A Dragon’s Curiosity

Nisha was quite interested when she heard that Henry planned to enter an order of knights soon, it was actually quite fitting for him to pursue a career as a knight.

He had a mighty steed as his familiar and the combination of water aura and earth mana was quite suitable, although not typical, for a man-at-arms.

A flexible style based on flow and waves combined with well-timed bursts of defense based on earth mana to support aggressive attacks would certainly make for a terrifying foe and a stalwart ally.

She could picture Henry doing quite well in this manner, it was definitely a good choice.

“Really? What do you want to do as a knight?”

 Nisha found it quite interesting to hear about the order of knights, she had not come across them in the materials she read so far or from the subjects at school.

According to her knowledge, knight referred to a certain level of strength once a cultivator made it across the first great divide and broke through to the fourth rank.

Magicians did not get a separate address, they also fell under the umbrella of the same term.

Monsters, beasts, and materials followed the same pattern, mainly because the largest part of cultivators was occupied by physical cultivators that trained their aura and monsters, which also relied on their aura to survive.

The other occupations used to have their own terms for attaining the fourth rank, but they eventually got replaced by the address for knights and were lost to time.

“Well, it mainly depends on whether I manage to join a knight order or not.

Without the prestige of belonging to an order, most knight-level cultivators can only enter an established force like a noble family or a large merchant house as a follower.

Apart from guarding the leaders of their force and providing security, you can take outside missions from the [Adventurer’s Guild] or other forces to obtain resources and so on.

In comparison, a knight order will take care of everything I just mentioned internally, which means that tasks, facilities, and resources are of a higher level compared to loose organizations.”

The [Cerulean Sky Owl] landed on Henry’s shoulder and pecked at his ear, dissatisfied that the playing session was interrupted.

Because the master was talking to the dangerous beast, he was too distracted to keep throwing the toy.

Bothering the scary elf was a very stupid idea though, hence the owl felt very wronged.

Luckily, the young man quickly understood what was wrong and took a moment to toss the disc far away again, restarting their game.

Nisha subtly felt that something was wrong with Henry’s familiar, it always avoided eye contact and hurriedly took to the air whenever she wanted to come close to it.

In theory, she could try to communicate with it in the monster language, but the familiar ran faster than the elf could establish a conversation.

Precisely then, Henry continued with his explanation about the knight orders.

“There are two large knight orders situated in the capital, namely the Order of the Lion and the Order of the Rose, they are both supported by the royal family.

In order to enter an order, you have to swear an oath, though the content depends on the organization.

The Order of the Lion serves the palace directly and the appointment is a lifelong commitment.

Their main task is protecting the king, the royal family and protecting the palace.

The Order of the Rose is less involved with the capital and mainly roams the country to aid the weak, defend the people and open new frontiers.“

Nisha did not have to ask which place Henry wanted to enter, his eyes shone with ambition when he talked about the latter.

The dragon was not quite sure about the details, so she made sure to ask.

“When you say supported by the royal family, do you plan to work for the crown in the future?“

Despite not staying long in the Thurgau, even Nisha knew that the prominent noble families and the crown often clashed and stood in different camps.

Having the heir of a Duke enter an organisation directly beneath the royal family was bound to make a stir, and Henry surely had to be aware of that outcome.

“No, just because they get support from the royal family, the two knight orders are still a neutral faction.

The palace gives material support and monetary compensation, and in return the Order of the Lion mainly protects the palace and members of the royal family.

As a result, the applicants are closely screened and only those of sufficient standing and family background are eligible to join.

In return, many of the cultivation resources they need are free or greatly lowered in price as a reward for completing missions.

The Order of the Rose similarly gives out rewards for missions, many branch family members from the many noble families in the kingdom aspire to join either order, it can save them a lot of time and effort and open a path that might not exist in their original situations.“

Henry tossed the wooden disk again when his owl familiar began to show signs of unrest and prepared to attack his ear again.

The [Guardian Griffin] trotted behind them and helped itself to the grasses and flowers planted on the lawn of the Dharnas estate, some should fetch quite a price and were rare materials, though they grew like weeds here.

Sensing the inquisitive gaze next to him, the blonde young man did not need to guess which question was coming next.

