"Flesh&Blood" Vol. 9 - Pirate Series Reading Club 🏴‍☠ ⛵

NicoleIsEnough · December 10, 2022, 10:20am

“Flesh&Blood” series home thread

Welcome to the “Flesh&Blood” Vol. 9 Reading Club!

Back to Vol. 8
Forward to Vol. 10

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Please update your status accordingly whenever it changes.

Chapters

Chapter	eBook %	Physical
Chapter 1	0 %	p. 5
Chapter 2	17 %	p. 35
Chapter 3	24 %	p. 53
Chapter 4	39 %	p. 85
Chapter 5	48 %	p. 108
Chapter 6	58 %	p. 129
Chapter 7	68 %	p. 151
Chapter 8	78 %	p. 175
Chapter 9	90 %	p. 204
あとがき	98 %	p. 224-225

Discussion Rules

Discussing anything is fine, be it about language questions, about the contents or about real historic events! Please state clearly which chapter (or roughly which percentage) you’re referring to, and please hide spoilers. Also, don’t forget the forum etiquette, of course.

Buying the Book

If you’re planning to buy the book on Bookwalker or Amazon and if you’re outside of Japan, you will need a VPN to buy them. Afterwards, you can download it to the app without the need for a VPN. I think you cannot read it in the browser without VPN, though.

Vol. 9 on Bookwalker
Vol. 9 on Amazon

Vocab sheet

Artwork from volume 9

Full color Extra

松岡なつきのあとがき, p 224-225

Historical Figures, Events and Places

The book mentions a lot of real (as far as we know ) historical figures and events. Here are some information resources on them. (Please be aware that if you want to go in 100% blind, these lists will contain some spoilers for you)

Please add Chapter, Page, if possible, when something is mentioned in the story.

Historical Figures and Groups

House of Alba (Ch. 2) (アルバ公) House of Alba - Wikipedia
Alessandro de Farnese (Ch. 3) Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma - Wikipedia
Alonso de Guzmán y Sotomayor (Ch. 3) (メディナ・シドーニア公爵閣下) Alonso de Guzmán y Sotomayor, 7th Duke of Medina Sidonia - Wikipedia
Andrea Doria (Ch. 3) Andrea Doria - Wikipedia
James Burbage (Ch. 4) (バーベッジ) James Burbage - Wikipedia
Christopher Marlowe (Ch. 4) Christopher Marlowe - Wikipedia
Dominican Order (Ch. 2) Dominican Order - Wikipedia
Elizabeth I of England (Ch. 1) Elizabeth I - Wikipedia
House of Farnese (Ch. 3) House of Farnese - Wikipedia
Francis Drake (Ch. 4) Francis Drake - Wikipedia
Ganymede (Ch. 4) Ganymede (mythology) - Wikipedia
House of Habsburg (Ch. 7) Habsburg Spain - Wikipedia
Hyacinth (Ch. 4) Hyacinth (mythology) - Wikipedia
Jesuits (Ch. 2) Jesuits - Wikipedia
Sir John Killigrew (Ch. 1) John Killigrew (died 1584) - Wikipedia
John of Austria (Ch. 3) John of Austria - Wikipedia
John Killigrew (Ch. 1) John Killigrew (died 1605) - Wikipedia
Juan Martinez de Recalde (Ch. 3) (ファン・マルティネス・レカルデ) Juan Martínez de Recalde - Wikipedia
Mary I of England (Ch. 1) Mary I of England - Wikipedia
Miguel de Oquendo (Ch. 3) Miguel de Oquendo - Wikipedia
House of Parma (Ch. 3) Duchy of Parma and Piacenza - Wikipedia
Philip II of Spain (Ch. 1) Philip II of Spain - Wikipedia
Privy Council (Ch. 4) Privy Council of England - Wikipedia
Marquis of Santa Cruz (Ch. 1) Álvaro de Bazán, Marquis of Santa Cruz - Wikipedia
Spanish Armada (Ch. 1) Spanish Armada - Wikipedia
Vincent of Saragossa (Ch. 1) Vincent of Saragossa - Wikipedia
Tiziano (Ch. 7) Titian - Wikipedia
Francis Walsingham (Ch. 4) Francis Walsingham - Wikipedia
Thomas Walsingham (Ch. 4) Thomas Walsingham (literary patron) - Wikipedia
Rogier van der Weyden (Ch. 7) (デル・ウェイデン) Rogier van der Weyden - Wikipedia

The Royal Diagram

Places and Rivers

Historical Events, Things etc

Stuff in other languages

Ch. 5: イン・ウィーノー・ウェリタース
In vino veritas. - In wine there is truth.

