Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume 4.5 - Chapter Pr

Prologue

Once the Archduke Conference was over, the nobles and giebes in the castle were all informed of the decisions that had been made. One of the more important outcomes was that two brides from Ahrensbach were being wed into the duchy.

“Aah! They permitted Freuden’s marriage!”

The exclamation came from Viscount Sidonius Wiltord, who had just heard from the archduke that his eldest son, Freuden, was being permitted to marry. Considering that the marriage had already been refused once before, this was marvelous news—so marvelous that his voice cracked as he spoke it aloud, and the letter shook in his trembling hands. He knew exactly who to thank for this gift.

“I must inform Lord Grausam at once,” he said to nobody in particular.

An ordonnanz soon began its journey from Wiltord to Gerlach. Both provinces were in the south of Ehrenfest, and their giebes were considered the very center of the former Veronica faction. The white bird shot through the wall of Gerlach’s summer estate just as he was eating dinner with his family, attracting the attention of all those gathered.

Gerlach’s youngest son, Matthias, was the first to react. He turned at once, his dark-purple hair swaying as he dropped his fork and immediately readied his schtappe. It was a response that now came to him naturally as a medknight due to enter his fourth year at the Royal Academy. His blue eyes carefully followed the ordonnanz; only under the most urgent circumstances would one send such correspondence after sixth bell.

The white bird circled the dining room leisurely before settling down on Viscount Gerlach’s arm. “Lord Grausam, this is Sidonius,” it said. “Aub Ehrenfest has sent word to me. It seems that, due to a discussion with Ahrensbach during the Archduke Conference, my son Freuden has been permitted to marry Lady Bettina. I shall tell you the details myself the next time we meet in person.”

Matthias continued to stare at the ordonnanz. He knew there was no reason to doubt what he was hearing—it was an update from Giebe Wiltord, a man who was very much not their enemy—but he struggled to believe his ears even as the bird spoke its message a third time.

“Lord Freuden and Lady Bettina’s marriage was rejected years ago,” Matthias muttered. “To think it would be permitted now, when the aub knows that reversing his decision will cause unrest in the duchy... Is this truly happening?”

The mana shortage was being felt all across Yurgenschmidt, and Matthias knew from his intelligence gathering in the Royal Academy that Ahrensbach was especially devastated. It made no sense that its aub would willingly relinquish a mednoble to another duchy. Sending an archnoble or a member of the archducal family had the potential of securing a stronger relationship with a duchy that could support them in turn, but mednoble marriages offered nowhere near as much influence.

Grausam scoffed at his son’s confusion. “Did you not hear the message?” he said. “This was decided during the Archduke Conference.”

“I am wondering why Ahrensbach would take such an interest in a mednoble marriage. I cannot imagine they would push for something so minor without some ulterior motive.”

“Aub Ahrensbach must truly care for these two young people. A betrothal dissolved by the decision of an aub brings no happiness to anyone. You should understand that better than most,” Grausam replied, his gray eyes boring into his son. It was an evasive answer, and Matthias quickly concluded that no amount of prodding would get him the information that he wanted.

“Greater duchies certainly are magnanimous,” Matthias said, withdrawing from the topic of conversation. Grausam returned a satisfied nod, while Matthias’s mother gave a pleased smile of agreement.

“This marriage would have been doomed if not for Ahrensbach’s support,” she said. “Today is a blessed day.”

“Father, shall we go to Wiltord to celebrate?” Matthias’s older brother Janrik asked. “I would like to hear more about this whole situation.”

“Indeed. If we are fortunate enough, they might assist with your marriage as well,” Grausam replied.

Matthias’s mother nodded her agreement. “Let us go as a family. Now, what gift should we bring for Freuden?”

