Roy pondered late into the night, alone in his tent save for a lone candle flame bobbing in front of him. What did Fie mean to him? Roy first met Fie at the squire admission test where, while searching for someone with the skills to join the 18th platoon immediately, Roy took notice of Fie’s match with Gormus. Apart from Crow, Roy had recruited every member of the platoon himself, and as such, he wanted to select a candidate in similar fashion from the pool of adult applicants. Outstanding talent was no simple thing to find, so he felt the need to examine each potential squire with due diligence.
However, he found himself drawn in by this young boy’s match. There was something beautiful about how this unrefined boy fought grimly with everything he had. The boy was small, perhaps not even twelve years old, and he faced one of the largest boys in the application pool. The large boy possessed a talent to match his strong build, and the smaller boy looked on the verge of collapsing at any second. He stood no chance of winning, Roy thought, but it puzzled him that this boy tried so hard to win in spite of the size difference. Considering how young he looked, the boy would have had other opportunities to try for squirehood again later; however, he fought as if his life depended on it. Waterfalls of sweat had poured off of him, and his breathing became labored. His larger opponent sent him flying as if he never even stood a chance. It was all over. Roy had half-expected the boy to give up on his own. Coincidentally, the blow had sent the boy sprawling just before Roy, and Roy remembered seeing a momentary flicker of surrender in his eyes.
That was when Roy had called out to him. Looking back on it now, I wonder why I did that, Roy thought. There was nothing that required him to help the boy. Roy could just as easily have dismissed him in his thoughts; besides, one did not need to win their match to join the squires. Had the boy been deemed fit to join, it made no difference if he won or lost there. Perhaps, if Roy wanted to justify himself, he could have claimed it was for some more legitimate reason such as wanting to see the boy’s level of dedication, in order to determine whether or not to accept him. Yet, as he thought about it now, he realized that he—forgetting his position both as an examiner and as a king—had simply wanted to help.
As Roy called out to the boy, a flame rekindled in his eyes. Roy knew this was not due to his own influence; the boy was cornered, and Roy felt he would have risen to his feet even without any support. Then, to Roy’s genuine shock, the boy dove at his opponent’s feet and yanked off one of his shoes. In the ensuing chaos, the boy took the opportunity to launch another attack.
No one could have expected what happened next. The small boy convulsed, struck with a cramp, as his stamina ran out. It was not a shocking sight, as the boy did not appear physically strong; however, the crowd of spectators expected him to fight to the bitter end, win or lose, and watched with bated breath. Exceeding their expectations, the small boy soldiered on through the cramp, his desperation leaving his opponent stupefied.
The match finally ended with the referee mercifully declaring the boy’s defeat. Everyone thought that even if he wasn’t picked now, he was sure to be accepted as a squire in the future. Perhaps he simply wasn’t cut out to be a knight yet, what with how small he was.
Roy looked down at that small boy and decided to accept the boy into the knighthood himself, realizing to his own surprise that he had already made up his mind to take the boy in sometime during the match. He needed a small, stealthy knight to be a spy for the Princess Fielle incident, but he hadn’t planned on choosing a teenage boy for the role. That was what the Grass were for, but truthfully speaking, Roy wanted to disband them. They were all too willing to sacrifice themselves for the good of the country. He had tried to broach the subject with them several times, but the Grass didn’t understand a word of it. Oh well, Roy thought, it was to be expected when the Grass’s training methods and servitude to the kingdom had been passed down for hundreds of years. He understood how important their espionage was for the good of the kingdom, so perhaps they would not be dissolved in his own lifetime. Yet, as Orstoll’s power grew and other nations proved they could function and flourish without robust intelligence networks, he wished that the Grass could return to more humane lifestyles.
It was his plan to take on Heath to assist in espionage, but he also planned to fully support her no matter what she ended up being; if she grew as brawny as her classmates, he would gladly help her become a brave knight.
Her eyes opened wide in absolute shock when he told her she was accepted. This was the first time in her life anyone had ever said to her, “I need you.”
She smiled in pure delight and said, “Yes, Cap’n!”
Later, as Roy fulfilled his duties as the king, he watched over Fie in her role as a squire. She was a hard worker, even in spite of possessing less stamina than the rest of her peers. She never gave up and made every effort to keep pace with her classmates. Now that Roy thought about it, he realized that she was no ordinary girl if she had kept pace with all these teenage boys with their eyes on the knighthood. At the time, unaware of her true identity as he had been, Roy found himself unexpectedly eager to give her advice.
With her eagerness, she soon assimilated into the squire community. Roy listened to her periodic life updates; he found it enjoyable to see the world from her perspective. In her eyes, life in Wienne possessed a kind of radiance, and when her face lit up with that same radiance as she talked, he felt like he was discovering a precious gem. The Orstoll of Roy’s mind was still riddled with problems and brimming with criminals who preyed on the weak. Whenever Roy and his knights cracked down on a criminal here, two more sprang up to take their place over there. Worse, no matter how many problems they solved within their sphere of influence, Roy knew plenty of innocents lived just out of his reach in the Dark Dominion. If he looked at it through an objective lens, he could not say that Orstoll was a particularly good kingdom. However, whenever he was with Fie, he felt that maybe it had the potential to become one. He had tried to support her, but, looking back on it, maybe Roy was the one who had been supported all along.
Fie had had so many adventures. Roy was overjoyed whenever he heard about the times she went out with the platoon to learn more about their various duties or studied in the library with her friends. It worried him that the castle library was so infrequently used, despite it being open to all members of the public. Later, during the East—North Interdormitory Duel, she told him about her unfortunate disqualification in spite of doing an incredible job on landing a hit against her much stronger opponent. A pity, Roy thought, that she was bound to the rules of the competition.
The two spent more and more time together as knight captain and squire—him listening seriously as she recounted the tales of her day with her eyes gleaming; her coming to him for advice in times of trouble; both joining their friends in the rest of the platoon in going out to eat. Come to think of it, they’d even squabbled before too. He remembered Fie yelling at him, “Captain Yore, you’re such an idiot!” the time he coldly turned the maid away. (Thinking back on it now, he had to agree with this assessment of him.)
Whenever he finished his kingly duties for the day, Roy donned his mask and walked to the guardroom on the edge of the castle grounds in order to meet with a certain small, blonde teenager. As he arrived, she turned to meet him and, with a wide grin, cried, “Captain!” She rushed over to Roy, her face beaming joy and eyes twinkling, ready to regale Roy with the stories of her latest adventures.