Chapter 17: On the First Day of Enrollment, a Status Window Opened (1)
At the end of February, the streets near St. Yansk University filled with crowds.
Because the finest post-war educational institution, founded by the late king’s command, was at last commencing its entrance ceremony. The entrance exam had been held last November, so it had been quite a long wait.
At this moment, with Prichenkaya merchants’ swindles unfolding to fleece the purses of new students arriving from distant foreign lands and their families, and every sort of “traditional pastime” including pickpocketing running rampant—
—new students unable to hide their excitement and happiness even in the harsh cold of an early spring morning, and undergraduates watching them with pitying eyes, filed in past St. Yansk University’s entrance.
“What is that?”
At least, they did so until someone pointed at the sky and made a bewildered sound.
One by one, the number of strange people pointing skyward grew.
And soon, as a long shadow blotted out the morning glow and fell across St. Yansk University’s grounds—
“A ship……?”
“An aerial…… battleship……?”
“Insane!! That, that, that’s the Kalion national crest, isn’t it?!”
The many people gathered before the grounds fell into panic.
“Y-Your Excellency! There’s a Kalion warship over Prichenkaya airspace right now—!”
“Sir, I have eyes as well.”
A silver-haired Minister of the Royal Household tore at her hair and ground her teeth.
“……Didn’t Elphera clearly say she would come by land route via Tiless?”
“That’s…… ahaha! Quite so! And on top of that they even used a concealment veil above the clouds……”
“Yes. The weather has been foul lately. So we failed to determine whether Kalion’s honored guest was coming by land route or crossing our airspace with an armed vessel and all. Reasonable.”
“No, senior. By any common sense, how were we supposed to plant an agent in Kalion! That place is……”
It’s the land of Elves……. How are we supposed to plant…… a person……. We’d be spotted instantly……
As a counterintelligence officer, breaking into a cold sweat, repeatedly muttered I’m screwed when I report to headquarters—
—in such an era, when peace has become a vulgar joke—
—a warship was descending from the sky.
It was early spring.
***
Elizaveta had better not kill the Elves.
Ivan thought this as he walked past the people still caught up in confusion.
What those fellows were thinking was probably obvious.
Now, from where we’re standing, it looks like only the Hero’s Party’s kids have been getting hit by terrorism? How much of a shambles is your border management, that we’d resort to this? Elphera is the treasure of our archipelago, you understand? How could we entrust her to you? From now on we’ll protect our own. Well done. And do cooperate.
It was difficult to refute. Isabelle and Esidis had both been caught in train derailments, and that all of them were unharmed was practically a miracle.
Elizaveta had even received Ivan’s warning in advance. But who would dare provoke Krasilov at a time like this?
Krasilov, in the midst of chaos, where a Princess and a Crown Prince were locked in a ferocious dogfight — thanks to which the nation’s military strength had been preserved nearly intact even after the war. A foreign power would dare?
Not unless they wanted to die.
Elizaveta must be feeling wronged. She wouldn’t have guessed there were actually madmen like that. In any case, this incident would most likely be passed off as a sort of happening. The Elves of Kalion wouldn’t commit a diplomatic breach beyond a “show of force” either.
She’d be heartbroken if I told her terrorism is going to happen at the academy countless times from now on.
Being able to see Iron-Blooded Liza cry again was rather tempting, but he decided to refrain, not wanting to compound insulting a superior.
He had no desire to face Elizaveta in the first place. After all, wasn’t theirs a somewhat awkward relationship?
Hm.
Elizaveta had written letters quite often, and Ivan had cleanly returned every one. The largest reason was that he hadn’t wanted to converse with a superior for private reasons, and the next largest was that he hadn’t wanted to get entangled with royalty.
Had he imagined she’d be commissioned as his superior a few years later, he should have been rather more careful in his conduct. Something to reflect on.
When she first wrote him a letter she had even been fourteen. Who could have predicted she’d take office as an Annihilation Corps officer in a mere 5 years? And in those days he had been in the late king’s Guards Division, no less.
Meaning the instant a scene of him exchanging private words with the Princess caught anyone’s eye, he could have been dragged into a political offensive.
The misunderstanding that the great late king had secretly sent someone to back Elizaveta had to be avoided……
“Huh? Mister?”
“……Hm?”
As he walked lost in thought, a familiar voice suddenly reached him.
Immediately after, someone came running with a patter and tried to smack his shoulder. Ivan twisted lightly aside to dodge and brought a hand to his waist. Nothing was there.
Only then did he recall he’d left his axe in the Director’s Office.
“What is with you, what’s with the killing intent! Can’t even say hello, how’s a person to survive the fright!”
“Tiless’s greeting customs seem to have changed a great deal in the meantime.”
“I clearly saw your hand go to your waist? Is answering a greeting with an axe chop a Krasilov thing? Hm? Is this any way to treat a comrade-in-arms you shared life and death with?”
It was Isabelle. She stepped close to him, beaming, with no attendant in tow.
“Doesn’t look like you’re going to class. Are you an instructor? A professor? Not the Knight Faculty, surely? You haven’t the face to be a knight. Ah, don’t tell me. Let me guess.”
“This didn’t seem to be your temperament originally.”
“You’re the one who told me to live smiling, aren’t you?”
Isabelle smiled brightly.
It was an expression so like her father’s that Ivan found himself smiling back without meaning to.
“I stiiill can’t stand Sir August, and I still find the ones who beam insincerely absolutely dreadful. Hm. Mm-hm, so wouldn’t it just work out if I were insincere too?”
“Admirable.”
Ivan genuinely thought so. This one was fundamentally like an insufficiently socialized puppy.
