SN Chapter 14

"I remember. Memory loss, you said. Doesn't know anything."

"Don't say it like that! How hurt would she be if she heard?!"

Nathan looked at the rambling Raymond with narrowed eyes. What on earth is this adjutant going on about? If it's memory loss, what other way is there to put it besides memory loss? Raymond also caught himself—"Oh, wait, that's not right!"—and hastily added words to return to his point.

"I already know that Dame Rosaline is an exceptional knight. However, there remain many deficiencies for the purpose of escorting His Highness. After a few more months of training—"

"I was on my way to the captain's office."

"...?"

Nathan said it to no particular purpose. Raymond had a somewhat aggrieved look but listened without interrupting.

"It was noisy outside."

"Perhaps things have grown slack since some time has passed since the incident. I'll push them harder."

"Good idea. At any rate, it seemed like the sound was coming from the direction of the training yard, so I went to see what the matter was."

"Were they diligently at training?"

"Dame Rosaline was beating Nestor the way one beats a dog. No—Rosaline doesn't seem the sort who would beat animals that way, so she wouldn't have beaten a dog like that either. I'll rephrase. She was beating him like a training dummy."

Raymond's jaw dropped. Who was beating—what?

"Is it confirmed that the opponent was Junior Knight Nestor of Seacrag?"

"His cheek was severely swollen, so identification was difficult. But most likely."

Raymond knew Nestor well. He was a really rotten piece of work who picked fights with Rosaline in every possible particular. His swordsmanship had been fine enough to lend some support to his rudeness, and Rosaline had tended to show no particular reaction to Nestor's provocations and simply let them pass. Partly because of this, Nestor had labored under the impression that he stood above Rosaline and had carried himself accordingly. The reason he hadn't been promoted this time was that senior knight was not a position determined by swordsmanship alone.

That aside—if someone asked Raymond objectively which of the two had the superior swordsmanship, he would have raised Nestor's hand without hesitation. The difference was that clear. And yet Rosaline had beaten Nestor like a training dummy?

"Nestor didn't... look drunk, did he? Or as though someone had already worked him over before he arrived?"

"...For someone who cherishes Dame Rosaline as much as you do, you seem to have rather little faith in her."

Raymond shut his mouth. It was certainly a disrespectful remark toward Rosaline. But the situation was that unbelievable. Until a few weeks ago she had been someone who couldn't hold a sword properly. He was already on his feet.

"I'll be leaving for the day!"

"At half past one? The sun is still directly overhead."

"I'm stepping out early!"

"Quite the commotion. I'll give you rest time—back within an hour."

I love you, Vice-Captain! The moment permission was granted, Raymond bolted from the vice-captain's office. A man of solid family, decent enough skills and character—but with a tendency to cherish his people to an excessive degree.

Nathan shook his head, then began writing out the several documents he needed to submit in order to assign her the escort duties.

Raymond ran. If Nathan had seen him, he would have frowned and said something. He found Rosaline walking in the corridor before long. There was not a single scratch on her anywhere. She looked peaceful to a degree that made it impossible to believe she had been sparring minutes ago, and there was no soil or dust on her uniform either. If not for the fact that Nestor was being carried, quietly and neatly, in her two arms, he would have found the whole thing entirely implausible.

"...Dame Rosaline?"

"To the glory of Idelabhim who cleaves the Black Moon."

Raymond rubbed both eyes vigorously. Rosaline was holding Nestor with a composed expression. Exactly like a knight in a fairy tale cradling a princess.

"To the glory of Idelabhim who cleaves the Black Moon..."

"To the glory of Idelabhim who cleaves the Black Moon..."

Behind her, two familiar faces followed, pale as sheets. Junior knights Claude and Bastian—always at Nestor's side, always with their chins tilted up. They were now utterly crushed—wilted, like puppies who’d just been swatted.

"To the glory of Idelabhim... Dame, that, that's—how did Nestor end up..."

In that state? Being knocked unconscious by someone you had looked down on was one thing, but the sight of him being cradled meekly in her arms was a separate variety of pitiful. Whatever else, if he had been conscious he would surely have wept from sheer shame.

"We sparred. On the way to the infirmary."

What Raymond had wanted was a slightly longer and more detailed version of 'we sparred'. But there were watching eyes, so he didn't ask again. The four of them headed to the infirmary together. The physician and the cleric stationed there both drew a sharp breath at Nestor's condition. What happened here? Did he fall from a horse and get trampled?

"Wh-what happened? Did a monster appear?"

Oh. Perceptive. Rosaline swallowed the word. In her composed silence, Bastian opened his mouth in her place.

