Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume 2.2 - Chapter 24

Summons from the Knight’s Order 

The time for the Harvest Festival ended and the blue priests returned to the temple. I hadn’t seen them arrive myself, but I could indirectly tell by the increased amount of divine gifts in the orphanage. 

The High Priest had been sent to a relatively close town and thus returned quickly compared to the other blue priests, which meant that I was back to helping him again every day after third bell. 

“High Priest, I finished the math on these sheets.” Just like usual, I was blasting through the math the High Priest assigned to me. 

I looked up after finishing a stack of sheets, just in time to see a white bird flying straight towards the window. “Oh no! It’s going to hit the window!” I cried on instinct, only for the white bird to pass right through the glass and do a loop inside the room. It flapped down to the High Priest’s desk and folded its wings politely. 

“B-Bwuh?! What’s going on?!” I was panicking with wide eyes, but everyone else here seemed to know what the bird was all about. The High Priest’s attendants were eyeing it with only a little caution. 

“Be quiet, Myne.” The High Priest chastised me as he touched the bird, and the moment he did, a male voice began to speak from the bird’s mouth. 

“Ferdinand, the Knight’s Order calls for the temple to perform its duty. Prepare to set out at once.” The message was repeated thrice, then the bird disappeared into thin air and dropped a yellow stone onto the table. 

The High Priest took out a shining baton-looking thing from somewhere and lightly hit the stone while murmuring something. The stone immediately began growing in size with its shape twisting, until moments later it looked like the same white bird as before. 

“Understood,” spoke the High Priest at the bird with a wave of his baton, and in turn the bird spread its wings wide. It then flew out of the window through the glass just like it had when entering the room. 

...Wow! So fantasy! I wiggled with excitement at the magic the High Priest had just performed, only for him to glare at me. That made me realize that the previously still attendants had stopped working and begun cleaning up, preparing for something. 

“Myne, the Knight’s Order calls upon us! Get changed into your ceremonial robes and head to the Noble’s Gate at once!” 

The High Priest looked so serious that I replied with an enthusiastic “Yes sir!” even though I had no idea where the Noble’s Gate was. “...Um, where is the Noble’s Gate?” 

“I will guide you,” said Fran as he did the cross-armed salute to the High Priest, then he picked me up before immediately leaving the High Priest’s room. He strode quickly down the halls. 

“Sister Myne, have you memorized the ritual prayer?” asked Fran, and I nodded while clinging to his shoulder. 

“Delia, Rosina! Prepare the ceremonial robes at once!” The moment Fran opened my door, he let out a loud shout unlike anything I had heard from him before. He didn’t stop moving as he yelled, either. He strode right up the stairs at high speed. Upon arriving on the second floor, he set me down, turned around, and sped back down the stairs. 

Delia ran up to me with the robes and set them on the table before immediately starting to take off the blue robes I was wearing. 

“B-Bwuh?!” 

“Geez! Please stay still!” Delia’s blue eyes glared at me hard after I reeled from the abnormal intensity of her undressing. 

While I froze in place, stunned by how much of a rush everyone was in, Delia slid the ceremonial robes onto me. Rosina began tying the sash while I was getting my arms through the sleeves. Delia went and got a yellowish strap of cloth, which Rosina tied around my sash as further decoration. 

...Have they rehearsed this? ’Cause I mean, wow. 

Just as Rosina finished tying the sash, Delia pulled out my hair stick in one smooth motion. Rosina sat me onto a nearby chair before my hair even had time to finish falling down. 

“Sister Myne, you will be dealing with the Knight’s Order. No matter what happens, you must not allow any displeasure to show on your face.” As Rosina stood behind me and brushed my hair, Delia took the fancy hair stick I wore at my baptism out of the closet. 

“Sister Myne, please wear this one.” 

I took the hair stick and bundled up my hair like usual. 

“Sister Myne is ready!” called Delia, and Fran immediately rushed up the stairs. He was wearing a pouch on his waist, and he set the tools he had been using in the High Priest’s room for work onto the table. 

