The blackette had arrived at the castle, having no hesitation whatsoever in entering through the front doors and randomly walking around.
Let's see... she thought.
She was searching for the werewolves, despite not liking a few of them, she decided that she should at least say some words to them.
"No-Ri-ko!" someone yelled.
She felt a tackle to her behind, but she didn't do much more than just wait for her attacker to continue speaking. She already knew who it was anyway.
"Where have you been? We've been searching for you everywhere!"
It was Kazuto. She shrugged, not at all alarmed.
"I highly doubt it since it was raining yesterday."
A whine escaped the male's lips as he lifted himself off of the young girl. He pouted, clearly disappointed that his 'younger sister' would thin of him as such.
He said, "Aw, do you think a little rain would stop me from finding my precious little sister?"
"Yes, since you don't like rain - and how many times do I have to tell you to stop calling me that?" she said.
Her brow twitched annoyingly, but he just grinned and started to cheer like the maniac werewolf he was.
"Yay! Noriko's back to her usual self!"
"Geez, chibi. Do you have any courtesy at all?" a female voice said haughtily. "Making us search for you because we had the decency to even worry about you, only to find that you were going to come back sooner than later."
Noriko retorted, "I never asked for your decency to worry about me, woman. I'm surprised that you even tried to worry about me."
"Well, Kazuto wouldn't have stopped bothering me if I didn't at least try to."
Reina flipped her hair, trying to look all high and might in front of the Knight Commander. Footsteps began to approach them, being impossibly loud to their ears like it was being done on purpose.
"Would you idiots stop with your measly, peasant chatter? It's quite annoying," another female voice said in a ladylike tone. "And very unbecoming of a werewolf and a commander."
Not again...
"Enough already," a male voice intervened, "you've already caught enough attention for one day. Noriko."
The girl turned her head over to the Alpha King, raising an eyebrow.
"Yes?"
"The prince wants to see you," Ryoto informed her. "He's in his chambers."
Curious about what was going on, she just nodded to his words and started walking to the prince's chambers.
---
She came to a stop in front of the chambers, knocking on the door and waiting for an answer from someone.
"Yes?" a male voice called out.
"It's me. Noriko."
"Oh... Come in..."
She sighed quietly. opening the door and entering inside. She closed the door behind, sitting on the ground beside the door instead of approaching the pierce, who sat on the edge of his bed with a unknown emotion.
She asks, "So, what is it you wanted to talk to me about?"
The prince remained silent, staring at the ground and seemingly to be sorting out his own thoughts at that moment. She just sat their patiently, knowing that he was the type to take forever to decide something, such as if he should say something of his opinion or not. He could be quite the annoying fellow though.
"I... Why do you think Father..." he began hesitantly. "Why do you think Father protects Maho? It's been on my mind ever since I had this weird dream..."
The Bond effect... she thought to herself.
"Oh..." she responded. "Who knows. It's your job to figure it out. I can't give you all the answers."
He sighs in disappointed, seemingly to have known that was going to be her answer. Noriko stared at him for a few seconds, before glancing at the ceiling.
"However, I suppose I can help you find the answer faster," she said.
She looked at him blankly, and he lifted up his head to look at her with a questioning look. He was wondering what her words were supposed to mean.
"How?"
"You can see the outside world for yourself, then you can understand the King's and everyone else perspective of the world," she simply said.
She pushed herself onto her feet, her back facing him and her face becoming absolutely unreadable to him now.
"If a prince doesn't know what the real world is like, you won't understand a thing."
She left the room with those last words. The prince just stared at the door with confusion, wondering if that meant he might be able to see the outside world. He also noted that was probably one of the shortest conversations he ever had with her. However, he wasn't expecting it to be very long. He had already concluded that she explained things with complicated words, but at the same time, made them short and easy to understand. It was confusing. He couldn't tell whether she enjoyed talking to him or really didn't care either way. He expected the latter though.
However, he did know that Noriko was trying to help him to get where he wanted to, whether she cared or not.
---
"Arata, my son," the King began.
He looked down at his son who stood before him, his eyes reflecting unknown emotion that made the redhead cringe.
"I grant you permission to go the Capital."
The boy looked at his father shocked, not really expecting those words to escape the mouth of the King.
"Really?"
"Yes," the King confirmed. "But not alone, and you won't just be doing nothing over there either. You have some conditions that you must follow - if Commander Noriko had not asked for this with such good reasoning, I might have left you in the castle for the rest of your life."
He flinched at his father's words, they almost sounded cruel in his ears but he knew that his father was only trying to do what was best for him. He mentally thanked the Commander of the Knight Unit. He snapped out of his thoughts as he heard a knock at the giant door.
The King called, "You may come in."
The large, golden-framed door creaked open, revealing a black-haired girl with a very, annoyed expression. She shook her head, looking at the prince with a face that suggested that it had somehow had to got to do with him.
"You better be grateful, Prince."
He only looked at her with confusion, not understanding a word that was leaving her mouth and it actually disturbed him that for once, he couldn't get what she was saying.
"Commander Noriko will be accompanying you on your 6 month vacation as a school student in the Capital," the King explained.
