Tutoring (2)
It felt like I'd spent a good ten minutes just sitting still and taking deep breaths.
By the time I reached the Imperial Palace, my stomach had started churning and my head was throbbing all of a sudden... but no matter how hard I tried to calm myself, nothing seemed to help, so I decided it was time to get out.
"Coachman, I'll get off now."
Click.
The door swung open and light came pouring into the carriage.
Before me spread the grounds of the Imperial Palace, imposing as always—so grand it stole the breath from my lungs.
I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment and clutched the pendant hanging at my neck.
"Thank you, coachman. Go find yourself somewhere to eat. This might take quite a while."
"No, my lady. I will wait right here at the main gate."
"......"
That was a bit much.
Was he seriously going to stand there waiting while his stomach growled hollow?
I wondered if he'd at least brought a rice ball or something with him.
Time to go.
This was no time to be worrying about someone else. I let go of the pendant and stepped forward.
My legs weren't trembling anymore.
At the very least, outwardly, I would look like someone who wasn't nervous at all.
"It's Yulia."
"The Imperial Prince's tutor, is it?"
"That's right."
"Aigoo. Another new one, eh. Hand over your identification and go on through."
The guard returned my identification with a look that said he pitied me.
I wondered what that was about, but decided to let it slide.
This was already my second visit to the Imperial Palace, yet somehow it felt stranger than the first.
Probably because last time I'd done nothing but trail along behind the Marquis like a duckling.
Coming alone, I found myself obsessing over everything—should I walk to the right or the left, was I supposed to bow to every single person I passed or not—until it drove me half mad.
Granted, the Marquis had taught me the basics of court etiquette, but now that I was actually here, not a shred of it came back to me.
Is this it?
The Prince's classroom.
One way or another, I'd made it to my destination without incident.
I stood at the door, took one more deep sigh before knocking...
Tutoring the Prince.
How on earth had I ended up taking this job, really...
Still, I consoled myself with the thought that it would be easy—elementary-school-level material, nothing more.
I had finally finished steeling my nerves and was just about to knock when—
"Your Highness, starting today, your private lessons will—"
"You're here already?!"
"Hrngh!"
BANG.
The door flew open with such force that it slammed square into my face.
I went flying backward and landed flat on my backside.
"The first lesson is nothing anyway, is it not! We shall simply count today as a day of study!"
"Ugh......"
Through slitted eyes, I caught a glimpse of the boy's back as he scurried off down the corridor.
What on earth just happened?
It took me a good while to process the situation.
Why would he go to the trouble of picking me himself, only to skip out on the very first day...?
"Oh."
Crystal-clear clarity struck me.
The reason I'd been chosen as the Prince's tutor from the very first meeting had nothing to do with my good looks or my exceptional teaching ability.
I was easy to push around.
He'd clearly picked me thinking that two whole years would give him plenty of room to slack off.
Well, that works out fine for me too, doesn't it?
If he had no intention of learning, that was his loss and my gain.
All I'd have to do from now on was follow the Prince around in a show of diligence, lounge about, and collect my pay.
The Marquis had been right.
This was a golden opportunity to rake in money—money earned without even working.
A honey-dripping dream job, in other words.
"What are you doing, sitting there on the ground?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Aren't you the tutor? Then fulfill your duties. Now."
Just as I was celebrating inwardly, a somewhat older-looking man came walking out from the back of the classroom.
Judging by his clothes he wasn't a noble—more like a hired servant. Apparently he was the one assigned to attend to the Prince.
I took his outstretched hand, got to my feet, and dusted off my backside.
"Duties, you say?"
"You ask the obvious. Your duty to sit His Highness down at a desk and make him study."
"Even if you say that, I have no idea where His Highness has run off to......"
"Then make an effort to find out. If His Highness fails to achieve the required results within the allotted time, the responsibility falls entirely upon you."
"Sorry—what did you just say?"
"I mean that if His Highness doesn't study, you will be dismissed."
"......"
Ah.
Only then did I truly understand what that guard's pitying look had meant.
I was evidently not the first to walk this road. Someone new would arrive, fail to stop the Prince from skipping lessons, and get fired. The next one would arrive, fail in the same way, and get fired too... and now it was my turn in that endless cycle.
This was maddening.
So much for a dream job where you got paid to lounge around. Of course such a thing didn't exist.
For a fleeting moment, I actually considered giving up and quitting right then and there.
Why keep a job that made my stomach churn with nerves every single time I showed up? I could just toss it aside while I was ahead.
No. I'm not giving up.
I clenched my jaw.
The word "quit" did not exist in my dictionary.
I'd once lived and worked in the house of the man who'd violated me, for heaven's sake. If I threw in the towel over something this trivial, I'd be a laughingstock even to myself.
"You know where His Highness is likely to be. Don't you?"
"Naturally."
The servant answered with a faint smile.
Fine. Let's do this.
Taming the little brat.
"Found you, Your Highness!"
"Gahh......"
He had no idea how much blood, sweat, and tears it had cost me to comb through this vast palace.
The stables, the training grounds, the arena, even the storage houses...
When the servant said there were places the Prince liked to frequent, I'd assumed I'd find him quickly. I hadn't imagined the list would be this long. And of all places, he'd turned up in the very last spot I searched—my luck really was abysmal.
Still, there was one advantage to him being holed up in the warehouse: no escape routes.
I asked the servant who'd followed me to block the entrance, then stepped inside.
The Prince backed away from me, brandishing a wooden sword gripped tightly in both hands.
Was he playing knight, perhaps?
He was certainly at that age for it.
But no matter how many other lessons he skipped, he needed to sit still and study during mine.
"Give it up now. There's less than half an hour of class time left."
