Chapter 85 - The King's Silence (3)

Soft footsteps whispered across the velvet carpet as pale bare feet paced back and forth.

Shut away in her quarters, Elpihera circled the room, chewing her lip. She had been racking her brains for hours without coming up with a solution.

“That... impatient beast... If he had just waited a little longer, I would have taken him in myself...!!”

There was no explaining this except as the hot blood so characteristic of short-lived races. Creatures with short lives—rats, rabbits, humans, and the like—started mating and rutting the instant you looked away.

Now look at dragons, phoenixes, and elves. They took one mate for life, spent long years together, and slowly nurtured one another's spirits until their love bore fruit!

“A hundred happy years together” was human wordplay. To elves, a love lasting a mere century was nothing more than a fleeting fling.

And so Ivan Petrovich was about to squander his chance to take an actual elf as his mate, all because of that impatience peculiar to short-lived races!

How foolish... Elpihera sighed in dismay.

“Well... Sir Petrovich doesn't have much time left. Of course he'd want to find a mate and have children as soon as possible. I haven't been understanding enough...!”

If he waited just two and a half years, they could go to Kallion together. Kallion had plenty of ways to cure humanity's congenital disabilities.

By congenital disabilities, she meant their short thoughts and equally short lives. Fortunately, a single cure would suffice: longer lives naturally brought deeper thoughts.

Elpihera sank onto the sofa, lost in worry.

“I can't let him win.”

If he won, he would end up marrying the Princess!

For ordinary humans, marrying royalty was undoubtedly a tremendous rise in status. Sir Petrovich had made a bold bid for advancement.

But no. He was choosing the wrong path. Marriage to an elf was so far beyond marriage to human royalty that...

“This is no time to dwell on that.”

As a rational elf, Elpihera forced herself to stop her thoughts from turning once again to anger and dismay. Right now, she urgently needed a cool assessment of the situation and a solution. Even the slightest mistake might leave her unable to save Ivan.

“How do I stop him from winning?”

Perhaps she could sponsor a noble capable of defeating him? But what if Ivan suffered a serious injury...? A horse with an injured leg died even sooner than its natural lifespan allowed. Humans would be no different. Short-lived creatures could die from even minor injuries!

“Should I ask home for help?”

Wait. That actually sounded promising.

“The tournament starts in five days... And tournaments like this never end quickly.”

Even an ordinary knights' joust doubled as a festival and lasted a full week. A tournament hosted by the royal house, with the Princess's hand in marriage as its prize, certainly wouldn't end overnight.

In that case... there was enough time for Kallion to send reinforcements. An aerial battleship traveling at full speed could arrive within a week!

“Assuming I request support and the reinforcements come straight here... I need to win the first two days of the tournament.”

In tournaments involving jousting or sword fights, contestants did not compete more than once a day. They were nobles, not gladiators.

Besides allowing each contestant to stay in good condition, events of this sort served as social gatherings. A contestant need only fight one duel a day, two at most.

“I can do this. I'm a genius. A genius mage, Veolgrin's daughter... Elpihera Grikencos!”

Calmly stating these undeniable facts, she steeled her resolve.

In an instant, she arranged her mana and activated the emergency communication crystal. It was a remote-channeling artifact with illusion spells linked in both directions—a miracle beyond the dreams of humans who still used telegrams.

Soon the crystal rippled, and a deep voice rang out.

- “What is it?”

“Father!!”

- “Yes, my daughter. I'm listening.”

Elpihera shouted as though she had forgotten every rule of aristocratic etiquette and conversation.

“Please send Sir Coenwulf to Prizhenkaya right this instant!”

- “...?? Did you eat something bad this morning? Ah, is it evening there? Was something wrong with dinner? Or is it mana poisoning?”

“Ugh... No, that's not it...”

Letting her father's fond mockery wash over her, she struggled to explain the situation. Not with the whole truth, but with elven rationality.

1. The Princess has organized a dueling tournament for nobles, with her own hand in marriage at stake.

2. Winning this tournament would secure a marriage alliance with the Princess.

3. We must therefore make use of this situation to our nation's advantage.

4. There are no nationality restrictions on entry. (Naturally, since the information had been passed in secret only to nobles within Prizhenkaya, there had been no need to explicitly exclude foreign nationals.)

