The Princess Knight is Too Strong

“…Well, rejected again.”
The carriage door closed harshly, and leaving only the murmuring voices of two girls inside, the carriage slowly moved away from Oscar.
Staring intently at the back of the carriage, Oscar thought:
‘Is this what they call push-and-pull, that dating strategy that’s popular in the Republic?’
Outwardly pretending to dislike him and pushing him away, while occasionally giving just enough hope to keep the man from leaving.
Indeed, isn’t it a dating strategy much like training a man?
‘…Well. As befitting the Princess Knight, she would train men rather than be trained by them.’
Oscar briefly imagined married life with a Evangeline as a good wife and wise mother.
…That wouldn’t be bad either, but it didn’t suit the her that he knew.
However, his happy imagination was short-lived.
A voice from behind Oscar pulled him back to reality in an instant.
“Well, if it isn’t Oscar.”
“…Brother Cardinando.”
Cardinando von Valentine.
The Empire’s First Prince and currently second in line for imperial succession.
A third-year student in the Knight Department of Polaris Academy.
With Yuriana von Valentine, they had a family relationship worse than enemies… desperate to devour each other.
“What brings you here? I was under the impression that you wouldn’t be attending the Eve Ceremony.”
“Ah, yes. Of course I shouldn’t attend.”
Cardinando let out a scornful laugh.
“When you and that sister you’re dying for are personally enjoying the Eve Ceremony, why should a nobody like me interfere?”
While openly mocking and belittling Oscar, Cardinando’s eyes never stopped moving.
“But you know, I heard something I couldn’t just ignore from my personal ‘shadow puppet’.”
A strangely flushed impression despite late containment of emotions. The carriage that had been standing here until just now. The back view of the woman accompanying him from a distance, and the left arm that shone particularly white, as if reflecting the light of the full moon that shone brightly even in the darkness.
“…Aha.”
Cardinando smiled maliciously.
“Your fiancée has arrived.”
“…”
A thin crack appeared and disappeared for a moment on Oscar’s expressionless face.
And Cardinando wouldn’t miss that moment.
“Oho.”
“…”
“So you do know how to show a little anger after all.”
Cardinando spoke without hiding his mockery.
“I thought you were just Yuriana’s puppet.”
He turned his head and slightly raised his chin toward the departing carriage.
“Is that fiancée so precious to you?”
“Of course.”
Oscar answered, glaring at the man before him.
Cardinando narrowed his eyes and asked again:
“Even though she’s a defective product that can’t even properly bear a child?”
-Crack!!
Simultaneously, blue lightning gathered in Oscar’s left hand.
Lightning like a wild horse, violently crackling as if it might burst forth at any moment.
With his arm pulled back as if about to slam the lightning into Cardinando’s face, Oscar stood frozen in that posture.
A blackened blade gently pressed against his throat as he glared at Cardinando with bloodshot eyes.
“…Indeed.”
Even facing this right before his eyes, Cardinando moved his tongue without shedding a single drop of cold sweat.
“So even Yuriana’s puppet doll values his woman?”

“…Take it back.”

Oscar said, clenching his left hand.

With each word he uttered, a drop of red blood formed on his Adam’s apple as it moved.

“Whoa, careful.”

Looking at that drop of blood, Cardinando said:

“If you move too violently, it might get cut off cleanly.”

“…What is all this? This isn’t like you, Brother.”

Glancing sideways at whoever had pressed the blackened blade against his neck, Oscar spat out a scornful remark.

“Is this your ‘shadow puppet,’ Brother?”

“Yes.”

“How many more do you have?”

“Do you think I’m foolish enough to honestly tell you something like that?”

Cardinando snorted and said. Oscar slowly nodded and said quietly:

“Well, I figured as much.”

-Flinch.

Oscar’s left hand, which had been subtly pointing forward, instantly turned toward his back.

-Bzzzzzzzzzzt!!!!

-Clang!!

Without even a death cry, an assassin—whether blackened by burning or originally dressed in black, it was hard to tell—collapsed unconsciously.

The black-painted dagger in his hand was cleanly broken in half.

“…Huh.”

Cardinando exhaled loudly as if surprised.

“Aren’t you afraid of having a knife at your throat?”

“Did you think a crude dagger without aura enhancement could penetrate a battle mage’s magical armor?”

Oscar replied in a plain tone.

“I won’t say it a third time.”

-Bzzzt!!

Once again, a ball of lightning rose in Oscar’s left hand.

Sharper and more violent than before.

“Your slanderous remarks about my fiancée, take them back right now.”

‘…Come to think of it.’

Inside the returning carriage.

I muttered while staring intently at my face reflected in the window.

Though it was dark outside, the inside of the carriage was quite bright, making my face clearly visible in the window glass.

‘There was another shadow puppet behind Oscar too.’

Since it didn’t seem to be watching me, I just left it alone.

What could that have been?

