Chapter 478 - Episode 5: Eleos's Study Abroad ③
Classes began the day after the entrance ceremony, and the days finally started to feel like actual school life.
One afternoon. In one of the many lecture halls of the High School, a class for first-year students was being held.
"—Therefore, it is a common understanding across the continent that a mounted charge by heavy cavalry remains the strongest tactic in a pitched battle. Even in these last few hundred years, where the development of magic and magic tools has been remarkable, this fact has remained unchanged—"
Aside from the voice of the teacher lecturing on military science, almost no other sound could be heard.
Most of the students were attending the class seriously, without chatting or dozing off. Among them, in the rear left of the lecture hall, there were those facing the chalkboard with particular intensity, their expressions almost fervent.
Yakov, Sasha, and Nikolai, the exchange students from the Grand Duchy of Arqvist. The three of them moved their pens with an intensity that suggested they were recording not only the content the teacher wrote on the blackboard, but every single word spoken.
Since their hands naturally could not endure spending the entire class from start to finish that way, they took a form where one person would rest while the other two wrote.
They were not mere exchange students. They bore the mission of recording as much of the curriculum of the Royal High School—of the Kingdom of Rhodeberg, a particularly advanced nation in the southern Adleon continent—as possible and bringing it back to the Grand Duchy of Arqvist.
Depending on how much information they could record here, the results they could bring back to their homeland would change, and that would influence the development of the Grand Duchy's academic and educational systems. Carrying a sense of mission as children of the Grand Duchy's nobility, they approached their classes.
Since Amanda and Theodore were heirs to civil official families, they were currently attending different classes, but the two of them were fulfilling the same mission over there.
Eleos, on the other hand, was attending the class with the very ordinary attitude of a student. Being intelligent for his age, much like his parents, he was following the Royal High School's lessons without difficulty at ten years old.
"—In this mounted charge, it is naturally first and foremost essential to possess a cavalry unit of a certain scale. However, this is by no means a simple feat. In feudal states, it has only been within the last hundred or so years that a single power became able to assemble at least several hundred heavy cavalry. The first to achieve this feat in the Kingdom of Rhodeberg was... Student Eleos Arqvist. Do you know who it was?"
As a tradition of the Royal High School, students were treated as mere students before a teacher, even if they were royalty. Eleos accepted the teacher's manner of speaking as a matter of course and stood up.
"Yes. It was His Majesty King Rudiger Rhodeberg First, the fifth king. Rudiger First succeeded in completely seizing control of the nobles in the central part of the kingdom and established a unit consisting of five hundred cavalry in the Royal Army. It was the unit that became the predecessor to the current Royal Army's First Corps."
"And the battle where that cavalry unit first demonstrated its true value?"
"The Battle of Helene Pass in Royal Calendar year 72. In this battle, the cavalry unit carried out a charge from the top of the pass and defeated two thousand infantry of the Pallas Empire."
"As expected of the son of His Excellency the Grand Duke of Arqvist. You seem to have studied well. You may sit."
Told by the teacher, Eleos took his seat.
"Splendid, Eleos-sama."
"This much is easy. I want to study harder things or new things."
Eleos answered Yakov's words while resting his cheek on his hand.
The educational content of the Grand Duchy of Arqvist's Public Noeina High School had already been organized as much as possible by the naturally clever Noein and Clara. Furthermore, like his parents, Eleos loved reading.
Therefore, no matter how renowned the Royal High School was, there were many parts of the introductory lessons that Eleos already knew.
"As Student Eleos just explained, the importance of cavalry units was recognized anew following the Battle of Helene Pass. This was the case not only for our country, but for the Pallas Empire as well. Thereafter, both nations made the expansion of cavalry units within their national armies a state policy—"
After that, the class proceeded solemnly.
...
Lunch break, after finishing two classes. Eleos and his attendants left the lecture hall.
"Ah, I'm tired. And I'm hungry."
"Eleos-sama, let us go to the cafeteria. If we don't go quickly, it will get crowded."
"Before that, we have to meet up with Amanda and Theodore. If I recall, those two are in the west wing—"
Along with Sasha, who gave a big stretch, the restless Nikolai, and Yakov, who was admonishing him, Eleos walked through the school corridor.
Just then.
"...I wonder what the commotion is?"
Hearing the sound of students buzzing about something, Eleos looked back.
The students who had come out of the lecture halls into the corridor naturally moved to the edges of the hallway to clear a path.
The person who appeared from behind them was—the Princess of the Kingdom of Rhodeberg, Margarete Rhodeberg. She was thirteen years old this year, and was Eleos's fiancée.
Accompanied by several young ladies who were likely children of the royal family's close aides, and several servants who were likely her attendants, she was walking while glancing around curiously. When her eyes met Eleos's, her face brightened instantly.
"Eleos-sama! So you were here!"
And with that, she ran over, her face full of joy.
Announcement.
I have started posting my new work, "Friedrich's Battlefield."
It is a war chronicle about a young man who was a country orphan whose life changes after a renowned military man discovers his talent.
At this point, approximately 50,000 characters, or about a dozen episodes, have been posted. From tomorrow, I will be updating daily for a while.
If you like, I would be happy if you could enjoy this one as well.