
While most of the students were still standing around the entrance, staring at Rina and Clara, who had already sat down, the teacher who had been leading them coughed loudly. This, naturally, woke them up, so they hurried towards their desks and took their seats.
Afterwards, the teacher, an elderly man with white hair, took his place behind the lectern and introduced himself in a calm and dignified voice, as it was expected of a teacher for nobles. “Welcome to the Royal Knight Academy from me, too, Ladies and Gentlemen. For now, I would like you to introduce yourselves, along with your name, age, what you want to be, what your hobby is, and what your dearest wish is.
Starting with me, my name is Marcs Lowens. I was born in the Lowens barony about half a century ago and have been teaching etiquette and magic here for nearly thirty years already. My hobby is watching my students grow stronger and more confident, and I hope I will never have to see the dead body of even one of you. So, train hard and work together so that we can overcome the impending demon threat.”
When he was finished, he pointed to each desk to have the students occupying them introduce themselves just like he did. After a while, having heard about half of the students speak, he looked at Clara, which prompted her to get up with both of her hands neatly placed in front of her stomach.
“My name is Clara Dragonherz, and I will turn sixteen soon. My hobby is watching a certain someone going about their day and thinking about our future together.” As she said this, everyone in the room could see a shade of red invading her face. This was, of course, planned by her, as she didn't want any of her classmates, be they male or female, trying to woo her. She knew it would only make her already self-conscious maid even more insecure, which was something Clara wanted to avoid at all costs.
A split second later, after pushing away the redness in her face, she continued, “Before coming here, I helped Father manage our lands. I hope to continue doing that in the future, even after my brother has inherited the title. Of course, the demon invasion must be repelled first, and I will make sure that the Dragonherz family plays an important role in that.”
With that, Clara bowed curtly and sat down again, eyes closed and her chest puffed out with confidence. This was also Rina's cue that it was her turn, so she stood up, like everyone before her had done for their introductions.
But because her upper body was slightly bent forward when she was getting up from her chair, a few strands of her red hair got into her line of sight. So she unconsciously combed them with her hand behind her ear, which for some reason entranced most of the people watching her, including her blonde mistress.
Rina, naturally unaware of all this, said in her usual bell-like and soft voice, “My name is Rina and I just turned thirteen a few weeks ago. I have the honour of being able to serve Lady Clara as her personal attendant, even though I am merely a commoner with no noteworthy background to speak of. My hobby is cooking for her and her family and watching them eat their meals. My wish is that I can keep Lady Clara out of harm's way in the upcoming invasion.”
After pulling of an exemplary introduction, as it was expected from a personal maid, she sat back down and looked around. Only then did she notice that almost everyone was staring at her with weird expressions, which she found slightly uncomfortable. Luckily, as already mentioned multiple times, she was already used to it, so it didn't bother her that much. On top of that, everyone looked away in panic when Clara, sitting next to her, loudly cleared her throat.
And like that, the introductions proceeded without any problems. However, as Rina listened intently, trying to remember everyone's name, she found three people among her classmates particularly intriguing.
The first one was a boy, or rather a young man according to this world's values, who introduced himself as Deniswal Brefton, heir to the Brefton viscountcy, which was promoted from a barony not too long ago for their recent achievements. As far as Rina could recall, when she looked up all the nobles to learn about them, the Brefton family was among those who had strongly recommended and helped to promote King Loki's new laws for aristocratic supremacy. This was why they had climbed up the ranks of the nobility ladder in the first place.
But that was not why Rina couldn't help but glance at him. One of the reasons was that he was the first person after herself who had red hair. Although some might argue that his hair colour was more brown than red, he was still close to having the same colour as hers. Because of that, she found herself looking at him several times, which led to the second reason why he stood out in her eyes. Since she was nearly constantly peering at him she was bound to be eventually found out by him. And when that happened, and she made eye contact with him, he instantly turned red and looked away in panic.
Naturally, Rina didn't really understand why he acted that way. Initially, she had thought that he was disgusted by her ugly appearance, but his eyes didn't seem to reflect that notion. She knew from her past life that people who made fun of her had much more displeased expressions on their faces.
So, curious about his behaviour, she continued staring at him, trying to find out his inner thoughts, which in turn led to a spiral of them locking eyes and him turning away even further.
