The royal castle Silver Palace, located in Ars—the capital of the Kingdom of
A garden filled with plants that bore white flowers.
Commonly known as the White Lily Garden.
It was there that a monster suddenly appeared.
Right before the Second Princess, Ariel, who had been taking a stroll through the White Lily Garden.
The monster, a Terminat Boar, instantly killed the princess's bodyguard, Guardian Caster Derrick Redbat.
It then turned its fangs toward the princess.
The monster was slain by the hands of the princess's guardian knight, Luke, and the princess was saved from her predicament.
Luke's valor in throwing himself in harm's way to protect the princess was commendable.
This was how the unprecedented crisis of a monster appearing inside the royal castle was reported to the nobles of the palace.
Sylph's existence was concealed by the hands of the Second Princess's faction.
One of the Second Princess's faction, Lord Liston, declared the following: "The Terminat Boar was secretly brought into the castle, then released at precisely the moment the princess would be walking through the garden. This must be a conspiracy by the anti-Second Princess faction. The only person with the power to make that possible is Lord August, who oversees the castle's security. Lord August is the leading figure of the First Prince's faction. This conspiracy must be the work of the First Prince's faction."
Lord Liston's hasty assertion led to the Second Princess's faction being cornered and ultimately collapsing, but let us set that aside for now.
--- Sylph was given thorough medical care.
She had descended from the sky—a savior who had rescued the princess.
It was only natural to welcome the hero who had saved them from crisis.
Counter to that view, however, there were also voices that regarded her with suspicion.
After all, she had appeared out of nowhere and slain the Terminat Boar in a single blow.
And she had done so using chantless magic—a technique said to have only a single practitioner in the entire Magic University.
Suspicious.
Therefore, the nobles chose to conceal her existence first and conduct an interrogation.
Some among them even suggested, "Wouldn't it be better to dispose of her while she's still unconscious?"
But the Second Princess, Ariel Anemoi Asura, spoke plainly: "Regardless of who she really is, she is a benefactor who saved my life. I will not tolerate any insolence."
These words were also agreed upon by Luke, the guardian knight.
"I feel the same way. If she truly meant to harm the Second Princess, she would have had no need to save her from the monster."
It was obvious that without Sylph, both Luke and the princess would have died.
Of course, if Sylph had been a boy, Luke might have had slightly different reservations.
While the size of one's chest was not really to his taste, the fact that she was a beautiful girl with a lovely face had nonetheless improved his impression of her—he was, after all, a womanizer at heart.
"If that is what Your Highness says..."
"So even Luke is speaking up now."
"It can't be helped."
The conclusion of their discussion was this: they would conduct an interrogation, but even if she turned out to be an enemy, they would let her go.
That was the verdict.
--- The moment Sylph woke up, she thought she was dreaming.
The bed was far too lavish.
The people around her were dressed in far too lavish clothing.
The room was far too lavish.
She had no idea why she was in such an extravagant place.
"Hey, good morning."
One of them—a young man slightly older than Sylph, dressed in a knightly fashion—spoke up.
He bore a slight resemblance to
"My name is Luke.
Luke Notos
And you are?"
A gentle smile that put anyone at ease.
He had used this smile since childhood to charm countless noble girls.
There were some he hadn't succeeded with, but there was no girl he couldn't at least talk to.
He took pride in that.
"...!"
But Sylph shrank back, curling up as if to protect herself.
No matter how much he resembled Rudy, she was uncomfortable with people her own age.
Even in
"Oh? What's wrong?"
Seeing Sylph shrink away in excessive fear, the young man grew flustered.
Being rejected outright from the very first moment was a first for him.
The surrounding nobles laughed.
"Haha, it seems even the great ladies' man has lost his touch."
"You said you were good with young girls, so we left it to you..."
"You're still young. Just step aside and behave."
The adults around them tried to shoo Luke away, one remarking after another.
But Luke wouldn't budge.
"Please, wait. Give me—give me a chance."
He had one rule when it came to women.
That was his pride.
"I'm sorry, I must have scared you.
But still, I'd like to at least say one word of thanks.
To you, with your beautiful white hair, for saving my life."
What did white hair mean? Sylph wondered.
And who was "you" referring to?
Bewildered, she glanced to the side of the bed.
There stood a vanity mirror.
