Chapter 468

We arrived in a moderately sized room meant to be used as a banquet hall. The checkered floor went well with the golden pillars, while the chandeliers and mirrors reflected each other’s light, giving the room a soft shimmer.

But that wasn’t the problem.

“Congratulations~ Congratulations on your return~”

Ulrike quickly placed a shellac record on the gramophone sitting on a small side table in the corner and set off some party poppers. A cheerful song began to play. He swept an arm toward the room as if presenting it to a guest. There was a whipped-cream cake on a small round table in the center. Colorful confetti from the party poppers fluttered down over our heads. I brushed a piece of confetti off the corner of my eye and muttered to Ulrike, feeling a chill run down my spine.

“‘Congratulations on your return’? Luise, you escaped from there with me too.”

“No, it’s different for you. You and Elias were trapped underneath the building. I wasn’t.”

“…….”

Was he saying that people saw the severity of what happened to us differently?

But the cake and the welcome-back celebration weren’t what mattered right now. I was genuinely grateful for them, but there was another problem. I put a hand to my forehead when I saw the easels and painting supplies arranged around the round table.

“What is this?! So the ‘club whose purpose you can’t reveal yet’ was a painting club? You’re doing this—!”

Oh, no. No. Anything but painting.

I turned around with a hollow laugh. Leo, who seemed to realize he’d done something wrong and was wearing an awkward smile, grabbed my arm.

“Just wait a little, Lukas.”

“Ah, Lukas! Don’t go. I’ll explain!”

Ulrike grabbed me as well. Fine. I was the one who’d said I’d listen to their explanation, so I might as well hear them out. I gave him a half-lidded smile, and Ulrike immediately launched into a rapid-fire explanation.

“You remember what Leo mentioned when we were making candy before? I was there too, remember? Anyway, he said a painter who’s popular at the Salon was coming to give a lecture and asked if you’d want to attend. I wanted to hear the lecture, so I asked Leo if I could join too.”

“…Then why drag me into this? You could’ve just gone by yourself, Luise.”

“Ah, well…”

Apparently embarrassed, Ulrike ran his tongue over his lips. He avoided my gaze, then furrowed his brow and struggled to answer.

“To be honest… you and Leo had only just started getting close, and I was wondering if there was a way for the three of us to keep spending time together. And… I wanted to spend more time with you too.”

I looked at Leo. He avoided my gaze. Ulrike had made an effort in his own way, while this bastard had simply gone along with it. Only now did I notice that my friends had come dressed a little more lightly and casually than usual. They were still wearing suits suitable for painting, but for some reason, their trousers and ties were in lighter colors. Ulrike, I could understand, but Leo had injured his arm and couldn’t even paint, so I had no idea why he’d gone and practically hocked his jacket just to come here.

“Oh, and there was another reason we wanted to meet the painter. No, wait, that’s not the right order… We thought you wouldn’t listen if we just asked you out of nowhere to come paint with us, so we brought him here ourselves. I didn’t realize you’d hate the idea this much, though. Sorry, Lukas. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to.”

Ulrike rushed through everything in one breath. I gently pushed him back and gestured for him to calm down.

“It’s not that I hate it that much. I’m just not used to it because I don’t have much experience. Anyway, what’s the other reason you wanted to meet the painter?”

“Well, apparently, he only gives lessons to the German and British royal families. I may be German, but I’m just a noble, so I wouldn’t be able to take lessons from him on my own. It’s just a rumor, but apparently he doesn’t accept every one-off invitation the royals send him. He chooses his students as if he were picking his own apprentices. That made me go, ‘Huh?’”

Huh?

So there was another reason Ulrike and Leo hadn’t just let this opportunity pass. Now I was getting a little interested. I tilted my head and asked, “Why? He chooses them? That’s a little unusual.”

“I don’t know. Apparently, he accepts an invitation, meets them in person, and then, if he decides they’re not suitable, he turns them down by making excuses about being busy with his work.”

“…….”

I ran a hand over my mouth, impressed by what I’d heard. His reputation must be in shambles. Well, if it were already that bad, that was probably why Ulrike had heard the rumor in the first place.

It was certainly unusual. A French painter who only taught the German and British royal families? And he personally chose which ones he would teach?

