Full summary: Once upon a time, in an empire far far away, there lived a handsome young soldier named Suzaku with a mildly alarming love for big robots, a propensity for bad decisions and a very high libido. Chaos ensues when, out of sheer desperation, Prince Schneizel recruits our young hero to protect his lovely, but temperamental sister Leloucia. Will Suzaku's bulging pectorals and bright green eyes be enough to make Leloucia accept her new knight? Will Suzaku manage to keep Leloucia safe from her insane uncle Victor? Will Emperor Charles ever find a hairstyle that is less horrible? Read and find out.
Background pairings: Schneizel/Kanon, Cornelia/Guilford, past Bismarck/Marianne, Marybell/Oldrin Zevon/Orpheus Zevon, unrequited Euphie/Suzaku
Chapter 1. In Which the Quest Begins
Once upon a time, in an empire far far away, there lived a handsome young soldier. Now, this young man—whom we shall call, for the purpose of this story, Suzaku—had not always been a soldier. In fact, once, he had been a prince. However, his homeland had been invaded by another, and in the process, his father had been killed. (Details not important. Ahem.) Where Suzaku's mother was, this storyteller does not know. Perhaps he simply manifested magically from his father's loins and he had no mother at all.
Either way, with his father gone and their retainers hiding in the four corners of their overrun kingdom, Suzaku found himself at a loss.
Anyone other than him would have perhaps decided to join a quest to free his homeland from its invaders. But our hero said no. Instead, he joined the army of the occupational force in question.
As you can probably imagine, he was not the most gifted man in terms of intelligence.
Nevertheless, he was extremely hard-headed, and perhaps, very determined, because he did indeed complete the torturous training necessary for his task. Our young hero rejoiced, thinking that he was finally getting somewhere... only to be relegated to the humblest position available.
He cleaned a lot of latrines and chopped a lot of potatoes in the months that followed.
Meanwhile, in another corner of the massive empire, there lived a beautiful princess. Fair of skin and dark of hair, the princess—whom we shall call Leloucia—was a vision of beauty few mortals dared to look upon. Why? It is quite simple really. She was as fierce as she was beautiful, and one glare from her lovely amethyst eyes made seasoned soldiers quiver in their boots.
There was one man, however, who ignored the danger to his life, and often entered the lair of the princess. The man was the young princess's brother, Schneizel, and he feared deeply for his sister's life.
"Leloucia, dearest," he would tell her, "you must take a knight. Your safety is at risk."
Emerging from behind a stack of books as tall as she was, Leloucia eyed him balefully. "I'll be fine, thank you. I can defend myself."
"Yes, I know, but you are a princess. You shouldn't have to defend yourself."
This was a recurring argument between the two siblings, one in which Schneizel unavoidably emerged defeated. But Schneizel was a very cunning man, and not beneath emotional blackmail. He was well aware that, despite her fierceness, the princess was fond of him. He had raised her, after her mother had decided children were boring and had returned to her previous position of knight.
(Incidentally, this proved to be a mistake, as she had been killed within a year. But again, details not important.)
What mattered was that Leloucia cared for her dear older brother, and so, eventually, after one particular evening that involved several games of chess, two bottles of wine and a foot massage, she relented to one request. She would agree to take a knight on a trial basis, and should the person displease her, he or she would be dismissed.
The news was received with mixed reactions. Some of young Leloucia's siblings rejoiced, as they believed their dear sister would finally be safe. Other, less naive ones, were already taking bets on how much Leloucia would make her chosen knights suffer. Emperor Charles was the one keeping track of each individual bet. He looked forward to whatever viciousness his lovely daughter would unleash upon the world.
The emperor's loyal retainers fell somewhere in between. While wary of what this may mean, they jumped at the opportunity to serve the beautiful princess. The emperor's most loyal knight, Bismarck, secretly wished he could offer his own services. As the Knight of One, he was the greatest warrior of the empire, and thus, the princess would likely be unable to find fault in him.
