Please Vote for Your Knight! Chapter 14

David didn’t answer, merely letting out a small chuckle.

The participant misunderstood it as a sign of agreement and grinned sheepishly.

‘He doesn’t know a thing.’

That participant—and Kilman’s group—were mistaken about something.

David looked down at the training grounds again.

The participant who had just sneered at Kusto had dark circles under his eyes.

He had overtrained late into the night in an attempt to surpass Kusto, and the fatigue had accumulated.

Kusto, on the other hand, showed no sign of exhaustion.

He looked as though this kind of hardship was simply part of his daily life.

Considering his past, that was only natural.

‘Kusto must be accustomed to going without food or sleep and keeping himself moving because of his experiences as a slave.’

Faction trainees and apprentice knights went through grueling training as well.

But they didn’t suffer nearly as much as slaves did.

At least they trained while being treated like human beings.

In other words, no matter how desperately Kilman’s group struggled, training like Kusto did was simply too much for them.

‘And yet they were so irritated by Kusto that they tried to surpass him.’

If people who ate well, maintained regular routines, and trained properly tried to imitate this method, they would only ruin their condition.

Dimitri, Raphael, and Maurice knew that, which was why they trained in moderation before heading inside.

But Kilman’s foolish group had overexerted themselves in an attempt to protect their pride.

‘Their physical patterns must be disrupted by now.’

The effects would surely be significant when the grade reevaluation took place in two days.

‘Without even realizing it, Kusto has eliminated his competitors.’

For some reason, David felt rather pleased.

 

***

 

The day before the reevaluation.

Edith and the Valkyria gathered together.

It was for a meeting.

“Everyone knows how we’re conducting the grade reevaluation tomorrow, right?”

“Of course, Your Highness.”

“Yes.”

“It sounds like it’ll be really fun! The participants are going to be so surprised, right?”

The Valkyria answered.

Edith nodded and opened her notebook.

“I watched them through the video orbs as well, but I’d like to hear what you felt while personally training them. Anyone who particularly stood out, for example.”

“Our fifth-grade group is so diverse that it’s hard to single out just one person.”

At Mila’s words, everyone except Ines burst out laughing.

“They do work hard, though.”

“Of course, Your Highness. But ‘working hard’ alone isn’t enough, is it? Ah! Right. There is one person who stood out. Maurice Arnaud…”

“The heir to the Arnaud Trading Company?”

“Yes. He’s surprisingly cheerful for someone in fifth grade. And he practices hard, too. I think his grade will probably go up during the reevaluation.”

“But why did that fellow enter Cartamen in the first place?”

Ines finally spoke.

Mila tilted her head.

“I’m not sure. He said his dream was to become a knight.”

“Someone like that couldn’t possibly be that bad at fighting.”

“He can shoot a bow fairly well.”

“Rich people like hunting as a hobby, so they generally know how to use a bow. But overall, he’s terrible, isn’t he? Why else would we have given him fifth grade? If he had that much wealth and dreamed of becoming a knight, he would’ve taken private lessons and been much better than he is now.”

“I think it has something to do with his family circumstances.”

Edith spoke up.

The Valkyria  focused their attention on her.

“The current head of the Arnaud Trading Company, Maurice’s father, has been married five times. And he has a lot of children. On top of that, Maurice’s current stepmother wants to make her own children the heirs. Maurice is the son of a former wife, so naturally, he’d be under pressure from her.”

“So he entered Cartamen to raise his honor and strengthen his position as the heir.”

Ines spoke cynically.

Amont shrugged.

“Well, as long as he works hard, it doesn’t matter. Honestly, he’s hardly the only one who entered with ulterior motives.”

“Even with all those circumstances, you can’t tell from looking at him. He seems so easygoing and incredibly cheerful.”

Mila remarked, sounding surprised.

Edith added,

“Perhaps he’s actually enjoying the situation itself right now.”

“Gasp! If that’s the case, that’s a little scary.”

“I think it’s interesting. I’ll have to take a closer look at him tomorrow.”

Amont spoke as though he were looking forward to it.

“Didn’t anyone in the third or fourth grades particularly stand out to you, Ines?”

“Everyone in third and fourth grade was rather mediocre.”

Ines answered.

It was the response Edith had expected.

‘There’s no one there capable of meeting Ines’s demanding standards.’

Of course, there was one participant who had caught Edith’s attention.

A tiny fellow had been following around a rather large participant everywhere.

The former was a noble, while the latter, who kept avoiding him as though he were a nuisance, was a commoner who had been a sailor.

‘Apparently, they’re from the same region.’

Perhaps because of that, the tiny noble seemed eager to become friends with the sailor.

It might also have been because he didn’t know anyone here.

‘If I keep an eye on those two, maybe I’ll get to see some interesting scenes.’

Edith looked toward Amont expectantly.

“Our first- and second-grade participants have generally been quite satisfactory. They’ve followed the training well. The upper-ranked participants, including Sir David, have been stable as well.”

Amont spoke proudly.

But Edith was worried about that very point.

‘Wouldn’t it be boring if everything were just too perfect?’