Ch 5: ヌンクァム・ペリーフルム・シネ・ペリークロー・ウィンケームス
Numquam periculum sine periculo vincitur. - Danger is never overcome without danger.

Ch. 5: オムニア・ヴィキト・アモール
Omnia vincit amor. - Love conquers all.

Historical and geographical inaccuracies

NicoleIsEnough · December 10, 2022, 10:20am

Just to make sure everything is ready when the time comes

NicoleIsEnough · December 12, 2022, 7:14pm

Sooo, caught up with the Eugenia book club yesterday, made a solid plan on how to catch up with the S&M book club until Friday (and followed through on it for today), and therefore…

Chapter 1:

Vicente and Kaito arrive in Lissabon. The plan is to immediately proceed to Spain from there. Kaito and Vicente get into a bit of a conversation about the meanings of their names. Then all of a sudden Vicente asks Kaito about his past. As Kaito has noticed before, his background story occasionally raises questions, e.g. as of why his English is so good etc, and so he used his half-sick time to come up with a better background story. He tries it out on Vicente, and it seems that he swallowed it! Let’s see if (and which) problems arise from this new story…

EDIT: When collecting the historical places and people, I noticed a potential issue for Kaito, or maybe an inconsistency in the story… in any case this may turn out to be a spoiler for later chapters:

Kaito includes in his new story that he was held captive by Sir John Killigrew and fled from him just before he bumped into Vicente. Turns out that Sir John Killigrew already died in 1584 and if Kaito made a mistake here and Vicente knows about his death, this might lead to trouble… On the other hand, he had a son, also called John Killigrew (but he was not a knight), who was into the same business and even more ruthless than his father. Let’s see whether the error is with our author or with Kaito…

eefara · December 12, 2022, 8:24pm

I knew it! sigh, I fall farther and farther behind… At least it’s good to know the books continue to be addicting?

NicoleIsEnough · December 12, 2022, 8:49pm

I’m so sorry! I really feel bad because I’m not waiting and therefore we can’t read together like we did earlier…

Also I am aiming for 1000 pages read this month plus I want to be sure I get a 20th book in this year and my book clubs won’t cut it for these goals, and a completely new book is always a risk, so I guess you understand that there simply was no choice

But I think at some point I need to stop (haha who am I kidding) as there are a few more book clubs on the horizon…

Anyways! Yes the books remain very engaging, can confirm!
I’m already scouting new places to visit next summer

NicoleIsEnough · December 14, 2022, 8:42pm

Oh, forgot to comment yesterday! Here goes:

Chapter 2:

They arrive in Lissabon and disembark. Despite Vicente’s warnings, Kaito starts to wander around the docks as he is interested in how the new “England-style” ships are built. And promptly he bumps into someone who starts chatting him up. (Will he ever learn? sigh)
Anyways, turns out that dude and his master Raul (who appears shortly afterwards) are old acquaintances of Vicente. They tell him that Santa Cruz wants to see them, and conveniently they offer them a ride to the palace.

Chapter 3:

Whoa, politics! I read it just yesterday but already don’t remember much. Santa Cruz tried to hide his terminal illness from everybody, but when they are there it becomes obvious that he suffers from consumption. This made me super nervous at first, but it turns out that consumption is not very contagious, so I hope our heroes can get away safely…

For the conversation, it revolves mainly around Kaito’s prediction of (a) Santa Cruz’ death and (b) that Spain loses the war. Turns out that the war is mainly about Spain wanting to regain some small part of the Netherlands? I think I need to read more about this at some point… Kaito tries to talk Santa Cruz out of even starting the war because it will cost so much money, and for such a little gain… but Santa Cruz gets furious and asks Kaito to not suggest this to King Philip whom they are going to visit next. In between, when Raul leaves the room, Santa Cruz tells Vicente that Raul is a spy (but for whom? England? Netherlands? I didn’t get that) and that he employs Raul as an advisor to be able to better understand the enemy. With that, they leave the palace because they want to go to see King Philip as quickly as possible.