“…It seems that this so-called Princess Knight woman is quite precious to you.”
Cardinando spoke with a snort, as if finding it ridiculous.
“Aren’t you an imperial prince? You’re someone who can choose any woman at will. What’s so lacking that you cling to such a worn-out woman?”
“Not all men in the world are womanizers like you, Brother.”
Oscar shook his head, openly clicking his tongue.
“Besides, you’ve been crossing the line for quite some time now. Evangeline is a hero who saved humanity from crisis. She’s not someone whose name you can casually drag through the mud.”
“A hero of humanity? No, a hero of the Kingdom.”
Cardinando retorted, mocking Oscar.
“Evangeline merely acted to save the Kingdom. Has she saved even a single person from the Empire?”
“Do you truly not know that it was because the Kingdom did not fall and held out that the Empire and the Republic could remain safe?”
“If the Kingdom had perished and the Demon King’s Army had deeply penetrated into its territory, they would have faced a three-front battle directly with the Holy Nation, the Republic, and the Empire.”
“How ignorant can you be about the Human-Demon War?”
Oscar raised his voice, unable to hold back.
“The enemy, the Demon King’s Army, was not an army with intelligence but a horde of monsters! They were beings to whom common sense did not apply!”
“Then all the more easier. They would have blindly charged ahead without understanding the danger of a three-front battle and all been annihilated.”
Cardinando continued his answer without losing his composure. But to Oscar, he just looked utterly foolish.
One could argue that in terms of strictly calculating gain and loss, he wasn’t far from stupid, but what would happen if such a person became the Emperor of the Empire?
Perhaps the Empire would regress entirely to 30 years ago.
To the dreadful past when it constantly waged war against the other three countries, cutting into its own flesh.
“Wasting emotions on useless matters. Are you a person of the Kingdom, or a person of the Empire?”
Cardinando taunted Oscar, who had fallen silent.
“…Now I finally understand.”
Looking at him, Oscar declared in a tone tinged with cold mockery:
“The fact that someone like you must never become the Emperor of the Empire.”
“…”
Only after those words came out did Cardinando’s expression lose its composure and contort.
“What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said.”
Looking at Cardinando, whose expression had distorted, Oscar sneered and hammered home his point:
“You are a human who should not become Emperor.”
“…You’re crossing the line, far beyond it.”
Cardinando’s voice lowered. However, Oscar snorted and compressed the lightning in his left hand more sharply.
“The person who brazenly maintained his position regardless of what was said is now shaken just by mentioning the Emperor? What exactly is the imperial throne to you?”
Oscar shouted as if finding it pathetic.
“What is the imperial throne that siblings have to point knives at each other, poison a sister’s meal, and even put down a brother’s beloved woman right in front of him?”
“…Someone like you will never understand in your lifetime.”
“Then all the more reason it should not pass to you.”
“What?”
“If your ideal is like that of a child who cannot properly explain what they want, all the more so.”
“…Till the end, you cross the line.”
Cardinando’s right hand rested on the hilt of the sword at his waist.
-Click.
As the blade was drawn from its sheath, characters engraved in intaglio on the blade’s surface shimmered faintly in the moonlight.
Magical formulas.
A type of permanent enchantment that can generate magic enveloping the blade simply by infusing magical power.
“[Sharp], [Unbreakable], [Penetration], [Thorn]…”
Oscar, who had been reciting one by one the blue formulas circling above the blade, eventually let out a hollow laugh.
“So you’re determined to see blood.”
“You were the one who drew lightning first.”
“Because you wagged your tongue wrongly.”
Oscar’s words no longer contained any respect for his blood relation.
Hostility that seemed about to burst forth at any moment wavered between the two men.
Simultaneously, the two men stepped forward.
“That’s far enough.”
And, a voice from behind Cardinando was heard at the same time.
“…Sister.”
Oscar said in a bewildered voice.
“Why are you here?”
“The Eve Ceremony is over, so I can’t stay in this building forever, can I?”
Yuriana, who said this, turned her head toward Cardinando, who was not looking back.
“Your words and actions up to now. As the student council president of Polaris Academy, I cannot let them pass.”
“…Yuriana.”
Only then did Cardinando turn his head and growl. The formulas circling above the blade faded one by one, but the burning hostility in his eyes, far from disappearing, blazed even more redly.
“Deliberately disparaging remarks about specific individuals from other countries or their achievements are subject to disciplinary action under academy rules. If you continue to run your mouth, it won’t end with just an ordinary level of discipline.”
“…Ha, it seems you’re already acting like an Emperor. If your nose gets any higher, it’ll pierce the sky.”
“Are you deaf? I gave an order as the student council president of Polaris.”
“…”
“If you’re prepared for ‘corrective measures,’ well, I won’t stop you.”
“Tch.”
After looking back and forth between Yuriana and Oscar, Cardinando eventually clicked his tongue audibly and left without a word.
Toward her younger brother who was glaring at his retreating figure, Yuriana cautiously spoke:
“Oscar?”
“…How did you know to come here?”
“I attached a shadow puppet.”
Yuriana answered as if it were nothing.
“Even right after being severely scolded by Evangeline?”
Oscar said with a dejected smile.
“…It’s become a habit.”
Yuriana quietly muttered, watching Bill 422 emerging from the shadow of the grass.
“And, after going to the trouble of creating it… I can’t just get rid of it, can I?”