I’m not such a child anymore that I’ll continue seeking love from those who don’t love me.
“And, for your information, Selena does not pity me,” I said.
“Did you just call her Selena?”
“Is it odd that a prince and a duke’s daughter would be on friendly enough terms to refer to each other without titles?” I smiled, though I was also concealing my fear since I could feel the animosity coming from Tiegel. I knew he was hiding in the shadows somewhere as my guard.
He is…my guard, right? Not an assassin sent to kill me?
I seriously questioned that sometimes. And Selena impressed me by keeping such a thing at her side and using it so well.
“Selena doesn’t pity me, and she doesn’t pity you,” I said. We were nothing more than pebbles on the path to her. “So, you should stop trying to draw out her sympathy using your situation. It’s a bad strategy.”
I turned my back on Ismail, who stood there, his clenched fists shaking from rage, and walked away.
I had to deal with her that night, so I wanted to save my energy as best I could.
“We’ll be taking tomorrow night off from training,” she told me once we finished training the day I had my altercation with Ismail.
I paused. “All right.”
Rather than be happy that I could have a day off from the harsh training, I felt uneasy that I would return to my former weak self after just one night off and sad that I wouldn’t be able to see her.
I think I might be falling hard.
I was jealous of Tiegel because he was always with her, not that you could even torture me into admitting it. I still wanted to live.
The night of the next day came, and it was the time I would normally be out training with Selena. I was having a hard time falling asleep, probably because my body had become so used to the other routine, and I started wondering what Selena was doing at that moment.
That’s when I heard the sound on the balcony.
I was stiff with nerves as I picked up the sword I brought to bed with me and moved closer to the balcony. I detected several people there.
But how? No assassins had come for me ever since I’d come to Astra. Why would they come only on the day I had off from training with Selena? Could it possibly have gotten out that I was training with her? Was that why she said we were taking tonight off?
If so, I felt bad. This had nothing to do with her.
“Gah!”
“Shit, why’s he awake?”
“Kill him, now!”
I’d hid behind the curtains and waited until they came in and I could confirm they were assassins, then I swung and stabbed at them without hesitation. They were shaken and couldn’t coordinate amongst themselves as I relentlessly attacked, not giving them a moment to breathe.
Even I was surprised at how calm I was.
“Even skilled assassins are not knights. Their main work is eliminating their target without ever being detected. Many of them are unskilled in head-to-head combat. The battle is half-won if you can engage them in that combat. Do not let your guard down, and do not give your opponent time to make decisions, and you will win.”
That’s what Selena taught me. I didn’t quite understand when she said it, but it made sense now that I was fighting them. Though, I could only process the information because I’d had her training.
“They didn’t say anything about him being this strong,” said one.
Who paid them, Anita? Or Father? They were stronger than assassins I’d encountered before. Not long ago, they would have killed me for sure. They were corpses now, though, and wouldn’t answer any of my questions.
“There were a few dangerous moments, but you get a passing mark since you defeated them,” came a voice.
“…Selena.”
She entered the room with Tiegel as if they’d been waiting for me to finish off the assassins. With her were men dressed in all black who silently began carrying out the bodies of the assassins I’d killed. They even changed out the blood-soaked rug with a new one, cleaning it all away like it never happened.
What is actually happening?
“Did you send those assassins, Selena?” I asked.
“Don’t say such scandalous things. I would never use assassins as pathetic as them.”
Meaning, if she hired an assassin, they’d be even better? I nearly died.
“Previously, I had been eliminating all the assassins sent after you. I simply didn’t tonight. I wanted you to gain more experience in real-life combat,” she explained.
“…Experience in real-life combat,” I repeated.
“It doesn’t matter what you can do in training; if you can’t handle combat, there’s no point. Starting tomorrow, we’ll focus on real combat. You’ll handle all the assassins we’ve been holding back on your own. It shouldn’t be an issue. They’re all worthless assassins hired by your father. It’s a good thing he’s so poor.”
She laughed, surprising me because I couldn’t see anything funny about this. She was cute when she did. I wished she would laugh more.
“If your father had more money, he could have sent more skilled assassins. They would have easily killed you,” she said.
“……”
Though what she said wasn’t cute, which was typical Selena.
And, starting tomorrow, the teaching materials she was preparing for me were other people’s lives. She treated a life as casually as she might a stone by the side of the road, throwing them away as easily. I felt slightly frightened at how she didn’t even hesitate to do so.
Would she throw away my life as casually someday? Her own?
“Selena isn’t very suited to being a teacher, is she…” I murmured.