Chatper 28: Post-match information gathering
The Dunkelfelger dormitory became quite lively when the knights and the archducal retainers returned from the practice match with Ehrenfest. Whether the players or the observers, everyone had something to say as a lot had happened during what had supposed to be just a regular mock battle.
While all of them were in high spirits, Lestilaut, who had arrived as well, was filled with frustration. And the barrage of eager voices was making it that much worse.
“Why didn’t Ehrenfest inform us that our offer of practice sounded like bullying to their noble?” he complained once they gathered in the common room. “The fault is completely on their part.”
His stern words managed to freeze five people in their place. The five knights who had initially arranged for the event gave each other uncertain looks.
“Lord Lestilaut, in hindsight, they might have voiced their surprise that we wanted to practice with a shrine maiden and also mentioned possible harassment, which we considered a misunderstanding at the time,” one of the knights uttered tensely.
“And you are telling me that now?” Lestilaut glared at him.
He could finally make sense of their restraint when arranging the match. The five offenders had actually supported his orders that were intended to avoid escalating the event into a big and costly headache. I should have known; it was way too easy to rein them in.
“We thought that we had managed to clear things out, and when we offered to help with future practice, their representatives seemed quite enthusiastic about the idea,” a second knight added.
“You fools, their previous remarks should have been enough hint for you to take caution. Ehrenfest is a middling duchy, and they currently lack an archduke candidate in their dormitory. Do you expect them to just outright refuse you when you push them on the topic? Mind your status!”
Lestilaut’s intensity quietened down the whole room. Even the students who hadn’t been present at the event at all stopped their own conversations.
“We didn’t push them.” The five knights shrugged.
Their response irritated Lestilaut even more. “You make us look like a bunch of abusers,” he grumbled before turning to the dormitory supervisor. “Rauffen, how could you let such harmful treatment happen during the spring classes?”
“Lord Lestilaut, I don’t oversee the spring classes. There is no way a Dunkelfelger knight would have ever needed remedial classes.” Rauffen raised his eyebrow.
True. Lestilaut deflated. With their rigorous selection process, there was no way they would ever allow a student to fail a knight class. Such a noble would have been relegated to another course long before their third year—not requiring further attention from their dormitory supervisor.
“Not to mention.” Rauffen crossed his arms. “Injuries are just a part of the knight course. That much is normal; you cannot fault the other professors, either.”
The course was supposed to prepare for real-life combat, so it was hard to argue otherwise. Lestilaut clenched his teeth. He still wanted to argue against such a claim, but at the same time, he needed to be mindful of his position as an archduke candidate. Diminishing the authority of professors in the knight course, especially when many of them came from his own duchy, would have been harmful to the overall order.
“True. I guess they merely did their work.” Lestilaut shrugged with a neutral expression.
Rauffen nodded in approval and refocused on the two knights who had fought Estelle during their separation, far above the raging battlefield. “What is your assessment?”
“We were wary of any new unexpected attacks, so we merely kept pushing her while covering each other,” one of the knights explained. “Our attacks were supposed to tire her out as she was forced to spend mana constantly without respite, but she seemed to have vast reserves.”
Indeed, I sensed her weakly during the introductions. She must have a lot of mana to be within range of an archduke candidate from a greater duchy. Lestilaut was impressed that a mednoble was even able to push that far.
Naturally, he didn’t share such an observation. While she hadn’t matched his level, being in range of a mednoble who had come from the temple could be exploited by others to diminish Lestilaut’s reputation.
“I can see why her family wished to baptize her even at such an old age. They can marry her off to an archnoble family and gain a valuable connection.” He nodded with a disinterested voice.
Aub Ehrenfest seems quite smart to arrange it. Lestilaut couldn’t imagine many archdukes “wasting” their time to accommodate a single mednoble, but in his eyes, Estelle was definitely an asset for Ehrenfest.
Once the other students noticed that the discussion turned back to the battle, their eagerness won over once again. Their voices filled the room.
“We need to figure out a solution for when someone stands behind you on your own highbeast,” One of them declared.
“Just disappear it.” His neighbor smirked at him.
Though, the first one protested, and an argument ensued. After a short exchange, they turned to Lestilaut’s guard knight who had been knocked down in the very beginning of the match.
“I don’t actually remember much.” He smiled awkwardly. “I was trying to stabilize my highbeast when I felt strong heat on my face, and then I just woke up hearing a prayer. It was weird.”
“She actually chanted a prayer?” a student near him uttered in confusion.
“Maybe she thought you had already climbed the stairway,” another one chuckled.
The others also added a few more teasing remarks at the guard knight’s expense.
“What do we know about that other girl? Mila, right?” Rauffen asked with an intrigued voice. “She seemed quite young, barely a second-year.”
However, even with her description, no archnoble student from the first two years was able to recall her. They merely expressed their surprise at the unusual name.
“The name stands out. Is the culture in Ehrenfest more prone to short names?” Lestilaut wondered.
“Ehm, couldn’t she be of lower status?” Elusia, one of the first-year archnobles, wondered.
