NOVEL NEXT Chapter 8 - Dispatching the Expedition Knight Order
How many days had passed since I met Miss Luna at the Wydro residence and returned home?
The atmosphere in the house was more peaceful than I expected.
I wondered if it was because Andrew, who was receiving treatment, wasn’t at home,
but in fact, I couldn’t understand why Adrian and Lady Cordelia were so quiet.
It wouldn’t have been strange if they had come to find me, poured out criticism, asked about the responsibility for Andrew’s injury,
or launched a suffocating exploration-like interrogation, asking if I had been hiding my skills all along.
But
For some reason, the two of them hadn’t shown themselves in front of me as if they had made a promise,
and thanks to that, I had been experiencing unexpected peaceful freedom for several days.
Chirp chirp
Chirp
Sparrows fly in pairs behind the dense branches.
Although I had lived in this house for 20 years, I could count on one hand the times I had walked around this peacefully.
As I walked along the path with my hands behind my back, I suddenly thought that the scenery inside the castle was quite beautiful.
‘Perhaps I haven’t been enjoying this world enough all this time.’
Just realizing that one fact that I’m living as a character in a novel,
I was able to look at myself a bit more from a third-person perspective.
I guess when you have a goal and the will to achieve that goal, your attitude towards life naturally changes.
“Hah!”
“Hah!”
“Hah!”
Lost in various thoughts as I walked, I had somehow reached near the training ground of the family’s knight order.
Until recently, when I had no talent for swordsmanship, even peeking at the family knight order’s training was far beyond my reach.
Although I was the son of the head of the family, because neither the servants nor the knight order members respected me,
I shrank back more, watching my own behavior, and seemed to have put self-imposed restrictions on my range of actions.
But,
Now, for some reason, all those things that used to bother me felt quite ridiculous.
“Hah!! Heave!!”
Before I knew it, I was naturally watching the members’ training.
Resonant shouts and disciplined movements
All the members were creating a wonderful picture, moving in perfect harmony as if they were one body.
“Heh, that guy… his serious expression is funny?”
Among the group of about a dozen, my eyes fell on Raymond, who was swinging his sword with the loudest shout and the most force.
That guy who’s more diligent than anyone
Feeling sorry for him, who was facing various discriminations within the knight order for being close to me, I found myself cheering for his training in my heart.
But,
Thud
“Team Leader Aiden… I’m sorry, but you invaded my step range-“
“Has this bastard gone crazy? I accepted you as a team member and helped with your training, and now you’re trying to match the team leader? Are you going to act up without knowing your place like that bastard Eden?”
“……”
“Not answering? Are you upset because I insulted your friend?”
“Isn’t this irrelevant to the training? Since it’s training to prepare for real combat, shouldn’t we focus on realigning our disrupted rhythm-“
“Look at how this bastard talks. You be the team leader then”
It was clearly a provocation.
Maybe he even invaded the step range on purpose.
Raymond was trying to talk it out nicely for the sake of the team atmosphere, but that Team Leader Aiden didn’t seem like he would let it go easily.
“It’s not the fault of your friend Raymond”
Startled
When I turned my head, father was standing next to me, looking at the same place as me, without me knowing when he had arrived.
“It seems that friend’s position within the knight order is quite poor, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, it seems so.”
I answered calmly, trying not to show my surprised appearance.
“This won’t do… For a knight, not only skill but also the hierarchical relationship with colleagues is very important. If he keeps getting trampled like that every day, no matter how much skill he builds, he won’t be able to become a senior knight. Eden, isn’t he your friend? Why don’t you go help him?”
What does this mean?
It seemed that father was the one launching an exploration towards me.
Until now, father hadn’t been a person who maintained a neutral stance.
He had shown one-sided favoritism towards Lady Cordelia’s children,
that is, Andrew, Adrian, and sister Christina.
For me, he just kept me alive out of a sense of duty, without showing even the slightest interest.
But
Now he’s urging me with sparkling eyes.
He’s pushing me to show my skills again, to surprise him.
It was hard to gauge father’s intentions.
“The financial support we promised from Wydro Hanson has arrived. It seems you ended your conversation with his daughter well? Good job.”
