Chapter 15 – Daily Life

It was now Monday morning, two days after my triumphant victory in the epic clash between the two legions. 

Word had been spread all over the academy, with newsof my victory and use of unconventional tactics. Additionally, someone had even gone around talking about how much of a beauty I was.

Currently, there was still a few minutes before homeroom started. Nonetheless, there were people still gathered outside our door, looking into our classroom trying to get a look at the main character of the story. While I did admit that I was cute and could easily be considered attractive, but I was still twelve for goodness’ sake are these people all inclined to have weird thoughts about a twelve-year-old. I wanted to just hide in my bed, but we had our chivalry exam today. So, I  couldn't just miss it.

The students only left when Professor Ian shooed them away as class was about to start, but even then, he didn’t forget to congratulate me on my ‘fabulous victory’.

As we had an exam to do he didn’t linger on the topic and started to take attendance. Everyone had shown up to the exam as you would expect for being such an important one that could determine whether they could pick up a weapon in this course.

Professor Ian started to explain the rules under which we had to complete this exam. He also reminded us that if we failed this once we could try again a second time but if we still failed the exam after the second time we would be kicked out and would have to try again with the next cohort that started later this year.

Once he had finished explaining what we had to do he called Louise and I up to help him hand out the exams as class reps. I was getting the feeling that the role of the class rep was essentially just helping the teachers do the odd tasks.

Nonetheless, as a model student I performed the task that was expected of me and quickly handed out the exams to the participants and returned to my seat waiting for Professor Ian to start the exam.

Overall, the questions in the exam were easy as they were multiple choice. But there were many questions that you had to do. In the two-hour exam, we were expected to complete all two hundred questions. That meant we had far less than a minute to complete each question. However, having graduated from a prestigious university in my previous life these types of exams weren’t too unexpected.

After the exam, we were dismissed and informed that we would be told of our results tomorrow. While it was still early and only eleven o’clock, we decide to have lunch in the canteen now anyways as to avoid the lunchtime crowds.

Some of the students had similar ideas as us as they followed us as we went to the canteen. Along the way, we often received curious glances. It was either because of my unusual silver hair or because of the rumours that had been going around. I would say, it was most likely a factor of both.

Ignoring all of it, we just ordered our food and sat in our usual corner and eat while quietly talking about various things we would do after lunch. Dorothy and Catrina were heading to the tea ceremony club while Anna, Louise and Chandra were going to the sword art technique research club. This just left Lyn, Hilda, and I without anything to do. Hilda could have gone to the board game clubs to kill time, but she had already been there for the last couple of days, so she opted to spend some time with Lyn and I.

Over the past week, I still hadn’t been able to find a club that I was interested in joining other than the large-scale warfare club.  Rather than just joining a club for the sake of joining a club, I opted to take it slowly and just slowly find the right club.

So today, I was going with Lyn and Hilda to have a look at the modern spear arts club. As I usually preferred the spear over a sword, I had looked at a few spear related clubs but they weren’t my style. I was hoping that this would be the one as it was the only spear related club I hadn’t been to yet.

Arriving at one of the many training yards located around the academy I found the modern spear art club. They were training and experimenting with various techniques. They all seemed to be different from the other clubs. 

The moves they used however were flashier but also had less substance in them than in other clubs. I was already thinking that this club was also a mistake. However, I still decided to go up to them and see whether this was just them playing around or they really were all style and no substance.

I don't know what I had been expecting. 

Five minutes later  I left the training ground with Lyn and Hilda furious. Those morons from the modern spear art club had the nerves to tell me that I had no idea about their greatness after I confronted them. Even when I defeated all of them, they still insisted that it was due to luck. Is there seriously something wrong with their brain.

I could see why they only had the bare minimum number of active participants. They were practically just a joke and probably formed the club so that they could have an area to themselves.

Seeing how furious I was, Lyn led me to the club for the weary student. After bearing my face in the soft fleece of a magical beast that looked like a bright pink alpaca and screamed out my rage, I felt much better. The pink alpaca unconcerned with my behaviour continued to munch on the carrots that Hilda and Lyn were treating it to.

After having experience, the power of the magical alpaca, I no longer thought of the name for this club as silly. The power of the alpaca is truly fearsome. But before long my attention had already been taken away by another creature.