This was worth clearing up. If someone was a painter popular at the Salon, there was a very high chance he was French. Even in the 21st century, the Salon exhibitions were widely known as prestigious French art exhibitions, and the reputation of the 19th century Salon was even greater than it was in the 21st century. The same was true of the 19th century in this world. When talking about Western art in this era, whether positively or negatively, the Salon could not be left out—the place where new artists and new artistic movements were born. There was plenty of backlash against how conservative it had become, but even so, the Salon still wielded enormous authority.

‘Still, could a painter really be popular enough to pick and choose his own students?’

No matter how popular he was, that just didn’t make sense. Of course, a renowned painter might receive a knighthood from a foreign country or become an honorary member of an academy, but royalty didn’t exactly go out of their way to learn art. Opportunities to study under someone like that would be rare enough as it is, yet he turned them down whenever he didn’t like the person?

There was a good chance the rumor had been distorted along the way. I didn’t want to believe rumors so readily.

But now that things had turned out this way, I was starting to feel like giving it a try. It wasn’t as if I had any shortage of time before returning to the headquarters, either. Just then, Leo quietly spoke up.

“I injured my arm, so I can’t actually paint right now. I can still take the theory classes, though. So I thought it might be nice if you, Lukas, as another member of a ruling house, learned alongside me. Would that be too much trouble?”

“No, not really. Just don’t laugh at me. What about Julia?”

“I tried convincing him, but he told me to go with you. He said he’d reconsider if that works out.”

“…….”

It was pretty obvious what had happened… It wasn’t that he didn’t want to because it sounded boring or he disliked it. He probably backed out just to get the three of us—me, Leo, and Ulrike—together. Or maybe he’d known about my drawing skills and set this whole thing up for that reason. Either way, it seemed more likely that he’d opted out because he found the whole thing amusing.

‘If I asked, he’d probably say he did it to clear up Ulrike’s misunderstanding.’

That would be a good result, too. If I spent more time with Leo where Ulrike could see us together, his misunderstanding might gradually clear up. As I stood there with my arms crossed, pondering it with a slightly softer expression, Ulrike took off my jacket, hung it over a chair, and pushed me forward. Before I knew it, Ulrike and Leo had herded me over to the cake.

“Luise, should we eat this no—”

Splat—

Ulrike scooped up some whipped cream with the fork beside him and abruptly pressed it against my cheek. I let out a hollow laugh, squeezed my eyes shut, and furrowed my brow.

“Seriously? Are you messing with me? I was about to ask if we were eating it now. Don’t joke around with food.”

“Hahaha! Because you’re the star of the celebration—huh?!”

I snatched the fork, still covered in cream, and lightly tapped Ulrike on the nose with it. Caught off guard, Ulrike let out a yelp. I sat down, wiped the cream off my cheek with a napkin, and said, “Okay, first things first. Where’s the teacher? Is he coming today? Judging by how you suddenly prepared the easels, I’m guessing he is.”

Leo answered neatly.

“Yeah. He’s coming today.”

“Talk about acting fast… You only mentioned this yesterday afternoon.”

“We didn’t expect him to come this quickly either. At first, the painter contacted us saying he wanted to stay in Bavaria for a while. Since he’s such a famous painter, the royal family invited him. That’s when the subject of lessons came up. Before we even had a chance to discuss the schedule, he contacted us first and said he wanted to meet us today.”

“And you accepted?”

“I was going back to Munich this evening anyway. Even if we still had a few days before we had to return to the headquarters, I didn’t want to waste time.”

“Right… More importantly, that’s not exactly the kind of nerve you’d expect from an ordinary painter.”

That didn’t necessarily mean he was a member of the French cult, though. Even now, countless French people who knew nothing about any of this came and went across German territory. A painter who was popular at the Salon would probably have connections to the French Imperial Family, which ran the Salon, but even if he had ties to the Imperial Family, that didn’t automatically mean he was receiving information from the French cult—Terminus Eukairia.

Why did I think that?

If I were on the French cult’s side, I wouldn’t send a spy in such an obviously suspicious manner.

That didn’t mean I intended to let my guard down. But there was no need to treat everything as a problem to the point of paranoia, either.

When Leo didn’t respond to my remark—which made sense, since I’d been talking to myself—Ulrike spoke up.

“There is a rumor that he has a rather eccentric personality.”

“…Hmm. So what time is he coming today?”

“After dinner!”

So he wasn’t even going to eat dinner with us. Was he really planning to just check out his prospective students and leave, just like the rumors said?

“I see. Then why did we come here in broad daylight? The teacher isn’t coming until tonight.”

“…….”

