I needed a countermeasure.
I didn’t necessarily need burn scars to leave the house. Besides, even if I’d decided to live the same way, I didn’t want to experience that terrible pain again.
Why on earth did Rilke do that to me in the past?
“Have you decided which knight will receive your glove?”
“Rilke must have decided already, of course.”
Rilke, who had gained attention because of Stefan, was responding with a slight smile.
What was certain was that going against that child’s mood would be disadvantageous.
Today as well, the four of us—Mikhail, me, Rilke, and Stefan—were eating breakfast together. I aggressively demolished the apple tart that came out for dessert.
“Of course, that child only needs to choose. Joachim, I asked if you’d decided.”
“No.”
The people of the Empire enjoyed and valued hunting events so much that for generations they held the hunting festival larger than even the Founding Festival.
Nobles invited to the hunting grounds had to participate in the hunt in some way, regardless of gender. Either catching prey themselves or designating a knight to compete on their behalf.
“I’m going to resolve it now.”
When I stood up abruptly, Mikhail and Stefan looked at me with surprised eyes, as if to say ‘You?’
My fighting spirit had decreased because of the two of them, but it was something I was going to do anyway. Inwardly encouraging myself, I came out of the main building.
“Young Master Joachim?”
Just then, one countermeasure was walking toward me.
The knights who had been returning while chatting noisily spotted me.
Perhaps it was after morning training, as sweat beaded on their foreheads. I stood before one person mingling among the knights.
“I’d like to talk for a moment. Is that alright?”
The knights exchanged glances with each other.
He’s popular, after the youngest young master, now the second young master too. Such talk could be heard. A knight with a slender build and long black hair, undeniably very handsome to anyone’s eyes, readily nodded his head.
“What can I do for you?”
Leon Lifros.
He was a knight from Iota, Mikhail’s recent pride.
Do well, his fellow knights patted his shoulder and went inside. Sir Lifros merely smiled brightly like a child in response. That person had an originally cheerful expression.
“The hunting festival is coming up soon,”
Standing there, I began with difficulty.
Sir Lifros’s violet eyes blinked.
“I was hoping you would escort Rilke,”
“If you’re requesting my escort,”
“Pardon?”
“Pardon?”
Ah, I belatedly understood his words.
I hurriedly raised both hands. I immediately added so that Sir Lifros wouldn’t feel embarrassed.
“I was hoping someone as excellent as you would escort Rilke, but I can see how you’d misunderstand! It’s excessive for me to step forward like this on my sibling’s behalf!”
Again, I’d been absorbed only in my own thoughts and rushed in from only my own perspective. I was embarrassed. Ugh, what would Sir Lifros and those knights from earlier think?
“Rilke came to see you, right? It seemed like you refused.”
The reason I came to find Sir Lifros was because I knew he had rejected Rilke’s proposal. In the past, he had said,
‘I want to escort the young master during the hunting competition.’
“If it were the young master’s escort, I think I would have accepted.”
He had been my escort.
Sir Lifros, who answered calmly, still had that grinning appearance.
Both in the past and now, I felt somewhat dazed. I couldn’t understand why he would volunteer to escort someone like me.
In any case, Rilke. That child had been very displeased when Sir Lifros, who had rejected his proposal, appeared at the hunting competition as my escort. In the past, I had accepted Sir Lifros’s proposal without knowing anything, but even knowing, I had no desire to walk into a rain of arrows myself.
“Why do you say you’ll be my escort?”
Still, I asked out of curiosity.
“I don’t have a good reputation. It’s awkward to say with my own mouth, but it will tarnish your reputation too, Sir.”
Sir Lifros looked down at me silently while holding back a smile. It seemed like an emotion that was neither goodwill nor malice yet. His pale violet eyes gleamed smoothly like glass marbles.
“It’s a secret.”
The answer was futile.
“Then who will you be with at the hunting competition, young master? You’ll need an excellent hunting dog to shine your glory.”
“A hunting dog. And I don’t need a knight.”
“I spoke too casually. I apologize. Then will you catch prey yourself? There are certainly excellent knights among omegas as well.”
Sir Lifros made an unprejudiced statement. I could if I tried, but I shook my head.
“If you put it that way, Rilke’s hunting skills are probably better than mine.”
That’s a lie. Rilke is on the clumsy side.
“In any case, I won’t be attending.”
“You mean you won’t participate in the competition? It will be considered dishonorable.”
“I have something important to do.”
This is also a lie.
* * *
The day of the hunting competition approached.
“Crazy—”
I could feel the face that had been smiling flatteringly since morning to humor Mikhail stiffen.
“I asked Sir Lifros myself!”
It seemed like my breathing became rough. Mikhail was smiling smugly, not knowing what was in others’ minds.
“You should be grateful to me, you brat! Since rumors spread far and wide that you were rejected by Sir Lifros, I couldn’t just sit still!”
The rumor spread…
The knights who were prostrating behind the knight commander pretended not to know. Setting that aside, I looked at Sir Lifros in frustration. With his long hair neatly tied back, when his eyes met mine, he shrugged his shoulders as if making an excuse.
