After I had finished singing the song, I took another deep breath. I don’t know why I specifically chose that song to sing, but it was the only thing that came to mind in the moment. I had to adlib to make it not a love song, changing some of the lyrics on the fly. Surprisingly, it didn’t sound bad. Another use of my ‘Music’ talent perhaps?

When I looked towards the nobles, I could see a lot of them dancing together. They seemed to at least not hate it. While my eyes wandered through the crowd, eventually the butler caught my attention again as he mouthed some words, ‘Another.’ I think he said.

But I was practically lost, I had no idea what type of song to sing that would fit the current vibe. None of the songs that came to mind would work.

Maybe classical? But there’s no singing in classical music, right? Why are they even dancing at a birthday party? Haah…It’s hard going through this blindly.

When I writ my novel, I started it on the day of the Heavensward applications. I was currently 2 months ahead of that time, so I had no idea about any of these events that were happening.

My eyes wandered the room again before locking onto Rio, he was talking to a noble whose daughter was by his side.

“Ah-”

I immediately started to press an ‘A’ chord on the piano repeatedly before transitioning to a song, “I spat out my blood and forged it straight into the imp’s blood~” I was just singing whatever came to mind. The words flowed out naturally even though there wasn’t a song I could think of.

Soon enough, I stopped singing and my hands stopped moving, I guess that was the end of the song. The lyrics I sung were burned into my mind and I could recite them all perfectly, as if I had listened to the song for years.

Musical Memory. That was a new skill I had gotten.

 

Musical Memory (C Grade)

The words and chords you’ve written are etched into your heart.

 

Weird… It’s all just so weird. Skills should be harder to get…

As I thought to myself, I started to hear a sudden whisper in my ear, “That’s enough for now, you can take a break.” It was the butler. I could never tell whenever he was behind me. It was like he was a cat or something.

I stood up before heading towards Rio. The noble and his daughter that was talking to him had just left him alone.

“Did you reject her?” I asked as I patted Rio’s back.

“Ah-!” He jumped before looking at me, “Leo! Huh? Rejected?! What are you talking about?!”

“She asked you to dance, right?’

“Huh? How did you know?”

“I’m a psychic. Anyways, is everything else, okay?”

“Yup! I feel a bit energized now actually! Like I could lift a mountain!”

“Huh? You didn’t take any drugs, did you?”

“No! I would never! After your song, the one that talked about imp blood, I started to feel better during that.”

Huh…? He does seem a bit more active… Is it because of ‘My Heart To You’?

“I see. How’s the food?”

“It’s great!” He paused for a moment before mumbling, “Though, I think I prefer the Inn’s food better, haha.” He smiled.

“I’ll have to ask Saul to cook you some more food then.” Shortly after I spoke, Count Janson headed over to me and started to speak, “That was beautiful, Mr. Vondheart” He lightly clapped his hands.

“Thank you.”

“I particularly liked the first one you sang, the one about flying to the moon. It made me feel more at ease, haha. Oh! But don’t get it wrong, the second one sounded nice too! It just made me feel a little more active than I’d like to be here.”

“Thank you, I’m happy that you liked them.”

“On that note-” As he started to speak, we were interrupted by a volcano-no, Evan Heatsworth the duke of the north. He had red hair and a chiseled jawline, he had a heavy presence and naturally frowned eyebrows. “Hey.” He had a blunt tone.

“Ah, excuse me, I’ll take my leave now, Mr. Vondheart. I hope to talk to you later.” Count Jansen bowed before quickly leaving.

I looked at Evan, he was even taller than Saul who was like 6’4 or something.

‘Evan Heatsworth, the defender of the north. His fiery appearance matched that of his personality. He was even more destructive than the king and had the power matching a volcano.’

That was how I introduced him in the novel, I knew him all too well. One of my more sporadic characters if I do say so myself.

It felt a little hot just standing near him.

“Hey.” He repeated himself, he sounded a little annoyed but that was just his natural tone.

“Hello.” I replied before looking towards Rio, he was shaking. Evan’s overwhelming presence got to him, I put my hand on his head before speaking, “Could you go grab some food for me, Rio?” I asked.

Rio stopped shaking as he realized what I said and nodded his head before leaving.

I’d of probably been the same if I didn’t have ‘Peace of Mind’.

“Musician, is that a skill?” He asked bluntly, his tone was naturally aggressive.

Is he referring to why I’m calm?

“Could you elaborate?”

“When you sung-Never mind, forget what I said.” He left shortly after.

What was that about…? When I sang? Is he referring to ‘My Heart to You’?

Rio came back a little bit later with two plates of food, “I got it!”

