On the day of the field trip, the Monster Studies and Hunting Techniques professors (both of whom were very stern) had gathered all the students and guardians to explain the schedule and details of the field trip. However...
“Erm. As I explained before, the participants in this field trip will be sleeping either in tents or carriages that they have brought themselves. As you can see just by looking around you, there are no accommodations or houses near the barrier. Therefore, you will have your...guardians...keep watch around you, and on the off chance that a monster appears, those...guardians...can... Sorry, er. Count Stewart?” The experienced instructors couldn’t hide their bewilderment, and neither could the students and their guardians.
“Hmm? What’s the matter, Professor Wolfgang?” Leonard Stewart was confused by the break in explanation and new attention on himself.
“Er... If I’m not mistaken, it appears...your whole family is participating?”
The Stewart siblings’ guardians stood a bit behind them...and they appeared to be their father, Leonard Stewart, their mother, Melsa Stewart, and their uncle Arven Stewart—who was supposed to be along the border—sitting there with a big, dopey grin on his face.
“See, everyone’s surprised you’re here, Uncle Arven!” Emma smiled at him, having noticed all the staring and whispering around her. “You graduated from the university with amazing scores, so you’re totally famous in the capital!”
William shook his head at his giddy sister. “Uh, sis? That is extremely not it. Everyone at school thought you were dead... They’re scared that a zombie’s here right now.”
“Hmm? Y’know, everyone else looks like they brought maids and bodyguards and stuff as their guardians...” George was realizing just how different his family was from the others around him.
“Oh, maybe I misunderstood what they meant by guardian? But I think Emma’s theory makes sense, and so does William’s... What should we do? I mean, I’m sure you’re all correct in some way...” Melsa put her hand to her cheek, worried about all the attention they were getting, and she looked to Leonard with worry.
“All of the above!” The teachers spoke for everyone there when they jumped into the Stewart family’s discussion.
“Huh?”
“All of the above! That’s right, every single one of those reasons! Why is Dr. Arven Stewart here, when he’s supposed to be standing in for you as the lord of the Pallas region?! And are you healthy enough to be here, Emma?! Your teachers have been worried sick! And why are your father and mother coming with you?! What about your maids?! Who’s going to take care of you?! It was already a shock that we’d have girls coming with us this year, but bringing a count and his wife to such a dangerous place...!” Wolfgang Garriano, the Monster Studies professor, blurted out what every single person present was thinking.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Hmm? Who, me? Well, my adorable little niece didn’t come home for the summer, so...I made myself at home!” The niece-brained uncle Arven stuck out his tongue cutely.
What is he, some guy’s girlfriend sneaking into his apartment in the middle of the night? Not like anyone’s ever done that to me... William wanted to retort, sad as it was.
“My relatives are taking care of Pallas right now (whether they like it or not), so there’s nothing to worry about!” Arven was proud to say that they could do the job of standing in for the region’s lord just fine.
“I’m doing juuust fine, Professor! Eep!” Emma stood up with her hand in the air to get her teacher’s attention. However, she was so energetic that she wound up pitching forward and almost falling until Arven swept in with a cool motion to keep her steady.
“Whoa there! You okay?”
“Thanks, Uncle Arven!”
It was a completely normal interaction between an energetic girl and her kind uncle, but it made all the participants choke back tears.
Lady Emma doesn’t have much longer to live... The rumors must have been true... That simple move had given them the “proof” they needed to believe it. Even if she wasn’t in a coma due to her condition, it was bad enough that Dr. Arven had come running all the way from the border just to see her. But despite her illness, as children of the lord of said borderland, George and William couldn’t forgo this field trip. Yet she had so little time...so she forced herself to join the field trip so she could be with her family, even though she was so sick... It was so... It was just so...!
They all started to sob, but stopped themselves. No! If we cry while Lady Emma and her family are trying so hard to stay strong, it will have been for nothing! So they choked back their tears (that were entirely caused by the emotions welling up from their wild imaginations) and sniffled back the snot as best as they could.
“You all have allergies or something? That’s pretty unusual this time of year...” Emma considered maybe passing out handkerchiefs to everyone.
