Philine/Story

Philine approaches Rozemyne during the winter socializing in the children's playroom, where the noble children introduce themselves to Wilfried and Rozemyne. Rozemyne takes an interest in her as she passionately tries to recall her mother's stories that she was told when growing up. Rozemyne offers to write down her stories in the beginning and later gives her the task to write down the stories herself.

While Rozemyne is sleeping in jureve, she keeps writing all the stories she can remember, which helps her learning reading and writing.

Upon entering the Royal Academy, her shared appreciation for literature and friendship with Rozemyne leads the archduke candidate to take Philine on as a retainer - a great honor for a laynoble. Philine is one of the very few retainers of Rozemyne's, who didn't come with recommendations from adults and were chosen solely by Rozemyne's own will.

Like all the students who enrolled together with Rozemyne, Philine managed to pass all her written exams on the first try in her first year at the Royal Academy. Though in history, she just barely managed to scrape by, being just one point away from failing. When the professor suggested she retake the exam at a later date after attending the course, Philine declined, so she could participate in the library registration three days later.

She serves Rozemyne as a scholar. She is normally tasked to carry around paper and ink for Rozemyne when she moves around, so she can take notes where needed, and transcribes books in the library.

At the Royal Academy, Philine shares a room with Judithe, a practice quite common in the Royal Academy for nobles of lower ranks to more easily afford them by splitting the costs.

During Rozemyne's absence for the Dedication Ritual, Philine and Hartmut are gathering and organizing information during their socializing. Among that information is a list of specialty products that each duchy produces, as well as the quirks of those duchies. She also keeps track of all the stories that other students transcribed for Rozemyne.

For fear of Philine being accosted on account of her low status in conjunction with her serving an archduke candidate, Judithe guards Philine on her trips to the library at the suggestion of Hartmut and Brunhilde.

Because of a higher than usual fee offered by Rozemyne for transcriptions, even students from other duchies are interested in doing so. After learning the proper procedure from her senior Hartmut and being advised to take referral fees, Philine arranges for this.

Due to her family being so poor, they could not afford the cost of learning Rozemyne's mana compression, so Philine works hard to earn the necessary money on her own. Between the referral fees and the pay for her own transcriptions, she manages to earn the necessary amount and is visibly relieved and happy about having achieved her goal.

But when Philine returns to her home estate, her stepmother takes away all her money. Jonsara then sends an ordonnanz to the castle claiming that Philine is ill, either not noticing or caring that Philine's shouts to return the stolen money are clearly audible in the message.

When Rozemyne, accompanied by Ferdinand and some of her retainers, arrives at the estate with Kashick, they discover that Jonsara had used her schtappe to severely abuse Konrad, leaving the five-year old boy covered in wounds and had also hurt Philine. Furthermore, she had taken away Konrad's mana-draining magic tool, leaving him to die, leading Philine to beg Rozemyne to save her brother's life.

Jonsara claims to have not believed Philine when she said that she became Rozemyne's retainer and that she believed the girl to be delusional, which is an obvious lie, since just hours before she sent an ordonnanz to Rozemyne to inform her of Philine's absence.

Thanks to a trick thought up by Hartmut, Rozemyne claimed that Philine was accidentally issued the money that was supposed to be payed to students of other duchies and thus Jonsara is forced to return the stolen money, lest she not only cross a member of the archducal family, but also be the cause of an interduchy scandal. However since the abuse of her step-children is a domestic issue, Rozemyne isn't able to interfere, as Ferdinand points out.

Upon learning that his wife took away Konrad's magic tool, Kashick is not pleased, but reluctantly remarks that they can not afford a new magic tool and have to prioritize the child with the higher mana capacity, which means the baby. They even lack the funds to make Konrad a blue priest at the temple.

Since both parents are obviously willing to let Konrad die, Rozemyne rather forcefully offers to make him a grey priest and decides to give Philine a room at the castle. This comes as a great relief to Jonsara, but causes Kashick mixed feelings.

Philine, unable to any longer keep her emotions in check angrily confronts her father about how he could let Jonsara get away with stealing the magic tool that was a heirloom from her deceased mother. This causes Rozemyne in inquire with Ferdinand about the cost of such tools. She then offers to buy it for Philine, expecting her to pay off the debt over time. Faced with a request from a noble much higher in rank, Kashick has no choice but to wrest the tool away from his wife and hand it over to Rozemyne, who immediately passes it on to Philine.