There was nothing unusual about such a spontaneous trip—the approval of a once rejected marriage was cause for celebration, and Gerlach was on good terms with Wiltord—but Matthias felt a profound sense of unease nonetheless. He found it strange to see everyone celebrating Ahrensbach, seemingly unconcerned that it had supported an attack on the Ehrenfest archducal family. Perhaps this blind support stemmed from Ahrensbach’s status as a greater duchy and the misplaced assumption that all greater duchies were deserving of such worship. Either way, it was much too different from how things were in the Royal Academy, where the Ehrenfest students all worked together to spread trends and boost the duchy’s rank.

Gerlach borders Ahrensbach, so supporting them has thus far proven beneficial to us, but I cannot see this continuing to be the case.

Wilfried and Rozemyne’s engagement had just been announced at the feast to celebrate spring. Ehrenfest would surely begin to centralize around them and continue to grow and develop while spreading Rozemyne’s trends and inventions to other duchies. The future was clear to Matthias, and yet, for some reason, his family was proactively attempting to maintain diplomacy with Ahrensbach. Why?

No matter how I look at this, supporting Ahrensbach is a losing bet.

Matthias’s mind raced with all that he had learned at the Royal Academy. One needed only look at Bindewald, an Ahrensbach province bordering the duchy barrier, to see that Ahrensbach was still devastated from the mana shortage. There also seemed to be a dispute of sorts over who would become the next aub: the archduke’s youngest daughter Detlinde or his granddaughter Letizia, whom he had adopted. Matthias had heard that Detlinde was at an advantage, both due to her age and because Ehrenfest, where her mother Georgine was from, was rising through the ranks. He was largely unsure about the details, though.

Father must assume Lady Detlinde is going to be their next aub. That was the only way Matthias could understand continuing to support Ahrensbach as Ehrenfest rose through the ranks. He crossed his arms and fell into deep thought, shaking his head as he mulled things over. Does Father plan to become a bridge between Ehrenfest and Ahrensbach...? No, I can’t imagine him doing anything like that.

Despite how much Matthias dwelled on the situation, he had not reached a satisfying conclusion even by the time they were due to leave for their impromptu visit. Wiltord and Gerlach would at times perform knight training exercises together, and this trip was being used as an excuse to do just that. As an apprentice knight, Matthias was required to participate.

“Hey, Matthias. Been a while.”

Upon his arrival at the Wiltord summer mansion, Matthias was first approached by Laurenz, the giebe’s second son. He was also an apprentice knight, so Matthias had spent more time with him than he had with other noble children.

“Laurenz. Congratulations on your brother’s marriage.”

“Yep. The whole family’s excited about it.”

Matthias and Laurenz celebrated their reunion while the giebes exchanged greetings. They were genuinely happy to see one another since meeting with friends was a rare occurrence while spending time in one’s home duchy.

“How about you two hurry on to training? It really is shameful how far you are trailing behind Lord Cornelius and Lady Angelica,” Grausam said, making his displeasure more than apparent. He had attended the Interduchy Tournament with his wife for Janrik’s graduation, so he had watched the ditter games and seen this skill gap firsthand.

All this because he’s proud we Gerlachs have archnoble-level mana...

Long ago, when Gabriele of Ahrensbach first married into Ehrenfest, the Giebe Gerlach of the time married one of her retainers. It was for this reason that Matthias’s house had a great enough mana capacity to rival some archnobles, despite them only being mednobles. They would rank up to archnoble status if the eldest son of the house displayed such an impressive mana capacity for three consecutive generations, which was why Grausam was especially sensitive about any perceivable gaps between them and the archnobles.

“That would be due to the excellence of Lady Rozemyne’s mana compression method,” Matthias replied. “It is not just Lord Cornelius and Lady Angelica either—the other guard knights of the archducal family are increasing their mana capacities equally as fast.”

“That method was devised by a lowly commoner—and while she was serving as an apprentice blue shrine maiden, of all things. We need only discover it for ourselves.”

