*Gyururu*.
There was the rumbling sound of a stomach..
"Ellis?"
"I-It isn't me!?"
Ellis turned bright red and denied.
Kamito made a wry smile.
"It's because we've been working since morning. The truth is that I'm also starving. Since it's almost time to change shifts, shall we have lunch or something?"
"Gu... E-Even though I'm saying that's not it."
Ignoring Ellis, who puffed out her cheeks, Kamito looked around his surroundings.
As there was the Valentia Holy Festival, there were many confection stores, but there were also plenty of street stalls selling other food. There was fried bread covered with sugar, a certain cuisine —wrapped in pie dough with vegetables and minced meat and baked— and grilled meat on skewers. ...Even if Ellis' hadn't, his stomach would have probably rumbled.
"Are you going to buy something at the stall? Or, are you going into a restaurant somewhere?"
"Mm, no, err..."
Thereupon, Ellis suddenly began to fidget for some reason.
"T-The truth is... I've made something though."
"Uh?"
Then, out of nowhere, a demon wind spirit in the form of an eagle came flying over.
It was Ellis' Simorghdemon wind spirit. It was holding onto a large basket in its claws.
"As expected."
Kamito was impressed.
To even make a bento herself, she was truly a capable ojou-sama.
"Well then, I'm going to buy something at the stall."
"W-Wa-Wa-Wait!"
Ellis caught hold of Kamito's neck as he was about to walk off.
"Wh-What?"
"Th-There's also your share..."
"Eh?"
"S-So, I'm saying that I also made your share!"
"My share?"
"Y-Yeah, because whether I make one or two, the time taken doesn't change that much. D-Don't misunderstand, I only made it because it would be wasteful to have ingredients left over!"
"I thank you for that. Ellis' bento is something I could look forward to."
"Mu[1], if you look forward to it that much, I'll feel troubled."
"Ahem", Ellis' cheeks reddened as she coughed.
"Well then, shall we find some place we can settle down somewhere—"
Ellis looked around the vicinity, and—
"Ah, Captain, there you are, shall we have lunch together?"
"Wh—!?"
While waving their hands on the opposite side of the road, a group of three girls came running over with the sound of their light footsteps.
All of them were Sylphid Knight members, who put on lightweight armor on top of their uniforms.
"Y-You girls, what about your patrol of the town?!"
"It's currently the time for the Ryuska-unit to be responsible for the patrol. After that, I had thought of having lunch with everyone. Captain, how about having it together with us?"
"Err, I have a prior commitment with Kamito—"
"Ah, how sly. Captain, you're planning to take hold of Kamito all by yourself!"
"Abuse of authority—"
"Captain, you perv!"
The three girls criticized Ellis simultaneously.
"I'm not taking hold of Kamito all by myself or something!"
Ellis turned bright red and flared up.
"Isn't that fine? You know, I couldn't do a self-introduction properly this morning, after all."
"Th-That was so, but, however..."
Ellis sighed, and—
"...I understand. Well then, let's have lunch with everyone."
"Mu", she glared at Kamito with a reproachful-like look and nodded.
Part 3[edit]
Just like that, they ended up having lunch at a nearby park.
It was a lushly-green natural park near the plaza.
Within the busy town it was only quiet here, because of the Valentia Holy Festival preparations.
The Knights girls sat on top of the lawn, and opened their lunch boxes.
The three of theirs were sandwiches, but only Ellis' was different.
"Oh? That's amazingly extravagant."
"...I-Is that so? B-But it's nothing special, it's the same as usual."
Kamito raised his voice in admiration, and Ellis looked downwards as she was a little embarrassed.
There were potato-salad sandwiches, sausages, fried eggs, fruits that were cut into perfectly shaped sizes and more placed inside the slightly large lunch box.
"Lies, you usually only have peanut butter sandwiches, and yet—"
"The apples are also cut nicely into the shape of Mr. Rabbits!"
"The sausages are also made into Mr. Octopuses!"
Being glared at motionlessly with scornful eyes by the three girls, Ellis ended up being overwhelmed.
"Y-You girls too—"
Dodging the question, she faced the three and thrust her index finger out sternly.
"Despite being afraid of Kamito this morning, what on earth is with this turn of events?"
"..."
As a matter of fact, that was also bothering Kamito.
The reputation Kamito had from being a male elementalist in an academy of boxed-in ojou-samas was extremely bad. There were things like pervert, licentious beast, demon king of the night... Cruel misunderstandings were being made.
Furthermore, although there were circumstances, he had even seen the girls changing clothes this morning.
His first impression was supposed to be the worst.
The three of them mutually looked at each other's faces, and made a bewildered-like face.
"U-Um... Honestly, I'm still a little afraid."