With all this concluded, Philine gives a final good bye to her family and vows to never return, again causing Jonsana to be relieved, but causing her father to go completely pale upon the realization that he now effectively lost both his children of his deceased wife.

Since leaving her family and living in the room in the northern building of the Archduke's castle granted to her by Rozemyne, Philine has to make do without any retainers of her own. There is a common dressing room for med- and laynoble retainers that do not have any attendants of their own, in which they can help each other dress or pay servants for their help. Due to her financial situation, Philine does not want to waste money on something like this, so she has made a habit of getting up together with the attendants, so they can help each other dress. This has also made her quite skilled at dressing other girls, unlike most other scholars of her rank.

Since their return from the Royal Academy, Philine has been going to the temple almost on a daily basis, only remaining in the castle when lectures, lessons, or meetings require it. As a result, she has also become very adept at summoning and riding her highbeast. Lady Rozemyne puts this down to a mix of natural talent and the constant practice from commuting between the temple and castle.

At the temple, she is generally more busy than she would be in the castle. There her duties include participating in the harspiel practice up to third bell, assisting the High Priest Ferdinand with his administrative work, transcribing books for her master, observing the orphanage and workshop, as well as participating in and transcribing the meetings with lower city merchants. This constant flow of work has made her more skilled than most other scholars her age, but also caused her to develop something of a workaholic disposition, to the point of feeling a little uneasy when she has nothing to do.

Ever since Damuel charged in to rescue her from her stepmother, Philine has developed a crush on the knight that keeps growing more and more over time. While Damuel himself remains unaware of her affection, most of her fellow retainers have long since seen through her and tease both Philine and Damuel about it, to her light exasperation and Damuel's utter confusion.

Despite fully realizing that there are no romantic feelings between Judithe and Damuel, she still sometimes gets jealous about the casual way in which the two knights interact, fearing that Judithe might fall for Damuel at any moment due to how wonderful he is in her eyes. Philine secretly dreams and hopes that Damuel remains unable to find a wife until she herself comes of age and might take the role. To that end, she is putting her all into compressing her mana as much as she can, to catch up to his mana capacity, so the two are near enough in mana levels to be compatible should that day ever come.

Shortly before the wedding ceremony is to take place, Matthias, the son of Viscount Gerlach finds out about an ambush that his father plans on the carriages carrying Rozemyne's grey priests and the Divine Instruments to the wedding ceremony at the border gate with Ahrensbach, but is unable to arrange a meeting with Lady Rozemyne due to being repeatedly turned down my her guardians, he gives a letter to Roderick, who is to pass it on to Philine during a shared lesson for scholar apprentices, so she can then inform her master.

When Roderick hands the letter to her, both she and Damuel - who is guarding her at Rihyarda's request due to worries about so many members of the former Veronica faction being present, while a considerable portion of the Knight's Order and Florencia faction members are on their way to the wedding - assume it is a love letter. Only once Philine reads the letter in her room does she realize the gravity of the situation and immediately storms to the others to inform them, at which point Damuel immediately contacts Lord Bonifatius via Ordonnanz. Thanks to everyone's quick reactions, Bonifatius is able to inform the Knight's Order in time for them to prevent the ambush from succeeding, and he praises them for their good coordination.

Once Bonifatius has been informed and the situation is calming down, Damuel expresses his sympathies to Philine, that it had not been a love letter after all, Philine nearly bursts out in tears, leaving the clueless Damuel deeply confused and floundering. Philine shouts at him that she wishes for him to not find a girlfriend or wife until she comes of age, but even that is not enough to make the confused knight realize what is going on, and he believes she was just saying this due to being mad at him for reasons he can not comprehend. Philine is equal parts happy and frustrated that her emotional outburst had not accidentally given away her feeling to Damuel, and she is able to laugh along her fellow retainers, who lose no time to further tease the befuddled Damuel.

Due to how she barely managed to pass her first year history exam on the first day, Philine is very nervous about her second year exam as well, but Rozemyne reassures her that it would be much easier this year, since she was preparing for much longer than previously. Despite finishing last among the Ehrenfest second-year students, she is still quick enough that they were able to turn all their tests in before any of the other duchies does.

