Whenever I had time, I visited Bertheim's mansion.
He'd asked me to keep a lonely old man company, so I should go drink tea and chat with him. In truth, the reason I maintained this relationship with Bertheim was that I needed to get close to this walking treasury of connections. I literally had none.
"You still haven't found Klugen?" I asked.
"I've sent people to investigate, but he seems to be hiding somewhere in the sewers. Searching any further would be too difficult, so I've given up for now," Bertheim replied.
"Someone who's been in hiding for years won't be easy to find."
After Günter von Klugen escaped, Bertheim had sent people to search, but nothing turned up. When they'd investigated the sewers, they found they'd been built during Roman times, so there was almost no information about their exact scale or layout. In other words, an underground labyrinth.
I could easily find him using the Searcher Scouter, but honestly, I had no desire to face him again. I wasn't foolish enough to risk my life over pride. Unless I ran into him somewhere by sheer bad luck, there wouldn't be any reason to fight.
Anyway, the knight Bertheim had promised to introduce me to was taking an eternity to arrange. He kept making me wait. I didn't know what kind of impossibly high-status family this was, but I was growing impatient. I needed to train Fühlen as soon as possible—that way, even if I encountered Klugen later, I wouldn't get pushed around so pathetically.
"Just wait a bit longer. Things are more complicated than expected, so it's taking time."
"Is this person worth waiting this long for?"
"What if I stake this old man's honor on it?"
You don't really need to stake that much.
"I'll wait patiently for the summons. Oh, could I ask for one more introduction?"
"Since I've made you wait, I can do that much. What kind of person?"
"My retainers can't even write their own names. If they're serving nobility, shouldn't they at least know how to read and write? I don't care what it costs—I'd like an introduction to a good teacher."
Since I was tapping into his connections anyway, I might as well get a teacher out of it too. Bertheim introduced me to a liturgical priest from the court clergy. He said he'd notify him through Göring beforehand, so I should visit Liturgical Priest Georg and hire one of his students as a teacher.
A liturgical priest was, as far as I knew, second-in-command of the court clergy, right? The person who presided over all the nation's liturgies. Wait, was it really all right to just introduce someone of that rank? And wasn't the court clergy openly opposed to me? I didn't want to get dragged into trouble, so I declined.
"Don't you have any less daunting connections?"
"Then look into students from the duchy university. Most students work as tutors for noble families to cover their tuition."
Hmm? That was a good idea, actually.
I'd look into it later.
But the next day, Göring, who arrived early in the morning, suddenly escorted me to the royal castle. Why the royal castle all of a sudden? Did I have any reason to visit the royal castle? Except for my hereditary knighthood, there was currently no particular cause for me to set foot in the royal castle.
Plus, with my status, I didn't even meet the qualifications for an audience.
You needed to be at least a decurion to reach the minimum threshold.
Even then, you had to wait several days before an audience was granted.
"I-I'm entering the royal castle for the first time. What do I do?"
"Calm down, Ted. You're not planning to embarrass Sir Wolfgang, are you?"
"Of course not! Huff! Huff!"
I'd brought Ted and Oscar as attendants. Maybe I should've just brought Oscar.
Why had Bertheim summoned me to the royal castle?
Turning over various possibilities in my mind, I passed through stone walls so magnificent and massive they made me feel small, and entered the wide garden within the castle grounds. In the middle of that garden, nine men were drilling in sync with commands shouted by their captain.
Ha! Ha! Ha!
They moved in unison, but it looked like they hadn't been training long.
Bertheim was enjoying refreshments in the cool shade. Beside him were two strikingly handsome boys. Could those boys be the knights he was introducing me to? Bertheim spotted me and waved. Then the men who'd been training all stopped at once, and their gazes fixed on me.
Rather embarrassing.
What the hell? Was this some new form of hazing?
"Welcome, Sir Streit. Sorry for catching you off guard," Bertheim said.
"Marquis, what's this all about? Summoning me to the royal castle out of nowhere," I asked.
"There's someone I want to introduce you to, so don't worry too much."
Someone to introduce? If it was a noble Bertheim had to address with honorifics, it would have to be royalty, right? My gaze turned to the boy sitting at ease—a pretty boy who seemed older than me. Strikingly handsome. The boy standing behind him was also quite good-looking.
