Chapter II: Inglis, Age 15—The Chiral Knights’ Academy (2)
Gossip, giggles, and laughs.
The air was lively with the sounds of young women. Inglis felt a little guilty as she looked around—after all, everyone was naked. “I don’t even know where I should look,” she mumbled to herself quietly as she soaked in the hot water.
Many of the academy’s students were girls—perhaps 30 or 40 percent.
Right now, she was in the bath of the girls’ dorm. The academy’s baths were not quite as opulent as those in Nova’s manor, but they were still spacious and well-appointed. Unfortunately, they were also quite packed at this hour. Rafinha being there was fine—she was family, more like a granddaughter than anything—but the presence of other girls was annoyingly awkward; her eyes kept catching glimpses of things she felt like she shouldn’t have seen.
As Inglis pondered her predicament, Rin perked up from her cleavage and looked at her curiously.
“At least you look like you’re having fun, Rin,” Inglis said.
Rin burrowed back down before quietly looking around the room. The small magicite beast definitely enjoyed being doted over by girls, and she hadn’t taken to Rafael anywhere near as well as she had to Leone or Ripple. Maybe she was looking for a new friend.
Rafinha had, rather bluntly, come to the conclusion that as a human, Rin oddly preferred women and was simply driven by her instincts as a magicite beast with her reasoning weakened now. That would have been an awkward conversation if Rafinha was wrong, but Rin, unable to speak, could neither confirm nor deny.
Maybe they’d find out one day, if she could ever be turned back to Cyrene. If it could be done with aether, Inglis would have to figure out how. After all, the leader of the Steelbloods had said such a thing was impossible. Managing to do so would be proof she’d surpassed him in control of aether. Granted, Inglis had no way of knowing whether he’d been telling the truth.
Leone approached her. “What’s wrong, Inglis? Lonely without Rafinha here?” Her skin was flushed a pale pink from the heat of the bath, and it was obvious here that she was as well-endowed as Inglis.
Inglis had sometimes flirted with the idea of explaining to her that Leone’s rounded hips and soft legs, which the Olfa girl disliked, were actually things that men found more attractive, but the lack of any way to explain how she knew that meant it was better left unsaid. For now, she supposed she could appreciate the view.
“Eh, not really.”
Another student had Rafinha’s focus, and they were in a lively conversation. Of course, as the little sister of the holy knight Rafael, she drew attention. Like him, she was a cheerful, attentive person who could make good use of that spotlight. In other words, she was always up for a good chat, and thus the circle around her grew.
I’m glad she’s already making new friends, Inglis thought. Normally, Inglis would happily watch over her, a bit protectively. But with only the other girls around, there were no threats here. Inglis didn’t mind if Rafinha did what she wanted.
“Looks like she’s pretty popular already... I’m a little jealous.” Leone sighed, and Inglis could understand why. Their social situations right now were night and day, based entirely on reasons neither one was personally responsible for.
“It’s okay, Leone. At least Rin’s happy to see you.” Rin was just about to hop from one chest to the other.
“Aha ha ha. She really does like hiding here, doesn’t she?”
“Yeah.”
“I wonder why she bounces back and forth between us, though. Is there a difference?”
“I’m not sure. It’s not like she can tell us.”
“Then I’ll get to the bottom of this mystery!” Rafinha suddenly poked her head between the two.
“Whoa?! R-Rani... Eek! C’mon, don’t!” Inglis squealed.
“When did you— Wait! Where are you—” Leone protested.
With an arm around each of them, Rafinha squeezed firmly before announcing her verdict with a sigh. “Chris, yours are springy and soft. Leone, yours are nice and perky. I wish mine were that big...”
“L-Let go!” Inglis protested.
Leone did the same. “I-Isn’t that enough?”
“Hmm? All right, why don’t we go get dessert after our bath? The cafeteria here at the academy stays open pretty late.”
Inglis squirmed. “That sounds wonderful! Now let go of me.”
Leone was surprised. “Dessert again? Didn’t you already have a ton after dinner?”
Rafinha grinned. “We’ve got plenty of room for more. And it’s free, right? Wouldn’t want to let any go to waste.”
Leone frowned. “I... I don’t think I could eat another bite. I’ll probably just head back to my room. If I overeat, I’ll get fat...”
After they all finished in the bath, Inglis and Rafinha enjoyed a second dessert at the cafeteria alone before heading back to their room. On their way, they were stopped by a commotion in the hallway on the east side of the third floor, where their room was.
“And thus, this room is entirely unsuitable for one of my stature! To imagine that you’d expect me to share accommodations with the flesh and blood of a traitor... Are you simply asking me to endure a situation where I may be murdered in my sleep? Why in the world would you admit someone like that in the first place?!”