The second person among her classmates who stood out to her was a young woman with straight black hair and dark, almost black eyes named Lucia Yamerli. She was a princess from a country in the far east called Yamerliria Queendom. It seemed that the queen had sent Lucia here as a representative, along with reinforcements, to help with the Valkyria Kingdom fend off the demon invasion.
Rina had paid extra attention to Lucia's introduction because the princess looked like a woman who came from the homeland of Rina's former life. Additionally, Lucia was the one who had stood up for her and Clara against the Duke in the auditorium earlier. As Clara's personal attendant, it was her duty to remember the good intentions of others towards her mistress so that she could repay them in the future.
Last but not least, the young woman who called herself Aurelia piqued Rina's curiosity. But it was not her appearance that caused it. While Rina did find her shoulder-length blonde hair and neatly formed face pleasant to look at, it was rather how Aurelia behaved that attracted her attention.
Even though Rina hadn't spoken to her directly yet, she noticed that Aurelia had never looked at other students so far. Additionally, unlike Deniswal, Aurelia had never returned her gaze, no matter how long Rina had stared at her. The same was true during the introductions. Aurelia only gazed forward as if she was completely oblivious to her surroundings or disinterested in her classmates.
But Rina knew that was not the case, for she was certain that Aurelia was blind.
This made Rina wonder even more how the young woman had managed to get into the Royal Knight Academy. As its name suggested, the academy's curriculum was focused on combat. So, it wasn't hard to imagine that a blind person would only be a hindrance on the battlefield.
Furthermore, Aurelia's uniform suggested that she was a commoner as she was wearing the same one that Rina had. These two aspects combined showed that something fishy was going on.
After all, with King Loki's new laws, while getting admitted to the academy as a commoner was still somewhat possible, achieving that with a disability was not. This showed that Aurelia either had the backing of a powerful noble or had some truly outstanding abilities. Either way, it was clear to Rina that Aurelia was not an ordinary person, which was why she couldn't help but notice her.
Meanwhile, everyone had finished their introductions, so at Instructor Lowens' prompt, everyone got up and left the lecture hall, as the next entry on their agenda was to learn about the academy's various rooms and facilities and where they were located.
About half an hour later, when the tour was over and everyone was back in the classroom, their teacher called it a day and dismissed his students, telling them to get some rest before the real lessons started the next day.
After he had left, Rina packed all of her and Clara's stuff in her bag, and prepared to go back to their assigned room, or rather apartment, where Marianne was waiting.
Looking at this, Clara wanted to help her maid. But she was aware that keeping up appearances was important, so she held back that urge. While doing so, or rather doing nothing, she noticed that the young heir of the currently fast-rising Brefton family kept glancing at her personal attendant, which naturally rubbed her the wrong way.
Fortunately, she knew that her father didn't particularly want to ally himself with the Breftons, despite their most recent momentum in the political world, so she didn't have to sugar-coat her interaction with them. This was why she didn't shy away from giving him the deadliest glare she could muster to keep him from getting any stupid ideas.
This seemed to work at first, as he quickly turned away in panic upon noticing Clara's eyes on him. However, even though he didn't have the guts to confront Clara directly and fight for the red-haired girl he was interested in, he was still confident in his family's name and its growing power. Just one word from his father and most would grovel before them.
So, he quickly whispered something into his companion's ears, who then sighed heavily, before he made his way to Clara.
Seeing Deniswal Brefton's personal servant approaching and the brown- and reddish-haired man behind him grinning smugly, Clara could already guess what was about to come and started to get headache.
When the servant, who looked like he didn't want to be here to begin with, arrived at Clara's desk, he paused for a few seconds before he opened his mouth, “Lady Dragonherz, my Master wishes to...”
But at that moment, a male voice echoed throughout the entire academy through the magic-infused speaker that had been placed in every corner of the academy grounds for announcements, [Lady Dragonherz, come to the headmaster's office immediately. I repeat. Lady Dragonherz, come to the headmaster's office immediately.]
With her quick thinking, Clara instantly grabbed the left hand of her maid, who had just finished packing, and led her out of the lecture hall, leaving the others behind without even paying them another ounce of attention.
Outside, while pulling the clueless Rina along, Clara thought for the very first time in her life, even if it was only temporally,
'I never imagined I'd ever be grateful to the Duke.'