by Dojyomaru
While I was thinking about that, Excel, unconcerned with our hesitation, opened her book and continued.
“Now, as I said earlier, the secret to a harmonious marital relationship is to know your partner, and to know how they see you. Let’s look at how His Majesty Souma looks at each of you. First... Roroa.”
“Meowhat?!” Roroa reacted like a startled cat.
“First we will begin with his appraisal of Roroa.”
“Wh-Why me?! Shouldn’t you be doin’ the head fiancée, Big Sister Liscia, first?”
“There isn’t any particular reason for it,” Excel said. “I simply thought we would start with the person who first met His Majesty the most recently.”
“Well, sure, I’m the newcomer here, but... Well, it beats goin’ last, I guess.” Roroa seemed to have reluctantly accepted it.
...Huh? I was going last, then? Urgh... That meant the tension would last longer or me, and I didn’t like that...
Excel pushed her spectacles up, then looked down at her notebook. “Now then, this is His Majesty Souma’s appraisal of Roroa.”
“Wh-What’s this? I’m gettin’ weirdly tense.”
“Ahem... According to His Majesty, ‘I like how Roroa’s so bright and friendly. It’s amazing how she manages to get in close with whoever she’s talking to. She can be a bit black-hearted, but that’s just one of her charms. It makes me happy seeing her treat Liscia like her big sister. Besides, Roroa’s financial sense is out of this world. To be completely honest, the kingdom’s economy couldn’t run like it does now without Roroa and Colbert. I’m grateful to have her with me, and to have her as my fiancée.’”
“O-Oh...” Roroa put her head down on the desk. She was covering her bright red cheeks with her hands. “This... This is pretty darned embarrassin’,” Roroa said, writhing a little.
Yeah, I was a little embarrassed just hearing it. Souma wasn’t the type to come out and say this stuff to us straight, so when he came out with his unvarnished feelings and said things like, “I love you,” or, “I’m grateful to have you at my side,” it really made an impact. Now that it had come to this, I was suddenly very interested in what he thought about me.
While we were agonizing over what was to come, Excel continued reading with an expression like it was no big deal. “Furthermore, when I asked His Majesty, ‘Do you have anything on your mind when it comes to Roroa?’ his answer was, ‘I know it was a war, but it still bothers me that I killed her father.’”
“Wha?!” Roroa stopped writing in embarrassment and immediately snapped back to her senses.
“‘It was a kill-or-be-killed situation, but I’m still her father’s killer. Roroa says they weren’t close, but what if that isn’t how she really feels, and she actually doesn’t want to marry me... There are times I worry about that,’ he said.”
“I-Is he stupid?!” Roroa shouted.
I felt like I’d had ice cold water dumped over my head, too. Oh, right... I realized. If these were Souma’s true feelings, it would include the insecurities he didn’t normally show us. To think he’d felt that way about Roroa... I’d never have noticed.
Roroa got up and stomped her feet in indignation. “Darlin’, you dummy! I’ve already considered all of that! I’m with ya because I wanted to be, so why’re you thinkin’ about that stuff?!”
“Roroa!” I stood up, and gave Roroa a hug. She ceased stamping her feet with tears in her eyes.
I could also understand why Souma would feel guilty when it came to Roroa. It was because Roroa was important to him. Still, even with that said, it was wrong for him not to take her affection for him at face value.
Roroa sobbed and rubbed her face against my chest. “Ohh... Big Sister Ciaaaa.”
“I know. We’ll have to tell Souma off later.”
Aisha and Juna nodded. It might have been something he’d done unconsciously, but he was going to have to pay for making our “little sister” cry.
After waiting for Roroa to settle down, Excel spoke to her. “The reason His Majesty thinks about that is because he loves you and you’re important to him. You understand that, right?”
“...Yeah,” Roroa said. “That’s why, though it’s frustratin’ that my feelin’s ain’t gettin’ through to him, I was a little happy that Darlin’ cares so much about li’l old me.”
“If you understand that, then you’ll be fine,” Excel said to Roroa with a smile.