So he said, but if the method truly was that easy to figure out, the archduke would not have started charging money for lessons or controlling who could attend them. Matthias had no way of learning the Rozemyne Compression Method solely because he belonged to a different faction. Just how many children in the Royal Academy were bemoaning being in a similar situation? He could remember the agonized cries of the other students of the former Veronica faction all too well.

You belittle her as a former commoner, Father, but do you know a compression method more effective than hers? Of course not. No matter how hard I work, the chasm between our mana capacities will guarantee my defeat every time.

Defiance toward his father blossomed within Matthias as the frustrations he had swallowed down in the Royal Academy were suddenly unleashed. “If you are so dismissive of a lowly commoner’s method, you must have a better one of your own, no?” he said. “You wouldn’t insult it while lacking one yourself, surely.”

Grausam fell into thought for a moment. “I will need permission, since this is not something that I devised myself... but I will ask our lady whether I may teach you,” he replied. It was an answer that caught Matthias entirely off guard—and who was this “lady” he was referring to?

As Matthias blinked in confusion, Viscount Wiltord voiced his agreement. “That would be wise. You have been working quite hard for her sake, Lord Grausam, have you not? I see more muscle on you now, even.”

“I need a fit body so that I might respond to any of our lady’s needs or demands without hesitation,” Grausam replied.

Father certainly does put his all into whatever he sets his mind on... Matthias thought as he glanced down at his father’s abs and saw that he was indeed more muscular than he had used to be.

“In any case, Matthias—you need to participate in this training. There is no point in knowing the compression method if you aren’t training to match it,” Grausam said.

Wiltord nodded. “Laurenz. Join him,” he said. “We don’t want you shaming yourself at the Interduchy Tournament.”

And so, both Matthias and Laurenz were shooed out of the parlor. Matthias glanced over at Laurenz as they made their way to the training grounds. Laurenz looked so much more like a knight than he did, being taller and fitter despite being one year younger. Matthias clenched his fists and tried tensing his arms, but even then his muscles paled in comparison. He didn’t seem to get any more buff no matter how hard he trained, and it frustrated him that he looked more like a spindly scholar than anything.

“Hey.” Laurenz suddenly pulled Matthias from his sad musing, his orange eyes shining with excitement. “Do you really think Lord Grausam is going to teach us that compression method he spoke about?”

Matthias wasn’t the only one agonizing over the mana disparity that was resulting from Rozemyne’s mana compression method; Laurenz and all the other students of the former Veronica faction felt the same way.

“I understand your excitement, Laurenz, but... who do you think their ‘lady’ is?”

“Probably Lady Georgine. Not that I have any proof...”

Matthias likewise wanted to avoid jumping to conclusions—after all, their fathers had never actually referred to this person by name, and they always sent their letters to nobles in old Werkestock of Ahrensbach, who may not have even been connected to Georgine. She was Matthias and Laurenz’s first guess because their families had rejoiced over “our lady arriving” back when she had visited with her retinue three years ago, but they lacked the evidence to prove anything.

It must be Lady Georgine, right?

Matthias thought back to the woman he had seen so many years ago, but the memory was fuzzy at best. He had been younger then, and she had visited only to attend a tea party that his father had not allowed him to attend. He recalled the deep red of her lips visible behind a thin veil, her elegant attitude fit for a queen as she received greetings... and the off-putting servile ingratiation with which his parents had treated her. He had reconciled to his parents’ behavior only after hearing that they had served Georgine before she was married into Ahrensbach.

Georgine had to be quite skilled to have become first wife of a greater duchy after being married off as a mere third wife. It was possible that she had taught Matthias’s parents the compression method before then, much like Rozemyne had taught her retainers.

That said, would she teach Ehrenfest nobles her method now that she’s the first wife of Ahrensbach?

The mana shortage in Ahrensbach truly was critical. Surely it was a much wiser decision for her to teach her method to her own duchy’s nobles, rather than Ehrenfest nobles like Matthias and Laurenz. Not a single reasonable explanation came to mind, and that was the main reason why Matthias was not entirely convinced they were referring to Georgine.

