Chapter 12

There is a vast difference between the way of the knight in foreign lands and in our kingdom.

Normally, being a knight involves great danger, placing them at the bottom of the peerage or at the level of quasi-nobility; consequently, those from noble lineages rarely become knights.

However, perhaps because our kingdom is an island nation far from the mainland, we do not engage in wars with other countries or face foreign enemies that result in casualties. For that reason, the percentage of nobles among this country’s knights is—surprisingly, from an international perspective—extremely high. If anything, the situation where commoner-born knights are concentrated in only one of the five Orders is the true anomaly.

A knight is not merely a social status, but a symbol of a brave warrior. In a sense, it is a “prestige” that transcends rank.

In stories, star-crossed romances between knights and princesses are common, and in our kingdom, there have actually been several precedents.

Thus, in this country, it is by no means rare for those carrying royal blood to belong to a Knight Order.

“This year’s Top Knight was Varna-kun again, wasn’t it?”

“Hey now, are those words really coming from someone who technically belongs to the ‘Holy Vessel Knights’? You truly do love that knight, Astraea.”

“Of course. He is a man I have recognized as a friend, after all. If anything, I’d be troubled if he didn’t create a few legends.”

Prince Ixion, the First Prince, gave a wry smile at the triumphant face of the man permitted to sit in the royal box despite being a Kingdom Knight—the Second Prince, Astraea.

Since entering the military academy, Astraea had gained two irreplaceable best friends.

Before becoming a knight himself, he had spoken of those friends whenever he had a spare moment. His expectations for Knight Varna, whom his younger brother believed without a shadow of a doubt to be the strongest swordsman, were excessively high.

“In any case, the one who decides the Top Knight is Father—sigh… Well, looking at the content of that match, it’s obvious to anyone who the strongest is. What do you think, Father?”

“If I were to choose anyone other than Knight Varna as the best after that, my vassals would suspect I’ve gone senile. This year’s Top Knight is decided as Varna-kun, then?”

“Heh, there was no need to even decide; Varna is the strongest in swordsmanship.”

“Oh my, look at this boy…”

Queen Mevina smiled as she watched Astraea boast as if he were talking about his own achievements. Astraea, who had once been rebellious toward his surroundings in an environment where royal freedom was not permitted, had completely changed his demeanor after making two friends. His prickly hostility had vanished, and their conversations, which used to be strained, were now this peaceful.

While she didn’t lack regret over not being able to change Astraea through her own power, Mevina, who had spoken directly with the two knights who made a vow with her son, was satisfied with the current situation.

Those two certainly possessed a warmth and a spark that their royal family lacked.

‘Unprecedented feats give rise to an unprecedented era. I wonder how the whirlwind known as Knight Varna will change the future of the kingdom?)’

The moment that change would appear before Varna was—still a little further in the story.

The day after the Imperial Matches, I officially received congratulations and rewards from King Ivalto VI at the royal palace, and just like last year, I was granted a generous amount of leave.

Naturally, when it came to a vacation in the Royal Capital, it was only right for the three of us friends to gather again.

I stripped off the annoying armor I’d dragged out just for the ceremony and fixed my appearance to the minimum standard for a knight. I put on the bothersome ribbons that increased every time I became the Top Knight and the sword I never failed to maintain, then tossed some small items like my wallet into a belt pouch. After that, I headed to the royal palace terrace I’d visited a few times before, where my two old friends were waiting.

Two best friends I had met by a miracle and grown close to.

Even if our workplaces were far apart, it made me happy to be able to reunite like this whenever the opportunity arose.

I had already seen Sedona, one half of my best friends, but I hadn’t had time to see the other one yet. That man—Second Prince Astraea—let out a laugh from his throat the moment he saw my face, as if he couldn’t hold it back.

“Yo. Still laughing as much as ever, Astraea-kun.”

“Pffft… Hahaha! Honestly, you… no matter how much you wanted to go wild, shouting ‘Next!’ like that! I still laugh every time I remember yesterday!”

He was as rude as ever, laughing the moment he saw someone’s face.

Muttering that to myself, I took a seat at the tea table on the terrace.

Immediately, a maid appeared at my side and offered me freshly poured tea. As expected of the royal family, they used tea leaves with a fragrance so good that even someone as unrefined as me could tell the quality.

However, what we were about to engage in was not an elegant afternoon governed by etiquette, but a simple chat.