I think I need to reread that chapter again, and maybe some background information, as this politics talk was a bit confusing to me, admittedly…

NicoleIsEnough · December 14, 2022, 11:36pm

Chapter 4:

Back to Gloria. Everybody is practicing like crazy for the upcoming war, and the Gloria crew excels despite their recent strenuous journey through the storm. We get some flashbacks on the moment when Geoffrey told Drake about Kaito’s kidnapping. This was made known to Elizabeth and Walsingham immediately, and the latter decided to send an assassin to prevent Kaito from leaking out any war-related secrets. Geoffrey is of course out of his mind and persuades Drake to let him go and rescue Kaito. Drake tells him to wait one more month as they are waiting for news from an English spy who is currently in Lissabon Sounds like we met this spy already… Anyways, as Gloria returns to the harbor after another day of practice, they are greeted by our old friend Marlowe who has news from the spy…

NicoleIsEnough · December 15, 2022, 8:06pm

Chapter 5:

Geoffrey, Nigel and Marlowe proceed to Nigel’s house where they discuss the details of the spy’s message (which Marlowe is leaking out to them behind Walsingham’s back). Of course Marlowe also tries to chat up Nigel, but Nigel simply calls his housekeeper’s watchdog, which immediately makes Marlowe stop all attempts…

First of all Marlowe is curious to know how the relationship between Kaito and Geoffrey had developed so far. Geoffrey confesses that they haven’t yet had “proper” sex because he was afraid to hurt him, which leads Marlowe to scoff at him. “You should have f*ed him for good! He wanted it too, didn’t he? Even if it hurts, he will forgive you afterwards.” What a moron.

Marlowe tells them that Kaito is now in El Escorial, and also how the palace is built and everything. It must be a huge building, and so Geoffrey needs to prepare well in order to be able to find Kaito in there. Marlowe suggests that they should disguise as Spanish priests, and Nigel would probably be able to fake one just from the looks, but his language skills are not good enough by far. He would need much more Spanish than he is capable of, and probably also a lot of Latin. So they decide that he’s a Spanish priest who is travelling in silence, and so he can use sign language that Sam (Lily’s husband) will hopefully teach them before their departure.

Meanwhile Marlowe throws in some random sayings in Latin, which makes Geoffrey think of taking Marlowe along for the ride. Of course, he first refuses because Walsingham would oppose, but Walsingham doesn’t know of Marlowe’s current trip to Plymouth either, so that argument is dismounted quickly. When Nigel hints that he might be impressed if Marlowe were brave enough to come along, he makes up his mind and agrees. “Love will conquer all”!

NicoleIsEnough · December 16, 2022, 1:08pm

Chapter 6:

Back to Kaito. They drive around in this very uncomfortable horse cart and he is suffering quite a bit. When Vicente feeds him candied oranges, he willingly accepts. But then he reflects back on how Geoffrey fed him wine when he was seasick for the first time, and he scolds himself for easily accepting such favors from everybody, even if they are the enemy…
I am really confused about Vicente right now. When we first met him, he was described as this super beautiful dude, and I somehow got the strong impression that he is also gay. But towards Kaito he behaves more like a caring mom than anything else. Does he control himself so much? Or did I misinterpret the first encounter, and he is really Spanish enough to disdain having sex with another man?

Anyways, in the chapter we have a long flashback of when Kaito chatted with our Dutch giant Juan (actually Jan, though). Turns out that Jan sailed together with Geoffrey when they were younger, on Watts’ ship. It’s a small world, I guess. Jan still has strong emotional bonds with Geoffrey and wants to help Kaito as much as he can. He also encourages him to wait for Geoffrey, as he wouldn’t abandon his peeps. He shares his past and how he became the slave of Raul, and he gives Kaito a small ship model that shows the inner workings of the new ships that he is building for the Spanish. Kaito immediately gets that he is supposed to pass it on to Geoffrey, and puts it into the inner pocket of his trousers. (Can you imagine having a model ship inside your pants? I guess Geoffrey will be very pleased by the sight )

But when Kaito asks whether they should free Jan as well, he declines and says that Raul has power over him that he cannot get rid of. Before he can share any details, Vicente calls Kaito to come to him. to be continued…

NicoleIsEnough · December 19, 2022, 4:25pm

I read a lot while travelling but didn’t feel like writing something on my phone

Chapter 7:

They arrive at El Escorial, and Kaito immediately gets an audience with the King. First of all, a priest who already had contact with Japanese people tries to check whether he is really Japanese, and asks him to say something in Japanese. Kaito first goes with こんにちは and the like, but when the priest does not approve, he tries to rack his mind regarding what the people in the 16th century would have said - luckily he had read some books on the topic and can settle any doubts.

