I was an apprentice in Ferren

Chapter 146 Prelude
“That’s how it is, that’s why I asked you for help.” DuPont stuffed the lamb chop in front of him into his mouth, the delicious juice bursting in his mouth. After he was blinded, he poured a small glass of wine for the two of them. “Sigh, the land deeds are selling rather slowly. It really is like money is flowing out of the bank. In the blink of an eye, I have less than 1300 gold left in my pocket.”

"A sword costs over ten thousand gold coins, you're quite willing to spend that much, even with the enchantment it's still not cheap." Deva coughed lightly, "By the way, do you need any money? If not, I can give you five thousand to use first?"

“No need to borrow money, I’m fairly well-off right now. I’ll come to you again if the land deed doesn’t sell. That dwarf master only charged five thousand, which is quite good; I reckon it’s at least a +3 weapon.” DuPont said, looking at the paladin: “Have you run into any trouble in the past week?”

"No, the guards listen to me now. The city hall gave me a bonus of 1000 gold coins because of the vampire incident, and I put it all in the guard team to give them extra food. Now they are very motivated." Deva couldn't help but chuckle as she said this: "Some people even wanted to give me gifts, offering thousands of gold coins to ask me to help take care of the nearby villages, but I gave them a good scolding."

DuPont chuckled: "Doesn't he know you're a paladin?"

“I know, but because there are so many paladins now, laymen like them don’t know the difference between them.” Deva slammed her hand on the table, pretending to be fierce. “Those paladins who have sworn oaths of conquest and revenge are just as despicable as the judges in the tribunal. They take bribes, hire spies, and carry out vigilante justice. They will stop at nothing to achieve their goals. They have ruined the reputation of paladins. And the adults don’t care. They are really annoying.”

“There’s a reason for not interfering, of course. If we just treat them nicely and provide them with good food and drink, wouldn’t that be letting those vicious criminals enjoy themselves?” DuPont asked with some curiosity, “What exactly is the difference between your traditional paladins and sworn paladins?”

"We know everything the Oath of the Holy Knights knows, but there are things we know that they might not." Deva couldn't help but proudly raise her chin: "The Demon-Slaying Slash, the Holy Slash, and the Chaos-Shattering Slash—there's bound to be one that suits you!"

DuPont wiped the sweat from his brow with a handkerchief. This seemed to work even better than his system: "...This god is too biased towards you guys, isn't he?"

"There's nothing I can do. Sometimes you wake up with a new ability, and you can't help it if you don't know how." The paladin said, then sensed something was wrong: "Why are you sweating? Are you feeling guilty?"

"The soup's hot," DuPont said, changing the subject without changing his expression. "By the way, have there been more professionals at the church lately?"

"No, why are you asking about this?" The paladin suddenly remembered something. "Oh, you mean the news in the newspaper? It was just approved today, how could it be so fast? Unless we use a teleportation array, it would take three days even to get here by airship. What, are you really worried that they'll travel hundreds of miles to cause you trouble? How could that be?"

"It's hard to say. The main problem is that I don't have many good ways to deal with them. After all, sparring is a skill-based activity, and as you know, I'm a mage, so my fighting skills are probably not that great. If I accidentally injure someone, it will be troublesome and there will be no benefit. Wouldn't that be a waste of my time?"

"Tch, you talk like you're some big celebrity." Deva said this, but she was a little worried. "But my family also said that you might run into trouble recently. You should stay at the academy more often. With your dean there, there shouldn't be too many problems."

"Relying on others for a living is ultimately not quite right. By the way, Midsummer Festival is coming soon. How about we celebrate it together at our college? It should be very lively there."

"Huh?" The sudden invitation caught Deva off guard, and she lowered her head somewhat embarrassedly. "Well, I'm not from your academy, so it wouldn't be appropriate for me to go so abruptly."

"What's there to be afraid of? They're all friends anyway." DuPont said, then asked with some curiosity, "What, is there something going on with the guards?"

“Yes,” Deva said, a hint of distress in her voice. “Midsummer’s Day is a holiday where accidents are more likely to happen. Although there are celebrations of love on this day, it’s also a peak time for rape cases.”

"Hey, let me know when you have time. We've also prepared a band." DuPont said, taking out a lute from the academy and casually plucking the strings. His instrumental skill, purchased for 100 gold coins, allowed him to quickly get the hang of it. "I once heard a wandering poet sing a similar tune and made a song called 'DuPont Brothers.' Would you like to hear it?" Deva was somewhat delighted, not expecting this guy to have such a talent: "You can do this too?"

"Hey, it's no big deal. If we can't create originals, we can at least modify other people's stuff. It's just for fun anyway." DuPont said, testing the sound: "Turn on the phonograph, turn on the tape recorder, let the music start, let the rhythm keep going."

The paladin seemed somewhat bewildered by the first two lines of the lyrics.

What is a tape recorder? Does it refer to a video crystal?
I've heard of phonographs. Apparently, they're made of shellac and use a kind of magical principle to record the music of bards. Then you can play the music on the film, which is almost identical to the original music.

Although the song has no magic, it is still very valuable, only slightly cheaper than image crystals, and can only be afforded by nobles and some tasteful professionals.

The high elves, however, disdained this, preferring instead to hire elven bands to perform live music, and referring to the phonograph as a vulgar tool that profaned music.

But before Deva could finish her thought, DuPont continued singing, "Don't ignore me, don't hate me, you can't be late for our date~"

"Whenever disco music starts, I pretend we're still together. You can hear my heart pounding, but you pretend you don't know."

Upon hearing this, Deva blushed and lowered her head, seemingly lost in thought. Just as she was about to listen to DuPont again, her fingers paused, and she put away her lute. She looked at the other customers in the tavern and said, "What are you looking at? Haven't you ever seen people talking about love before? You're all so bored."

“DuPont!” Deva finally lost her composure, her face burning with embarrassment. “What nonsense are you spouting?”

"Hehe, actually I haven't even started composing the rest yet." DuPont raised an eyebrow: "How's the intro? Not bad, right?"

"It sounds nice, but it seems to be missing something..."

"No harmonies, no accompaniment, it's so monotonous, it's only good for fooling little girls." Before Deva could think further, she heard several pedestrians coming in from outside the door. The female elf in the lead had long, pale golden hair, and her green pupils gleamed with a blood-red light under the lamplight. She looked at the two people sitting in the corner: "Are you DuPont?"

“It’s me.” DuPont picked up the bottle cap from the table and flicked it at the female elf’s astonished gaze, but just as it was about to hit her, it struck a transparent outer shell.

It's a shield spell.

DuPont scoffed, seemingly disappointed that the bottle cap attack had missed: "Who are you?"

(End of this chapter)