A "mirror"—something considered extremely expensive in this world.
"............"
At first, Sylph didn't realize it was herself.
There was something strange on display, and in it sat a single girl propping herself up in bed.
Their eyes met.
When she moved her hand, the girl's hand moved too.
She quickly realized it was like looking at a reflection on the water's surface.
She was stunned.
"...Eh?"
Sylph's hair had turned completely white.
"Wh-white?"
Confused, Sylph looked to Luke, who was speaking to her gently.
Luke nodded and, with flowery words she barely understood, praised her white hair.
"Yes. Your hair is like the first snowfall of late autumn."
That saccharine dialogue didn't reach Sylph's heart at all.
Sylph was simply, utterly bewildered.
Her hair was supposed to be green.
She'd never had a mirror, but she had seen her own shed hair before.
So why had it turned white?
This should have been something to be happy about, yet she couldn't understand it at all.
"W-why...?"
What had happened?
Where was this place?
Why was she here?
And what had become of her?
Unable to make sense of anything, all Sylph could manage was a pitiful voice.
--- Afterward, the interrogation began.
The nobles conducted it.
Luke, who was ignored entirely, stood off to the side with a dejected expression on his face.
"Where did you come from?"
"Who do you work for?"
"Who taught you magic?"
Sylph had no idea what was going on.
Why was she here, surrounded by people with frightening expressions?
Still, she answered honestly to every question as best she could.
She was from the Fittoa Region, the daughter of a hunter in Buena Village, and had learned magic from her friend Rudy.
Then the next thing she knew, she was in the sky.
When she tried to get down, she found a monster there, so she used magic to defeat it.
She had absolutely no idea why any of this was happening.
That was what she told them, honestly and plainly.
The nobles who heard this cocked their heads in doubt.
A village child who knew magic.
Found herself in the sky.
Then found a monster.
None of it was believable.
A more plausible story would have been that she was a wandering mage who had tried to curry favor with the princess, defeating the Terminat Boar as a performance to demonstrate her power.
There was nothing credible in Sylph's account.
The nobles of the Second Princess's faction discussed the matter back and forth.
"Oh, now that you mention it, I do recall a certain rumor."
One of the nobles suddenly remembered something.
"I've heard that the tutor hired by Boreas of Roa uses chantless magic—a genius who could cast saint-tier magic at a young age. Could that genius be this girl?"
It was Rudeus they were talking about.
In the capital, rumors about Rudeus were only faintly known.
This was because Sauros had been suppressing the information.
And yet, that very Sauros, emboldened by drink, had been bragging about Rudeus as though he were his own child.
He spoke of a genius boy who defeated the underling of a high minister.
He spoke of a genius boy whom Sword King Ghylaine regarded with respect.
He spoke of a genius boy with questionable taste who had somehow managed to tame Boreas's violent daughter.
None of it sounded remotely plausible.
Therefore, the nobles had dismissed it as idle gossip.
But the reality was that Sylph could actually use chantless magic.
If that was the case, the rumors suddenly took on a much more serious ring of truth.
"No, no, the rumor was about a boy."
"And besides, why would that boy even be in the capital?"
The nobles shook their heads in doubt.
They interrogated Sylph once more.
This time, pressing harder.
"Tell me—is it possible that your real name is Rudeus?"
"N-no. Rudeus is what Rudy—that is, the person who taught me magic—is called..."
Sylph explained in detail how the boy named Rudeus Greyrat had taught her magic.
Rudy was very clever, she said, and had taught her all sorts of things.
That story greatly astonished the nobles.
If it was true, it meant that the fabled genius boy actually existed, and that before leaving the village, he had left behind a disciple.
Not just any disciple—a practitioner of chantless magic.
How terrifyingly promising that was.
If it was true, that is.
Sauros's information manipulation might have twisted the story of a boy into that of a girl.
But the fact that she could use chantless magic was undeniable.
Practitioners of chantless magic were not exactly common.
If
The genius's real name was Rudeus Greyrat.
Upon hearing the full name, a few of them went "Hmm?" and tilted their heads.
Greyrat was the name of the high-ranking noble families that guarded the four cardinal directions of the Kingdom of Asura.
The name Greyrat itself was not particularly rare in this country.
That family was known for womanizing.
It was a common tale for them to impregnate the daughters of lesser nobles or their maids and take them as concubines.
