Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume 5.3 - Chapter 11

My First Awards Ceremony

“The awards ceremony will be performed next,” Rauffen announced. “Students, descend to the grounds after fifth bell rings.” He was instructing the audience with a voice-amplifying tool, so even the bustling crowds, still excited about Dunkelfelger’s ritual, were able to hear him.

“We should clean up in the meantime,” I said.

Just like last year, the short gap between the end of ditter and fifth bell was used for a quick cleanup. The apprentice scholars put away the important magic tools and such they had taken out for their presentations, while the apprentice attendants put away the teacups and sweets that had been put out for guests.

While everyone else was working busily, I sat down and got some rest. I had been on my feet the entire time I was watching ditter, so my legs were aching.

But I’m not feeling sick or light-headed, so yeah—I really am healthy now.

Come fifth bell, everyone stopped cleaning and started making their way to the grounds for the awards ceremony. Seeing everyone descend on their highbeasts was breathtaking—the sky was filled with capes of every color.

“Wilfried, Charlotte, I’ll entrust you with guiding everyone,” I said. If every duchy’s student population descended at once, the sky would get too crowded, which sometimes caused struggles and small fights to break out. My siblings had taken charge last year, so having them do it again felt like the best way to avoid trouble.

“Sure,” Wilfried replied. “You can stay sitting with Father. You’ll need all the rest you can get before Uncle lectures you later.”

“I would rather you say he’s going to praise me! The compliments will come first, you know.”

Or so I wanted to believe, but he had tried to pinch my cheeks the second we had reunited. If even Wilfried thought I was guaranteed a lecture, I probably needed to come up with some kind of countermeasure.

How about... the moment he tries to scold me, I’ll stick a spoonful of consommé in his mouth! Or maybe I could start a rebellion, using the shumil to drown him out and return fire. Yeah, that should work.

As I was ironing out the details of my battle plan, Sylvester poked my cheek. He looked a little nostalgic as he said, “No need to strain yourself, Rozemyne.”

“Hm?”

“As long as you get the king’s praise while you’re up on the stage, Ferdinand won’t be able to lecture you. Use it as your shield. Besides, this is the third year you’ve come first-in-class—but because of us, it’s only your first awards ceremony.”

I thought back to what Ferdinand had told me about his Royal Academy days. Coming first-in-class had granted him a rare, precious opportunity to get praise from his father.

“You go too far sometimes,” Sylvester continued, “but you’re still working as hard as you can. I’m sure he’ll be nice to you—at least on this one occasion. He hasn’t read your reports to Ehrenfest, so he shouldn’t know the details of all the things you’ve done. The lecture can wait until you’re back home.”

His reasoning hurt a little. “Well, um... I did mention quite a lot in my letters to him. Am I still going to be okay?”

“You only wrote what was safe for Ahrensbach’s inspection, right? Pretty sure you’re fine—unless you willingly said more than you needed to.”

I didn’t respond. No way could I admit that I’d more or less signed my own death warrant in shining ink. My silence must have spoken volumes, though, because...

“Oh. That’s your fault, then. Enjoy the lecture.”

“Eep...”

“Anyway, you should get going. When the king praises you, just say, ‘This is a great honor.’ Don’t be rude, and please don’t say anything incriminating. Understand?”

After warning me over and over again, Sylvester finally saw me off. I descended to the grounds by highbeast, with retainers all around me. It was nice that I could tell where I needed to go just by the mass of colored capes.

Upon landing my Pandabus, I lined up with the rest of Ehrenfest. Wilfried and Charlotte had descended first, and the others must have gathered soon after. They were all chatting about how they hoped we would get plenty of honor students this year.

Eventually, the royal family arrived, surrounded by a platoon of black-caped knights who were carefully eyeing their surroundings. The royal highbeasts descended to the stage one by one, their wings spread wide. First to land were the king and his first wife, then Sigiswald, Adolphine, Nahelache, Anastasius, and Eglantine.

I didn’t really notice before, but now that they’re all together like this... pretty much the entire royal family came to the Dedication Ritual, huh?

