Reincarnated as the Villainess's attendant

Zoemi arrived at the training ground in an excellent mood – no need to explain why exactly – greeting the other participants.

That year hosted one of the best batches of knight training participants in a long time – merely two people dropped out because they couldn't keep up the intensity of the exercises and both did so during the first week.

"Good morning, young lord Grazio."

The black-haired boy greeted the red-haired one cheerfully as always.

"...yes... Hello."

Despite being the one who wanted to gain forgiveness, Grazio's way of greeting was as cold as usual. Zoemi didn't particularly care, although if he was not aware of the tsundere tendencies the other boy had, he would also not suspect that something was up.

After all, the difference in their status could explain everything – and that did not exclude giving the other party a cold shoulder.

"My sister asked me to pass on her thanks. You were right about that one issue with the spell."

Unexpectedly, Grazio didn't just turn around and walked away but instead, he spoke up seemingly attempting to engage in small talk.

"Young lady Victureo is too kind, someone like me doesn't deserve her kind words."

Zoemi bowed his head politely and responded lightheartedly with the right amount of bootlicking to not get on Grazio's nerves.

"So you say, but you did find a fault with the construction of the complicated spell. You must be proud of yourself."

The red-haired boy shrugged his shoulders but his eyes never moved away from Zoemi's expression as if he was only waiting for him to show some change.

What kind of change, though, remained a mystery for Zoemi.

"You are giving me too much credit, my lord. I merely chanced upon your esteemed sister practicing her magic and used my attribute to copy whatever spell she was focused on. I could not construct it properly and had to experiment so it could be cast. It just so happened that I stumbled upon the solution. Far from being something to be proud of, I would be a very shameful person if I tried to hide the discovery away from her."

The black-haired boy backed off while shaking his arms denying the honors that Grazio was pinning onto him.

He was obviously lying too. After all, he didn't have a drop of mana in him in this timeline, but his experience with magic from the past timeline didn't just evaporate from his memory.

The spell in question wasn't even that complicated, to begin with, it was bound to work after applying the principles of earth magic to the fire attribute.

Still, that way of thinking wasn't something that other magicians were used to trying, hence the overblown reaction.

"Say, you said that our mana reservoir is limited... by any chance, did you consider a career as a scholar instead? You might be weak – too weak to be a knight, at least at your age – but you are smart. Why not make use of your talents in that direction instead of trying to become a knight?"

The surprises didn't stop coming! Grazio seemed to be warming up Zoemi and showed him a lot of respect with that question... although it was preceded by some backhanded compliments...

Although it was done with some crude words, the heir of the Victureo family was giving him credit for his intelligence – despite his age, those did not appear to be just empty words.

"My father got expelled from his family because of me, so we have basically no money and the territory that took us in is in a critical moment of development so it cannot invest any funds in someone with no obligation to stay there after pursuing higher education."

Zoemi feigned a sad smile and lowered his head as he explained his circumstances rather bluntly.

"If you will hang around my older sister more instead of making sweet eyes towards lady Miriette, maybe she will tell my father a word or two and he will put you on a scholarship."

Grazio scoffed and turned around so Zoemi couldn't tell his expression.

"She has a soft heart, father trusts her, and we already have enough soldiers and knights – but our territory could use a lot more scholars."

The red-haired boy pointed out, raising his head triumphantly as if it was something to be proud of.

"Thank you, my lord. I might go that way, but for now, I am focused on continuing the knight training. It would be a shame to drop out at this point when I am starting to get a hang of things."

It was a legitimately interesting offer and Zoemi had to stop and think about it for a while, but ultimately he decided to put that idea to the back of his mind.

There was a path that he had already planned out and was working out just fine.

"Hey, I know that you are sneaking out at night to train, but honestly, you should see that there are barely any improvements to your strength. It's better to know your place."

Grazio scoffed, pointing out.

"..."

His tone certainly wasn't to Zoemi's liking – it might have appeared that he was doing it out of good intentions, but was so condescending about it that no one, no matter how self-conscious, would listen to his advice.

...not to mention that the sneaking out that took place was the time when Zoemi could do some actual training that reallymade him stronger...

As for the exercises and activities during the preparatory part of the knight training, the black-haired boy would be careful to always end up last.

At first, he was trying for that to happen, but then he began cultivating star powers that didn't augment his body strength and stamina by meditating while running and keeping himself busy enough to look as if he was struggling.

Thanks to that, he was close to raising the levels of every single star power at his disposal, which was an outstanding feat considering that he could use all twelve at this point.

"Thank you for the advice, young lord Victureo."

The title itself wasn't all that important – becoming a certified attendant before Miriette would go to the Aspakeony Academy topped it without even being on the horizon – but wasn't completely useless either.

It could open a few more doors that he would have to break open otherwise – but, that was something for the future.

|Hmm... Law of Pisces and Law of Scorpio. I better not butt into somebody.|

Zoemi thought to himself as the training started as always – with the morning run.