“R-Right. I see. But, er... I think perhaps it would be best to have at least one maid...” The Stewarts did have two other guardians, but their dress implied they were hunters. One had a large bow, and the other had a spear. In other words, it didn’t appear like anyone could provide food or wash their clothes.
“They can take care of their own... Er! Ahem! I mean, our maids are all on paid holiday!” Melsa clammed up in the middle of her retort. She’d realized before that the fact that she could do anything self-sufficiently was not a given in high society, where a noble didn’t do everything themselves.
As it turned out, the Stewarts’ servants weren’t even used to the idea of having paid holidays, so they’d saved up all their time off, uncertain of when to use them. Realizing that they’d never be able to use them up at that rate, they finally decided to cash it in all at once, so the benefit the family had provided had backfired. If their servants hadn’t been on vacation, someone might have realized Melsa had misunderstood the definition of guardian and stopped them. Unfortunately, their last line of defense had failed, and they’d come to the field trip like this.
“Paid...what now?” The Hunting teacher had never heard this phrase.
“U-Um, Professor! Those of us who brought our maids with us can help out.”
“E-Exactly! Lady Catherine, Lady Caitlyn, and my guards have never fought monsters before, so er...in exchange, we asked the Stewarts’ experienced hunters to look after our guardians as well.”
The more the professors pressed them, the more the Stewarts would put their feet in their mouths, so Marion and Francesca stepped in to help. It was the sort of ability they’d naturally picked up after spending over half a year in the same class as Emma.
“We could never see any monsters in the Simmons region, right, Caitlyn?”
“We never could see any monsters in the Simmons region, Catherine!”
The twins both agreed they wanted to see a monster as soon as possible.
“What?! Er... Mmngh... Lord Leonard, we’ve never seen a monster before either!” The men with the bow and spear both covered their mouths as they tried to protest the girls’ excuses. They were some ruffians from the slums that Leonard had scouted out to become hunters in Pallas. He’d brought them along to see how well they could fight in the face of monsters before sending them off to Pallas.
“Shush, you two! We’re finally getting some of the heat off of us! Just stay by me, Arven, and George, and you...probably won’t die, okay?” Leonard whispered.
“Probably?!”
“The least you could say is that we definitely won’t!”
“I mean, ultimately, it depends on the type of monster. Like, if we’re up against a dragon? It’d be over. Those flying types are pretty horrifying.”
“F-Father!” William nudged his father, who had been mumbling with the two ruffians. The Monster Studies and Hunting Techniques professors were both staring suspiciously at them.
“A-Anyway, it’ll be just fine! Heh!” Leonard forced a smile.
“Y-Yeah! It’ll be just fine! Hee hee!” The whole family responded with the flashiest (or fishiest) grins possible, desperately trying to get the professors to stop grilling them. But they were as fishy as the sea.
“Sigh. Well, there’s nothing we can do about it anyway. His Majesty, the king will be here any moment now. You should all steel yourself for a most grueling ten-day period. This isn’t the capital, where we can guarantee your survival. Always bear in mind that you’re on the border now. Monsters could appear at any moment. Now get your food and beds ready.” It was clear the Stewarts were hiding something, but the teachers decided they couldn’t waste any more of the time it would take for the students to prepare such unfamiliar lodgings for themselves. Besides, there were some things people were better off not knowing.
“All righty then! Arven, George! We’re gonna put up our tent, so I’ll get our owata supports for us!” Whether or not Leonard was aware of the teachers’ feelings, he stood up and started getting their sleeping arrangements ready.
Sorry, did he just say...owata?
“Hey, which carriage did we put our Emma silk tent?” (The one woven with Violet’s thread to make it waterproof.) Melsa took the initiative to start unpacking their carriages.
Did she just say they made their tent...out of Emma silk?
“Hee hee. We’re gonna have to break out the special cooking utensils to make rice today! I mean, camping means you have to have curry, right? Oh! William, I’m gonna start the fire, so can you get us some good sticks?” Emma decided to start getting dinner ready and asked William to be her errand boy as always.
Wait, she’s starting a fire?! A noblewoman?! Starting a fire?!
As the teachers had thought... There were many, many, many things in the world they were better off not knowing. It was one of those things that the professors deemed too absurd to even look at, and they did their best to avert their eyes as much as they could.