Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume Short Story - Chapter 13

Wilfried — Uncle’s Retainer

Justus came to the Royal Academy on the same day as Rozemyne, now serving as Traugott’s new attendant. I was actually thankful to have him here—he got Rozemyne to take on the socializing work that had been piling up while she was away, meaning I could finally have some fun getting ready for the Interduchy Tournament. He even gave me lots of advice on what I should prepare, a stack of papers on fey creatures and their weak points that he had compiled while gathering ingredients, and a list of unusual ditter strategies employed in the past.

“During a group battle, it’s crucial to have someone overseeing everything from above and giving instructions,” Justus began. “Everyone needs to listen to that person without fail. If anyone rushes forward on their own in an attempt to seize glory for themselves, the whole strategy falls apart.”

This explanation was punctuated with a stern glare at Traugott, an apprentice knight who had resigned from serving as Rozemyne’s guard knight. According to my own knights, he had gone against Rozemyne’s orders during a match against Dunkelfelger and was generally known for acting rebelliously. Many overheard Rihyarda’s furious rants in the dormitory, and everyone knew that his resignation was actually him getting fired.

There had been a time when I probed Traugott about being my own guard knight—he was Lord Bonifatius’s grandson and reasonably strong for his age. He had refused me in favor of serving Rozemyne, however—which had made his recent resignation from her service all the more surprising.

Sometime after Rozemyne returned to Ehrenfest, Dunkelfelger sent us a request for a ditter rematch, which I accepted. And during the game, Traugott had flown straight toward the enemy. I remembered thinking that he was brave and motivated, but given what Justus was saying now and the displeasure in his eyes, it was starting to seem more likely that Traugott had only been focused on glory.

Rozemyne had apparently won our first game against Dunkelfelger using a devious scheme of some kind, but we hadn’t come up with any clever tricks for the rematch. And without our main powerhouses, Cornelius and Angelica, we were demolished more or less instantly. It hadn’t even been a real match. Professor Rauffen had been visibly disappointed, and his mood only seemed to lift when one of his apprentice knights said they could just challenge us again when Rozemyne returned.

Come on! Don’t tell him that!

After the match, Traugott was made to return to Ehrenfest. He had only come back to the dormitory today, and it was obvious from his dejected expression and the fact that Justus was now attending to him that his family had given him a stern talking-to for resigning as Rozemyne’s guard knight. It couldn’t have been easy for him, considering that Lord Bonifatius would have been among them. Rumor had it that the old knight commander was prone to using his iron fists whenever he was scolding someone.

I’m just glad that Traugott managed to get through all that alive.

That reminded me—Rozemyne had mentioned that Father and Uncle entrusted Justus with a lot of scholar work. I could imagine that he was going to struggle, having to balance this with attending Traugott, but his help here was bound to be appreciated nonetheless. Our dormitory supervisor Professor Hirschur couldn’t be relied on for anything, after all.

“Justus, I’ve heard that Professor Hirschur is planning to publish research on the large shumils in the library. Will that be alright?” I asked. These magic tools were the heirlooms of old royalty, and I was cautious of another fight starting over them.

Back when Rozemyne had first become their master, my instinct had been to tell her that she should give them up—that the library had managed well enough without them. However, after seeing how invested she was in the library and the joy on Professor Solange’s face, the words had stuck in my throat. It was then and there that we had lost the best way to keep Rozemyne from causing incidents.

And that brings us here, to this mess. I think all of my problems began with those shumils, to be honest.

Rozemyne had needed to make new clothes for the magic tools as their master, Professor Hirschur had gone on a rampage, defending ourselves against Dunkelfelger had led to a game of ditter, and then that had resulted in socializing with the prince. I wanted to take things a lot more slowly and carefully from this point onward.

Justus stroked his chin as he considered my question. “I can’t imagine it being too much of an issue, but as Lady Rozemyne has a meeting with the prince tomorrow, I will ask her to consult him. His permission should assuage your fears.”

“Sounds good.”

As far as I was concerned, there was nothing better than getting rid of a potential source of problems. All of my time spent with Rozemyne had taught me that preparation was key to everything—although Rozemyne herself often acted so abruptly that it led straight to errors.

“I expect the apprentice attendants will struggle the most during this year’s Interduchy Tournament,” Justus said.

“You think so? I’ve heard they consistently have the least work out of anyone, to the point where they barely have anything to do at all.”

“Hah. That takes me back,” Justus replied, his eyes crinkling in a smile. “I remember apprentice attendants saying the same thing when Lord Ferdinand first joined the Royal Academy. Oh, how they suffered.”

“They suffered...? What in the world did Uncle do?”

“The same thing he ended up doing again and again: come first-in-class without batting an eye.”

It seemed that Uncle had started attending the Academy when Father was in his final year, meaning there was a short period when there were two Ehrenfest archduke candidates. Father had expertly managed the feverous students while Uncle had perfectly dealt with the preparations, making them an excellent duo.

“Lord Ferdinand excelled so much as a student, and Lord Sylvester was dead set on inviting Lady Florencia that, well... many circumstances overlapped. That year, during the Interduchy Tournament, Ehrenfest received far more visitors than usual,” Justus continued. His face then clouded over as he said, “The situation ended up being too much for Ehrenfest’s apprentice attendants.”

“Hm?”

“Our duchy’s space was thrown into chaos. All the attendants who had come along with the students were told to help out, but even then, we eventually ran out of tea and sweets. In the end, our apprentice attendants were ranked the lowest out of all the duchies. You and Lady Rozemyne are both here this year, you’re starting trends, the greater duchies have their eyes on you, and the prince is involved; I expect the chaos to be even greater than it was back then,” Justus warned, causing all the apprentice attendants in earshot to pale at once. “You’ll need to prepare three times as much tea and sweets as you currently have planned, and you will need to have the students’ attendants ready and waiting to serve visitors at any moment.”

“Three times as much...?” the apprentice attendants asked, looking suspicious.

Justus shrugged. “It’s up to Lord Wilfried to decide whether he takes my advice. This is his discussion, after all.”

I examined Justus for a moment, then turned to the attendants and said, “Do as he says. After witnessing all the disorder that Rozemyne caused without even being here, I’m confident that we can’t rely on our past experiences. It’s in our best interests to listen to someone with proper expertise.”

Upon hearing my announcement, the apprentice attendants all turned serious and started redoing their plans from the beginning. Justus oversaw things all the while, being the “someone with proper expertise” I was referring to.

It was only the next day that we learned about Uncle’s retainer gleefully cross-dressing and walking around the Royal Academy as Rozemyne’s retainer. From there, people started to pity Traugott for being stuck with such a weird attendant.

Rozemyne was bad enough, but now there was Justus as well... In an unusual twist, it seemed that Uncle liked to surround himself with weirdos.

Oh, wait... Uncle’s weird too!

I clapped my hands together in realization... and then felt a strange chill run down my spine for some reason.