Damsel and the Knight[Athena]

School... it has a surprisingly similar feel to Helsreach though not as nearly as militaristic as the fortress-monastery, he never actually stepped inside a school until recently. Before the divide he was too poor and after he was educated at Helsreach by the Black Lions. He didn't really had to go to school as his function is to combat the enemies of the church, however socializing is key to maintain your mental health.

The school itself seemed to incentive social interaction between students, assigning group projects in the classes. Though he ended up with someone he was somewhat familiar with already, Athena one of the cadets. So the knight calmly awaited for the arrival of the other cadet at the meeting place.

"Hello, hello!" The model exclaimed cheerfully. She knew it wasn't polite to be late but she had done it nonetheless and since she didn't have any good excuses the best she could do was hope to make a good first impression. Athena had of course forgot, or rather, ignored to check the person she was assigned to work with and that was the reason she was shocked to see the Germanic knight waiting for her at the study. A shock that Athena only needed a couple of seconds to get over.

"Oh it's you" She said her attitude changing right away. "Your name is Aldrech, right?" Athena was uncertain if she got that correctly, she remembered it sounded germanic and that it's first letter was A but little else.

And there she was, her sudden change in demeanor did not go unnoticed by the knight, yet he did not paid much mind to it. He instead greeted her with a smile. Perhaps what stood out the most about him, outside his height and muscles, was perhaps the large case strapped to his back. Inside was kept his Lamina Sanctus, the angel blade, though Athena could not see the blade.

"Good day, Athena. You almost got it right, it's Albrecht Frost. It will be a pleasure to work with you." He offered his hand for a handshake, should the pink haired lady take it she'd notice his grasp was firm and perhaps a bit too tight. It wasn't on purpose of course, she was his superior and Albrecht had no intentions of causing conflict with her"Should we get started or is there something you would like to discuss before we begin?"

Athena would shake the man's hand before taking a seat on the desk they have been assigned to. "Well it is a history project so we have to find a cool subject to analyze. This said subject must not be the Eternal Divide since it has been so overdone it's getting annoying and I also might have already turned a project like that a couple of times already" She would then reach for her backpack and proceed to take out a big purple tome with golden letters engraved on it, though due to the age of said book the once glamorous letters have lost much of their shinning and have been reduced to a measly mustard yellow. The tome read "Hellenon Basileia" Athena proudly caressed the velvet cover
"This is a book of the history of Greece, well it's modern history to be precise, it will sweep the history teacher off her feet. Is it alright to work on that?"

"I doubt there's many records of that time to make a compelling project anyways." Other than the history of Endymion he was really skeptical anything at all could be found at all, but it didn't matter as Athena discarded the option right away instead. "Greece...?" Albrecht tilted his head to the left while staring at the book's frivolous cover, he was not very familiar with Greek history and culture outside their dead pagan pantheon of gods, some collection of myths and maybe the Spartans.

"My knowledge on the subject is... limited, I am willing to learn however." He did not have any objections, he was hardly a scholar to suggest anything else so he'd just follow the Athena's lead. "You are Greek yourself, right? Shame what happened to Europe after the divide, perhaps someday the Vatican might be able to..." Albrecht had to stop himself from going any further, he was not quite sure if Athena cared about the subject.

"The Vatican won't help" Athena replied coldly "When Northen Greece got invaded it didn't use its resources or army to intervene... I mean I can't really blame them can I? The pope has absolutely no power in Greece due to its religious dogma and as you are aware the Vatican hates not being the absolute ruler of everything so even at our time of need they let us deal with it ourselves...yay" Athena hardly tried to hide her disappointment for the Papal State. "Hardships, however, create the fancier stories, wouldn't you agree? A knight such as yourself must have seen his fair share of tragedies." Wheather Athena's subtle interrogation was driven by curiosity or spite was unclear though from the way the girl spoke one would be safe to assume it was both.

It didn't took a genius at psychology and social interactions to tell Athena was not pleased with the subject, he should not have brought it up. All he could do was try to be friendly and attempt to defuse the situation, it was his fault after all. After letting out a groan, he finally spoke again.

"I had my fair share of hardships, i still bear the scars in my body to prove, the training to be a Knight was very demanding... My sister also did not survive the divide." He had never spoken of her to anyone ever since his arrival on Endymion, nobody really asked and even then he wasn't willing to speak much of it. "I think it's hard to tell i have any at all though, my face has been left mostly undamaged and my body is often covered by armor or clothes."

