That World of Otome Games is Tough for Us - Volume 4 - Chapter 8

Chapter 8:

Court Nobles and Regional Nobles

AFTER RETURNING from the dungeon expedition, Marie settled back into academy life. Part of that was meeting up with Brita and her two friends to listen to the latest gossip. What Marie subsequently heard left her flabbergasted.

School had ended for the day, so only four people were in the classroom: Marie, Brita, and Brita’s two companions. After being filled in on the first juicy tidbit, Marie nearly jumped out of her seat.

“Jilk and Olivia had a fight with a second-year?!” Brita and the others had told her about the confrontation between Clarice and Jilk.

Brita pressed a finger to Marie’s lips, shushing her. “Dummy! That’s Lord Jilk to you! Granted, boys are mostly below us, but how come you’re so ignorant of the social hierarchy here? He shared a nursemaid with the crown prince! If someone learned that you were disrespecting him by failing to use his proper title, Clarice wouldn’t let you off easy.” 

Brita and her friends glanced worriedly at the door, concerned that someone might’ve overheard them. It was this sort of reckless, loud gossiping that had landed them in hot water with Stephanie during their first ­semester. They were understandably leery of repeating that experience.

Marie slapped her hands over her mouth and nodded vigorously. In a much quieter voice, she whispered, “I can’t believe that there’s a love triangle.”

I never imagined that Olivia would progress so rapidly with Jilk while we were busy in the dungeon. Olivia had shown no sign of committing to any specific route up to that point. It disappointed Marie to hear that Olivia had grown so close to Jilk. Not because she was hoping for the harem route—she was just distraught that she hadn’t been there to see the drama unfold herself.

Now they’re in a love triangle—Jilk, Clarice, and Olivia! If only we hadn’t had to go on that dungeon expedition. I could’ve had Luxion spy on them and watched how it all played out. It was like missing one’s favorite romance reality TV show. Marie was devastated. There was still room for skepticism, but considering that Brita and her friends were just as keen on juicy romantic gossip, they’d gone to the trouble of gathering as much information as they could before reporting to Marie.

“Miss Clarice told that scholarship student, ‘You’d better not put your hands on my man,’ and, ‘You should stop messing with taken men.’ A bunch of people saw the whole thing play out firsthand. Hearing her say what we’d all been thinking for so long felt like a huge sigh of relief,” Brita reported.

Her friend nodded. “It’s bad enough that she’s messing with the crown prince and then all those other guys, too. I think most of us hoped Clarice would go harder on them.”

“Seriously. We can’t count on Angelica for anything.”

By turning up in the inner courtyard with all five of them, Olivia had been showing off, but then Clarice had interrupted the group and voiced the other students’ growing dissatisfaction. No wonder they were universally praising her.

“Argh! I wish I could’ve seen it!” Marie cried, head in her hands.

Brita smirked at her. “It’s your own fault for not finishing your dungeon requirement sooner. Oh—and before I forget, there’s more.”

Marie’s head snapped up. “More?! Tell me!” She leaned forward, eyes gleaming with eager interest.

Pleased to have such a rapt audience, Brita continued, “The scholarship student has behaved herself since, but rumor has it that that’s because Miss Clarice has put insane pressure on her. You know that she’s a court noble, right? They use some really dirty tactics to get their way.” That, Brita suggested, was exactly how Clarice was dealing with Olivia.

This was all premium gossip, as far as Marie was concerned, but something about the way Brita spoke distracted her from her curiosity. “What do you mean by ‘court noble’?”

Brita gawked at her. “You really don’t know anything, do you? Court nobles serve the royal family directly. The higher they rank, the more insidious their methods. Everybody knows that. And in Miss Clarice’s case, her family members have served as ministers for generations. I bet she can pull tons of unseen strings to get her way. All the girls born into court nobility are sinister like that.” Brita obviously didn’t have a glowing opinion of court nobles.

“Hunh. I didn’t know that.”

Brita cleared her throat. “I know you’re quite invested in what happens with Lord Jilk, but don’t forget the crown prince and his other friends. Everyone’s anxious to see what’ll happen next with them. In fact, they’re taking bets to see who gets the girl.”

Marie blinked at her. “Huh? You mean she hasn’t already chosen Ji—er, Lord Jilk?” Brita spoke like it was still a toss-up.

“I haven’t heard any rumors about her deciding on Lord Jilk, no.” Brita folded her arms. “Though I did hear that the scholarship student and Lord Jilk have kept on meeting in secret even after Clarice warned her to knock it off.”

“So they are still spending time together. That girl’s a man-eater,” said Marie, quite impressed. 

