Chapter 30 – Katrina’s plan

17/12/2022PC

I looked at Riley with disdain. Just like I thought, he never had the water attribute, Nicola was the one who possessed it. He’d always claimed that it was curse but like Nicola said, if he could cast something like that, he wouldn’t have been suffering with Mana Poisoning in the first place1.

He’d been ordering me around, complaining when I couldn’t use the water attribute, but in reality, he was the one at fault. And now, that’s been proven. Riley was wrong, I am not incompetent after all. I guess Riley wasn’t the only one who was wrong, I’d made a mistake too. I’d evaluated Nicola poorly.

Not only could Nicola use the water attribute, he was also able to use the fire attribute. And I was never able to see that in him. No, he must not have possessed it before. If he had, there’s no way someone as discerning as me would have missed it.

He’d always suffered with Mana Poisoning, and after getting healthy he awakened to his true potential. Not just that, he took down a Treant that other adventurers with Servants were having trouble with.

Yes, he has finally grown to become a fitting contract-holder for me. The only hiccup was that he seemed to have formed a contract with another Servant temporarily, but it shouldn’t be a problem. If I asked “Let’s bind a contract.”, I was sure he would break that contract without a second thought. After all, Nicola was always dependent on me. He wouldn’t have even been able to function without me.

Compared to the present Nicola, Riley is useless. Sitting opposite me in the carriage, his head drooping, he had a death grip on Zoe’s hand. She was patting head and consoling him with a cloying voice.
“There, there. It’s all right.”
“If only he removed my curse…even I could…”

Actually, during that incident, a single goblin rushed towards us. And of all things, Riley threw me away and set himself with Zoe to face the goblin. However, he couldn’t do anything. He was terrified. In the end, a knight came and dealt with the goblin. His never broken, Riley collapsed right there. He was practically carried back to the carriage by Zoe.

Pathetic. He threw me away for that? I wonder what Zoe was even doing then. She had the gall to call me incompetent, wasn’t she the incompetent one? Yes, I’m sure that’s the case.
I could no longer keep this incompetent duo company.

Our carriage reached town called Larva. It was a seedy looking place, but the inn seemed to respectable, and Riley rented two rooms there. One room for Riley and Zoe; and one for me. I was sure they would be all over each other in that room, but I no longer cared.

Nicola would definitely come there. The adventurers appeared to be relying on him after all. I decided to ask Nicola to renew our contract when we met the next day. He was always reliant on me after all, by all rights he should be the one requesting me to form a contract, but I was sure he was just trying to protect the feelings of his new Servant when we ran into each other before.

So I shall graciously bestow another chance upon him.

T/N Notes:

Nicola only thought that statement, he never said it. Guess the author forgot quotes in Chapter 28.