Joi was at a loss for words.

“I, uh…”

She had wanted to become a Knight.

To cut through the limits of gender, wealth, age, and status—and be free of all of them.

Yet when Kyrie made the offer, her mouth wouldn’t open.

What’s wrong with you? This is the moment you’ve dreamed of your whole life.

Joi was quick on the uptake, and sly besides.

Don’t tell me being a Knight still isn’t enough?

She caught, fast, the reason for her hesitation.

You greedy bastard.

A Knight was certainly the highest station a subject of the Empire of Stars could realistically ascend to.

Like Feijin, they boasted the prowess to take on a hundred alone, and they were respected and feared by all—from white-haired elders to ten-year-old kids.

Even at forty they flaunted the lively looks of their twenties, and, becoming lords, they ruled from above people’s heads.

As Kyrie’s adjutant, Joi had swayed dozens—hundreds—of those Knights.

Formidable Knights paid her courtesies, and even Blue Knights could not dismiss her.

She had even met Princess Erica, that pure-blood direct heir of a great House, one-on-one.

So you’ve had a look at what’s above the clouds.

It was a privilege even her teacher Feijin had never enjoyed.

Of course, Joi knew perfectly well that it wasn’t her own strength.

Like a drake playing king in a river with no dragon, it was authority that Kyrie had lent her.

Fine. Let’s admit it. I enjoyed it.

Joi might have enjoyed authority, but she had not abused it.

Those who labor, and those who are prodigies, still can’t beat those who enjoy.

She still wanted to become a Knight.

And I want to keep enjoying it.

She wanted to become a Knight at Kyrie’s side.

Kyrie had already acknowledged her.

He had told her that her goal wasn’t some impious act shaking the Empire’s order—but the finest dream a subject of House Astreos could hold.

“My lord.”

Joi lifted her head and met Kyrie’s eyes.

His one remaining eye looked down at her as if waiting for a single choice.

“First—please forgive me if I don’t know how to bear the grace you’ve shown me.”

“What.”

“Heh… There are Blue Knights who look after their adjutants now and then, but there are almost none who do it in the manner their adjutant actually wishes. All the more so if that adjutant happens to carry a secret that would make the Manseong Church’s inquisitors come running with glee should it ever get out.”

“…”

“I know it’s not proper, but still—if I may speak first as your adjutant, I have a question. Do you perhaps not need me anymore?”

“What?”

Kyrie’s eye shook, as if it had never once occurred to him to hear that.

“I’m nothing but a deputy commander of five hundred who met the right Blue Knight and ended up acting second to a Myriarch’s host. I do know my place—know that it wasn’t my ability, but the fact that I was tied to your ankle.”

Joi pressed on without hesitation.

“Right now, my lord, you mean to… set things in order and move on, don’t you? If I’m not pulling my weight, then please say so. I know very well you’re a deeply kind man—but telling a useless wretch she’s useless is its own form of mercy.”

Even if it killed her, she didn’t want to seize her benefactor by the ankle.

“Back at the Blue Knight training school, there was a strength drill—tie a rope to a saddle, the rider gallops, and you either keep up at a run or get dragged till your knees and elbows are scraped clean off, and if you keep up long enough, you build the body of a Knight who can run as fast as a horse.”

Kyrie answered by turning to an old story of his.

“If you can’t keep up, you get hauled along and peeled raw; if you somehow keep up, your body becomes that of a Knight who can sprint like a horse. Whatever anyone says—you kept up.”

“Did I? Then I’m relieved.”

“I liked having you as my adjutant. So drop that line of thought and answer me. Shall I send you as an adopted daughter into a Knightly House? Or do you stay under me as my adjutant? There’s a period, to become a Knight, where you must focus only on the body’s training. If you keep serving as my adjutant under me, you might never become a Knight.”

It was Joi’s turn to answer.

“Kyrie, my lord.”

She spoke—and moved.

“Even if I enter as an adopted daughter, it’ll be the same. There are fools who are born sons and daughters of Knights—who could become Knights with the bare minimum of effort—and still fail to become Knights.”

She sank to one knee before Kyrie.

“I will give my breath to the one who acknowledged my dream. I’ll do my utmost so that someday I can receive a sword from your hand. I’ll aim where you tell me to aim, and swing where you tell me to swing.”

She kissed the white, knuckled back of his hand.

“It’s a dream I could dream thanks to you, so I’ll go on dreaming it at your side.”

“If you don’t achieve it?”

“Heh. Then it means I was a lost cause from the start. If I couldn’t become a Knight even under someone like you. Even so, serving as adjutant I’ve enjoyed power not beneath a Knight’s—so I could be content with that.”

Loyalty surged in Joi once more.

So he cherishes even a mere training-school discharge like me this much.

There are many who make others dream; there are also many who use people with dreams they can’t attain.

“I too will strive for everything you desire—for results at least good enough to satisfy you.”

Kyrie told her he wouldn’t allow otherwise.

“…”

He drew the Star-Sword.

With the flat, he tapped her right shoulder, her left shoulder, and her crown, in order.

“Someday, before all the people under heaven, I’ll do this again.”

Joi knew what that act just now was.

“My lord? Ah, I—um, that, just now…”

Her mind went white, then returned, then went white again.

“I give you my word. You will follow me at my side until the moment you yourself desire, and when the day comes you leave my side, I’ll set you up with enough Gold Coins to fill a room and a barony besides.”

From the crown of her head down to the tip of her spine, Joi thought amidst the spreading shiver:

I’ll remember this moment forever.

Kyrie, as expected, knew how to drive a person mad—

Like lightning-fire that lingers on the retina even after it’s gone.

Done.

After sending Joi back, I clenched my fist tight.