Secondly, Kaito does not want to just sit around in the palace and so he offers to work. But there is not really anything he can do, until the King asks him whether he can play the virginals (which apparently is a distant relative of the piano). So Kaito plays and sings a song, and everybody is enchanted. Finally, Kaito gets asked to repeat his life story.

Chapter 8:

Took me a while to realize, but this chapter is actually from Vicente’s POV
And to settle my previous puzzlement, it is briefly mentioned that Vicente very rarely had lovers, and also loved a woman.

After Kaito finished his story, the king starts discussing his life situation with the other members of the audience, and what they say is not very friendly! Kaito needs all his focus to keep up the façade of not being able to speak Spanish.

Regarding their lodging, the king had planned to let Kaito stay in the cloister but Vicente was supposed to stay in the palace. Vicente manages to convince him to let them stay next to each other in the cloister. That’s very convenient because if Geoffrey and Nigel manage to appear at El Escorial disguised as priests, they will probably also stay at the cloister
They also discuss the baptism question and decide that Kaito should be baptized as soon as possible.

When they are shown their quarters, Vicente is asked to lock Kaito in but manages to convince everybody that this is not necessary.

Chapter 9:

After a good night’s sleep (and after Kaito having a wet and pretty realistic dream of Geoffrey) they are taken to the library that the king promised to show Kaito earlier. It is vast and Kaito is very impressed. Then the king shows Kaito a painting. It’s an altar triptych by Hieronymus Bosch, and boy that dude must have known stuff about drugs
Here you can see the painting: The Garden of Earthly Delights - Wikipedia

Kaito is asked by the king, who apparently likes the picture a lot, what he thinks of the picture and whether it’s improper, and Kaito says no, it’s not improper, it’s interesting. The king then turns to the priest who accompanied the group and says “Now we know that Kaito is a heretic.” What a trap. As if that was not bad enough, the king receives a message that the Spanish Inquisition has received a claim that Kaito performed heresy and witchcraft, and therefore is on the way to the palace to do a hearing

Now we have a double cliffhanger of Kaito’s fate with the Inquisition and Geoffrey’s whereabouts while trying to free Kaito. Let’s see how this continues!

And with that, I finished this volume

and it doesn’t look like it’s possible to stop any time soon…

eefara · January 15, 2023, 2:46am

Finished chapter 1 right after finishing the previous volume!

So, two big points in this chapter: the continuation of Vicente and Kaito’s relationship and a brand new backstory for Kaito. The former is ongoing, so let’s talk about the latter. Props to Kaito for coming up with an entirely new history for himself, yet again, but man, you know he’s tired of it by this point.

So the situation is this: Vicente has heard story A from Kaito (“I’m from the future, I’ve been living in London for 9 years, etc.”), which he tosses out part of as trash. So Vicente believes that Kaito’s been living in England for a while. He hears from his court spy that Kaito told Elizabeth I/Geoffrey that he’d been on a Spanish ship and was kidnapped by French pirates (story B), which Vicente also knows (based on his knowledge of story A) is a lie. So he demands that Kaito tells him the truth. (He apparently remembered the “I’m from the future” bit and declared it hogwash yet again, haha, before Kaito could even try.)

Kaito had apparently been aware that this question might come, and he’d already spent some time while recovering to come up with something appropriate. He instead changes his story to that his pregnant mother was kidnapped by Portuguese (I think?) slave traders, and he was born during the voyage to Europe. Their ship was lured onto rocks during a storm by English Wreckers (? need to check if that’s their name), and Kaito and his mother were captured and taken to live and work for John Killigrew. Surprisingly hard to find this guy; there were quite a few Killigrews at the time, and his katakana-ized name didn’t translate nicely in my head. Kaito escapes from Killigrew, and boom, time for Geoffrey.

Vicente buys the new story; Kaito did a good job of making his life the most miserable it could’ve possibly been; I don’t know if he did it in a calculating way, since this kind of stuff seems to be Vicente’s kryptonite, but it worked. Anywho, they’re headed to Lisbon. Gotta read more tomorrow~

Oh, and this is the first volume with only one full color picture and no interior pictures! What the heck is up with that! Maybe it has something to do with the upcoming artist switchover in a couple of books?

…Maybe after this book I can finally get back to the neglected bonus stories. -.-;

Oh snap, good catch with that one! I’m interested to see what might happen there. What is the current year, speaking of? I highlight it whenever I see it, and I still can’t remember.