The creature that had caught my attention was this blue rabbit that sitting on the head of another magical alpaca that was sleeping. Noticing my gaze, Lyn explained to me that the blue rabbit was a dream rabbit. Like me, they could help other creatures sleep better. In the wild, they would protect themselves by making predators fall asleep, if they were trying to harm them.

 However, here at the club for the weary student they just help the other magic beast and animals sleep better as well as the occasional weary student.

Having already arrived here for the rest of the afternoon Hilda and I played with, I mean helped Lyn and the other club member look after the magic beasts and animals. We only left late into the afternoon when the other club member started to leave. I could completely understand why people would stay here for hours on end. If we could turn their cutes into a weapon, all wars would be instantly over and won. However, these magical beasts and animals tended to be timid, so it wasn’t right to bring them onto the battlefield.

When we finally got back to the villa everyone had already returned. After having a light dinner, we played a few games that Hilda had borrowed on the way back from her clubs.

I wasn’t usually invested in board games but this one truly intrigued me it was that it was a game like chess, but it also heavily depended on luck. It was highly stressful for anyone who likes to be in control. The game was like chess was divided into different pieces and you could only move once per turn but unlike chess, you would choose a piece that could move and would roll a six-sided dice and that number would determine how many spots that piece can move. If any enemy pieces are in the way you could take it like in chess. If you reach the end of the board, you could also choose to stay there or start moving backwards.

Playing this game, stressed me out but for people like Anna, who has a straightforward personality, that didn’t like to think too hard about things, it was a fun game.

That night I had a dream about falling under the control of Anna like the pieces in the board game. But luckily for me, a pink alpaca came to my rescue. Saving me from the tyranny under Anna's abnormal luck. 

Another simple day passed by, uneventfully at the academy.

The next morning Professor Ian was handing out the results for the exam we did yesterday. My friends and I all passed with flying colours. With none of us losing any marks and receiving two hundred out of two hundred. However, as predicted not everyone passed. Those that didn’t pay attention during class failed. He further explained the questions that people often got wrong.

Once professor Ian was done explaining everything, he took away all the students that had failed and started remedial classes. A hardy looking man in plate armour showed up and took his place introducing himself.

“Good morning, young prospective knights. I am Owen Lawson a knight under the order of the silver wolf. You may call me Sir Lawson. I am going to be your main knight training instructor and will be taking over from Professor Ian who taught you the introductory component of this knight course. Now I know all of you are excited about being able to finally be able to pick up a weapon and receive official knight training, but the weapon of a knight should be kept away at the best of times. You must all remember the things you have learnt under Professor Ian. If I ever find out that any one of you have worked against the chivalry code and acted in a less than honourable way, I will personally kick you out of this course and academy. The duty of a knight, first and foremost is to protect. If you cannot do this, then I ask you to leave now.”

The room was silent, but no one got up to leave. Glancing around the room his eyes linger over my group for a bit but continued soon after.

“Good all of you stayed if any of you left, I would have been disappointed. Class representatives stand up and report.”

“Sir Lawson, Knight candidate Ayra Asteri Kar of class one reporting.”

“Sir Lawson, similarly, Knight candidate Louise Adams of class one reporting.”

“Good. Excellent posture and firm replies. This is the standard I expect. Even if you are a child of a high ranking noble or in knight candidate Ayra’s case, a princess here, you will be just a knight candidate. Your achievements won’t be from your birthright but from your hard work. Knight candidate Ayra I heard you performed wonderfully as a commander during club activities. You will become the commander of class one, do you accept?”

“Yes, Sir Lawson.”

“Knight candidate Louise you will serve as her vice commander, do you accept?”

Louise similarly accepted. 

“Good. Now everyone follow me, I will now take you to the training ground that where I expect to meet you after homeroom every day.”

After we headed to the training yard Sir Lawson grouped us into various ability groups and sent us to another instructor that would instruct us according to our level. My friends and I were placed in the highest level along with three other boys who were in their mid-teens. Our instructor was an old knight that had clearly seen better days, as he had scars all over his callused hands.

Without batting an eye in finding he had eight little girls that weren’t even thirteen in his class, he asked us about our preferred weapon. He further told us to bring them tomorrow, as we would start training with them as we were well past the point of gaining experience using wooden training weapons.

Soon after lunchtime arrived, we were dismissed for the day. That evening my friends and I were excited that we would finally be allowed to use our real weapons and armour for a change started to personally check on and maintained them.