Something Has Gone Wrong
"Y-Your Holiness...!"
"...What business brings you all the way out here, Your Holiness the Pope?"
"Oh, I was just out for something of a stroll, that's all. Pay it no mind if you like..."
But even told to pay him no mind, their mouths stayed clamped shut and would not open. No matter that one of them was a duke and the other an imperial knight — neither dared raise his voice again as he had moments before. Not in front of that man.
"What, didn't I say you were welcome to keep fighting?"
"..."
"The wounded being carried off over there so diligently — never mind them, and fight to your heart's content, won't you?"
The Pope stood as he had all along, hands clasped behind his back, a smile brimming at the corners of his mouth. But the presence radiating out from behind that smile was anything but warm. It was ominous, through and through.
"...Our apologies, Your Holiness."
"Ahem... I, as well..."
"There is no need to apologize to me."
He walked on past — past the two men offering up their apologies — without sparing them so much as a glance.
"Save your apologies for the wounded soldiers over there, whose treatment the two of you delayed."
"...Ahem... cough..."
"...Yes, Your Holiness. We shall."
Behind him, still smiling, followed a great throng of priests. So many of them that one wondered where they had all been hiding until now.
"Now then, everyone — carry the wounded and see to their treatment first. Disperse, each of you."
At the Pope's single word, the priests at his back scattered all at once, each of them carrying patients to safety, steadying them, and pouring Holy Power into their wounds.
"Well, I don't see any patient here who particularly needs my personal atten—"
"Your Holiness?"
"Haha, now there's a face I haven't seen in a long while."
The Pope came to a halt — right beside the carriage I was riding in. From behind him came the puzzled voice of a high priest who had been trailing him like an attendant, but the Pope paid it no mind and flung the carriage door wide open.
"It has been a while, Brother."
"...Good day to you."
"If it is no imposition, might I ask to share your seat for a moment?"
"..."
"Haha, thank you."
Without waiting for my answer, he stepped inside. His movements flowed as naturally as water.
"...Did you have some business with me, Your Holiness?"
"...Hah. Do you truly not know?"
When he had suddenly climbed aboard, I had naturally assumed he had come for some other purpose — yet here he was, staring at me in open disbelief, as if astounded that I didn't even know that much. I genuinely hadn't the faintest clue what he meant, so I simply stared right back at his face.
"Your fame has spread far and wide through the Empire, if only in whispers. How could I possibly let it slip past me?"
"...What kind of bullshit is that supposed to be?"
It was a day or two after that incident in the Great Forest when it happened.
A summons went out, sudden and without warning, to the uppermost echelons of the Empire's most prominent ministers.
"What could this possibly be about?"
"Has anything happened of late that would warrant His Majesty summoning us like this?"
"Hmm... no matter how I turn it over in my mind, nothing comes to me..."
Those who administered the Empire's laws and governance, and even the wealthiest magnates of the realm — the most illustrious names in the Empire had all gathered under one roof. Yet not a single soul among them knew why they had been called here.
"...I haven't the faintest idea either."
"Rniel — you're telling me even you don't know?"
And Rniel — known as the Imperial Knight Commander and the Guardian of the Empire — was inwardly flustered by the summons that had come flying from the palace as well.
"Hmm, whatever could have happened for His Majesty to..."
"I'd have thought you, of all people, would know."
"...I don't."
At length the doors swung open, and in came four figures. The heads of the Four Great Families. Yet they were no different from the rest — drawn here by the same sudden summons. None of them knew why they had been called, but defying the crown's command was unthinkable. All they could do was wait, quiet and obedient, for the architect of this whole affair.
"...By the by, you seem remarkably unbothered, I must say?"
"What are you getting at, Rniel?"
"Oh, nothing~ I only thought you might look a touch brighter... now that your family's little blemish has been scrubbed away, that is?"
"...Still all mouth, I see. You repulsive old fox."
"THE SUN APPROACHES!!!"
In the middle of the light banter and the fraying nerves traded between Reinhardt and Rniel, a great cry rang through the hall. A voice so thunderous that every gaze in the room was seized by it, willing or not.
The instant the herald's shout faded, music began to drift in from somewhere, and silence settled over the hall. Only footsteps, swelling louder from beyond the doors, filled the chamber — and then the Sun revealed himself.
"We greet the Sun!"
"We greet the Sun!!"
At once, every eye in the room converged on a single point: the man who strode forward with unshakable poise and settled leisurely onto his throne.
"It's been a while, everyone. Hasn't it?"
A throne embroidered with a golden sun and inlaid with jewels of every kind. Upon it sat a man, a crimson cape — the very color of his own hair — billowing about him.
"Well, today I had a few things to discuss, you see. So I called you all here. ...I trust I didn't put anyone out?"
"Not at all, Your Majesty!!"
This was the Emperor of the Empire — the man they called the Sun. His name was Siegfried. Siegfried Frabel.
No one dared speak carelessly. Not after that man had appeared. For they all knew, beyond any shadow of doubt, who the man before them was.
The Sun. He was the Sun of this Empire — and its flawless sovereign.
"Your Majesty, might we ask why you have summoned us all at this hour?"
But whether one's voice caught in one's throat, it turned out, depended on who you were.
The Four Great Families — wielders of the greatest power and prestige among all the nobility. They had checked the throne's authority since time immemorial, and from where they stood there was not the slightest reason to be cowed. The Empire needed them, after all.
"Haha, but of course."
"Then might you tell us the reason now—"
"Before that — how much do you all know about that attack that took place within the Empire of late?"
