Chapter 50 – The Exodus
ROBIN'S PARENTS CAME HOME to a surprise, seeing the Scarred Knight eating grilled chicken intestines and grilled chicken blood cubes with their daughter.
Sir Thoras explained what happened and asked Robin's parents not to be alarmed.
“I apologize for being here this late at night. And not bringing anything to offer,” Sir Thoras said as he consumed five sticks of chicken intestines at once.
Robin swallowed the food she was chewing. “He got hungry, so we bought food outside.”
“No need to apologize, Sir Thoras,” said Robin's mother.
“Y-Yes. In fact, we're the ones who should be apologizing for not having food to offer to a Royal Knight.” Robin's father added.
“Nonsense. These street foods Robin bought outside are delicious! We don't have this back at Emergania Arc.”
“By the way, Sir Thoras. May we know why a royal knight is here in our humble home?” asked Robin's mother as respectfully as she could.
“Right,” Sir Thoras wiped the grease on his lips. “We've been receiving reports about a series of stealing back at Cannoppia Arc. And after seeing your daughter in action, we immediately knew that it was her.”
Robin's mother started to cry and panic. “Please, don't take our daughter! Take us instead!”
Robin's father even prostrated himself and placed his face flat on the floor.
Thoras quickly went over to the couple and asked them to stand up. “Maybe I should explain further first,” Thoras continued. “We've actually been observing your daughter for some time now and her ability to move from one place to another with ease was a serious skill. We would like her to live in Emergania Arc where we can train her to become a knight.”
“Wait, you're not going to take our daughter to prison?” asked Robin's father.
“No, of course, not! Do not worry about the things she stole. We already covered it. Now, all we need is for you three to agree and we can all take you to Emergania Arc. You'll be living in my household. And while Robin is training and going to school, you two can work at my house.”
The days when Robin's father ate nothing but damaged crops, spoiled tomatoes, reject produce, and large grasshopper and worms, the days when Robin's mother ate nothing but leftovers, the days when Robin stole to help her parents, all of those were finally over. And Robin promised that one day, the lives of the people of the slum will also turn for the better.
* * * * *
A few years later, Robin grew up to become a fine, young lady.
In Thoras's household, she learned how to act properly when in the presence of the nobles, royalty, and other upper class of the society. During her days in the academy, she excelled in her class, but still got bullied for being a lower class. And during her training to become a knight, she used her skills in moving quickly from one place to another to overcome her opponents.
Her fighting style was unorthodox. Anyone who tried copying her style could not keep up and ended up having to catch their breath.
Robin became fairly skilled with swords and spears. But what she excelled most at was the use of bow and arrow. She has become a great soldier and a great knight under Thoras's supervision.
Any skilled soldier can become a knight as long as they were granted by any of the members of the royal family. However, only the king can appoint the Royal Knights. There can only be seven of them at a given time as each one of them will wield one of the seven sacred weapons of the kingdom.
The royal knight that once wielded Irithium, one of the seven sacred weapons, died during a skirmish with barbarians and a new owner must take his place. The king may easily appoint a new one, but the king wanted to witness the strength of all current knights.
At that time, a competition has been held to see who will be the next wielder of the Irithium.
“Do you really think I'm ready for this, Sir Thoras?” asked Robin who was getting anxious. There were many strong competitors. Even with her great dexterity and mobility, she was not sure if she has enough strength to win.
“Hey! I trained you personally! I'm sure you can do it!” Sir Thoras joked and laughed to ease the tension. “Kidding aside, I'm sure you can do it.”
* * * * *
The competition pitted dozens of knights from the three arcs of the kingdom. But it didn't take long before the two last contenders remained. On one end of the arena came out the commoner-turned-knight from Sandersonia Arc named Lancea, and from the other end came the apprentice of Sir Thoras himself, Robin.
Lancea and Robin met at the center of the arena. Since the battle was for the Irithium which was a rapier, both of them are to use rapiers for the final duel.
“I heard you learned from the Scarred Knight himself,” said Lancea as she unsheathed her rapier.
“Sort of. He took me and my family in from Sandersonia Arc.”
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“Really?! You're from there as well?”
“Yeah, but we were from the slums.”
“Well, let us show these upper class what Sandersonians are made of,” said Lancea in excitement.
“You got it!” Robin replied as she prepared for her offensive stance.
The two immediately clashed.
Both of them displayed great rapier handling, footwork, and technique, not letting the other make a contact with their armor. They started off as if they were just fencing, trying to figure out each other's strengths.
Robin immediately figured out that Lancea was not fit for a light weapon like a rapier, so she changed her stance and became more aggressive, releasing continuous slashes and stabs, not giving Lancea a chance to counter.
Lancea was caught surprised and had to back away to regain her footing, but Robin quickly followed through, hitting Lancea's armguard. Lancea sidestepped and avoided getting stabbed and quickly made a distance between them.
After finally regaining composure, Lancea immediately retaliated. This time, Robin showed her blocking and parrying skills. She immediately managed to counterattack, using Lancea's own weight against her.
With one decisive parry, Robin managed to disarm Lancea and pin her rapier's point-end on the latter's neck.
Lancea raised her hands in submission. “Let me be the first to congratulate you.”
Robin smiled and hugged Lancea.
The six current royal knights of the Emergent Table witnessed as King Daffodil appointed Robin to become the new wielder of Irithium and become the youngest member of the Royal Knights at the age of fifteen.