“Rosina, please put these away. Forgive me, Sister Myne, but we must hurry,” said Fran, and he picked me up once again and strode out of my chambers. 

“Fran, where is the Noble’s Gate?” 

“It is located at the back of the noble area of the temple. It connects to the Noble’s Quarter and is used for blue priests returning home or entering the Noble’s Quarter on church business.” 

Considering that I had been taking long detours around the noble area of the temple to avoid seeing blue priests and that I had no business in the Noble’s Quarter, the Noble’s Gate had basically been irrelevant to me up until now. 

“Sorry to keep you waiting.” 

We passed through a door within the noble area and found the High Priest clad in silver armor, along with Arno holding the staff that was the Goddess of Water Flutrane’s divine instrument. 

The High Priest’s entire body was covered in plate armor, and on top of that he held a full helmet beneath his left arm. The helmet wasn’t very decorated, but it was styled like a Corinthian helmet from Ancient Greece, where there was a T shape in the front which covered the nose but left the eyes and mouth visible. To top things off, his gleaming silver armor had a blue cape covered in vibrant designs. 

In front of them was a tall wall that seemed to separate the temple from the outside, with a large two-doored gate that seemed impossible for human strength alone to open. Each were made of the same white marble as the temple, and under the sunlight they were so bright it was hard to look at them. 

“Are those your ceremonial robes?” The High Priest looked me over from head to toe after Fran set me down, then spun his finger in a circle to instruct me to turn around. I held out my arms and spun so he could see more of it. “That is a somewhat unusual design, but it is better than I expected.” 

The High Priest’s expression softened, then he called for Arno, who came this way and held out something towards me. “Myne,” continued the High Priest, “you were born in summer, as I recall. I will lend this to you for now. You would do well to put it on your middle finger.” 

Arno had given me a ring with a large blue gem in the middle. The ring was clearly too big for me, but I took it and said my thanks before putting it on my left middle finger as instructed, expecting it to slide right off. But once it was on, the gem shone with a bright blue light and the ring shrunk to fit my finger perfectly. 

“B-Bwuh?!” 

“Cease gawking over every little thing.” 

“I-I mean, can you really blame me...?” How could I not be surprised? These weren’t “little things” to me. 

The High Priest lending me this ring meant that it would be important where we were going. And we were going to a land of fantasy, where nothing I knew would apply. 

“Wait here,” instructed the High Priest, who then walked to the gate with his armor clanking. Upon reaching it, he placed a hand upon a door. 

A massive magic circle immediately sprung into the air, just like the one that appeared over the hidden door in his room. The gate then began to open on its own, slowly but surely. And despite being used to automatic doors from my Urano days, the sight of that made my heart jump with surprise. 

“Bwuh?!” 

“Your commoner origins are painfully obvious. Could you at least try to remain silent?” 

The High Priest was expecting too much from me, an actual commoner. But Arno and Fran seemed unfazed by the opening gate, likely due to having accompanied the High Priest to the Noble’s Quarter before as his attendants. If this was normal for nobles and something that both they and their attendants experienced on the regular, then the Knight’s Order would doubtlessly view me with suspicion if I were to keep letting out embarrassing cries of surprise. I pressed my lips together to try and contain them. 

“Follow me.” The High Priest began walking through the open gate. Arno followed, and so did Fran after picking me up. 

We passed through the gate and into the Noble’s Quarter, and my eyes widened in shock. It was like passing through the gate had taken us to another world. There was a large fountain in the middle of a paved stone plaza. The plaza gleamed white as it reflected the sun’s rays, and the street was made of the same stone. 

In the lower city, tall buildings were crammed next to each other. But here, ivory stone paving and lush green parks stretched on as far as the eye could see. And unlike the filthy lower city, I couldn’t see a single trace of grime here. The Noble’s Quarter was startlingly clean and beautiful. Even the air was cleaner, perhaps due to something keeping it separated from the lower city. 

There were twenty-some knights in the ivory plaza, each wearing silver armor similar to the High Priest’s but distinguished by yellow capes instead of blue. They were undoubtedly the Knight’s Order. And they must have noticed the gate opening, as they gathered together and formed four rows. 

