As soon as I’d taken a bite, the freshly baked bread and the umami of the sausage mixed, filling my mouth with their flavor. “Mmm, this is good! Could it be that you were the one who made these, Nia?” I asked. As I spoke, I couldn’t help but think that this was a perfect start to the day. The meal seemed less like it had been made for work, if that made sense. I mean, yeah, the chef always made our meals properly, and from her perspective it was indeed work, so I wasn’t about to blame her for it, but...
It seemed that my hunch was correct, because Nia gave me a happy smile back. “Oh my, I didn’t think you would notice. Yes, I made them. To be quite honest, it bothered me to just relax while you were out here training, so... Ah! I did have the chef bake the bread for me, though.”
“You’re such an admirable woman,” I murmured.
“A-Admirable?!”
Shoot, I accidentally said what I was thinking out loud! How do I brush this off... No, wait. Instead of trying to play it down, it’d be better to just come out with it!
“E-Er, yes, admirable. Most wives of viscounts wouldn’t even consider cooking anything themselves, but you did it for Laura, Tom, and me, right?”
Plus, she was a former princess. It wouldn’t be strange at all if she had no idea how to cook. With her past being what it was, though, it was easy to guess that she’d had to make her own food. But I was working hard to keep that past where it belonged.
“It’s a bit embarrassing to have you acknowledge my efforts like that, but...I’m really happy.”
“Nia...”
Ahhhhh, she’s so cute! Our Nia is so cute!
Despite my internal struggles, I managed to keep a straight face. After all, there were so many other people with us: Laura, Tom, the gardener, attendants, maids, servants, just to name a few. Any grinning I did would be known by every single person in the manor in an instant, and as soon as I was seen, any dignity I had been able to accrue as the master of the house would surely be damaged.
Also, I’d like some understanding on how much of a loser I was for not being able to call Nia “mine,” even in my head. I know. I know! But I couldn’t; it would be unthinkable! So please, just get my reasoning!
“Lord Ark, please, try this too.”
“Th-Thank you, I will.”
Completely unaware of the battle raging in my mind, Nia served me another sandwich. I didn’t let it slip, right? It’s not written all over my face, is it? I mean, in Nia’s case, she’d probably keep quiet even if she noticed, so I couldn’t be sure. Anyway, if she was going to pretend not to notice, then I would just roll with it, because it was way better than trying to be smart.
“Ah, this is great too. I could eat a ton of these,” I commented.
“Hee hee! I made a lot of them, so eat as many as you like!” replied Nia happily.
Mornings like this are nice sometimes, I thought to myself as I savored this happiness.
After I’d eaten through a fair chunk of my breakfast while being healed by Nia, Tom suddenly asked me a question, having recovered somewhat from today’s training. “By the way, Master, why’d you want to do some ridiculous training like that, anyway? You didn’t do it just for the fun of it, did you?”
“Ah, yeah. Something my swordsmanship teacher said made me wanna start doing that.”
“I see. And what did he tell you?”
“He told me not to fight three-on-one, though two-on-one was fine,” I answered, only for Tom to silently give me a sour look. When I looked over to Laura, she had her brow furrowed.
“From that statement alone,” she said, “I feel keenly that your teacher was a dangerous person.”
“A lot of the stuff he taught me was like that, yeah. He said that two-versus-one fights were okay because as long as you can take out one opponent on the first strike, it’ll just be one-on-one,” I explained.
“That idea in and of itself is crazy! Why would you assume you’d take out one opponent with your first strike?!” cried Tom.
“Oh, I don’t assume I could. I’m just training to get there.”
“The issue is you thinking you can get there at all!”
The more I answered, the sharper his retorts became, and honestly, I was happy that we’d gotten to a point where Tom wouldn’t hold back with me anymore.
“But none of that works when you get on the battlefield. There, you might get three people charging you at once. Or maybe I should say up to three at once?” I continued.
“Oh, so after you beat one in the first hit, you’d take on two at once?” he asked.
“No, if I took out two in the first hit, then it’d be one-on-one again, right?”
“That thought process is even worse!”
Tom’s quips continued, but there was some actual logic behind my thoughts.
“I think about it in proper numbers, you know? His Highness taught me that every triangle has a circumscribed circle in the middle.”
“Huh?”
“Ah, so that’s why you use your wolf tooth cudgel, isn’t it, Lord Ark?”
Tom looked completely lost, but Nia seemed to understand what I was saying immediately. Go Nia.
“Um, Princess... Er, Madam, what do you mean?”
“Any arbitrary combination of three points, especially those that are not bound by any rules to govern them, will always have a single circle that goes through all three. Like this,” Nia explained, using a stray stick that was nearby to draw three points before drawing a circle—or rather, the curve of one that went through all three.
Tom looked at it in interest for a little bit, before suddenly looking as if he realized something. “Wait, you mean that each of those points is an enemy, and Master swings his wolf tooth cudgel in a way so the curve hits all three?”
“Yup. Which is why I can mow down three in one swing, which would theoretically mean I could take on four opponents at once.”
“Ah, I see, so if you beat three at once, then you’d be one-on-one with the last one. Perfect logic right there. Even if that’d be completely impossible for a normal human!”
Ah, he snapped. Probably shouldn’t expect him to be the straight man all the time, huh?
Now, some of you may be wondering why I was training like this first thing in the morning. Some of you might’ve already realized. To put it simply, we were getting close to the day we’d all set off to the new territory I’d been given. My marriage to Nia was all finished, and we’d reached a point where I could pass on leadership of the Special Battalion. We needed to get a move on, and quickly.
The territory I’d been given was the one we’d recently gained from the war, after all. No doubt the current residents were both worried about us and hostile towards us, so we couldn’t leave them lordless for long. What’s more, Brigandia had sent a brigade there ahead of time to keep order, and we wouldn’t want to risk having the region’s stability turn into just plain military rule from the brigade. Of course, Prince Alphonse hadn’t picked someone who would do something like that to be the brigade’s commander, but the moment a person got away from the capital and took total control of a province, anything could happen.
And so, one of the reasons I’d wanted to train like this was because I wanted to gauge Laura’s and Tom’s skills before we left in a few days. I’d sensed that they were capable from the moment I’d met them, but until I knew just how capable they were, I’d worry. But now that I’d actually seen them fight myself, they were even better than I’d thought.
The duo’s close-range battle skills using swords were levels better than the average knight, and they were a good team. Tom had the physical strength and guts to fight head-on, while Laura, who was good at strategizing and finding the opponent’s weak points, could take them out once she had an opening. Not many people would be able to handle them together like that.