“I suppose there’s no point dwelling on it forever,” Matthias said. “I’m more curious about why they’re giving more training to knights when we’re already so busy with the sudden Starbinding.”

Laurenz clapped his hands together in apparent realization. “Oh yeah. Father was talking about doing more joint training with Gerlach too.”

Upon hearing those words, Matthias felt a sudden wave of uneasiness; why were the giebes having their knights attend more joint training sessions now, of all times? This feels just like when Father was summoned after the attack on the archducal family...

Matthias doubted that his father would ever attack the archducal family—there were eyewitnesses who claimed to have seen him in the grand hall—but his suspicions somehow still remained. The queasy feeling from back then resurfaced.

“Laurenz, do you know the details of the ceremony?”

“Nope. Just the basics. It’s going to be held at the border gate instead of the castle. Sounds like the archducal families of both duchies will be showing up.”

“You mean... Ahrensbach’s archducal family is going too?”

“Yeah, since Aub Ahrensbach’s niece is marrying Lord Lamprecht at the same time.”

This was the first Matthias was hearing of that. He had wondered why a greater duchy would involve themselves in the marriage of a mednoble, but now it all made perfect sense—it had been to strengthen their push for one of their own to marry Lamprecht, who served Ehrenfest’s archducal family and was the son of its knight commander. Ahrensbach was sinking its claws as deep into Ehrenfest as it could.

“This isn’t good...” Matthias muttered. “Should we warn the aub?”

“You can try, but we’re kids; I doubt he’ll take us seriously. Plus, think about what might happen to us after. I can’t imagine our fathers would ever forgive us...” Laurenz replied. He sounded deflated, but Matthias struggled to tell whether his warning was truly out of concern for their safety.

“I know how you feel. But if we follow after our parents without understanding their intentions, we’ll end up walking down the same road as Roderick,” Matthias cautioned, remembering the boy who had suffered the consequences of mindlessly obeying his father. He may not have been able to change his own faction by will, but he could at least express his intent through actions. He wanted to choose whose sake to work for—to decide for himself who he saw as his lord or lady.

“Just as Janrik said, Lady Rozemyne isn’t being established as the next aub despite being best suited for the position,” Matthias continued. “This engagement has locked her into being the first wife. Still, I think she’ll remain at the absolute center of Ehrenfest—that the duchy will continue to revolve around her. And with that in mind, I can’t overlook our fathers working against the archducal family. You know... maybe Lady Rozemyne will believe us.”

“If you can get a meeting with her, that is. Sounds like even Leisegang nobles are having a hard time there,” Laurenz replied. Matthias had never considered that her guard would be so tight that not even nobles of the same faction could meet with her.

“If this were the Royal Academy, we could at least contact her indirectly through her retainers, but...” Matthias trailed off. There were few enough opportunities for apprentice knights to speak with guard knights during training sessions, and now that they had returned to Ehrenfest, there were practically none at all.

“You sure are a worrywart, Matthias. We can’t say for sure if something’s going to happen. Besides, what are the chances they’d try to attack a place with two aubs?” Laurenz said, ever the optimist. “Not like stressing about it now will change anything.”

Matthias glared at Laurenz, his arms crossed. “If our fathers really are planning something then we need to act. Otherwise, it’ll be too late.”

Matthias was certain that his father had at least some involvement in the Ivory Tower incident; the man had exchanged countless letters with Ahrensbach around that time and seemed aware of what had happened even before winter socializing. That was why Matthias could not discard the possibility that his father had likewise been involved with the attack that had put Rozemyne to sleep for two years.

“It’s important to expect and prepare for the absolute worst,” Matthias said. “Do you disagree?”

“Matthias, you... Man, you really are like Lord Grausam,” Laurenz chuckled. “You think ahead and form all sorts of plots just like he does. Like father, like son, huh?”

Matthias responded only with a frown. At least on that particular day, it was a comparison he did not welcome.