Over the next year, I became a regular visitor to Gestalt kingdom's Royal Capital.

My letter to the prince was met with much enthusiasm and soon I was officially named as a study partner to the first and second prince of the country. Quite the honor to a child my age. The peanut gallery went wild.

Nobles kept contacting Verne house asking to invite me over to tea parties for their children and play dates. Luckily, I was far too busy with travelling to and from the royal palace and had an acceptable excuse to refuse their attempts to curry favor.

The free pass to the royal palace was only extended to me, hence Claire couldn't tag along. Good riddance.

She was definitely miffed at not being able to rub elbows with the royal family, but I couldn't care less. She already gold dug her way into Verne's pocket; she should quit while she's ahead.

That aside, the royal palace was quite magnificent. With towering spires, intricate carvings and sprawling gardens, it was infinitely more flamboyant than Verne house, yet much more tasteful.

There were so many twisting and turning hallways that had I not been led by a servant I'd have no hope of finding my way.

I had left Maddie in charge of taking care of Ronnie and took my brand new "maid" Regina with me after I realized that I didn't really have any attendants close to my age around me. I refused to have Claire or-- god forbid, Verne implant any pests by my side and bringing my wet nurse is a bit...

So, I was forced to have "Regina" get a crash course in etiquette. He's a fast learner, but there was no way he could pick up all the fine details, so for the time being all he needed to do was stay quietly by my side and occasionally help me out.

We finally arrived at our destination after much much walking. It was a huge pair of ornately carved double doors. The steward in front of us opened it and dipped into a bow. We stepped into a luxuriously decorated room that at first glance seemed to be a study. There were books of all sizes thickness and color lined up neatly on floor to ceiling shelves on the walls to my left and right, huge bay windows that lead out onto a wide balcony and several chairs facing the window behind matching desks. In front of the smaller seats was a larger desk and chair facing them. Nearly all the seating was occupied and when the steward announced my arrival all eyes turned to me.

There were two familiar faces, two semi-familiar faces and one completely unfamiliar face. The two blondes were no doubt the two princes. The other two children I somewhat recognized but couldn't quite place their identities. Meaning: they were most likely game characters. The last person was an adult a middle-aged man with a kind face, most likely the royal tutor. There was a moment of complete silence before the first prince made the first move.

I ignored the intense nervous energy coming from the maid at my back and returned Fabian's sparkly smile with a cool one of my own. He rose from his seat and approached me before taking my hand in both of his.

.... My eyebrow twitched.

"Kaoru, I am so glad that you finally agreed to study with us!" He said beaming brightly. I smiled and shook my head at his words.

"How could you be more flattered than I? It's my pleasure after all," I replied, to which he chuckled.

"Ever the formal one, aren't we?"

"With a name like "The Child Prodigy" following me around just how could I show my face if I weren't?" I laughed lightly. I could have done without the way he immediately greeted me like a girl, but then again who didn't? I genuinely enjoyed Fabian's company so I could let it slide with only a little cursing on the inside.

He turned to the other occupants who were looking our way curiously.

"You remember my brother Leon," he gestured to the other blonde who nodded and gave a quick, almost shy greeting. He then pointed to the semi-familiar persons. "These two will also be joining our study sessions. This," he pointed to the nearer one, "is Julius Meroë, the son of Prime Minister Meroë and that over there is Shinobu Rain son of the head of the Royal Guard." They both greeted me warmly. Julius studied me curiously while Shinobu just had a huge grin on his face.

... Of course. It was two more capture targets. The prime minister's son and the knight captain's son. I remembered that these three-- Fabian, Julius and Shinobu, were supposed to be close since childhood despite the two-year age gap between Shinobu and the other two.

It seems they were all tutored together including the game's Kaoru. No wonder they became the famous ikemen group. I sorted through my memories of both these characters routes.

Julius Meroë was, despite being the heir, the second son of Duke Meroë. He was named heir after his older brother proved himself to be a complete prodigal causing their father to grind his teeth uncontrollably. Because Duke Meroë only had two sons, one of which already failed him, Julius was put under a lot of pressure growing up. He needed to be perfect in his father's eyes especially since, unlike his older brother, he was the son of a mistress. His stepmother-- Duchess Meroë, would point out his every flaw out of spite and complain to the Duke about it, and he couldn't retaliate. Because of this he learned to put up an amicable face to hide his true venomous personality. He had dark brown, slightly wavy hair that fell just below his shoulders and dark forest green eyes. His face was somewhat on the feminine side with a mole at the top of his left cheek just below the eye.

In the game he was two grades above the heroine in the same class as Kaoru. He had somewhat of a sadistic, passive-aggressive personality. It's best to be wary of him. His attributes were wind and minor fire, I think.

He meets the heroine at the opening ceremony where, even while she has a sprained ankle, she climbs a tree (stupidly enough) to try and see which way it was to the opening ceremony. Upon finding that she can't get down from the tree with her sprained ankle, she bawls her big sparkly eyes out, causing him to find her there. Ever playing the role of the kind upperclassman, he helps her down. She promptly thanks him by blowing etiquette out of the water and shaking his hand wildly before dashing (limping madly) off to the ceremony. He gains an interest in her after that, and she uses her conveniently insightful motivational speeches about being perfect the way he is to snag him.

