Forced Training (5)
Forced Training (5)
Field Practicum evaluations were polarizing, varying greatly depending on a student's individual disposition.
Students who enjoyed being outside and didn't particularly care for desk-bound study couldn't help but love the practicum. Academy lectures were anything but easy, after all. To be honest, unless you'd been thoroughly educated by a private tutor or had attended a separate school when you were younger, simply keeping up with the coursework was already overwhelming.
And the students who had been receiving prior instruction were hardly the type to coast through their classes either. Class rankings were tied to the honor of their houses, so most noble children fought tooth and nail to maintain at least above-average grades.
To a student who found that stifling, a field practicum like this, a chance to get out of the imperial capital and catch their breath, would feel wonderfully refreshing. That was probably even truer for commoners, for whom traveling outside the imperial capital was financially burdensome. Though to be fair, a commoner whose family circumstances were that dire wouldn't have been able to enroll in the academy in the first place.
On the other hand, if someone was a bit more introverted, not very good at approaching strangers on the street to ask various questions, or simply disliked being out and about, then a field assignment like this would be completely incompatible with their nature. They'd much rather hole up in their room with a book. Those who had a group to accompany them could at least coast along with the others, but those without even that... well, even scraping together a minimum passing score would probably be a struggle.
As for me, I was decidedly the latter type of person.
I was the sort who played games released annually, titles whose bare minimum first-playthrough time ranged from fifty to eighty hours, across multiple playthroughs. My remaining time was spent poring over short side-story novels, comics, and the Setting Guide. And even when I wasn't consuming the Aetherna Chronicles, I was watching films, dramas, anime, or reading books.
I did travel very occasionally, but when I did, I always booked the coziest possible lodgings and minimized my time outdoors. Unless there was a plan, not going out was my default modus operandi.
"Sylvia!"
"Huh-wha?"
"...... Big Sis Sylvia?"
In other words, at four in the morning, my younger sister, who wasn't related to me by blood and whose face I hadn't seen for ten years, had flung open my door, barged in to wake me, and her personality was, in many ways, very much not compatible with mine.
Again!
*
Why on earth had I chosen the Cool Beauty image in the first place?
Wouldn't it have been fine to choose an emotional, optimistic personality instead? I could have become the sort of character who was usually laid-back and easygoing but could resolve difficult tasks with an untroubled expression once committed.
When I'd first settled on the Cool Beauty concept, my reasoning had been that it allowed me to minimize things like facial-expression acting and was great for hiding my thoughts. But on second thought, even a personality like Lucas's or Jake's could've worked. If I'd only tacked on a trait like 'rotten to the core,' they would've made excellent characters.
If I hadn't felt the need to maintain this Cool Beauty concept, then there certainly wouldn't have been any need to get up half an hour before Claire barged into my room, wash up, prepare in advance, and pretend to be cleaning my firearms.
"Sylvia! Ah, you were already up."
Truthfully, I didn't think the "you were already up" part was particularly necessary.
Claire had been the one who was actually startled. She heard the flustered sound I made while half-asleep and became incredibly flustered in turn. But honestly, there was no reason for her eyes to widen just because she found me awake at this hour, cleaning my firearms.
"Well, that's right. Last time, Sylvia was up before any of us."
...... When had I done that?
............ Ah.
Could this be about that first request after we'd enrolled?
From what Leo and Claire had said back then, they'd already been outside by four in the morning. I'd apparently gotten up even earlier than that and taken down the Elemental Dog. So it seemed that was the story they were talking about now.
Since that incident, I hadn't deliberately woken up earlier than those two in order to complete a request. Adapting my sleep schedule to Alice's waking hours and going off to study had been better for my mental health. If there was ever something I needed to handle alone, I'd simply request her understanding and move independently for a time.
Even the side quests I already knew about required the sheer misery of waking up at three in the morning. If I tried to complete weekly requests that weren't even depicted in the game ahead of those two, I might genuinely have to give up sleeping entirely and run around all night.
"Leo and I were about to head out first. What about you, Sylvia? Do you want to come together?"
"......."
I fell into thought for a moment. What quests were there at this hour?
The requests, unless the scenario explicitly stated they were genuinely urgent, were all ones that Jennifer had collected beforehand. In the game, they appeared under the label 'Quests'...... Unlike the first week, which was practically a tutorial, this first field practicum was the point where we'd begin gradually entering the main story.
The game's story wasn't made up of the protagonist characters alone. A hunting quest that had no major story impact no matter when it was cleared could easily be handled at this time of day. But quests involving people were clearly meant to be undertaken at a time consistent with their context.
My purpose was to experience this game's story as a character within it, to save those who were fated to die, and to reach a happy ending.
...... Since I'd ended up possessing someone in this world without having done anything particularly wrong, that was the goal I'd decided upon.
"And what of the imperial princess?"
"The imperial princess? Ah, Alice."
At my question, Claire's expression clouded somewhat.
I doubted Claire harbored any particular ill feelings toward Alice. More than that, she'd been the first to form something like a sisterly bond with me, and the thought that Alice and I now had that kind of relationship probably left her feeling a little bittersweet.
