Lestilaut/Story

During Rozemyne's first year at the royal academy, Lestilaut becomes aware of the Ehrenfest girl having somehow become the master of the royal heirloom magic tools Schwartz and Weiss. When Rozemyne takes the pair of shumil-like magic tools to the Ehrenfest dormitory to be measured for new clothing Lestilaut gathers students of various duchies to confront her, stating suspicions that Ehrenfest might steal these magic tools.

They gather near the Ehrenfest dormitory and when Rozemyne and her retainers, accompanied by many more apprentice knights emerge, the group led by Lestilaut blocks their route and confronts them.

Upon hearing that Rozemyne was on her way to return the magic tools to the library many students are satisfied there had just been a misunderstanding that Ehrenfest didn't intend to steal the magic tools and consequently went back to their own dormitories. Lestilaut and a small group made up mostly of Dunkelfelger students remain confrontational, insisting that Rozemyne turn over master-ship of Schwartz and Weiss over to him, due to a greater duchy being much better suited to handle royal heirlooms than a mere middle duchy. To Lestilaut's surprise Rozemyne agrees that having someone from a greater duchy as their master would be much better, but also insists that she will only relent if the person in question fulfills certain qualifications, asking whether Lestilaut is willing to visit the library personally.

When he states that an archduke candidate has no business going to the library and is supposed to have their underlings handle such mundane matters, Rozemyne outright refuses to transfer master-ship of the magic tools. When the Ehrenfest students try to rush through the other students to reach the library, a student from the blockading group launches an attack, leading to an actual fight breaking out. Despite the efforts of Lestilaut and his allies, Ehrenfest manages to break through and nearly reach the library, when Prince Anastasius and orders everyone to stand down.

At the prince's behest, most of the students are dismissed, so he can handle the issue with just Rozemyne and Lestilaut - the respective leaders of the clashing groups - and summons their dormitory supervisors. In the meeting Professor Rauffen suggests to settle the matter in a match of Treasure-Stealing Ditter, stating that this will show which of the two duchies is better suited to protect the magic tools and Anastasius agrees to the proposal.

Unexpectedly Rozemyne decides to not merely spectate, but to personally participate in the ditter match, despite being an archduke candidate and just a first year student. To avoid losing face, Lestilaut also participates. With Dunkelfelger currently running a considerable winning streak in ditter and Ehrenfest regularly ending up even behind a couple of duchies ranked lower than them, nobody expects much of the middle duchy and sees Dunkelfelger's victory as a foregone conclusion.

During the match Rozemyne employs some unconventional tactics and catch their opponents completely off guard and under her guidance they manage a spectacular victory over their technically much stronger opponent. Lestilaut feels very much humiliated by Rozemyne's earlier defiance and this victory, but has no choice but to accept the outcome, cementing Rozemyne as the proper master of the magic tools. He does however state that her victory was only won by dishonorable and immoral ways and calls her status as the "Saint of Ehrenfest" in question. He also nurses a serious grudge against her for quite some time. With this opinion Lestilaut finds himself in the minority though, since most of the participating and spectating knight apprentices are impressed with Rozemyne's skill and adaptability, as well as her humility after the match, where she openly admits that her duchy was only able to win through tricking their much more coordinated and powerful opponent.

Following the match Professor Rauffen makes changes to the training regimen of the Dunkelfelger apprentice knights, to account for the weaknesses revealed by the match. When he sees this Lestilaut rebukes him and orders that the training should once again be focused exclusively on speed ditter since he considers the duchy rankings to be their highest priority. Rather than just standing down, Rauffen went on to explain why he felt it was important to keep those changes, not for the duchy rankings, but for the apprentices' futures beyond the royal academy. When Lestilaut keeps insisting, Rauffen calls his qualities as an archduke candidate in question, if he can not separate his own personal feelings over the loss from what is best for his duchy.

In anger Lestilaut strikes out at Rauffen with his schtappe transformed into a sword, but after an exchange of several blows, Rauffen manages to disarm Lestilaut, bringing forth more arguments. Following this Lestilaut turns around without saying a word at first, but then tells his guard knights to participate in the training and that his attendants of the sword will suffice as guards before moving off.

In the Autumn following Hannelore's first term at the Royal Academy, Lestilaut and his sisters were invited to Prince Hildebrand's baptism, alongside Eglantine.

