CHAPTER 5 The Vesteria Royal Guard

Our private jet arrived at the Arkstoria mansion at seven in the morning the next day.

“Thank you for everything, President. That was a really great experience.”

“Thank you very much. It was a lot of fun!”

“Yawn… Thanks.”

I expressed my gratitude to her alongside Lia and Rose.

“Hmm-hmm, you’re very welcome. See you at the academy,” Shii responded with a kind smile.

Chairwoman Reia, who’d traveled back with us, cleared her throat.

“You kids will face much temptation during summer break but try not to have too much fun!”

She attempted to bring the summer training camp to a close by giving us a very teacher-like warning.

Doesn’t hold much weight coming from her, though.

The chairwoman had gotten herself wasted just the previous night by having a drinking contest for the ages with Ferris. We all ignored her with strained smiles.

“Want to head to our dorms?” I proposed.

“Yeah, let’s go,” responded Lia.

“I need a nap…,” said Rose, yawning.

The three of us started to walk back toward the Thousand Blade Academy dorms.

“I’ll accompany you partway. I’d normally just return home, but I have an unusual guest today. It’s a real pain, but as the chairwoman, I need to meet with them,” Reia said with a sigh.

We walked through the winding streets of Aurest, eventually arriving at Thousand Blade Academy. Rose stopped at a corner leading to multiple buildings.

“Yawn… My dorm is this way. See you later…”

She rubbed an eye with her left hand and waved with her right.

“Bye, Rose,” I said.

“Make sure you don’t oversleep in the morning,” cautioned Lia.

“Take care of yourself!” the chairwoman added.

We continued on to the dorm where Lia and I lived in. A nice breeze blew past us.

“The wind feels so good.”

“It really does.”

“I couldn’t agree more!”

After a few minutes, I caught sight of a swordsman ahead of us wearing dark-blue, expensive-looking clothes.

That outfit is really fancy. I wonder if he’s a noble.

A moment later, the swordsman did something unexpected.

“Hegemonic Style—Annihilation!”

He rushed toward me and aggressively slashed his blade.

“Huh?!”

I drew my weapon and blocked the move just in the nick of time.

Geez, he’s strong…

From the incredible speed and weight behind his blow, I could tell he was no ordinary swordsman. Intriguingly, he used the same School of Swordcraft as Lia.

“Wh-what is this about?!” I asked.

“Back away from Her Highness, you boorish swine!”

The regal fighter glared at me with a face full of rage.

Did he say Her Highness?

“C-Claude?! What are you doing here?!” asked Lia.

“Hey, long time no see, Claude!” greeted the chairwoman.

They both seemed to know him.

His angry eyes were piercing and sharp. His black, glossy hair was a little long, and he wore resplendent clothes typical of the nobility. I guessed he was around fifteen years old. At about 165 centimeters tall, he was slightly shorter than me.

“Um…could you please introduce us, Lia?” I asked.

“Ah, sorry. This is Claude Stroganof, the captain of the Vesteria Royal Guard. I thought the Royal Guard was busy with their duties at home…,” Lia told me.

“I—I see…”

I didn’t know why he’d assaulted me out of the blue, but I supposed he was an ally.

“It’s so nice to see you again, Your Highness! Reia, explain yourself! How could you let such a filthy maggot get near her?!”

“Filthy maggot”?

We hadn’t even said a word to each other yet… Talk about uncalled for.

Chairwoman Reia shook her head in disbelief in response to Claude’s reprimand.

“Cool your jets, Claude. These two have a…special relationship,” she said.

“S-special, you say?! D-don’t tell me…a-are they l-l-l-overs?!” stammered Claude, pale-faced and trembling.

“Oh, no. It’s much more extreme than that. Their relationship is one of master and servant—put bluntly, she’s his slave.”

The chairwoman revealed the shocking truth.

“Princess Lia…is a slave? …Huh?”