"We... sparred..."

"Sparring? Is there a kind of sparring that leaves a face looking like this?"

The physician lifted Nestor's clothing and startled at the dark bruises beginning to surface across his body in abundance. At his question, Claude spoke in a listless voice.

"We'd agreed to continue until one party made a declaration of surrender, but Nestor passed out on the first strike and couldn't say the word surrender—"

Claude could not finish the sentence. He appeared to be turning that scene over in his mind.

Raymond understood the situation well enough. He knew Rosaline's increased strength. He also knew quite well that she had lost various common senses along with her memory. Rosaline would have kept hitting Nestor, who had passed out and couldn't produce the word surrender—and he would have kept getting hit because he couldn't produce it. If Bastian and Claude, after watching this unfold for some time, hadn't been seized by alarm and declared surrender on his behalf—well. ...Hmm. Even to imagine it was chilling.

Raymond asked the physician to take good care of him. He mentioned that they were short-staffed at the moment and would appreciate every effort—which earned him an unspoken but pointed look: you know we're short on people and you let someone destroy one of them. The man clearly hadn't guessed that the black-haired female knight standing beside Raymond was responsible.

Raymond felt, for no particular reason, a prick of irrational guilt. He let out a hearty laugh and dragged Rosaline out. She was untying her hair, which had come loose from the sparring, and running her hand roughly through it.

"...Any injuries?"

"Yeah, no. He's weak."

"You can't say that in front of Nestor, all right?"

"All right."

"And next time—if someone passes out during a sparring match, you can't keep hitting them even if they haven't declared surrender. Understood?"

"Yes."

Yeah, okay. She gets it. She gets it. Paperwork is completely out of the question for this one—entirely impossible. For the current Rosaline, escort duty was exactly right: stand quietly nearby, and beat down anything suspicious. The vice-captain's foresight suddenly seemed to shine with a brilliant, happy light.

Moonstone Castle, residence of the Second Prince. From morning, Rikardis's office was full. Viscount Chrysanthos, Count Seacrag, Count Autumngloam, Duke Azurelume. Even Marquis Grandram. All the principal figures of the Second Prince's faction were present and seated. They were unsettled. Because of information Duke Azurelume had brought. Second Prince Rikardis sat at the head of the table, drinking tea with an untroubled expression. Having first confirmed the color of the silver tableware, naturally.

"Everyone's acting surprised. Isn't it obvious? That a foreign assassination unit managed to cross a border watched by thousands upon tens of thousands of eyes without being seen—that part I can accept, I suppose. But then they attack a camp they happened to stumble across by chance, and somehow only the Second Prince's forces suffer casualties, and furthermore—isn't it simply remarkable? The First Prince was nowhere to be found. Good grief, the whole thing is so contrived that even a fool could catch it..."

At his words, Marquis Grandram's eyebrows twitched. These vile, wicked men. How could a prince of Illavénia join hands with foreign fanatics? His hands trembled.

"It seems we can fairly conclude that His Highness the First Prince has joined hands with the Dark Moon. Ah—shall I correct that to the Balta royal family?"

"Why bother to distinguish. The Dark Moon has settled itself right inside the royal family. They're one and the same."

Rikardis rested his chin on his hand, looking bored. An unchanged, petty scheme. That was how his so-called brother was. What on earth was so maddening about the position of Emperor that it drove men to this.

It was simply laughable.

"Evidence?"

"He'll find an easy exit. He may even lay the blame on us."

"Even though I and my knights suffered the most casualties?"

"He'll call it a political fabrication."

"Exactly, Marquis. The sort of nonsense my brother is perfectly capable of."

The expressions around the table were far from pleasant. First Prince Elpydion—closer, in practical terms, to the crown prince's position than Rikardis. He was not the vessel to lead Illavénia, an empire occupying half a continent. Though he had studied widely in the subjects required of a First Prince—statecraft among them—one had never seen him actually listening attentively to those around him, and having been raised to be fawned upon and indulged in all things, he had acquired an arrogance that admitted no comparison.

But behind him stood the Empress—more precisely, her family, the Leomane Ducal House. Their power was beyond words to convey. They held a ducal title, one of the handful that existed in all the empire—and beyond that, they were originally a cadet branch that had split from the imperial family itself.

The Empress and the Emperor were not distantly related by blood, but the imperial family did not shy from consanguineous marriage in pursuit of holy power. And that obsession bore fruit in Elpydion. The powerful backing of Empress-born status. Vast holy power comparable to any emperor in the dynasty's history. In Illavénia, where the eldest son inherited unless circumstances were exceptional, Elpydion was effectively the crown prince in all but name.