Who Dares Touch Us? (2)
It was a bright, sunny midday. Or, to put it another way, the hour when the largest number of people gathered in one place. With classes suspended, the students suddenly found themselves with far too much free time, and each of them passed it in their own fashion. A few diligent souls buried themselves in long-neglected studies, but many others, reluctant to return home amid the grave atmosphere, simply remained in the city.
Which meant…
“…Ugh.”
If someone were to collapse in a suitably inconspicuous manner—not blatantly in the open, but believably enough—there was an extremely high chance that one of the Sigmund students would approach and offer a helping hand.
And there were very few Sigmund students who had not participated in the forest field training. Therefore, anyone who had taken part could not possibly fail to recognize this red-haired woman. Even if they had never seen her in person, they would have heard countless stories about her.
Yet here that very woman lay, face-down on the ground, looking more haggard than anyone could imagine. Without uttering a single word, she was screaming with her entire body.
I’m in pain.
Save me.
As a result, even without anyone pushing them forward, it was only natural that a person driven by a sense of duty soon appeared.
The pink-haired girl moving through the crowd, her basket brimming with flowers and skeins of yarn, reached out a gentle hand. That warmth enveloped the fallen woman—Hylken.
“Excuse me, miss…! What’s wrong? Are you ill?”
“Water… please…”
Hylkenbesta answered in a voice so cracked and dry it sounded as though she had endured torture, pleading desperately for moisture. After all, this was the very order she had received from her heaven-like senior.
Yet the face that drew near was one Hylken already knew. At first she had been half in doubt, but the moment their eyes met, recognition flashed between them.
“Ah! You’re… the one who saved me…! You’re the huntress who was with Sir Yohan! His junior!”
“Mika…?”
The priestess. The same priestess whose stomach had been torn open and then restored. And Hylken, whose own conscience was hardly spotless, instinctively understood the moment she saw her.
No matter what, meeting the person she had risked everything to save and now being able to ride the coattails of that favor to earn pity…
Today’s luck is excellent—
As it happened, Mika had water with her. Hylken drank greedily, using every ounce of strength she could muster. The sight drew the eyes of countless onlookers who had been watching from a distance. One by one they gathered, curious about what was happening.
“Wait, isn’t that the woman…?”
“She’s the one who rained celestial magic everywhere beside Sir Yohan.”
“That’s right! The huntress! Wait—hasn’t she been missing?”
Amid the swelling tide of attention, Hylken spoke with the attitude of someone ready to die for the cause, feigning complete innocence.
“Thank you… I was locked away for days… I couldn’t eat or drink anything…”
In truth she had been fed—even if the rice had been nibbled by rats—and given two bottles of water daily, so none of it was accurate. But what did that matter?
Mika’s eyes widened in shock.
“What?! Who would do something so terrible?!”
“I don’t know… I barely escaped the supervisor’s basement and made it here. Damn it, what month and day is it now?”
“It’s definitely late May. Don’t tell me you’ve been imprisoned ever since the field training ended…?”
“Yes. There wasn’t a single ray of light in that room. How was I supposed to track the passage of time…?”
Hylken subtly gauged the mood, then slowly closed her eyes within the warm, worried touch of Mika’s hand.
“I’m so tired… Miss Mika, if it’s not too much trouble, could you take me somewhere safe?”
“O-of course! Just wait a moment—this is urgent…!”
In reality, Hylken had been eating and living rather well. With her usual grit she had endured confinement without much difficulty, so her body was hardly on the verge of collapse. Still, she looked convincingly haggard, and when she closed her eyes and delivered her final line—
“Montgomery… locked me up…”
—the sea of people who had gathered erupted into a storm of murmurs.
“Montgomery? The chairman imprisoned the huntress?”
“Is he insane? Why would he do that to someone like her?!”
“I heard he’s tight with Crown Prince Vancite’s faction. Obviously he wanted to keep any strange stories from leaking out.”
“Is that all? Maybe he was trying to frame her…”
Students demand accountability after knight who saved lives during forest training is revealed to have been secretly imprisoned. Public outrage grows as new testimony reveals inhumane conditions and possible political motives tied to the Crown Prince’s faction.
Figaro, who had been leisurely sipping coffee and scanning for any incident worthy of a front-page scoop, was also watching the scene—a fact Hylken herself could not have known. All she had done was leave a cartridge behind; she had never seen his face. Yet the sharp-eyed journalist muttered to himself,
“The thread has unraveled. The villain really is the villain.”
The very next day, the Sigmund Newspaper Club’s breaking report on the chairman’s atrocious imprisonment sent shockwaves through the academy. Calls for Montgomery’s resignation quickly followed.
Sigmund Academy’s chairman—Montgomery, whose already thinning hair seemed determined to abandon his scalp entirely—greeted the worst morning of his life. The residential district, which should have been perfectly quiet, was instead filled with a thunderous roar.
“…Secretary. Who are those people outside?”
“Eek…”
The woman called secretary trembled as though the words were too painful to speak, but she eventually forced out an answer.
“They are citizens enraged by the huntress imprisonment scandal published in the newspaper club’s exclusive. They have been gathered since dawn…”
“D-damn it—!”
He flung the curtains open, only to be met with—
“The worst chairman this era has ever seen—!”
An egg flew through the narrow gap with terrifying accuracy. Montgomery barely dodged it and slammed the curtains shut again. In that brief moment, an uncountable amount of filth had already poured inside.
Steam practically rose from his head as he bellowed,
“This is exactly why I insisted the newspaper club must be eradicated—abolished entirely—!”
