Volume 2 - CH 29

On the first day at the royal city Academy’s new term, the young Ladies of the noble course gathered inside one of the training rooms, located in one of the buildings built on the vast school grounds.

These young Ladies were basically brought up like princesses and trained to be ladylike from a very young age. But, it had been decided that just for the first Physical Education lessons of their middle school years, it would be compulsory for them to learn self-defense.

There were several reasons for this, but mainly it was to make them realize that they were being protected.

Just like how the difference in physique between girls and boys didn’t show yet in middle school, one’s self-defense skills largely depended on one’s talent and environment. Therefore, there were times when tomboyish young Ladies would win even against boys who aspired to become knights.

However, in the years following middle school, differences in physique due to one’s gender would start appearing and their progress, brought on by their training, would begin to show. Therefore, the chance of a tomboyish young Lady winning against a knight-in-training with her strength alone would become one in a million.

Of course, it wasn’t like the female students would definitely lose against their male counterparts. There were also instances of female students becoming knights, doing great deeds and being called heroines. However, that was nothing but the fruits of their gruelling, bloody training.

There were a lot of subjects that the young Ladies had to be educated in, including etiquette. It was reckless to teach them self-defense in order to protect themselves in spare moments between other lectures. It could be called a case of ‘Zeal without knowledge is a runaway horse.’1 Therefore, the young Ladies would be taught to recognize their limits so that in an emergency, they would run away.

Such was the reason behind the young Ladies of the noble course learning self-defense once they reached middle school. Also, the teacher in charge of this class was a former knight, a man in his forties called Terrence. He used to be an outstanding knight but he was attacked by a night burglar when he was on duty guarding a certain young Lady. Although he had driven the attacker away, he was seriously injured and was forced to retire.

Under normal circumstances, he would have been able to drive the attacker away without any problems. However, the young Lady he was guarding proclaimed that she could fight as well and was acting thoughtlessly, getting herself into a tight spot. To save this young Lady, Terrence had to become her shield leading to his future as a knight being severed.

However, Terrence didn’t blame that young Lady. He believed that it was the negligence of the person who didn’t teach her that in time of emergencies, she had to run rather than fight with her meagre knowledge and skills, which was dangerous. Therefore, he continued to take on the unpopular role of a person who made the young Ladies aware of their limitations, so that such a tragedy like that would never happen again.

And so, this year too, young Ladies enrolled in the academy. The majority of them found the self-defense classes daunting but there were a considerable number of young Ladies who had overly confident expressions on their faces. These were the young Ladies who had learned shallow self-defense skills at their homes and mistakenly thought that they were perfectly able to protect themselves on their own. A guard like Terrence wouldn’t always be by these Ladies’ side.

Therefore, the first step was the most important. He would make them realize that what they had learned by themselves were just hasty lessons of self-defense and that their “skills” couldn’t even hold up to an old knight who still carried old wounds.

“I will teach you how to protect yourself. Is there a young Lady who would like to demonstrate to this old man on how to defend oneself?”

Terrence looked around at the young Ladies, all dressed in their sports uniforms. He had no issues with the young Ladies who took a step back or averted their eyes in response. Cowardice was an advantage when it came to being protected. 

The problem was the young Ladies who were confident in showcasing their “impressive” skills, even against an opponent like Terrence.

Due to his old wounds, Terrence’s grip strength had weakened in one of his hands and above all else, he was getting old. Despite this, children who had only learned some superficial self-defense could not match up to him. The conceited belief of something like that being unimaginable was dangerous.

Just who should he humble so that it would be effective? 

Just as he was carefully selecting his opponent this way, one young Lady caught his eye.

Her platinum blonde hair glistened in the sunlight. She might have been dressed in the same sports uniform as the rest of the young Ladies, but there were some minor alterations made to the design. This young Lady, who he could tell at first glance had been born into a high-ranked noble family, fixed her gaze on him, meeting his own gaze head on.

“Hmm…this young Lady right here. What is your name?”

“My name is Sophia, teacher Terrence.”

Once he heard that name being said in a clear tone, he was convinced. He was able to recall that name, it was the name of Marquis Rosenberg’s daughter. She inherited her father’s prestigious lineage, and came out as the top student of her grade. It was likely that she had exerted suitable efforts when it came to her self-defense skills as well.

He was able to glean that from her introduction too. 

Although it was customary to introduce oneself by including their family name, she introduced herself without mentioning it. This indicated that she didn’t rely on her family name and had confidence in her own self. Precisely for that reason, she was the perfect match for his demonstration that would serve to teach the young Ladies their limitations.

“Then, Lady Sophia. Would you like to show this old man your true strength?”

“If I shall do, I will gladly be your opponent. Also, teacher Terrence, I am a student and you are a teacher. It is not necessary for you to add honorifics when addressing me.”