* * * * *
A perk of being a Royal Knight was that she will become the lord of one of the seven divisions of the Emergent Kingdom.
The Emergent Kingdom was divided into three arcs: the outer and longest arc, Sandersonia which was the closest to Shiromori; the middle arc and the widest in terms of land, Cannoppia; and the innermost arc and the closest to the sea where the kingdom's harbor was found and most of the upper class and royal family, Emergania.
All arcs were named after the three main goddesses that the kingdom worships. While Cannoppia was divided into three territories, Emergania and Sandersonia were divided into two territories each. And each territory was under the banner of one Royal Knight who serves as the lord.
They ensured peace and order and can directly order the military stationed in their territory.
Since then, Robin became a lord in one of the three territories in Cannoppia Arc where her parents now live, and also got to do initiatives of their own. His father took the initiative to ensure that the farmland was being maximized where a portion of the produce goes to the slum of Sandersonia Arc and her mother opened a restaurant where a portion of the income also goes to the slums in Sandersonia Arc.
Aside from being a lord in Cannoppia Arc, Robin also became the official knight that will protect Princess Cattleya. Being the same age, the two instantly became friends. They even regularly meet with Lancea and another knight named Drancei, both of whom became their friends.
A few year after her eventful knighthood, the exodus of the people from the slum and of the commoners began. These people decided to defect from the kingdom, renounced their citizenship, and lived inside Shiromori instead.
Despite the danger inside the forest, the military did not stop the people from leaving, as if they do not care for their own people just because they were from the slums.
Queen Mellia wanted to know what caused these defections to transpire. She would then frequently meet with the people inside Shiromori and see how they were doing.
Although the people of Shiromori were glad that the queen regularly goes to the forest to know how they were doing, trying to find out how they could survive in such an unforgiving place, and what the kingdom could do to make them come back, they already made up their mind that they could no longer live inside the kingdom after experiencing discrimination.
Aside from the discrimination, the people from the slums claimed that they were being caught for crimes that they didn't commit. Every day, there were missing people from the slums and no effort was being done by the military and government to find them.
Not the king nor the queen were aware of such events.
Another year passed and the situation got even worse. Not only were the civilians leaving, but also some of the soldiers, mostly the archers. The kingdom's economy also started to drop after fewer and fewer people do important works that the nobles always belittled—farming, fishing, blacksmithing, and trash collection, to name a few.
At that point, people from Shiromori were now being hunted and were sent to prison for the alleged crimes of terrorism and treason. The kingdom claimed that the people of Shiromori attacked carriages and wagons that contained valuables and stole from them. The kingdom fortified its security and even sent Royal Knights during diplomatic visits or to escort caravans and carriages containing food, gold, money, and other valuables to and from the Emergent Kingdom.
Robin covertly investigated where the caught people were actually being taken. And it didn't take her long before she realized that the missing people from the slums, the unjustified arrests, and the hunting of the people of Shiromori were all connected, all of which were being backed by the upper class, some of the ministers, a member of the royal family, and even knights.
Soon, Robin discovered the secret mining operation directly under the kingdom’s castle.
Not knowing whom to trust, she took care of things into her own hands and decided to join the Rogue Archers of Shiromori and keep the people of Shiromori safe from the kingdom.
During an escort mission, she purposely let the Rogue Archers overpower some of the soldiers with her. She then ordered those soldiers to fall back and she alone fought the Rogue Archers.
She easily managed to defeat the Rogue Archers without killing them thanks to her Irithium, a rapier that could control the wind and use the wind itself as an extension of its blade. And after talking to them, she managed to convince them to accept her and some of the soldiers who decided to follow her on their own and be one with the people of Shiropolis as well.
It was then that she learned about Shiropolis, a village on the treetops of Shiromori. Knowing the people of the slum, she figured that they will find a way to survive inside the forest. And with her knowledge as a Royal Knight and a great archer, their strength rivaled that of the kingdom itself. And soon, she became the leader of the Rogue Archers.
News of her death and of those who didn't leave her side soon followed after finding the destroyed carriages and the Irithium deep inside the forest, much to the sorrow of the princess, the queen, Robin's people in Cannoppia, her parents, her friends, and of Sir Thoras, Sir Lancea and Sir Drancei who just became Royal Knights, when their predecessors retired.
Months passed by and the tension between the Emergent Kingdom and the people of Shiromori never got better. On the contrary, the tension became even worse when the Rogue Archers became more aggressive and organized.
Queen Mellia, who has been suffering from an illness for months now, continued her visit to Shiromori despite her condition. With her condition worsening, Robin, who has been calling herself Sparrow to hide her identity, agreed to take her to Shiropolis.
There, the queen saw how beautiful their new home was and that the people were happier and livelier than ever.
Still, she wished that these people could be living inside the kingdom where it was safer, not worrying about the dangers of the forest floor.
“It seems the kingdom doesn't deserve people like them,” said Queen Mellia as she witnessed the ingenuity of the people of Shiropolis.
“Please, my queen,” Robin removed her mask, revealing her true identity to the queen. “Spend your days with your family. That's what matters now more than ever.”
The queen sobbed. “Robin, dear. Take care of them.”
Even on her deathbed, it was the people of Shiromori whom the queen really thought about. Her last wish was to keep the efforts of convincing the people of Shiromori to come back to the kingdom and give them a better life.
And her only daughter, Princess Cattleya, who was the only one the queen trusted to give everything she knew about Shiropolis, took the burden on her shoulders and inherited her will.