The type that barks at anyone and bares its teeth at the slightest fright.
She had changed her disposition in a single night, so Ivan appraised himself as having more aptitude as an educator than he’d thought. (For Isabelle, who over that one night had watched some 80 citizens massacred and had to fight a demonfolk to the death to save a dozen survivors, this was a somewhat bewildering appraisal.)
“Anyway! Mister — no. Hm. With your skill, professor? Right? Which faculty? The College of Physical Education. It’s definitely the College of Physical Education. Not the Knight Faculty, so, hmm…… does Yansk University have an assassination curriculum?”
“Consider whether an educational institution teaching such a thing would be of any use to this world.”
“It’s good to learn anything! Except magic. That one really was too hard.”
“It’s a bit of a problem if a Hero can’t use magic.”
“Ahaha, I said I’m in the Knight Faculty!”
Ivan walked along watching the animatedly chattering Isabelle for a good while. As Isabelle prattled on merrily, another crowd of people came walking from a distance.
“My lady!”
“Bleh.”
Isabelle’s expression hardened coldly, then in an instant she managed her face.
With an ahem, she glanced at Ivan, forced her complexion into order, and then took up the exchange brightly.
“Why, young master! Fancy meeting you here!”
“Do speak informally with me, my lady. Please call me Oscar.”
“Yes, next time!”
Oscar.
Ivan’s eyes opened sharply.
A strikingly handsome blond youth, surrounded by a crowd of female students, approached him beaming.
Good heavens. He really is the very image of his father, this one.
Ivan was impressed. Not only the looks, but even that self-satisfied expression was inherited. If there was a difference, perhaps the crowd around him.
Because Gilbert’s history with women had been remarkably clean.
In truth, it hadn’t been easy to meet women anywhere in those days.
The only women in the party were the Saintess and the Thief, and Patricia had been a kid barely fifteen while Enrique was a vampire past a hundred.
“Hm. A pleasure to meet you. I am Oscar de Sathion of Tiless. And you are?”
“Ivan Petrovich.”
“Forgive me, but what is your relation to my lady……? Ah, my apologies. You may not be aware, but my lady is a state guest of our nation, so I’m afraid I must commit some rudeness.”
Seeing a plainly suspicious bearded oddity walking alongside the Hero’s daughter, anyone would inevitably think this way.
Ivan wouldn’t agree with the appraisal, but from Oscar’s standpoint it held. This man is suspicious. All the more so recalling the time Isabelle suffered the train attack.
Oscar had departed 3 days after Isabelle. Because Isabelle had refused to travel with him even if it killed her.
And when word of Isabelle’s accident reached Tiless—
[Advance! To Prichenkaya!] [Let us tear the paws off the Krasilov brown bears!] [A nation that forgets history has no future! Do not forget the Hero’s sacred deeds, citizens of Tiless!]
The streets of Saint Mathilenne had filled with citizens holding placards like these. When the Hero’s daughter had gone missing abroad — caught in terrorism, not even an accident — what was there to argue?
Fortunately, an urgent dispatch arrived reporting that Isabelle had returned alive without a single injury, and the demonstrators dispersed. But there was no helping that Tiless’s wariness and distrust had shot sky-high.
And amid all that, he’d come having been given a firm talking-to by his father, Lord Protector Gilbert.
Once you enroll, protect Isabelle so that not a single hair is harmed, no matter what happens. Even if I die? However I think about it, her life is more precious than yours. Truly remarkable. Why not just swap her for me, then? You were close with the Hero, weren’t you? Had it been possible to swap, I’d have swapped 20 years ago, son. Julia and I wanted a daughter. Wow, that’s genuinely chilling.
Oscar’s face contorted as he recalled the solemn admonition of Gilbert, the great Lord Protector and model of Tiless’s knights, then he forced his expression back into order.
“I’m a staff at Yansk University.”
“My apologies for the discourtesy. There have been many unfortunate incidents lately. I ask your generous indulgence for my rudeness.”
“Hm.”
“Might I ask which faculty you serve……? It’s a name I haven’t seen on the faculty roster.”
At this point Isabelle’s ears pricked up. He wasn’t a professor?
“Gardener.”
“Bleh.”
“……Hm……?”
With that skill? What? Gardener?
Isabelle looked at him with shocked eyes.
Those deep eyes that still gave no hint of what he was thinking, and that shaggy beard that showed not a trace of expression.
I really want to shave that off, she thought without meaning to, then suddenly caught on.
“……Ahaaa?”
She soon wore a peculiar smile and gave Ivan a smack in the side. Ivan reflexively put a hand to his waist, then, realizing there was no axe, lowered it naturally.
You’re a government agent. Right? A secret agent, that sort of thing? Wow, university life is really thrilling. What on earth is hidden here that they’ve even planted a government agent?
Isabelle whispered this, then promptly ahem-ed her expression back into order.
It’s a secret between us. Understood? You mustn’t go telling anyone else? If it’s a secret between us, it seems you’re the one who ought to mind their mouth more. What’s this? I’m the Hero’s daughter, you know? Solemn, discreet, righteous. Was the Hero any of those.
As the 2 of them whispered on, Oscar’s expression turned strange.
“My lady?”
“Ah, yes. Young master. Ahem. Mister Petrovich? Thank you for showing me the way. Wow~ the grounds are so vast I nearly got lost! Farewell!”
Does Yansk University’s Faculty of Arts have an acting department? Ivan departed thinking he’d have to seriously recommend Acting Theory for Isabelle’s general education class.
***
At that moment, in the grand auditorium where preparations for Yansk University’s entrance ceremony were in full swing, one person was staring blankly into empty air.
“What is this. Status……? Window?”
[Congratulations!]
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