The only ones who hadn’t attended were the king’s wives. On reflection, maybe the ritual really had been crazy.

“Ewigeliebe the God of Life grants his harsh judgment each winter, and your gathering here today means you have all endured it,” the king said, beginning the speech in the same way as last year. His voice, which was resounding throughout the arena thanks to a sound-amplifying magic tool, sounded stronger and more lively than during the Dedication Ritual. Assuming it wasn’t just my imagination, I was glad to know he was feeling better.

“I shall now grant this year’s ditter awards,” declared a black-caped man, who was probably a Sovereign noble; it was time for the top three duchies to be announced. “First place: Dunkelfelger.”

Dunkelfelger’s placement was both fair and magnificently well deserved—not only had they learned to obtain blessings on their own, but they had also done an incredible amount of research into fey creatures. Nobody could deny the speed with which they had completed their match, so everyone acknowledged their victory.

“Second place: Klassenberg.”

Klassenberg also knew a lot about fey creatures, and its students had attacked without hesitation. They surely had years and years of research available to them. On top of that, luck had absolutely been on their side; their feybeast hadn’t been tough or hard to beat like the gumka, so they had breezed through their match. Their placement was only half due to skill, in my opinion.

“Third place: Ehrenfest. Representatives, come forth!”

Immediately, a buzz ran through the arena. Ehrenfest had come in sixth in the mock battle but was now being awarded third place. Not once in Ehrenfest’s history had it ranked so highly in the Interduchy Tournament.

“This is only because they knew the fey creature ahead of time,” came a voice from the front. “Feyplants were a critical part of their research with Drewanchel, after all.”

“They surely asked Professor Gundolf to summon a creature of their choice.”

A group of students began to giggle maliciously, and an ominous feeling spread through the crowd. Leonore, Matthias, and the others were all wearing stiff expressions.

I wanted to protest. “If we were skilled enough to perform such bribery ahead of time, Ehrenfest would not be mocked for its poor diplomacy skills,” I would say. “Ditter results are fair and square; the better players win!” But the insults were coming from the front, which meant they were from top-ranking duchies.

As I debated whether to speak up or swallow my words, someone from another duchy intervened. “Nobody could rig their match in such a manner; the professors do not know whom they will produce a feybeast for until right before the tournament. I find it off-putting that you would demean others simply because your own duchy’s knights were so incompetent.”

Another voice spoke out in agreement. “Luck decides which fey creature a duchy will receive, and Ehrenfest was made to fight especially challenging ones this year and the last. Anyone with eyes can recognize their strength.”

Right! That’s exactly what I wanted to say!

The apprentice knights who had taken lessons with us and watched the game carefully knew just how hard it was to take down a gumka. We now had several duchies in our corner, which made those who had so openly criticized us fall silent.

“At least some people understand...” Leonore remarked with a smile, eliciting happy nods of agreement from Ehrenfest’s other apprentice knights. She and Alexis then took the stage as our duchy’s representatives.

To think, when I was a first-year, our apprentice knights barely ever cooperated and were a shambles against Dunkelfelger. Everyone sure has been working hard.

They had studied to make up for their weaknesses, cast aside the shackles of our duchy’s factions, and endured brutal training—but we couldn’t forget the role that Karstedt and Bonifatius had played too. It was because of their heroic efforts that the apprentice knights had grown stronger, even if our wizened elders had mostly been acting to prevent a future of disarray after learning that the Royal Academy’s changing standards were impacting the quality of new recruits.

“Your battles were glorious,” Raublut said, commending the apprentices as commander of the Sovereignty’s knights. “I pray that you stay this path and consider joining the Sovereign Knight’s Order.”

The representatives returned with clear blue feystones that looked a lot like medals. “This is my first time receiving such an award,” Leonore said.

I smiled. “Let us show Grandfather, who agreed to train everyone despite being in retirement. I am sure he will be pleased.”

“Indeed.”

