Bruno said he had a daughter around Veronica’s age. The existence of his daughter often made her mistakenly think of him as a safe person.

“Good. Let’s see… you said you’re currently working at a restaurant? You can start once you’ve wrapped things up there. I’ll help you prepare for the exam too, so let’s work well together.”

With those words, Bruno extended his thick hand for a handshake. The handshake ended rather plainly, and Veronica thought she was truly fortunate to have met such a good person.

Working at the pharmacy wasn’t particularly difficult. Bruno took care of Veronica as if she were his daughter. He let her use the second floor of the pharmacy as lodging since she was staying at an inn, and when things were quiet, he would teach her Calvenian spelling.

He always called Veronica “Roni” like a child when addressing her. The reason was that she was like a daughter to him. Veronica felt a strange discomfort each time, but she thought it was because she had grown up without a father.

“Roni, could you come here for a moment?”

Bruno called Veronica aside exactly six months after she started working at the pharmacy. There was no one in the dispensary, but Veronica wasn’t particularly wary.

“You called for me?”

“Yes, Roni. Um… there’s something I want to ask.”

Bruno hesitated a bit as if about to bring up a difficult topic, then carefully asked:

“Did your grandmother ever make abortion-inducing drugs?”

“…Abortion medicine?”

“Yes.”

Bruno’s gaze was somehow full of expectation. Veronica hesitated a little, then shook her head.

“No. She didn’t… make such things.”

It was a lie. Her grandmother had occasionally helped women escape unwanted pregnancies. She called it menstrual medicine, meaning that after taking it, menstruation would resume.

But that was a fact that shouldn’t be revealed. Abortion medicine was considered not as medicine that treated people, but as drugs that killed fetuses.

“Actually, there are people who occasionally look for such medicine.”

Bruno opened his mouth after a slight pause. The point was that with free love becoming fashionable among nobles, there were cases of unmarried noble ladies getting pregnant before marriage. But since they couldn’t obtain abortion medicine, there were instances where they took unsafe drugs and even put their lives at risk.

“…Besides, this could be due to unwanted relationships. As a father with a daughter, I want to help.”

“……”

“Don’t you find it pitiful, as a woman regardless of social status? If you know anything at all…”

Unwanted relationships? For Veronica, who had thought all noble women lived safely, it was a bewildering statement. She kept her eyes lowered and hesitated for a long time. Recalling what her grandmother had said while making menstrual medicine. Bruno waited quite a while for her to speak.

“I don’t know much either. But… I heard you can use the sap of the half-tree.”

“Oh, by half-tree, do you mean hemicylon? That would be toxic.”

“Yes. After distilling it for about 3 hours, with ground ivy and…”

As Bruno took notes with admiration, Veronica’s voice gradually gained strength.

“Thank you so much, Roni. Could you help me occasionally in the future too?”

Bruno asked kindly as he put down his pen. It meant that he wouldn’t treat Veronica as a mere errand worker. She was truly naive at nineteen. A time when she couldn’t even distinguish between being recognized and being used.

Because the beginning had been smooth, she thought the end would be too. There was such a time.

* * *

Veronica’s prediction was not wrong.

“Are you insane?”

Roman raised his voice irritably after hearing the same proposal from the village chief. He usually maintained proper courtesy with Abriel, but when pushed, he would spew harsh words as if he had never been polite.

“Have you gone senile? Should I give you a dementia test? Well, do you remember today’s date?”

“No, what could possibly be wrong with it? You both heal people, don’t you?”

“I am a doctor, you hear? A doctor! You want me to work with some mere midwife? You might as well tell a bear and a tiger to become friends!”

Roman struck his chest with his fist. Despite his violent reaction, it wasn’t uncommon for doctors or pharmacists to secretly employ midwives as secretaries to see patients or make medicine. If he had been the only one who knew that Veronica was a midwife’s granddaughter, he might have considered such an approach.

But rumors were already circulating that Doctor Roman was a quack, and that the midwife’s granddaughter had cleaned up his mistakes. If Veronica joined the clinic, patients might increase, but everyone would think it was the midwife treating patients, not him. He couldn’t bear such treatment after already being relegated to this rural backwater.

“But Dr. Roman. Veronica may be young, but she’s quite a skilled midwife. Why, even Silvia’s leg was…”

“Nonsense! That would have healed on its own. If treatment had been necessary, I would have done it long ago! If anything, it’s healing slowly because that woman is meddling with her so-called treatment!”

Roman shouted, full of indignation. As if he had forgotten how he had berated Silvia, telling her to endure this much since she had gained a new life after childbirth.

But what he hadn’t considered was that the village chief looked after the villagers more carefully than he thought. Quite naturally, he had visited the sheriff’s house a few months ago to comfort Silvia, and had clearly heard what the doctor had said to her as she cried and complained. How much trouble he had gone through to calm down the angry sheriff.

“I heard she provided illegal treatment again and demanded potatoes in return, isn’t that clearly a loophole? And if that wasn’t enough, I heard she’s now teaching something to a girl named Rita… Ha! Is she in any position to do so? She doesn’t even have medical qualifications, let alone having ever set foot in an academy!”

“…I think there’s a misunderstanding. She’s not teaching pharmacy. I heard she’s helping with foreign language studies.”

Still, Abriel tried his best to think positively. After all, it was technically a loophole, and it was unlicensed medical practice, so it could be a sensitive issue from a doctor’s perspective. Moreover, it was true that he was suffering because of it.

“Isn’t Veronica also studying a foreign language for academy admission? Since Rita is interested in that field, while she’s studying herself…”

“What would a girl learn about medicine!”

But despite Abriel’s efforts to understand the doctor, Roman just shouted again as if he had heard something absurd.

“Tell her to stop meddling unnecessarily and have children instead! That’s what women’s work is…!”

Roman, who was panting with indignation, quickly closed his mouth when he noticed the gaze upon him. The village chief was looking at him with narrowed eyes.

“Do you know how old Rita is?”

“Well, what I meant was…”

Though he had grown up as the third son of a baron’s family, he had now fallen to the position of a rural doctor. Fortunately, he had been able to assert himself until now thanks to the moderate village chief, but in reality, if he fell out of the village chief’s favor and was driven out of this village, he had no other options.

“Whether man or woman, each should be faithful to their own duties, that’s what I mean. Just as giving birth to life is a woman’s duty, protecting it is a man’s duty. Medicine, too, is about protecting life, so naturally, isn’t it a man’s job?”

“……”

“I’m saying that innate duties and roles are different. I’m not trying to determine superiority. Women are entrusted with the noble and sublime duty of childbirth, so by being faithful to their respective duties…”

Roman tried not to flounder as he offered his excuses. It wasn’t too difficult for someone who had been raised with aristocratic education. Nobles often used such words to defend their territory.

But no matter how plausibly it was packaged, the essence didn’t change. Abriel, who as the village chief had met nobles not infrequently, naturally recognized this.

“…I see, I understand your point. You don’t want Veronica in the clinic, is that it?”

“If she obtains medical qualifications and comes to ask directly, I’ll consider it.”

It was essentially a rejection. Abriel swallowed a sigh and got up. As usual, Roman didn’t even come out to see him off.