Claude’s face went totally blank.

“Ch-Chairwoman?!”

“R-Reia?! Why did you tell Claude that?!”

“Ha-ha-ha! What would be the point in lying?”

She burst out laughing.

I can’t believe her!

The maniac was totally enjoying this.

Crap, how can we talk our way out of this?!

We were speaking with the captain of the Vesteria Royal Guard. I couldn’t begin to imagine the trouble that would occur if he knew that Lia was “under my command.”

“Y-Your Highness…is this true?” he asked Lia directly.

This is our chance!

If she just gave a firm no, that would put an end to this nonsense. Chairwoman Reia’s horrible transgression would come to nothing!

But that’s not what she did.

“Um, well…y-yeah, it is…”

Instead, she blushed and nodded.

Well…honesty is one of her virtues…

That was a good trait for anyone to have, and I didn’t want her to change that about herself.

Time and place, though! Time and place!

In this situation, a white lie would have been best.

Lia’s confirmation of the awful truth may as well have been a spear through Claude’s heart.

“Y-you can’t be… Princess Lia… A slave…?”

The shock was so great that he fainted on the spot.

“C-Claude?! Get up, Claude!” Lia yelled.

“Ha-ha-ha, this is about to get real interesting!” the chairwoman guffawed, clapping me on the back.

…This is bad. This is the worst situation I’ve faced yet.

I’d enslaved the princess of a nation, even if I didn’t treat her as such. That was a big deal. To make matters worse, I’d heard that Lia’s father was as overprotective as they came.

Ugh…why do these things always happen to me…?

I heaved a huge side and stared up at the blue sky.

---

Afterward, Chairwoman Reia carried the unconscious Claude to the academy’s infirmary. The nurse told us he had symptoms of anemia brought on by significant stress, but he would wake soon after some rest. When she asked the chairwoman what happened, the nurse received the vague answer that he’d “received some shocking news.”

We waited for about ten minutes before Claude stirred.

“Urgh…where am I…?”

He slowly opened his eyes in the bed he had been placed in.

“Ah, you’re awake!” Lia exclaimed.

“Y-Your Highness? Thank goodness. Everything was just a vision after all…,” mumbled Claude.

“…Huh?”

He smiled softly with relief.

“It was the strangest dream… You’d left to study abroad and had become the slave of some repulsive maggot… What a horrible nightmare.”

“U-um…that wasn’t a dream.”

“What do you mean? …Huh?!”

Claude’s gaze darted around the room and landed on me.

“You’re the maggot! No, that was all real…”

He jumped out of bed and glared at me with a mixture of animosity and outright loathing.

“Nice to meet you, Claude. I’m Allen Rodol.”

I wasn’t really a fan of being compared to vermin, so I decided to give him my name. I didn’t get the response I was looking for, though.

“I couldn’t care less about your name, you savage pig! Stay away from Princess Lia!”

He stared at me with total hostility. I could see I wasn’t going to be able to have a conversation with him.

Wh-what should I do…?

I wanted to keep the information he’d learned between us. It was of the utmost importance that we avoided the king of Vesteria finding out about the nature of the relationship between Lia and me.

I need to get him to talk to me somehow…

I sighed internally. This was obviously going to be difficult.

---

---

“How dare you, Claude! You’re going too far with your words! Apologize to Allen!” Lia snapped, clearly offended.

“Y-Your Highness? You trust this filthy maggot completely, don’t you…?” Claude gritted his teeth, visibly trembling after Lia’s scolding. “You’ve always been a little clumsy… He must be deceiving you somehow!”

“W-wanna repeat that?!”

Claude ignored Lia and continued to glare at me.

“Remember this, maggot! I’m going to give you hell to pay! And, Your Highness…I promise to free you from his evil clutches! For now, we part. I’ll see you again soon.”

He then jumped out of the infirmary window.