Suddenly?
When I just glanced at him without any particular answer to father’s abrupt words, he continued speaking.
“Now it’s our turn. We need to let the world know that our family has become the backing for the Wydro family. There was also a request from Wydro Hanson. Select some knights from the family and accompany Wydro’s next trade expedition. You can take a few of them with you, right? Try to choose some useful ones. Ah, it would be better if they’re knights who can be faithful to your orders.”
Take family knights to accompany Wydro’s trade expedition?
Well, I expected that there would be similar requests at some point, given that the marriage promise was based on a give-and-take premise…
But I didn’t expect father to directly ask me to lead the knight order…
It seems that
Things are changing faster than I thought.
Well, why don’t I show him the sword dance he wants to see
Without any particular answer, I walked away from father’s side to the front of the training knight order.
“It… it’s Young Master Eden.”
“What… why did he come…”
Voices using honorifics that they probably wouldn’t use normally can be heard, probably thinking it’s within earshot.
Well, they can say whatever they want behind my back,
but the “that bastard Eden” that Team Leader Aiden spat out earlier was sufficiently unpleasant.
“For someone who’s a team leader, you can’t even match your movement properly?”
“E… Eden…..”
“Eden? Am I your friend?”
“……”
Whether he was surprised by my sudden appearance, or he didn’t expect me to come on so strongly,
Team Leader Aiden lost his words for a moment like a mute who had eaten honey.
“This is knight training. I would appreciate it if you, Young Master, didn’t interfere.”
Although he used honorifics, it was still a dismissal full of nuances that seemed to look down on me.
“Knight training… I didn’t recognize it, I thought it was just a scene of local thugs picking a fight”
Team Leader Aiden’s face visibly crumpled.
“Young Master Eden, your words are too harsh. While I am indeed part of the family knight order, I’m not in a position to receive such insults from you. Each knight is an independent combat force. Please be careful with your words and actions.”
“I’ll keep that in mind”
As I mocked and scratched at him, Aiden’s face contorted to the point where it could hardly get any worse.
“Please vacate the-“
“I intend to dispatch your team to accompany me on my journey.”
“What… what do you mean-“
“It seems I need to run an errand for father, that is, Baron David Castillo.”
As I finished speaking and threw my gaze to the side, Aiden and all the other knights followed my gaze and confirmed father’s presence.
The knights automatically paid their respects.
I waited for a moment for their ceremony to finish before continuing my words.
“I said I would dispatch your team, but you don’t need to worry about it.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“What could it mean?”
“……Young Master. Are you coming here to cause trouble because I had a small argument with Raymond, who is close to you? Do you know well about the knight order’s combat formation?”
“I might not know much about combat formations, but I think I know quite a bit about the steps of someone who uses a sword. Just now, it was clearly a scene where you were about to cause a dangerous situation by invading Raymond’s area with your terrible steps, breaking the formation and causing swords to tangle.”
“Haa…”
Aiden put his hand on his head, then openly sneered as he poured out his words.
“Do you think you’ve suddenly become a master of swordsmanship because you luckily won against Young Master Andrew in a duel?”
“Do we need long words? If you don’t believe me, it’ll be quicker to show you with our bodies. Draw your real sword. I’ll face you with this reverse-edged sword where the blade is on the back. Don’t worry about any unfortunate accidents. At most, it will end with your two legs broken like Young Master Andrew. The blade part is blunt, you see.”
“If I win, you will stop interfering with our training and quietly go on your way. Understand?”
“Of course. However, if I win, your team members will elect a new team leader, and they will accompany me on my errand.”
Ching
To prevent the conversation from dragging on any longer, I drew the reverse-edged sword.
The crisp sound of the blade coming out of the scabbard drew all the other knight order members around.
After confirming the blade part of the drawn reverse-edged sword with his own eyes, Aiden, ridiculously, showed a sardonic smile as he received a real sword.
And, for a while, Aiden fell into a state where he couldn’t invade anyone else’s step range.
Because his two legs were broken so miserably that it was impossible for him to even stand on the ground, let alone kick off from it.