The Lady's Butler: I Reincarnated To Serve The Villainess-Chapter 9: A Cat Named Noctis

«Why choose those glasses?»

The cat asked as it got comfortable on the bed and turned towards Adrian who was observing the tool in his hand.

He silently looked at the glasses as light from outside his window passed through them.

He smiled as he lowered them unto the desk and then turned towards the cat before answering, "because it’s a tool my Lady thinks highly of."

The cat looked at him confused, as far as it knew, Adrian hadn’t met the lady he was supposed to be serving just yet, so what’s up with the obsession?

Unaware of the cat’s thoughts, Adrian spoke again.

"By the way, what should I call you?" he asked as he leaned back slightly in his chair, "I can’t just keep calling you cat forever."

The black feline let out a lazy yawn as it placed one paw over the other.

«Oh?» it said, its silver eyes filled with amusement, «and what makes you think I care what you call me?»

Instead of an answer, Adrian just kept looking at it without a change in his expression.

He then rested his elbow on the desk before asking, "well?"

The cat tilted its head slightly.

«What makes you think I have one?»

"Because a spirit without a name is either newly born... or hiding something," he simply answered.

Its eyes narrowed as it studied him more carefully.

«You know...» it murmured slowly, «for someone who only bonded with a ’spirit’ just yesterday, you talk like you’ve been dealing with them for years.»

Adrian didn’t answer that.

Instead, he simply repeated his question.

"So?"

The cat stared at him for another moment.

Then it stretched lazily across the bed, extending its paws before relaxing again.

«Fine.»

It closed one eye as if debating whether this was worth the effort.

«You may call me... Noctis.»

Adrian nodded in satisfaction, "noctis."

The cat, Noctis, smirked faintly.

«Don’t look so pleased. It’s not my true name.»

"As long as I have something to address you by," Adrian said as he turned back to his desk, putting the glasses on.

Aside from the fact that this was a tool important enough for Renelle to gift to the prince, there was also another reason he chose it.

The moment the glasses completely rested on his face, the world around him suddenly changed.

It seemed a lot brighter.

Not in the sense that the sunlight had intensified, but as if something invisible had suddenly become visible to him.

Thin streams of faint light drifted through the air like slow moving currents.

Adrian immediately understood what that was.

Mana.

He could see it very clearly thanks to these glasses.

The ambient mana, made of multiple different colors, that filled the world flowed through the room in gentle waves, gathering near the corners of the walls and dispersing through the open window like mist carried by the wind.

If anyone else saw this, the only way they could describe it was, beautiful.

Adrian’s gaze moved toward the desk.

The wooden surface, which had appeared completely ordinary just moments ago, now carried faint strands of mana embedded within it.

It truly was a fascinating sight.

But even more interesting was that, floating in these waves of mana were beings normally invisible, until they allowed themselves to be seen.

Spirits.

They were small, small enough to fit in one’s palm, and they were also shaped like normal animals, some being rabbits, others were deers.

The only difference, apart from the fact that they were small and floating, was the fact that they looked translucent and glowed with the color of mana they swam in.

These seemed to be newly born Spirits, still hesitant to leave the wave of mana they were born in.

Adrian then glanced toward Noctis and the sight before him made him pause.

The cat’s small body was surrounded by a dense cluster of black swirling mana, that in itself was not surprising.

What was surprising was the amount of mana that it seemed to be made up of. It was so much that the entire space it occupied was covered by dark mana.

And all mana and spirits in the room avoided moving towards it.

Noctis noticed his gaze and asked, «what are you staring at?»

"What rank spirit are you?" Instead of a reply, Adrian asked.

«.....»

"Forget it," he said, seeing the cat had no intention of replying.

He then withdrew a bit of his mana from the glasses, turning down the brightness of the world just a bit and only allowing a selected few things be visible.

Adrian then turned towards his desk again, picked up a journal that lay on it, before flipping to an empty page.

The previous Adrian hadn’t noted down anything that would be useful to him save for his daily routine, so he didn’t bother reading through it.

Picking up a pen, Adrian scribbled down something before underlining it.

Important Plot Points.

He was sure he wouldn’t forget anything he had read of the manhwa, but just in case, he jotted down a few important things related to Lady Renelle.

The first was the engagement being cancelled.

According to the manhwa, it had been cancelled a few days before the Academy resumed, during the yearly royal ball, and from all the info gathered, there was exactly one week left before that happened.

Now, did he have any intention of changing that? Not in the least bit, but he had to ensure Renelle truly got over the prince.

Even if he had to replace her obsession with hate.

He scribbled down a couple of important details on the paper, including characters he was interested in bringing by his lady’s side before reviewing it once more.

Satisfied with the notes, Adrian closed the journal and tapped the end of the pen lightly against the desk.

The soft tap... tap... tap echoed in the quiet room.

His eyes drifted back toward the window, though he wasn’t really looking outside, rather, he was a bit lost in thoughts.

Adrian leaned back slightly in his chair.

"One week..." he murmured under his breath.

One week before the royal ball and before the engagement between the crown prince and Renelle Ardent collapsed in front of the entire aristocracy.

In the manhwa, it had been humiliating for her.

The prince had announced the cancellation as if he were discarding something inconvenient, while standing beside the saintess the academy had recently welcomed.

And Renelle had only stood there frozen, refusing to cry in front of everyone, only to completely break down after returning to the Ardent estate.

That moment had been the beginning of her end.

The young noble lady developed hatred towards Saintess and obsession towards getting his childhood sweetheart back, all of which had slowly twisted her into the villainess the story needed

Adrian placed the pen down.

"That won’t do," he said quietly.

His gaze returned to the journal as he reopened it again. There were several names written beneath Renelle’s.

Some had been crossed out, and others were circled.

These were potential allies.

Useful individuals who, in the original story, had either been neutral... or had eventually sided with the heroine simply because she was the main character.

Adrian had no intention of allowing that to happen again.

His eyes settled on a particular set of name.

"These two will be first," he said as he tapped on the page.

Those two also happened to be the most easiest to recruit, especially given their conditions during the early story.

«Who?» Noctis asked curiously, as its contractor had been muttering to himself all this while.

Adrian closed the journal.

"You’ll see."

For now, he focused on getting ready to leave this training facility for the main estate, after all, he had recently completed his final test.