Chapter 9.2

The Move (2)

And that was expected. If a family wanted to produce a Crown Princess, they say that they start educating girls who were born between two to five years after an imperial prince was born before they even learn how to stand and walk. Once they become around seven years old, they gather all the Crown Princess candidates and start marriage interviews. Among the girls who are thought to be a good match to the prince, a fiancee is picked by the time they reach ten years of age with consideration to their family, influence among the nobility, and the Emperor’s opinion. Then, the crown princess training becomes more intense. By intense, I mean that from day to night, they drill into you every possible thing on how to be the perfect lady, and when you reach fifteen years old, you start preparing for the marriage ceremony. It would be fortunate if you can successfully marry, but it apparently wasn’t uncommon for the Crown Prince to fall in love with another lady and cancel the marriage. What should I say, it certainly wasn’t easy being a noble lady.

By the way, I later asked Her Majesty if all this was actually true regarding the Crown Princess training. She had a dry smile and looked far off into the distance, so it seemed it was true.

At any rate, both Mother and all my sisters were lamenting how there just wasn’t enough time to prepare me for becoming the Crown Princess. I tried my best, but these were simply just things that you needed to keep repeating over and over again to internalize. No matter how hard you tried, there would always be some small mistake somewhere. However, regarding developing an eye for jewelry, since I was interested in it and also had good eyes and instincts, I was able to develop my skills to a pretty impressive level. But of course, this was meaningless if that was the only thing I was able to do. I studied and practiced relentlessly, even if I got into arguments with Mother and my sisters who kept expecting the impossible from me. Due to this, however, hmm, how shall I put it… I felt like I got a lot closer with my family, who were basically strangers to me, to the point that I could say things to them without reservation.

It goes without saying, I wasn’t able to go to the forest nor the plaza, so stress kept building up within me. However, according to Mother, once I enter the palace, it would be a lot worse. The maids at the palace had all undergone intense training and were all professionals of etiquette. So, even Mother cannot let her guard down whenever she is called in as a guest of Her Majesty the Empress. If you slip up, scornful laughter erupts and it becomes a widespread rumor among the nobles within seconds. What the… so scary!

“It is okay, Mother. There are too many things to point out in my etiquette and manners that they would be too astounded to spread rumors.”

“Putting aside that they would be too astounded by you, I will be the one who will be laughed at for not educating you properly!”

“You do have a point, but it is true that I wasn’t educated by you and was instead playing around in the Caliente Territory.”

“Hearing you say that puts me in a difficult place…”

Mother shook her head. It seemed that Mother knew it was impossible for me who had been living like a monkey in the Caliente Territory to suddenly become the Crown Princess, and was feeling bad for me. It was to the extent that she would indirectly ask if I had any intention of divorcing Cermiane a couple of times.

She would even say:

“I should have had Incrouge marry Cermiane.”

Incrouge was the daughter of my brother, the current Marquis, and my niece. My three-year- younger niece  who fell in love when Cermiane was proposing to me. In truth, she had been strictly raised as the first daughter of the Caliente marquisate since she was little, so she probably was the better Crown Princess candidate indeed. She herself hadn’t gotten married yet and was at the Caliente residence. She has been helping out with my Crown Princess training, but she would always boast, “I knew I had good taste in men!” But, even Incrouge shivered and never offered to switch with me, saying, “Being the Crown Princess is impossible for me.”

I had no intention of divorcing Cermiane, and after talking so big to Cermiane, I didn’t have the courage to evade becoming the Crown Princess. As a result, I couldn’t avoid Mother’s intense Crown Princess training. Of course, I had no intention of running away from it. Though, at times, to the point of tears, I did my best. Mother and my sisters never gave me a passing grade, but they did say, “Well, I think you might have slightly improved compared to before.” I want everyone to forget about how terrible my starting state was…

By the way, I unexpectedly improved at dancing really quickly, to the extent that I was able to surprise Mother and my sisters. I’m pretty athletic, and I also have muscle. Once I got the hang of it, it was a lot easier than shooting a deer. For that matter, it was my only opportunity to freely move my body during this intense training that built up frustration, so I even considered it as my break. Mother commented, “I guess every person has at least one strength.”

In addition to etiquette, I also received primary education, but I already knew how to read and write. I also knew how to write official documents and how to use a signature from when I helped out with governing the territory, so they deemed my knowledge as satisfactory enough the way it was. I was glad the knowledge I gained while I was bored at the territory turned out to be useful. However, they told me that as the Crown Princess, I needed to memorize the Empire’s history, the imperial family’s history, and the entire directory of all the Empire’s nobles. That amounted to about eight thick books from the marquisate library which was obviously impossible to memorize in this short span of time. So, they excluded that from my curriculum.

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