Also, the princess bore a distinct resemblance to the late empress, to whom Bismarck had been... acquainted with in a rather biblical sense. He wouldn't have minded if he reenacted the pleasant memories of his time with Empress Marianne with her even more beautiful daughter.
But alas, it was not possible, as his oath was to serve the emperor. So instead, he and Prince Schneizel assigned the Knight of Three, Gino Weinberg to safeguard their treasure of loveliness.
In hindsight, Bismarck should have known better. Weinberg had many qualities, but tactfulness was not one of them.
To his credit, he did last one whole week in the princess's service, which proved to be a good performance during the following months. Luciano Bradley's attempt went south within a day, and the man barely escaped with his life. Monica Krushevsky lasted two weeks, while Anya Alstreim barely managed to reach one like Weinberg. Kewell Soresi lasted three days. Dorothea Ernst, Viletta Nu and Nonnette Enneagram lasted six.
Jeremiah Gottwald held the record of two weeks and five days. It was a source of much dismay, as Prince Schneizel truly had hoped Gottwald would be able to meet his dearest sister exacting standards. Possessing a near fanatical loyalty to the empire in general and the princess's line in particular, Gottwald would have been a perfect knight. But apparently, Leloucia was not so easily swayed.
Naturally, Schneizel persisted. He enlisted his sister Cornelia in his quest, and she generously donated her own knights in an attempt to find someone good enough for their beloved sibling.
Alas, each and every attempt was rejected... most explosively. Usually resulting in traumatic effects for the individuals in question and bouts of maniacal laughter from the emperor.
At this point, you will perhaps wonder what made the princess so fearsome and why her siblings were so obsessively protective of her. Well, this particular empire had always promoted a vision of 'strength over weakness' and, for this reason, most of members of the nobility tended to prefer to choose their partners from the same social circle. Unfortunately, there were actually not that many families that provided adequate candidates, which led to constant inbreeding. This had manifested in a wide variety of unlikely hair and eye colors—the bubblegum pink of Princess Euphemia's hair still remained genetically unexplainable—but also in a tendency of extreme overprotectiveness of one's closest relations.
Technically speaking, this problem was one that appeared often in the empire, as most nobility encountered it in some shape or form. However, the imperial family had always been hit hardest by this plight. On a regular day, the emperor himself appeared to be sane and the craziest thing about him was the fact that he still believed powdered wigs were in fashion. Nevertheless, he had made the insane decision to take over one hundred wives, which had long ago clued the entire empire in on the fact that he wasn't all there. Also, on top of wrangling his harem, the emperor had his brother to worry about. The brother in question seemed to have taken Emperor Charles's lustful ways quite personally, and it was not unusual for him to hunt down the children and wives Emperor Charles favored, as he deemed them a threat to their brotherly bond. Thus the death of Empress Marianne.
Naturally, this put a strain on their relationship, but Victor zi Britannia had never been one to give up and he persisted in his original strategy.
Princess Leloucia was her father's favorite child. She had inherited much of her mother's looks and skill with weaponry, but also her father's cunning. She also had a propensity for causing huge explosions, although nobody seemed to figure out exactly how she managed to do so.
The natural consequence of this situation was that Leloucia had one crazed obsessive uncle trying to murder her and several desperately overprotective siblings attempting to prevent her demise—although in Schneizel and Cornelia's case, their attitude was just common sense, rather than actual overprotectiveness. Most of the time, at least.
In any case, the imperial family went through a large number of knights in an attempt to guard the prized heiress. None fit the bill, and Schneizel despaired.
In the meantime, our young hero, Suzaku found himself in a different predicament. During his regular work hours, he had been intercepted by a noble who had deemed his skills perfect for a new, revolutionary undertaking that would advance warfare in the... (At that point, Suzaku had stopped listening).
The noble in question, Earl Asplund, had bodily dragged Suzaku off from his previous post and presented him with the latest knightmare frame, the Lancelot.
Now, our Suzaku would have probably been more worried about strange men making him offers that were too good to be true while shoving him into uniforms that seemed designed to show off his genitals, but like in the case of most young men, his mind stopped working properly when presented with either a. a beautiful woman or b. a giant robot.
