Hello all, it's been some time again. sorry, I've just been really lazy when it comes to writing (as usual.)
This is an idea that came to mind a while back when I was reading vol 12, but I just got around to it recently, and by that I mean I've probably been chipping at it a little bit at a time when I had motivation for half a year now. The thing about these little what if ideas is that when you actually start writing them out it's kind of hard to build it up from there. Annoyingly enough, another random idea came to mind while finally finishing this up, but it's going to be for the crossover collection. Several of the main characters had some serious temptations presented to them, and I couldn't help but imagine a few of them, like Quenser joining up with Skuld for some reason. Still, I have no idea if I'm going to get around to it sometime, I still have to get motivation for Demon Lord, and I need to get around to rewriting the existing chapters of Forceful Offer due to all of the revelations about the Information Alliance from volumes 14 and 15. I can make the story so much better...if I got around to it, but such is the life of a procrastinator.
Anyway, all this rambling aside, read and enjoy.
"Hey Oscar, do you mind coming over to my house today? My parents wanted to meet you".
It was in a classroom of a prestigious private high school primarily for nobles located in Paris that the young man Oscar Vieux faced the invitation to the first true test of his first relationship. At the beginning of the school year, he found himself captivated by the beauty of a girl his age and a month prior to the current day worked up the courage to ask her out. As the third son of a lower-ranked noble family of the Legitimacy Kingdom, he was raised in the values of chivalry, and treated the girl with absolute care. He believed he had done well so far and had nothing to be ashamed of, but being asked to meet her parents still made him nervous.
"R-right, yes I'll go." He hoped his nervousness didn't show too much, but his girlfriend quickly picked up on how he felt. She ruffled his hair with a smile and reassured him. "Don't be so nervous, there's nothing to worry about. It's just time for a proper introduction is all." Her smile brought warmth to his heart as always, and he felt his worry get washed away by the shining light she emanated. Truly, he thought to himself, Catherine Barbotage was a girl with no equal, and he was damn lucky to have managed to have her as his girlfriend. Seeing that he had cheered up a bit, Catherine turned to walk out of the classroom when she suddenly stopped.
"Oh right, big brother is in town today too! I can't wait for you to meet him!"
Oscar felt he must have done a much better job hiding his worry this time, as Catherine continued to walk down the hall happily humming; unaware of his returned nervousness.
As the son of a noble family, Oscar usually was driven to school by one of his family's servants, but Catherine was of a common family, and walked to school every day, even in the winter. After making a quick call to his family letting them know where he would be heading, Oscar followed alongside Catherine on her way home. He was grateful for the time to compose his thoughts before meeting her family, and his mind drifted to the day he mentioned to his father that he had started dating Catherine. His father had sternly told him to never make the girl cry, and as a man of the Vieux house he took that advice to heart. However, for some reason in the back of his mind he felt that his father had told him that for a reason besides being a man of honor.
Being a youth dedicated to his studies, Oscar did not participate in gossip, however even he knew that it was common knowledge that Catherine idolized her older brother. Even during their dates she would sometimes boast about how great of a person he was for traveling through battlefields around the world without a gun at his side. She never went into detail about what exactly he did when asked, so many assumed she was just making things up. Oscar simply believed he was a humanitarian aid worker, a respectable profession and Catherine's awe only showed how compassionate she was. That was what he thought.
After about a half hour of walking, Catherine stopped in front of a modest house and cheerfully turned to Oscar. "Ta da! This is my home! Come on in, mama and papa should be waiting for us." Oscar double checked his clothes to make sure they were on straight and followed Catherine as she unlocked the front door and walked inside.
"Papa! Mama! I'm home! I brought Oscar along as well!" In response to Catherine's cheerful greeting, a deep voice could be heard from another room. "Oh, Catherine, Mom went to have lunch with the neighbors, she should be back soon. I'll grab some snacks, take your boyfriend to the living room and I'll be there in a moment." At her father's request, Catherine looked back to Oscar and motioned for him to follow her with a smile.
