Grand Duke's Beloved Granddaughter

“Oh oh! Is that boy good too?”

 

“I don’t think he would lose even if compared to our master. He has have the right posture.”

 

“Are you looking forward to that? I think it would be fun to spar once.”

 

“Did you see the hit earlier? It was an amazingly perfect posture. The sprouts of the article are visible. Sprout.”

 

I could hear people murmuring next to me. When I turned my head to check the sound, I saw that just like before, the knights were watching the sparring, pressed up against the wall. The same was true for not only the knights but also Elliot, who was training with them. Elliot belatedly noticed what I was looking at and quickly ran towards me. On the other hand, the knights who had no choice but to watch from the training ground outside stood under Brian’s pitiful gaze.

 

“Are they all playing around right now?”

 

Brian spoke in a bloody voice, but in reality, he was smiling with his eyes wide open as if this situation was funny.

 

“I’m sure I told everyone to complete their training sessions, right? Is it possible that you all finished it in this short amount of time? It seems like the amount of training is a bit lacking, right? I guess all the crying I did was just a sign of death.”

 

The knights hesitated and fell off the wall under Brian’s stinging gaze. However, only a few went back to training.

 

“Duke, shouldn’t we go back to the beginning when we see this kind of lively sparring?”

 

“You’re right! There should be some entertainment like this!”

 

“How do you live by training all the time?”

 

The knights protested against Brian’s words.

 

I felt deep trust in the drivers and Brian who spoke without hesitation. Well, they were the knights that Brian trained all along, so the bond must be deep. As I was thinking about that, a thought suddenly crossed my mind and I slowly scanned the articles. After looking at them for a while, I came to the conclusion that none of the faces of the knights and soldiers here were the knights and soldiers I faced when I died. So, were those who raided the mansion then Daniel’s private army? Can Daniel lead a private army? The authority to command private soldiers would only be given to great nobles who had received the title of earl or higher… I felt puzzled. I thought I would have to look into that part later. Unlike things that could be handled secretly, like letters, private affairs were not the type of thing that could be kept secret. In the first place, we needed a space to train with a large number of people, so if there were any subversive movements, it would definitely be a problem. 

 

While I was organizing my thoughts, Elliot came running to me.

 

“Belle, who is this?”

 

Elliot asked, pointing at Jeffrey.

 

“This is Jeffrey Coleman, my friend.”

 

First, I introduced Jeffrey to Elliot. For some reason, Geoffrey looked at Elliot with her wary eyes.

 

“And this is Elliot Crichton. He’s my cousin.”

 

“Nice to meet you. Did you say Jeffrey Coleman? Please take care of me.”

 

As soon as I finished speaking, Elliot extended her hand to Geoffrey to shake his hand. Jeffrey looked at Elliot’s hand, then took his hand and shook it.

 

“How old are you?”

 

“Eleven years old.”

 

“Then I’m one year older. “I’m just saying this just in case, but I hope you can be a good friend to Belle.”

 

Elliot didn’t let go of her hand to shake, she said. There seemed to be a strange current flowing between the two people.

 

“Duke~!”

 

“Noisy! Can’t you run 100 laps of the gym right now?”

 

“That’s too much, really.”

 

“There is no place to be so mean.”

 

“And then hair loss occurs.”

 

As the knights turned to go around the training ground at Brian’s command, they did not forget to say a word. The knights’ boos toward Brian filled the training hall.

 

“Didn’t I say it was noisy! Maintain your speed!”

 

Brian urged the jeering knights. However, he also didn’t really dislike the knights’ grumbling.

 

* * *

 

While the knights were moving around the training ground in a row, we each picked up our wooden swords to achieve the purpose we had come to the training hall for. After the sparring ended, another sparring continued. This happened because Adrian wanted to spar ten times. However, despite sparring ten times with me and ten times with Jeffrey, Adrian could not defeat us even once. It was natural to me, but I think it was unfair to Adrian. After losing twenty sparring sessions, he was bothering to follow Brian around, asking him how he could become stronger. Brian told Adrian that he was doing well enough, but he didn’t seem to believe it. Aside from the sparring with Adrian, the most interesting thing to see in the sparring that followed was the sparring between Elliot and Jeffrey. In the meantime, Elliott didn’t have an easy time defeating Jeffrey, as if it was worth it to come out early every morning to train. They were sharing swords with equal skill as if they were rivals. Jeffrey did not use a sword when sparring with Adrian, but it seems that sparring with Elliot was an exception. For the first time in a while, I clearly noticed that people other than knights competed with similar skills. There was a lot to learn just by watching. Elliot uses standard swordsmanship, and Jeffrey uses instinctive swordsmanship. I saw tricks that I couldn’t see when I was swinging the sword myself, attack timing that I didn’t know about, and loopholes. Elliot was able to feel her own limitations by sharing a sword with a swordsman who was outside of her standards, and Jeffrey was able to learn how to prepare for a formally trained knight by facing Elliot, who had formally learned swordsmanship. Brian watched Jeffrey and Elliot’s sparring and felt sorry for not being able to bring Jeffrey under his wing.