It had been a bit tumultuous, but now Roroa’s turn was done. Next, Excel called her granddaughter’s name.
“Juna. His Majesty’s appraisal of you is, ‘She’s pretty, she’s beautiful, and that about sums it up. I don’t mean just her looks, or her voice— I mean her heart, too. I feel like, of all my companions, she’s the one who is always taking a step back to look at the larger picture. She’s truly the ideal woman. I wonder sometimes if it’s okay for me to have her as my fiancée, but I wouldn’t want to let anyone else have her. I’m trying to do my best to be a man who is good enough to be her husband, but it’s frustrating that I can’t quite manage it.’”
“So that’s how His Majesty feels...” Juna was wearing a slight, but happy, smile. Well, of course, any girl would after hearing “I wouldn’t want to let anyone else have her”... you know?
Excel kept on reading. “So, when I asked him, ‘Do you have anything on your mind when it comes to Juna?’ his response was, ‘Juna is too mature and not good at letting others indulge her, so when she occasionally lets me spoil her, as a younger guy, I feel really special.’”
“...Excuse me, but I was under the impression that His Majesty and I are the same age?” Juna broke in.
Now that she mentioned it, I had heard that Juna was supposed to be turning twenty this year, just like Souma.
“This is something His Majesty realized later, but in his world, a year is apparently 365 days,” said Excel. “The days in our world are 384 days, so with the gap between the two, you would be a year older in Souma’s world.”
The gap between the two worlds’ years was 19 days. 365 divided by 19... In about 19 years, it would add up to a full year’s difference.
This fact sent Juna into a rare panic. “I-I was older than His Majesty Souma? Excuse me, what did His Majesty have to say about that? He’s not against having an older woman, is he?”
I didn’t think Souma would ever reject Juna just because she was older than him, but she probably couldn’t help but be worried. By the way, when she mentioned the possibility of him not wanting an older woman, Aisha looked like she’d just been hit by a stray bullet. You could never tell how old someone from the long-lived races was by their appearance, after all. We hadn’t been told how old she was right now, either.
Excel gave Juna a big grin. “Don’t you worry. This is what His Majesty Souma said: ‘In my world, there was a proverb: “Find a woman one year your senior, even if you have to wear metal sandals to do it.” Juna is a woman worth wearing metal sandals that won’t wear out, and searching the entire world to find. There’s no problem with it at all.’”
“...I’m glad.” Juna looked deeply relieved.
Next, it was Aisha’s turn.
“His Majesty’s appraisal of Aisha was...”
“Um? Why did you suddenly pause there?” Aisha burst out.
“Well... ‘She’s like a pet.’”
“Say what?!”
“““Oh...”””
“Whaa?! Why do you all look satisfied with that answer?!” Aisha shouted.
No, I mean... You know? When Aisha was with Souma, she was like a pet dog, catching prey for her master and then going, “Praise me, praise me” as she wagged her tail, after all.
“According to His Majesty Souma, ‘Aisha is a strong, noble, and beautiful warrior. It would be fair to call her this kingdom’s greatest warrior. It’s reassuring to have her at my side... or it should be, but I feel like I just can’t leave her alone sometimes. It’s supposed to be her job to protect me, but I end up wanting to protect her... Well, when t
here was that disaster in the God-Protected Forest, I did see how emotionally fragile she could be, after all.’ To my question of, ‘Is there anything on your mind about her?’ he responded, ‘That I hope we can sit at the same dinner table forever, I guess.’”
“Uwahhh! I’ve failed as a bodyguard!” Aisha wailed. “But still, when he says, ‘I can’t leave her alone,’ and ‘I want to protect her,’ it made me feel a little happy, stupid meeee!”
While Aisha laid her head down on the desk, stuck between feeling happy and pathetic, Roroa patted her gently on the back. It looked like Aisha was in shock, but as for me... I felt a little jealous of her, maybe? If she was like a pet, it meant he cherished her just that much, and I wanted him to say he wanted to protect me, too.
Wait! Have I always been this prone to jealousy?