Now there’s no problem at all with me taking this sword and those 100,000 Gold Coins for myself.

No problem when I oppose Gracus, or when I oppose Traysan.

I had seen Joi’s eyes fill to the brim with a shiver.

A person with eyes like that never betrays—so says the textbook on kingship.

In case Joi, failing at the end to become a Knight, might feel disappointment, I had told her the truth—that by following me she might never become a Knight.

I promised land and goods as well.

Now, at least, I can carry away a force equal to the power that was originally mine.

At the very least, there won’t be any of Joi’s cannon crews screaming, “You mean to fight the senior foster heir Traysan?! Don’t talk madness!” and firing cannons at me.

One mountain crossed.

Now to go over the next.

“Nereus.”

I left the Governor’s Citadel and headed to Nereus, who was stationed in the city center.

“Large-scale unrest at the docks! We need reinforcements!”

“A marsh drake family and a pack of lizardmen hit four villages southwest of the Citadel. About a thousand! Send a Blue Knight!”

“Rykenta merchants are evading tariffs and gouging profits, taking advantage of Spiramentaon’s confusion. You must identify the tariff schedules as soon as possible…”

Around him thronged caravan masters, the sons of village heads, and guild representatives—each rushed in with a problem from their own corner.

All of them were matters that could be solved by the sword, and a Blue Knight was the one who could swing the biggest sword right now.

“I’ll send Navigators to suppress them. Adjutant—dispatch anyone you can spare. If they’re fighting over property, sweep up all that property.”

“I’ll send a Blue Knight. Draft men from the Heavy Cavalry, and get support from the nearby Beast Purge Order.”

“If information is the problem, go to the Governor’s Citadel. If you tell me where they are and what they’re doing right now, I’ll send troops immediately and seize the profits.”

A Blue Knight among Blue Knights, Nereus was saying things exactly like a Blue Knight.

“Who else is—what? Kyrie?”

The moment he saw me, his eyes wavered.

“Got a moment to talk.”

We walked the street.

“I’ll say it first—I’m not going to apologize.”

Nereus growled.

“I’m not your subordinate. I hold a sizeable stake in the victory over Gracus. While you sprawled and slept for a week, I handled all the urgent administrative tasks you tossed aside and made the rounds with these people. If you mean to brandish the title of Acting Governor—”

“Were you thinking of having your uncle do that?”

“What?!”

He cracked on the note.

“Exactly what I said. At Heavy Cavalry commander level, Acting Governor is about right.”

I had to go to the capital anyway.

Acting Governor of Spiramentaon was a grand seat, but its impact on central politics was small.

And the fact that Nereus and the several hundreds of the Heavy Cavalry were still bound as one made me uneasy.

If by any chance they flipped to Traysan, I’d be dead on the spot.

I was confident I could check the roughly three thousand Nereus had originally led—but with five hundred more Heavy Cavalry added, I wasn’t so sure.

Whether the man himself would succumb to Traysan’s cajoling or threats, I didn’t know; by House, I knew even less.

After all, it was also a fact that Traysan had “protected” the cadet branch’s prerogatives against the main House.

So before I went up to the capital, I had to separate Nereus and the Heavy Cavalry.

“Are you serious?”

Nereus bit his lower lip.

“Would I lie?”

“There’s little tie between you and my uncle. There’s no deep tie between my uncle and this city either. He’ll use me as a heavy piece.”

“That’s right.”

“Once this affair calms, if I return to this city and take on major practical duties, I’ll soon become a higher-ranked foster heir than you.”

“Work at it. By then I’ll be a higher-ranked foster heir than you.”

I let the words roll out as they came.

It sounded downright hearty.

“I’ll laugh at you when you regret it.”

Nereus nodded.

“To do that, first we settle this affair.”

His eyes flashed with that signature red light.

“That’s right.”

“Go to the capital.”

“That’s right.”

“Fully armed.”

“That’s right.”

“I’ll get them ready.”

So would I.

Nereus returned to his tent and called his adjutant.

“Prepare to depart for the capital. And send to my uncle—tell him I’ll visit this evening.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Call in the captains of the mid-sized mercenary companies as well. The Border Patrol Corps and the Beast Purge Order, and the surrounding landed Blue Knights.”

“Immediately, sir?”

“Immediately.”

One way or another, a debt was a debt.

A Blue Knight repaid it with struggle.

“There will be those who think the war with Rykenta is over.”

Nereus gathered the mercenary-captain Knights and the Blue Knights whose positions had grown ambiguous.

“Hasn’t it ended?”

Right now even the Border Patrol Corps Blue Knights who had followed Kyrie this far—Hensonia and Daniel—were mixed among those “ambiguous” ones.

“The one at the center of all this—the Princess of Rykenta, Erica—is still being hunted. Until she finishes giving testimony, this war is not over.”

They had lived through it, so their feelings toward Gracus—and his backer Traysan—were not good.

But they weren’t about to abandon their posts and risk punishment to go up to the capital with Kyrie and fight the senior foster heir.

Many will curse their boss; few will stake their post and fight him.

But if someone starts the fight first, the story changes.

“If you don’t want to fight again, you must go to the capital with Kyrie. If anyone blocks the way, we cut them down! Who among you will chase a little comfort now and run?”

Nereus was ferocious and hasty—but when dealing with men in this “ambiguous” posture, that temperament becomes a virtue.

No contracts; no long speeches.

“Follow Lord Nereus!”

“For Lord Kyrie!”

“Until this war is ended completely!”

True to the name of his cadet House, Nereus stood among the swordsmen to thunderous shouts.

Epicus, in the corner of the tent, stared openly at that Nereus.

Chapter 101.1

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