Goddess Kaleidoscope

Clearly sensing the barb in Aina's words, Lud scratched his cheek instinctively, but then realized he hadn't done anything wrong, so why was he feeling so ashamed?

However, Aina did remind him that he had class to attend later.

“I’m so sorry, Miss Servis, I have to go teach a math class to my students in a little while. If you would like to continue your tour, I can have my apprentice show you around the school.”

“Since you have other matters to attend to, I will not disturb you any longer. I can come again tomorrow.”

"That's fine then. I'll definitely bring the manuscript tomorrow. You're welcome to come anytime during the day."

"Then it's agreed, Your Excellency."

“It’s a deal, Miss Servis.”

Having received the promise she wanted, Servis turned and left with a flourish. As she passed Aina, she glanced at her briefly before flashing a very amiable smile. But this expression made Aina genuinely uncomfortable, because it was the look of an adult "caring" for a child, completely disregarding any threat Aina posed.

After Servis left, only Lud and Aina remained in the classroom. Seeing that things were not going well, Shanes, who was outside the door, had already slipped away.

Feeling the awkward atmosphere, Lude, feeling uncomfortable, hurriedly tried to run away, but as he passed by Aina, she suddenly grabbed his clothes, making him unable to move as if he had been frozen in place.

"Aina?"

"Master, are you planning to abandon me?"

"what!?"

When Lude suddenly heard Aina ask him in a slightly tearful voice, he was stunned and couldn't come to his senses for a long time. He couldn't understand why Aina would ask him such a strange question out of the blue.

But when he turned to look at her, he saw Aina with a pitiful expression, her red eyes brimming with tears that seemed ready to pour out like a downpour at any moment.

At this moment, Lu De had to admit that the sight of a beautiful girl with teary eyes was incredibly alluring to men. If he had been called Awei instead of Lu De, he probably would have died on the spot by now.

"Aina, what's wrong with you?"

"Master, I promise I'll be a good boy from now on, please, please don't leave me..."

"No, well... Aina, you've confused me. Why would I not want you? Who told you that? Don't be so naive and believe everything you hear. Don't worry, I can lose my integrity, but I can't lose you. I swear to God!"

"Really?"

"Really! Absolutely true."

Seeing Lude nod solemnly, Aina finally relaxed. Lude, however, breathed a sigh of relief, but then suddenly realized something else. Although Aina appeared to be a beautiful sixteen or seventeen-year-old girl, and even a goddess in her true form, her actual age was less than a year old. Even though she possessed a certain level of knowledge from birth, unlike a newborn who is a complete blank slate, her experience and emotional intelligence were still only at a toddler level.

It is this contrast between her outward appearance and inner self that causes Lude to often subconsciously forget that she is still a child!

In a sense, the way Lud and Aina are currently getting along is similar to that of a single father raising his daughter alone—it's similar, but not entirely. Once you understand this, Aina's emotions become much easier to understand.

The two had a minor disagreement because of the divine garment. Although Aina said it was all her master's fault, she actually felt guilty for making her master angry. However, she didn't want to back down first, so she put up a cold war and dragged it out.

Unfortunately, Servis suddenly appeared at this moment and immediately started chatting and laughing with Lud. Aina suddenly felt that her position next to Lud was threatened and panicked.

Ultimately, children are simple-minded but prone to overthinking. Sometimes, adults might casually say things like, "You were picked up from a trash can," or "I don't want you anymore," and these jokes can be taken seriously by children.

Faced with Aina's sudden emotional breakdown, Lude panicked and hurriedly tried to comfort her.

Looking at Aina, whose eyes were red and who was still sobbing softly, Lude patted the little goddess's head with a mixture of amusement and exasperation.

"Don't cry, your master won't abandon you. Miss Servis and I were just talking about work. I want to take over her circus for our use. Remember those stories I wrote before? I plan to adapt them into plays and then use the Rainbow Circus for cultural dissemination, paving the way for our missionary work. Don't worry! As long as your master is here, you'll never go hungry!"

End of this chapter

The incident itself wasn't anything major; in short, Rude and Aina, the "non-biological father and daughter" with no blood relation, were reconciled as before. So that evening, Rude personally cooked a hot pot for everyone, using several spices harvested from the garden in the temple's backyard.

Everyone enjoyed the meal. After all, the food culture in this world is limited by the times and productivity, and the overall level is still very low. Many spices are "luxuries" that ordinary people cannot afford. Therefore, the spicy hot pot with its extremely impactful taste has a powerful charm that can conquer the taste buds of goddesses!

It's worth mentioning that the spices planted in Ludd's Garden were the same seeds Hamilton had given him before. Although their names sound fantastical, like Flame Fruit and Madou, they are quite similar to common spices on Earth in both appearance and taste.

During the planting process, Lude also discovered that most of these plants were tropical species. Therefore, if they were planted in Pine Village, they might easily become unsuited to the local subarctic climate and suffer from acclimatization problems.

Lude was worried that the seedlings would not grow big or die halfway through, and he once had the idea of ​​building a greenhouse. However, he soon realized that he could not make such a thing with the existing conditions in Pine Village. So he temporarily abandoned science and turned to theology for help.