Hearing Souma praise his other fiancées, I caught myself feeling envious of them, and it shocked me a bit. This was a feeling I couldn’t let myself embrace, wasn’t it? I was the candidate to become Souma’s first primary queen. More than anyone else here, I had to respect the harmony between my fellow queens. I felt the hand I was holding my collar with clench tighter.
At last, my turn came.
“Finally, Princess Liscia... For this one, I should start with his response to my question, ‘Don’t you have anything on your mind when it comes to Princess Liscia?’ I suppose.’”
“Huh...?”
Why were we starting with the “Do you have anything on your mind?” question for me? I wanted to find out what Souma thought of me, just like everyone else had. While I was thinking that, Excel shook her head silently with a smile.
“There’s no need for that. I think his appraisal of you is summed up quite succinctly in his answer to this question. This is what His Majesty said: ‘Nothing.’”
Nothing? He didn’t have anything on his mind when it came to me? No fair... He’d had something for everyone else, hadn’t he? And yet... when it came to me, it was “Nothing”...
Why...?
“Princess!” Excel barked.
I’d nearly gotten lost in my thoughts, but Excel’s voice snapped me back to attention.
“Oh! Sorry.”
“Listen until I’m finished, please. His Majesty continued on to say this: ‘I told her the most important thing on that snowy day. I don’t have anything more to say than that.’ Now, as for what he said on that snowy day... I refrained from asking him in detail, but I think you must have some idea what he meant, right?”
It came back to me. Of all the days I had spent with Souma, there was one day in which I vividly remembered that it was snowing. It had been the 31st day, 12th month, and 1,546th year of the Continental Calendar. Last year’s New Year’s Eve.
“The truth is, this is something... I really ought to have told you before Aisha, before Juna, and before Roroa...”
That night, on the terrace of the governmental affairs office, Souma had said it.
“Liscia... I love you. Please, marry me.”
Souma had proposed to me in the snow that had just begun to fall. He had already told me the most important thing, and there was nothing else left to think about. That was what Souma said.
I see... I had already received them, hadn’t I? The feelings that Souma held dearest. The moment I thought that, there was a warmth in my chest. Then...
Slap, slap, slap, slap... Roroa, Aisha, and Juna all started slapping me on the back.
“Ow...! Hey, stop it! That hurts!” I shouted.
“““...”””
“I dunno,” Roroa said. “It feels mighty unfair that only Big Sister Cia gets it.”
“Ohh... Something special just for the two of you, I’m so jealoooouuuus,” Aisha moaned.
“Oh! Dear, how shameful of me...” Juna said.
When I looked at the jealous Roroa and Aisha, and Juna who was blushing in embarrassment about what she had just done, I broke into a smile.
Yeah... That was right. Everyone could feel jealous, or that things weren’t fair. The fact that I was candidate to be the first primary queen had nothing to do with it. It was a feeling I had just because of how much I cared for a person. That being the case...
“...Hey, Roroa, I’m jealous of the rest of you, too, you know?” I said.
“Hm? Are ya?” she asked.
“Yeah. I wanted to be told, ‘I like this about her,’ or, ‘I don’t want to let anyone else have her,’ or, ‘I want to protect her.’”
“Hmm. Well, maybe that’s just how it goes.”
That was why I had to accept it, not deny it. Because I realized this feeling was important.
With all of our appraisals over and done with, Excel clapped her hands together.
“Now, you all understand what Souma thinks of you. From here, I think we’ll go into some more practical knowledge of how to improve your marital relations.”
“‘Practical knowledge’?” I echoed without thinking, for which Excel gave me an incredibly nice smile.
“Didn’t I tell you at the very beginning? In this lecture, I teach you how you should act as a wife, the way gentlemen think, and everything from how to support your husband to how to perform your nightly duties in the bedroom in a way that makes your marital relations go more smoothly. I’ll be ever so very thorough teaching you about that.”
““““...”””” We all fell into dead silence.
Right. Now that she’d mentioned it, she had said that was what this course was about.