After they do, Professor Fraularm starts to raise a fuss and calls it highly suspicious that not only did all of Ehrenfest's students once again all gain a passing grade, but were also the first to finish, leading to a discussion between her and her increasingly annoyed fellow proctors, who didn't think there was anything suspicious going on. This delays the announcement of Ehrenfest's marks. While this discussion is going on, two other duchies are passed, which makes several of Ehrenfests students increasingly jittery and even makes Philine quietly whimper from the tension, leading both Wilfried and Rozemyne to reassure her. Eventually, the professors announce that Ehrenfest did indeed reach all passing marks, and unlike last time, none of them is called forward due to barely scraping by.

On the second day of the term they have the math exam. Here Philine is far more confident in herself, due to all the work she did in the temple, and expectedly aces her test. She states that despite it being a test, it was much simpler than working for Lord Ferdinand at the temple. This greatly surprises Roderick, who didn't consider the possibility that as a mere apprentice scholar, she would follow Lady Rozemyne into the temple, and he fails to keep a look of disgust from his face due to the temple's still poor reputation, earning him a mild rebuke from Rozemyne.

During the following theology lesson, each student is expected to write about the seasonal deity of their birth season and their respective subordinate gods, as well as the gods of a second season, leading to the students' discussion about which one they would choose for the latter. Both Rozemyne and Philine wish to write about Schutzaria, the Goddess of Wind, and hope particularly to gain the blessings of her subordinate Mestionora, the Goddess of Wisdom.

Roderick states dejectedly that due to having only affinities for his birth season of autumn - so wind - and earth, he was not allowed to choose, but had to write about the two. To this, Philine expresses her envy that he had wind as his birth season, since that put him closer to Schutzaria and Mestionora from the beginning, on top of having two affinities as opposed to her one, making the boy reconsider his position and be far more positive about it.

Philine also manages to pass her music exam with flying colours on the first try, earning great praise from Professor Pauline for her considerable growth since last year, and loses no time to thank Rozemyne, since she was only to improve so much, thanks to practicing together with her under Rosina's tutelage allowing her to reach levels far beyond what most laynobles her age can achieve.

In the third year, the students of the Royal Academy have the practical lesson Divine Protection Acquisition, where all students who passed the theology exam earlier that day participate, regardless of rank. The majority of present students are from Ehrenfest and Drewanchel, with only very few of other duchies managing to pass theology on the first day. After being presented with the prayer, the students will enact their ritual in the order in which they finish memorizing it.

Since the prayer is almost identical to prayers she is already familiar with, Lady Rozemye goes first and comes back soon after without making any comments. The second student to memorize the prayers is Lord Wilfried. When he returns, he happily announces that he managed to gain the protection of twelve gods. This surprises most present students and even Professor Gundolf, since it is very rare these days for students to gain the protection of any subordinate gods, save for those of Leidenschaft, but even that generally only happens with Dunkelfelger students and apprentice knights. Lady Hannelore of Dunkelfelger seems particularly impressed by Wilfried's success.

Several Ehrenfest med- and laynobles are able to finish their memorization ahead of archnobles and archduke candidates of other duchies, but choose to remain silent for the time being to not risk overstepping their bounds, despite technically being well within their rights to go first. All the other high ranking students only manage to gain the protection of the primary gods they have an affinity for, until the last one to do the ritual. Lady Hannelore states that she gained the protection of both Angriff, the God of War, and Dregarnuhr, the Goddess of Time, but this only confuses her deeply, since she has no idea how she might have attracted their attention.

Once all the students of other duchies have finished their rituals and consequently left, the lower ranking Ehrenfest students go to the chapel in order of social rank by unspoken agreement. The only exception is Roderick, who lets Philine go first. During her ritual, Philine is able to obtain the divine protection of Mestionora, the Goddess of Wisdom. She rushes back into the hall and happily tells this to Lady Rozemyne, not even thinking of keeping her noble facade up.