Suzaku was extremely good at suppressing his sexual frustration, but his inner child rejoiced upon seeing the robot, and he embraced the opportunity wholeheartedly.
It was only much later that Suzaku realized the only reason why he'd been made the offer in the first place was because the robot in question was very much experimental, and piloting it was tremendously risky. By then, he didn't particularly care about the reason. He just liked his robot, thank you very much.
As it turned out, Suzaku did very well at piloting the Lancelot, so much so that he was actually deployed in combat against the resistance in his kingdom. It didn't feel great to have to fight against the same people who'd once been his family, but it wasn't like he could back down now. Also, his awesome robot rocked and kicked their asses to high heaven. So there.
Suzaku's goal was to gradually make it up the ranks, to change the empire from within and prove that everyone could live together in peace and harmony, no matter what their blood was. Unfortunately for him, the likelihood of this happening outside extreme circumstances was slim to none. In fact, he was far more likely to get blown up by Lloyd's experiments than he was to reach his ambitious, if noble goal.
But our young hero must have had some sort of deity watching out for him—or perhaps an author who was secretly fond of him despite his young and naive ways—because he did not get blown up by his sociopathic superior. Instead, he received a mysterious summons, demanding his presence to the imperial capital of Pendragon.
Unbeknownst to Suzaku, Prince Schneizel was on the edge of a nervous breakdown due to his sister's antics. Princess Cornelia was suffering from her monthly affliction and had retired to her villa, which was understandable and wise, since it was not a good idea for her to roam about in that state. Meanwhile, Prince Clovis was doing his very best to sabotage the security of the palace by organizing orgy after orgy and Princess Marrybell was attempting to poach palace staff for her new Glinda Knights. It was madness.
In a mad attempt to comfort his superior, Earl Kanon Maldini made a suggestion they would later come to regret.
"Perhaps we should look into the possibility of employing an Honorary. Princess Leloucia has proven to be a little more forgiving with the disadvantaged."
Normally, Schneizel would have disregarded the suggestion outright. It was scandalous. How could Princess Leloucia, of all people, take a Number as a knight?
However, Kanon had a point. Leloucia had been less snappish and more permissive with commoners than she was with nobles. It was why Viletta Nu had managed to last six days to begin with, despite her rather... distasteful character.
But who could he possibly trust with his dearest sister?
A memory flashed through Schneizel's mind. There was one person who fit the bill. Suzaku Kururugi.
Lloyd Asplund had sent him the report on the young pilot of the Lancelot. Schneizel had been impressed by Kururugi's piloting skills and mildly amused at the fact that the former prince of Japan was now actively fighting against his own people. He'd briefly wondered if he was perhaps a Trojan horse, before discarding the idea. If the Japanese resistance had wanted to wriggle a spy into the Britannian army, they would not have used Suzaku Kururugi of all people.
Also, Asplund pointed out that the boy, while a talented pilot, seemed to fight purely by instinct and possessed no strategic skills whatsoever.
He would do nicely, until he found another, better option. At the very least, he could provide a meat shield should Victor choose to come after his beautiful, defenseless Leloucia.
"Kanon," he said, "you are a genius. Get me Lloyd Asplund."
If Kanon was surprised that his prince had listened to his suggestion, he did not show it. Instead, he rushed to follow the command.
The next day, one Suzaku Kururugi arrived at the Pendragon Imperial Palace, the residence of the emperor himself. He still did not know why he had been called here. Earl Asplund had seemed just as confused—well, mostly, he'd seemed troubled that he'd lose the most important 'part' of his knightmare. Cecile had assured him that the reason for the summons could not be bad, which made sense. If he'd been accused of treason or anything similar, they wouldn't have bothered to bring him to Pendragon.
Still, he was nervous, and that nervousness did not decrease when, upon his arrival, he was ushered into a meeting with the White Prince himself, Schneizel. Suzaku knelt in front of the prince, as was expected of him. The prince urged him to rise, but his eyes seemed very sharp and piercing when they zeroed in on Suzaku.