After the chatter quieted down, it was time for the research awards. These had the greatest influence on noble society and were given out based on which projects the Sovereign nobles found the most impressive.

“First place: Dunkelfelger and Ehrenfest’s joint research on rituals and divine protections. Second place: Gilessenmeyer’s research on mana-amplifying magic tools. Third place: Ahrensbach and Ehrenfest’s joint research on making magic tools more mana-efficient.”

The speaker then asked for the representatives of each project to come forth. I didn’t know what to do; I was supposed to be representing Ehrenfest this time, but I couldn’t be in two places at once.

“Um, Wilfried... could you be our representative for our research with Dunkelfelger? I need to go up for our work with Ahrensbach.”

“Nah, nah, nah. Hold on. You were central to that research. Either go just as our first-place representative or represent us for both awards. I don’t want to steal my little sister’s accomplishments.”

So, having no other choice, I approached the stage with Leonore as my guard knight. “Is it really okay for Wilfried to stay behind...?” I asked her.

“Of course, Lady Rozemyne,” she replied. “You are the one who did the research, after all.”

Lestilaut was acting as Dunkelfelger’s representative. He was expressionless, but he seemed more deflated than usual and wouldn’t make eye contact with me. I could imagine Sieglinde had given him a particularly harsh scolding after her conversation with us... Staying silent didn’t seem like a great idea.

“Isn’t this a surprise, Lord Lestilaut? I never thought we would come in first place.”

“I did...” Lestilaut replied. He shot me a glance, then sighed and stood up straight. In an instant, his glumness vanished, replaced with the airs of a proper Dunkelfelger archduke candidate. “Rozemyne, you—”

“And I did not expect our research to come in third,” came an unexpected voice. “How delightful, Lady Rozemyne.”

“Wha?” I said. “Lady Detlinde?”

I didn’t have a clue why she was joining us onstage as a representative—and with a shameless look on her face too. I searched for Raimund, baffled, but he was nowhere to be seen.

“Um, should Raimund not be Ahrensbach’s representative?” I asked. “I don’t believe anyone else from Ahrensbach contributed to the research whatsoever.”

Detlinde met my doubts with a peal of refined laughter. “Ohoho! Raimund fears the public eye, so I agreed to take his place. And as my fiancé oversaw this research, I see no reason why I should not act as Ahrensbach’s representative.” It was definitely an excuse; she had probably been so forceful that Raimund just gave in.

Geez, Raimund. You need to market yourself more at times like this!

Feeling angry at Detlinde for stealing someone else’s credit, I went and stood in line next to Lestilaut. “My apologies, Lord Lestilaut. What were you saying?”

“Nothing. Pay it no mind.”

An unfamiliar man stepped out from the platoon beside the royal family. The knight commander had addressed the apprentice knights during their portion of the awards ceremony, so this was probably a representative of the scholars.

“Dunkelfelger, Ehrenfest—your research has made us see the rituals once abandoned to time in a new light and illuminated the requirements for obtaining divine protections from the gods,” the man said. “It is fascinating beyond words that having more protections changes the efficiency of one’s mana usage. As the royal family’s participation in your ritual should demonstrate, this research will play a key role in Yurgenschmidt’s future.”

He went on to detail the parts of our research that inspired the most awe, noting in particular our findings on how one’s divine protections affected one’s mana expenditure. He then said that he hoped we would continue our work so that growing students could get as many divine protections as possible.

That said, is there really much more we can research?

“This is your prize,” the man concluded. “Continue striving for the sake of our country.” He handed me a light-yellow feystone, which was noticeably different from the medal that Leonore had received. It was heavy in my hands.

I got Leonore to hold on to my medal for me, then moved to stand next to Detlinde while the Sovereign scholar spoke to Gilessenmeyer, the second-place winner.

“Third place. Ahrensbach, Ehrenfest—your research has made it possible to run mana-intensive magic tools more efficiently. Many of your innovations are superior to current methods, and their potential applications reach far beyond what was demonstrated today. We pray for even further improvements and optimizations.”

