Chapter 2
"Your Highness." Someone knocked on the door, "The tutor is asking for Your Highness in the study room, the first door in the hallway located at the third floor."
"I understand." He said with the usual commanding dignity of a prince. He was a prince after all, and he used to be a prince too.
He could adapt. He could do this.
He changed his clothes to something more acceptable and with a confident stride that demanded respect, he went out of the room.
This time, he was no Lelouch vi Brittania. He was Kaster Fritz. And he needed to look the part.
The study room was easy enough to find. All he needed to do was climb up the stairs that was located straight across his room and turn right.
He opened the door and looked inside.
"Come in Prince Kaster." An old man—the tutor—said from the table without looking up from the scroll he was reading.
He took a moment to familiarize himself with the study room. If he was not wrong ( and he was rarely wrong ) he would be a constant occupant of this place soon.
This place seemed like some type of library-like office. There was only one desk at the end of the room, with two chairs opposing each other, one for the tutor and the other…probably for him. He noticed that at every side of the room were bookshelves—full of books that seemed to be categorized as 'Materials—orange cover, Important—green cover, and Fiction—yellow cover'—by their labels.
He also noticed something among the Fiction section—a red thin book ( which was probably why he noticed it in the first place ) squashed between thick yellow books with Japanese characters printed on the side.
'Outside' he translated mentally—it wasn't really that obvious that it was Japanese characters to begin with considering the fact that it looked more like random slashes and scribbles, but fortunately his studies on deciphering codes and hand-writings seemed to pay off.
'Interesting…' he thought.
"Prince Kaster ?" the tutor looked up from the scroll he was reading.
"Ah yes. I apologize." He hastily tore his eyes away from the book, taking the empty seat in front of the tutor.
"Right then, today we're going to study history first." He moved away the scroll and opened a book next to him to a page that had already been marked. A photo of a…gigantic deformed human-like monster with crazed blank looking eyes and saliva drooling from his mouth met his eyes.
"That's…"
"A titan. It's just a normal one." He said," But before we learn about the titans, we need to know about the Walls first. "
He put aside the book and opened another book depicting a great wall that seemed so high and endless, "This is Wall Maria. Our outermost wall…."
He began explaining each and every wall, the district inside, how society used to be before coming to this stage and how the titans had influenced them.
Lelouch absorbed it all like a sponge to water. His mind quickly categorizing the information about this world. He was quiet all the way—at least until the subject of titans came up.
The tutor—whose name he still didn't know—had just finished explaining the type of titans there were that had been categorized by the Scouting Legion when he decided to voice some questions.
"Um…Mr….uh…." he started.
"Its Mr. Rencharteuae, Prince Kaster."
"Mr. Renche….Recateru…um…Mr. Rencharte…uh…." He stumbled after the words purposely—to give himself an excuse for not saying his name—and well, coincidentally the tutor had one weird long name that worked in his favor.
"Just call me Mr. Charte then, Prince Kaster."
He nodded his acquiescence and started again, "Mr. Charte. I want to know about the outside world."
He looked up and saw the shocked look in 's face and quickly stumbled on while wondering if what he just asked was weird.
"I mean, the Walls are supposed to be a century old and…humans can live up to 120 years old at most. Surely someone should have live during the time of the Walls building and have seen the outside. Surely someone have told stories about it ?" He asked with childish innocence.
Mr. Charte's eyes looked panicked for a moment before he stared at him sternly in response, "Prince Kaster. Never bring the subject of outside again. Anywhere. Anytime."
The vehemence in his tutor's voice was very palpable. From the strong reaction, it seemed that this topic might be off-limit. He filed that information away in his mind before murmuring an acceptance. To his surprise, the tutor apparently still entertain his question despite his previous warning.
"To answer your questions though…., the outside world is not really that much different…probably the only different is the nature. There's ocean, the mountains and many more…" he said as if remembering something before looking back to him again, "….Or so the books said."
"Why…why is asking about the outside is forbidden ?" he asked.
"Because we believe that since we are safe for a century then the titans won't be able to breach the Walls…ever." He sighed.
"So…we don't want to be reminded of something that's unachievable…?"
"Something like that, Prince Kaster."
"But will the Walls really hold for much longer ? Are we really safe ?"
Mr. Charte looked thoughtful. "Hmm…maybe. We can only hope so. Without the Walls, there won't be any protection between us and titans. Humanity will be destroyed instantly."
"But the Walls can only buy time. Sooner or later, titans will find a way in…what will happen then ? Shouldn't we be doing something before it happen and everything's too late ?"
"You sure have lots of questions, Prince Kaster," Mr. Charte smiled at him, "We do have Scouting Legion for that purpose though—they are the one that search for titans weaknesses and how to stop them once and for all."
"Oh…I understand." He said.
But he didn't. The answers just add more questions.
"Anyways Prince Kaster, you shouldn't ask questions like that to anyone okay. Not everyone are willing to answer them. Most take those as insults." Mr. Charte said before he could ask anything else.
"Insults…?" he said thoughtfully," I understand ."
"Now then, moving on to mathematics…."
And thus Mr. Charte began the lecture about multiplication and division that he had long mastered in his time as Lelouch.
Somehow he had managed to make sure his face looked like he was listening while he actually was pondering about the information he had just get.
This society was messed up. What kind of people practically worship a wall after all ? If the titans have in fact breach the Wall—even if it's just Wall Maria—, he was fairly sure that he would have a riot in his hand.
Let's just hope that didn't happen soon.
A/N : Hello again ! Thank you for the reviews ! Hope you enjoy it :)