It was an abrupt question. One entirely unrelated to the matter at hand.
"If you mean recent events... do you refer to the attack within the Church?"
"Yes. Strange, isn't it?"
The Emperor rose from his throne, his blood-red cape still billowing.
Step. Step.
The sound of the Emperor walking the aisle echoed through the hall.
"Why — why attack the Church of all places?"
"..."
"If sowing chaos in the Empire was the aim, any number of other targets would have served just as well."
"..."
"Moreover, the Church at that time was on high alert, inside and out, on account of an important announcement it had scheduled."
"..."
"And yet why? Why were they so fixated on the Church?"
No answer came to the Emperor's question. And understandably so — the situation was patently absurd. They had attacked the Church, fixated on the Church alone, and left nothing but the Church in ruins.
"I know the clergy make up the bulk of its membership, but the Church is hardly a soft target, is it?"
"..."
"And yet they very nearly carried off victory against the Church outright. So I had an investigation conducted."
Intelligence on a new power was always essential, after all.
The moment those words left his mouth, attendants came hurrying in from somewhere, each clutching a bundle of documents.
"The materials being handed out now are the findings of our investigation into the force that attacked the Church. Read them in their entirety."
Each set about reading in their own fashion. Some flipped through the pages with an air of indifference, while others adjusted their monocles and pored over every line with genuine fascination. Rniel, for her part, simply used magic to read hers.
"...Hmm. Certainly... at this level..."
"No — where on earth did a force like this even come from?"
"One might even say they possess the strength of a small nation..."
Yet the verdicts of those who finished reading were largely one and the same. Strong.
Too numerous to dismiss as a small band of heathens, and their deeds were far too extraordinary to write off their might.
"No — high-grade magic stones, found piled up in heaps at what's presumed to be their hideout—"
"M-magic formulas of this complexity would baffle even a senior high mage—"
"And notes suggesting they conducted experiments... on monsters, of all things—"
High-grade magic stones ranked among the most precious energy sources in the Empire, and the magic formulas inscribed across the walls and floors looked intricate at a single glance. What was more, notes had been discovered at their hideout describing the forms and traits of monsters no one had ever laid eyes on before. For an ordinary gathering of heretics, their trajectory was anything but ordinary.
"And furthermore — battered as they were, I hear they crossed blades with the Pope himself?"
"Wh-what did you just say?!"
"That's impossible—"
The Emperor's words drove the wedge deeper into those already reeling. The hall, silent mere moments before, was soon packed to the brim with murmurs — and the Emperor's mouth did not stop there.
"Come to think of it... I hear the Great Forest, too, was trampled into a wasteland by a single monster — apparently one of their remnants."
"Th-the Great Forest, you say?!"
"That forest crawling with those arrogant, pointy-eared—!"
"Yes, and it seems our side suffered quite serious losses because of it."
The murmuring hall erupted into open uproar. The Great Forest, attacked? That forest, teeming with spirits and elves?
"Th-then this is hardly the time for us to be sitting on our hands, is it?!"
"We must prepare our defenses against another attack!"
"W-wait, one moment — first we must confirm the facts—!"
The Emperor watched the flustered nobles with a look of quiet satisfaction, then resumed his steps. Toward the Four Great Families.
"Haha, that aside... you must be terribly disappointed, no?"
"What do you... mean by that, Your Majesty?"
No — to be precise, he was walking toward Duke Reinhardt.
"The moment word of the attack on the Great Forest arrived, the crown dispatched an envoy."
"..."
"A decision had to be made: send reinforcements, or seize the moment and devour the Great Forest instead."
"..."
"But by the time the envoy arrived, it was all already over. The only news left was that someone had slain the monster."
"...Your Majesty, what does that have to do with me—"
"Hear me out a little longer. It is very much your concern."
The Emperor's lips, carrying the story onward, were somehow brimming with a smile — and Duke Reinhardt thought it a deeply, profoundly unpleasant one.
"Who do you suppose killed that monster?"
"..."
"At first I assumed it was the knight commander I'd sent as escort. Failing that, I thought it must have been the elves."
"..."
"But the intelligence that came back said otherwise. The one who killed it was neither the knight commander nor the elves."
The Emperor seemed to pass by Reinhardt's side — then rested his hand upon the man's shoulder. And with a sly, crooked smile, he gazed at the man's profile — a sight that struck every onlooker as insufferably smug.
"The stain of House Reinhardt. The child you cast out of the family — as all the world learned only recently."
"...?"
"They say that child was the one who slew the monster. Every last report that reaches my ears says so."
The Duke had no idea what his own face looked like at that moment. For the person the Emperor had named was someone he had never once anticipated.
"Haha... Your Majesty, I believe your jest goes too f—"
"It's no jest."
"..."
He had taken it for the Emperor's mischievous teasing and let out a scoffing laugh — but what came back was an utterly resolute, dead-serious voice.
"Well, as far as the crown is concerned, we're only grateful. You did say you'd cast that child out, didn't you?"
"..."
"One careless step and your faction might have grown even larger. Why, the imperial authority itself might have come under threat, no?!"
"..."
"For the first time in ages, I find myself owing you thanks. Haha!"
Laughing heartily, the Emperor clapped his shoulder a few times and walked on past. And the Duke, who could not manage so much as a smile — the contrast between the two men could not have been starker.
No matter how desperately the Duke tried to cover his face with his own hand, he could not hide the whole of its ruin. It had already been branded into every eye in the room.
The face of a man who knew, deep in his bones, that something had gone terribly, terribly wrong.