Ulrike shut his mouth and looked at Leo. Leo looked at me and calmly said, “If we really are going to take lessons, we need to have the basics down. We’re going to get some intensive basic lessons first, Lukas. If you’re okay with that.”

“…Good grief…”

I rubbed my forehead and the back of my neck before smiling and pressing a hand to my eyes. Ulrike was watching my reaction. Leo was doing the same today, too. When I met Ulrike’s eyes, he gave me a sheepish little smile, but he couldn’t hide it from me.

For the sake of basic drawing skills? They were seriously underestimating my abilities this badly? Well, I suppose the guy who saw a slightly crooked checkered pattern on an egg and immediately mistook it for a coordinate system would have an eye like that.

I smiled and asked, “So, are we eating the cake first, or are we drawing first?”

“The assistant teacher who’s going to teach us the basics should be here soon. How about we start drawing first?”

“Sure. Sounds good.”

I held out my hand to Leo. He took it, using my hand for support as he got to his feet, then looked at me with a puzzled expression. He clearly hadn’t expected me to be smiling.

“They say well begun is half done. Might as well give it a shot.”

“Should I go get Julia…?”

Ulrike whispered quietly as he glanced at the drawing paper on my easel. I ran a hand through my hair, which had fallen loose from being pulled at, then closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

One hour since we started.

By now, even the teacher who had come to give me the basic lessons was watching my reactions. He had been trying so hard to teach me that I felt bad, so I did my best to keep a straight face. But the finished product was so blatantly awful that there was only so much I could do to keep the mood from dying around me.

‘What is with everyone? People are allowed to be bad at drawing.’

Thank goodness drawing wasn’t essential to life. Come to think of it, art had relatively few class hours and barely affected entrance exams. Thankfully, I’d made it through life without art ever getting in my way. Even now, I was only doing this to pass the time before returning to the headquarters, as a member of the club. It wasn’t like this was some essential lesson.

Feeling considerably lighter, I cast a soundproofing spell and said, “Luise. You know what I’m thinking right now?”

“Hmm…?”

“Maybe this is how people ruin their lives by acting on nothing but curiosity. Being pointlessly curious about why a French painter would approach the British and German royals, then having the spirit to go, ‘Eh, why not give it a try?’ We really need to think about whether this kind of curiosity is going to ruin us. I think it’s time.”

Leo, sitting across from us, replied flatly, “Ah, the sodium bicarbonate is back.”

“Hahaha! Lukas really does get talkative at times like this.”

“…….”

“More importantly, Leo. What if he refuses to teach us…?!”

“I’m sorry, guys. If he refuses because of me, just learn from another painter.”

Even as I said it, I knew it was nonsense. Leo had already studied painting under countless artists as part of his education. The only reason he was sitting here trying to learn from this person was because he’d gotten the chance to meet a ‘painter who was popular at the Salon.’

Leo then said casually, “It’s fine, Lukas. If it really doesn’t work out, we can call Julia instead of you.”

“…….”

Our eyes met, and Leo smiled. I curled up one corner of my mouth.

So that’s how you’re going to play it? Ulrike might have said something like that innocently, but Leo wasn’t naive enough to say it without meaning anything. He was provoking me.

“…Let’s start again.”

When I straightened up, the assistant art teacher beside me placed a fresh sheet of drawing paper in front of me and handed me the pencil again.

“Your Highness, you need to relax your hand. If that’s difficult, shall we start at level ten and slowly work our way down to lighter strokes?”

“Yes.”

I tilted my pencil and shaded one of the divided squares on the paper. The darkest part was easy enough, so while filling it in, I asked the teacher, “Teacher, there is something I am curious about. How much would I have to study art before I could become halfway decent?”

I expected to be told off for asking that after doing only one shading exercise—something along the lines of You have to draw more before you can know that—but perhaps the teacher had already gotten a good enough idea from my shading alone. He smiled and answered, “You will need to spend about a year just learning the basics.”

“Then how good could I get?”

“You would develop the same level of dexterity as other people.”

“So you are saying I am currently in the negatives, and after a year I would finally reach zero?”

“Well, that’s…”

“…….”

Ulrike, who had been listening quietly, avoided my eyes. Leo openly burst out laughing. I let out a snort with one corner of my mouth raised.

Still, after about three sheets of shading practice, I was starting to get the hang of it. The problem was that lighter strokes were still difficult. I’d botched the previous two exercises at the light-stroke stage, so my hand naturally tensed up. I swallowed as I looked at the last two sections and brought my pencil to the paper.