With a try-it-and-see attitude, Lud picked a seedling in the field and infused it with Aina's divine power. But the result was not as he expected, that it would accelerate the plant's growth. Instead, he obtained a glowing seedling whose leaves could be used to cure coughs.

Rudd concluded that simply injecting divine power would produce different effects depending on the divine position to which the power belonged. Following this line of thought, Rudd could roughly guess what the effects would be if Shanis's divine power were used.

Later, Rud changed his approach and used holy water infused with divine power to irrigate the seedlings. This time, he finally succeeded. The seedlings, which were originally growing poorly, grew much stronger at a speed visible to the naked eye. Rud successfully harvested the first batch of crops that had been accelerated to grow in early June.

It was because of this experiment that Rudd began to plan to add a "Fertility" divine position for Aina. To achieve this goal, Rudd first needed to develop fertilizer, one of the important cornerstones of modern agriculture on Earth.

However, limited by his own profession, Lu De's agricultural knowledge was limited, and whenever fertilizer was mentioned, the bizarre image of three foreigners, one yellow, one black, and one white, fighting over Jin Ke La would automatically appear in his mind. It was an indelible mental imprint!

In fact, farmers in this world are already aware of the importance of fertilization, and they have known for a long time that pouring manure into the fields can make crops grow better. However, farmyard manure has its limits, and compared to real chemical fertilizers, its effectiveness is at best just for show.

While Lud may not be able to create fertilizer yet, given the infinitely versatile power of divine magic, he should be able to make something with a similar effect.

Perhaps in the eyes of the original sects of this world, using supreme divine power to create a fertilizer that increases production is undoubtedly a waste, and it is no exaggeration to say that it would be perfectly acceptable to label it as "blasphemy".

"How can the power of the gods be used so casually for farming? Doesn't that just seem incredibly cheap?"

It was this traditional mindset that bound the priests' hands and feet. They followed the old ways and used the ancient divine arts that had been passed down for thousands of years. Ordinary priests dared not make any improvements to the spells, let alone conduct repeated experiments like Rud to try to analyze divine power.

This is the most, most, most serious form of disrespect!

However, these "taboos" were no big deal to Rudd! When it came to using divine power, Rudd only cared about its usefulness and cost-effectiveness.

The next morning, Lude arrived at the school with the script of Romeo and Juliet. As soon as he arrived at the school gate, he saw Servis waiting for him.

In order to see Ludwig's script as soon as possible, Servis got up very early. As soon as the village bell rang, she quickly got out of bed, and then, to the astonishment of her fellow members, hurriedly dressed up and went out to school.

Many unsuspecting group members couldn't help but secretly speculate that their group leader, who had become a "leftover woman" because of her high standards, might have finally met someone she could take a liking to.

"You've arrived very early, Miss Servis."

"Don't laugh at me, but I barely slept last night. I was just so impatient!"

Upon hearing Servis say that she had stayed up almost all night, Lude noticed that her eyes were slightly dark, which she had covered with some stage makeup powder, but it was still quite noticeable upon closer inspection.

Lude hadn't expected Servis to value his script so much. He couldn't help but think of their casual conversation yesterday, during which Servis had said that although the arts and literature scene seemed to be thriving and had a bright future, the reality was just like early spring, when everything was only just beginning to revive.

Compared to outstanding actors and singers, what the arts and culture sector currently lacks most are playwrights, and truly excellent playwrights are extremely rare. This is because the conditions for training playwrights are far more demanding than those for the former two.

The main reason for this situation can be attributed to the social environment of our time. The low literacy rate caused by the lack of basic education excludes the working class, who make up the vast majority of the population.

Secondly, writing is not currently a viable profession. The time required to create a script is uncertain, and no income is received until it is completed. Therefore, the vast majority of the limited number of creators are wealthy aristocrats who are literate and have a certain level of literary cultivation. Only they have the leisure to treat writing as an interesting hobby.

But precisely because these people don't make writing their main job, they aren't very motivated to create. They're all "old procrastinators," and you can't even urge these noblemen with titles to update their work. It's infuriating just thinking about it!

The difficulty of entry, the small circle, and the lack of enthusiasm have ultimately led to a script shortage across the entire arts and entertainment industry. Only a few large and well-known song and dance troupes have a relatively stable source of scripts, but Rainbow Circus clearly does not have this ability.

The school gate was bustling with activity, clearly not a good place to read a script, so Lude led Servis to the school's faculty office and handed the box containing the script to Servis.

“Miss Servis, I have a class to teach later. You can read the script here to your heart’s content. If you need anything, please let my two students know. Excuse me for now, we’ll talk again later.”

"I'm really sorry to trouble you, High Priest."

After Luther finished speaking, he turned and left the office to teach his students, leaving only Servis and the two nuns in the large office. Although Servis was eager to read the script, the two strange nuns in front of her really bothered her.

Servis had to admit that both girls were very pretty and looked very young, probably under twenty, but their figures were unusually voluptuous!

In comparison, although Servis believed she also had a pretty face, she was far inferior to these two beauties. Even if time were to rewind fifteen years and she were to return to her peak beauty at seventeen, she would still be a level below them.