Come to think of it, if Lucas hadn't existed, I might well have been taken in by the Grace household. If that had happened, the three of us, Leo, Claire, and I, might have become siblings, and I might never have felt compelled to adopt the 'Cool Beauty' character in the first place.
Still, it was already done, and I had liked the character Alice anyway, so I was enjoying the current situation in my own way.
"Alice didn't seem fully awake yet. Actually, I stopped by her room before yours, but she just mumbled something incoherently, so I couldn't really make out what she said."
"......."
Hm.
Nevertheless, I thought Alice would eventually join us.
The reason was simple. In the game, you could add Alice to the party formation. If the setting had been that Alice was still asleep, then it wouldn't have been possible to put her in the party from the very first quest.
"Understood. I'll come down shortly."
"Okay!"
The moment she heard my answer, Claire's expression brightened in an instant. Could it really please her that much?
Well, in the original story, Claire had never even had someone who resembled family make an appearance. So even just having me, someone close to a family member, around might be a source of happiness for her.
Now that I thought about it, what had become of all the children from that orphanage, who were barely mentioned in the original? Were they still at the Grace estate? Perhaps they had been employed there, working as servants, aides, or maids.
Given the Claire of now, even if someone from the same orphanage came to work as her servant, she would probably treat them like a brother or a sister.
It was a scene that lifted my spirits just to imagine.
We were slated to visit the Grace household later in the story, so perhaps I could check on it then.
"Then I'll go down first and order breakfast ahead of time!"
"Understood. I'll finish what I was doing and come down at once."
"Yeah!"
Claire gave a large nod and carefully closed the door. Then I heard the sound of her footsteps hurrying slightly away from my room.
Was she excited?
Hm, perhaps so. After all, two people who were practically family to her were here together, and every friend she'd grown close to was present as well.
From Claire's perspective, it probably felt like nothing more than a group outing. Or maybe something like a training retreat?
"......."
As I started to reassemble the disassembled firearm parts I'd been blankly polishing, I continued to think.
Well, anyway.
Even an introvert like me was looking forward to this, so it was a little funny to think that Claire, with a personality like hers, wouldn't be anticipating it as well.
"Yaaawn."
...... Still, being a bit tired was something I couldn't help.
*
I'd pretended to be thorough by disassembling and cleaning my firearm at the crack of dawn, but I didn't consider it a bad thing. Thanks to that, I'd been able to double-check the weapon's condition before we properly began the mission. If it ever malfunctioned during a dramatic moment, I could have ended up in a situation where I'd need to spend several hours completely retracing my steps just to reassemble the gun.
Since we wouldn't be heading out immediately, I left the gun safely inside my room and stepped outside.
"Ah...... Sylvia......."
Unlike her usual tone, a voice cracked and raspy called out to me.
"Your Highness."
"...... We may be on a practicum, but...... I'm still an academy student, so, call me by, my name......."
Her eyes were barely open, and she sounded halfway like a zombie, but even so, Alice chided me about that.
"Are you alright?"
"...... Do I look alright?"
In response to my question, Alice turned her face directly toward me and asked. The reason I said she 'turned her face' rather than 'looked at me' was because Alice wasn't able to fully open her eyes.
Her face wasn't swollen, and aside from a few stray strands of hair sticking out, it was still Alice's pretty face as always. But it seemed that even for the impeccably self-disciplined Alice, waking up at four in the morning was difficult in many ways.
"......A few strands of your hair are sticking out."
"...... Forget it. Even though I'm aware of it, I don't have the confidence to fix it right now."
Despite my words, Alice merely said that and began to walk slowly.
Still, perhaps because she was gradually waking up as she talked, her cracked voice was slowly returning to normal.
I descended the stairs behind Alice, her eyes still barely open, keeping a watchful eye on her footsteps as I went. Fortunately, Alice didn't suffer the indignity of missing a step.
On the first floor, we found a dining room with several round tables, similar in shape to the ones we'd seen near the train station the other day.
However, the surroundings were somewhat different from that place.
Unlike that establishment, which had felt slightly gloomy even in broad daylight, this one was bright before sunrise. The former had been a combined restaurant and inn with old, creaky parquet flooring stained black in places. This place was made of high-grade lumber and expertly finished, and the hotel lobby I'd seen before entering was equally well constructed.
It was clearly a building created with a different class of materials and a different class of money, yet the fact that I still thought of that restaurant only proved that the north was still the north.
"Hello."
Leo, who was already seated and waiting, raised a hand in greeting toward us.
"......."
And alongside him, in states almost indistinguishable from zombies just like Alice, sat our classmates in a row.
To be honest, Mia Crowfield already looked dead. She was seated in a chair, true, but her head was planted on the table, and she wasn't moving a muscle.
Jake was continuously rubbing his eyes, and Charlotte was barely holding herself upright in her chair with just enough poise not to lose her dignity as a princess.
......A relief.
So I was normal after all.
Well, the original protagonist had been Leo, after all.
The original protagonist's party members were entities that moved as the protagonist led them.
Though the problem was that this particular protagonist's morning was just a bit too early.