"Warrant Officer Kururugi. You are probably wondering why you were summoned here."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Earl Asplund speaks highly of you. While your service in Area 11 has been noted, I have a far greater task you are needed for. I require you to be my sister's knight."
Naturally, Suzaku was befuddled. He did not think he'd done anything to warrant this kind of attention. Yes, the ASEEC was a division supervised by Prince Schneizel, but that didn't mean his accomplishments so far qualified him for such a task.
His shock must have shown, because Prince Schneizel proceeded to explain the situation. Apparently, the princess was very particular when it came to knights, and Prince Schneizel had trouble finding someone he could trust his sister with. "You've proven to be trustworthy in your participation in a classified project. Do not fail me. The consequences would be most dire."
"I will protect the princess with my life, Your Highness," Suzaku promised.
Prince Schneizel simply arched a perfect, blond brow at him and gave him a mysterious tiny smile. "I am certain that you will."
And just like that, Suzaku was dismissed. The prince summoned a sour-faced attendant named Ms. Lohmeyer and instructed her to take him to see his new charge. After bowing lowly, the woman led Suzaku out of Prince Schneizel's office, practically irradiating distaste.
Ms. Lohmeyer didn't say anything to him. She just guided him to his next destination, like the prince had ordered her to.
Suzaku ignored her palpable hostility. He paid no heed to the way people stared at him, or to the ugly whispers and occasional snickers. This was his chance to prove himself, and he would not fail.
Fortunately, the princess's office was not very far from that of her brother. A stern-looking man with orange eyes demanded their identification, sneered at Suzaku, but apparently deemed their presence satisfactory, because he didn't send them away. Instead, he knocked at the door and politely waited until a soft voice came from inside. "Yes. Enter."
The orange-eyed man opened the door and bowed, "Warrant Officer Suzaku Kururugi, here to see you, Princess Leloucia," he explained.
"Right. See him in then, Jeremiah."
The man—now identified as Jeremiah—complied and gestured for Suzaku to go in. Suzaku entered the princess's office, keeping his stance perfectly straight and his expression level despite the fact that his stomach fluttering with nerves.
He really should have known better than to believe things would be in any way simple.
In front of him, seated at her desk, was the most beautiful creature he had ever beheld. Her pale skin reminded him of the color of the cherry blossoms in the trees around the Kururugi shrine. Her dark hair curled around her cheeks in gentle waves and her eyes shone like bright gemstones, no, like sakuradite.
Never had he been more grateful for the existence of the hideous orange uniform he was wearing today. Had he worn the Lancelot devicer outfit, his status as a knight would have ended very quickly indeed.
Fortunately, the jacket of his uniform covered his groin—and his very rigid erection.
It wasn't that Suzaku was unaccustomed to beautiful women, far from it. Britannian fashion tended to be far more revealing than what Suzaku had been used to as a child, and he'd worked closely with Cecile, whose... assets were not inconsiderable. And unfortunately for him, Suzaku had always had a high libido, which could be problematic.
But despite his numerous flaws—which he was well aware of—Suzaku was actually a very disciplined individual. He had never forgotten the lessons he had been taught by his sensei and he'd always honored that code, even when he'd decided to use his skills in the service of the Britannian army. Alas, as good as he may have been at controlling his sexuality, it all went out the window the moment he set his eyes on Princess Leloucia. And it only got worse when she spoke to him.
"So... You're my new knight," she said, getting up from her seat.
Her voice was like a song, flowing over Suzaku like a physical caress. Now that she was upright, he could actually see the way her black uniform beautifully accentuated her curves.
God damn it, he'd known he shouldn't have forgone sex for giant robots. That decision was coming back to bite him in the ass, big time.
He knelt in front of the princess and bowed his head, struggling to catch his breath. "Warrant Officer Suzaku Kururugi, at your service, Your Highness."
Mercifully, the princess did not seem to notice his lapse. "What has Schneizel told you?" she asked.
"Simply that I am to be your knight, on a trial basis, Your Highness," Suzaku replied, still keeping his eyes down.
The princess hummed thoughtfully. "I suppose that's accurate enough," she drawled, "although it's a little more complicated than that. Get up."