5. Thus, if one of our privy councilors wins, we can establish a federated kingdom of Kallion and Krasilof!

For an argument she had assembled so quickly, it was flawless. Elpihera gazed down at the crystal with a confident smile.

Of course, the crystal transmitted only sound. Unable to see her smile, Veolgrin heaved a deep sigh.

- “What a reassurance to a father, knowing his daughter is more interested in international affairs than the studies she's supposed to be pursuing.”

“Fatheeer...!!”

- “Yes, very well. A reasonable argument. But there seems to be something you've left out. What is it?”

“Huh?”

- “You wouldn't come asking me a favor for that alone, let alone have the audacity to request Sir Coenwulf. What is it? Whom do you want to thwart in this tournament?”

An insight worthy of an elf. If his daughter suddenly asked him for something, whatever lurked beneath that request must be her true objective.

Elves did not simply ask outright for what they truly wanted. That was aristocratic etiquette in Kallion.

“Well... Sir Ivan Petrovich is entering... entering it.”

- “Ah, Little Ivan. Hmmmm... Hmm... Well, Elizaveta did have an interest in him. So this is... Oh... That little girl has been using her head.”

“Huh? Her head?”

- “This so-called ‘marriage duel’ nonsense is really a game the Princess has rigged. Never mind. It's nothing you need concern yourself with.”

Veolgrin muttered something in apparent amusement, then addressed Elpihera again.

- “Very well. It wouldn't do to have our Ivan tied down to one place just yet. I'll send Sir Coenwulf. But it will take a full week. Didn't you say the duels begin in five days?”

“Oh, I can manage two days myself! I'll submit an entry in Sir Coenwulf's name for now!”

- “Hmm. And you do remember that Sir Edelflat Coenwulf is... a woman? Not exactly the ideal sex for the Princess's consort.”

“Love knows neither sex, race, nor borders!”

- “I'm fairly sure... it does. Never mind. What does that matter? If Ivan is taking the field, Coenwulf will have some interest, I suppose.”

The connection ended. Elpihera clenched her fists and trembled.

Elves did not practice swordsmanship. Their culture considered it vulgar to work up a sweat engaging in close combat.

And as had been noted before, if an elf carried a sword, it meant they had made a name for themselves in swordsmanship despite that culture.

Elves belonged to the long-lived races. Devoting a lifetime to a single art allowed them to reach heights beyond any other known race. The sheer time available to them was on an entirely different scale.

Sir Coenwulf was the strongest of those ‘sword-bearing elves.’ In other words, the finest swordfighter in Kallion.

Skilled enough to teach the hero swordsmanship.

* * *

The next day, Isabelle finished her morning lectures and headed out to the campus square with Yuri as usual. It was the best part of the day: lunchtime.

She wasn't some factory worker living for her lunch break. It was because mister brought packed lunches at noon.

Men generally couldn't cook (untrue: most chefs in this era were men), so Ivan's lunches usually consisted of ingredients in their original state. Vegetables with some dressing sloshed over them, which he insisted were salads.

This was her chance to introduce him to her homeland's cuisine. Isabelle was confident in her cooking, and the results had generally justified that confidence.

Even if his reactions to everything she fed him could be summed up as “Delicious,” “Mm,” or “Rich”...

'Honestly, I told him to come over as soon as he got discharged...!'

After hearing he had left the hospital, she had waited patiently at home, but he never came. In the end, she had to throw out all the stew she had made that day.

Adults who broke their promises were bad adults, and bad adults deserved punishment.

Chuckling wickedly, Isabelle stepped out onto the grounds—and spotted Esidisi standing alone, scuffing the ground with her foot.

“Huh? Eshi, where's mister?”

“Uncle is, um... Maybe he's busy today? He wasn't over by you either?”

“Uh... He wasn't near the Knight Department.”

Well, he must be busy. Come to think of it, that was normal.

Isabelle accepted this. He would have to be too busy even to visit her for any of this to be possible. Apparently, he had something so terribly pressing to do that he could resist the lure of ‘kimchi stew.’

Fortunately, she hadn't been stood up after all. With a pleased little laugh, she took out her lunch.

“Well, at least we don't have to eat that weird salad today!”

“Oh, right. Yeah.”

Esidisi worked her lips and nodded.

* * *

The next day, and the day after that, Ivan was nowhere to be found at Jansk University.

“How does that make any sense?!”

A man who used to appear wherever she looked on campus had suddenly vanished without a trace?

