Returning to our usual daily grind the next day, the four of us were pleasantly surprised that we were not immediately swarmed by our fellow classmates as we walked onto campus. Focusing their attention on the upcoming school festival and tournament, instead of us, everyone was walking around discussing what booths they wanted to run or competition they wanted to participate in. Wanting to skip the whole thing, as it was not something I was interested in, I turned and asked the women what they planned to do.
"I am honestly not sure what to do.", Angelica remarked, thinking of ideas, "Honestly, I was planning on helping the manage the festival, but I doubt that is an option now."
"I planned on helping my subordinates at their booths, unless one of you had a suggestion.", Clarice said, looking at Olivia and me.
"Haha, I am considering skipping the whole thing to work on some projects.", I chuckled, "What about you, Livia?"
"Well…do you have any suggestions for food we could serve?", Olivia inquired, "I think we could be the number one booth, if the dishes we had on break are any indication."
Nodding their heads in agreement, Angelica and Clarice shared her optimism about my culinary knowledge. Thinking back to the festivals I attended as a child, in my previous life, I recalled several different food items that would work. Before opening my mouth to acknowledge her, an important thought crossed my mind. If I supplied them with the ingredients and recipes, would any of them be able to cook them.
"Yeah, I have a few recipes that would work, but who would cook them?", I asked, looking at Angelica and Clarice specifically, "Can any of you cook?"
"I can bake a few desserts like cupcakes and cookies.", Angelica said, with a proud smile.
"I know how to boil eggs…", Clarice answered, with an embarrassed expression.
"Of course, I helped my mother cook back home.", Olivia replied, happy she could be of use in this situation.
"So only one of you is able to cook the recipes…great.", I sighed, "Livia, are you certain you are okay cooking by yourself? If your reactions are anything to go by, your booth will be incredibly busy from dawn till dusk."
Puffing her cheeks out as she looked at me, Olivia did not like my answer. Immediately stopping where she was, she made it abundantly clear I needed to help physically too.
"It will not be any fun if you skip out on us. Is there something wrong with spending time together with your friends?", Olivia inquired.
Looking at Angelica and Clarice, the two of them nodded their heads in agreement. Unwilling to open their booth without my presence there, the three of them were trying to strong-arm me into participating. Realizing this was them trying to get to know me better, I relented and agreed to participate.
'I have been meaning to test my Neural Network out, this could be a good opportunity to do it. If it works properly, I should be able to help them here while simultaneously working on my projects in my lab.', I thought, believing it would be a good way to hammer out the bugs, "Alright, you win. If you agree to let Lucoa and Roxanne help us, I will participate. The four of us will not be able to run the booth alone, we need them to pull it off successfully."
"That makes sense, their assistance would be greatly appreciated.", Clarice accepted, as Angelica and Olivia nodded their heads, "How about we head to the library to write out our proposal? The sooner we get it to the administration, the better our chances of getting a good spot are."
As this semester was mainly about building connections and making allies, our academic course load was significantly lighter than the prior semester. With no classes holding us back, the women were very enthusiastic about this as they began verbally planning the décor and design of our booth. Just as we were about to head over to the library, a voice called out asking me to wait a moment. Turning back to see who it was, a blonde, drilled haired woman strolled up to us with her subordinates in tow.
"My apologies for interrupting all of you, may I have a moment of Viscount Victor's time?", Deirdre inquired.
"How can I help you, Miss Roseblade?", I replied.
"I have been meaning to thank you for saving my life, but certain things popped up which inhibited me from doing so. Please forgive me for not expressing my gratitude to you sooner.", Deirdre bowing her head respectfully.
"It is alright, the end of the semester was quite hectic for all of us.", I said, "As for saving you, you are most certainly welcome. I am glad that you made it out with only a few bumps and bruises."
"My father would like to properly thank you in person as well. Would you be available to come to our manor for dinner in the next few weeks?", she questioned.
Taking a quick look at my calendar, I confirmed that I was open for next Thursday. Letting her know this, she promised to notify her father and get back to me with formal details. Thanking me for my time, Deirdre turned and began walking away. Stopping after a few steps, she glanced back at Angelica and Clarice.
"You may have a head start, but I will catch up quickly. Mark my words.", Deirdre stated, before walking away.
Knowing full well what she was insinuating, I assumed her father would bring it up during our dinner. As one of the more prominent nobles in the kingdom, their family was in quite a predicament as Earl Roseblade only had two daughters and was unable to sire more children. The continuance of his bloodline meant he had to marry his daughters to promising young men or it would die out with his daughters. His eldest daughter had already graduated the Academy without finding a husband, and now Deirdre was about to do the same.
'They are a good family, though the daughters are a bit much. Dorothea is a shy, silent masochist and Deirdre is an energetic masochist parading around as a sadist. Their personalities are part of the reason the Earl is probably sweating bullets right now.', I thought, as we began walking to the library.
"Why was she talking about a head start?", Olivia asked, with a confused look, "Are the two of you in a competition with her?"