“Um, Grandmother? Setting the other parts aside, well... D-do we absolutely have to take your lectures on our nightly, um, ‘d-duties’?” Juna asked.
“L-Like Juna said,” Aisha added. “It’s just too embarrassing...”
“I’m a little interested, y’know?” Roroa put in.
“R-Roroa!” I shouted.
“Huh? You ain’t interested, Big Sister Cia?”
“That’s... Maybe a little, but...”
While we were acting reluctant, Excel gave us a look that seemed to say, “I’ve already planned around you feeling that way,” and she patted the remaining black bundle confidently.
“Oh my? You’re sure you want to pass up this opportunity? If you take my lectures to the end, you’ll receive one of these in commemoration.”
As she said that, Excel unwrapped the black bundle, and inside there were notebooks just like before. However, these books were thin, and their covers were black. Their covers carried the even more dangerous sounding, “Documents Contain Top Secret Classified Information,” and “Dispose of by Incineration After Reading.”
They were being treated like forbidden books, but Excel opened one up and began flipping through it as if to show it off to us.
“This black notebook contains the [censored] that His Majesty Souma wants you to do for him, or that he wants to do for you, and the situations involved.”
““““Huh...? Whaaaaaa?!””””
The look in everyone’s eyes changed.
[Censored]? Wait, seriously?! I thought.
“I heard all of this after plying him with even more tequeur, so I’m sure of it,” Excel said. “In short, these notebooks contain the naked truth about his desire for the four of you that His Majesty Souma normally keeps under control and hidden away.”
So this was it!
Juna and I looked at each other once again. Little wonder he had suppressed the memory. If he’d remembered blabbing about all of this embarrassing stuff, I was sure he’d never be able to look any of us in the eye again.
Everyone looked intently at the black notebooks. Excel made a show of flipping through one of them so that only she could see.
“My, how interesting. It seems he wants to do different things with each of you. With Roroa... Hoho. With Aisha... I see, so that’s how he likes it, huh. With Juna... Oh, my, to be so young again. And with the princess... Hee hee.”
Hee hee, what?! What exactly was written in there?!
Though Excel was beautiful as
she gave us a sidelong glance with a seductive smile, she also looked like a demon lord. I dunno... I had to feel sorry for Souma after all this.
“Um... Duchess Walter? I think those notebooks are going a bit far...” I hesitated.
“Oh, you don’t want them, then? In that case, they’ll have to be burned like it says on the cover...”
““““We want them!”””” the four of us shouted in unison.
Excel nodded with satisfaction.
...Sorry, Souma. But I’m sure this is for the good of the kingdom. While making excuses to my absent husband-to-be, I gave in.
“Now, let’s begin the lecture,” Excel said with satisfaction.
This was how the first lecture of Excel’s Bridal Training Course began.
The course content, naturally, made us feel embarrassed sometimes, but Souma’s fiancées took the lessons seriously. That included me, too.
Well, of course, I wanted that black notebook... I felt it was necessary for building a stable household and a stable country.
So that we could all live happily ever after.
◇ ◇ ◇
Now, about these black notebooks: it is said that, in later days, the candidates to become queens would ask Excel to produce them regularly. At first, they would incinerate them when they finished reading them, but eventually they started to store them somewhere safe, thinking they could be useful again in the future.
In later years, an historical scholar who discovered a box containing several of these booklets attempted to announce their contents at an historical conference, but he stopped just before the announcement claiming the discovered documents were “forgeries.” There were reports that a group of suspicious men had made contact with him a few days prior, but the truth of those rumors remains in the darkness.
Chapter 3.5: After the Bridal Course (Souma’s Day)
Lately, Liscia and the others had been acting weird. Liscia, Aisha, Juna, and Roroa... All of them had been acting a bit off.
If you were to ask me to put into words what exactly was off about it, I’d have had a hard time answering; but for some reason they turned pink whenever we met, turning and immediately walking off in the opposite direction as if they were embarrassed. It wasn’t like they were deliberately ignoring me, but it was a bit depressing to have them avoid me like that.