In her class, there were only two Ehrenfest students. She was certain of that as they had completely dominated all the practical subjects.
“Yes, in our class, there are only Lord Ignaz and Lady Marianne,” Elusia’s classmate Kenntrips added with a discreet sigh.
He had expected to compete with archduke candidates from other duchies, not to be outdone by archnobles from number thirteen.
“The girl publicly admonished her own team for ‘lazing around,‘ even though many of them were archnobles.” Lestilaut shook his head.
Sure, he had witnessed a lot of shouting during combat training. In the heat of the battle, there wasn’t time for etiquette. But no one with lower status would have dared to just shout such remarks as part of the audience, while in the presence of nobles from different duchies.
“Indeed, I overheard some of their conversation, and the apprentice archknights seemed to take her input seriously,” Rauffen mused out loud.
“You could actually hear anything from down there?” Lestilaut widened his eyes.
He himself heard nothing beyond occasional shouting.
Rauffen laughed heartily. “It’s a skill one needs to possess as a teacher of the knight course. How do you expect me to grade coordination if I can’t hear the communication between the fighting students?”
Naturally, he hadn’t been able to overhear it all, especially when the students spoke in a low voice close to each other. But the tidbits that reached his ears had made him quite intrigued. “…Is it worth it to use a trick in a battle for bragging rights when you then can’t use it in a war…” echoed in his head. Rauffen was quite impressed that someone so young could understand such a thing, unlike many young hotheads who just wanted to prove themselves without much thought beyond the match in front of them. It made him want an immediate rematch, just to see her adaptation.
“It is a shame they are low on ingredients.” Rauffen sighed. “I would like to see how she would act against a different tactic.”
Seeing his supervisor’s interest, Lestilaut tried to recall his exchange with Mila. “She looked quite composed.” He frowned. “Are you sure this whole fight wasn’t just a scripted stunt on their part?”
During last year’s Interduchy Tournament, Ehrenfest’s knights ended up close to the bottom. It wouldn’t have been surprising if they had used some underhanded tactic to improve their reputation by seemingly holding their own against the strongest knights in the Academy.
“Quite the opposite, she actually improvised everything.” Rauffen shook his head. “I heard her asking whether she could fight alongside their knights. When they refused her, she displayed proper patience and avoided the main fight, not disrupting their formation. Some of our eager second-years could learn from that restraint before their course starts next year.” He turned towards them.
The group of knights in question averted their eyes, trying to look busy.
Rauffen smirked at them before turning back. “I assume, after the initial scramble, she deduced that our formation was vulnerable to ramming attacks and made the decision on the fly to exploit that. Then, after seeing us adapt, she immediately changed tactics and harassed our team in a different way.”
“That sounds so interesting. It is quite unfair that we were barred from observing,” Clarissa grumbled.
The other students nearby nodded along. As it stood, most of the students in the common room could only rely on the excited conversations of those who had been present.
“We are a greater duchy, are we not?” Rauffen smiled energetically. “You scholars should be gathering all the information you can instead of moping about the lack of it.”
The apprentice scholars straightened their backs. The archnobles among them nodded with the same energetic attitude, ready to bring results.
Though, in the end, it was the mednoble scholars from the first year who had managed to foster a direct connection at their socializing. Once they mentioned it in the common room, they were immediately surrounded and blasted with curious questions.
“Wait, waschen what?”
“She apologized to Klassenberg’s students for their etiquette class.”
“Drewanchel seemed interested as well.”
With so many questioners, it was a bit of a mess.
“So she is a scholar of the sword, interesting,” Kenntrips remarked among the various voices.
All the rumors he had encountered during his investigation made him quite intrigued. Their conflicting nature felt like a complex puzzle to be solved.
“She even promised ingredients to Lady Raziella, for her brewing,” her classmates remarked teasingly.
Raziella pressed her lips into a tense smile.
“I thought Ehrenfest lacks ingredients.” One of the listening scholars frowned.
“Did they overstated their lack of supplies?” another wondered.
By that time, Lestilaut and his guard knights had managed to reach the cluster of students and joined the inquiry as well. “Just because one noble has resources to spare, it doesn’t mean the duchy has.” He scoffed. “If they had actually pretended to lack ingredients, they would have certainly not offered them to a student from Dunkelfelger.”
“Yeah, right.” Everyone seemed to realize how silly such an accusation sounded.
“The question is…” Lestilaut narrowed his eyes at Raziella. “What kind of favor does she expect from you for this kind of bribe?”
Thanks to the work of Dunkelfelger’s scholars, he was already aware that Estelle had been brought to Mila’s household, making the two sisters. The scholars had managed to find out all sorts of information and rumors alike.
The commoner rumors seemed to switch their target randomly between both sisters based on social setting and time, lacking consistency. It seemed unlikely that there was any proper justification beyond mere attacks on their reputation, using the short name or a connection to the temple as a convenient opening.
However, what was confirmed firmly was the bragging of Klassenberg students about their possession of a highly valuable piece of art depicting the practice match between Dunkelfelger and Ehrenfest, gifted to them by Mila.