Still, this latest update bothered her somehow. When I saw them together before, Olivia didn’t strike me as the conniving type who could do something like this. Did she just develop that quality out of nowhere? As Brita told it, Olivia had those boys dancing in the palm of her hand. Something about that didn’t quite sit right with Marie, but she was more interested in how the relationship dynamics would play out than anything. It looks like we’ll need to investigate properly to figure this out. I’ll have to ask Leon to get Luxion on board.

***

“You want me to contact Luxion because you want to know who the protagonist will end up with? I’ll give you this—you’ve got no shame about demanding what you want.”

It was a weekend morning when Marie barged into my room. It didn’t seem smart for a girl to force her way into a boys’ dormitory like this, but no one bothered to admonish her for it. The academy was too indulgent with the female students. If a guy had snuck into the girls’ dorm for no good reason, then in the worst-case scenario, he might face expulsion.

I still sat in bed, drowsy from having just woken up. A yawn slipped past my lips. Marie clenched her fists, raising and dropping them against her knees for extra emphasis. She’s sure invested in this. 

“Jilk’s fiancée, Clarice, basically declared war on Olivia. It’s all anyone’s talking about at school!”

“Then plenty of rumors will be floating around whether they like it or not,” I reasoned. “Just ask Brita and her friends what the latest is.”

This world had few forms of entertainment, so people were deeply invested in illicit rumors about others. It was the same with celebrities in Japan—scandal was always a hot topic. But since no one had anything better to do, and people were voracious for the juiciest drama, the attention focused on gossip here was tenfold what it was back home.

“I’ll ask them, for sure, but that kind of thing needs to be give-and-take. If I never offer anything in return, it won’t be healthy for my friendship with them,” Marie explained.

I gave her a long, hard look. “That’s not very convincing, since when it comes to Cynthia, Ellie, and Betty, you’re always giving and never getting anything in return.” Marie always cared for those three very attentively, but I didn’t see what she got out of their relationship.

Marie shrugged. “Those girls are an exception to the rule. Brita and her friends are the normal ones. Anyway, doesn’t having access to info no one else has make you feel superior? I want that.”

“So that’s what this is really about. You want me to invade someone else’s privacy so you can feel superior. Do you hear yourself?” I’d barely finished speaking before another yawn snuck out.

My words must’ve hit hard, because Marie shrank back. “B-but this info is important, right?” she feebly protested. “Once the protagonist picks a route, we’ll have nothing left to worry about.”

“True. With the last boss sealed away, the only thing left to care about is which love interest the protagonist picks. But,” I added emphatically, “there’s no actual need for us to know what’s happening in her love life.”

“Hold on.” Marie scrambled to find some way to convince me. “We screwed up the plot in all kinds of ways, so aren’t you worried about how her relationship will develop? I feel like we’ve got an obligation to make sure it goes smoothly.”

She’d hit me right where I was weakest, because she was right—we’d interfered in most of the events meant to deepen Olivia’s relationship with her chosen love interest. It was bad enough that we’d done away with the Offreys, but as a consequence, Olivia had spent the school trip alone, without any of her love interests. Although that wasn’t all my fault, I still bore some culpability.

While I hesitated, Marie added quickly, “I’m not saying we should expose every little secret they have. We just need to keep an eye on how their relationship’s going. Please?” She pressed her hands together and lifted them toward me imploringly.

I wasn’t too keen on the idea, but she had a point. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll contact Luxion.”

“Yay!” Marie hopped around excitedly, which I found adorable—at least, until I remembered that her excitement stemmed from me agreeing to violate other people’s privacy to peek at their love lives.

I grabbed the transmission device I kept hidden in my room and spoke into the transceiver. “Luxion, we’ve got a problem on our end. Can you help us out?”

“That depends on how serious your problem is,” Luxion answered promptly. 

His response was followed by an earsplitting scream. “Eeeek!”

Although I had to lift the transceiver away from my ear, I recognized that voice as belonging to the Saint’s vengeful spirit. “Jeez! Wh-what the hell are you doing? Why’s that thing screaming so loudly?!” Luxion had answered me very nonchalantly, which made this all the more unsettling.

Marie frowned. “Huh? What do you mean? Is he doing something to that spirit?”

Pausing, Luxion adjusted the microphone settings; I could tell because the spirit’s screaming grew fainter and fainter until I couldn’t hear it at all.

“Nothing that you need to be concerned about,” Luxion said simply. “I am merely questioning her.”

“Would she be screaming if you were only questioning her?” I demanded skeptically.

“Digressions aside, what is your emergency?” Luxion didn’t seem interested in speaking further about the spirit.

I glanced at Marie. She nodded encouragingly at me, so I launched into an explanation. “There’ve been developments in Miss Olivia’s love life. I’d like more info on what’s going on, so I want your help. Can you come back down here?”