So, the Sovereign scholars were more interested in the basis of Raimund’s research—mana conservation—than in the magic tools themselves. Thinking about it, every single award-winning presentation had been about making magic tools more efficient or increasing one’s mana capacity. The mana crisis really was a matter of grave importance here in Yurgenschmidt.

We returned to the crowd with both medals, at which point the winners of the next awards were announced. These were for the duchies that had received the most visitors and served as the best hosts. Unfortunately, Ehrenfest didn’t place this time; the results instead matched the duchy rankings, with Klassenberg in first, Dunkelfelger in second, and Drewanchel in third.

“I thought Ehrenfest did rather well this year,” I said, pursing my lips, but Brunhilde shook her head with an air of ambivalence.

“Our duchy simply lacks an appropriate number of attendants and archduke candidates. We are forced to leave guests waiting, which lowers their satisfaction. Even coming close to the top scorers is going to be beyond us.”

Our sweets, trends, and the appeal of early business discussions meant we had plenty of means to draw in customers, but we didn’t have enough people to host them all. Apparently, this kind of thing was outright impossible if your duchy didn’t have a large enough population to begin with. I simply had to agree with Brunhilde when she said we couldn’t make more apprentice attendants appear out of thin air.

Plus, Ehrenfest’s citizenry is small even for a middle duchy.

We would need to think about how to increase our population as quickly as possible, even if only by a little.

Once all of the awards related to the Interduchy Tournament had been given out, it was finally time for the Royal Academy’s honor students to be announced. In a sense, all of the achievements thus far had been for entire duchies, whereas these were for individuals.

“I shall announce this year’s top students,” came a voice. “Those named, step forward.”

Among the sixth-years, an archscholar from Drewanchel came first-in-class overall. I’d thought the title would go to an archduke candidate, so that came as quite a surprise to me. Lestilaut was then announced as having come first-in-class for the archduke candidate course—another surprise, considering how obsessed he had been with illustrating A Ditter Story.

Lord Lestilaut’s grades are so high that he beat all the other archduke candidates in his year? That’s news to me.

Had he focused on studying instead of obsessing over art, I thought, he might have come first-in-class overall. I didn’t dwell on that thought for much longer, however, as Leonore and Alexis were named as honor students.

“Well done, Alexis,” Wilfried said.

“Congratulations, Leonore,” I added.

“It is all thanks to you, Lady Rozemyne,” Leonore replied. She then headed toward the stage with Alexis while everyone praised them.

Next were the fifth-years. Their first-in-class student was announced first, then the honor students were listed in order of the duchy rankings.

“Ehrenfest the Eighth... Brunhilde, Natalie, and Matthias.”

“Brunhilde, Matthias—congratulations, you two.”

Matthias had been recognized as an honor student last year as well, but this was a new experience for Brunhilde. Her amber eyes widened in surprise and then grew teary as a smile spread across her lips.

“This is my first time being made an honor student...”

“Indeed,” I said. “You have worked very hard interacting with top-ranking duchies. I’m glad your efforts have been recognized.”

“I am honored, Lady Rozemyne,” Brunhilde said, her cheeks flushing with happiness. Her pretty smile made her look more flowery than usual.

“An honor student, hm?” Matthias uttered. In stark contrast to Brunhilde, he didn’t look very pleased at all. Maybe he had set his heart on something higher, but a mednoble being selected as an honor student was already an exceedingly rare feat. I thought he should have been happier.

“You should delight in this achievement, Matthias,” I said. “As your lady, I could not be more proud of you.”

After a moment of stunned silence, Matthias knelt. He took my hand and, looking at me sincerely with his blue eyes, respectfully pressed his forehead against it. It was the most extreme form of gratitude a noble could express.

“Wha? Matthias, what are you...?”

“Lady Rozemyne, this honor would not be mine if you had not so considerately rescued us. You have my honor and my complete and utter gratitude, my lady.”

Please, stop! This kind of gratitude is bad for my heart! And you’re standing out! You’re standing out so much!