Just to the left of the entryway was an open room with some furnishings including two couches, a coffee table, a recliner, and a cabinet with a TV inside. Oscar slowly looked around as he tried to act casual while following Catherine to one of the couches, on one of the walls something caught his eye. Held up by a couple of nails was a wide board decorated with a dazzlingly large number of medals. Along the sides were pictures featuring what appeared to be soldiers in a variety of locations.
Oscar started walking towards the board to get a closer look. As he examined it more closely he noticed several prestigious medals that even someone with little knowledge of military awards would recognize. Wait, this is the Royal Order of Nikolaschka, and that's the Chivalric Order of Valor, these are extremely rare! Just what did her father get up to during his time in the service? The boy briefly turned back to Catherine as she was lightly skipping through channels on the TV searching for something that interested her.
"I was unaware that your father was a military man" he lightly spoke while continuing to look at the board. Moving from the impressive display of medals in the center, he glanced to the pictures pinned up along the border. In all of them was a young, blonde man no older than his late teens in varying camouflage. Sometimes with injuries, others surrounded by rubble, the boy was often accompanied by a similarly aged brown-haired soldier in heavier gear and a blonde girl even younger looking than him wearing a blue skintight suit. Oscar followed the impressive array of locales until he reached a picture much larger than the others placed at the center of the top border. Featured on the picture was the usual group of Catherine's father, the brown-haired boy, and the blonde girl alongside the distinguished looking woman in uniform, the old lady with various engineering tools and the asian girl who always seemed to be carrying different equipment he often saw in the pictures as well. However, he found his attention drawn to the center, where another blonde girl cheerfully smiled. Behind him, Catherine spoke up in a casual tone.
"Hm? Papa was never in the military." Oscar felt a sudden discomfort he couldn't recognize run down his spine. There was no mistaking it, the girl in the picture was undoubtedly Catherine, and she said herself that her father wasn't in the military, then who was the boy in the pictures? Oscar continued examining the board, only this time with a more active vigor for reasons he didn't understand himself. Along the bottom rows, similarly colored medals were lined up; each with a different distinct outline far unlike any medal he had seen before. On the plate where the pin was located on each of them was what seemed to be a name. Water Strider, Rush, Deep Optical; Oscar could only assume they were names for something. Catherine found a channel she approved of and looked to see her boyfriend still staring at the board.
"Those are all my big brother's." Oscar froze at that statement. He had asked Catherine before if her brother was a soldier, and she had replied that he wasn't. However, no matter how you looked at it he was obviously not a humanitarian worker, no matter how many warzones you traveled to in order to aid the locals, the medals on the board were quite clearly not the result of such activities. Oscar felt his future depended on correcting the errors in his information.
"I'm sorry Catherine, may I ask about your brother? I seem to have made some misconceptions on my own about him." As Oscar nervously asked Catherine while keeping his focus on the board to keep her from noticing the growing worry on his face. "Sure, ask away!" At Catherine's permission, Oscar began his questioning.
"You said your brother doesn't carry a firearm on the battlefield, right?"
"Yeah, he was handed one a couple of times but he said he couldn't hit anything even if he fired."
"You also said he wasn't a soldier."
"Right, he was a student on deployment to learn engineering from people in the field."
"Okay, that's understandable. Then may I ask how he got all these medals?"
Oscar slowly turned to look at Catherine as he asked his last question and found the girl cutely tilting her head. "Wait, you didn't know? I thought everybody knew about big brother Quenser and how he destroyed Objects on foot." It was at this moment the boy truly froze. Everything started to make sense; how a commoner like Catherine managed to enroll in a noble school, why nobody had attempted to woo Catherine before him, why he felt like he was being followed walking side-by-side with her in town, and why his father had given him such a stern warning. The big brother his girlfriend spoke of so often was the monster explosives expert who had very nearly ruined half a century worth of military doctrine on his own.
Before Oscar could ask any more questions, Catherine's father returned with a plate covered in a variety of snacks like cheeses, meat and crackers in one hand and a pitcher of water and bag of plastic cups in the other. He set the plate, down on the coffee table and poured out a few cups. Before he could sit down, the sound of a hefty car engine could be heard from the road. Catherine jumped up from her chair and eagerly ran to the front door. "Big brother's here!"