As Isabelle fumed, Esidisi gnawed relentlessly at her thumbnail. With Ivan no longer there to ensure she ate a balanced diet, she seemed to be suffering from malnutrition.

“Has he... gone off to stalk someone again...?”

That made Isabelle intensely curious, but she decided not to ask. She knew perfectly well there was no point in taking the ramblings of someone in a weakened mental and physical state seriously.

Wisely, she sought out someone who could resolve the situation: Morde, who had been evicted from the orphanage. (Reason: the King of Droan had destroyed it.)

“Do you happen to know where Mister Ivan went?”

“How would I know?”

“Well, you've been rushing off to the orphanage after every lecture lately...”

“Ahem... Hm.”

‘Volunteer work’ was a rather embarrassing occupation for a man of Droan. Morde cleared his throat before answering.

“I was wondering myself. I need to ask when they'll finally finish rebuilding that damned orphanage. Yes, I know someone who might know.”

He strode confidently across the campus, heading for a man occupying a bench in a corner of the grounds with a newspaper over his face.

“Get up.”

“An agent of Counterintelligence Command never sleeps. He merely rests.”

“Cut the bullshit and get up. Isn't this dereliction of duty?”

“That's rich, coming from an allied country's spy.”

Pavel crumpled the newspaper covering his face and sat up, rubbing his eyes. He glanced around at Morde, Esidisi, and Isabelle surrounding him, then sighed.

“How does our commander do this every day...? What a bloody nuisance.”

Assigned to guard the Hero's Party's children during Ivan's brief absence, Pavel wiped the dried drool from his mouth and stood.

He was an intelligence operative who had personally orchestrated a terrorist attack in central Prizhenkaya, and thus knew every weakness in the city's intelligence apparatus.

Now that he had returned to Counterintelligence Command, no human agent could make trouble in the city. His intelligence network would invariably catch them.

This assignment was therefore nothing more than killing time. If anything urgent happened, he could wait until then to respond and still make it in time.

Scratching his forehead, Pavel asked,

“What is it? Keep it short. I'm working.”

“Like hell you are... Ivan Petrovich. Where is he?”

“Our commander? Uh... Why?”

Isabelle stepped forward and shouted,

“Mister's been missing ever since you kicked me out the other day, saying it was a state secret!”

“Well, he's on official business.”

“For three whole days? Without even clocking out? That's exploitation! Doesn't this country have rules about working hours?”

“What, Thilles has those? I'm applying for citizenship.”

“Wow. Unbelievable.”

For the record, Thilles did have legally prescribed working hours. Sadly, the law did not apply to serfs, tenant farmers, or other commoners.

But Krasilof didn't even have that. Why let people rest when they were capable of working? Wasn't that a waste of labor?

“Well, want to go see him? I was getting curious myself.”

“Huh?! We're allowed to? This isn't another state secret or something, is it?”

“Of course it's classified. It is, but... does it matter? Nothing's going to change just because you know.”

“Huh? What does that... What is he doing?”

Pavel grinned.

“Training.”

* * *

“Next.”

Blindfolded, Ivan lowered his head and whispered.

Even in a darkened room, a superhuman's senses could detect the faintest reflection of light. The blindfold was a means of pushing his senses to their limits.

Soon he felt the next opponent enter his range.

The inevitable sounds of a body in motion: friction in the joints, tension in the muscles, a beating heart, sweat running down a cheek to drip onto the floor.

Nervous. Height, 187 centimeters. Judging by the sound of the planted foot, weight between 80 and 100 kilograms. A well-trained physique.

The right foot landed more heavily. Right-handed. And likely carrying a heavy weapon.

How long was the weapon? What kind?

Time to find out.

TCH.

Ivan clicked his tongue once.

TCH. TCH. TCH.

Into the darkness, toward the unseen opponent panting with tension.

He would have entered with a darkvision spell cast on him. Yet even with his sight intact, he dared not approach Ivan, who was effectively blind.

The tiny clicks of his tongue echoed through the room, allowing him to gauge the shapes and distances of the objects around him.

Sound visualized through the acoustics of the space. Slowly, he built an image of the room in his mind.

Ignoring the dozen or more men lying gasping at his feet, mindful of their dropped weapons and the spaces around them, he clicked again toward the opponent before him.

TCH. TCH. TCH.

Softly, like the whisper of a coiled snake concealing its venom.