as a letter.
She was an intellectual who maintained rationality and logic.
Or perhaps an overly eccentric miser.
‘Hmm. She feels a bit like Oknodie. The foolish demeanor reminds me of Titos, though.’
However, the third eccentric lady turned out to be a lesser version of Oknodie in that not all her attempts were always successful.
Still, compared to the other two ladies, her adaptability was terrifyingly fast.
Maybe that’s why her grades were absolutely excellent, and her advancement to the upper class was confirmed; she slowly started exhibiting strange behaviors.
━━━
# Day 32 at the Academy.
*Obtained information that points are needed for promotion in all grades.
*Conducted local procurement for smooth collection.
# Day 33 at the Academy.
*Learned point robbery methods by using the point distribution feature of a magic watch from a senior member.
*Intentionally obstructed assignment submissions and material collection from students refusing point extortion.
*Recruited collaborators to suppress resistance more easily.
# Day 34 at the Academy.
*Successfully recruited competent collaborator Velocasio.
*Confirmed obstruction acts not reaching the level of instructor intervention.
*Launched more comprehensive collection using contracts.
━━━
Contract Scammer Velocasio.
He was the one leading extortion activities aimed at the first-year students of Class 981, which included Jiang, among the seniors of Class 980.
That villain was actively working alongside the third lady.
The severity of his exploits was enough to make one wonder if the current Velocasio was just joking around.
━━━
# Day 55 at the Academy.
*With support from loan sharks, successfully passed most exams in the faction during midterms.
*Some grades of the loan sharks used as consumables were remarkably low. Need to replace them with new parts.
# Day 56 at the Academy.
*Intervention by the upperclassman, White Knight Roe, led some loan sharks to defect from the organization.
*Need to recruit a rival to Roe.
# Day 57 at the Academy.
*Recruited Deadcat from the upper class under the condition of providing regular prey as a rival to Roe.
*Successfully repelled White Knight Roe. Follow-up exam results for the defected loan sharks were marked as failures to make a point.
━━━
Taking away points from fellow students and turning them into loan sharks was not enough; those who refused to follow directives were marked as examples by failing.
Even Oknodie, who disregarded human life, couldn’t distinguish right from wrong and generally didn’t stop what she was doing.
Such mercy did not exist for the third lady.
Someone more suited as an assassin than Oknodie or even herself.
Her mentor, the life-thief Rung Nosa, once said:
The best assassin is one who has killed their own heart.
Someone who is not swayed by anything.
Who lives in eternal numbness.
Perhaps that lady was someone who was endlessly close to numbness.
━━━
# Day 75 at the Academy.
*Meeting with the butler.
*Conducting inquiries about regular reports.
*Received directions to halt aggressive expansion of forces due to the risk of exposure as a Foundation Scholarship Student.
*To solidify the foundation, was informed about the existence and entry methods of the [Secret Laboratory].
# Day 76 at the Academy.
*Discovered a [Letter Box] while analyzing the lab’s structure.
*Recognized the butler’s selection criteria for ladies.
*My way was right. The butler will soon realize it too.
# Day 77 at the Academy.
*To survive at the academy, it is necessary to foresee a distant future beyond the first year.
*Request to establish counter-strategies against the [Student Council], who will become the ultimate enemy.
*Large-scale plan constructed.
*Mobilized all material and human resources to proceed with the plan.
━━━
Even such a person made one marvel at Jonnas’ butler skills, which could compel acknowledgment, but going down this path felt utterly wrong.
The ominous premonition eventually became reality.
━━━
# Day 84 at the Academy.
*If resource supply to the Student Council and classmates become obstacles to survival, it may be necessary to expel as many classmates as possible all at once.
*Launched the ‘Classmate Reduction’ operation to replace aggressive expansion during the finals period.
━━━
The journal recorded the various schemes the third lady used to attempt reducing the number of students, detailing what plans were executed as scheduled and how many students were reduced.
The cohesion among the students of Class 980 wasn’t solely due to the top student, [Mandela Castera]’s efforts.
There was a formidable threat pushing them to unite or perish.
━━━
# Day 89 at the Academy.
*Forced hypnosis and brainwashing was forcibly lifted due to Mandela Castera’s broad abilities.