Perhaps they needed to be given a little hardship after all…

Just then, Amont frowned as though he had remembered something.

“But there is one strange individual.”

“Strange individual?”

“Yes. You know Kusto, the second-grade participant, right?”

Edith’s eyes widened.

‘Was that why he seemed so bothered?’

During the training sessions she had watched through the video orbs,

Amont had been particularly harsh toward Kusto.

“Is Cartamen some kind of joke?”

“I don’t understand why you’re in second grade. Looking at you now, you’re a very solid fifth-grader.”

Even the participants who looked down on Kusto for being a slave were whispering among themselves, saying, “Isn’t that a little too harsh?”

‘It was almost as if he was deliberately trying to test Kusto’s limits.’

But Kusto’s skills were gradually improving.

He lacked the fundamentals, but since he had started from a completely blank slate, he was steadily building upon everything he learned and practiced.

At an astonishing speed.

Even in the horseback riding he had taught them as a trial a few days ago, Kusto had demonstrated respectable skill.

‘But what exactly made Amont dislike Kusto?’

“I really don’t understand that participant.”

As though answering Edith’s question, Amont spoke up.

“He must have developed bad habits from his experience in slave duels, but there’s no sign of any of them.”

Only then did Edith understand Amont’s feelings.

It wasn’t that he disliked Kusto.

He simply couldn’t make sense of him.

During the entry evaluation, Kusto had displayed habits in his martial arts that could be considered experience and know-how from one perspective, but stubbornness from another.

‘But what he’s doing now looks like a child learning swordsmanship for the first time.’

How was that possible when he had already spent so much time wielding a sword?

Could it be that he had no habits at all?

‘That can’t be.’

Even knights who followed an elite path from beginning to end developed bad habits during their training and often struggled to correct them.

‘And yet Kusto, who had to do whatever it took simply to survive, has no habits at all?’

Just as Amont had said, it was difficult to understand.

Impossible, even.

And fascinating.

“I think he’s deliberately hiding his abilities and participating in the training like a beginner. So I intend to push him to his limits and find out what he’s really capable of.”

Amont said.

 

***

 

The day of the grade reevaluation.

The participants gathered in the circular arena once again.

The difference this time was that each person had been assigned a seat before entering.

Kusto was number 11.

Dimitri was number 3, while Raphael and Maurice were numbers 26 and 52, respectively.

‘Then surely David must be…’

Number 1.

David was seated at the highest position.

Kusto tilted his head.

‘These must be the training rankings.’

But the grade reevaluation hadn’t even begun yet. Had they already determined the rankings?

‘Then why did they call us here?’

That wasn’t the only thing that puzzled him.

‘They gave me such a high ranking?’

Amont had seemed determined to chew Kusto up and spit him out.

Being number 11 was actually a fairly decent ranking, even among the second-grade participants.

‘I thought my grade would drop after getting scolded so much.’

Number 11 meant he was still second grade, and not even a particularly low-ranked one at that.

Because of the grade changes during the special training period, there were now eight first-grade participants and fifteen second-grade participants.

Twenty-three in total.

‘Could it be that Amont didn’t determine the rankings by himself?’

“Oh! Looks like they’re going to demonstrate swordsmanship over there!”

Just then, Maurice’s voice came from the seats below.

‘He certainly has a loud voice.’

Kusto sat down and looked toward the place Maurice was pointing.

The center of the arena.

A stage-like structure had been installed there.

At that moment, Kilman spoke from a seat slightly higher than Kusto’s.

“There’s no one who still hasn’t prepared their swordsmanship demonstration, right?”

He was ranked fifth. Although he had received harsh criticism for his adherence to his faction’s methods, his actual skills were quite good.

On top of that, he at least made an effort to correct the things he was criticized for, which seemed to have earned him a high ranking.

Of course, whenever Amont wasn’t around, he complained like crazy.

“We’ve practiced this much, so if you’re still at the basic level, I swear on Cartamen’s honor that I won’t let it slide.”

He deliberately spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear.

Several participants flinched and lowered their heads.

Kusto let out a quiet snort of laughter.

‘That guy must get his kicks out of picking fights.’

Still, if they were from the same region, couldn’t he show them a little more consideration?

Some of the third- and fourth-grade participants even seemed to stick together like a married couple.

‘Though it did look more like one-sided courtship.’

Soon, Edith and the Valkyria  appeared behind the judges’ seats.

“Did everyone train hard?”

“Yes!”

The participants answered Edith’s question with booming voices.

Quite a few participants had spent the entire week training without even returning home.

Most of them were brimming with confidence.

Of course, some participants in fourth and fifth grade, as well as a few from the higher grades whose training results had been poor, were looking rather dejected.

‘There are quite a lot of confident faces.’

Looking at the participants who were eager to show off what they could do, Edith called out,

“From this moment on, we will begin the grade reevaluation. The reevaluation event will be…!”

At that moment, a huge banner unfurled behind Edith and the judges.

Two crossed swords were emblazoned on the banner.

The participants, who had no idea what was coming, cheered.

Looking at their innocent faces, Edith said,

“The reevaluation event is one-on-one combat!”

“!”