Those concubines were permitted to bear the Greyrat name.
They could never use the names of the Four Guardians—Notos, Boreas, Euros, or Zephyros—of course.
There were many in the Kingdom of Asura who bore the name Greyrat.
But when one became a genius, the story changed.
Among the nobles of the privileged class, some believed that a genius must surely belong to the main bloodline of the Greyrats.
Given that Boreas had employed him, there was speculation that he might be a hidden child of either Philip or Sauros.
At the very least, there were no rumors of anyone having married into the Boreas family or taken the family name through a formal engagement with the unruly daughter.
Luke also said there was no such boy among his brothers or relatives.
"We'll need to investigate more thoroughly."
That was what the power-hungry nobles concluded.
If Rudeus was a Greyrat outside the Notos line, he could be useful as leverage to undermine their rivals.
If he was Notos, he could potentially be recruited as an ally.
And so, their discussion drifted from its original purpose of uncovering Sylph's true identity.
For them, the power struggle mattered more than Sylph's identity.
--- One week later.
Word arrived that the Fittoa Region had been annihilated.
It was a breaking report.
On the day of the teleportation, a knight who happened to be just outside the teleportation zone had witnessed the annihilation firsthand.
He reported the situation to the nearest town.
Another knight relayed the message, riding a horse for an entire day and night without rest, delivering it to a larger city.
From there, it was carried to the capital by carrier pigeon and other means.
Upon receiving the report, the king ordered the Asura Mage Corps to investigate.
It took one week for the information to reach the capital.
During that time, there had been sporadic reports of people and monsters suddenly appearing out of nowhere.
These reports had been processed as mysterious incidents with no discernible cause.
But thanks to this report, it was confirmed that they were all part of a massive-scale teleportation event.
The news of the great disaster spread through the capital in no time.
Naturally, the information reached Sylph's ears as well.
Her father and mother's whereabouts were unknown.
Everyone had gone missing.
"What... is that...?"
Upon hearing the news, she simply sat there, dazed.
She didn't know how to react.
She didn't know what she should do.
She didn't know what would happen.
The nobles, too, were uncertain about what to do with Sylph.
The report of the large-scale teleportation had answered the question of why Sylph and the monster had appeared so suddenly.
The suspicion that she was a spy from another faction had weakened.
Her claim that she was the humble daughter of a hunter now seemed far more likely.
A hunter.
No matter how much she had saved the princess's life, a hunter was still a low-ranking commoner.
They couldn't keep her in the royal palace indefinitely.
But sending her home was equally impossible—she no longer had a home to go back to.
"My, my, what a predicament."
"If we can't keep her in the palace, and she has no home to return to..."
"Perhaps one of you could take her in?"
A chantless magic user would be useful in many ways.
Moreover, a white-haired elf would be quite rare, and as she grew, there could be various uses for her...
The nobles exchanged leering smiles while keeping each other in check.
It was then that the Second Princess dropped a bombshell.
"If Sylphiette's home has disappeared, then she should simply live here in this castle with me.
Let's become friends."
The Second Princess had taken a great liking to Sylph.
This was not merely because Sylph had saved her.
For a princess, being helped by others was simply what was expected.
The real issue was Sylph's half-baked etiquette.
Her tone and mannerisms were what most would consider somewhat rude.
With fellow nobles, it was just barely tolerable.
With royalty, it was just barely intolerable.
The Second Princess, however, interpreted it as "casual" and "friendly."
"Um, Your Highness. I—that is—our stations are far too different..."
"Oh? Then let's not be friends... In that case, be my bodyguard. Won't you serve as my guardian?
Currently, my only guardian is the knight Luke. The position of Guardian Caster is vacant."
"Huh? But I'm not that strong, or..."
"Not strong? Giggles... You're too modest."
Of course, the nobles objected.
No matter how connected she was to the incident, no matter that she could use chantless magic, no matter that she had saved the princess in her hour of need, Sylph was a commoner's child.
And not just any commoner's child—one whose background was now thoroughly unclear.
She claimed to be a hunter's daughter, but there was no proof whatsoever.
To the contrary, for someone raised in a rural village, she knew etiquette all too well.
Frankly, she was an enigma.
They dismissed her words as superficial.
This useful child was too precious to be the princess's plaything—that was what the nobles truly thought.