“Well... We checked her out, and there was nothing suspicious about her...”
A blonde girl was arguing fervently with Principal Miriela. “I cannot possibly have faith in that decision!”
Inglis realized the girl was Liselotte, one of the students who had put up the best fight under high gravity against the golems. Looking at Liselotte’s hand, Inglis saw an upper-class Rune. No one in their class possessed a special-class Rune, so that meant Liselotte was one of the strongest here, apart from Inglis herself.
Liselotte seemed to have a problem with Leone, who was slumped gloomily nearby. The girls’ dorms were set up as two people to a room. Inglis and Rafinha had been placed together—as, apparently, had Leone and Liselotte. The latter pair seemed far less happy with the arrangements.
“At the very least, you could permit me to change my room! I don’t know how I could go on otherwise.”
The principal sighed. “If you must. Ahhh...” She turned to the gathered crowd. “Would anyone like to volunteer to trade room assignments?”
Every person there either shook their head or shrank back, trying to avoid eye contact; no one wanted Leone for a roommate. News had already spread that she was the sister of the disgraced holy knight, Leon.
“Me! I’ll do it!” Rafinha raised her hand.
Inglis had expected this from her. The willingness to do what was right, no matter what the crowd around them thought, was a trait Rafinha and Rafael shared strongly. It was the best thing about both of them.
“You’re all so terrible! Leone’s been out there fighting magicite beasts in Ahlemin all alone! You should be thanking her! There’s no way she’s as bad as you think!”
Inglis whispered, “Rani, I understand how you feel, but calm down.” Rafinha seemed so angry she was ready to snap at her fellow students.
Inglis placed a hand on her shoulder to calm her down. I know it’s frustrating, but they need to see it to believe it.
“We’re fine with three in a room! Right, Chris?”
“Yeah, that works for me. Let’s go, Leone.” Inglis took Leone’s hand and led her toward their room.
“I’m sorry I keep causing trouble for you.” That was about all Leone could struggle to say without breaking into tears.
Later, they went to Liselotte’s room to get Leone’s things.
Miriela, who had come to help, sighed. “I expected some of the students to be unhappy, but not this many nor this soon.”
“If you expected this would happen, why did you admit her?” Inglis asked.
“She was recommended by both Prince Wayne and Rafael. There’s something going on behind the scenes. Plus, she has an upper-class Rune. It’d be a shame to let that go to waste. And I feel she should be judged on her own merits.”
The two girls nodded in response to Miriela.
“Sorry, but can you take care of her for now? I’ll try and see if I can get you three a bigger room or something.”
“Of course!” Rafinha exclaimed.
Inglis agreed. “Will do.”
Once they returned to their room, it was time for them all, including Leone, to settle down for the night. Sometimes the best way to forget troubles was to sleep them away.
“I’ll take the floor, I guess,” Leone remarked listlessly. The room had been set up with a bunk bed for two, and there was now an extra.
“It’s fine. Come here. You can sleep next to me.” Inglis patted a space beside her on the bottom bunk. It would be a little cramped, but it wouldn’t be a big deal.
“Ah, me too, then!” Rafinha had decided for her own reasons to climb down from the top bunk, making the trio crammed into one bed like sardines. However, maybe just being there would help Leone after the day she’d had.
After a short while, Rafinha fell asleep. Leone whispered to Inglis, “She’s a little loud...”
“She snores a bit when she’s this tired. I’m used to it.”
“It’s been a long time since I’ve slept next to anyone, but I do feel a little calmer.”
“You’re not alone, Leone. We’re here for you. Don’t worry.”
“Thanks, Inglis.”
“Mm.” Inglis quietly wrapped an arm around Leone, whose shoulders were still shaking from the stress, and let her eyes close. It reminded her of soothing Rafinha when she was scared of a ghost or had woken up from a nightmare. It felt like home.
And the three drifted off into their own dreams...
◆◇◆
The next morning, Rafinha—in the knights’ course—and Inglis—in the squires’ course—had separate classes. Knights would be drilling with their Artifacts, while squires focused on Flygear piloting and maintenance. Lectures, overall combat exercises, and joint Flygear operations were shared.
Inglis’s class of freshman squires were gathered in front of the academy’s gate, listening to a burly bald man. His bulging muscles threatened to tear apart his teacher’s uniform.
“My name is Marquez, and as your instructor, I am responsible for you! Listen well: My mission is to train each one of you to become a squire! You may not have a Rune or an Artifact, but do not assume you are inferior because of that! You will face more than just magicite beasts. You must work hard to strengthen your body, your spirit, and your mind to compensate for your lack of a Rune! You will undergo training harsher than any knight, and we will accept nothing less than one hundred percent! Your first order: to the Flygear dock, on the double! Fall in!” Marquez set off at a brisk jog toward Lake Bolt.