“By saying that, the Holy Boot Knights’ reputation was flattened like pizza dough, you know?”

“Shut up! I didn’t mean it! It was just a slip of the tongue!!”

“Hahaha… Oops, excuse me. A bit late, but it’s been a while, Varna-kun! I don’t even need to ask to see you’re in good health!”

Sedona greeted me next with a slight nod, and I returned it.

Astraea, who hated acting like a prince, was the type of person who said whatever he wanted in private. He usually acted like a “good boy,” but the politeness he showed me seemed to be the bare minimum. Well, I knew that’s just how he was, and it would feel gross if he started being formal now, so I let it slide.

He was the polar opposite of Sedona, who was polite twenty-four hours a day, except when romance was involved.

“But really, Varna-kun, that was quite the slip of the tongue… And smashing through a secret technique with your own secret technique for a head-on one-hit win? You were totally trying to crush his pride, weren’t you?”

“I told you, don’t say that! I just unconsciously launched the optimal attack and it happened to be the ‘Twelfth Form’!!”

“You perfectly executed the ‘Twelfth Form: The Eight-Span Crow’—which some people live their whole lives without ever mastering—unconsciously? You just let a statement fly that would make enemies of ninety percent of the kingdom’s swordsmen…”

“I mean, that secret technique is totally nonsensical anyway, isn’t it? The instruction manual just says ‘the ultimate strike.’ What’s up with that? Isn’t the explanation way too vague?”

“Apparently, it’s a ‘watch and learn’ kind of thing, but honestly, the clash between Varna-kun and the ‘Sword God’ was over so fast I have no idea what happened… It wasn’t useful as a reference at all.”

“It’s true that the technique is unfriendly. Honestly, I don’t even know when to use it… According to what the instructor told me later, there’s no set way to learn it. They just said ‘find the answer within yourself’.”

“That’s a total garbage quest.”

“It’s just unreasonable, isn’t it?”

There was a saying that when three women gather, it gets noisy, but when these three gathered, there was a high probability that the conversation would turn to swords. It could be said that this was proof of just how much time they had spent training together.

Even so, that final secret technique was so nonsensical that it wasn’t surprising to hear the two knights grumbling their dissatisfaction.

To use that technique, one had to reach a state of selflessness, making it a strangely conceptual skill that the user couldn’t even explain in detail. Mastery was basically achieved through watching and mimicking, but even now, having attained full mastery, I wasn’t entirely certain if the “Twelfth Form” I used was truly the official version.

As of now, I was the only one of our generation who had completely mastered the “Twelfth Form,” the ultimate secret technique.

To be specific, even Astraea, who graduated from the military academy ranked second in swordsmanship, had yet to master three of the secret techniques, including the ultimate one. As for Sedona, her swordsmanship was lackluster; she had been a regular contender for the bottom rank in swordsmanship grades back at the academy.

“Speaking of which, Sedona-chan. How is your swordsmanship doing? Have you improved since then?”

“Not at all.”

‘She said it with such a straight face…’

Sedona suddenly began munching on cookies as if to say the topic wasn’t interesting at all, causing Astraea and me to exchange looks and shrug. To be honest, it was a result we’d more or less expected.

There was a legitimate reason why Sedona’s swordsmanship didn’t improve. It wasn’t a lack of innate talent; the problem lay in her environment.

Knights, by nature, do not compromise when it comes to swordsmanship. They grow by striking and being struck down repeatedly.

However, just how many knights in this country would actually feel like truly striking down Sedona—a good-natured, beautiful woman from a high-ranking family?

While female knights were few, a certain number did exist; in my year, there were five, including Sedona. The other four always trained together, and since they were an even number, Sedona was inevitably the odd one out, forced to engage in mock battles and training with men. Noblemen could engage in fierce combat against members of the same sex, but when facing a woman, they instinctively resisted attacking and couldn’t move effectively.

And what about the commoners? They couldn’t go all out either, paralyzed by the fear that if they accidentally even scratched a lady from a prestigious family, they might be socially erased.

And so, she had spent her time in the most fruitless swordsmanship training, engaging in mock battles against men where she barely even had a sword swung at her.

…By the way, the absolute worst man who had mercilessly brought a wooden sword down on the crown of her head during those stagnant days, giving her a massive bump, was me. I had drawn immense disapproval from those around us, but Sedona herself was endlessly positive about sword training, so I had simply treated her with sincerity. I did hold back, after all.