Ariel shut them down coldly.
"Sylph saved my life.
And she is my friend!
So what if she's a commoner!
I will not tolerate insolent remarks!"
These words brought a bitter expression to Luke's face.
Part of his role as guardian knight was to keep harmful elements away from Ariel.
He wasn't sure whether Sylph was a beneficial or harmful element, but protecting the princess from such unknown quantities was Luke's job as well.
He, too, was grateful to Sylph.
She had saved his life.
That gratitude was something only those who had been there—only those who had been on the brink of death—could truly understand.
There was also the added emotion that she had avenged his colleague, Guardian Caster Derrick.
Luke had originally thought of Derrick as an annoying person.
But this incident had made him reconsider somewhat.
Despite being a mage, Derrick had thrown his body in the way of the Terminat Boar's assault to stop it.
He was a man of great pride.
Without him, the princess would have died long before Sylph's arrival.
And without Sylph, Luke himself would have died too.
After all, weapons were forbidden in the garden, so Luke had been unarmed.
With a sword, he might not have won, but he could at least have gotten Ariel to safety...
Given all of this, Luke was inclined to be favorable toward Sylph.
That said, traditionally, the honored role of the princess's guardian caster had been held by high-ranking nobles generation after generation.
It would be unthinkable to welcome a country girl into that position.
Even he, a high-ranking noble himself, might be looked down upon for it.
"I will abide by whatever decision is made."
And so Luke closed his eyes in a deliberately noncommittal posture—neither approving nor opposing.
This made the nobles a bit anxious.
Setting aside their own selfish desires...
Even if the princess had taken a liking to Sylph, there was no guarantee that Sylph harbored no ill will toward the princess.
She was a hunter's daughter and a victim caught up in the teleportation disaster.
Even if that was the truth, there was no saying that friction wouldn't arise between her and the princess going forward.
And they couldn't rule out the possibility that someone else—for instance, the First Prince's faction—might exploit that.
When they thought about it that way, there was simply no way they could allow Sylph to remain by the princess's side.
Asuran nobles were, without exception, schemers.
If Sylph had been nothing more than an ordinary village girl with no special abilities, perhaps they could have permitted it.
But Sylph's existence went well beyond the scope of an ordinary village girl.
She could cast intermediate offensive magic using chantless casting.
And while she had the rough edges one might expect of a village girl, she also possessed some knowledge of etiquette.
She was an enigma.
"Where exactly did you learn your manners?"
"Um, there was a woman named Lillia in the village, and she taught me."
Lillia.
Hearing that name only improved Ariel's impression of her.
"Lillia! I remember her. She was a lady-in-waiting in the rear palace who risked her life to protect me when I was young!"
And the nobles' opinion sank even further.
It was well known that ladies-in-waiting from the rear palace were often dismissed when they could no longer work due to injury.
Most of them had let slip some secret regarding the rear palace and were quietly dealt with.
Lillia had fled all the way to the Fittoa Region.
"Um, Lillia was—I mean, Rudy's father is a man named
"Paul, you say?"
A new name had surfaced.
Paul Notos Greyrat.
The name Paul was infamous—he was known as the black sheep of the Notos family.
There were even rumors he harbored grudges against the previous head of house.
A maid from the rear palace, taken in by the runaway scion of a high-ranking noble family, teaching etiquette to a practitioner ofchantless magic.
It was too perfectly arranged to be coincidence.
The nobles could not shake the feeling that this was some kind of conspiracy, a fabricated story.
But even if they wanted to investigate, the Fittoa Region had already been destroyed.
Verifying the truth would be difficult.
"What should we do..."
" Hmm."
The nobles deliberated.
Ariel rarely made unreasonable demands.
And the position of Guardian Caster was, in fact, vacant.
Though Sylph's origins were common, her ability as a mage was beyond question, and while her etiquette wasn't perfect, she at least knew the basics.
Her competence was not lacking.
And it was precisely because she was competent that they were wary.
Among the Greyrats, the Notos line belonged to the Second Princess's faction.
Luke's role as guardian knight was a symbol of that.
For Ariel, Notos was an ally.
But Paul Greyrat was a man who had abandoned his family due to a falling-out with his parents.
Notos was an enemy—which meant Paul could also be Ariel's enemy.