"You could say that…", Clarice acknowledged.
"Livia, Deirdre was referring to building a relationship with Leon.", Angelica informed her.
"Oh!!", Olivia said, understanding things now, "It seems like you are going to have your hands full…must be nice being so popular."
"No, not even a little bit…", I responded, "Being popular means I will have troublesome people pestering me all the time. I would rather keep the company I have now than be swarmed by dozens of self-serving admirers."
Taking that as a compliment, the three women smiled pleasantly and got back to discussing our booth.
---3rd Person POV, Fanoss Capital---
Sitting on his throne, King Fanoss listened to several of his nobleman complain about recent incursions along the border with the Kingdom. Regretting his decision to bribe or chase Sky Pirates into the Kingdom's airspace, he wished he had followed his gut instinct instead of the honeyed words of their most prominent ally. Having been led to believe the Kingdom would ignore this act of aggression, everything had gone downhill just weeks after the plan went into effect.
After a brief period of calm, Viscount Stark began a deadly campaign against the pirates and the principality's ships. Having caught them in the act of chasing pirates across the border on several occasions, the Viscount's ships had shot down both groups without any hesitation. The first few times this happened, the local noblemen attempted help believing that with additional numbers they could overpower the Viscount ships. Unfortunately for them, the Viscount obliterated everything they threw at him. They even attempted to ambush a lone vessel with over two hundred ships, and it sunk all of them alone.
"Your Highness, we need to do something immediately!!", one of the noblemen cried, "If nothing is done, the Viscount will grow bolder and begin striking our cities!! Our navies are almost depleted, we need help from the Royal Navy!!"
"With several thousand vessels, we will definitely be able to push the Viscount away!", another noblemen said, truly believing numbers would overwhelm the Viscount's small fleet.
"Sir Vandel, do you believe we could win if we threw more ships at the Viscount's fleet?", Queen Fanoss inquired.
"Having seen their power firsthand, I do not believe a numerical advantage will get us anywhere. His soldiers are nothing like the Kingdom's soldiers, they are well equipped, well trained, and are strong willed men.", the Black Knight said, "Not only that, but his vessels are also far superior to anything we have in our arsenal. In every encounter I witnessed, not even one of our attacks managed to breach the ship's defenses let alone scratch the paint. If we sent the Royal Fleet out to face them, it would only demoralize our forces as they bore witness to the insurmountable odds we face."
Agreeing with his assessment of the situation, King Fanoss was inclined to seek out a peaceful resolution to this matter. Knowing that making peace with the Kingdom was impossible, given that Vandel and many noblemen would revolt against them, the next best option was making peace with the Holfort Prodigy. Since he was not spoken for yet, King Fanoss felt that offering to marry him to one of his daughters would be sufficient to end the mounting aggression along the border. Just before he could speak his suggestion aloud, the noblemen began getting rowdy again.
"So we are to just let him walk all over us?!", a noblemen spat, full of disgust.
"The harvest season begins in less than two months!! If nothing is done before then, he could burn our food supply to the ground and make the people starve!!", one of the more prominent men shouted.
"Wait a moment, I did not say all hope was lost. I simply stated that numbers alone will not win the battle for us. We need to plan accordingly and pull the Viscount away from the border. Once his ships are gone, we can attack their border nobles and raze everything to the ground.", the Black Knight said, "To do that, we will need to rely on our allies within the Kingdom. While he is no longer the Defense Minister, Marquess Frampton still has a lot of sway among the Kingdom's nobles. The duke and his allies are in shambles right now, thanks to the actions of two women, so this is the opportune moment to begin laying the groundwork for our counteroffensive."
"Hang on, I believe there is a more sensible option here. As he is unspoken for, we can have him marry one of my daughters and bring him over to our side. This would resolve our border problem while also garnering us a powerful ally within the Kingdom.", the King suggested.
Disregarding his words, Vandel and the noblemen left the room to discuss their plans in detail. Watching them disappear as they turned the corner, the two royals hung their heads in defeat. From the beginning of their reign they wanted to make peace with the Kingdom, but centuries of bad blood kept that possibility from happening. Very few nobles wanted peace, meaning they had to adopt a hardline stance against the Kingdom, or face possible assassination at the hands of their own nobles.
"Dear, what are we going to do?", the Queen inquired, with a worried look, "We have been unable to find the leak in our intelligence network. Once the Holfort Prodigy gets wind of their plans, he will be lying in wait for us to make our move."
"I know dear, that is why I believe we should move forward with my idea of wedding one of our daughters to him. We can send Hertrude to the Academy under the guise of being a foreign exchange student. Given the less than favorable treatment his peers have given him, it should be simple enough for her to win his heart and seal the deal with marriage.", the King said, optimistic of his plan.
"Very well, we should have Marquess Frampton begin the process of making that happen.", the Queen agreed.
Rising from their seats, the couple quickly went to their study to begin laying out the groundwork for his plan.