Suzaku did and forced himself to look up at the princess. She wasn't looking at him, but rather, ruffling through the files on her desk. Suzaku was half-grateful, half-dismayed at that. He really wanted to get another glimpse at those beautiful amethyst eyes. But perhaps it wasn't the best time, not yet.
Princess Leloucia produced a thick folder which she offered to him. "Your debrief," she said curtly.
Suzaku instinctively reached out to take the file, but at the same time, couldn't help but admire the princess's beautiful hands. She had long, elegant fingers, and Suzaku got an unwilling flash of how they'd look around his dick.
Damn it, this was ridiculous. Get a grip, Suzaku.
Taking a deep breath, Suzaku thought about the least arousing things he could possibly come up with. Cecile's cooking. Lloyd's eerie laughter. His Honorary Britannian training.
No, it needed to be something worse. Todhoh-sensei in a Britannian evening gown. Senba doing a split. His father.
Yeah, all right, that had done it.
Finally clear-headed—and how the hell how he ended up using patricide as a method to cope with sexual arousal?—Suzaku clutched the folder like a lifeline. At first, he wasn't sure he supposed to read it right then and there. He waited a few seconds for more instructions, but when none were forthcoming, he decided that he had no other option and opened the file.
As it turned out, the folder contained several sections, ranging from information on what was expected of him, his duties, assigned weaponry and quarters, to details on the Britannian royal family. They appeared to have been sorted by... threat level?
If this was accurate, he had no idea why someone like him had been picked for such an important task. Still, if he had been trusted with it, he would do his very best to protect the princess. Nobody would ever hurt her on his watch.
When he finally looked up from the file, he found Princess Leloucia watching him closely with those piercing amethyst eyes. "Done?"
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Any questions?"
Suzaku considered the information in the file and hesitantly nodded. "With your permission, Your Highness, I do have two questions."
"Proceed," the princess replied expectantly.
"What is the level of damage that I am allowed to inflict on possible threats if they are from the imperial family? And I am allowed to keep a pet?"
For a few seconds, the princess just stared at him. Then, much to his surprise, she burst into bright peals of laughter.
She had a beautiful laugh, much like everything else about her. It seemed to light up the room, reminding him of the way the inside of the Lancelot flared to life when the machine was turned on. Lovely, electric, infectious.
Suzaku allowed himself the luxury to revel in the sound, enjoying the lightness it brought to his heart. When the princess's chuckles faded into a soft smile, he found himself feeling far better and more optimistic about this strange new situation he was in.
"Having a pet is not against the rules, but do you think you have the time for it?" Princess Leloucia asked, her tone a little more serious, but still holding a dose of amusement.
"I have a cat," Suzaku quickly explained. "He's pretty independent, really, so time constraints shouldn't be a problem."
"Well, then, if that's the case, I certainly don't mind. Keep your cat, Kururugi."
Suzaku beamed. Sure, Arthur made it his business to attack Suzaku on a regular basis, but Suzaku didn't care. He seemed to be making progress with the feline. There was less angry hissing and clawing these days and more slight biting. He would have given Arthur up for the sake of his new duties, of course, but he was glad he didn't have to.
"As for your first question," the princess continued, "By all means, be as violent in your duties as you deem it necessary."
Awesome.
First a big robot, then apparently, a nice shiny sword and a gun. And he got to keep his feline friend too. Things were finally looking up for our young hero.
Sure, he'd have to deal with a huge amount of sexual frustration, but maybe he could just take it out with some good old-fashioned ass-kicking of the princess's enemies. That sounded like a good solution.
"I understand, Your Highness. Thank you, Your Highness."
The princess shot him one last bemused smile. "Not a problem, Kururugi. Now go on. Report to the armory. They'll outfit you with everything you need there and show you to your quarters. Once you're done settling in, come back here. Dismissed."
Suzaku saluted and quickly left the room as he'd been bid. It was only after he left the office that it occurred to him that he had no idea where the armory was actually located.
Sigh. It looked like getting used to this job would take a little longer than he'd hoped.