As he said that he'd slide down his coat revealing the black t-shirt underneath and a well-defined body, Athena would see scars coming from his arms all the way to the back and chest, some were obviously pretty recent while others appeared to be quite old. Few seconds had passed before he slid it back up covering his body once again.

"I'm really sorry for bringing that up, but we should focus on our current task." There was a hint of grief in his usual stern and firm voice.

"I'm not a shrinking violet, the view of some scars wont faze me... However, you shouldn't apologize about them to begin with" Athena replied as she softly caressed the book she had brought "They remind us of our past, you can't forget a mistake if you are constantly see it's result, of course others might view their scars as a mark of honor though personally I don't see the glamour.
Maybe it's due to my line of work. I prefer more subtle ones." Athena closed her eyes for a second in an attempt to regain her composure. "You are right, we have drifted from our intentions and the project isn't going to write itself. Do you have an alternative or we should do the Greek thing?"

He remained in silence for a moment, while she was not wrong that among Knights battle scars was a sign that you were a hardened warrior and brought honor, not all of those scars were the result of glorious combat. It could be said they were quite the opposite of a mark of honor, but that's not something he should bring up.

"I did not had the intention of causing shock or awe, i'm sorry if that's what it looked like." The Knight shook his head, she didn't seem like the type who enjoyed physical combat so most of what she had said didn't come as a surprise. "As i said previously, i do not know much but i am willing to learn for the sake of this project." Albrecht reiterated.

"So, where should we begin?."

"Perhaps we should focus on the formation of the Attica Republic, information about modern history are hazy but from what I have read it looks like there was an accident in a Turkish nuclear plan which caused terrible disasters at Eastern Aegean, this made the Turkish government desperate and in order to escape the fallout they invaded Thrace.

As I said before the Vatican decided not to help Greece and so much of the northern cities fell under Turkish control, obviously the people didn't like that and there were many riots bt the current government realized that with their political enemies of the northern indisposed they could do literally everything they want, paint it as patriotism and means to protect the people, and still come up looking like heroes. This how the Attican Republic was founded"

Athena realized she has been doing awfully lot of talking and since her goal wasn't to deliver the entire paper orality she figured she should simplify her recounting. "Long story short,
Greece got invaded and those who survived decided they needed a different government to survive, sounds familiar?"

He quietly listened to Athena's short lecture, he'd nod along while making some notes on it. He had been mostly unaware of what had been going on at Eastern Europe, his knowledge was mostly limited to the lands the Vatican had a hold, and even then it was mostly limited to the German homeland. It was only when Athena made her question that he spoke up again.

"You mean it's like Endymion." He folded his arms while raising an eyebrow. "I doubt they hold as much power as Isla, but i see your point. I have been quite ignorant about the world post-divide outside Germany, even my knowledge of Endymion was quite limited so this experience has been quite enlightening to me."

"I have left Greece a long time ago so I can't tell exactly how the government works at this moment, they must have found a way to battle demons or else the land would have turned into a wasteland.." Athena didn't want to admit that her own knowledge about her homeland was this limited but she couldn't hide the obvious truth, at the end of the day, though, she was a citizen of Endymion now, at the very least the name of the city paid homage to one of her country's myths. "Since I told you about my country it's only fair to give me some information about Germany and the Vatican, no? How do the Catholics deal with the new demon threat?
How was the government like prior to the Divide?"

He was surprised she even showed interest on the matter, especially when they should be focusing in getting their school work done and not long ago she showed quite some discontent with the Vatican's actions. But no matter, he'd entertain her question even if for just a few moments, it should be harmless to their end goal.

"The Vatican rose to power ever since the divide, we have other orders much like the one here in Endymion with knights like me and other functions. I come from an order know as the Black Lions, the order... has very unorthodox combat doctrines. We are settled on a fortress called Helsreach." That was more than enough for her, she likely did not care for the Order's mission so no reason to go further... as for the second part of her question."I believe it was a parliamentary republic...? Honestly i never payed much mind, they were weak though. Didn't put much of a fight when the eternal divide hit. I'd say the Lion are the defenders of Germany in a way, some feral tribes have come to clash with us." He did not hide that he had nothing but contempt by the old government.