The Nymph Wants to be Plundered - Chapter 163

“Shh, you can’t talk carelessly. Can’t you see the knights are watching with sharp eyes?”

If we were to name the most respected knight within Jupiter, it would undoubtedly be their king, but Iel’s reputation was naturally high as well, having been built on solid ground over many years. He was the First Knight Captain to begin with, and it was safe to say there was no one in Jupiter who didn’t know Lord Iel, who was renowned as the Millennium Knight.

Eventually, with their mouths itching to speak, the trainees who had come to a corner to avoid others’ eyes all grumbled in unison.

“Wait, hold on. I object to this. Did she really catch that thing by herself?”

“Hmm… Honestly, I’m not sure.”

“Senior, please tell us about it. What were the traces of that ghost tree or whatever being caught like?”

“Well, there were no traces of being cut by a sword, and only countless silver arrows were embedded in it. Oh, there was something strange that I noticed. There were quite a few arrows dangling around because they couldn’t properly pierce the ghost tree’s bark, and less than a third of the arrows had properly targeted its weak points.”

When the senior with considerable trainee experience honestly revealed what he had seen, complaints and suspicions began bursting forth like firecrackers.

“See! It’s obvious.”

“Ob…vious?”

Eyes intent on thoroughly investigating the nature of the luck that Polyxene had stumbled into, and eyes more consumed with jealousy, clashed at once. The trainee who had hastily jumped to the conclusion that it was obvious lowered his voice to an extreme whisper.

“What else could it be? Lord Iel must have subtly taken the bow and helped her.”

“Come on, surely not…”

“I think there’s merit to that. If Polyxene was really just being chased by the ghost tree, what would you do if you were a knight? You’d naturally have to save your cousin, so you’d swing your sword and finish it off cleanly, right? But a ghost tree that was purely dealt with using only the silver arrows that Polyxene was carrying?”

“Right. If he had cleanly cut it with a sword rather than arrows, naturally those blackish roots wouldn’t have been able to move. It’s strange that Lord Iel just stood by and watched that.”

They were making a slight mistake.

Silver itself was an easy metal to see, but it was difficult to properly refine it and make it into arrows that could display pure power. Daggers or parts of armor might be one thing, but the situation was difficult for use as arrows that needed to be continuously shot, retrieved, and repaired.

Wandering guardians couldn’t easily make them anywhere, and since they had to request or commission blacksmiths, they were essentially rare weapons that were as good as unusable. Therefore, they had no way of knowing how truly powerful silver arrows actually were, or what their compatibility with ghost trees was like. Moreover, in forests, silver could reflect light and risk being discovered by enemies, so it wasn’t particularly welcomed as a material either.

Someone who thought that silver arrows and wooden arrows shot by experts would be similar once fired, since the arrowheads themselves were metal, casually said this.

“You know what. Then shouldn’t we formally raise this suspicion at some point?”

“To whom?”

“Who do you think? To Lord Iel or those… knights who are dealing with the ghost tree’s corpse, or to those handling the practical matters. Honestly, Lord Brax seems too soft-hearted and won’t push for a decision. What do you all think?”

At the suggestion to approach the knights who rarely smiled and didn’t really acknowledge greetings, everyone averted their eyes.

“Uh, umm…”

“Hmm…”

“That’s… a bit…”

Though the virtue of knights was supposed to be noble justice, they often didn’t hesitate to engage in rough and merciless acts when it came to practical matters. Moreover, the reason the knights had been deployed here was purely because of the inadequate skills of the trainees—and they wanted them to go complain to those very knights?

It was certainly difficult to step forward willingly in this situation. Though they felt they should overturn the current situation, when it came to actually doing it, it was nothing but frightening.

However, even without saying it, the fact remained that everyone harbored seeds of suspicion and jealousy in their hearts.

If even one among them had witnessed Polyxene fighting desperately against the ghost tree by herself and eventually bringing it down, the atmosphere wouldn’t have been like this.

It would be one thing if she had used her usual arrows, but to catch it by shooting countless times with only the silver arrows that Lord Iel had gifted her? Moreover, the only witness to that event was Lord Iel, her cousin. It was a suspicious affair where dubious signs were billowing up like dark clouds, no matter how anyone looked at it.

Just like during previous training sessions, this time too, public opinion about Polyxene among the guardian trainees was extremely poor. Since they were all in the same boat of suffering together, there was plenty of potential to view her favorably under normal circumstances, but it was the lazy Polyxene who had thrown that away.

However, it felt quite awkward to openly present the claims they had been making.

“……”

And so, a certain special day in the thorn forest slowly drew to a close, quiet yet harboring an ominous atmosphere.

***

And so, a certain special day in the thorn forest slowly drew to a close, quiet yet harboring an ominous atmosphere.

A few days later. Polyxene returned to Jupiter Castle with a flushed, excited face.

The judgment of those who first recognized her was similar. She had departed later than the other trainees but returned early, and with only Lord Iel accompanying her—the reason was obvious without even looking. If she had given up on the harsh thorn forest training so quickly, all that remained would be getting expelled from the castle.