EP.69 – The Knight Cheers On the Youths (4)
The Royal Capital was in an uproar, for the banquet celebrating the royal grandson's first birthday was close at hand.
And yet—
"Come on, there's still a whole month left! So why are the inn prices like this?!"
"You ought to know these rates are still on the cheap side. Give it a little longer and they'll only climb."
"Good heavens..."
A month still remained before the banquet, and even so the noise seemed far too much. The Royal Capital's population density was hitting its highest point in nearly three years, and some streets were so packed a person could hardly find room to set a foot down. Carriages poured in from every province. Lodging houses named prices that made the eyes pop, and still most of them were full. People gathered as a matter of course, the markets came alive, and the small merchants were making serious money—one busy season, enough to cover two years' keep.
But the world could never be purely pleasant, and the sudden flood of people was giving the Royal Capital's officials a thorough headache.
"Provincial nobles are brawling on the south street!"
"Knights are dueling!!"
"And now there are idiots who want to hold a War Game!?"
Rival houses that had come up from the provinces were feuding. Quarrels that should have stayed petty swelled as if someone meant to die over them, until at last blood was drawn. With so many powerful figures gathered in one place, such side effects were inevitable. Even so, the scrabbling of nobles and merchants over their interests was among the more tolerable troubles. At least it happened in the open, where it could be stopped.
In that sense, the truly worst side effect was this.
"Easy. Far too easy. Easy enough that I almost feel sorry."
"You don't look sorry in the slightest. You're just sneering."
"Shut up!"
"Hmph. You always start by raising your voice."
"You little—!?"
Openly suspicious people could slip into the tide of the crowd and hide there, and no one would notice.
The knight order and the soldiers would of course insist that they screened everyone entering the Royal Capital with the utmost care. Their standard, however, was an ordinary one. Had they truly wished to be thorough, they would have had to pour every resource of the Royal Castle into the task, and the Royal Castle had done no such thing. It was a blunder born of the arrogance of thinking this much would surely do—and for the ones now walking those streets, that blunder was nothing but a blessing.
"More importantly, what are you going to do about that?"
"Hm?"
"The thing the Black Apostles asked for. You'll have to grant it, won't you?"
"...Ah. That worthless little request? Forget it."
"Are you sure that's wise? You owe them—especially the First Apostle."
The question came worried in tone, and yet the man who asked it wore a strange smile. At the sound of it the middle-aged man drew his brow, already pinched tight as a scar, tighter still, and scoffed.
"Debt? There's no way any debt is left between us. Not for him, and not for me."
He said it jeeringly, then turned his gaze to a newspaper lying by the roadside. Its front page was dominated by a single line.
He looked at it, and his mouth twisted.
"Treacherous wretches. Truly impressive. They'll even run a fraud like this."
He only snorted at the tale of a royal grandson said to have inherited the blood of both the Pendragon and Britannia royal houses. No—it went beyond a snort. It was contempt.
"Inherited the blood of Pendragon and Britannia at once? What a load of shit."
He would sooner believe that oil and water could mix.
The man's cold mutter rang out fairly loud, but the countless voices of the crowd buried it and scattered it, leaving behind only a thin breath of something unclean in the air.
"Hmm. So in the end you turned them all down?"
"Something like that."
"Hoh..."
"...You suddenly look pleased. You."
"Ah, no! Th-that's not it!"
The girl with golden hair and blue eyes denied it at once. She was absolutely not happy that he had refused to serve as chaperone for the other young ladies. She was merely, purely, relieved that he had not gotten himself tangled in something bothersome...
Sh-shut up!
Eee!
Irene Windler was a beautiful girl who called fairies to mind. Over a light dinner with the knight who lived next door, she had heard what happened a few days ago, and she was now properly caught in the storm of feeling that followed.
Those foxes, I swear!
Yes, if she were honest, harsh words had been right on the tip of her tongue. She had reason. Hadn't these foxlike creatures thrown a fit about making the instructor their chaperone? And if he became someone's chaperone—
It means I wouldn't even be able to ask him to be my partner!
