What was that boy’s name again?
Riersha was still trying to recall the boy’s name when she sensed movement behind him — the boy who had just been knocked to the ground.
A moment later, the tent flap was wrenched aside, and a man walked in wearing an expression of barely contained irritation.
“Hah… Tie this little wretch up and throw him somewhere! To even think that anyone would be foolish enough to — unless they actually want to die together, every last one of them —!”
“Please calm yourself, Lord Bahamut. It wasn’t intentional, at the very least.”
“Even after this little brat nearly got me seriously hurt?!”
The commotion drew every eye inside the command tent.
That included Pernoa, who had been in the middle of receiving a report.
Finding himself the sudden center of attention, Bahamut made his movements even more dramatic. He huffed noisily, tossed his sword carelessly onto the table, and glared down at his reddened forearm.
The wound still throbbed.
Bahamut’s eyebrows drew together in irritation.
“Can’t you see it’s my right arm?! Do you have any idea how important an arm is to a knight?!”
He had nearly watched his entire promising career as a knight end in a single moment.
All because of one wretched little brat.
“How is any of this my fault?!”
The boy shouted back, fury blazing in his voice as he scrambled to his feet.
Bahamut let out a sneer and jabbed his index finger repeatedly into the boy’s forehead.
The boy planted his feet and tried to hold his ground, but the force behind it was enough to push him stumbling backward regardless.
“Oh, so it isn’t your fault? As if wandering into the forest without a shred of caution wasn’t enough — you threw my entire unit into chaos. What you’ve done is an extremely serious offense.”
Bahamut said it with a harsh edge and barked his next order at the men around him.
“What are you all standing there for? Didn’t I just say to tie him up?”
“I… yes, sir. We will. However — this boy’s father is the Marquess of Tetran.”
“What?”
“Tetran, sir.”
The knight shuffled forward hesitantly with a rope in hand, clearly reluctant to carry out the order.
The Tetran Marquessate was one of those knight houses that soldiers held in genuine respect.
The moment the name Tetran was spoken, Bahamut went still.
Of all people, he had gone and raised his voice at the son of a marquess. He felt a flicker of something uncomfortably close to regret — but…
Too many eyes on me right now.
He had already said what he’d said, and far too many people had heard every word of it.
Then again, what does it matter. I’ve heard the family is nearly finished anyway. And judging by the state of him, he looks nothing like someone who’d ever make it into the Imperial Knight Order.
The sorry state the boy had arrived in for the hunt said plenty on its own.
Bahamut let his gaze drop with thinly veiled contempt.
He didn’t like the look on the boy’s face — that unbroken expression, that unbowed stare.
Who did Tetran think they were anymore, that this boy dared to look up at him with eyes still burning like that?
“What’s your name?”
“…Kyle Tetran.”
“Out of respect for the Marquess, I won’t have you bound. Sit quietly in that corner and wait for your disciplinary decision.”
“……”
“You’ll never set foot in my unit anyway, so sit there and enjoy the view.”
Bahamut gave a dismissive smirk and turned toward the center of the tent, where the physicians had gathered to treat his injury.
Riersha had been watching the two of them argue this whole time, and the moment the name Kyle Tetran registered, she gave a quiet nod of recognition.
So that’s why I hadn’t seen him. He got swept into the forest.
She studied Kyle carefully.
Whatever had happened out there in the woods, his injuries looked far worse than those of the grown man still making such a fuss about his arm. Blood was running down from Kyle’s shoulder and dripping steadily onto the ground.
“Gata, Rosinante — that boy is hurt.”
“I’ll have the physicians informed.”
“But what did Kyle do wrong? Who is that man, and why is he so angry?”
“He’s the newly appointed Imperial Knight Commander. He received his appointment through a letter of recommendation from Duke Willias.”
“Duke Willias?”
“Yes. …Duke Willias has been putting considerable effort lately into placing his own people within the Imperial Palace. With the Empress providing little real support, he appears to be seeking another avenue.”
Riersha looked at Bahamut with an expression of quiet disbelief.
With Duke Willias standing behind him, it seemed everyone was content to look the other way no matter how far beneath a knight’s dignity his behavior fell.
She glanced in the direction where Pernoa was standing.
Pernoa had apparently lost interest in the scene entirely and returned his attention to his own work.
…Well. Strictly speaking, what just happened is an internal matter for the Imperial Knight Order.
The situation was outside the bounds of Pernoa’s authority.
And if Duke Willias himself was standing behind the Imperial Knight Commander…
There was no reason to go stirring up unnecessary trouble.
It might look cold-hearted, but it was the most sensible thing to do.
