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Some people wore animal skins and appeared to be from some tribe. Perhaps they were from a different country.

 

They were all foreigners, white men. Most had brown or blonde hair. Black was rare.

 

The town itself was large, with many lines of houses that stretched far. It seemed that there was even a wall at the edge of the town.

 

I could also see a tall, stone castle in the distance. Did some king live there?

 

…So, what was this? My initial impression had been that it was typical medieval Europe, but civilization here seemed far less developed than it should be…

 

In any case, I would just have to observe this world and get used to it.

 

And the thing that was a minimum requirement in order to live here…was words.

And so I put an almost desperate amount of effort into learning the words.

 

…

 

Two months passed.

 

The season appeared to be summer, as it was quite hot, but the climate was comfortable and far from the wretched humidity of Japan.

 

My language abilities had improved to a point where I could communicate with others and gather information.

 

I might have been impressed with myself for learning a language in only two months, but this was really not my own ability. It was as if Balian’s body remembered it, the words just entered me smoothly.

It sounded right in my ears.

 

Balian’s full name was Balian De Lioncourt. And he was seven years old.

 

Fancy name, huh? He was a noble after all.

 

The Lioncourts were counts, great nobles with an established reputation.

Their lands were called the Lioncourt Basin, which was located in the east and surrounded by mountains.

 

This town that I was living in was the capital of the Amoros Kingdom.

Believe me, I was quite shocked to find out that the people that I had thought were neighbors, were in fact, vassals.

 

The lord was Rudolph…The black haired giant, who happened to be my father.

Weren’t nobles supposed to be sophisticated? I’ve been lied to all of this time.

 

Unlike Japan, there was no distinction between court nobles and warriors in the Amoros Kingdom. It was the duty of all nobles to fight, as was the western style.

Noblesse oblige. Privilege entails responsibility…something like that…I think.

 

Rudolph De Lioncourt, the lord of the Lioncourts, was thirty-two years old. He had been active as a military man, which now allowed him to live in the capital as a man of high station.

There were some who referred to him as the Lioncourt Falcon.

That certainly explained the face.

 

Lucienne was my mother. A cheerful and beautiful woman with brown hair. Like my father, she was also thirty-two.

She was supposedly the daughter of some noble.

I had assumed that noble women would not do any housework, but it seemed that she did, by ordering the maids around the house.

Well, the maids were the ones actually moving about.

 

As for siblings, I had two older brothers and one younger sister, but things were a little more complicated than that.

 

The only sibling that lived with me was Robert, the oldest.

The other brother and sister were born through a mistress of low rank, and so they were treated as vassals and not family.

In other words, I was the third son but treated as the second…it wasn’t the most satisfying treatment, but what can you do?

I believe even Oda Nobunaga had an older brother of low rank.

 

…Still, Amoros Kingdom. Never heard of it…

 

I wasn’t the most knowledgeable about geography, but I’ve never heard of this Amoros Kingdom or Amoros region. Perhaps it was an old name…but I was having doubts.

 

I was resolved to live as Balian…but, my father didn’t come across as a particularly honest man, and there seemed to be a lot going on in the house…I was just an average company employee, would I be able to make it here?