*Plans to expel students were unfeasible.
*Long-term imprisonment in the Great Prison was confirmed.
*Impossible to continue pursuing the primary goal [Survive at the Gift Academy].
*The butler is the one who provides answers.
*The one who allowed a new life in an untenable environment.
*Need to meet with the butler to reset the goal.
*Wishing to escape the academy before imprisonment, activated the forced rampage of senior scholarship students using [Dark Mana], which works separately from hypnosis and brainwashing.
*Thus concludes the records at the Academy.
━━━
The path of the third villain lady concluded like this.
Whether she met with the butler after leaving the academy, and what penalties she faced remains unknown.
It could only be confirmed that she never returned to the academy, and the journal ended here.
“…”
The taste is bitter.
Like sipping on a gritty black coffee.
Tastes awful, but the rich aroma lingers deeply, causing his halted hand to slowly close the journal.
‘It was almost similar. To Oknodie’s way of thinking.’
This might have been a trace of a failure that could have been Oknodie’s story.
If Oknodie had lacked sufficient knowledge about the academy, if she had enrolled a year earlier, if she had just been a bit more ruthless…
Yet, if the desire for acknowledgment from Jonnas still remained, she would certainly not have been much different from the third villain lady.
Three ladies.
And the fourth lady, Oknodie.
Now it makes sense.
The true nature of Oknodie’s source of tremendous information.
It was a measure by Jonnas to prevent the lady’s unilateral decisions.
Through trial and error, he became a means to protect the lady.
In reality, with sufficient information to gain and stay ahead, Oknodie felt no need to ruthlessly contain others.
The more Jonnas turns a blind eye to danger, the more unfortunate the lady’s life becomes.
The more Jonnas risks danger, the happier the lady’s life becomes.
‘I might not have been supposed to read this.’
Let’s return it.
As he lifted the letter box and stepped out of the dormitory, his stride halted in the middle of the hallway.
If I return it… to whom?
The step he had intended to take toward Oknodie’s dormitory finally turned back.
In the dead of night, she headed to Jonnas’ office.
Inside, the dimly lit room cast shadows around the decorative surroundings like iron bars, where he stood alone.
As if he already knew Jiang would come.
“Looks like I couldn’t fool you after all. The fact that you noticed due to the cancellation of the soundproof spell was just an excuse, wasn’t it? You had a way to detect even advanced divine arts.”
“Regrettably, this lady enjoys playing hide and seek. As a butler, I felt the need to develop new techniques.”
A bleak office vacant of any decoration, save for the minimal necessary furniture.
The letter box resting on the table caught the faint light, casting new shadows.
“The ladies’ letter boxes. You already knew about this too, right? The urgency of the last lady leaving the letters, and the presence of the letters within the box. To explain the inconsistency, just like other ‘materials,’ this letter must also be classified as a ‘collection’ of the Metal Mice.”
“I don’t understand why you’re discussing such matters openly in front of me without saying a word about it.”
“Knowing of the box’s existence yet leaving it there means you were hoping Oknodie would discover it, yes?”
“Did you not think of returning a misappropriated item to its rightful place? I can’t even bring myself to blame you for such foolish reasoning.”
“Rightful place? Which location do you refer to? The place within the laboratory where the letter box was kept? Or perhaps… Oknodie’s dormitory?”
Jonnas, no, Jonnas the Butler’s previously cold and sharp demeanor slightly wavered.
The swaying of the sword reflected the turmoil in the inspector’s heart.
“You must know what it would mean for Oknodie to see this letter. There’s no way someone like you wouldn’t know. Let alone that the Foundation would be oblivious as well.”
A faint sadness brushed across Jiang’s face behind the mask.
She felt sympathy.
For the Foundation’s butler, and for the ladies.
For her precious friend who might someday follow in their footsteps.
“A multi-talented butler who can do anything. My only ally who would never betray me. Making such a butler’s secrets exposed. That is the punishment the Foundation has given you and the Chairwoman’s plan to tame Oknodie?”
This letter box was a Pandora’s Box, a seed of distrust that would fundamentally destroy the relationship and trust between the two.