Any adult of nineteen or older could attend the Debutante, and Irene's presence at a royal banquet of this sort was not optional. If she were honest, she did not want to go. She had no choice. She was Galahad's adopted daughter, and she had to carry out the duties that came with it. Attendance was unavoidable, and if she had to attend, the best thing would be to take the man she wanted as her partner. With that in mind she had meant to use tonight's dinner as an excuse to ask him, but—
...It's not easy.
But...
I-if I had my way, I'd want the instructor to ask me. Holding out a hundred roses. Hehe.
Wh-why are you looking at me like that?
"Hey!!"
In the end the girl shouted it, and the ghost girl shook her head as if giving up.
The ghost girl was simply at a loss.
What's she been doing this whole time?
She was the one who had called them to dinner, and yet she wasn't eating. Her expression shifted by the second while she muttered to herself, and Lee Han blinked at the sight of it.
Well, she uses magic. Can't be helped.
He decided to look upon the somewhat unhinged girl with nothing but warmth. However normal she might be among spell-slingers, a spell-slinger was still a spell-slinger. Wasn't it only natural that she had something wrong in the head? After all—
It's common sense that spell-slingers aren't right in the head.
Lee Han's prejudice against mages was set more firmly than his Diamond Indestructible Body, and odd behavior on the girl's part was something he let pass without a second thought. More than that, she was not the only guest.
"But, Master. Why did you refuse the other young ladies? I thought you, of all people, would accept."
Levi blinked as she asked, and Lee Han answered with a light shrug.
"I've only got one body. I can't do it for some and not the others. Better I just don't, than leave bad blood between them."
"Mmm. I don't think the young ladies would hold a grudge over something like that."
"You never know. Kids just can't show it on the outside. Who's to say they aren't feeling hurt?"
"That's..."
"And I've got something I need to check on personally."
"...?"
"There is such a thing. Anyway, are the other two not coming after all? And here I was, ready to feed them."
"Both of them looked awfully busy..."
The chick from next door had proposed tonight's dinner, but Lee Han was the one who had prepared the food and invited the people, partly as thanks to the key hands who had helped when he made the stone statue. Even so, only two had shown up. From the gray-haired one and the black-haired one, as expected, there was not a word.
"These brats only show up when they want something."
"Hehe..."
Levi did not deny it. She only laughed, timidly. His words were a little rough, but she could see that he was worried about them. He really was a kind person.
So the smile lasted only a moment.
"...Mm."
Levi fidgeted with her fingers, looking somehow anxious, and then—
"Um, I-Instructor."
"Yeah?"
"I-if a ch-chaperone is too much... th-then maybe a partner would be all right...?"
"...?"
"The banquet runs for five days, doesn't it? So I was wondering if, maybe, we could attend together for just one day...!"
"...With me?"
"Yes!"
"......"
The girl had found her courage. At that utterly bold proposal Lee Han fell briefly silent and blinked, as if he had never expected to be asked such a thing.
"......"
But soon he saw her hands trembling like an aspen.
"Which day works for you?"
"—!!"
"Tell me the day you want."
"Th-then...!"
"Thinking about it, I didn't do a partner's job properly last year, so this time I'll do it right. Look forward to it. For that one day, I'll do my best so you can shine brighter than anyone."
"...Yes!"
Levi broke into a beaming smile, glad she had found the courage. The girl was happy.
And—
"...What did I just do?"
"......"
"......"
And so the mage girl—no courage, only a great many wishes—watched the cat scramble up onto the hearth ahead of her, and felt defeat settle over her, thick and clinging.
There was, however, one thing the mage girl did not know.
Let's see. I agreed to go with the maid on the last day. That woman wanted the first day. And there was someone else I'd agreed to see...
She had already lost not to Levi alone, but to several people at once. Pendragon's social world seethed with schemes, and the clumsy did not survive in it.