The Sage Arrives Tomorrow
Putting down a hundred people ought not to have taken long. Consult the clock, though, and a considerable stretch of time had passed.
The farther she worked her way down the line, the whiter the remaining faces went, until Jin almost pitied them. The Black Knights were streaming cold sweat as well. They knew Nina already, and so they could feel in their own bodies just how much stronger she had grown.
Right. They're all thinking it, aren't they. How does someone like that even exist?
Monstrous strength, technique refined past all belief, and a body light and quick besides—and she had dropped every last one of them without once calling on her spirit. When the final body hit the ground, Nina dragged the ones she had passed off to one side and heaped them together.
"I'm hungry!"
At her shout, Jin went to an attendant and told him to steam a great heap of potatoes. Nina had already gone into the captain's office to look over the successful applicants' papers when the man returned, a tray piled high with them.
A mountain of steamed potatoes was perfectly edible. It made her sad all the same.
"Just once, when I say I'm hungry, I wish something other than steamed potatoes would show up."
"We don't have the money."
Jin said it as if it were nothing. Second son of a trading house, a man who had once kept the books for a ducal family, he was ruthless where coin was concerned.
"Then at least steam them with salt."
"I'll suggest it."
Nina let out a long sigh and ate. Hunger would have made anything taste fine, and still she was a little sad. The sadness vanished the moment she was full.
Looking thoroughly pleased with himself, Jin set a cold glass of juice before the sprawled Nina.
"Oh, and—fine work."
"Mm."
The praise was soaked in sarcasm, but she decided to forgive him on account of the juice. Body loosened, stress burned off, people chosen. Three gains at once. She drained the sweating glass in a single swallow, and a rough, satisfied kah escaped her on its own.
Jin took the empty glass as if snatching it and asked,
"But is it all right to take only that many?"
"Hm?"
"I mean, isn't the number too small?"
"That was already a generous cutoff. Otherwise I'd have taken only the first three."
Nina grinned.
"Well. Training will fix them."
The memory of hellish training came flooding back, and a prickle ran the length of Jin's body. So the ranks of comrades were growing. No—was it really all right for fresh recruits and the vice-captain to be ground down at the same seniority?
No. That's the sort of pride that gets you killed.
He shook his head at himself. Wasn't there something more important? He did not want to follow behind her, staring at her back. He wanted to fight with his shoulder set level with hers. For that, he could fold his pride away. He was settling the resolve when Kirill came into the captain's office, and for once she had the white coat on and wore it well.
"For people struck in the vitals, they're all remarkably intact. Only the first one who took the blow will have to live on soup. The rest are fine."
"Please. I went easy."
Nina winked. Kirill went on.
"Everyone whose body was sound, I sent home."
Jin asked, doubtful.
"Did no one protest?"
"Would they?"
Kirill jerked her chin at Nina, and Jin nodded.
"Fair enough."
This was Kirill, after all, long since practiced at handling the rough men of the Black Knights. She had surely dragged Nina's name out and spent it well. He had wondered what they would do if a full-scale protest came in, but even so, it seemed a hard thing to complain after losing a fight of a hundred to one.
Yeah. I'd be too ashamed to say it anywhere myself.
He was coming around to it when Kirill drew a letter from her pocket.
"And a letter came from Blue Stone Island."
Nina took it and looked at the envelope.
The name stood stark and clear.
"Huh? For real?"
Nina shot upright.
"Why? What happened... sir?"
The honorific arrived a beat late. Nina laughed through her nose.
"When it's just us, you can drop the formalities."
Jin shook his head.
"Nope. I—I mustn't. What if I slip in front of the new recruits?"
"Yeah, sure. Whatever."
He had already answered in the familiar before scrambling back to formality. Pointing it out was more trouble than it was worth, so she nodded offhand and looked at the name Randel once more. The male lead.
Wow. I really didn't think a reply would come from the man himself. I was sure it wouldn't.
In the original, too, he meets the heroine because of the plants and animals of the Purple Forest, but he might not even be interested right now...
Or so I thought. It really is him. Wow. Wait—?
She broke the seal, read down the page, and frowned. In a formal register so stiff it prickled, Jin asked,
"What's wrong? Did something happen?"
"It's nothing. Apparently a sage is coming to our territory."
"What? Why would they?"
Plain speech flew straight out of the startled Jin. Catching himself, he cleared his throat and tried again.
"I mean—what business brings them?"
"They received the plant specimens and the report I sent, and it seems they've taken a considerable interest."
Nina read the rest. A date of departure and a date of arrival were written there.
Tomorrow? They arrive tomorrow?
Are we even ready for guests? Why are they coming so fast? No—shouldn't they have asked whether they were allowed to come in the first place?
Weren't nobles supposed to settle these things well in advance? She scowled at the thought.
I ought to tell Adrian.
Except Adrian wasn't here. Nina folded the letter.
"They say they're due to arrive tomorrow."
"Tomorrow? Have they lost their minds?"
Jin's eyes went wide. Kirill snorted.
"Sage bastards are all the same. Selfish, thick-skulled little shits."
At the rough turn of phrase, Nina looked at her.
"That is a voice carrying a personal grudge."
"Live to my age, and there isn't a place left where you haven't made an enemy."
"Kirill, don't you think it's time you reconsidered your life?"
"Brat."
Kirill flicked a finger against Nina's forehead. Nina yelped, half a scream and half a laugh.
"Ack!"
Jin shook his head.
"I dislike this guest already. They're not bringing some strange news, are they?"
At the grumble, Nina huffed a laugh and shook her head.
"Hardly. For us, it's only good if they do the research in our place."
She had sent the letter hoping someone else would take up the work, and she had never imagined an answer would come back this fast.
"I should tell someone. If we're to ready a guest room..."
I'll have to go to Sir Louis. Nina rose. This was news that could not wait even an hour.
She was stepping out of the captain's office when the man crouched before the door sprang to his feet. Pale purple hair, deep blue eyes. The one she had passed earlier. On the papers, clearly—
"Raza Gota."
Raza, who had never imagined the captain of the order would know his name, snapped both arms into an X and bowed from the waist.
"R-Raza Gota!"
"Yeah. What is it?"
"I—I came to offer my thanks for the instruction!"
"I didn't really teach you anything."
"N-no! Just witnessing skill like that set my heart pounding so hard I thought I was going to die!"
"You'd better not die."
"Thank you!"
Are we even speaking the same language? Nina tipped her head, then laughed.
"So the thanks was the whole errand?"
"Y-yes!"
"All right. It was nothing. Go in and rest. Training starts tomorrow."
Training.
At the word, Raza's eyes blazed. He looked at Nina with admiration brimming over.
"Yes!"
Jin regarded him with a sour face, then fell in behind her.
"That one seems strange."
"His voice is a bit loud, and he seems slow on the uptake."
"That is what's strange."
"No. That and strange are different things."
Nina squinted at him for going too far, and Jin shut his mouth on a pained grunt. They were knights of the same order now. Nothing good would come of speaking ill of the boy.
"It's fine, it's fine. Pound it into them and they'll all listen."
The words that followed sent a chill over Jin's skin. He swallowed.
Right. Put them through that training, and they'll listen well enough.
While he was concluding that he would not need to do a thing to unite the recruits, Nina turned her gaze toward the Purple Forest. Cold as stone, the Young Master had gone into the forest before first light, without so much as a goodbye.