“No,” Luxion said curtly. He didn’t even think about it. “I see no need for that.”

“What?” I had a hard time digesting his refusal. “This has to do with the game’s future, though. There’s plenty of need for it. We’ve royally screwed up the original plotline, so we’ve got a responsibility to keep tabs on stuff.”

“We already removed the threat posed by the last boss. Regardless of who Olivia settles on, it will not impact us significantly. In fact, if she ends up alone, even that shouldn’t affect us.”

“Well, maybe not, but…” I hesitated, then turned to Marie for help. “Marie?”

“He’s kind of got a point,” she conceded. “It’s not like Holfort’s fate is riding on who she picks.”

“Where’d all your passion for seeing this through go?! Like you said, we’re the ones who messed Miss Olivia’s future up. We’ve got to make sure it plays out right,” I reminded her, irritation rising. “So there, Luxion! Help us out.”

“This does not rank highly on my list of priorities,” Luxion said, unmoved. “I am preoccupied with my interrogation of this vengeful spirit. I will prepare the items necessary for you to conduct your own investigation; deal with this situation on your own. Now, if you will excuse me.” He cut the line without waiting for me to respond.

I turned back to Marie. “He shot me down.”

She gave me a cold look. “You sure he hasn’t decided to abandon you?”

“No! Probably not, I mean,” I said haltingly, then added, “I hope.”

Marie frowned at me and shook her head.

***

“Tsk, tsk. I expected it must be a real emergency, and it was only an irrelevant request. I wish Master would evaluate our priorities more critically.” Luxion cut off the transmission, and his eye moved back to the trapped spirit. “There. I have dealt with the interruption. Let us resume.” He was about to flip the switch and send another electric current through the flask the spirit was trapped in, but she suddenly shot up.

“That was Lier’s voice just now,” she said.

Luxion’s red eye gleamed eerily in the light. “I have corrected you on this repeatedly. New humanity seemingly lacks sufficient intelligence, even as spirits. My master’s name is not Lier.”

“Let me talk to him.” The spirit flung herself at the glass and clung to it. “If you do, I swear I’ll tell you everything you want to know. The whole reason I was reduced to this miserable existence was that I hoped to see Lier again.”

Given that the spirit refused to back down on her demands, Luxion debated changing his tactics. If he kept torturing her, her energy might completely run out, and she might disappear entirely without giving him any answers. He decided that causing that wouldn’t be a smart strategy.

“Depending on what information you can share with me, I will consider it. But I will not grant you permission to meet Master unless and until you produce something useful.” Inwardly, Luxion debated whether what she might offer would be worth the potential danger of letting her meet Leon again. He was leaning toward the answer that, yes, it probably would be.

The spirit snickered at him, her mouth pulling upward in the corners, shining like a black crescent moon against the darkness of her mist-like form. “Ask me anything. I’ll offer you whatever knowledge I possess. It will be a small price to pay if it means I can meet Lier.”

He studied her. “Very well, then. I shall display several images for you. If you have information that pertains to any of them, tell me.” 

He projected several pictures onto the wall of the room. A certain one made her react.

“Wait. That looks familiar—similar to the Demonic Suit we got our hands on. Well, a fragment of one, anyway. It has the same characteristics.”

What Luxion had shown her was one of the weapons that new humanity had created. Hearing her answer, his red lens shone even brighter. “Tell me more.”

***

“It sucks that we couldn’t get Luxion on board, but I guess we’ll just have to handle this ourselves,” said Marie. “Fortunately, that should be easy with the items he provided us.” 

She moved past her annoyance over my failure with renewed determination as she examined what Luxion had sent us. He’d provided several spherical drones and a remote control to manage them with. They came with a monitor that streamed whatever the drones recorded. These were all high-tech gadgets—I’d have expected no less of Luxion—but something about them bothered me.

“If we use these to spy on them, won’t that kind of be…stalking?” I asked.

“Yeah. I guess it kind of would.”

It was one thing when Luxion did it—he’d filter unnecessary information and only give us what we needed. But neither Marie nor I was up for peeping on someone without consent; besides, this situation wasn’t urgent enough to require us to resort to that.

“Luxion was right, I guess. This really isn’t that important,” I said with a shake of my head. “I want Miss Olivia to be happy, but I don’t want to violate her privacy like this.”

Marie nodded. “Yeah. Thinking about it calmly, this would be completely overboard. I guess we’ll just have to go about finding info the old-fashioned way: ask around and gather it ourselves.” Although she’d agreed that we shouldn’t use the items, she still wasn’t ready to give this up.