Whether Sylph realized this or not, she had brought up Paul's name.
What did that mean?
If she wanted to earn Ariel's trust, she would have been better off not mentioning Paul's name.
Surely she was smart enough to understand that.
So by mentioning his name, was she signaling that she was not an enemy?
But even so, who was the mastermind pulling this girl's strings behind the scenes?
At the very least, they were certainly enemies of Notos.
Then again, few people would want to oppose the great noble house of Greyrat.
The only ones who could were other Greyrats.
That was when the thought struck them.
There was one person who had been on bad terms with the current head of house, Pilémon—a Greyrat.
Sauros Boreas Greyrat.
Sauros had always been murmuring behind Pilémon's back that it would have been better if Paul had become the head instead.
But Sauros was not the kind of man who would exploit a young girl for political purposes.
If anyone would, it was the other one.
Philip Boreas Greyrat.
Philip might well employ such a roundabout scheme to crush Notos, and by extension the Second Princess that Notos supported.
Both Sauros and Philip—and Rudeus too—had gone missing as a result of the Fittoa Region's annihilation.
If the teleportation event had been their doing, they could be using it as cover, operating in the shadows.
And perhaps this girl, Sylphiette, was their opening move.
Or, if Philip was the mastermind and Sauros was not involved, then Philip could be acting to frame James, the heir apparent.
He might be trying to seize the position of next head of the Boreas family, positioning himself as a supporter of the Second Princess and hoping to become her backer.
In that case, Sylph, who had been sent in, would be an ally.
Either way.
If there was a mastermind behind all this, it was either Sauros or Philip.
That was the nobles' conclusion.
Pure speculation, of course.
It was then that one noble had a sudden, electrifying idea.
"What if we announce that she is the genius boy Rudeus and see how they react?"
If Sauros and the others were making their move, Rudeus would surely be with them.
If the rumors about Rudeus's abilities were true, his power was formidable.
Sauros and his allies would likely keep Rudeus as their trump card, close at hand.
They would be hiding his existence so he could make a dramatic debut.
When they finally showed themselves, Rudeus would appear openly, as a legitimate bearer of the Notos bloodline, unimpeded by anyone.
A powerful piece on the side of the First Prince, backed by Boreas.
Assuming Sylph was their agent, if they publicized her as Rudeus, they might disrupt the enemy's plans.
If they shook them up enough, the enemy might reveal their hand.
The other nobles raised objections.
"Won't they see through it immediately?"
"Not at all. We simply dress her in men's clothing and have her conceal her identity. There are countless ways to explain it away."
"But what if she's actually a spy sent to investigate us?"
"Would anyone really send a spy who uses something as conspicuous as chantless magic?"
"They might think we'd find her too valuable to discard."
"Either way, once we've drawn them in, it will be easier to feed them disinformation."
One by one, the concerns were addressed.
The nobles gradually began to see this ridiculous idea as though it were a stroke of genius.
"I see. If she is a spy, we can destabilize the enemy with false intelligence. If she has no connection to them whatsoever, then we gain a powerful mage as the princess's guard at no cost. And if she does wish to curry favor with us, we can simply go along with it."
"That's not all. Her build is similar to the princess's. We could even use her as a body double. Surely, there are magical tools that can accomplish that."
"Oh yes. If we keep her dressed as a man regularly, no one would ever suspect that a dangerous agent is actually a mage hiding in plain sight near the princess. They would never think a man could be disguised as a woman."
"You are truly wise, my lord."
And so.
The Second Princess's Guardian Caster—"Fitz"—was born.
A mysterious genius who used chantless magic.
His face was hidden behind sunglasses, so no one could tell his true identity.
The name carried echoes of the Fittoa Region and hinted at the genius boy who had once served the Boreas household.
But his true identity and background remained unknown to everyone.
He spoke little, and with only brief conversation, it was difficult to even determine his gender.
Such a boy had come into being.
There was no will of Sylph's in any of it.
They had promised her a guarantee of safety and access to information about the disaster.
But Sylph had no veto power, nor any alternatives.
She had nowhere to go, either, but— She was forcefully made into "Fitz."
A pawn in a political power struggle.
And so, it was decided.
Sylph became Ariel's guardian, "Fitz."
: Note : Her hair turned white due to the combined effects of the teleportation, magic exhaustion, and terror.