Lisbon?

ekg · January 15, 2023, 7:28am

Ah, we also call it Lissabon, in Swedish. I didn’t even notice! XD

Yeah, I’m not sure what that’s about either. It’s just the cover art in a different color scheme even.

In any case, I see you’ve already made your way through ch 1. I’ll be giving it a go today.

NicoleIsEnough · January 15, 2023, 10:35am

Haha I had a hard time with that one as well

I was soooo disappointed! Could have imagined a few nice drawings in this one

Oh is that why the newer book covers feature so much red and pink and … stuff?

Maybe they want to focus more on the BL side of things with the covers? Or maybe the contents even shifts more in that direction?

The year is 1587, it should be autumn by now. (If you forget again, just remember it’s the year before the Spanish Armada - Wikipedia sailed against England.)

Sigh Sorry for using the German term (and also Swedish, as it seems)! We should just stick with names of cities and countries in their original language, that would avoid lots of confusion… Lisboa it is, then

ekg · January 15, 2023, 12:52pm

Chapter 1 thoughts

first page of the chapter, p 5
At some point I suspect Vincente will figure Kaito out, as he keeps mentioning things he should know nothing about. …

…and so he does,
later when he confronts Kaito with the lie about how he ended up in England. With little choice here, Kaito comes up with yet another lie about how he lived in England for the past 9 years. ^^; Things are getting increasingly complicated, i feel. Will, Kaito be able to keep this new lie consistent? There are just too many parts to his origin-story I feel like he’s bound to trip over his own lies now. ^^;

New expression learnt, p 18
物心ついて以来【ものごころついていらい】 (exp) for as long as one can remember
物心ついて時には【ものごころついてときには】 (exp) for as long as one can remember

eefara · January 15, 2023, 12:57pm

See you then! I probably got a bit too greedy last night, reading chapter 1; got to the end and my brain was paste from F&B overload, haha.

Fake edit: you posted your thoughts as I typed this. XD

Hahaha, I was wondering if it was something like that! Nah, continue using whatever makes you feel comfortable! OG language could be pretty interesting, though. : thinking: Speaking of, I wonder if we’ll get any Portuguese in this volume?

Ah, thank you! I am absolutely terrible at dates; F&B itself has been my biggest help in reminding myself about and contextualizing the historical events we look up, funnily enough.

Yep; it’s volume 12, I believe, when the shift happens. It’s super noticeable, too; the new artist (Aya?) has an extremely different style than the current artist.

eefara · January 15, 2023, 1:02pm

(Ch 1 spoilers)

I’m totally thinking this is going to happen, or something similar to this situation:
Vicente: I won’t let you take Kaito back to be a slave! He told me about his horrible past!
Geoffrey: ???

I guess his two origin stories are pretty distinct, at least; less chance of getting the broad strokes confused. I am curious if there will be any lasting consequences once Felipe II hears about the story; now monarchs of two different countries have separate stories.

ekg · January 15, 2023, 4:30pm

Chapter 2 thoughts

Finally

having arrived in Lisbon, Vincente and Kaito disembarks while they resupply and repair the ship.

New useful phrase learnt! XD おたんこなす fool; twit; idiot; bird-brain!

While Vincente is caught up in conversation with Perez, Kaito takes his chance to investigate a ship under construction in the bay. It looks off to him as he notice it looks a lot like an English ship rather than a Spanish galleon. Here he runs into a wall - who turns out to be a giant of a man, with northern looks speaking English. Finally time for a new character from the Character book! <3 Jan Grifus, I really like this character! <3 We also get to meet Raol de Toledo, quite the snake of a character, let’s just say that. XD)
And there seems to be something off about both him and Grifus interactions, as Kaito notices toward the end.

Well, things are already turning into dangerous territory for Kaito. He’s forced to make his visit to Santa Cruz, who’s death he predicted previously. And who tried to order Vincente to kill Kaito. He’s also on deaths bed, due to disease. Kaito has no choice here.

eefara · January 15, 2023, 7:34pm

Done with chapter 2 and chapter 3! Man, chapter 3 felt harder than we’ve seen in a while; not sure if it was the language used, my brain telling me it’s had enough, or a little of both.