During the fellowship gathering in Rozemyne and Hannelore's second year at the academy, when the Ehrenfest archduke candidates greet their Dunkelfelger equivalents, Lestilaut is witness to a talk between Hannelore and Rozemyne, where the latter states how much she enjoyed the book Hannelore had lent her. Lestilaut appears impressed that Rozemyne was able to dicypher the archaic dialect in which the book his sister hand lent out was written, though he quickly falls back to his arrogant attitude or perhaps trying to provoke her by pointing out Ehrenfest's short history. Rozemyne does not rise to the bait and remains acting humble, but Hannelore is rather upset with him for his impolite comment. .

According to his sister, Lestilaut actually had somewhat noble intentions in trying to wrest Schwartz and Weiss away from Rozemyne. As it turns out his actions were a misguided attempt to help his little sister. After seeing the two shumil-like magic tools the first time Hannelore whispered dreamily that she wished she could be their master without thinking or any actual intent behind the words.

Unfortunately at that moment her cousin and Lestilaut's retainer Rasantark was within earshot and misunderstanding the situation went off to tell his master how much Hannelore wished to be the master of the magic tools.

Upon hearing this, her brother started his quest to obtain said mastership for her sake without ever bothering to ask or tell her about it. On account of attending a class at the time Hannelore only learned of his brash actions well after it was too late and the issue had already come to Prince Anastasius' attention, much to her distress.

At some point after the school-year ended, Lestilaut came up with a design for a hairpin for the girl he intends to escort at his graduation and used the merchants that visit Ehrenfest in the summer to pass the orders along. Included in the orders were detailed illustrations and descriptions. Thanks to these pictures the craftspeople of the Gilberta Company are able to fulfill his order despite never having seen the kind of flower he wished for with their own eyes, since it does not grow in Ehrenfest.

Reading "A Ditter Story" has Lestilaut very inspired and motivated and he spends a lot of time and paper on drawing illustrations for the book. Rather than deciding ahead of time which five scenes to illustrate, he draws any scene that inspires him and intends to select the five that come out the best once he's finished them all.

In the past he was rather unintrested in the words of the books he read and considered them to be mere channels through which the illustrations can thrive and thus had no care for books without any illustrations. This attitude however changed somewhat thanks to Rozemyne's transcription of the Dunkelfelger history book into modern vernacular. Owning to the archaic dialect the original book is written in, it is so difficult to read that even among those few who have access to it, the contents are most often passed down orally, which over time naturally distorts the content bit by bit. But Rozemyne's version is easy to read and accessible, ensuring that future archduke candidate will actually read the book rather than having their predecessors tell it to them and thus preserve the exact details of their duchy's history much better. Lestilaut thinks they should produce similar transcriptions into modern vernacular themselves in the future. However with Dunkelfelger not being privy to how Ehrenfest is able to make many duplicates of the same book, mass production of any such book is more or less out of the question for the near future.

When in the privacy of his own room with only his retainers around, Lestilaut draws an illustration of Rozemyne's whirling. When he saw her at whirling practice her dance completely enraptured him and even several days later still fills him with a near all-consuming urge to draw her. He puts so much effort and passion into the painting that his retainers suspects he might have fallen in love with Rozemyne and seeks to make her his first wife. He denies this and tries to explains that it was the beauty of the moment that captured him, not the person, but his retainers remain dubious.

Disregarding the possibility of Lestilaut developing feelings for Rozemyne, his retainers still push him to try to take her as his first wife for political reasons, thinking that with how much her influence is growing each year the royal family is sure to recant her engagement with Wilfried and snatch her up for themselves sooner or later, so they might as well get there first. Having all the pros and cons laid out, Lestilaut agrees that it would be beneficial to win Rozemyne for Dunkelfelger, albeit with his graduation already being this year, they have only a very small window of opportunity to work with. He orders his retainers to make covert preparations and keep all of this secret from Hannelore. He believes that his sister's bad luck and seemingly cursed timing would be a bigger detriment than any advantage they would gain from leveraging her friendship with Rozemyne.

As punishment for selfishly gambling away his sister's marriage without even consulting their parents his mother gives Lestilaut, his retainers and the other apprentice knights who were involved in challenging Ehrenfest to bride-taking ditter a severe scolding. Additionally she forces him to give all his illustrations to Ehrenfest as punishment, including the portrait of Rozemyne whirling, which he spend so much time, passion and resources to paint. Despite what some of his retainers seem to believe, that he put so much effort into this portrait is not necessarily a sign of Lestilaut developing romantic feelings for Rozemyne, since he had similar bouts of inspiration before, after seeing Eglantine whirl or other witnessing other beautiful sights of events that inspired his muse. Nevertheless having to give such a portrait to the very person that was depicted in it is a great embarressment and humiliation for him, which is exactly why his mother decrees it, showing how upset and angry she is over his thoughtless actions. This also puts a deceisive end to his attempts to win Rozemyne for Dunkelfelger.

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