Arnold parted ways with Luke immediately after they entered the academy. The two of them wouldn’t be able to interact on a regular basis since they’re not in the same buildings or year.

Arnold was also too busy to meet up with anyone during lunch break every time. He also had to call Lunaria everyday to make sure that there weren’t any loopholes in their plan. So far nothing strange surfaced.

He hadn’t heard anything about Vetis messing anything up which was a relief. He was afraid that Vetis would cause another Luthial Kingdom incident if it was necessary.

Perhaps Vetis caused trouble in that nation on purpose because he had an agenda. Arnold wanted to avoid indirectly helping a Greater Demon who would slid his throat when given the chance.

Of course, the two of them had a mutual understanding so Arnold was certain that Vetis wouldn’t do anything that would jeopardize the Undead Nation.

Undead Nation.

He always wondered why they called it that. Why not Vampire Nation? Or was it named after their queen who was literally a moving corpse? Or maybe it had to do with how Selia had the power to reanimate the dead, including the citizens who died in the slaughter when they waged war with the city lord.

In any case, he thought that they had to change the name of that nation since it had an ominous ring to it. Perhaps Selia would consider changing the name if he suggested it.

Besides her nation’s strange name, she had to change the way people see her and her subordinates. Every person on the street knew her as “ a monster with unfathomable power” or “a murderous vampire who has the power to kill millions”.

If he wanted to show the world that he was working with Selia as an allied city then he had to wait for the right moment. If he showed their relationship now then being attacked immediately by other nations wouldn’t be an impossibility.

Even the Empire would join in the fray if they suspected that Arnold was conducting a scheme with Selia. Considering how his family knew his scheming nature and thirst for power, they might also fight against him.

All of this would happen from one misunderstanding: that Arnold and Selia wanted to destroy the world or something.

It wasn’t completely dumb for them assume so since that was what it meant to be cautious but Arnold wanted to avoid creating more enemies. His death flags would multiply by the day and probably overload the system.

His only salvation would be hiding behind the skirt of Brynhildr Selia Bloodforth. Even all nations combined on this continent wouldn’t be able to stand up to her. He would flee there until things calmed down.

Of course, none of this would have to happen if everyone’s opinion of the Undead—no, Vampire Queen, was changed.

Perhaps Selia didn’t even consider doing that since it wouldn’t benefit her in any way but Arnold’s life and fortune was on the line here so she would have to help him when the time comes. It would affect her nation as well if Arnold lost his fortune, after all.

The final bell for today rang. Classes were now over which caused an uproar as students raced through the hallways in excitement.

The teachers’ voices—who reminded the students to do their homework and study—was filtered out by the shouting and cheering.

It reminded Arnold of his time when he was in high school.

He was a loner who barely had friends. It wasn’t that he didn’t want friends. It was more like people didn’t want to befriend him at all. Perhaps it was because of how gloomy he always was or they just thought he was unlikeable due to his social anxiety.

The reminder of his high school days left a bitter taste in his mouth. And now he was experiencing something similar to high school all over again.

Arnold felt like he was being too petulant. Those days of being lonely were gone.

He now had a lover that he’ll definitely marry and have lots of babies with. She was the woman he definitely wanted a future with.

Though Arnold von Berkley didn’t have friends either, he had people that loved him—like his family. He also had comrades—well, as Nova—like Elora and Sylphiala’s party. Perhaps their relationship was more like admiration for his strength, though.

Arnold walked down the hallway leading to the student council building as his mood was lifted by the reminder that this life wasn’t so bad.

◇

Celeste von Penston wasn’t one of the capture targets but she had a big role in the later stages of the game.

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Due to her family’s huge wealth, she was able to give aid to people during the wars that occurred between the empire and enemy nations.

Although the Penston House was only a marquis household, their wealth could almost rival that of the Berkleys which had remained the richest nobles since the empire’s founding. One could even say that the Berkleys were the ones who helped the imperial family found this empire.

The Berkleys became rich by trade and renting out their soldiers while the Penstons became rich by mining gold and other precious minerals.

Of course, since both the Berkleys and the Penstons were so wealthy, they had a duty to fulfil to the crown.

Financial duties.

This meant that they had to back the imperial family during wars and such. This was because they were nobles of the empire, obviously.

Celeste became the matriarch later in the story and helped the common people. This wasn’t something expected of a noble. Nobles had to provide to the empire’s soldiers, not to commoners.

But Celeste didn’t change her mind even with oppression from other nobles. Many called her gullible and weak but were forced to swallow their words when it was revealed why she had done that.

What made an empire or kingdom wasn’t its nobles, the officials or even the royal family.

What made a nation was its people. Celeste knew this and took full advantage of the cards she had.