“I... I understand, so go and join the others,” I said, frantically pulling my hand away. “Everyone is waiting.”

By the time Brunhilde, Matthias, and Natalie made it up onstage, the fourth-years were already being called. Laurenz and Ignaz were recognized as honor students too.

“Lady Rozemyne, I would like to kneel and offer my utmost gratitude as well,” Laurenz said teasingly. “Would you permit me?”

I glared at him. “If you save your gratitude for when there are fewer people around, I’ll make sure you get an extra helping of meat on your plate come dinnertime.”

“Understood,” he replied, holding back laughter as he took the stage with Ignaz, who had received some congratulations from Wilfried.

“Next, the third-year who placed first-in-class overall,” said the announcer. “Rozemyne, the archduke candidate of Ehrenfest.”

I also placed first-in-class for the archduke candidate and scholar courses. Some were in awe at hearing my name over and over, while others groaned as if to say, “Again?”

Shortly after, the honor students were announced—and “Wilfried of Ehrenfest” was among them.

“Oh, congratulations, Lady Rozemyne!” Philine exclaimed. “At last, your first awards ceremony! Go forth and accept your honors.” She and Lieseleta were a lot more excited about my achievements than I was.

“Rozemyne. Your hand,” Wilfried said. He then started escorting me to the stage while my retainers saw me off, smiling. I could tell from all the whispers that we were drawing a lot of attention.

“So, that’s the Ehrenfest girl, huh? The archduke candidate who invited the royal family to a Dedication Ritual...”

“She missed the past two awards ceremonies because of something or other, right?”

Wait... Am I drawing attention for the wrong reasons?!

From what I could tell, people were whispering about everything except my being first-in-class. Their hushed voices sent a shiver down my spine, and I started to wish that I’d skipped out on this year’s awards ceremony too.

“Straighten your back,” Wilfried said quietly, coming to a stop alongside the other honor students. “You’ll be alone from this point on.”

With my hand now free, I slowly climbed the stage, making sure to move as gracefully as I could. After reaching the top, I gazed around and saw that I was drawing as much attention from the guardians up in the stands as I was from the students in the audience. The weight of having so many eyes on me was intense, but I stood up straight and tried to maintain my nicest smile.

Guhhh... This is nerve-racking. I really should have sat this one out.

I was already drained—but when I reached the row of royals, Eglantine gave me the most spectacular smile. I suddenly felt renewed, and it was with that newfound vigor that I knelt in front of the king.

The king looked down at me in turn. His face seemed much healthier than before, and there was more color to his cheeks. There was kindness in his eyes, and the tone in which he spoke was especially peaceful.

“Rozemyne, archduke candidate of Ehrenfest. You have obtained extraordinarily high grades for three consecutive years—and this year, you participated in joint research with Dunkelfelger, Drewanchel, and Ahrensbach. Your hard work and contributions to Yurgenschmidt’s future are worth immense praise.”

Maybe it was because everyone always scolded me for causing trouble or doing things I shouldn’t, but... having the king himself praise me and say I was making meaningful contributions to the country made me feel so warm inside. And it was clear that he was speaking from the heart rather than just being polite.

I’m helpful. Everything I’ve done has been helpful.

“It is my honor to have aided the Zent,” I replied.

Great applause filled the arena. After securing the king’s permission, I stood up and turned to the audience. Not just the students but also the adults in the stands were clapping for me. Among them, I could see Sylvester, the knights, and the parents. At the opposite end of the arena, standing among Ahrensbach’s light-violet capes, I spotted faint traces of ocher. I squinted my eyes in an attempt to get a better look and saw Ferdinand, Eckhart, and Justus all clapping as well.

Ah. Sylvester and Ferdinand are happy for me too.

There were so, so many people here praising my results in the Royal Academy. In truth, it was something I’d never experienced before. My anxiety was quickly replaced with absolute joy, and as my heart warmed, I was overcome with a feeling like everything in the world was good.

Right. I’ll work hard next year too.

The awards ceremony had restored my hope and feelings of optimism.