Heisshitze

Heisshitze (ハイスヒッツェ, Haisuhittze) is a knight from Dunkelfelger who's Royal Academy education overlapped with Ferdinand's.

Befitting his position as a Dunkelfelger knight, Heisshitze is hot-blooded and ditter-hungry. He is extremely persistent, insisting to challenge Ferdinand for years despite Ferdinand being very reluctant and turning him down repeatedly.

While not entirely rash, he tends to go with his emotions rather than pragmatism. He usually has good intentions, but appears to be rather naïve in his views, often acting on what he thinks is right even when lacking crucial information. As a result, he unintentionally make things worse for the person he wants to aid.

As long as his goals do not negatively affects his home, he puts his personal feelings above the benefit for his duchy.

At some point of their shared time at the royal academy, Heisshitze wagered his cape in a competition against Ferdinand and lost. During the remainder of their time at the academy he challenged Ferdinand at every opportunity to regain his cape, but was never able to beat his rival.

While Ferdinand does not appear to reciprocate the feelings, many Dunkelfelgerians consider Heisshitze and Ferdinand to be "frenemies". With Heisshitze himself being convinced that playing ditter against each other can bring even the worst enemies together in friendship over time, it seems clear he shares this view. As such he holds Ferdinand in high regards in more ways than just as a rival to strive against.

During their time in the academy Heisshitze and several other Dunkelfelger knights made it their goal to rescure Ferdinand from the abuse he suffered from Lady Veronica and her faction. To this end they pressured their Aub to arrange a marriage between Ferdinand and Magdalena, without getting her consent. This infuriated Magdalena who was already in love with Trauerqual the fifth prince. Aub Dunkelfelger eventually gave in to the pressure, but before any official arrangements between Dunkelfelger and Ehrenfest could be made, Magdalena managed to secure her betrothal to her beloved on her own, dashing the efforts of the knights.

At some point after his graduation Heisshitze married the younger sister of his uncle's wife, who have a considerable age-gap between them. Due to how close he is with the Commanders second son, their in-law relationship of uncle and nephew seems to take precedence over their biological connection as cousins.

At the Interduchy Tournament in Rozemyne and Hannelore's second year at the royal academy, Aub Dunkelfelger challenges Ehrenfest to a Ditter match over the publishing rights for a manuscript that Lady Rozemyne - Aub Ehrenfest's adopted daughter - had made by translating a borrowed Dunkelfelger book into modern language. When Aub Ehrenfest and Rozemyne are unable to dissuade Aub Dunkelfelger from this and find other ways to handle the publishing rights, Aub Ehrenfest reluctantly agrees, but suggests to make it a very small scale affair between only one champion of each duchy.

Aub Dunkelfelger accepts those turns and requests for Ehrenfest to declare Ferdinand as their champion. Ferdinand is very opposed to participating, but Heisshitze manages to convince him to join by wagering several valuable materials. Being able to convince Ferdinand also earns him the approval of Aub Dunkelfelger and thus the right to fight as Dunkelfelger's champion against Ferdinand and thus the chance to win back his old cape.

At Heisshitze's suggestion Hannelore and Rozemyne are chosen as the treasures in their ditter match, much to the two girls' surpise, confusion and dismay.

Meeting his old rival Ferdinand again at the interduchy tournament reinvigorates Heisshitzes passion for "rescueing" him from his duchy. Without bothering to gather information or talk to Ferdinand he assumes that him remaining in the temple can only mean that he is still mistreated. Together with many other Dunkelfelger knights he once again pleads with Aub Dunkelfelger to find a woman for Ferdinand so he can marry into another duchy and be free of the abuse they believe he has to suffer in his home. Initially their passioned please are argued down by Lady Sieglinde since she sees no benefit for Dunkelfelger in it.

After discussing the matter further among themselves the knights come up with ways they can achieve their goal and benefit their duchy at the same time, securint the support of the Aub and his first wife who then go on to support Aub Ahrensbachs bid to the king to have Ferdinand as a husband for his daughter Detlinde. For various political reasons the king forces this engagement through, making Heisshitze believe he was finally able to rescue Ferdinand, blissfully unaware of Ferdinands feelings on the matter.

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