In his bad ending he snaps under the pressure and his jealousy towards the other capture targets. The heroine is imprisoned by him, shackled away in the Meroë estate at his whim for the rest of her life while in the good ending he exposes his stepmother's insidious plan to have him killed and inherits the place of Duke before defying his father's wish for once in his life and marrying the heroine, a commoner.

Basically, he had the personality of cold, cunning snake masquerading as a kind, capable upperclassman. Currently he was still just a child with a cherub face and therefore posed little threat to me, seeing as I was not an air headed heroine, but I couldn't help but be wary of him.

Not that it showed on my face though. No. He got another cool smile in response to Fabian's introduction. He showed me a more childish version of the cunning smile that would cause women to swoon in the story and shook my hand in the most courteous fashion.

'Not bad for a child.' I decided that Julius had the potential to be a formidable businessman.

I was jerked from my musings... literally, as a somewhat larger, calloused, yet still childish hand wrapped my own thin one and shook it vigorously.

I looked into the grinning face of Shinobu Rain, the most honest, straightforward, easy-going and somewhat rough character in the game. In other words: the resident big, friendly doggy character.

Shinobu was also the easiest character to capture in "The Magus' Romance", therefore, the one people started out with. He was an aspiring knight and also the tallest brawniest capture target. The game's Shinobu was an extremely strong character that was always chasing passionately after his rival, the game's Kaoru who always seemed to be a step ahead of him in power.

He had close cropped midnight blue hair and golden eyes against skin that was bronzed from training in the sun all day. His rippling muscles and great sword that was as thick as an adult’s torso would be intimidating if it weren't for the blindingly sunny, easygoing grin always present on his face. Not even the two sharp canines that were the result of a beastman ancestry could make this pochi seem sinister in the least.

He first notices the heroine at the start of the game as she trains hard to increase her physical stats and enthusiastically challenges her to a spar forgetting his brute strength and injuring her causing her to miss the entrance ceremony (even though it was just a sprained ankle). He apologizes by offering to help train her. In his bad end he grows disappointed with the heroine who shows zero passion for training and disassociates himself with her. The rest of the students seeing her get disliked by the guy who naively never disliked anyone, surmise that she must be that bad and ostracize her. The heroine is soon forced to leave the academy once her schoolmates' scorn becomes too much. In his good ending he proposes to the heroine after returning from the Demon surge and live happily ever after. I had to say that his bad end was the tamest in comparison to the others. She actually walks away free... and alive.

At the moment Shinobu was nowhere near as brawny as in the game but he was the biggest boy among us despite being the youngest. His trademark airhead grin was also present making his identity certain. Looking at his healthy tanned skin in comparison to my own pasty one was... depressing. Perhaps it was wrong of me to compare myself to the most muscle-bound target in the game but... I was really scrawny, huh? Maybe a little more sun wouldn't hurt...

"Hi, my name is Shinobu! So, you're Kaoru, huh? Wow you're pretty! And pale and so small! I thought you were a girl for sure a minute ago!!" He rambled off quickly.

"..."

From the corner of my eye, I think I saw Julius face palm.

"Shinobu!" Fabian groaned exasperatedly. Yup, he really is the doggy. Straightforward, dense and honest to a fault.

"Hm?" He tilted his head in confusion, pouting slightly at the reprimand. Yup, definitely a dog.

Fabien just sighed. I smiled again showing that I didn't mind.

He wasn't wrong. Saying my frame was "slight" is an understatement. I was small for someone my age. Shinobu, or Shin as he insisted, kind of reminded me of Ronnie with his childish innocence. It contrasted with the calm mature attitude of Fabian and Julius. Prince Leon, on the other hand, I didn't know what to make of him. He seemed a little standoffish, just sitting silently at his desk. Every now and then I would feel his gaze drilling holes into me, I would glance at him, and his eyes flicked away. He was warily studying me just like at the reception.

Once the polite introduction was out of the way, the lesson began.

....

Two minutes in and I was considering whether to laugh or cry.

What was with this primary school math??!!

According to our tutor, Sir Ferris, it was advanced mathematics from the Magus Academy senior year two curriculum......

It's times like these that I'm forced to remember that this world really is completely mideival.

For the time being I decided to pretend as if I were listening attentively while internally crying of pure boredom. Once, halfway through the "lesson" I was just about to accidentally let a yawn slip when it was stifled by a burning gaze. I turned to look at Leon who instead of looking away like usual, gave me a long stare before huffing. And looking ahead at Sir Ferris.

I simply turned back around and continued to ponder my current domestic predicament. I had no time for a huffy prince.

I needed to find a way to make sure that Verne became less of a danger to me. Moving to the capital with the excuse of studying would only work for so long before I had to go back to the wolf's den to prepare for school. I had years until then, but I'd rather it was sooner than later because I don't think that I could sit around pretending to learn things I already knew. I'd die of boredom!

Unfortunately, there was no way I could remove Verne without implicating the entire household......

Not unless he dies in an accident or something like that...

'...'

And like that an eight-year-old boy started to seriously hypothesize the pros and cons of instigating his stepfather's death in the middle of a math lesson.