Claire’s POV
“CLAAAIIRE, fetch me a piece.”
“Yes, yes.”
Catherine sprawled herself out on my bed like she always did, asking me to fetch her a piece of her favorite candy. I was a bit distracted, having been deep in thought, but I concealed it and did as she asked, taking a piece of licorice out of the nearly empty candy jar.
She thanked me and returned to reading her novel. I went back to my desk and was about to get lost in my thoughts again when she made another request.
“Claaaiire, fetch me the third volume of Futago Escape.”
“Yes, yes, I’m on it.”
“…Claaaiire, give me a shoulder rub.”
“All right, but only this once.”
“…Hmm.”
I moved to my bed and began to massage her dainty shoulders, thinking back on what had happened in Euclid as I did so.
“Sit down on the floor, Claire.”
“Huh?”
“What happened? Tell me.”
“Wh-what’s with you all of a sudden?”
She sat herself up, meeting my eyes with a serious look. That was when I realized exactly what I had been doing.
“The Claire I know would never indulge me this much. Something happened to you, didn’t it?”
“N-no, nothing in particular.”
“Reaaaaally?”
“W-well…”
She seemed to see right through me. Seeing it was futile to try to hide it any longer, I confessed. “…I learned what poverty was like firsthand.”
She looked surprised for a moment, then urged me to continue. “…Go on.”
“Up until recently, I’ve known what poverty was and meant, of course…”
“Right.”
“But I never truly understood what it was like. I’ve been…willfully ignorant up until now.”
I told Catherine about what happened in Euclid: the trip to my villa, the shocks I experienced at Rae’s home, the undead incident, the battle in the ghost ship, and how I let a truth remain in darkness. Of course, I asked her to keep this all a secret.
“I walked the town with Rae after the incident and saw so many things I hadn’t been able to see before.”
There were orphans gathered in institutions, elderly farmhands forcing their tired bodies to toil on, an ex-adventurer who’d lost a hand sitting on the ground and gazing into the distance. Not a soul tried to help them, and yet they were all striving to survive, in their own way.
“Back when the Commoner Movement was ongoing, I saw a group of children begging for alms on the street. The only thought I had to spare for them then was how filthy they looked…”
“Do you regret that?”
“I do. How could I have been so arrogant? I understand now that I knew nothing of the world.”
I had thought it was their own fault they wound up that way. That their own indolence was what landed them in poverty. But that wasn’t how the world worked. That wasn’t how the world worked at all…
“Rae explained much to me. I know now that none are poor because they wish it, and that poverty is something that can befall anyone.”
How was it the fault of the orphan that they didn’t have any parents? How was the farmhand to avoid aging, which came for us all? Who could rebuke the adventurer for becoming injured and losing his livelihood?
All I’d ever done was look at those poor, blameless people…and leave them to rot.
“I’m so ashamed of myself…”
“Claire…” Catherine held my hand. Her warmth calmed me slightly.
“I can’t let myself wallow in self-pity forever,” I said. “I need to make amends for my mistakes.”
“How?”
“I’ll eradicate poverty from the Kingdom.”
“…I get the feeling that’s going to be very hard to do.”
“But it must be done, for I am the daughter of Dole François and Melia François.”
My mother had once told me something that Lene reminded me of when we parted: “Listen, Claire. A noble must not surrender to reality and abandon their ideals. If you are to call yourself a François, you must stand by your ideals and make them reality.”
Now that I knew just how deep poverty ran, I understood eradicating it would be no easy task. But for me to avert my gaze from the issue simply because it was daunting would cast shame on the François name.
I was a noble, and as a noble, the livelihood of commoners was my responsibility. It was my noble duty to ensure they were able to lead good lives, and to forget that would make me no different than parasites like Clément Achard, who merely tyrannize and exploit the weak.
“Claire…you’ve grown.”
“…Huh?” I looked to see Catherine giving me a soft gaze, the kind a mother might turn on a child who’d learned how to do something new. “What’s that look for…?”
“Oh, I’m just thinking about how far you’ve come.”
What? Was I a disaster earlier?
“There aren’t many nobles who are capable of seeing the world in such a way. You’ve done well, Claire, even if that Rae girl helped you a bit.”
“Y-you think so?”
“I do. But if you put it another way, that also means you don’t have many like-minded nobles to be your allies.”
She was right. I could now see why those partaking in the Commoner Movement wanted to call nobles corrupt.
“I see… That is quite the problem.”
“Are you throwing in the towel already?”
“Unthinkable. If anything, I’m more fired up than before.”
“That’s my Claire!” Abruptly, she pulled me into a hug.
“Wha—Catherine? Cut it out.”
“No way!” she laughed. “I’m so happy my little Claire’s grown wise!”
“I’ve always been wise!”
“I know, I know. But now you’re more enlightened than ever!”
“I don’t need your empty flattery!”
“I mean it, though!” Finally, she let me go and broadly smiled. “You can do it, Claire. I know you can. I’ll be cheering for you.”
“Hmph. Of course I can do it. Just who do you think I am?”
“Now, this part of you I’d be okay never seeing change.”
“And what part is that supposed to be?!”
“Yep, that part right there.”
“What?!”
We continued to squawk back and forth. It made me think—I must’ve frustrated Catherine on countless occasions until now. She was once a commoner. This grand epiphany I’d finally had about poverty must’ve been very obvious to her all this time. My immaturity and arrogance had been on full display to her.
Even so, she didn’t give up on me. Hence, it was only right that I not let her down.
“Hey, Catherine?”
“Yeah?”
“Watch me.”
“Heh, you bet.”
I had much I needed to do. First, I needed to grasp the current situation. I began planning my course of action for tomorrow, returning a smile to Catherine as I did so.