PrePub - Ascendance of a Bookworm

Damuel x Philine is making progress! Konrad and Dirk have a heartwarming friendship going on here, and it it mildly amusing to see that there positions in the hierarchy have effectively swapped. Finally, Hartmut has revealed how much he knows about Rozemyne's backstory, to the suprise of absolutely everyone present. In fact, Benno seemed to take it the best out of all of them. Also Benno's excitement upon hearing about the merchant priest hopeful is encouraging to see.

Roz this chapter: "Philine, raising someone as a noble is very expensive. You will need a lot of money, as well as money for yourself. Think carefully about your future and try to build up a savings."

Also Roz: "can you grab 5 large golds from my stack? I'ma spend it on PAPER"

Dirk is way too adorable. His relationship with Delia is also very beautiful. It is also nice to see how much everyone wants to maintain what Rozemyne has built.

Hartmut finally released his power levels. Like many have speculated, he has known for a long time.

P4V5 had this bit:

“Still, Hartmut... I’m impressed you noticed that,” I said.

“Lord Ferdinand and Lord Justus have taught me much about you, Lady Rozemyne. I am glad their teachings have already proven useful.”

Um, wait... Excuse me? What exactly are they teaching you?

Hartmut went on to describe everything he had learned. “This will be necessary to contain your chaos within the Royal Academy, Lady Rozemyne,” he eventually concluded. I had no choice but to reflect on my own deeds and weep.

Did you have to tell him EVERYTHING, and in that much detail?! Stupid, stupid Ferdinand! Stupid, stupid Justus!

There is a fan translated chapter which I think would now be rather safe to read now. It will most likely be printed in Short Story Collection 3 but that has not released even in Japan yet, so we would have to wait for a long time to get it officially in English.

Funny to note Rozemyne influencing Dirk and Konrad in the worst ways:

Delia: "Geez! You always mimic Lady Rozemyne's worst traits!"

Dirk: "They're her coolest traits!"

Delia: "You did something major on a whim, without even warning anyone! That's definitely one of her worst ones. Geez! Lady Rozemyne's has always been like this!"

Konrad: "I want to be a cutthroat negotiator with the soul of a merchant, just like Lady Rozemyne!"

Rozemyne (thinking): "Uh, Konrad...? Isn't that a pretty messed-up goal to have?"

And of course, later on Clarissa's bad influence on Philine (predicted by several people):

Philline: "Once I am an independent woman, I will propose using the method that Clarissa told me about[.]"

...

Rozemyne (thinking): "Should I warn him of what's to come? I really hope you like knives, Damuel."

Also, sad times for Damuel getting seemingly rejected.

Time to set more cleanup events in motion. Pretty telling that Benno is immediately expecting to be relocated; might be Hartmut's presence, but I was expecting a bit more banter from him on that note.

Not suprised that Hartmut knew, but I am suprised at how blatently he told her. Just blurting out: "btw, I know your biggest secret. Carry on with your conversation".

Elvira at least waited for a natural point to bring it up and was a bit indirect about it.

Hartmut's justification for keeping it secret was nice though. Not "of course I would never betray you", but "Do you know how hard I worked to learn that?"

The chaos gremlin is spreading chaos and sweeping orphans with her. I wonder how Kamil is faring? Philine needs to make some hard decisions and wants to propose the dukefelger way to Damuel. Hartmut is always two steps ahead of everyone else and knows everything about Myne. Of course everyone will miss understood Rozmyne if she will have a multi-day research bender for Ferdinand.

I wonder why Rozemyne only considered getting Elvira to help Philine until her coming-of-age, but not her siblings. Melchior is too young to have much benefit of her working for him, apart from her being there in his first year at the academy... not much to go on. But Charlotte and Wilfried could have solved all the issues.

In favour of serving Wilfried would be that they are the same age and him wanting to be more involved in the printing industry, so they both have something to gain (not to mention that his current retainers do not seem particularly competent...), but the downside would be their gender differences, meaning he can't let her live with him in the northern building and thus would have to make different arrangements, but then so does Elvira, so not much of a downside. The bigger problem (for Philine anyway) would be that at least some, if not the majority, of his retainers would probably look down on her. Then again... in the former Veronica faction, the archnobles allowed themselves to be greatly influenced by mednobles, so maybe they would be willing to listen to a laynoble for the sake of improving themselves? I doubt it, but wouldn't rule it out completely. We know they seem to have a propensity to treat commoners horribly, but I don't remember hearing anything about how the former Veronica faction treated laynobles off the top of my head.

Charlotte on the other hand would fit well for being the same gender, meaning they could have Philine live in one of the attendant rooms in the northern building, like she does with Rozemyne right now. Just like her brother, she is on a path to more involvement with the printing industry, so Philine's expertise in this regard would be benefitial to Charlotte and her other scholars. Philine is far more likely to be treated well under her care. The downside for Charlotte would be, that Philine is one year older, leaving her lady one scholar shorter in her final academy term. Then again, since Philine is an addition to her regular scholars, not a replacement, that shouldn't be an issue. In the meantime it gives her current scholars two years to learn from Philine, assuming they can overcome their pride and accept teaching from a laynoble.

Oh well, with her becoming orphanage director, this is just academic anyway. Theoretically Sylvester might forbid this, but I very doubt he will.

With what Philine said this release, I think any path of her getting engaged to Damuel prior to coming of age is closed off. Speaking of which: Oh no... DO NOT EMULATE CLARISSA! Poor little Philine is being corrupted by that weirdo. Get her away from the sweet little girl!

But wait... doesn't that mean Philine will now become a blue shrine maiden, like how Hartmut and Melchior are blue priests? Otherwise, she wouldn't be able to have gray robe attendants, right?

Guess that means her chances to obtain more divine protections went up a bit more.

I can't wait to see Benno's reaction when he learns that Rozemyne

Another amazing section. It seemed likely that Hartmut could figure it out, but I was still really surprised.

I want to hear more from Benno; he seems to be taking this alarmingly well, and especially with the uncertainty of exactly where.