“…Pfft, ha-ha-ha! Claude never fails to crack me up! I’ve always enjoyed teasing that lunkhead!”

Chairwoman Reia had been fighting hard to keep a straight face, but the moment Claude left, she grabbed her stomach and burst out with laughter.

“Ugh…Chairwoman?”

“R-Reia! What the hell are you trying to do here?!”

“Hmm-hmm, don’t give me that look. It was just a little prank.”

But the repercussions of this would greatly surpass the level of a “little prank”…

“Phew… Getting serious for a moment, Claude will most likely try to approach Allen before long. At that point, you’ll have a choice—explain the full situation to show there’s no problem or fabricate a story to cover it up.”

“Both of those options sound like a pain…,” I responded.

Claude had looked like he was going to erupt with fury. I didn’t think he was going to listen to us.

“You’ll just have to do your best! Anyway, that’s my business taken care of, so I’m off!”

The chairwoman swiveled and left the infirmary. It seemed that Claude was the unusual guest she’d mentioned earlier.

“Haah…we should head home, too,” I said, sighing.

“Claude could strike, anywhere, day or night… You need to be careful, Allen,” Lia warned.

“Will do.”

We left the infirmary and returned to our dorm.

---

A full day passed without any sign of Claude.

I can’t let my guard down, though.

He was probably planning his attack at this very moment. I needed to be ready for him at all times.

“Man…guess I’ll head back.”

It was seven in the morning. I finished my daily morning practice swings and returned to the dorm.

“Yawn… Oh, morning, Allen. You’re up early again.”

Lia gave me a drowsy wave, still in her pajamas. She must have just woken up.

“Good morning, Lia. Oh yeah, you got a letter.”

I handed her the envelope I found in our mailbox.

“For me? Who’s it from?”

“I dunno. There’s no name on it.”

Somebody must have dropped it directly into our mailbox.

“Oh no!”

There was a bombastic red seal on the back of the envelope.

“Wh-what is it?” I asked.

“This is a letter from my father…,” she answered.

“Your father… Do you mean the king of Vesteria?!”

“Yeah. This doesn’t bode well…”

This could only be about one thing. Claude must have returned and reported to the king immediately.

“Well…won’t know until we read it.”

“Y-yeah…”

She opened the envelope carefully and took out a folded, high-quality piece of paper. The following was written on the letter in neat handwriting.

To my beloved Lia,

I heard an interesting story from Claude. It sounds like you’re having trouble adjusting to your new environment. In fact, I’ve been so worried that I haven’t been able to focus on my duties. How about you return home for summer break?

I’ve sent a royal aircraft to arrive at Thousand Blade Academy on July 6 at ten in the morning. Make sure you bring your friend Allen Rodol with you. I can’t wait to meet him.

I love you.

From,

Papa

At first glance, the letter seemed nice and innocent. However, the hidden anger oozing from his words was plain to see.

“F-Father is really pissed…”

“Yeah, that’s pretty clear…”

He had just learned that his beloved daughter, whom he’d allowed to study abroad, had become a slave to some guy he knew nothing about. It was a natural reaction.

Claude being the one to report this is only made matters worse.

I was sure he’d embellished the story as much as he could.

“Wh-what should we do, Allen?! July sixth is today!”

“…We have no choice but to go.”

This was the king of a nation we were dealing with. He was bound to be a much wiser and more mature person than Claude. I was sure he would understand if we gave him the full story.

“S-sorry about this… I’ve given you nothing but grief,” Lia apologized.

“Don’t worry about it. We need to focus on preparing for this trip. Time is already running short.”

“Y-yeah, you’re right… Thanks.”

Lia ran into the dressing room.

“Geez…I can’t believe this…”

Receiving a direct summons from a king was quite overwhelming for a simple student like me.

First, Veneria Island, and now across the sea to Vesteria Kingdom… I’m not going to get any rest this summer vacation, am I…?

Sighing, I began to pack for the trip.