Involuntarily, a smile broke out on his face. Although it was a given that a teacher’s social standing was above a student’s, there were a lot of children in the noble courses who chose to forget about it. Although Terrence had to deal with this issue every year, this young Lady seemed to have quite a pleasant personality.

“Then, Miss Sophia. Please have a mock fight with this old man and show me this true strength of yours.”

“Understood. Can I choose any weapon I like?”

“My my, would a person of nobility be carrying a weapon ordinarily?”, Terrence questioned her, a little provocatively. This question included some sarcasm, as if saying: ‘Since we’re talking about defending yourself on your own in an unexpected situation, what are you trying to do by using a weapon you wouldn’t normally carry with you?’

She’d be disqualified if she got enraged by this but Sophia’s expression didn’t change.

“That…is true. Ordinarily, I do not carry a weapon with me. Ah, of course, I wouldn’t normally have concealed weapons on me either.”

“…Hm? Then, you deem it acceptable for us to fight barehanded?”

Although he could pick up on some feelings of discomfort in Sophia’s words, he still proposed having a mock fight using just their bare hands.

“Then, as soon as we begin, I will do my best to escape,” the young Lady said in response.

Stupefied, Terrence understood the meaning of her words a moment later and a smile showed on his face.

“….Teacher Terrence?”

“Ah, apologies. It’s just as you had said. Running away is the correct decision to make. Half-heartedly taught self-defense is meaningless. Thinking that you can protect yourself on your own is nothing but vanity.”

The goal of the class was to make the young Ladies understand that ‘Zeal without knowledge is a runaway horse.’ If this young Lady seemed to be aware of this, Terrence thought it might be necessary to call on another student but Sophia’s attitude did a full one-eighty.

“See for yourself whether the self-defense I was taught is meaningless or not.”

“Are you saying that you want to fight even though you’ve already understood that running away is the best way for you to defend yourself?”

“Yes. There are times when even noble ladies have to fight.”

The reason why Sophia flipped her attitude was because the techniques that Cyril had taught her were deemed meaningless.

There was no way Terrence could have even imagined it was due to something like that. He concluded that it was Sophia being confident in her own self-defense skills and he decided that he had to crush that confidence.

“…Then, let’s have a match. Are you ready?”

Sophia didn’t answer, simply slackening her knees slightly in response. Then, she straightened her spine and lowered her hips before positioning herself in the standard fighting stance. Her appearance was calm and dignified. Probably, through the eyes of an amateur, she didn’t appear as if she was standing at the ready. However, Terrence sensed Sophia’s clear mind that seemed to be saying that she would take him on no matter which direction he would come from.

Apart from the times when he was still on active duty, this was the first time that he felt such pressure. The fact that it was coming from a sweet, barely twelve-year-old girl made him shudder.

Nevertheless, if this happened during his active duty, he wouldn’t have paid it any mind. In other words, if he didn’t teach her the hard facts here, showing her that she had nothing but superficial skills, the girl might end up going through a painful experience later on.

For this reason, Terrence psyched his aged body up in order to avoid repeating  a tragedy like that ever again. Fueled by these intentions, Terrence closed the distance between himself and Sophia. He attempted to grab her arms right away but Sophia knocked him off using a knife hand strike. The only reason she did so was because she loathed the idea of grappling with him. When it came to comparing their physical strength, Terrence was the clear winner. He stretched his arm in an attempt to turn this into a match of strength but Sophia skillfully stepped out of his reach. She went round his body like she was gliding across the ground but Terrence was able to twist his body again by pivoting on his leg. But pivoting his body around one fixed point meant that Terrence wasn’t able to advance towards her.

This carelessness was taken advantage of. 

Suddenly, Sophia disappeared. By the time he noticed that she had squatted, her sweeping kick was already flying towards Terrence’s pivot leg. Normally, he would have been able to block the blow without any problems, but because his leg was caught in a swift turn, he had less solid contact with the ground. This was what Sophia was aiming for.

“Not yet!”

Right before his pivot leg could get swept from under him, he kicked against the ground and suspended himself in mid-air. This was how he was able to avoid the sweep. Although the sweep grazing his leg threw him a little off balance, Terrence was able to immediately correct his stance mid-air. 

At that moment, a small smile appeared on Sophia’s face. Seeing this, Terrence realized that she predicted everything he did up to that point, including him escaping the sweep by jumping up.

Between kicking the ground and jumping up and a freefall, the former was clearly faster. The moment Terrence, currently hovering in the air, started getting pulled down by gravity, Sophia kicked against the ground and jumped up.