"When I saw Captain talking normally to him, I thought he isn't such a bad person or something."
"Besides, he opposed that Velsaria head-on, how amazing."
The three of them placed both hands on their cheeks, and their faces slightly reddened for some reason.
Ellis slightly and sullenly pulled her lips back and pouted at such an appearance from the three of them.
"It's nothing, I just didn't like her."
Kamito agilely picked up a sandwich made by Ellis.
It was a ham-and-egg sandwich. The pepper was working, and it had a simple yet very pleasant seasoning.
"Delicious. To be able to make such a simple thing delicious is proof of your excellent skills."
"R-Really? ...That's great."
Ellis took a breath of relief.
"D-Don't hold back, eat up!"
"Ah, well then, I shan't hold back—"
Kamito was about to toss the sandwich into his mouth, and at that moment.
*Nom*.
The sandwich in his hand suddenly disappeared.
*Nom nom*.
"...Est, what are you doing?"
Est had returned to her human form from the sword and was beside him.
"Kamito, I'm also hungry. Feed me please."
"...It can't be helped, come on."
Kamito made a wry smile as he reached out to the sandwich.
He tore it into small pieces so that it'd be easy to eat, and threw it into Est's mouth.
*Nom nom*.
Chewing the bread expressionlessly, Est was almost like a small animal.
"Uh, Kamito, Th-That's the sandwiches I made for you, you know."
Ellis puffed her cheeks out with a "hmph".
"Ah, Est-chan is cute～"
"I also want to feed her!"
"Eat my sandwich, eat my sandwich too!"
The three Knights girls presented Est with food one after another.
*Nom*. *Nom nom*.
"As I thought she's a great one revered by humans."
"...No, she's completely being fed like an animal, you know?"
"Fua..."
Soon, Est made a lovely yawn, and threw herself onto Kamito's lap.
When he thought that she would instantly be making sweet sleeping-breaths—
Her body turned into particles of light, vanished into an empty space and returned back into her original sword form.
"Ah, she turned back into a sword..."
One of the girls muttered, seemingly disappointed.
"She ate all she could eat and went to sleep."
As Kamito placed Est back into the sword belt on his waist, he shrugged his shoulders in exasperation.
STnBD V03 143.jpg

Est, who was detached from her Astral Zero body, was different from other contracted spirits, normally she would be spending almost the whole day in a sleeping state. Once she fell into this state, she pretty much wouldn't wake up.
After that, he ate the sandwiches as the time passed quietly.
The topics, which were brought up, were about the endless lectures and the books they read recently.
The Knights girls seemed tense about talking to Kamito but, a short while later, they had gradually opened their hearts. ...However, Ellis was making a face like she was not amused for some reason.
(Nevertheless—)
There was something Kamito suddenly noticed while the girls were talking.
"Even though you're in the Knights, all of you are normal girls?"
"Fue~?"
The three of them had their faces slightly reddened at the same time.
"Erm... N-Normal girls? Wh-What...do...you...mean?"
"Err, I certainly thought that you all would be like Ellis."
"Kamito, what do you mean by that?"
Ellis was sullenly glaring at him.
"Err, more strict, or rather, capable or something—"
"It was like that before. People like us would be discharged after all."
One of the three girls muttered.
"Yeah, it was the time when Velsaria was captain."
"She suppressed everything with power, honestly, the atmosphere in the academy wasn't good."
The other two also nodded their heads together. As they were members that joined after Ellis was inaugurated as captain, they seemed to be dissatisfied with former captain Velsaria's way of doing things.
"Was there no one, who would oppose Velsaria?"
The ones attending the academy were mostly highly-prideful daughters of nobles.
If they were suppressed by power like that, there should also be many people opposing her.
"—Of course, there were. Several people too."
Ellis cut into the conversation.
"However, even the most superior class upperclassman wasn't a threat to Aneue. In the end, the reason that Aneue stepped down from the duty of captain was because of the pressure from influential nobles."
"The ones, who rebelled against Velsaria to the very end were roughly those from the Raven Class. Especially hellcat Claire Rouge, even the Knights at that time seemed to have gotten their hands burnt."
"Well, but Claire Rouge is still a problem child now."
"...I see."
The confrontation between Claire and the Knights seemed to be something from the time before Ellis was inaugurated as captain.
Suddenly, Claire's face from yesterday came into Kamito's mind.
(...Is she still angry?)
Listening to the current conversation, Kamito also reconsidered that his explanation wasn't sufficient.
Since there was such a discord, it was also natural that she got angry after hearing that Kamito joined the Knights.
The truth was that he thought of looking into her room in the morning, but he was so extremely busy with the Knights work that he couldn't meet her.