The teacher placed his hand over the back of mine and gently pressed down, making me relax my grip.

“You need to loosen your hand, Your Highness.”

“Yes.”

I took a deep breath. Since I couldn’t bring myself to move my hand easily, Leo, who had been leaning over to watch me, asked, “Lukas. Can I come over there now?”

Not knowing what he might say to crush what little motivation I had left, I told him not to come anywhere near my table easel. I pressed my fingers against the corners of my eyes and answered firmly.

“No.”

“I just want to help.”

“Don’t come over. Just talk to me from there.”

Leo leaned toward me from where he was sitting.

“Lukas. Close your eyes.”

“Why?”

“I told you, I’m going to help.”

“…….”

I narrowed my eyes at him, then closed them as he told me to. Leo spoke calmly.

“When you’re preparing an air-blast spell, how does the tip of your wand move? Move your hand the same way.”

“…Ah.”

The spell he was talking about worked by dividing the air into thin layers and letting mana flow through each one, then creating a powerful explosion by striking them with a strong impact afterward. It wasn’t a spell meant for one-on-one combat, but one used from the rear. To increase its destructive power, the air had to be divided more precisely and the mana had to be spread extremely thin, requiring careful control.

I imagined I was holding a wand instead of a pencil and slowly drew lines where the squares would have been. Even after opening my eyes again, I kept my gaze away from the drawing paper. Once I thought I had more or less finished, I looked at the paper again.

“……”

My eyes widened.

It worked.

I’d succeeded. It wasn’t that I was completely incapable of drawing. I just needed to approach it differently. Seeing the smile spreading across my face, Leo mirrored it with his own.

‘As expected of my sparring instructor.’

Leo would probably make a good school teacher, too.

After that, I spent another five hours doing nothing but drawing with the help of the two instructors. During that time, Leo gave me advice while practicing drawing with his left hand, and Ulrike diligently followed along despite already having the basics down. I had no idea what we were doing anymore. Was it taking this long because I was so bad, or did everyone just have an absurd amount of stamina?

After two lessons, we were hungry, so we returned to the round table where the cake was and picked up our forks. By then, I felt like I had lost about five kilograms, so I shoved a piece of cake into my mouth. Even though it had been sitting out in the air for a while, it practically melted in my mouth.

So this was what cake tasted like.

I murmured in admiration.

“This tastes pretty good. But why does it feel like I’m eating after a whole day of hard labor…?”

“…Lukas almost never says food tastes good. Wow, that’s amazing.”

“We should make him draw before feeding him from now on.”

Ulrike and Leo took turns saying strange things. I polished off a slice of cake in an instant and finished my meal with a cup of freshly brewed hot black tea.

That was our dinner. Afterward, we cleared the table and prepared to receive the French painter. I asked the servants to get me last month’s newspapers, then went into another room, channeled divine power, and pointed my wand at the newspapers.

— Seek, and you shall find.

“Eugène Lamour.”

Light burst forth in several places. I opened the articles that mentioned him and began to read.

He really was a painter France had its eyes on. His name appeared in every German newspaper that came out after the Salon opened in March this year. French newspapers were filled with articles about him as well, many of them making the front page. In the first week of the Salon alone, I found five separate articles about him in a single newspaper.

There was a hint of Fauvism in his paintings. I even found a photograph of him, his expression making him look completely uninterested in anything going on in the world. Just then, someone knocked on the door.

Knock, knock—

“Come in.”

Leo’s attendant opened the door and spoke politely.

“Sir Lamour will arrive within five minutes, Your Highness. Shall we move?”

He had said Lamour would arrive within five minutes, but Eugène Lamour was standing outside the room where I had been painting earlier in less than a minute. He was about the same height as a New Human, with a sullen expression and an extremely sleepy look about him. I held out my hand to the painter as he casually observed the people passing by.

“Good evening, Sir Lamour. I am Lukas Askanien.”

“It is an honor. I am Eugène Lamour.”

“You arrived early. Come in.”

After shaking his hand, I checked his status window before letting him inside. There was nothing unusual about Eugène Lamour’s status window. Leo and Ulrike rose from their seats and shook his hand as well. Lamour looked at Leo and tried to open his sleepy eyes a little wider.

“It is an honor to meet you, Your Highness.”

“The honor is mine. I have seen your paintings in the papers from time to time. They were very impressive.”

