Bear School Astartes

"Coming straight to me was a smart choice, child."

Nanik led Lann around as if they were strolling through a garden, walking here and there while they talked.

"Oh?" Lann said with an interested smile on his face, "Hearing you say that... sounds like Duke Seward hasn’t made any progress in the ’discriminating against people’ department these past few years?"

"Child, don’t assume that just because you’ve fought a few hard and glorious battles and done some impressive things, you can win everyone’s respect. Don’t be that naive."

Nanik stretched out her plump, wrinkled hand and picked two golden calendulas from the flowerbed. Those flowers are often put into salads and eaten.

She ate one herself, and handed the other to Lann without even looking back.

At the same time she kept talking to Lann.

She looked exactly like a grandma stuffing snacks into her grandson’s hands while nagging on and on.

Lann obediently took the golden calendula and put it into his mouth to chew as well.

"Hey, I’m not that naive, Nanik."

"Good. That way you’ll have far fewer disappointments you could have avoided." Nanik went on.

"You can’t judge a person’s stance just by what’s on the surface. That old dog Seward knows how formidable you are, of course. If he really met you, he might give you some basic respect."

"But no matter how his face looks, his true attitude toward you depends only on where he stands."

Lann savored the fresh fragrance of the calendula in his mouth, along with its subtle grassy bitterness.

"So at this stage, what exactly is the stance of this Duke of Elrand Duchy?"

"You’re much sharper than that block of wood Geralt." Nanik looked at the young man with a bit of surprise. "All right, let’s speak plainly."

"In recent years Seward has been working hard to push a certain policy. He wants to help the White Rose Knight Order obtain authorization from the Holy Hall Council, so that every Knight in the Order can receive an actual enfeoffed fief."

The Holy Hall Council is the body within Temeria responsible for managing the affairs of the various Knight Orders.

Knight Orders tend to have combat power well above that of regular soldiers, and quite a few of their members are young people with noble inheritance rights. Of course you have to manage that kind of trouble with care.

So setting up a dedicated organization to handle these matters is perfectly normal.

In Toussaint, the ’Land of Knights and Fine Wine’, although for policy and historical reasons they have no formal military force, they do have a cultural tradition of Wandering Knights.

To manage the Wandering Knights, they even set up a dedicated ’Wandering Knight Guild’.

Take High Hill Castle, which Veltrest enfeoffed to the Embers Knight Order—formally it had to go through the full Holy Hall Council procedure.

Normally that process easily takes close to ten years to review, but back then the Embers Knight Order under Lann’s command performed on the battlefield of Sodden Mountain in a way that could hardly be called merely ’outstanding’.

It was downright terrifying!

So, riding on the reputation of having ’smashed the Battle of Sodden Mountain’, that round of approval probably set the speed record for Temeria since its founding.

Whereas the review sent in by Duke Seward is the sort of process that, in the usual run of things, takes nearly ten years of constant pushing to move along.

"Because Seward is driving this review forward, he can get the White Rose Knight Order to give him their fervent assistance."

Nanik chuckled.

"Or rather, it’s precisely because he wants the support of the White Rose Knight Order that he works so hard to move the review along. This is the Knight Order with the biggest momentum in Temeria in recent years... of course, the Embers Knight Order, nominally stationed abroad for Sintra, doesn’t count in this list."

"You mean," Lann carefully savored the information Nanik was revealing, "the White Rose Knight Order is an important part of Seward’s power base?"

At this moment, Lann was also inwardly pleased with his decision to visit the Meretelli Temple first upon arriving in Elrand.

Things like the composition of the local Duke’s forces are the kind of information an outsider normally has absolutely no way of knowing.

But for Meretelli’s Chief Priestess, whose roots here are just as deep, and whose influence is even broader and greater than Seward the Duke’s, such information is trivially clear.

"He’s putting in the effort to move the Holy Hall Council’s review forward in order to trade for the loyalty of the White Rose Knight Order. That means that while he accepts the Order’s oath of fealty, he has to accept the influence exerted on him by the Order itself."

Lann followed behind Nanik’s leisurely steps, speaking in a low, firm voice.

Generally, people who haven’t taken a deep look into a group or organization tend to naively think: the leader’s will shapes the entire group or organization.

There’s some truth in that, but it’s quite narrow.

More often, what happens is: the will and inclination that the leader seems to possess are merely the collective will of the organization or group, projected onto him.

It’s like how a crime boss has to be ruthless, because the very structure of a gang demands they all be ruthless.