“Sister Myne, please act like a noble,” whispered Fran in a quiet voice with me still held in his arms. I nodded and attempted to make a graceful smile like Rosina’s. 

Only the lone knight who stood in front of the others had a helm under his arm. He was a somewhat stocky older man with reddish-brown hair. Each movement he made was trained and precise, almost beautifully so, but he had the furiously intense air of a warrior. 

He walked up to the High Priest and knelt before him, which signaled all the knights behind him to kneel as well, filling the air with the sound of clanking armor. “Lord Ferdinand, I am pleased to see you well.” 

“Same to you, Karstedt.” The man talking to the High Priest seemed to be named Karstedt, and it wasn’t hard to guess that he was the captain or something of the Knight’s Order. “Not many knights with you today.” 

“There are many who have not returned from the Harvest Festival.” 

“I see,” murmured the High Priest in a resigned tone before lifting his hand. Fran set me down, and gently pushed me from behind so that I would stand in front. “Karstedt, this is Myne, the apprentice shrine maiden who will be performing the ritual. Keep an eye on her, if you would.” 

“Greetings, Lord Karstedt. I am Myne. It is a pleasure to meet you.” I knelt before Karstedt and greeted him, calling him Lord as was appropriate to do for a noble of higher status. Our eyes met as I knelt, and his light-blue eyes narrowed as if he were evaluating me. 

“A pleasure to meet you as well.” 

“Let us be off, then.” 

At the High Priest’s words, all the knights stood up and touched the gems embedded on their right gauntlets. The gems shone brightly, and in moments the plaza was filled with sculpted animals. Judging by the fact that the gems were gone from each gauntlet, these multicolored animals had probably been created from them just like the bird had been created from the stone. 

“Karstedt, allow our attendants to ride with one of your knights. Myne, come with me.” The High Priest, now wearing his helmet, gave instructions while picking me up and setting me onto what appeared to be a white lion with wings. I straddled its back, trying to maintain my balance. 

The High Priest jumped onto the animal’s back behind me with surprising spryness for someone wearing a full set of plate armor, then gripped the reins. The lion sculpture immediately proved not to be a sculpture and started moving like a normal animal. 

“Bwuh?!” I jerked from the unexpected movement, hitting the back of my head against the High Priest’s chestplate. “O-Owwww...” 

“You would do well to keep your mouth shut. Unless you want to bite your tongue off, that is.” 

I clenched my teeth hard and leaned a bit forward, then gripped the shaking reins in front of me. The winged lion ran a few steps forward, then jumped high into the air with its wings spread wide. For a second I felt something hit me, like I had jumped through a giant spider web, but the feeling only lasted a moment. We raced through the sky, flying right over the lower city. 

“Wow, we’re so high...!” 

“Were you not afraid?” 

“I was just surprised at something unnatural I didn’t expect happening. This is actually less scary than carriages, since it isn’t shaky.” 

The magical lion soaring through the sky felt kind of like a slow roller coaster. It was much more comfortable since it didn’t shake hard like a carriage. The lack of a safety belt was, uh, thrilling to say the least, but I wasn’t that scared since I was nestled between the High Priest’s arms as they gripped the reins. 

Other flying animal sculptures rose into the air alongside us. Horses seemed to be the most common one, and so a rainbow of different colored flying horses soared through the sky. There were some wolves and tigers in the midst too. Personally, I thought the flying rabbit was the cutest one. 

“High Priest, what are these animals?” 

“They are highbeasts made from magic stones. They will move freely as long as their supply of mana does not run dry. It is up to the caster to decide what animal to turn their stone into.” 

We passed the lower city, flying over the gate and following the city road from above. I could just barely see the distant walls of another city in the direction the road was going. Our city was surrounded by lush forests and sprawling farms that had just finished participating in the Harvest Festival. 

“High Priest, where are we going?” 

“Over there.” The High Priest pointed towards the far end of the forest where we usually went gathering. There was a large crater opening a hole in the forest. I did a double take and realized that it was a wide expanse of exposed dirt with no grass or trees, yet somehow... there was a massive plant monster rampaging in the middle, swinging giant branches around. And the more it rampaged, the larger the crater grew. 