There was no way for Terrence to defend himself against the palm heel strike of that slender arm. He instantly took on the blow with his crossed arms. Unable to counter the impact, his upper body bent backwards. Flipped over by the sheer force of the impact, he placed both his hands on the ground and was able to escape further away from her via a backflip. He let out a small breath after confirming that she wasn’t pursuing him with another attack.

“…Hmm. This is a surprise.”

Although he feigned calmness, the words that spilled out were undeniably what he was truly thinking. He would have never imagined that a young Lady with a sheltered upbringing would be able to move like that. However, unresponsive to Terrence’s words, Sophia’s expression remained firm. Although Terrence was blown back ostentatiously, that was only due to him being suspended in mid-air. Since he had skillfully averted the impact of the attack, he didn’t take any substantial damage. Sophia was aware of that.

Since that was the case… Terrence decided to shake her up. Once more, he easily closed the distance between them and grabbed for her. Loathing the battle of strength, Sophia knocked back his arms in the same way she had before.

However, Terrence used this momentum and turned his body, striking out a backfist. Just when her temple was about to get struck by the perfectly aimed blow, Sophia suddenly bent her body backwards. Her bangs softly fluttered in the breeze following the fist that flew by right in front of her face.

“…You’re quite the Spartan teacher.”

“You needn’t worry, if it seemed like the blow would land, I would have definitely stopped it before it could hit you.”

With Terrence’s skill, stopping a blow right before it landed was easy. That being said, a regular young Lady would have already sunk to the floor long ago. Nevertheless, Sophia just frowned slightly. Her clear eyes were only taking in Terrence’s body; there was no trace of fear visible in them.

Having made it this far, he had no choice but to re-evaluate his appraisal of Sophia. Naturally, if one looked at her technique from the point of view of Terrence who used to be a first-class knight, she still had a long way to go. However, she definitely didn’t possess skills that could be called superficial. She certainly possessed the skills to protect herself only using her own strength.

At the beginning, she took the option of running away into consideration first. She surely wouldn’t make mistakes such as retreating at the wrong time.

However, Terrence’s duty was to make the young Ladies understand their limitations so that they wouldn’t do reckless things. Although Sophia was aware of her own limitations, at this rate, she would cause the other young Ladies to become arrogant.

That was the reason for Terrence to attack Sophia for the third time.

Sometimes he would try to grab her and sometimes take her by surprise by swinging his fist. Turning towards the girl who was attempting to get out of his reach, he sent a kick flying towards her. Sophia completely evaded all of these attacks.

Unless a person was a knight-in-training attending high school, there wasn’t anyone who could move like this. Landing upon this realization, Terrence intentionally lifted the corners of his mouth up.

“If you’re just going to keep running around, trying to escape, wouldn’t it have been better to avoid the fight from the start?”

He was provoking her because he recognized that Sophia had extraordinary confidence in her self-defense skills. For an instant, the eyes of the girl who was fully absorbed in avoiding his attacks were dyed with red and she charged forward.

Gotcha!

Although, to a certain degree, she was skilled, mentally she was nothing but an inexperienced child. Terrence read Sophia’s movement and corresponding to her attack, he sent a high kick her way. 

A second later, Sophia also responded with  a high kick. Under normal circumstances, since Terrence kicked first, his attack would have been sure to land on Sophia’s shoulder first. However, Sophia’s kick was notably faster.

At this rate, Sophia’s kick would hit Terrence before his own kick could land on her. Making a split second decision, Terrence bent his upper body. With this motion, he forced his body out of the range of Sophia’s kick. However, at the same time, Sophia also bent her upper body backwards.

The trajectories of both of their kicks changed, and their legs crossed. However, if Terrence’s leg was to collide with Sophia’s slender one, her leg might break. At the very least, it would end up bruised. Even for a retired old knight, it was out of the question to bruise a young Lady, even if it happened during training. Making a split-second decision, Terrence put strength into his pivot leg and instantly stopped his other leg.

However, Sophia didn’t stop and kicked Terrence’s restrained leg flying. Despite the differences in their physiques, there was no way he could withstand getting his leg that was swung up high, kicked. 

Terrence lost his balance and fell on his backside. He attempted to let the impact of it pass and get up but Sophia sprang at him faster than he could do so.

Sophia was faster than Terrence. Although she had confirmed that she had the upper hand, she reached her hand into the sleeve of her jacket and suddenly  stiffened. Before he could guess the reason behind her actions, he reflexively sent Sophia flying overhead.

“Oh no-” The one who let his voice escape was Terrence. He was terrified that he had inflicted serious injuries upon the young Lady. However, when Terrence turned around, he saw Sophia’s figure standing up from her safe landing, her body facing forward. Terrence involuntarily let out a sigh of relief and immediately decided to end the mock fight.

“Let’s end it here.”

