Alvin (2)

Upon returning to the headquarters of the Goran Knight Order, Alvin ordered an investigation into the trona deposits and the proprietress of Elm Tree Manor.

He felt bad about investigating a woman who clearly wanted to conceal her identity, but he had to make certain she wasn’t a spy working for the central nobles.

The sales contract kept at Fus Town Hall revealed that the innkeeper’s name was Lydia Venesca, and from there, it didn’t take long to establish her identity.

Just as Alvin had suspected, Lydia had formerly been a female knight serving in Maruam Central, the Royal Palace Knight Order in the capital. She had been an exceptionally talented knight, reputed to be among the very best in the kingdom when it came to magical ability.

Alvin knew her name, at least.

However, he had never seen her face. Royal palace magic knights and mages wore masks in public to prevent their identities from becoming known.

And yet…

Alvin studied the report thoughtfully.

“Why is she here?”

She was twenty-seven. Hardly old enough to retire. Besides, with such an impressive record, she could surely have found employment in the royal capital or practically anywhere else, even after leaving the knight order.

So why was she living in a place like that, almost as though she were hiding from the world?

And there was something else…

Alvin could sense only a feeble amount of magical power from Lydia, less than that of an ordinary mage. It would make sense if she were using her formidable abilities as one of the kingdom’s foremost mages to disguise her magical power so thoroughly that even Alvin couldn’t see through it. But his instincts told him otherwise.

The final entry in Lydia’s service record merely stated that she had “resigned from the knight order for personal reasons.”

Sensing that there was more to the story, Alvin ordered a more thorough investigation.

When he read the subsequent report, Alvin frowned.

Apparently, Lydia had suffered a permanently debilitating injury while protecting the Crown Prince.

Lydia had been a royal palace magic knight, not a member of the Royal Guard responsible for protecting the royal family. Nevertheless, it had been Lydia who thwarted the attempt on the Crown Prince’s life.

Pressure had been exerted from somewhere, and the entire incident had been covered up with considerable effort. Not even Lydia’s injury had been mentioned in the official records. Alvin found himself disliking the people in the royal capital even more.

Alvin was working diligently in his office, occasionally nibbling on a cookie.

Lydia had given him two varieties of cookies, one sweet and salty and the other cheese-flavored. They were perfect for snacking on whenever he needed something to keep himself awake.

Having grown quite fond of them, Alvin had been carefully rationing the cookies Lydia had given him, eating them a little at a time. However, after ten days, his supply had finally run out.

He had asked his head chef to make him some identical cookies, but the resulting batch somehow tasted rather bland compared to Lydia’s.

“…Perhaps I should visit again.”

Alvin hastily invented an excuse about going to thank her for the baking soda information and headed back to Elm Tree Manor.

When Lydia asked him to introduce her to a knight from the fortress, Alvin found himself feeling displeased, even though he had been the one to offer in the first place. The very thought of introducing her to another man—and of her potentially falling in love with that man—was unbearable.

It was at that moment that Alvin realized he had fallen in love with Lydia.

He was in love with her.

He had originally planned to stay a little longer, but after receiving the banshee’s prophecy about an impending epidemic, Alvin and his companions had to return immediately to the Goran Knight Order’s headquarters to prepare countermeasures.

Once the necessary preparations were completed, Dennis would head to the fortress. Alvin absolutely couldn’t afford to contract the epidemic himself, so he and Dennis would be operating separately for a while.

As they rode their horses, Dennis struck up a conversation with Alvin.

“Lord Alvin, I hear Lady Lydia is the daughter of a baron.”

Dennis had realized that Alvin was in love even before Alvin himself had noticed.

Alvin was notorious for his dislike of women, yet he actively went out of his way to strike up conversations with Lydia.

Dennis had never seen him behave that way in all the years they had known each other, and he had watched their conversations while silently hoping things would work out between them.