Riersha was about to pull her attention away from Kyle entirely.
There was something far more important she needed to focus on right now — namely, finding whoever had caused the monsters to go haywire during this year’s hunt.
Not only did the creature grow to that size without warning, it broke out of the containment array entirely. I need to ask Sion how something like that is even possible, and quickly.
By now the report would have reached the Mage Tower as well.
Riersha was reaching into her bag to retrieve her crystal orb when it happened.
“Why should I be disciplined?”
Kyle shoved aside the hands of the knights trying to usher him to the corner, his voice sharp and unrelenting.
As the commotion threatened to flare up again, Rosinante pressed his lips together, his expression deeply pained.
“This is a problem. The Young Duke absolutely detests this sort of — hah…”
“I know. I think Father would hate this situation too.”
“No.”
Riersha had been about to nod in sympathetic agreement when Rosinante shook his head to correct her. His face looked as though he might cry at any moment, and he smoothed his hair back several times in a row.
“He has been looking forward to exactly this kind of disruption for quite some time.”
“…Huh? You mean he doesn’t hate it?”
“There had already been some friction earlier, in the forest — between the army commanders and the Imperial Knight Order.”
“…Friction?”
“Yes. Apparently the Knight Commander suddenly declared that all command authority over the forest operations should be transferred to him, and backed it up with threats. He insisted it was only natural for the Imperial Knight Commander to hold full authority in an emergency situation.”
Riersha turned to look at Bahamut, her expression caught between surprise and disbelief.
He certainly didn’t look capable enough to be worthy of that kind of command…
“Because of that, everything has been falling further and further behind, and the Young Duke is on the verge of losing his patience entirely. Apparently the man dug in his heels, insisting the Imperial Knight Order ought to share responsibility for resolving this incident as well.”
“Why would he even push for that?”
“The journalists covering the hunt, most likely.”
He was worried about negative coverage of the Imperial Knight Order ending up in the papers.
Especially if people started saying the Knight Commander had been handed his position through connections rather than merit…
That would unravel into a chain of associated names, and eventually Duke Willias’s name would surface as well.
If that happened, Bahamut would be discarded without a second thought.
“He’s absolutely useless. At a time like this, all he can think about is protecting himself.”
He was a man entirely unworthy of the title of Knight Commander.
Rosinante grimaced in full agreement and gave a slow, pained nod.
Bahamut, who had been showing his arm to a physician, turned and walked toward Kyle with a face gone dangerously cold.
“What did you just say?”
“I asked what I did wrong.”
“…Oh, is that so? You genuinely don’t know what you did?”
“No. I don’t.”
Kyle Tetran glanced at the sword resting on the table and pointed at it.
“If anything, aren’t you the one who made a mistake, Lord Bahamut? You failed to properly deflect the attack from a mid-rank creature, got your arm injured in the process, and dropped your weapon.”
“You—!”
“On top of that, one of the creatures escaped — and yet you reported it as fully handled…”
“Shut your mouth right now!”
Bahamut lurched forward in a panic, trying desperately to silence Kyle.
But every word had already been heard.
From across the tent, Pernoa — who had been watching the uproar in composed silence — let out a low, quiet laugh.
It was barely a sound at all, and yet every person inside the command tent heard it clearly.
Rosinante covered his eyes with both hands.
“Oh, God. No.”
“……”
“We cannot afford a conflict with the Imperial Knight Order. Please. Please — Young Duke…”
Rosinante began to pray in earnest.
Pernoa took one measured step toward the tent, then another.
With every step he took, the people around him parted without a word, as if the motion had been rehearsed.
“You said something quite grand about the Imperial Knight Order bearing its fair share of responsibility — and now what was that? A creature escaped?”
“Th-this is the boy lying, sir. I handled every creature in my assigned sector. Every single one.”
“Your assigned sector?”
Those three words made Pernoa’s expression settle into something cold and knowing, and a thin, humorless smile crossed his lips.
He turned his head at a slight angle, his gaze fixing on Bahamut.
“I’ve been trying to let it go. But this I simply cannot overlook.”
“……”
“So if that creature was found within the jurisdiction of the Arachrene Ducal territory — are you telling me you were trying to pin that on me? Because that is exactly how it sounds from where I’m standing.”
At that, Bahamut went white.
Oh no.
“C-Commander! One of the creatures fled east, sir. What are we supposed to do?! We barely managed to handle the one we had. …There’s no way we can track it.”
“Leave it. That’s not our sector. Every creature found in our sector has been eliminated — file the report and close it.”
At the same time, everything that had happened in the Knoum Forest came rushing back through his mind.