He didn’t think that there would be someone among the middle schoolers who could move like this. It would be impossible for Terrence, who was already old and bore old wounds to defeat this girl without causing her injury. Earlier, when he had retaliated reflexively, it was also due to her overpowering him. Although Terrence appraised Sophia highly, the girl in question was making a displeased face.

It was clear that she was dissatisfied with them suspending the mock fight. However, Terrence couldn’t understand why someone as talented as her, would be so obsessive over something like a mock fight.

“Miss Sophia, about that blow earlier. If I hadn’t stopped my kick, there was an extremely high possibility of you hurting your leg. You understand that, right?”

“But I’ve said that there were times when even noble young Ladies had to fight, didn’t I?”

It wasn’t like he couldn’t grasp the meaning of her words. However, he couldn’t understand her preparedness to get injured during a mock fight at all. But then Terrence remembered how her kick had accelerated with astonishing speed.

She couldn’t have used magic to enhance her physical abilities, could she…?

He’d heard rumors about it but Terrence himself couldn’t use magic, so he wasn’t able to tell. But, if she had enhanced her physical abilities, she might have been able to devise a plan on how not to get injured. As if she knew what Terrence was conjecturing in his mind, Sophia shook her head.

“I know that I am inexperienced. If you hadn’t gone easy on me teacher, I would have been at a loss on what to do and would have been defeated.”

“And yet, you decided against running away?”

“Yes. Because the self-defense that I have learned is not meaningless in the slightest.”

The words that she uttered in such a dignified manner pierced his chest. He could sense her utmost respect for the person who taught her these techniques in her eyes, eyes that her strong will was hidden within.

“I understand. I didn’t mean to speak ill of your teacher, Miss Sophia. I apologize.”

“I forgive you.” Sophia smiled. 

Her response was admitting the reason behind her anger as well as her declaring her intention to reconcile. It seemed that Sophia had a refreshing personality.

“I apologize for speaking impudently as well,” she added.

“That is , of course, forgiven. I’m always being told cheeky things by my students.”

Upon hearing his joking words, her attitude softened. She was a young Lady with a sublime beauty that he didn’t think someone who had just started middle school could possess.

She wouldn’t do things like causing trouble for her guard by not bearing her limitations in mind. However, there might be some young Ladies who, after watching her, might misunderstand that they could also fight.

Worried about this, Terrence scanned the other girls. He realized that it was a needless worry.

It went without saying for the timid ones, but even the young Ladies who were confident in protecting themselves on their own were giving them somewhat astonished looks. One of them, a young Lady who had previously shown especially prideful behaviour, timidly raised her hand.

“U- um, teacher Terrence. I’ve heard that we will be learning self-defense in this class, but will we have to be able to fight like Lady Sophia?”

“If you intend on protecting yourself on your own, that would be the case, yes.” 

Upon hearing his confirmation, the young Ladies shivered in fear. However, after this confirmation, Terrence softened his expression before continuing.

“However, I’m sure that young Ladies such as yourselves have outstanding guards with you. Therefore, there is no need for you to protect yourself on your own. Behaving in a way that will make it easy for your guards to protect you in an emergency, that is what you are going to learn here.”

Upon hearing Terrence’s words, the young Ladies were visibly relieved. And so, an atmosphere of ‘There is no way that I would be able to fight like Sophia so I have to properly take this class in order to fully allow my guard to protect me’ spread throughout the class. Although he had imagined a completely different development, it seemed that for the time being, his goal was fulfilled.

Terrence let out a sigh of relief and turned his gaze back to Sophia.

“Miss Sophia, thank you for being my mock fight opponent.”

“Thank you too. I’ve learned a lot.”

""

She quickly bowed her head and made her way back to the other students. When she passed him by, he quietly muttered something he’d been curious about. Caught off guard, Sophia responded with a blink, but she returned to her classmates as if she hadn’t heard anything.

Seeing this, Terrence knew that his guess was correct.

When Terrence fell down, Sophia had leapt towards him with her hand reaching into her sleeves before suddenly stiffening. If she hadn’t done that, Sophia’s hand would have reached him first. His murmur earlier was also his guess about the reason why she had reached into her sleeve.

Geez. After telling me so convincingly that normally, she wouldn’t carry a weapon with her.

If she had been fighting him seriously from the beginning to the end, it might have been Terrence who would have lost. He grew curious about the teacher who had raised her. However, Terrence finding out about Cyril and reeling in shock is yet another story.

Author’s Note: Moreover, there is a rumor that Terrence’s wife is the same young Lady he once used to protect.

Translator’s note: This chapter was really interesting and fun, although challenging to translate because of that fight scene, not going to lie!

Next side story has seven parts and seems to be more focused on Lady Sophia and Cyril’s teachings~. Thank you so much for reading!!