A mere mednoble couldn’t just gift something so valuable. Lestilaut shook his head lightly. No, a mere mednoble, from a low-ranked duchy, shouldn’t be invited to an archnoble tea party in Klassenberg’s tea party room in the first place. He couldn’t wrap his head around such an occurrence.
There didn’t seem to be any apparent connection between Klassenberg and Ehrenfest.
Lestilaut really wanted to see the art piece, but it was quite tedious to arrange for that. As an archduke candidate, his socializing was based on political considerations, which meant socializing mostly with the other archduke candidates.
The owner of the painting was from an archducal branch family, but still an archnoble in his first year, so there was no previous interaction between him and Lestilaut. It made it hard to reach that Klassenberg student on such short notice. Although, the gap in status and connections was definitely smaller in comparison to a mednoble from a lower-ranked duchy.
Something doesn’t add up.
This recent offer of ingredients to one of their students was consistent with that observation. Mila had been able to negotiate with Lestilaut, an archduke candidate. She had been invited by an archnoble from Klassenberg. Professors from Drewanchel seemed interested in her. And Ehrenfest students always default to the same phrase, “She was baptized under her noble family, and that is all that matters.” Lestilaut frowned. I thought it was because of those commoner rumors. However, Ehrenfest students hadn’t repeated those kinds of phrases when scholars had asked about Estelle. It had caused him to believe that they had been hiding something else.
“Should I refuse the gift?” Raziella asked tensely.
She must have mistaken Lestilaut’s thinking face for scrutiny of her actions, and because of her being a mednoble first-year, it made her quite nervous.
Lestilaut waved his hand dismissively. “I do not concern myself with socializing among mednobles. It is of no consequence for the archducal family.”
Raziella relaxed her stance.
“I was merely curious as the mednoble in question seems highly unusual,” Lestilaut added.
“Definitely.” Raziella nodded. “Especially the way she taught all the attendees from the top-ranked duchies how to cast the cleaning spell.”
“During socializing?” Lestilaut blinked.
He had overheard something about a cleaning spell when approaching the first-years, but this still took him aback.
I mean, it’s the standard spell every knight needs to learn. In Dunkelfelger, they learned it relatively early. With so much physical training, it was kind of necessary. As such, the concept didn’t seem too audacious. But practicing spells during socializing?
“Indeed,” Raziella confirmed.
The other medscholars from the meeting nodded along.
What gives her so much confidence to disregard the social norms? Lestilaut frowned once again.
“During the socializing, she first approached students from Klassenberg,” Raziella continued relaying her perspective.
From her words, one thing seemed pretty obvious to everyone around—Mila clearly must have had some sort of backing to justify her behavior. The reports about Klassenberg had given this assumption more clear contours.
A couple of weeks later, Lestilaut was finally able to observe the painting of their battle. During his socializing in Klassenberg’s tea party room, the art piece was displayed as a part of the decorations, no doubt to ascertain his reaction. He maintained an indifferent expression to not divulge anything to his host.
The color composition is quite beautiful. Lestilaut appreciated the style.
“You are framed right in the middle; you must be important,” one of his guard knights muttered silently.
He was teasing the other guard who had had the ill fortune of being struck down at the beginning of the battle.
The second knight glanced at him for a second, but he couldn’t outright glare as they were in public.
“I wonder who from Ehrenfest has produced this,” he replied instead.
Isn’t that obvious? Lestilaut wanted to scoff at them. There was only one person from Ehrenfest to see that spectacle from such a high altitude.
No matter how indifferent he tried to look, he was overwhelmed with this unusual feeling. He felt a strong kinship with the other artist. To capture such beauty in something so mundane as a battle.
It was hard to maintain his composure.
As he saw it, Dunkelfelger would definitely benefit from such a talent. Then again, he needed to be cautious. Estelle was connected to Mila, and the surroundings around the other sister remained quite hazy.
During Dunkelfelger’s information gathering, the nobles from Klassenberg had claimed they had no connection to her. And yet, she was invited to this very room. Lestilaut refocused. A noble from Klassenberg received such an extravagant gift from her. Am I to believe it was for mere pleasantries? Klassenberg had probed them about any connection between Dunkelfelger and Ehrenfest, which made Lestilaut highly suspicious. If Ehrenfest really isn’t in their area of interest, why do they care about their interaction with us?
Lestilaut had a feeling as if Klassenberg had been hiding something. He didn’t know what, but it must have been some kind of scheme involving the nobles from Ehrenfest. Maybe it had something to do with all that talk about the grades of Ehrenfest’s first-years. Or the reinvigorated discussions about the role of the temple. Or the gag order from the royalty on some kind of occurrence near Klassenberg’s dormitory.
Some of the possibilities contained quite a lot of risk in them. Lestilaut wished to find out, and if necessary, pluck Estelle out of that danger to the safety of his home duchy. She had enough mana to match any of his retainers with ease. Shame, she comes from a mednoble house, otherwise…
Lestilaut shook his head and turned away from the painting.