But what could he do? Whenever he tried to storm their clubroom, they evaded him with almost supernatural skill. He could have drawn his sword, yet he had been stabbed in his one weak point: the excuse that he had no time because of other duties. Having already lost the hearts of Sigmund’s students and faculty, nothing was going his way. The Jurchen connection he had been carefully cultivating still seemed quiet, but the person he had worked so hard to keep locked away had escaped.
“And how the hell did that bitch Hylken get out?! I gave clear orders to keep her confined until this matter was resolved! Damn it—if I’d known, I should have just eliminated her…!”
“T-that is… it appears an insider in the supervision office received some form of benefit and released her without anyone noticing. We attempted to locate the individual, but he fled the day before yesterday.”
“Then release the hounds and hunt him down!”
Only then did Montgomery snatch up the newspaper on his desk and begin reading. The content was nothing short of public condemnation aimed directly at the chairman.
“Fuck… what is this ridiculous story about starving a hero and not feeding her? We never did that! We didn’t, right?”
“U-ugh…”
“We’ve been had. Had. Had. Haaaaad!”
In a single word, the situation could be summed up perfectly as: we’re fucked.
Hylken had been kept hidden from the public all this time, both to monitor her and to keep her under control. The moment she stepped outside, she had orchestrated this performance. It was clearly one of two things—either she was far more cunning than they had imagined and had done this simply to ruin them, or someone was backing her. But with his blood boiling, the chairman could not think straight.
His hands shook as he removed his glasses. Then the door exploded.
BANG—!
It had been solid cedar, yet it shattered as easily as a sugar stick. A vortex of power surged in from outside. There were few beings in Sigmund capable of exerting such force.
“Chairman. I request an audience.”
“Y-you—?! This is a restricted hour! No one is allowed inside! This is grounds for suspension—suspension!!”
“Suspension? How delightful.”
The chairman had grown furious at the unidentified intruder who had entered without permission, seized the opportunity, and even dared to speak down to him. But the moment he saw the flowing blue hair, the elegant yet heavy steps, and the spirit pressure sharp enough to slice flesh, he knew exactly who she was.
She was the Grand Duke’s daughter of the North—Karalin von Vitagarte.
“Since you seem to enjoy handing out suspensions so much, feel free to give one to me. I have no interest in degrees or any of that nonsense anyway.”
“G-Grand Duke’s daughter?!”
“What are you staring at?”
Veins stood out on her forehead; she was clearly furious.
“Someone in your position should already know my background quite well. I was essentially pushed out of the North and sent here. I have zero interest in central politics.”
“K-kggh…”
“So where do you get the nerve to threaten me when you have no power to back it up?”
Yet, just as Karalin had anticipated, Montgomery could do nothing. If she had been the son of some remote count who only flirted and caused trouble instead of studying, perhaps he could have acted. But the Grand Duke’s House—whose prestige had soared to the heavens after the recent forest training—was one of the empire’s only two grand ducal families. Imprisoning their sole daughter would be like trying to swallow something far too large for his stomach. It would burst.
Karalin held up the very newspaper Montgomery had been reading and pressed him.
“You must already know why I’ve come. The Hylken you imprisoned is a knight who serves our house. Were you aware of that?”
“I-is that so…”
“Yes. Although she has temporarily left our territory after being appointed huntress, she still holds a formal commission from the Grand Duke’s House. Furthermore, she is not even a ‘student’ under your jurisdiction.”
Her voice was ice-cold.
“So I have only one question. A northern knight who is not a student—meaning even your authority as chairman does not extend to her. On what grounds did you, a mere private individual, dare to detain her?”
“T-there is no such fact, however…”
“Do not make excuses. Are you claiming that Hylken, who is currently suffering from the aftereffects of your unlawful imprisonment, is lying?”
Montgomery stammered, unable to produce a single coherent defense.
“Moreover, she was the one who risked her life to save people during the field training that you people ruined.”
With light, graceful steps she approached the chairman’s desk.
BANG—!
She slammed the newspaper down so hard the desk shattered. On the broken surface, Karalin placed the document she had prepared in advance—the formal letter of protest.
Chairman Montgomery of Sigmund Academy has unlawfully detained Hylkenbesta, a commissioned knight of the Grand Duke’s House who is not a student under academy jurisdiction. This constitutes a clear abuse of power and an insult to the North.
We demand immediate accountability, a full public apology, and severe punishment for those responsible.
The Grand Duke’s House will not tolerate any further interference in northern affairs.
“What is this, Your Highness…?”
“What does it look like? I am simply doing what I can. Even if I am not the official successor, I am always free to write a letter of protest concerning the unjust treatment of our people.”
“……Ugh.”
“I don’t know how much we must have looked like pushovers for you to dare something like this, but steel yourself.”
Her voice dropped to a low, dangerous growl.
“As stated in this document, I intend to lodge a formal protest. Not as the student Karalin, but as Karalin von Vitagarte, daughter of the Grand Duke.”
All Montgomery could do was twist his entire body in a desperate apology. No matter how many sinister schemes he might plot later for revenge, right now he could do nothing to her.
“……I-I apologize. I have lost all face. Your Highness the Grand Duke’s daughter!”
“Why commit acts that require an apology?”
Karalin’s heart had already grown cold. She knew the news of her personal intervention would spread like wildfire. It was only a matter of time before the entire academy knew. As chairman, Montgomery would find it even harder to touch the matter now.
This should be enough. I don’t know if this was exactly what you hoped for… Yohan.
Everything had unfolded according to her servant’s plan.
「Other students might be different, but if it’s a noble student of Gremory or Karalin’s caliber, even the chairman won’t be able to lay a finger on them.」
Commonly known as the Noble Card.ver2.