“Huuuuh?!”
“What do Flygears have to do with what he said?”
“He’s fast! We’re gonna lose sight of him!”
“Let’s get going!” The students hurriedly ran off after him.
“I guess I can get used to this,” Inglis muttered. If nothing else, Marquez was right. Physical training was key. But just running around everywhere was too simple. Inglis tried to recreate the gravity-increasing Artifact’s Gift she’d seen the day before. She remembered the flow of mana and how it was positioned, but it was delicate and complex. It would be hard to reproduce.
“Hmm...” Closing her eyes, she began to convert aether to mana and manipulate the mana as it wrapped around her. She didn’t have to do something advanced and make it an entire gravity field like the Gift was; she needed to apply it only to herself. She would be replicating just a part of it. So even though she didn’t have much practice with the technique—
Thunk!
She could feel her body being pulled toward the ground. Trying a quick hop, she could tell that she was heavier than normal. “Ooh! I did it!” How many times normal gravity was she under? She could tell it wasn’t much, but more practice would take care of that. And even a little bit would make her training significantly more effective.
“All right! Good enough for now.” Inglis finally took off, at the back of the pack. But even with the added gravity, even with the slow start, in no time at all she was nipping at Instructor Marquez’s heels.
“Ha ha ha! Don’t overdo it! No recruit is going to be able to keep up with me from the beginning, of course! If you lose sight of me, just knock on the door of a house and ask for directions to the— Whaaaat?! When did you get here?!”
“Sir! Requesting permission to arrive early, sir!”
“That’s just fine, recruit! But do you even know the way there?”
Inglis paused to think. “Now that you mention it, I don’t really. So I’ll be following you for today.” She wasn’t completely satisfied with the idea, but she could at least try to increase the gravity while keeping pace.
Then she noticed someone else closing in from behind.
“Gahhh! Wait up!” A short young man with a stubborn expression on his face was doing his utmost to keep up with Inglis and Marquez. He was one of the standout students from yesterday—Lahti.
“Not bad,” Inglis commented.
Lahti didn’t have a Rune. He definitely wasn’t a divine knight like Inglis was. He had normal human legs. He was fast, no support needed, and Inglis and Marquez both grinned at the sight.
Lahti gasped for air as he ran. “Damn it, why are you smiling like that?! This is gonna kill me!”
“Ha ha ha! Looks like they brought me the good stuff this year!”
Two boys shouted at the people in front.
“Hey, don’t forget us!”
“Yeah! How’s anyone supposed to keep up with this?”
One of them had blue hair, and the other had red. Their hair colors were opposites, but their faces were like peas in a pod. Twins, maybe?
Inglis quickly remembered where she’d seen them. They’d been guarding Liselotte during her time in the ring. Her retainers, then. Middle-class Runes shone faintly on their hands. They could perhaps have been enrolled in the knights’ course, but it seems they’d chosen to train as squires for Liselotte instead. Inglis had seen others in her retinue with Runes, too, but all lower- or middle-class. And she’d heard Liselotte was the daughter of the king’s right-hand man, Chancellor Arcia. That meant she was the scion of a rising family. No doubt that fact drove this pair’s enthusiasm to be even squires.
Each of the boys carried an Artifact sword. The power of an Artifact enhanced its wielder’s physical capabilities, which explained how they could almost keep pace. She could feel the mana wafting off of them. Well, Marquez hadn’t said they couldn’t use Artifacts.
“Ugh... Damn it!” Lahti slowly began to fall behind.
“Hey, don’t push yourself, bro! Ain’t gonna surprise anyone if a pleb waddles in late!”
“He’s right. It’s not good to pretend you’re something you’re not.”
Liselotte’s retainers teased Lahti, the red-haired one openly and the blue-haired dripping with sarcastic condescension.
“Shut up!” Lahti yelled between heavy breaths. “You’re just acting big down here as squires because you couldn’t cut it as knights! There’s no way I’m gonna lose...to people who want to...take an easier road out...”
“Hey, you givin’ me shit?!”
“Hmph... Looks like your mouth runs faster than your legs.”
The blue-haired boy wasn’t, strictly speaking, wrong. Lahti was at his limit.
Inglis fell in beside Lahti and whispered in his ear. “Do you remember the way to the dock?”
“Yeah... Mostly...”
“C’mon, let me show you.” She took his hand and sped up, almost dragging him along. “Here we go!”
Lahti stammered. “Whoa! Too... Too fast! Guhhh...”
“Do your best. You don’t want to lose to them, right?”