 

“His Royal Highness, it is time for you to return.”

 

“Already?”

 

Adrian slumped his shoulders as he checked that the sunset was slowly setting. He had other plans even after dinner, so it would have been difficult to be late any longer. Adrian, who eventually returned his wooden sword to its original place, still slumped his shoulders and trudged towards his servant. Before leaving for the last time, Adrian turned his body and looked at us.

 

“I hope we can all spar together next time.”

 

“There will be an opportunity for that.”

 

I left some hopeful words for Adrian, who was feeling sad.

 

“Right? We can do this again, right? Then I won’t lose either.”

 

Having strengthened his will, Adrian left the training ground with his attendant. We watched Adrian leave, then turned to look at Jeffrey, another guest here.

 

“Jeffrey, what do you want to do?”

 

I asked Jeffrey. Jeffrey looked at the sky and shrugged his shoulders.

 

“I have to go now too.”

 

Jeffrey said, unable to hide his regret. After a little hesitation, I grabbed Jeffrey’s arm. Jeffrey reflexively looked back at me.

 

“Let’s go and eat dinner.”

 

“Yes, Jeffrey. Go and have a meal.”

 

When I spoke first, Brian suggested it to Jeffrey again. Jeffrey checked on us with a puzzled look on his face. I knew he didn’t owe me food, but I still felt uncomfortable sending him away after he came this far. Anyway, if he went out of the mansion, it would be full of unkindness. It would be difficult to get a proper meal, and getting a decent place to sleep would become like a dream. I knew better than anyone else. The pain a child must experience walking around alone.

 

“Yes, Jeffrey. At least eat.”

 

Even Elliot helped us. Jeffrey seemed hesitant. I thought he would just say he would go back like this, so I took Jeffrey by the hand and led him into the mansion.

 

“Ugh! Let go of this, Mirabelle!”

 

“Let’s go. Dinner will be delicious.”

 

I entered the mansion accompanied by a confused Jeffrey. Since he was sweating, he couldn’t head straight to the restaurant.

 

“Go wash up first. I’m going to take a shower too.”

 

He let go of Jeffrey’s hand as he saw the servants approaching. Jeffrey nodded his head with a puzzled look on his face.

 

“See you later.”

 

“Oh, yes.”

 

After saying goodbye to Jeffrey, I went up the stairs to take a shower. My bathtub was next to my bedroom on the third floor. As I was soaking in the warm water, I felt like all the fatigue in my body was being relieved.

 

“Cool…”

 

“Little lady, why do you always go into warm water and say it feels refreshing?”

 

As I could not overcome the feeling of fatigue and muttered without realizing it, Anita tilted her head and asked.

 

“Because it’s cool?”

 

“Why is it cool? Should I add more warm water?”

 

It was cute to see Anita still not understanding, so Kalina and I looked at each other and laughed.

 

“Why are you doing this? “Did I say something strange?”

 

“No. You will find out later when you grow up.”

 

“What if I grow up later? Then how do you know now, little lady?”

 

“I know, right. It’s usually hard for a little girl’s age to know this kind of feeling.”

 

“I use my body to train my sword. So I can tell you’re tired.”

 

Kalina agreed to my words and nodded her head. Only Anita still didn’t understand what we were talking about. After taking a bath, I changed my clothes and headed straight to the restaurant. Jeffrey was already at the restaurant. She wasn’t the only one. The entire family was already at the restaurant except Daniel, who was away all day because he had a meeting today. Jeffrey was sitting looking around with a puzzled look on his face, but when he saw that I was entering the restaurant, his face immediately widened.

 

“Mirabel!”

 

I thought it was cute to see Jeffrey smiling brightly as if he had never done that before.

 

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