Hikari stood in the waiting area in front of Lord RazenHeir's study. Plain white shirt, black skirt, knee socks and a pair of plain brown loafers. Not as heavily enchanted, but it meant she could look forward to a clean set while one is at the washing bay. It appears Ria was getting really good at keeping her properly clothed.
The waiting room was quite spacious, roughly the size of a village abbey. A straight forward decor, wooden walls and a warm brown carpet. Paintings lined the walls, chiefly those of the current lord's predecessors, a couch, a coat of arms, a wyvern header and antiqued suit of armour whose inscriptions had not been imbibed in ages. A good effort at minimizing the clutter.
A squad of maids circled around the room, furiously feather dusting away. A lot of catch up maintenance to be done on a room sealed away for a year due to the absence of its chief inhabitant. They were children, signs of malnourishment, skinny and pale.
"Alright! Finish up, dust off your feathers into the bucket, and get to work on the Madam Knight's shoes." The head maid, a middle aged woman, clapped her hands twice. Like a school of fish, they swarm around the huge loafers, making up for their lack of strength with numbers.
"Where are they from?" Hikari arches one foot forward, allowing them to dust off the bottom. "The cultists camps, Madam Hikari. They were used as slaves instead of sacrificial material from what I hear, unlike the adults. The boys are on the courtyard sweeping duty."
"How are they?" "If you would indulge me, we could just about nurse them to shall we say, 'living' condition. Even porridge is hard to come by these days."
"I see."
"Let's go! Chop! Chop! The knight has a meeting with the Lord RazenHeir. On to the next task!" The girls dust off their feathers, walking in two neat columns past either side of Hikari.
"The Lord RazenHeir is waiting inside. You may enter now." The head maid closed the door behind her.
Hikari took two strides towards the door on the opposite end. With a gentle nudge of her finger, the wooden doors creaked open. The doorway was wide enough, but she had to bend over to make it through.
The interior was as plain as the outside, same decor, some light fixtures, oiled lanterns. A row of fine suits and coats took up half a wall on one side. Books, ledgers, paperwork occupies another section.
On the other side, portraits of his family, Ria and her siblings together with his wife. And a live sized painting of Hikari in shining steel plate armour, the top wooden frame extending to above Hikari's hips.
In the center of the room, a conspicuously huge stool, wooden surface, with shiny steel linings and a red cushion on top the size of a queen-sized bed.
On the opposite end, a wide rectangular table, half the height of the stool. The empty table top, Its wooden surface, shiny and well polished.
And an empty chair.
"Greet me."
A puckering sound. The lord RazenHeir bowed his head back down into the carpet. Then he shuffled to the side, rotated 90 degrees, keeping his face close to the ground.
Hikari paced forward. Slow deliberate steps, each making a deep imprint onto the carpet. Lord RazenHeir crawled behind her, following the trail of crushed carpet fibres.
Once the left shoe finished its third step, her right leg raised over the stool, landing on the ground on the other side. Hikari lowered herself into the stool. She swung the other leg over, crossing it over her right, slightly slanting her knee to the left.
"Go to your seat."
The Lord RazenHeir crawled under Hikari to his table, curving his path slightly around her shoe, then under his own table and finally onto his chair.
"Hands on the table. Look at me."
The pair of trembling, rugged and scarred hands slowly emerged from below the table.
"Keep them there."
Using all his willpower, he pressed his hands against the surface of his table.
"Good. You may speak."
His mouth was open, but all that came out were howls not dissimilar to that of the cultists strapped in the dungeons. Deep breaths through his nose, the veins on the sides of his temple flexed, like an overpressured steam engine. It took several minutes before he could compose himself.
"It really has been a while. I'm quite certain now that if I had come home in a coffin, you would have dragged me back from the nether."
"You jest."
"I do. Necromancy is after all outlawed. Actually I'm not sure anymore, It felt like I had been completely out of touch."
"Nothing much has changed around here."
"Aha. Now that is already the best news I have heard in a long while. It's all thanks to your efforts."
"I have done nothing special."
"It's true, you have yet to learn any advanced swordsmanship. You simply put an entire ton of effort behind those very , very simple swings."
"When would you teach me?"
"After what I saw on the frontlines, you won't ever need it. Those flowery moves were meant for nothing more than the arena. "
The Lord Razenheir leaned back onto his chair. He opened his drawer, took out a cigar, lit it with the tip of his finger, and took a good long puff.
"We lost so many good people. Including your old comrades. We couldn't hold that line despite all those sacrifices."
"You could have used my blade."
"I told you before, we really couldn't have."
"Why not"
"The strategic reason being that you need to defend the estate and all of the farms, smitheries, weaveries around it while all of our best units are gone. The royalties they pay is really all that's keeping us afloat. It would have taken an entire division to do what you have done."
He takes another puff.
"But!"
The cigar butt was pressed onto a glass ashtray.
"Ahahahaha! We are not thinking straight. Why exactly are we so invested in a war that never ends."
"We'll be dead otherwise."
"Good point. But the vastly more important reason I don't want you in the war now is all for the future of our house."
"Oh?"
"I'm sending you to the academy."
Hikari raised her eyebrow, slanting her head slightly, the white of her eye expanding outwards.
"I'm a grown woman aren't I?"
"Thats not a problem. You can enroll as a veteran, non pure blood knight. Many of the current RazenHeir knights had gone through it."
"Pure blood?"
"Indeed, those with what is referred to as a mana form that could only be manifested through heredity. Non-pure blood knights refer to basically anyone with sufficient tolerance for mana to borrow these mana forms for a limited number of uses."
Hikari nods.
"Now, my dear wife seems to think you are , by definition, pure blood as you appear to have a mana form of your own. But the politics of entering you as pure blood is rather … complicated."
"I look forward to it. But, would the estate be fine while I'm gone."
"Well, that's… the part where I would need a favour from you."
Hikari uncrossed her legs and stood up. A stride from the left leg and right leg, she reached the Lord RazenHeir's table. Boom! The bore of her left shoe landed on the wooden surface, just diagonally right of the Lord RazenHeir.
Sweat beads immediately began emerging from
"A favour huh?"
"Yes, umm… we are in fact lacking a bit of coin as of late. But, your recent achievements have drawn in some rather wealthy clients."
"Oh?"
"We spent some of our reserves to get you the best gear we could afford for you… glup! … my daughter Ria will go with you … in case the assignment requires some delicacy… mmm… "
"Hands on the table."
Hikari's skirt briefly swung over him. His neck collar was soaked through at this point.
"Fufu~, so my little piggy is all milked dry"
"Umm… not yet… we could still… "
A mass of damp, strong smelling cotton was dropped to the right of him.
"This is for the armour you will be buying. Though I'm not sure how you might earn the next one."
"Mmmm….. ! I … "
"I think it's time I give my piggy a little refresher."