Lancelot’s POV
GASP!
I sprung up, sweats dripped down from the side of my face until it trickled the lining of my collarbone. Strange, I thought I have already died when they said they are going to take my heart for the heart transplant for my nephew. Am I alive because they are able to find another heart substitute to be able to be donated to me?
No no, no way. I believe I have already died, because the ceiling and the surrounding felt unfamiliar to me, it looks too british-like compared to the usual white ceiling of the hospital ward.
Where am I?
“Master, are you alright?”
A butler inched closer. Despite his stoic appearance and that tail coat as well as that sophiticated aura his old self emits, I don’t think I recognize who he is. “Who are you?” I blurted. He smiled politely at me as a response before bowing his head in a respective manner. “Sire, my name is Taylor. I am the hed butler of this mansion.”
Taylor.... Wait.
“Taylor James?”
The old butler nodded.
My jaw dropped little by little, shock then masked my whole expression as my mind screamed of one obvious thing. There is only one Taylor James that an introverted antisocial person like me know, and he was from a webnovel that I read. Don’t tell me...
“Taylor, who am I?”
I pointed at myself. The reality looked so true to be deemed as a dream, so I had to make sure myself.
“Your name is Lancelot Ral Constance, sire. You are the head of the Constance household and the Baron of the town of Isaia.”
His explanation is brief and easy to understand, which what instills terror inside me. I brushed my hair and laughed at myself. This is a joke, really, I never have thought that I’m getting reincarnated like this myself.
If I’m correct, the world I am in right now is from a novel titled ‘Love of The Life’, a webnovel about Cecilia Istvan, the MC
Main Character
who came from the countryside and fell in love with the second prince of the country yada yada all those cliche settings of a historical webnovel that you can think of. Yet, here I am, reborn as Avery Ila Ronan’s young uncle, who was only 23 and a bastard in addition of very bad at handling his own self and fief after his whole family died
Which was actually plotted by him and Minerva to gain power of the land
. In the end, Lancelot will be thrown away by Minerva and will be murdered by the crown prince’s assassins.
Heck, I’m even one of those mob character that are going to die after a month here, what am I gonna do?
I heaved a long sigh. The heavens probably despise me or something, with them reincarnating me in this world just to experience death. I might have an idea why the divinity dislikes me, but...
Is being an antisocial really irks the heaven? Are there something wrong with their mind?
This is unfair.
“Master?”
Taylor suddenly knelt on the floor beside the bed, tilting his head up to see my cast down gaze with a worried look on his subtle wrinkly face. He is just like what the novel depicted, a kind and caring old man. He was the one who mourned the death of his master’s family the most among all people, and continue to serve the household even after Lancelot died. My expression softened.
“Master?” The old butler seemed quite surprised somehow right after the hard expression left my face.
I shook my head a no as a reassurance that I am completely fine before I sat up and turned to look at the window. The air coming from the window is divinely fresh, yet the accumulation of some dust at the little corner of the windowsill kinda irks me given I am a Japanese that likes cleanliness.
“Taylor, how much left is all the servants in this household?” I started to ask. From the view of the window, I can clearly see the main garden that is kept in a satisfying level, but not good enough to call it excellent.
I believe that after his whole family died, many of the servants resigned because they could not handle Lancelot’s tyrannical behavior in the house. Though, that story was only depicted a little in the novel.
“Yes, including the knights, there are 30 servants in total.”
“Hmm...”
That amount was a lot more than I thought. Unlike my imagination or assumption based on meager evidence that Lancelot’s life began to get worse at some point, having that much amount is not that bad at all. I guess there are still people here that care after all, or maybe they just sympathize with me.
“How much is everyone’s monthly salary?”
“Yes, about 50 gold coins per month.”
50 gold coins huh? I do remember the author disclosed about how much the coins worth. One gold coin is about uh, 2500 yen? So the monthly salary is uh about...
125k yen?!
What is with that amount? Isn’t that too little for even the minimum amount in modern Japan? Wait, this isn’t even Japan though. Maybe they are the average amount for household servants, who knows?
“And uh, you take care of the accounting of this house, right? How much money that we have left?”
For a moment there, I can see his reluctancy to tell me the amount. Of course, Lancelot is known to be a huge spendthrift that his family was on the verge of ruin after he took the lead about two years ago.
“It’s about 8 million gold.”
I nodded. That was actually quite a lot for me, as I was only a mere citizen back in my world. But I bet that amount was too little to be owned by a noble.
“Just that?”
“...Yes.”
When I glanced back at him, I could see a gloomy emotion filled his dark grey eyes and he was sweating nervously. He must have been very worried about this household affairs, but he could not speak a word to Lancelot because even if he was a tyrant, he was still the head of the Constance family.
For a brief moment, I pursed my lips and let my eyes do their work of studying people’s expressions. It was an ability I managed to obtain living as someone who relied on others to do daily chores. “Listen, Taylor.”
I paused, letting both of my hands move to rest on my hips. It is surprisingly slender for a middle aged guy like me.
Wait, slender?
“Hold up.” I said, with a Japanese accent.
“Master?” Taylor once again expressed his concern. Although it was ignored by me, because I am more distracted by more important things, that is...
“I...” I shot my gaze towards my legs. Wiggling my toes for a bit, I said in a tone mixed with happiness and utter disbelief. “I can walk...”
Tears slowly welled up in my eyes. Inhaling slowly to keep my tears in, I perk my gaze up to see Taylor, who was frozen on his feet. “Taylor... I can walk again...”
The tears finally flowed down on my cheeks, the streams of tears were too massive that it drenched the bathrobe that I wore and dripped down to the magenta carpeted floor. That being said, this tears still couldn’t equal the amount of happiness that I experience right now.
I was disabled from my waist below since my highschool days due to some accident. Many dreams that I wanted to do were left behind because of this disability, causing me to turn into someone with low self esteem and even depression. While spiting myself, time went by, and I became a middle aged man without doing anything to chase my dreams and to fulfill my desires of becoming a successful sportsman. Now that I have my legs back, the dreams that I had overflowed again inside my mind.
I burst out into chuckling when I felt the cold wind brushing between my legs. The air was indeed cold, but I’m enjoying it.
“Taylor...” My word apparently snapped him from his daze, because he flinched the moment I called his name.
“Y-Yes, master?”
I sniffled and wiped the tears with the hem of my sleeves, forming a smile after that. “I want to go out, can I go out?”