Chapter 2

So we meet two new characters this chapter: ファン・グリフス and ラウル・デ・トレド. The former is a 2 meter tall Belgian (at least, by our standards; sounds like from the reading Antwerp would’ve been a Spanish territory at that time), the latter Spanish man I’m hoping NicoleRauch has already looked up. Anyhow, the two are working for the Marquis of Santa Cruz, Vicente’s ailing superior, and they take Vicente and Kaito with them.

(Edit: Looked at Nicole’s reply after typing this, and I don’t see an identification for ラウル・デ・トレド there yet, so I’ll drop this link as a starting searching point for now: Fernando Álvarez de Toledo. Not the same guy, I don’t think, but should be related to him in some way.)

Fan (I think? No clue how that’s supposed to be romanized) apparently worked as a shipbuilder in England for years before joining the Spanish to build their fancy new ships; he’s the one who designed the Santiago. I’m wondering if he isn’t actually a spy for the English. He mentioned something about Drake losing his 「魔法の鏡」, clearly a reference to Kaito, and I’m wondering how well known that unofficial designation is among the Spanish.

We also get a bit of katakana-ized Japanese here, after quite a while without, but I wanted to ask about one part I was having trouble understanding:

「ダッタラ、サッサトソノクチヲトジヤガレ、オタンコナンス」

This is right after Vicente scolds Kaito for thinking about wandering off and Kaito gets pouty and starts complaining in Japanese. I’ve got the ダッタラ and the オタンコナンス, but I’m having a hard time with the middle.

Another question for you all: ファン’s age is described as 四十代の半ぐらい, and ラウル as 三十代の半ぐらい. Does this mean they’re 45-ish and 35-ish? Or 20 and 15 ish?

Next on my highlights to mention list is Nigel finally gets a “title” in Kaito’s mind:

愛するジェフリー。大好きなナイジェル。

I both laughed and felt a little bad for Nigel, poor guy.

Oh nice, he’s in the character book? Gotta check him out after this, at least his portrait.

Chapter 3

Now dang, this one was harder than it’s been for a while; too much politics. @.@ I really hope whatever Raul was saying in the beginning of the chapter wasn’t too important; not much of it really sank in, and even now I’m having to flip back through my book and see if anything brings anything to mind.

I’m going to skip Kaito’s audience with Santa Cruz and focus on Santa Cruz’s chat with Vicente near the end of the chapter instead. So let me make sure I’ve got this straight: Raul is a spy for people who have an interest in the conflicts in the Netherlands continuing, and Santa Cruz knows he’s a spy. Right? Does that sound right? Does Raul know that Santa Cruz knows?

Two names are given as potential candidates for the staff officers that would be serving the Duke of Medina Sidonia: ファン・アルティネス・レカルデ and ミゲル・デ・オケンド。According to Wikipedia, his second-in-command ended up being Diego Flores de Valdes.

I think I’m starting to get the hang of when 「」and 『』are used in these chapters: 「」is for when that person’s native language is being spoken (English for Kaito and Spanish for Vicente) and 『』for when a foreign language is being spoken, so it ends up being another way to identify who the POV of the chapter is from right off the bat (in addition to looking for how Kaito’s name is spelled).

We’re also seeing some very interesting relationship progression with Vicente and Kaito: Vicente, as far as I can tell, starts getting faintly jealous when Kaito starts chatting and warming up to Jan Grifus. Kaito also willingly sticks pretty close to Vicente throughout this chapter; sure, his life is in more immediate danger than usual, but I saw no complaints from Kaito.

Interestingly, Santa Cruz has TB, and the book mentions that, according to Vicente and Santa Cruz, it was apparently unusual for seamen to come down with TB (while at sea, I presume). Anyone know why/if that’s true? I did some initial searching, but didn’t find anything concrete.

One last link to help look for who Raul is: Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma - Wikipedia

Glad it wasn’t just me. @.@

ekg · January 15, 2023, 7:52pm

Chapter 3 thoughts

Well, there is definitely something going on with Jan Grifus and Raol. Very sus!

Anyway, they arrive at Santa Cruz’ residence. He’s in bed and pretty bad off. Unsurprisingly he wants to hear the prediction of the Spanish fleets defeat. *Don’t help them too much, Kaito! ^^’ In any case, Kaito’s suggestion for how to not loose a war, by not starting one, doesn’t go down well with these military nobles. In his anger, Santa Cruz even tries to attack Kaito, but Vincente makes sure nothing comes of it. I don’t like them being around this sick man though.

ekg · January 15, 2023, 8:21pm

It’s this.