“Ah-Thank you.” I replied after taking one of the plates. I wasn’t actually too hungry, I just wanted to keep him away from Evan, he has too strong of a presence…

A little while after I had finished eating, the butler appeared behind me once again, “The party will be ending soon, could you play an ending tune on the piano?”

“Sure. I don’t need to sing, right?” Surely I wasn’t going to have to sing a goodbye song, right?

“You don’t. After everyone has left, I’ll give you your pay.”

“Awesome.” I replied before heading back to the stage.

Because I still didn’t know any songs, I just let my fingers work their magic while thinking about a closing song.

…

By the time everyone had left, it was already night time, sometime after midnight. Way past my bed time, but I was getting a gold coin for this, I couldn’t complain much.

Rio was sitting next to me on the piano seat, we were just quietly talking after I had finished playing.

“This key right here, it sounds nice with combined with this one.” I was talking to him about the piano, I didn’t know the specific names or chords of the piano, but I could tell what keys sounded nice with each other.

“I see…” Rio pressed the 2 keys I had showed him, and a loud sound came out.

“They sound different based on the amount of pressure you apply.”

“Oh-okay, got it!”

Suddenly I felt a voice whisper in my ear, “Mr. Leo.” I flinched a little bit before looking back, it was the butler as usual, “You know, you don’t have to scare me every time you want to talk to me, right?”

“I apologize.” He smiled, “I have your pay here.” He held a pouch in front of me.

Mm? Did I get 1 gold worth of silvers or something?

After taking the pouch I looked inside to see a handful of gold coins in there.

“Huh? This isn’t 1 gold?”

“It’s 10 gold, the princess liked your songs, and the pay was upped to 5 gold. The other 5 gold are just a tip.”

…Holy shit! Lets fucking go! That’s half of the money ready then! I just need 10 more gold then Rio and I can apply to Heavensward, things are looking hopeful now!

“I see…Thank you. This will help.” I handed the pouch to Rio, and he looked inside of it with a wide open mouth and wide open eyes.

“My pleasure, but may I ask what you were doing just now?”

“I was just showing Rio some keys that sound good together, was that not allowed?”

“No, it’s fine. It’s just a little interesting to me.” He smiled.

Is he a weirdo?

“Well then, I guess we better get going.” I stood up and Rio followed.

“I’ll escort you two out.”

“Alright.”

Unfortunately I didn’t get the chance to speak to anyone about any more events, but it’s fine. I still had another month and a half to get another 10 gold, if I was really out of luck, I had a last resort way to get it.

We had a carriage take us back to the inn. Luckily, we were allowed to keep the suits and shoes that they gave us. So if another important event like that happened, we didn’t need to spend any more money.

When we entered the inn, dining hours had already past. Everyone was probably already asleep. Rio and I headed back to our room, and I flopped on the bed after I got undressed and put on some shorts. I was way too tired to take a shower now, I was going to do it in the morning.

“Night, Rio.” I mumbled.

“Goodnight.”

…

The next few days went along like usual. With my standard pay and the amount of tips I’ve received, I had already saved up 1 gold that was separate of the 10 we got from the king.

I was sitting at a table with some of the customers, it was my break time, and I was learning more about the world from talking to them. It’s crazy, I was learning a lot even though I was the one who writ the novel.

“Hahaha! Back in my day, when I was still a greenling adventurer, I remember running into a pack of direhogs! I thought I was dead! If Helkin wasn’t there I’d of been pig food!” Pon laughed as he took another swig of beer.

“Helkin?” I asked.

“Yeah-Helkin. Hic.” He hiccupped, “He’s an S rank now, but when I met him, he was also a greenling! He ran in front of those hogs to save my ass!”

Pon was an adventurer, this world had fantasy monsters residing in it. Adventurers were just like the adventurers you’d see in any other fantasy novel, odd jobs, exterminate monsters, yada-yada. I didn’t think much about it when I wrote it, but they also used the F to S rank system. I really did like my basic plot when I wrote my novel.

By the way, I had no idea who this ‘Helkin’ was. I remember writing about a few strong S-rank adventurers, but not him.

“How’d he beat the direhogs?”

Direhogs, another monster I had no clue existed. According to Pon, they were a pig-like monster with horns and a red striped leading down their back.

“He stood in front of them, held his sword high and it started to emit some kind of blue light, when he swung, the only thing left was fried pork! Haha! It made some kind of loud ‘BOOM’ sound!”

Just after he finished speaking, my ears rumbled, and the inn shook. A loud explosion rang throughout the capital.

“Yeah-Just like that, hic.”