By swaying the common people to her side, she was able to become the most powerful woman in the Empire. After swaying the common folk, she was able to make even the nobles into her allies. Even the imperial family didn’t have the amount of power she had.

That was why even Arnold was suspicious over why she called him to her office.

If she wanted to make her business grow then her best option would be to seek Olivia’s advice. The two of them were associates after all.

Even the previous Arnold had no idea how to manage a business. He was raised to manage an entire household and its territories, after all. Anna would’ve handled the business side of things. A heir couldn’t do everything, after all.

“Thank you for the hard work, everyone.” Celeste said to the student council members.

All five of them bowed towards her before heading towards the door. All of them were surprised to see Arnold standing there. They looked at Celeste who was smiling warmly and decided to leave since she seemed to have expected Arnold to be here.

“To what do I owe this pleasure, lady Celeste?” Arnold walked towards her desk and bowed.

“There’s no need to be so formal. The two of us are longtime friends.”

“Just tell me what you want.”

“I’ll get to that part,” Celeste walked over to the window, “I heard you caused quite the ruckus at Lumourge at lunch break.”

“Don’t blame me. It’s those imperial faction clowns.”

“Please don’t say that in front of others, Arnold. Unlike the Crown Faction, the Imperial Faction doesn’t let insults and threats go unpunished.”

“I know what I said.”

Celeste rolled her eyes, “You’ve always been like this. You never care about what could happen to you if you mess with the wrong people. No, more like you’re confident they can’t do anything. I know the kind of things they can do since I’ve gone on a lot of projects that involved cleaning up the mess always left behind by the Imperial Faction. They hadn’t just destroyed farms that was owned by many of our faction members, they even killed livestock or broke down walls from the cities and towns under our protection.”

“Then why isn’t the emperor doing anything about this? Their actions impacts the empire as well.”

“How can he do something if we don’t have proof? Sure, we know that it was our enemy but we can’t prove it.”

‘I must admit, Ronia is very sneaky. She’s slowly chipping away at the power of her enemies instead of doing any big scale attacks. She really learned from her mistakes that caused the civil war.’

Just like Celeste and Judith, Ronia didn’t have much screen time in the game. She was the kind to operate in the shadows. She was a real nuisance to the Hero and Olivia.

‘I hope Ronia and Judith haven’t already joined forces.’

Then things would be bad.

“What will you do then?”

“…We’ll continue cleaning up after them for the time being. We’re still waiting for orders from His Highness.”

“I see. Well, what else can you guys really do without your faction leader there.”

Silence descended upon the room.

The two of them hadn’t made eye contact once. Arnold already accepted the fact that he didn’t know how to act around her but her reaction around him was strange.

Whenever he looked up he would catch her staring but she would quickly look away.

‘Do you hate my face that much?’

He felt a little sad. Well, that girl who became his roommate acted the same way so he could understand it a little bit. Maybe they were just shaken up by how they knew a murderer.

“So…” the silence was finally broken by Celeste, “would you like some tea and biscuits?”

“Tea would be nice. But I’ve already eaten a lot before I came here.”

He bought the croissants, cakes and buns he promised to buy himself earlier when lunch break came. There wasn’t any time for him to buy it off-campus so he decided to just buy the cheap ones at the stores inside the academy.

The quality was awful compared to that small café he was at but he could bare with it. He dropped off the rest in his dorm room before returning to class.

Celeste poured tea in a cup before placing it in front of him.

“This is the empire’s best tea leaves so I hope you enjoy it. I haven’t been brewing tea for very long since I’ve lived a sheltered lifestyle.”

Arnold could tell this without even knowing her personally. Her hair was neatly tied behind her head with a few bangs let down next to her cheeks, her uniform was comprised of a skirt, leggings, blazer and a tie. Not a wrinkle was in sight.

She looked like the ideal model student.

Then there was her mannerisms. Although it wasn’t obvious, her tone always sounded polite as if she couldn’t speak any other way. Her back was almost always straight and her neck stiff.

Her uniform and mannerisms screamed “Sheltered princess”.

“Hm… it’s a little bland.”

‘And hairy.’ He secretly spat out a small hair that was in the tea. ‘Someone ought to teach this girl to tie up her hair when making tea.’

But Arnold decided not to criticize her brewing skills.

“Ugh, I really should’ve asked our treasurer, Mekecia to brew the tea.” Hearing Arnold’s heartless insult, Celeste blushed in shame.

“Can we move on to why I was called here?” Arnold didn’t apologize for being honest.

If he had to guess what piss tasted like then it probably tasted like the tea Celeste made.

“Ah, I apologize for not having told you yet,” Celeste stood up from the couch she was sitting on and went towards her desk. She pulled out a letter which had the Penston insignia stamp on it.

With a smile, Celeste said: “I hope our marriage will be a long and fruitful one.”

“Marriage!?”