The Crown Prince's Ruthless Awakening
You damn bastard.
The curse flew from the mouth of the crown prince, renowned for his gentle demeanor and boundless love for his siblings. The moment those words landed, the atmosphere in the conference room froze solid. It didn't matter anymore who had been chattering or raising their voices. A single curse had turned the room into a tomb of silence where no one dared speak.
Did I just hear that wrong? The Chief Justice doubted his own ears.
...His Highness the Crown Prince has finally shown his wrath. The Grand Marshal marveled in admiration.
Is the Empire truly in such peril? Enough to enrage even the prince hailed as a sage king, a living god of peace? The Minister of Finance found himself rethinking the Empire's future.
The crown prince's words were utterly unforeseen by all. No wonder the Second Prince, forgetting his position entirely, trembled in his seat with legs shaking and eyes wide open.
"Since when have we fawned over the Maselin Kingdom like this? We're not even in any significant diplomatic ties with them. When did we start holding meetings over a single weak kingdom just because they're weak?"
The retainers' eyes bulged at the crown prince's follow-up. It was exactly what they'd wanted to say every time the Second Prince's stubbornness dragged on. But the strengthened imperial authority had kept their mouths shut. All this time, the Empire had been lavishly supporting Maselin due to the Second Prince's absurd whims.
Finally, the crown prince had seen through how ridiculous it all was.
"H-Hyung... why, why are you suddenly like this? Huh? You weren't before... N-No, I mean... Maselin's in danger, so... shouldn't we help them...?"
Even in the frozen tension, the oblivious Second Prince clumsily pressed on, desperate to reclaim the brother he knew.
"General, did Maselin ever request our aid first?"
The crown prince didn't even glance at his brother, instead demanding an explanation from his retainers.
"Never, Your Highness."
"So you're saying we've been sending unconditional aid to a kingdom that never even asked?"
"Precisely."
"I don't get it. It makes no sense... especially deploying our Empire's sharpest blade."
With that, as if no further words were needed,
"Let's just pretend this meeting never happened. It wasn't even worth reconsidering."
the crown prince rose from his seat.
The meeting ended in an instant. Ignoring whether the others had adjusted or not,
"Great changes are coming to the Empire."
he delivered his final words and strode out of the conference room.
The Bellos Empire's imperial authority was at an all-time peak of strength. From the founding emperor, who built the nation with absurd martial prowess and served as its unifying force, down to every successor—no one had ever lost the title of the Empire's foremost warrior. Beneath that immense power, no one dared rebel.
Of course, it wasn't as if challenges had never arisen. There had been attempts, but they had been erased so cleanly from history that they were long forgotten.
Anyway, on this foundation of unyielding imperial power, the Empire had become a bottomless tree of handouts, thanks to the Second Prince's nonsense and the First Prince's brotherly indulgence. Countless nobles chafed at this.
"What? His Highness said that?"
"I'm telling you, in the meeting just now, he cursed at the Second Prince and told him to cut the bullshit!"
"And that's not all—he said great changes are coming to the Empire. Finally, we're reclaiming our old glory!"
The Bellos Empire hadn't always been seen as a pushover handing out resources to neighboring kingdoms. Backed by overwhelming might, it extracted benefits from them, checked their growth, and unabashedly flaunted its power to hold the top spot.
But the love-struck Second Prince had ruined it all—and it had been three years already. If it weren't the Empire, it would have collapsed long ago.
"What a relief. We nearly dispatched the Executioners straight to Maselin."
"Hell, was that even a dispatch? It's more like giving them away."
"Right? The Ironclad Knight Order we sent last time hasn't come back in over a year, and that was called a 'dispatch' too!"
"And we're still supplying them from our own treasury. How absurd was that decision..."
The retainers vented their grievances one by one, hopeful that the Empire was finally normalizing.
"But what if it's temporary?"
"..."
"He only nixed the Executioners. If he demands something else..."
"Worse, what if the Second Prince pulls his usual stunt outside meetings?"
"...You mean running to the Crown Prince's chambers begging when the retainers oppose an agenda?"
Their conversation shifted to worries about how long this change would last. The chance that this moment wouldn't be eternal was, frankly, far higher than the opposite.
"I'm not asking for much. Just... stop the handouts from here on."
"Yeah, recovering what's already given? Not holding my breath."
Amid these varied concerns, news of the meeting spread rapidly through the palace.
At the same time, the man at the center of the rumor—the crown prince—was staring at the system message before his eyes, steeling his resolve.
I must normalize the Empire.
The moment I left the conference room, I headed straight to my chambers.
I need a space with no one around to clear my head.
I'd gone off-script because the Second Prince was trying to squander Empire resources on his usual bullshit. But more importantly, I needed to figure out how the hell I ended up here.
Being alone wouldn't solve everything, but at least I could sort out my rattled mind from the sudden upheaval.
"...It's really First Prince Bellon."
The mirror greeted me with a face so handsome that "gorgeous" was the only word that came to mind. Golden blond hair, crimson eyes. Eyes like the sun—unmistakably Crown Prince Bellon.
"Why'd I possess him? To normalize the Empire?"
What was the point of this random isekai reincarnation? As I muttered to myself about a situation I couldn't share with anyone,
Canceled dispatch of Executioners to Maselin Kingdom.
Fate changes.
Worldline shifts.
Empire's Doom Probability decreases by 1%.
Current Empire Doom Probability: 91%
Status Summary: The Empire will definitely perish within 5 years.
If the Empire perishes, the Crown Prince dies.
"..."
A message that snapped me to attention appeared before my eyes. From the translucent screen to the blatantly modern design screaming "only you can see this," it was obvious.
"This is insane."
The first thing out of my mouth was a curse. A 91% doom probability? But what shocked me most was that even with odds that high, the grace period was only five years. A 9% chance to hold out that long showed how mighty the Empire was—and how much the Second Prince had bled it dry.
An Empire that could last five years despite such high collapse odds. How much had he given away to push it to the brink? Unimaginable.
No, I actually know... Yeah, but if it's really that bad, no wonder it's doomed.
Whenever Maselin whined, he'd send men, resources, even waive their taxes. Holding on this long was a miracle.
First, I need to know exactly how much we've given.
To take it back, I had to know what was lost. Plus, I needed the current story point. I'd read up to around chapter 50, and nothing had spiked the doom that high yet. How far had time progressed?
At least, with talk of Executioners... past chapter 100?
The Empire's ultimate force, the Executioners. Once they moved, problems vanished—like deus ex machina straight out of an elementary school notebook game where "they show up and you win!"
Handing even them over meant the story had advanced a lot. No way they'd give away top assets from the start.
At least mid-to-late game...
I decided to pause my solo brainstorming there. Next, I needed objective data from records.
As I moved to head to the library,
The door burst open without a knock.
"Hyung! Hyung! Th-That was just a joke earlier, right? It's me, your little bro Bedin...!"
The Second Prince tumbled in toward me.
"I know you're my brother, Bedin. What's up?"
Why the hell was he here? Before I could ponder,
"The Executioners—you just ended the meeting 'cause the retainers opposed it, right? You still plan to send them? Secretly, just between us? Right? Huh?"
His words tumbled out, and with them,
Empire's Doom Probability is fluctuating.
The system message underscored the crisis. Seeing it, I knew now wasn't the time for timeline analysis.
The top priority was clear.
I have to remove this guy from the Empire.
Strip his prince status and ship him far away. He was the greatest villain likely to doom the Empire—and kill me.