"Then how about you give up instead, hm? Half an hour is hardly enough time to teach anything."
"If one has the will to learn, half an hour is time enough for anything. Come along at once, Your Highness."
"I refuse! Why are you all so desperate to rob me of my personal time?!"
"It is not personal time, Your Highness—it is time for study......"
"That cursed studying! Study! Study! Sit still all day and my backside will rot right off! Even I deserve a short break now and then! What do you people take me for?!"
"The one destined to lead a nation. The one fit to guide the Empire. That is what we take you for."
All lies, of course.
From what I'd heard, the Emperor's eldest daughter was already both capable and competent, and she'd been given charge of a duchy.
She was as good as slated to be the next Emperor, and the only people pushing this little pipsqueak for the throne were a handful of nobles.
Whether this brat became Emperor or not was none of my concern. All I needed was for him to sit still, study, and keep my salary flowing on schedule.
And for that, I absolutely had to win him over.
"And what good is mathematics supposed to do me?! Isn't that a subject fit only for lowly engineers?!"
"Ah......"
And there it was. My tongue tied itself into a knot on the spot.
Hearing "what do you even use math for?" firsthand, I had to admit it was a genuinely awkward question.
So this was really the question that left teachers speechless.
For a moment, I understood the plight of math teachers everywhere.
"Ha! See? Mathematics IS a useless subject! It's hard, it's boring, and studying it barely raises one's marks! Poor efficiency, all around! Therefore it is my judgment that spending that time on other studies, or on sword training to manage one's stress, is far more rational! If any can refute this, let them try!"
"......"
Textbook math-dropout mentality.
The kind of fool who believes that abandoning mathematics will magically skyrocket every other grade.
The problem was that there was no way to refute it.
His head was already stuffed to the brim with the conviction that he was right, rational, and logical—no doubt nothing I said would penetrate that skull.
No helping it, then.
I'd just have to resort to something a little underhanded.
"Your Highness. I have a proposal for you."
"Do not pester me. I told you plainly—no mathematics."
The Prince turned his back on me and began swinging his wooden sword at empty air.
My teeth were grinding audibly, but I barely managed to swallow my anger.
He was still a child—and an imperial one at that.
Losing my temper was absolutely not an option.
"I will administer an examination every week. Composed entirely of problems that can only be solved by attentively attending the weekly lessons. And if you score a perfect mark on that examination even once......"
"Bah! I told you I don't care!"
"......I will arrange a private audience for you with His Excellency, Marquis Dragonia."
"What did you say?!"
The Prince's eyes went round as saucers.
He hastily twisted his face to hide his expression, but I didn't miss that split-second flicker of temptation.
So the Prince really did idolize Marquis Dragonia.
No—"idolize" was putting it mildly.
Calling him a rabid fanboy wouldn't have been far off the mark.
I'd heard from the Prince's servant that the boy trained with his sword day in and day out, even skipping meals for it.
No one was teaching him. He wasn't sparring with friends his own age. He simply swung his sword alone, in silence...
For a boy to be that obsessed with the sword in an environment that made it so hard to take an interest in—that could only mean he had a role model.
And my conclusion was that the role model was Marquis Dragonia.
I'd figured it out the last time I visited with the Marquis, when the boy had clung to him so tenaciously, whining to be taken to the borderlands.
"I may even provide swordsmanship instruction as well."
"D-don't lie to me! You claim you can bend the Marquis to your will?!"
"His Excellency owes me a debt, and is therefore obligated to grant me one favor. Well, Your Highness? Do you accept the proposal?"
A complete fabrication.
The Marquis owed me no such obligation.
But since I intended to make sure the boy never scored a perfect mark, the lie would never come to light.
All I wanted was for the Prince to study hard. That was satisfaction enough for me.
"I accept......"
"Excellent. Then shall we head straight back to the classroom?"
"You'd make me, with so little time left?"
"Plenty of time for a simple placement test."
"Ghhah......"
The Prince dragged his wooden sword along the floor as he trailed after me.
I honestly hadn't expected it to work, but somehow the persuasion had succeeded.
A fanboy devoted enough to study the math he despised, all for a fan meeting with the Marquis.
Just what on earth was so great about that man...
I truly could not comprehend it.
"A private audience with Schwarz! How marvelous! No matter how many times I summon that man, he never so much as blinks—a most ill-mannered wretch, he is."
"Why do you want to meet His Excellency so badly?"
"He is an expert on monsters. He has faced countless monsters, so he knows their weaknesses, how to kill them—everything. Were he to write it all into a book, it would sell like wildfire, but the fool apparently can't be bothered. So I have no choice but to learn directly, do I not? If I befriend the man and absorb his knowledge of monsters, the number of people dying to them each year might well be reduced."
"......"
My mouth pressed shut of its own accord.
Here I'd thought he was nothing but an ill-mannered, flighty little brat.
He had a surprisingly admirable side to him.
If anything, he even looked a little... cute, like this.
"The lessons won't be all that hard. If you simply focus, Your Highness, one session a week will surely be...... Oh."
Flip.
As I fiddled with my pendant, my finger slipped and pressed the clasp. The lid popped open and the picture inside tumbled to the floor.
The Prince bent down and picked it up.
And then, gazing down at the picture, a bright smile spread across the Prince's lips.
"Who is this precious little miss? How lovely! Bring her to the palace next time! I simply must meet her!"
"You rude little brat, how dare you lay your eyes on someone else's precious daughter——"
"What was that you just muttered?"
"Nothing at all......"
In that instant, I couldn't stop my expression from hardening into stone.
Anger flared up in me, sudden and hot.
Yep. He was a rude little brat, through and through.