“You want to know why they would rather join a neutral faction instead of cultivating at home?“

Silence was his answer, as he accurately grasped the follow up from the elf, the topic would naturally go along this direction.

“Yeah, isn‘t it better to be content with what they have?

As long as they are talented, they should get the corresponding nurturing and rise to the top anyway.“

Over this period of time, Nisha had also learned how big families operated, especially those with high ranked noble titles.

They spared no effort to nurture the next generation and distributed a lot of resources through competitions and for results that gave the family face.

Of course that also rendered those without talent without any hope to advance, since they would not receive anything without results, but people like that should not have a chance to join a knight order either.

Hence the girl wondered what exactly was wrong with her train of thought or if she had missed something.

“You‘re not wrong in theory.“

Henry‘s first response did not satisfy Nisha, because theory was just that, a theory.

It often clashed with reality, just like in this case.

“The rewards you mentioned should indeed go to the most talented members of a family, so that they nurture a new generation of trustworthy people that will one day succeed in the position of leadership.

But there are always those that are not content with fair competition and use their position to abuse the distribution of rewards or take the results of others.

Let‘s say that a branch family member shows a fair amount of promise and cultivates at a fast pace.

Now the child of a main branch family member is also talented, but not enough to compete with the branch family genius.

In theory, the resources should go to the branch family member first, but what if the main family member in charge of the results holds back the news for some time until the child of the main family member can catch up?

At least from the outside, it looks like the main family child is more talented as long as his success is reported first, and a large portion of the rewards will remain in the hands of the main family.

A friend of mine encountered a similar problem in his family, but he has no way to go against the main family, hence he never got the things that should have been his.“

Towards the end of his words, Henry‘s eyes blazed with anger on behalf of his friend, he disdained such underhanded means and looked down on the adults that went to such lengths to cheat a child.

He was very fortunate to have been the only child in the family for quite a long time until Nisha was brought home, and as such had never had to struggle for resources.

Even now, the two of them would never match the income of a Duke estate, if they needed any materials or resources for their cultivation, they could simply go to the storage inside the main house and take what they need or order things through Galan if they were not available.

“But doesn‘t that go against the original purpose of setting rewards and giving out resources based on results?

The people in charge should not look away if the talents they want are getting smothered?“

Nisha had trouble imagining the fierce struggle against close relatives as well.

Back in the Wilderness, whatever one of the dragons had, the others would not lack either.

Because of their different elements, the four dragons never fought against each other and shared whatever resources they had with each other, because that was the best way to ensure their survival.

Her current way of cultivation mainly relied on innate gifts and practice instead of pills and other resources, which was why the elf did not understand the allure of more resources either.

The concept was more vague, Nisha mainly saw that other people did their best to obtain them and accepted that that was just how things were.

“Again, yes in theory.

But the people in charge probably used similar methods when it was their turn to compete and therefore pretend to not notice some things.

And if the main family has enough talents, they might not necessarily need too many from the branch family either, because it will lower the total amount of resources if too many people want them.

Without sufficient support, the branch family members can‘t show their talent either, no one will make things difficult for them for a talent that fell behind the cultivation of the main family members.“

Henry was rather helpless about this too.

He helped out his friend whenever he could and shared some of his own stuff, but it was not enough to catch up with those that enjoyed the full support of their family.

The youth knew how talented his friend really was, but no one would believe him without results.

Eventually his friend rejected his goodwill and gifts and looked for another way out..

Despite Henry not saying everything he wanted, the elf understood the gist of it.

Her brows were knotted as she thought over the new information, astounded that the competition was this vicious.

It made more sense with some context, but she still was not sure why such a blatant disregard for the rules was allowed, especially since it robbed them of the talents that suffered.

“It‘s not only the major noble families that do so, Merchant Houses and other small groups follow the same trend, where identity is often more important than raw talent.

Once these talents see no hope in their original circumstances, they often agree to take the path offered to them as a way out.

The Order of the Lion mostly accepts nobles, whereas the Order of the Rose is open to anyone as long as they show promise.“

The duo had reached the far end of the lawn inside the Dharnas estate while they were talking.

A well maintained white wall blocked them from seeing inside the compound next to them, along with a row of trees that either currently flowered in preparation of bearing fruit or already showed signs of immature yield.

Similar to the other plants inside the estate, the fruits were rare to see in other places and freely grew here without a care.