Chapter 3: Locket woman, floating around and trying to make our Sven to not ignore her. Gianni is a good guy and definitely is not a villain after a few interactions.

So it was the the locket woman.

Sven was not certain it was the woman, but the way that she laughed at the scholar. She would be the prime suspect.

"Sorry young master Sven. What have I done wrong?"

Gin managed to control himself, the slap wasn't that painful.

It was stinging yes, but the problem was why this young man slapped him.

"Yep. Yep. Tell him Sven~ If you do I'll kill you~"

She whispered on Sven's ear, the woman was floating right above Sven's head. Making her features not visible to him.

"Don't worry. I'm only visible and audible to you~"

She gave Sven a reminder to make sure that he won't cry again like last time.

It was common knowledge to ignore ghosts.

Sven was standing stiff, his hair on goosebumps from the woman's voice.

What the mentor see's is Sven silently staring into him absentmindedly.

With subtle exhale, Sven had a small tear in his eye.

Sven was spoiled, but that did not make him stupid.

Arrogance was one of the things he was given, listening to the lectures of the numerous con mens had him proud of his status.

He wasn't about to cry on front of another person, much more especially from this mentor he barely knows.

He steeled himself and remembered he could imitate what the con men did to fix things, which was the only inspiration he had.

They were disgusting yes, but they were also Sven's indirect teachers from how they always act while giving lectures to the farmers.

"Oh, Its a part of our culture." Sven wanted to fix the situation. Not able to get a good excuse he'll bullshit his way through.

"Only young masters like me can do it though, I do it with the maids once they talk to me."

Sven turned to a maid that was standing on the door, gesturing the same way as his father did with a half raised hand.

The maid came over to Sven, and asked. "What is it young maste-"

Slap!

This time the slap was actually from Sven, he did it to decisively make things less complicated.

Wincing, the maid covered her cheek with her hand, staring at Sven with a fearful expression.

"Huehaha Haha! That was smart!" A deep slightly feminine voice rung in Sven's ear.

The lady had her thumbs up, upon further inspection the woman had a white one piece dress on her.

Her face was translucent, making her features unrecognizable like a hazy mist.

Sven shooed the maid away, obligated to follow instructions walked back to her station and stood at the door.

This time she's patting her cheek with a cloth, sobbing silently.

"See? I do it all the time."

Sven was always observing the con men back in the fields, noticing how they managed to keep a poker face.

First they do something to control themselves, whether it be tilting their head, licking the top of their mouth, and fiddling with their rings.

Its a way for them to make sure the act is convincing as they move. The more expert con men's use smarter ways to reinforce habit.

Sven is doing a smile, which was pretty convincing for Gin.

However, the maids reaction of shock came back to his mind and made him doubful. It was bad to question a noble's culture, so he'll be doing his best to ignore it.

"I-I see. Then let us be on our way."

Gin was a trained mentor, he had dealt with other nobles when teaching previously. Some of them were more arrogant, which made him leave.

For him, he can simply excuse himself and be on his merry way if he was treated any more unfairly, like another slap.

Experienced scholars were hard to come by, and Sven's father paid precious money to him.

That and the threat of his family being tortured and executed.

On second thought, he'll stay.

"So, young master. What are your main options right now for a career?"

Gin asked inquisitively and gestured Sven to follow him to walk along.

"I guess I want to have women, food, and glory. I heard being skilled at anything works, so It wouldn't matter what I choose."

Sven commented, he followed along where Gin was walking to.

Where they both went, the maids either were in the middle of gossip and got back to working.

Some others who were more skilled heard the footsteps and started grabbing their buckets and mops, then they were speaking in hushed tones to continue their conversations.

The moment the young master walked by, the maids bowed.

"I understand, theres a lot of options aren't they?" Gin fixed his glasses up with his index finger.

He could get a grasp of what this young master wants now.

Gin had already conversed with Sven's father about his personality.

However, since these accounts were from the father it may be biased, and may possibly have mellowed down his flaws, and only emphasized Sven's good side.

One of the good sides the father had commented on Sven, was his helpfulness in assisting the farmers.

Gin had never heard of such in nobles, that they directly were helping with the hard chores, like harvesting.

"Then, young master Sven. May I interest you in being an explorer?"

Gin wanted to take this chance to educate Sven on what it takes to survive in the wilderness.

Which was what most of those nobles did not have any experience in.

"Yep, sure. Whatever."

Sven did not care much about what an explorer is. More so that a random spirit is right now bugging him.

"Sven! So that is your name~ how dainty, my young master~"

The woman teasingly poked Sven's cheek but it only noclipped into it.

Sven did his best to keep a poker face and slapped the figure's hand in front of him, it only passed through it too.

"Okay, the first thing an explorer needs are preparations."

Gin nodded, retrieving his bag from a maid close to the entrance of the manor, making him unable to see Svens action of slapping the air in front of him.

Gin's backpack was huge, comically huge, it could probably fit three of himself and have some room for more.

Exiting the manor, they are heading towards the empty garden. Gin took out a huge camping tent.

"Sven, the first lesson I'm gonna teach you is how to put up a tent."

Gin made Sven fix the tent up himself.

The floating woman, feeling ignored, then dissapeared.

Sven didn't notice that it did, since he was listening to Gin lecture about how to put up a tent.

"Sven, heres how you do this, help me hold the heavy fabric."

Gin continued to instruct Sven how to make the tent.

They helped together to position it correctly to secure the corners. Hoisting the central poles upright, locking them into place.

Sven correctly did all the instructions his mentor gave him.

Gin on the other hand was delighted of Sven's capacity to follow his orders, most nobles would be too arrogant to let someone tell them what to do.

"Tighten the ropes."

"Hammer those stakes."

"Assist me pulling these."

Gianni gave him casual orders, gently measuring his tone to make himself sound more like a teacher than a drill instructor, the little guy was still a noble after all.

Making sure to sometimes help Sven in fixing up the tent, he did most of the knots and other simple things.

It was surprising for the mentor to see that a young noble had strength enough to help fix the huge tent.

"Done!" Gianni exclaimed as the huge tent was now fully formed.

Without noticing it, the time was already night.

"Next, we make a campfire."

Gianni turned to Sven with a brighter smile, already gathering some pieces of wood.

Sven on the other hand was tired as hell, he didn't expect this lesson to be so physically tiring.

He himself did not expect a scholar like Gianni had enough strength to fix up the huge tent.

"You got to be kidding me."

He was tired from the manual labor. Sven entered the tent and laid down on the tarped ground, head facing up.

"Well, looks like our young master needs some rest."

Gianni remarked, peeking from the door made from the tarped fabrics of the tent.

"I'll order some maids to bring some pillows and mattresses. Tonight we'll sleep here."

Sven didn't hear it, he was fast asleep.

So Gin carried the little boy's fat body to a mattress and a pillow.