“So the ‘Princess Treatment’ hasn’t changed even after joining the knights. You have it rough, too.”

“That’s because Varna-kun is the only one who teaches me swordsmanship properly. Astraea-kun is great at teaching academics, but his swordsmanship movements are completely different from the textbooks.”

“Urgh… You say that, but I’ve been learning Royal Palace Guard Swordsmanship since I was a child, not the standard knight’s style, so of course the movements are different…”

“It can’t be helped, right? Sigh… In the end, Varna-kun is the only one who taught me the sword seriously until the very end. Varna-kun is the only one who understands me… If Varna-kun were in my Order, I’d have his sword style hammered into me every single day until I was soaked in it…”

“Hey, this woman is starting to say some dangerous things!?”

“True to her nickname, ‘The Unscathed Holy Shield,’ she seems to be even more overprotectively guarded than she was at the academy.”

Muttering “Varna-kun is, Varna-kun did, Varna-kun’s…” over and over like a curse, my friend looked like a ghost crawling across the ground. I had thought she wouldn’t be coddled once she joined the knights, but she apparently possessed a “talent for being spoiled by others.”

While that can be a strong leadership trait depending on how it’s used, she truly wanted to learn more swordsmanship as a knight. In reality, her physical strength aside, her level of skill wasn’t low by any means. Her poor grades were simply a matter of insufficient training experience and the limited number of secret techniques she had learned. If she trained, she should be able to learn a bit more and gain actual strength.

“It can’t be helped… there’s a small training ground behind the royal palace. I feel bad for Varna-kun since he had a match yesterday, but why don’t the three of us do some sword training for the first time in a while?”

“Really?! I’m so happy!! You’ll both teach me at the same time, right?!”

“Yeah, well… I didn’t get to go wild enough yesterday, so I’ll join you for some exercise.”

Her earlier depression vanished instantly; Sedona snapped her head up with a beaming smile. While Astraea was bad at teaching movements, his critiques were actually quite accurate, giving him the mysterious quality of being useless alone but shining when working with two or more people.

“This is guidance from me, the future Commander of the ‘Holy Vessel Knights,’ and Varna-kun, who is already a legend. We’ll be in trouble if you don’t get stronger, alright? Future Commander of the ‘Holy Shield Knights’?”

“I’ll do it! Mastering a new secret technique in a single day isn’t impossible! Because it’s the three of us!!”

“Good grief, I suppose I’ll give guidance worthy of this ‘legend’ title I’ve unintentionally acquired…”

This kind of inexplicable excitement was a common occurrence back in our school days.

These guys hadn’t changed.

A part of me felt glad to know that they remained the same. Perhaps that was a rare kind of happiness.

After the three of us finished our tea simultaneously, we stood up and headed toward the training ground, making a ruckus.

Incidentally, Sedona, whose motivation went into overdrive and left her incredibly excited, actually did master a new secret technique that very day.

…That part was fine, but her adrenaline levels were so high that she made us stay for training until dawn. Where does that stamina come from? Tell me for the sake of my future studies; it might be useful as emergency doping.

“More, more, more!! My limit isn’t something like—”

“That’s quite enough… ALREADY!!”

“Eh? —Fugyah!?”

Having been dragged along all through the night, I finally lost my patience and knocked her out with an angry, direct-hit sword strike to the crown of her head.

My body was finally reaching its limit; I wobbled unsteadily while holding the unconscious Sedona so she wouldn’t fall.

It wasn’t my fault that I stepped on Astraea, who had been fast asleep on the ground by the time dawn broke.

After Astraea let out a very un-royal-like “Gueh!” sound, I gently placed Sedona—who now had an extra-large bump on her head—down beside him and sat down myself.

I hung my head as I remembered that during our student days, there were quite a few days that ended in this kind of idiocy. It was good that they hadn’t changed, but they hadn’t changed too much. Unable to bear the absurdity of always feeling like I’d drawn the short straw, I couldn’t help but shout.

“My… friends… are all such IDIOTS, DAMMIT!!”

The only thing that comforted me as I nearly succumbed to sleepiness was the morning sunlight, which stung my eyes.

Man, I don’t know why, but right now I really wish Nonoka-san would praise me and say, “You did great♪”

Even so, including all of that, they were still my friends; I couldn’t just leave them there, so I carried them both back into the royal palace.