“Seriously? We’ve got to run around and dig for gossip ourselves?”

“Duh. And, with that decided, let’s go ask around. It’s the weekend, so all the gossip-loving girls will be visiting the city. We’ll have to hunt for the info we want!”

I tore my gaze away from Marie. She was pumped about this, but I didn’t share her excitement. My eyes landed on the items Luxion had given us, and I grimaced. “You’ll pay for this, Luxion.” 

With no other choice, I accompanied Marie into the city.

***

“Hey there, ladies! I’ll pay for your meals, so why not fill me in on the latest gossip at the school?” I sounded like a playboy hitting on girls.

When I strode up, the girls in question were sitting on a café terrace, sipping tea in casual clothes. I wasn’t approaching them at random; I’d targeted this group because they were reportedly the best information source among the female students. As for why I’d used such a corny line on them, well, that was because I couldn’t think of how else to phrase my question. I’d gone with the first thing that popped into my head.

One of the girls’ personal servants stomped toward me, ready to drive me away. Most personal servants were demi-humans; this one was an elf.

“You aren’t allowed to approach Her Ladyship so casually,” he snarled at me.

“Hold on. I have something to speak to him about as well,” one of the girls—presumably the servant’s mistress—interjected. She and her group had glowered at me at first, but once their eyes landed on Marie, they’d realized that I wasn’t there to make a pass at them.

The personal servant stepped back silently; his mistress scrutinized me. 

“You’re Bartfort, aren’t you? I’ve heard the rumors about you,” she said.

“Little old me? I’m famous?” I joked.

It didn’t land; the girl clicked her tongue at me. 

“Sorry…” I muttered.

“After the part you played in bringing down the Offreys and Lafans, so you honestly believe that a single person at the academy doesn’t know about you? You’re close to Deirdre as well,” the girl scoffed. “You regional nobles are such warmongering beasts, honestly.” 

I described this girl as being dressed casually, but even her casual wear was fancy and expensive-looking. From the way she spoke, her family was court nobility, so it made sense that her voice held so much hostility.

On the surface, regional nobles and court nobles were deceptively similar. Both served the crown; one group was like a subsidiary, while a “parent company” employed the other. Court nobles held no land over which to govern, but they served the royal family in close proximity. They were the parent company’s employees and executives. I’d heard that the two groups feuded sometimes, but I’d never seen someone from the other group act so openly hostile.

“Hm?” I blinked at the girl. “Did I do something to offend you and your friends?” If so, I was happy to apologize for it and—while I was at it—ask them whether they’d heard anything useful. But I was pretty sure I’d never spoken to them before.

“No. We’re not directly associated with you,” the girl confirmed. “In fact, this is the first time we’ve ever spoken.”

“Right…” Guess they just really hate regional nobility.

Marie pushed in front of me; she probably didn’t have any faith in me handling this further. “Let me get to the point: We want to ask you guys some things about the scholarship student. You must’ve heard the rumors that Miss Clarice has been doing horrible things to her, right?”

The girls’ faces hardened.

“Excuse me? Why do you think Miss Clarice would resort to petty, underhanded tricks?”

“Huh? Because that’s what the rumors said,” Marie answered quizzically.

“Look here. Miss Clarice epitomizes propriety and grace. Unlike you and your group, she doesn’t need to resolve things with violence. She’s clever enough to find a more peaceful, strategic resolution to her problems. You shouldn’t take such lowbrow gossip at face value.”

Marie and I exchanged looks.

“That sounds totally different from how the other rumors described her,” I said.

“I wonder what this is all about, then.”

We tilted our heads, thoroughly confused.

Perhaps annoyed, the girl continued, “Miss Clarice handled the issue with the scholarship student because Angelica proved incapable of doing so. But there’s no reason why she would put pressure on the scholarship student behind the scenes. That commoner is the last of her concerns.” She seemed to have great faith in Clarice, presumably because they’d both been born court nobles.

“Sorry for disrupting you like this on the weekend,” I said, leaving some coins on the table to cover their orders. “Please excuse me.” 

I turned and headed off. Marie scurried to follow. 

“This is just getting fishier and fishier,” I told her over my shoulder. 

“What they told us definitely doesn’t match the rumors.” 

I was actually invested in this now. Why was there such a discrepancy between what these girls had said, and the information Brita gave Marie? “Looks like we’ll have to investigate this properly.”

As I showed interest, Marie brightened. “So you’re finally ready to take this seriously. Great—where to now?”

As we walked together, I contemplated her question. Who could I turn to? Only one person came to mind. “Let’s ask a certain relative of mine.”

“Urgh!” Marie pulled a face. She’d already guessed exactly who I meant. But what did she have against Deirdre?