This causes Professor Gundolf, one of the two instructors of the lesson, to become very interested, since it is already exceptionally rare for students to gain the protection of subordinate gods other than those of fire in general, but even more so for someone who doesn't even have the element of that god. He practically bombards her with questions, making the shy laynoble shrink back until Lady Rozemyne makes him ease up a bit. Under her lady's watchful eye, she does her best to answer the professor's questions and tells how hard she works in the castle, academy, and temple, but nothing she says seems to enable Gundolf to pinpoint how she was able to do it, when no Drewanchel student was, despite them doing pretty much the same as she described.

Their conversation is cut short when Roderick returns and reports that he somehow gained the protection of all seven primary gods. This outright shocks Gunfolf. For someone with only two affinities to go to omni-elemental during the ritual is unprecedented in recorded history and has been believed to be entirely impossible. However, with neither the professor nor Roderick himself having even the slightest clue as to how this happened, there is little to gain from asking any questions. At Rozemyne's prompting, Professor Gundolf congratulates the Ehrenfest students and gives them leave. Before they go, Professor Hirschur cautions them to keep this information secret and invites herself in for dinner in the dormitory the next day for more detailed discussions.

The next day during said dinner, Professor Hirschur makes no mention of this and instead praises the students for the successes in the written lessons and talks about the food. Only in a more private meeting after the meal does she broach the subject that is the real reason for her visit. Before they can get to that, Rozemyne brings up that since the ritual she is having an issue with her mana control and that while performing a song she was unable to keep a blessing from leaking out. Hirschur just brushes her off stating that since blessings don't hurt anyone she should just let it happen. Having tried and apparently failed to help Ferdinand with his problems related to his huge mana capacity have made her unwilling to do so every again, and she says that their best option is to contact Ferdinand and "have the monsters decide this between themselves."

Due to the sensitivity of their main topic, Hirschur has brought a wide-area sound-blocking magic tool and has Rozemyne set it up, arguing that using up some mana will probably help her with her previously mentioned mana control problem. While she does not insist to hold the meeting in complete privacy, she has everyone not directly involved stay outside. The only ones inside the tool's protection are the three archduke candidates, Roderick and Philine as the subjects of the discussion, and Hirschur herself. Since she wasn't present, Hirschur first recaps the previous day's inciting incident to Lady Charlotte. Then the students tell Hirschur what happened while she was with Roderick in the chapel.

Charlotte voices her confusion over why Hirschur is so secretive and worried about this. In her eyes, it should be celebrated that Ehrenfest students managed to gain more divine protections than expected. In return, Hirschur explains just how out of place these events are. Unless this was kept completely under wraps when it happened, not a single student has received a blessing from any subordinate god not associated with warfare in over a decade. Even in the past, this happened rarely enough and mainly for archduke candidates and members of the royal family. Even more disturbing, to find the last med- or laynoble who managed to gain the divine protection of even a single subordinate god, one had to go back more than a century. And someone going from two elements to omni-elemental is entirely unheard of. To have both of those things happen at the same time would be beyond merely standing out if it became public knowledge and could easily result in negative effects on Ehrenfest.

Since out of the eight Ehrenfest students that participated in the ritual, the four who produced unusual results are all tied to Rozemyne on account of being Rozemyne's fiancé and retainers respectively or Rozemyen herself, she is quick to jump to the conclusion that it's in some way Rozemyne's fault. An evaluation that Wilfried immediately jumps on board with. Rozemyne herself, however, has a different explanation and says that it is really obvious and that she is surprised no one else has realized it. All four of them have visited the temple on multiple occasions and been involved with work that is usually done exclusively by priests, on top of having earnestly prayed to the gods more often than most nobles their age ever do. Even supplying the Ehrenfest's Foundation is done with a prayer to the gods, where at least some other duchies just pour mana in. Rozemyne is certain that praying to the gods, assisting in their works, and respecting their temple and priests is surely responsible for the gods looking at them with more favour than on nobles who only say empty words when it is convenient for them and look down on the temples and priests.

Hirschur is completely convinced by this and even calls it a revolutionary rediscovery. She also wishes to have a discussion with Aub Ehrenfest about researching this further and presenting the results at the next Archduke Conference, to help improve Ehrenfest's reputation with other duchies and the Sovereignty in particular. Once the archduke candidates agree to pass this request on to Sylvester, the meeting ends and most of them leave, albeit Rozemyne and her retainers stay to discuss something else.

< Philine