“I am very pleased to hear you say that, Your Highness.”

“You are very fluent in German.”

“My mother is German. She is from Darmstadt.”

Eugène Lamour answered slowly, his expression blank. His manner of speaking was just as informal as his expression and attitude.

From what I could tell after observing him for even that short while, he didn’t carry himself like a commoner. Of course, after winning prizes at the Salon several times and becoming so popular, he must have met all sorts of people. Perhaps he simply wasn’t very conscious of social status anymore. It wasn’t as though I wanted him to be particularly conscious of mine, either.

It was just obvious that his personality was unusual, whether in a good way or a bad one, and I could easily imagine that the distinctive quality of Eugène Lamour’s paintings came from that very personality.

As expected, he didn’t bother with any more small talk and went straight to the point.

“I am already familiar with His Highness the Crown Prince’s skill with a brush, and I hear the two of you have just received some basic art lessons.”

“That is right.”

Unlike when he was alone with us, Ulrike answered with a polite smile and a calm voice. Even so, it was easy enough to tell that he was enjoying himself. I could still vividly picture him raging in front of Einsiedel, veins bulging in his neck, yet here he was, looking just as excited as ever, both yesterday and today. Whatever kind of person Eugène Lamour was—if the rumors were true, he could still cancel the lecture after this meeting with some ridiculous excuse—today seemed to be an enjoyable adventure for him.

Eugène Lamour nodded, repeatedly clenching and relaxing his hand.

“If you have any paintings you usually work on, might I take a look?”

“Here.”

Ulrike held out a canvas he had brought from his estate. It was a fairly decent landscape painting. Eugène Lamour gave it a knowing smile, as though he had expected as much, then handed the painting back to Ulrike.

Leo spoke up.

“Sir Lamour. Lord Askanien isn’t familiar with painting. I thought you should know that beforehand.”

“…….”

At that, Eugène Lamour began staring at me. A chill ran down the back of my neck. His pale green eyes seemed to rake over me, as though they were searching through everything I had left concealed.

Ulrike slid my sketchbook in front of him. Without taking his eyes off me, Eugène Lamour opened it. He only looked away from me once he reached a page with pencil marks on it. He flipped through the sketchbook with an indifferent expression, then closed it without properly looking at it and pushed it across the table.

“When would be convenient for you, Your Highness?”

“…!”

Ulrike gave me a glance, pursing his lips slightly. Leo glanced at Ulrike and spoke.

“How about tomorrow morning?”

“That works.”

“I will have someone sent to Sir Lamour’s lodgings in the morning.”

Leo set down the tea he had been drinking and continued with a smile.

“To be honest, I was a little concerned after hearing the rumors that you often cancel your appointments. I am glad we have been given such a wonderful opportunity.”

“They are only rumors.”

Eugène Lamour visibly frowned before returning to his usual blank expression and getting to his feet. It seemed less like he was irritated with Leo and more like an instinctive reaction whenever the subject of the ‘rumors’ came up. Ulrike seemed so taken aback by Lamour’s personality that he let out a quiet, incredulous laugh.

“I think I will be going now.”

With that, Lamour put on his coat and walked toward the door. He gave us a polite bow, then suddenly said something completely unexpected.

“I teach artists. If someone has the talent to be an artist, it doesn’t matter whether they have any formal training or not. Besides, the Bavarian royal family invited me to the palace, so I intend to repay the favor.”

It came completely out of nowhere. But, unexpected as it was, it was an answer to Ulrike’s question. Ulrike narrowed his eyes with curiosity.

“An artist?”

“What do you mean?”

At Leo’s question, Eugène Lamour opened his hand and gestured toward me. His indifferent gaze settled on me once again, as though it could see straight through me and uncover whatever lay hidden inside.

I could feel Leo and Ulrike looking at me in confusion. Apparently convinced that Eugène Lamour had made some serious mistake in his judgment, Ulrike hurried to clear things up—for the sake of Lamour’s reputation as an artist, if nothing else.

“…Aside from one hobby, Lord Askanien has very little to do with art. He is much closer to being a born politician than an artist.”

“Is that so? I don’t think that is the case at all.”

The French raised an eyebrow, his manner as blunt as ever. Leo stared intently at me. Ulrike, clearly unable to make sense of the situation, alternated between looking at Eugène Lamour and me with an awkward laugh.

“…….”

Cold sweat trickled down my back. I maintained my smile and ran my tongue along the inside of my lips.