"S-school student?"
Noriko shrugged, clearly knowing about this fact.
"You didn't think that the outside world was all fun and games, did you?"
"... N-no..." he lied.
He sighed.
"Yes..."
The King cracked a laugh.
"If you thought that, then I suppose it was a good idea to agree to your suggestion, Noriko. You will both be acting and be like school students, you are not to peep a word about who you really are - only the teacher's will know, but they'll treat you like any other student. That means you have to wear the uniform provided for you. You'll live in a house that your mother lived in before I chose her as my wife."
"Understood," Noriko muttered.
She sighed again, seemingly to be really disappointed about the outcome of her choice to help the prince.
"Another thing - you are not to be out of Noriko's sight for more than a few hours. Not that you would since she'll be keeping an eye on you 24/7 on alert - meaning, you'll have the same timetable."
"When does she sleep?" Arata asks.
"You forget that she is a Commander, she can sleep with her body alert. No one can get past her defences."
Noriko murmured, "Now I have to watch him 24/7, great."
"And you don't have to worry about Drake or Winter, they'll be left here and only be called if necessary," the King continued. "She's fully capable of defending you without turning into a beast."
"I know, father," Arata muttered. "I watched her fight already."
"Oh right."
Arata asks, "When are we going?"
"Tomorrow. Everything has already been packed for you, your uniforms should be on your beds. If you have anything to ask about the 'outside' world Arata, just ask Noriko."
The boy nodded along with Noriko, who wasn't actually paying attention to anything that left the King's mouth. She probably knew all of the details anyway.
"You two are dismissed."
---
"Class, please meet Arata Flim and Noriko Lillinight," the teacher introduced the two newcomers. "They'll be joining us from now on."
Arata practically hid behind Noriko, having all of the female eyes raping his appearance. It felt like the times he had been approached by noble women, and only caused him to be more frightful of the women around him.
Noriko only shook her head and patted his back reassuringly. Though, he had his suspicions that she was disturbed by the male portion that stared at her with heartfelt eyes.
"Be careful of who you trust," she murmured into his ear.
She walked off to go sit at her assigned seat, not even giving him a second glance and didn't even let him have a moment to talk. He just looked at her confused, then followed after her and taking a seat beside her.
First period began.
His first experience as a student was not as he expected. Classes were easy to follow, considering he was a prince that was taught many, many things. The only thing was the attention he was gaining, it bothered him. The smallest thing could get everyone's attention on you, or if the teacher asks you to answer a question, everyone's attention is on you. It certainly didn't help that the girls were glancing at him every chance they got.
So these are the type of people we're protecting... he thought to himself.
He darted his eyes around the room, looking around the people that surrounded him.
The way they are... I'm wondering why we do protect them.
The boy glanced over to Noriko, who was behind him. Her eyes were fixated on the board, writing down the notes that needed to be written if she wanted to pass the upcoming exam. He doubted that she only cared about it, and only glanced at him when he would look at her - this did usually ended up with him looking away quickly with a blushing face.
That, and every five minute break they got, both were bombarded with questions from both genders. Noriko mainly by males while Arata was stuck with the eye-raping females. The only time the two had time to talk to each other was at lunch, where Noriko had quickly ran out of the classroom with Arata.
He sighed in relief, happy that he had been saved.
"I didn't expect life here would be so..."
"Different?" Noriko supplies.
She walked just a feet ahead of him, only glancing back at him every few times. He nodded in agreement, waiting for her to continue.
"You need to keep in mind that they've been taught differently from you, plus have different lifestyles and backgrounds. But that means you have to be careful about who you trust..."
Then why protect them? He wanted to ask, but he didn't say it aloud.
They arrived at the roof, the young girl throwing him a bento lunch for him to eat and sat down herself. She began to eat, staring out to the capital and watching the people walk around randomly or working.
"But you have to keep in mind that not everyone is the same," she added shortly. "There are some that you can trust, some not so much. It's all a matter of instinct. The only thing people have to do is find people they can trust."
He just nodded, eating his lunch.
He randomly asks, "Why did you pick the roof to eat?"
"To stay away from the people," she merely stated. "I'm not a people-person. Besides that, down at the cafeteria is where most people tend to draw attention - I don't want that."
"Have you ever been to a school?"
"Nope. Been homeschooled and taught by the military my entire life. However, the other commanders have. Takehiko and Mika mainly, Rumon not so much - he's a noble, so he spent most of his time being homeschool or doing 'noble' stuff."
"He's a noble?" Arata asks, shocked.
She nodded, and said, "He doesn't like talking about very much though. It's understandable, but don't ask me why - ask him yourself."
"O-ok..."
She glanced out from the corner of her eyes, the two of them hearing the sounds of male voices speaking from behind the door that led to the roof. They were going to have some company. The door opens to reveal a bunch of delinquent-like idiots, most of them having smirks on their faces as the pair was spotted.
Noriko narrowed her eyes, clearly not liking the expressions that were on their faces.
Great. I don't think these idiots are here to have a nice chat with us.
She didn't know how right she was.