"It's such a waste that such a beautiful girl is a nun!"

After a brief internal monologue, Servis steadied herself and began reading the script Luther had left her. She quickly became engrossed in the romantic yet poignant love story before her.

Unlike other scripts that Servis had previously seen, which tended to pile up flowery language in an attempt to cover up the clichés of the story itself, Romeo and Juliet, while using relatively simple language (Loud's vocabulary was limited), was supported by a sufficiently excellent plot. Therefore, these relatively "down-to-earth" dialogues made the whole story more realistic and attractive.

Servis was thoroughly engrossed in the story. She had never seen such a novel and interesting script before. The whole story was so cleverly designed. There were no heroic legends like the hero fighting the dragon, nor were there any vulgar jokes like "My Encounters with a Noble Widow." It was a story about a young man and woman falling in love at first sight and overcoming family hatred with their sincere love.

Servis, who hadn't seen the final scene yet, made this guess.

Just as she was engrossed in reading, a cup of warm tea was suddenly placed next to Servis, slightly interrupting her reading.

Servis looked up and saw that the silver-haired nun was pouring her tea, while the other, dark-haired nun who was a little older, had already left sometime earlier.

"Uh... thank you."

She raised her teacup and took a small sip; the sweet, fruity aroma soothed Servis's slightly dry throat. She had been performing for the past two nights, and hadn't slept well last night because she was too excited, so her throat was actually quite uncomfortable.

After taking a couple of sips of the sweet berry tea, Servis was about to continue reading when Aina suddenly asked a question.

Are you preparing to perform a script written by my master?

"We do have that plan, but to be honest, I'm suddenly a little lacking in confidence because I'm really not sure if we're capable of performing well in such an excellent production. This work is simply perfect!"

Servis's praise was partly flattering, but more so sincere, because the script was truly amazing. However, she quickly realized something was amiss, because the little nun in front of her had just said, "It's a script written by my master." Servis wasn't sure if it was a slip of the tongue or an unintentional remark.

So, to further confirm the information, Servis casually asked Aina a follow-up question.

“Sister, the script your mentor wrote is truly outstanding; it’s the best I’ve ever seen. So I’m quite curious, besides Romeo and Juliet, does Lord Rudd have any other works?”

Yes, there are! And lots and lots of them!

"Oh! Can you tell me what kind of works there are? Uh... you don't need to know the specifics, just some titles will do."

"Let me think... Besides Romeo and Juliet, there's Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, Thunderstorm, Calabash Brothers... and so many more that I haven't heard of yet. Master said he'll tell us about them slowly in the future. There's a whole bookshelf full of them!"

As Aina spoke, she stretched out her arms in an exaggerated gesture to describe how big the bookshelf she was talking about was. Servis couldn't help but gasp, her heart filled with a storm of emotions.

In Servis's view, Aina wasn't the scheming type; she was more of a naive, innocent girl. And these kinds of people usually have one flaw: they can't keep secrets; a few questions and they'll spill everything.

Therefore, after mentally analyzing the information she had gathered, Servis came to a conclusion: Ludd hadn't been telling the truth; there was no such person as William Shakespeare, or rather, William Shakespeare was Ludd!

The old priest didn't seem to want to reveal that he was the author, so he made up a name to fool himself. However, he forgot to tell the naive little nun beside him, which allowed Servis to find a breakthrough from her.

As for why Ludl concealed his identity, Servis speculated that he probably didn't want people to know that he, a high priest, actually had a hobby of writing scripts, and that he wrote them so well!

Similar situations are not uncommon. Many playwrights with aristocratic status use pseudonyms when creating their works. After all, in the eyes of many traditional older generations, indulging in painting and writing is a waste of time and energy. As a glorious nobleman, one should be armed and ready to fight for the family and the king on the battlefield.

Instead of wasting time fiddling with pens, why not go horseback riding and sword practice, or at the very least sleep with a few women to continue the family line? That would be doing something worthwhile!

Fortunately, social attitudes have changed somewhat in recent years, and some more enlightened families no longer force their children to pursue only martial arts as a career path. However, considering Lu De's age, he has most likely experienced the harshest era and is therefore understandable as he may not dare to easily reveal his true interests.

Relying on this set of logically rigorous assumptions, Servis believed that she had deduced the "truth".

Across from her, Aina saw Servis's shocked expression, as if she had been startled by what she had said, and proudly put her hands on her hips.

The young nun was indeed simple-minded and didn't think too much about things. She and Ludwig had reconciled yesterday, and even had a meal together at a restaurant they hadn't met before, so she was in a great mood. Therefore, when Servis asked her about her master's works, Aina didn't think much of it and immediately launched into a barrage of self-praise, showering her master with compliments on her literary genius!

Unexpectedly, her actions completely fooled Servis, causing her to imagine a whole bunch of nonsensical scenarios.

Just thinking about how this literary master had an entire bookshelf full of so many unpublished works, even if they weren't all masterpieces of Romeo and Juliet's caliber, was enough to make Servis drool with envy!

"I'm going to cling to this invincible leg!"