Sabine would've lost her mind if she'd seen these two.
Both boys had a naturally aristocratic air about them.
I wasn't bad-looking myself, but compared to these two, I definitely fell short. But I'd seen these handsome boys somewhere before. Where had it been? Ah, now I remembered. They'd been a famous duo you'd inevitably cross paths with at least once when playing Medieval Knight.
"I am this nation's crown prince, Franz Ludwig von Altringen. This is my close associate, Leo von Vermeer. I've heard about you from the Marquis. They say you're strong enough to have no equal in your generation?"
I'd never expected to encounter the crown prince duo, famous among players, this quickly. To begin with, a lowly hereditary knight who hadn't even been knighted had no business receiving an audience with the crown prince. You needed to be at least a decurion to meet the minimum qualifications.
Not just any noble could meet the crown prince.
I simply hadn't expected to meet him under such unlikely circumstances.
"You overpraise me, Your Highness. I'm merely a lowly knight who hasn't even been knighted yet."
"If you were just an ordinary lowly knight, the Marquis wouldn't have introduced you to me. Admittedly, status was a considerable issue, but this isn't an audience chamber—it's a garden, so there's no need to stand on formality. If you're looking for sparring partners, how about testing yourself against my guard? Except for the guard captain, none have seen real combat yet. I'd be grateful if you, having been through fierce battles, could show them a thing or two," the crown prince continued.
The men training were guardsmen—officially knighted knights and, in a sense, my seniors. But he was asking me, not even knighted yet, to instruct them? The guardsmen's eyes held a mix of competitive fire and hostility as they looked at me.
Naturally.
Being slighted by their lord like that, of course their feelings toward me wouldn't be warm.
This looked like it would turn into a fight, not a sparring session.
Had Bertheim and the crown prince conspired to arrange this little stage?
"Marquis, this is somewhat different from what I had in mind," I said.
"I'm sorry. I couldn't find the opponent you wanted, so I had no choice but to introduce you to His Highness. And His Highness happened to be looking for talent like you," Bertheim explained.
Even so, wasn't this a bit much?
The crown prince had said he wouldn't worry about formalities since we were in the garden, but it was still an unofficial audience, and I was more flustered than anyone by this situation. It had been beyond anything I'd anticipated.
"Don't be flustered. Think of it as a golden opportunity. Do you know how many nobles pay through the nose just to get acquainted with His Highness? Seize it."
"...You're right. This would be an honor for someone of my standing."
"If it weren't for the Marquis's introduction, I wouldn't have gone to the trouble of arranging this meeting."
Bertheim had essentially handed me the most valuable connection possible. If this was the person who'd become the next Grand Duke, that was an extraordinary privilege. But I was still suspicious: why was Bertheim showing me such generosity? Be wary of kindness without reason. That old adage flickered through my mind.
But regardless of Bertheim's motives, it was undeniably an opportunity.
"Marquis, shall we make a wager?" the crown prince asked.
"Oh, a wager? Count me in. I'll bet one silver coin on Sir Streit," Bertheim said.
"...I was going to bet on him first. Then one silver coin on the guard. Leo, you bet too."
"I'll also bet on the guard."
Now they were placing bets. Was the crown prince really this sort of character? I knew the crown prince duo had been famous among players, but unfortunately I didn't know the specifics. I'd repeated only lord knight–related quests, so I'd skipped most royal castle quests.
Should've done the royal castle quests if I'd known.
Well, I'd never imagined I'd actually end up inside this Medieval Knight world.
Just idle griping.
But suddenly the guards' eyes blazed with a spark of an entirely different kind.
"Your Highness! If I defeat Sir Streit, please give me that silver coin!" one guard shouted.
"That sounds good. I'll give one silver coin to anyone who defeats Sir Streit," the crown prince announced.
"Wow! One silver coin! No more choking down black bread!"
"I'm first!"
Weren't these men a little too excited about one silver coin? And black bread? The crown prince's guardsmen weren't going around half-starved, were they? Facing the eager guard, I gripped the wooden sword handed to me by a waiting attendant—a sensible precaution, since sparring with real swords would easily cause injuries.
Was it because I'd grown too accustomed to real blades?
The wooden sword felt slightly off somehow.
...But how had I ended up here?