“I have my own knight.”
My eyes wandered frantically.
I grabbed Stefan, who had been staring blankly somewhere, and pulled him over.
“It’s Stefan.”
“Wha, what! N-no, it’s not!”
Stefan denied it vehemently. Thinking the situation was turning unseemly, Mikhail warned in a low voice not to embarrass him further.
“That’s why you should have just stayed still.”
Stefan, who had gotten into the carriage together, said as if exasperated. My back still burned from being hit when I talked back, saying I’d rather compete myself since I couldn’t give up.
I looked at Stefan sitting across from me with surprise.
“What brings you to ride together?”
“What do you mean.”
“Don’t you want to see Rilke?”
We had divided into carriages with Mikhail and Rilke, and me and Stefan.
Since saving Prince Benedict, Rilke had been visiting the imperial palace occasionally. Every time that child received a golden, shining audience permit, Mikhail didn’t know what to do with himself, wanting to talk with Rilke. Since he had visited yesterday too, the two of them sticking together was the natural course.
What was surprising was Stefan.
“Does your back hurt a lot? Shall I rub it for you?”
Normally he would have said he’d ride with Rilke and been rebuffed, but he had docilely followed me into the carriage.
Moreover, he was clearly just speaking thoughtlessly. His eyes looked vacant.
“—Mm.”
Judging by how Mikhail occasionally teased him, Stefan clearly hadn’t gone bankrupt as much as in the past—in the past, he had gone so seriously bankrupt that even Mikhail couldn’t tease him carelessly. It was clear he’d taken my advice not to go into the great mansion’s basement, but he continued in that state.
“Or what. Don’t you have anything to say? Want me to introduce you to an alpha?”
Even now. It should continue to when-are-you-getting-married, but he immediately became indifferent. I don’t think he was like this even when he squandered three years’ worth of income from his territory.
Throughout the journey, Stefan remained lost in thought looking out the window, or suddenly made anguished sounds that startled me.
Still, what was fortunate was that Rilke didn’t seem as displeased as before.
Perhaps unlike the past, rumors had already spread that I was rejected by Sir Lifros, and he became an escort at Mikhail’s request.
But I was disappointed in the knights. They couldn’t carelessly spread rumors about Rilke being rejected, but they let out my rumors so quickly.
“Count Meyer and his brothers have arrived!”
At the entrance to the garden, the wide clearing connected to the forest was bustling with people.
Dozens of white tents embroidered with traditional patterns were spread out in the middle of the clearing surrounded by oak trees. Dozens of large and small blue flags fluttered in the wind.
Between them, people and horses, beasts and murmurs were all mixed together. Since they had everyone from the subjugation unit’s centurion level and above to soldiers who had distinguished themselves attend, it had to be this way.
A pack of about a dozen hunting dogs passed by, barking while being held by large-bodied soldiers. Eek, Stefan made a sound and stuck close to my side. Perhaps it was fortunate that I didn’t make my cousin my knight.
“There’s no better place than this to spend your last moments with Stefan!”
Finally, Mikhail arrived at his intended destination. Perhaps feeling good, Mikhail smiled with ulterior motives while arbitrarily connecting things. Of course, today was indeed the last day Stefan was staying in the system.
“Aren’t you going? You said you’d run away.”
Stefan, seemingly uninterested, poked my side. He was in favor of anything that would damage my reputation as heir.
“No—”
I turned to look at Stefan, somewhat flustered.
“That person behind His Highness the Prince there. Do you know them?”
Since this wasn’t a charity event, the prince was surrounded by attendants. The wind that crossed the forest disheveled his red wavy hair.
And behind him,
“Are you talking about Sana?”
It was that female knight who had been escorting the prince at the marquis family’s charity event.
Even though she wore the ordinary dress of a knight’s uniform and had her hair tied up carelessly in a ponytail, my gaze went to her like that time.
It was because she was a rare female knight, and because of her sharp eyes honed like a dagger in her pretty face.
Moreover, from what I felt up close at that time.
“She’s a commoner-born magic swordsman.”
She was an omega.
The prince’s close associate, attractive appearance.
A rare magic swordsman, and an omega at that.
Was there such a person in the past?
I couldn’t remember every person who passed by, but it didn’t make sense that I wouldn’t remember someone who stood out so clearly at a glance.
“—so they say her skills are truly outstanding. To receive a knight’s rank as a commoner, a woman at that, says it all. Joachim, are you listening?”
“Yeah. You said she’s from the frontier?”
“I heard. They say she was at the northernmost gateway’s front line. —Hey, what are you doing?”
Stefan looked at me suspiciously, not knowing what was going on. I had hidden behind Mikhail’s back while he was in the middle of talking with Rilke.
“We made eye contact.”
Perhaps I had been staring too intently, as the person called Sana noticed.
The sharp eyes that had been looking back clearly were chilling.
“I’m going over there. See you later.”
“What about Sir Lifros?”
“I clearly refused. And he’ll manage well on his own.”
After asking Stefan for an excuse, I left the clearing.
