Chapter 1. Kale Russel Wants to Become a Dragon Knight
What year, month, or day it was by the kingdom’s calendar, what the political situation surrounding this region looked like — what did any of that matter? All Kale Russel needed to know was that the sky was clear and cloudless, brimming with peace, making it a fine day to accomplish something great. Everything else was entirely beside the point.
“Alright, one-two. Kale Russel can do this!”
He slapped both cheeks to fill himself with positivity and sharpen his mind, then shouted it like a battle cry. His eager voice was quickly swallowed by the noise of the crowd swarming the plaza. It was a resolve that dissolved into nothing before reaching anyone’s ears — but the one who had shouted it didn’t mind at all. He knew he wasn’t the only one steeling himself to make a dream come true.
“Wow. It’s just as packed as last year— agh!”
In the brief moment he’d glanced away, someone passing by clipped his shoulder, and Kale stumbled, barely managing to catch his balance on one foot. There were so many people — as thick as a school of fish — that he couldn’t even call out to blame whoever had bumped into him. After being jostled around for quite a while, swept up in the crowd surging toward the center of the plaza, Kale finally managed to escape to somewhere safe.
God, look at all these people. I nearly suffocated to death.
Scratching his head and tousling his red hair — sun-faded toward the ends — Kale rolled his wide eyes and tried to roughly estimate the number of people. Everywhere his gaze landed, there were clusters of people talking loudly and animatedly. Last year there had been over a thousand applicants alone, so this year would probably be about the same.
And that was exactly it. Every person gathered in Carter Village’s plaza — Kale included — had come from all corners of the kingdom, hoping to sit the Dragon Knight Order’s entrance exam, held only once a year, and become Dragon Knights. You could call them this year’s apprentice Dragon Knight candidates.
The Charlemayna Kingdom. Carter Village in the Draconia region at the far western edge, where countless competing interests were tangled together. Accessible only by passing through a rugged gorge, this place was home to the kingdom’s one and only Dragon Knight Order. The village where Kale had settled a year ago in pursuit of the Dragon Knights might as well have been built solely for the convenience of Dragon Knight life.
The Dragon Knight garrison, closely connected to the village, claimed a vast swath of land on the outskirts, backed up against a mountain. From what Kale had heard, that wide plot of land wasn’t filled with dragons to match its size. The kingdom didn’t keep many dragons — which meant the Dragon Knight Order, with its equally small number of knights, had somehow still managed to develop an entire village around itself.
That was because the people who handled the administrative work needed to run the Order were also counted as Dragon Knights. Beyond that, there was a royal law requiring those in charge of miscellaneous duties — cooking, cleaning, and the like — along with their families, to live on the grounds as well. Draconia was also technically crown territory, meaning taxes were lower than in other domains, so those with nowhere else to go often drifted in.
There were even people who raked in money by running businesses targeting outside applicants during exam season, living off those earnings for the rest of the year. Even so, this land was not a particularly good place for ordinary people to live. The Dragon Knights patrolled regularly, so security wasn’t bad, but the area bordered the Black Lands, and the danger of monsters invading was an ever-present threat lurking beneath the surface.
The soil was infertile too — crops were planted but yields were poor, so most grain had to be imported from outside. Thanks to the Dragon Knight Order managing the village and selling surplus food at low prices, many people barely scraped by. In any case, setting aside the various circumstances Kale wasn’t aware of, days like today — when the plaza of Carter Village filled to the brim — were rare outside of special occasions like this one.
That person came back again this year. I really need to pass this time.
The truth was, today wasn’t Kale’s first attempt at the Dragon Knight Order’s entrance exam. Last year, at nineteen, he had come of age and left the orphanage, then rushed here without any plan and sat the exam completely unprepared.
The fact that he was here now said it all. He had not become a Dragon Knight. Having just left the orphanage, still ignorant of how the world worked, Kale had suffered a crushing defeat in last year’s exam.
A year had passed since then. Back then he had fallen apart after stumbling through things and coming face to face with the gap in skill between himself and everyone else — but Kale had spent this past year working relentlessly hard. He had trained in whatever spare moments he could find, drawing on the hard-won lessons he’d learned firsthand that time, and he firmly resolved that this time would be different. But almost immediately, as if to shatter that resolve, a powerful force rammed into Kale’s stomach.
“Oof!”
“Watch where you’re going, would you!”
“You’re the one who bumped into me — you should be watching where you walk!”
Rubbing his stomach where the hard luggage had hit him dead-on, Kale grumbled to himself. Maybe because his small frame made him look like an easy target, Kale often got shoved around for no reason when walking down the street. He twisted out of the way of yet another person bearing down on him. Everyone’s nerves seemed razor-sharp, judging by the ugly looks on their faces.
Outside visitors had been pouring in for several days ahead of the entrance exam, and the low-end inn where Kale worked had filled up with guests too. So he’d expected as much — but even so, there were just too many applicants.