Inglis heard shouts from behind as she ran. It was the instructor. “Wh-When you arrive, get out there in a Flygear and get some flying practice in!”
“Sir! Yes, sir!” She turned her head to smile back at the instructor before running even faster.
“She’s fast!”
“No way! What’s going on?!”
In the blink of an eye, Inglis had pulled away from Marquez and the twins.
Lahti wheezed, hunched over, as they arrived at the Flygear dock first. “Ugh... I feel like I’m gonna throw up...”
“Glad you didn’t lose, right?”
“It’s just because you dragged me along, not anything I did... That’s probably worse.”
“It’ll probably happen a lot, so get used to it.”
“Are you trying to pick a fight with me too?!”
“I’m down for it if you are.”
“Nah, I’d probably end up getting myself killed if we fought every time...” he said. “Anyway, thanks. I’m Lahti. Nice to meet you.”
“Inglis. Same here.”
“I’m not from here. I come from Alcard.”
Inglis thought, Alcard—that’s the subarctic country that neighbors us, Karelia, to the north. It’s a harsh climate to scrape out a living in, but at least the dry weather means there isn’t much chance for the Prism Flow to fall, though there are still some threats from magicite beasts.
“Oh! So you’re an exchange student?”
“Yep. It’s nice to be able to take in the sun down here.”
“It is, yeah. Hey, is that Pullum girl from there too?”
“Hmm? Her? Yeah.”
“So you were probably sent here to learn to be her squire, right? I’m the same. I’m training to be Rafinha Bilford’s.”
“The holy knight’s sister, right? I guess we’re kinda like that, maybe.”
“Really?”
“But I really do want to get good at piloting a Flygear so I can be useful taking on magicite beasts! And there’s nowhere else I’m gonna learn that, so I deliberately tried to become an exchange student! All right, that’s enough of a break! I can’t stand waiting like this. Let’s get up there in Flygears!”
“Yeah. You’re right.”
Inglis and Lahti checked in with the flight instructors stationed at the dock, and took off in separate Flygear units before long.
“All right! We’re free until the others get here! Let’s take these things out for a spin!” As they pulled out over the lake, Lahti opened his throttle.
“Yeah!” Inglis followed. There was no sign of any magicite beasts today, so time to get some flying in!
“All right!”
“Wow! Pretty good!”
Lahti’s Flygear cut an arc through the sky, moving forward in turns that drew spirals without ever slowing down. His ascents, his rolls—they were all perfectly swift and precise. Inglis’s direct path paled in comparison. It seemed like he really was a born aviator.
“Heh heh heh! I’ve gotta have at least one thing I’m better at, or it would be no fair, right?” Lahti pulled just ahead of Inglis, matching her pace as he shouted back. With her throttle already wide open, there was no way she could catch up.
That got on her nerves a little bit. “Oh, I’ll catch you!” Inglis extended a hand backward and fired off an Aether Strike!
Whooosh!
The pale blue blast of energy tore up the surface of the lake behind her, but that wasn’t the point of her attack. Using the recoil of the blast, she sped up, pulling ahead of Lahti for a moment.
“Whoa?! What the heck was that, Inglis?!”
“I don’t like to lose either.”
“I’m not worried about that! I’m worried about the cannon-like light you just pulled out of nowhere! You don’t even have a Rune. How in the world...?”
“I’ve been practicing.”
“That’s not really what I’m concerned about!”
“Anyway, I’ve got you beat in speed.”
“Sure, but how about handling?”
“You’ve got me there. I’ve never seen anyone fly like that. You have to teach me how.”
“Sure thing.”
As their race drew to a close, Marquez and the other students finally drifted into the Flygear port, and the group’s flight lessons began. Even then, Lahti’s talents were head and shoulders above the others to the surprised delight of Marquez.
And thus, the squires’ separate training concluded for a time. The next day was lectures and joint combat training. So was the day after. However, that night, Miriela called for Inglis and her friends.
“What do you need, Principal Miriela?” Inglis asked after being admitted to the principal’s office.
“Ah, Inglis, Rafinha, Leone. Remember when you protected that ship from a magicite beast while I was showing you the Flygear dock? Its owner was very impressed and would like to extend an invitation—”
“Wow! Is he treating us to dinner?” Rafinha’s ears perked up.
“It appears so.”
“Who is he, anyway?” Inglis asked.
“He appears to be the owner of the Rambach Company.”
Inglis and Rafinha stifled their shocked gasps. That was a name they hadn’t heard in a long time.
Rafinha whispered, “Chris, is that them? Rahl’s—”
“Yeah. That’s Rahl’s father’s company.” But Rahl had become a Highlander. Wouldn’t his father have too? So why was the company still around?
There was no way to find out but to accept the invitation.
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