Respecting Lydia’s wishes, Alvin had disclosed her identity to only a handful of his closest aides. Dennis was one of the few people who had read the report.

Lydia was the daughter of a provincial baron. Although it was difficult to say that her social standing matched Alvin’s, the difference in their ranks wasn’t so great that marriage would be impossible.

More importantly, Lydia was an exceptionally talented former magic knight. Dennis hoped that the two of them could use her knowledge and experience to help develop Goran’s territory together.

“I believe Lady Lydia would be perfectly capable of fulfilling the duties of your wife, Lord Alvin.”

Although he had known her for only a short time, Dennis was confident in his assessment.

Alvin was twenty-seven years old. Having inherited his father’s position at a young age, he had put marriage on the back burner. But as his subordinate, Dennis sincerely wished he would finally settle down.

Alvin, however, let out a melancholy sigh.

“Lady Lydia… I don’t believe she would want to marry me.”

“What? Why not?”

Alvin possessed status, wealth, and considerable ability, not to mention his handsome appearance. Surely there wasn’t a woman in all of Goran who would turn down a marriage proposal from him.

Dennis looked at Alvin in surprise, but Alvin merely furrowed his brow more deeply as he answered.

“When you get right down to it, all I have to offer is money and status. And she abandoned both of those things to come here.”

“Ah…”

Dennis understood.

Magic knights held a higher position than ordinary knights, and although their rank wasn’t hereditary, they were considered equivalent to barons. As long as Lydia remained a magic knight, she was a noblewoman in her own right.

Although her injury had forced her to leave the knight order—or rather, precisely because the circumstances surrounding her injury couldn’t be made public—she should have been able to obtain whatever she desired, whether money or a noble title, if she had played her cards right.

According to the report, Lydia had enrolled in the capital’s school for aspiring mages at the age of six and now appeared to have little contact with her family, whose estate had since been inherited by her elder brother. Even so, she could probably have used her family connections to arrange a reasonably advantageous marriage as a nobleman’s daughter. Alternatively, she could have lived comfortably on her family’s estate without wanting for anything.

But Lydia had chosen none of those options.

“If she has no interest in money or status, then I’m nothing more than a busy manual laborer.”

“Ah…”

Dennis thought that was a rather questionable way of putting it, but since it wasn’t entirely untrue, he couldn’t bring himself to disagree.

As far as Alvin could tell, Lydia didn’t dislike him. However, she wasn’t interested in him as a man, either.

At first, Alvin had found it refreshing to be on the receiving end of Lydia’s gaze, which contained not the slightest hint of romantic affection. Now, however, he was desperate to capture her interest.

Alvin smiled wryly at his own contradictory feelings.

He had always hated women approaching him for his family background and wealth, yet he couldn’t think of a single attractive quality he possessed apart from those things. He was confident in his abilities as a magic knight, but Lydia was wary of Alvin precisely because he was a knight.

He didn’t consider himself particularly unintelligent, and he thought his appearance was reasonably good. But to Lydia, who was accustomed to seeing refined young noblemen, Alvin, with his rural upbringing, probably looked like nothing more than a rough country brute.

“I doubt she has any intention of returning to public life. For a retired knight, the life she’s living now is practically ideal.”

“…Is it?”

“It is. When I retire, I’d quite like to spend my days working as a lumberjack myself.”

Alvin declared this with an utterly serious expression.

“Well… A lumberjack, you say?”

Dennis tried to imagine it for a moment. The troubling thing was that he could actually picture Alvin doing the job rather well.

“So, are you going to give up on Lady Lydia?”

“No.”

Alvin shook his head in response to Dennis’s question.

“I have no intention of giving up. But if I reveal my status and propose to her now, she’ll undoubtedly reject me. I’ll tell her how I feel once I’ve earned her trust as a good friend. Besides…”

As Alvin murmured those words, his eyes narrowed, glaring into empty space as though he were preparing to confront an invisible but formidable enemy.

“Right now, we need to contain this epidemic.”