There was a specific reason why Dragon Knights — who had to hole up in this harsh, expensive land and face all manner of dangers — were so wildly popular. To become a knight of any other order under the Charlemayna royal family, noble blood of some kind was required, no matter what. But Dragon Knights alone — who fought monsters and conquered the Black Lands — could be applied for by anyone, regardless of social standing.
That was due to a reason that will be explained later, but in any case, for Kale, whose dream was to become a Dragon Knight, this entrance exam was his one and only chance — and that hadn’t changed.
The unfortunate part, however, was that it wasn’t only his chance. For anyone without a distinguished background, Dragon Knights were the most revered path to advancement, and that was true for everyone here equally.
Dragon Knights who could tame powerful dragons and had mastered the knowledge needed to conquer the Black Lands were invaluable assets to the kingdom. As the only military force holding back the advance of monsters from the west, it was widely known that they received support in the form of bribes from all manner of nobles. The rumor that their salaries were so staggering they put lesser nobles to shame had long since been treated as established fact.
Receiving a knighthood title — limited to one’s own generation, but a knighthood nonetheless — was an honor worthy of risking one’s life for among commoners. Most applicants didn’t even fully understand what a Dragon Knight was, but were drawn in by the attractive conditions and desperate to squeeze through the eye of a needle by any means possible. With every capable person in the country seemingly showing up, the competition was inevitably fierce.
Of all the applicants packed into the plaza, the number who would become apprentice Dragon Knights was around twenty, based on last year’s figures. Was it even remotely realistic to make that cut? Letting himself face reality for a moment, Kale’s confidence evaporated in an instant.
“Hah. Get it together.”
Just as his heart began to sink into a deep swamp, Kale refilled it with his signature strength — optimism. He’d even taken a day off work at the inn he was indebted to, just so he could sit this exam. Normally he was always getting scolded for not doing anything properly, but today of all days, he had to get it right. If you don’t try, you can’t succeed. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. One of Kale’s personal creeds.
Even if all Kale had going for him was a loud voice and an energetic smile, it wasn’t as though he was going into the entrance exam with absolutely nothing to rely on. There was one area where he held a slight edge over others. The one stroke of luck in Kale’s otherwise unlucky life — magic power. To become a Dragon Knight, one had to be born with magic power.
In this world, those who possessed magic power were extremely rare. Most of the people gathered in the plaza had none. The flower shop owner’s son loitering over there, the tavern owner’s daughter standing on the opposite side — neither of them had magic power, yet they were proudly going on about taking the entrance exam.
Even last year, more than half of the applicants had been eliminated in the first hurdle: the magic power measurement test. Even with the steep application fee, this kept happening because so many people thought the same way Kale did — nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Kale didn’t think that was a bad thing. He believed wholeheartedly that instilling hope and courage in people who were struggling was one of the virtues of a Dragon Knight. The spirit of challenging something even when you know the odds are against you was likewise an example for knights to follow. So by Kale’s standards, everyone gathered here already possessed the basic qualities needed to become a Dragon Knight.
When it came to magic power, though, Kale himself couldn’t just brush past the issue. Yes, he had magic power — but in the sense that he wasn’t without it, not that he truly had it in any meaningful way. Compared to someone who genuinely wielded magic power, his might as well not exist. According to last year’s magic measurement results, he technically met the condition of having magic power, but there was a strong possibility that his pitifully small amount would drag down his overall score.
Maybe this really is just a waste of money. I should’ve used it to…
Kale fidgeted with the coin pouch hidden in his chest pocket. In his life, things had never gone the way he wanted them to. And of course, this time would probably be no different. Kale shook his head to fling the anxious thought away. Even so, he couldn’t give up without trying. He recalled a promise he had made with a childhood friend long ago.
Well, I have to get inside the Dragon Knight Order somehow — that’s the only way I’ll be able to confirm whether that person is who I think they are.
Kale had a childhood friend who had grown up with him in the same orphanage, and about ten years ago, they had been adopted by some noble family. Every now and then, as Kale wandered around Carter Village, that familiar name would slip out of a Dragon Knight’s mouth. He didn’t know whether it was the same person, but imagining that his precious, sweet friend — one year younger than him, someone he shared so many cherished memories with — had achieved their dream made Kale feel both proud and restless.
I wonder if they’re doing well. It’s been years since I’ve seen their face. They haven’t eaten so well and lived so comfortably that they’ve already forgotten me, have they? Nah. If they really became a Dragon Knight, that means they still remember the promise we made!
Kale wanted to see that dear childhood friend of his. To confirm they had truly become a Dragon Knight, to know they had been healthy and well all this time, to meet in person and catch up on everything they’d missed. Last year they hadn’t appeared at the entrance exam site — maybe they’d been busy with something. The area accessible to applicants was limited, of course, but he prayed that the outcome wasn’t simply that it had been someone with a similar name.