While Catherine eagerly waited at the front door, her father addressed Oscar with a stern look. "Boy, you look like a fine young man, so you do right by Catherine and you're good in my book." Despite the man seeming to give him a good initial review, Oscar felt the tingling in his spine grow worse as the man continued to speak. "But I'll warn you, the real test starts now. My son is...very protective of Catherine." Before Oscar could press for details, Catherine returned followed by a blonde young man in a military uniform covered by a lab coat and a blonde young woman in a sundress.
"Hey, dad, how's everything going?" The young man raised a hand in casual greeting as he walked into the room. He placed a small bag down on one of the couches and moved to give his father a hug. After they released from their brief hug, Oscar stiffened up as the new arrival's eyes locked onto to him. The man's smile never changed, but that only made it more terrifying.
Well, this is it. Oscar gathered his resolve to deal with the wrath of a big brother, but contrary to his fears, the man simply walked over and offered a handshake. "You must be Catherine's boyfriend. Oscar, was it? Good to meet you, I'm Catherine's older brother, Quenser." Oscar returned the handshake with all the polite firmness he could muster. "Relax, I won't do anything to you kid." With that quick assurance, Quenser put a hand on Oscar's shoulder and turned to introduce the woman that arrived with him. "This is Milinda, my wife." The woman raised her hand halfheartedly in greeting, but her face remained disinterested, or perhaps more accurately annoyed. As Quenser walked back over to Catherine, Milinda's eyes continued to follow him.
"Catherine, I left a few bags out in the car, could you and Milinda go grab them for me?" Quenser's smile continued to set off alarms in Oscars mind as the man sent Catherine and his wife outside. Milinda seemed to mumble something to Quenser that he laughed off, but Oscar could not hear what was said. Now, the only person left in the room besides Oscar and Quenser was Mr. Barbotage. Quenser picked up the bag he left on the couch and addressed Oscar once again.
"Hey, kid, come with me to the kitchen for a sec, will ya?" With that request, Oscar found himself at what he felt was an extremely dangerous crossroads. He briefly looked to Mr. Barbotage for help but found that the man had averted his eyes. His gaze returned to Quenser who was still maintaining that eerily perfect smile.
Damned if I do, damned if I don't. No choice but to pass this trial! Throwing his sense of caution to the wind, Oscar followed Quenser into the kitchen. As Quenser pulled items out of the bag, Oscar found that they were simply various sweets from shops in the section of town normally reserved for nobility. Oscar quietly followed the instructions he was given, but after everything was placed on the table there was an uncomfortable silence. Quenser leaned against the counter top, folded his arms, and looked right at Oscar.
"So, you're dating my cute little sister, huh?" Quenser finally spoke, and Oscar stood up straight with his arms at his side while forcing himself to meet the terrifying gaze of the man in front of him. "Yes, sir! I have been granted the privilege of going out with Catherine!" Oscar felt that the drilling done by his father to instill discipline came in handy to keep himself from faltering. "I see, so you're dating her, huh? I see. I see." Quenser closed his eyes and nodded dramatically for a moment before opening them again and speaking. "You better not be hoping for an easy mark, boy."
It took Oscar a moment to realize what Quenser meant, but when he did he felt insulted. "I take offense to that. I am a man of the noble Vieux house! We may not be high-ranking, but my parents properly raised me, including in how to treat a lady as fine as Catherine!" Despite the angry outburst, Quenser's mood seemed to improve a little. "So you have some guts after all, but saying you're a noble isn't exactly helping your case. I know a few too many to be blinded by the ideal, especially with all the time I spent around Heivia."
At that statement, Quenser unfolded his arms, stood up from the counter top, and placed a hand on Oscar shoulder. "Well, I'll give you this one chance to prove yourself as worthy." Quenser's face grew closer to Oscars as he continued to speak. "But if you plan on bringing my cute little sister to bed, she damn well better have a ring on her finger." His face continued to inch closer. "And I don't give a damn about what noble protections you might have or what the reasons may be, if you make her cry even once." Quenser brought his free hand up to Oscar's face as he spoke and a tiny explosion caused Oscar to shudder.
"I'm certain you know of my specialty, don't think it's going to be an open casket, you son of a bitch."