The gang’s purpose is to make money, so when the boss no longer wants to make money with the crew—when he’s made enough, hates the danger, and wants to drop everything, retire, launder his name, and dissolve the organization—nine times out of ten that’s exactly when he’s going to die.

Because at that point, his will is already at odds with the will of the organization.

Seward was the same.

He brought the White Rose Knight Order under his banner, gained their oath of fealty, and strengthened his military power. But at the same time, he was inevitably dragged along by the style and spirit of the White Rose Knight Order.

And what kind of style does the White Rose Knight Order have?

—Back then, even though Geralt was being well received by Nanik, treated as a guest and enjoying the protection of the Meretelli Temple, the Knights who came over to cause trouble for him were Knights from the White Rose Knight Order.

As blatant racists as you can get.

And if you want to win over this group of racists and maintain their loyalty, then whether Seward himself wants to or not, he has to be a "racist."

This is what people mean when they say "your position determines how you think."

"Looks like skipping the whole noble-greeting procedure with Seward and coming straight here was the right call."

Lann sighed again, only this time he said it out loud.

Nanik raised a hand to straighten the blue headscarf covering her hair. "You had no reason to go looking for trouble in the first place, child."

"You and that old dog Seward are not the same kind of people. I could see that at first glance."

"Now you’ve come here mainly because of what’s happening in the Ponta River Valley. Aside from that you have no overlap with him, and no need to even know him."

"You can just settle down here without worry." The kindly fat lady spoke in a tone that brooked no argument. "This is my domain, it is the Divine Hall of Meretelli! Since the Hall was founded, no one has ever dared run wild on my turf."

The old woman’s words were firm and natural, as if it were only right and proper.

If one of those students from Ossenford University’s recently popular "anti-superstition" movement were to hear this, they’d probably think it was the blind fanaticism of a backward believer in a fictitious deity.

But for Lann, he was thinking of that slight "abnormality" Nanik had shown just now when they came out of the cave greenhouse... as the most renowned temple of Meretelli’s faith on the Continent.

If someone really had the guts to make trouble here, Lann figured their end would be... "far from optimistic."

"Then we can be at ease." The Demon Hunter shrugged, then shifted the topic. "As for business... what exactly is going on in the Ponta River Valley?"

Nanik tugged Lann lightly, and the two of them stepped around a small mess on the ground.

It was a scatter of feathers and bird droppings, apparently left when the Female Priestess Apprentices had just driven the chickens, ducks, and geese away.

Still, in the lush gardens of the Divine Hall, such things would soon vanish on their own, becoming nourishment for the soil.

Speaking of this inland waterway artery of the Four Northern Countries, Nanik’s usually calm expression also creased slightly.

"How much did Veltrest tell you?"

"Not much," Lann answered. "But even just that was enough to leave a bad feeling."

"That’s exactly right." Nanik nodded, agreeing with the young man. "If Veltrest weren’t busy handling a sudden border clash with the Niflgaard Empire, he would have come here himself."

"As for this matter, whatever Seward knows, I know as well."

Nanik said it as a matter of course, without a trace of pride.

"After all, when those refugees reached the outskirts of Elrand City, the first place they thought of, of course, was the Meretelli Temple. Besides this, who would be willing to take in people who’ve been walking through the mountains for ten days or half a month with no time to rest?"

"Filthy, reeking, skin and bones, looking like they’ll drag misfortune in with them. Hmph."

Nanik’s tone wasn’t quite mocking, she spoke with the weary amusement of someone who’d seen it all.

"So these people... what did they actually run into?"

Lann’s tone shifted from casual conversation to cautious focus.

He was slipping into a Demon Hunter’s working state.

Nanik had known Geralt a long time, even cared for him like a son, so she was naturally familiar with a Demon Hunter’s way of working.

So she spoke without any awkwardness.

"They were originally mountain folk living in the Mahakan Mountains."

Nanik first explained to Lann the origin of the whole affair—or rather, the circumstances under which it was discovered.

"They lived in the mountains, making a living by working for the Dwarves. Mahakan is a great mining mountain; the Dwarves have been digging it for hundreds of years and are nowhere near finished."

"Their current Great Elder is a conservative named Hog. He doesn’t want Dwarves leaving Mahakan to enter the dangerous human world. But as for letting a few humans into the mines to work, he has no objections."

"Not only does he have no objections, Seward and Veltrest don’t either. After all, the mountain folk earn gold in Mahakan, and they have to exchange it for supplies down in human society at the foot of the mountain."

"And besides earning by mining for the Dwarves, the mountain villagers have a few Hunters among them, who can bring back some meat from the Mahakan mountains."