“Wh-What is that thing?” 

“A feyplant known as a trombe.” 

“Bwuh?! Th-That’s a trombe?!” The rampaging trombe in the middle of the crater was so unlike the stretchy tree things I knew that I hadn’t recognized it at all. 

But speaking of which, I remembered how Lutz and the other kids had all freaked out after seeing a trombe, and how half of the guards at the gate had to work together to take one down once it got too big. I had heard that the Knight’s Order would get involved when the trombe got too big for soldiers to deal with, but I hadn’t expected it would end up this monstrous. 

...They’re dangerous. Only now did I understand why Lutz got so mad when I suggested way back when that we cultivate trombes ourselves. 

“You will be needed after the knights finish it off. Until then, hide in the forest and do not put yourself in danger.” It seemed that it was the duty of priests to restore mana to ground drained of its own mana by trombes. Due to their diminished numbers, the High Priest was helping the Knight’s Order kill the trombe, and then would help me restore mana to the ground afterwards. 

...Is it just me, or is the High Priest kind of amazing? 

The High Priest pulled the reins and descended to an opening a short distance away from the trombe’s crater. The rest of the Knight’s Order followed him down. 

“Myne, wait here with Fran and Arno. Karstedt, assign two of your men to guard her for me.” He slid off the back of his lion and turned around to speak to Karstedt, who nodded and selected two guards. 

“Damuel, Shikza. Guard her.” 

“Yes sir!” 

The knights named Damuel and Shikza climbed off their flying horses to serve as my guards. The horses flashed with light that beamed into the holes in their gauntlets, turning back into gemstones in the process. 

“Thank you for the assistance.” Fran and Arno thanked the knights who had flown them here before nimbly jumping off the animals. I tried learning from their example and jumping off, but the High Priest glared at me before I could, stopping me with one angry look. 

...Oh, right. I need to be graceful. I remembered that I was supposed to be acting like a noble and turned sideways on top of the lion, which had stopped moving entirely like a statue. 

“You will be the end of me,” muttered the High Priest as he picked me up and set me down onto the ground. He then looked up and spoke in a louder voice. “Guard the apprentice shrine maiden closely. Allow no harm whatsoever to come to her, not even a single scratch.” 

The two knights ordered to guard me nodded with a firm “Yes sir!” 

The trombe’s crater continued to grow in size bit by bit as everyone got off their highbeasts. Out of nowhere I heard the mass fluttering of a flock of birds, and then the sound of something heavy hitting the ground so hard the earth shook. 

“Kyaaah?!” 

Through the cracks in the trees I could see that a massive one had fallen. Roots that seemed almost alive sprouted from the trombe’s crater and wrapped around the fallen tree. Its leaves dried and crumbled before our eyes as the large trunk dried out as its life was sucked out. And once it was completely sapped, the roots returned to the ground, having nothing more to do. 

I felt a cold sweat of terror run down my back. I had never imagined that trombes were so monstrous. With fear in my heart for the Knight’s Order about to fight the rampaging trombe just ahead of us, I knelt to the ground. 

“High Priest, men of the Knight’s Order... I pray for your success in battle. May you all have the divine protection of Angriff, God of War and subordinate to Leidenschaft.” The moment I said that, the ring the High Priest had given me glowed blue and light fell upon the members of the Knight’s Order. I realized that the stone in the ring was sucking up my mana and hurriedly held it back. The ring stopped glowing once I had my mana completely cut off from it. 

“We have the blessing of an apprentice shrine maiden, men. Let’s go!” roared Karstedt, which made me realize what I had done. I looked up at the High Priest and saw that he was looking down at me with a conflicted expression. 

“Myne. Under no circumstances, no circumstances whatsoever, should you make any move until it is time for you to perform the ritual,” he said, emphasizing the “under no circumstances” part extra hard before straddling his lion and soaring upwards. The other knights followed suit, gripping their reins and flying into the air.