At Sword’s Edge
If the Lahazer Empire and the other kingdoms were to go to war, who would win?
Ask any commoner living in one of those kingdoms, and most would let out an awkward laugh and answer, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, that the kingdoms allied together would surely prevail.
“Come on, no matter how strong the Empire is, how’s one empire supposed to take on every kingdom on the continent by itself?”
Most people settled the matter that way, as if it wasn’t even worth measuring the balance of power.
But if the question were narrowed to the intelligence services of each nation, or to members of the royal families, the answer changed.
No matter what military strategy or tactics you use, even if every kingdom set aside its own interests and united, they would never defeat the Empire.
That was the conclusion reached by the intelligence agencies that cultivated and exploited talented people in every country.
If the Empire deployed its battle units equipped with specialized artifacts, it wouldn’t even need magical weapons to erase most weak nations from the map in less than half a day.
It was a truth the high-ranking figures of the kingdoms kept hidden from their own people, but a truth it remained all the same—and it became the spur that drove every kingdom to develop its national strength so they would not be trampled beneath the Empire’s heel.
Earlier, when the Hero party had been invited by the Empire, they had been told this very fact in the receiving room of the Marinella Kingdom.
So the Empire really did make itself into the organization that punishes Hero parties when they commit crimes. But to think its actual power was this monstrous.
Hilde had been promised the loan of three Mythic-grade items. The items would be returned to the nation’s treasury.
Mythic items were supposed to be officially registered for ownership, but it seemed the duke had been illegally hoarding those as well.
Still, the loan period would last only until the current Hero party was dissolved, and since none of them had any intention of using the items beyond that, they accepted the offer.
Hilde leaned back on the massage chair installed in the high-end inn her group had taken and drifted into thought.
In the game, the Empire had functioned as a leash placed around the Hero party’s necks, a restriction imposed to keep them in check if they lazed around doing nothing or slaughtered civilians for no particular reason.
In the real world, the Empire’s role was not much different. Hilde didn’t think that was a bad thing.
The members of the Hero party were still human beings, after all, and no matter how noble their character, they could wither and become twisted under hardship and adversity. There had been times when a Hero who murdered and betrayed comrades had stood on the demon race’s side and threatened humanity, only for the Empire to solve the problem with clean, efficient intervention.
But then a question occurred to Hilde.
If they possessed that much power, wouldn’t it be better to fight the Demon Realm directly and bring peace to the continent, rather than merely acting as a restraint on the Hero party?
If the Empire put its mind to it, maybe it could have purged the high-ranking demons long ago. Yet the Empire didn’t seem all that concerned with what happened in Makyeong.
…Don’t tell me there’s another enemy? Someone even the Empire can’t handle.
No matter how hard she thought about it, the thread of the matter didn’t seem to run any further, so Hilde let her body go slack and enjoyed the cool massage. Her body was a little sore, probably because Kamiel had possessed her the night before and used her power recklessly.
Knock, knock.
“Who is it?”
“...Lady Hilde. I’ve come because I have something I’d like to talk about for a moment.”
Because the massage chair had left Hilde’s voice pleasantly languid, Lee Yu-seong answered with a slightly trembling voice. The saint had gone out to visit a bakery, and Agatha was also away since early morning because she had someone she knew at the temple, so Hilde was alone in the inn room.
Hilde told them to wait a moment, stopped the massage chair, and opened the door. Standing there with Lee Yu-seong was an unfamiliar woman. Hilde was inwardly startled by her unusual eyes.
One eye shone with the brilliant yellow of topaz, the other with the clear blue of sapphire. Odd eyes were the first she had seen since reincarnating into this world, and rather than seeming strange, they suited her beautifully.
“You!”
The woman with Lee Yu-seong widened her eyes in surprise and pointed at Hilde. Hilde shot Lee Yu-seong a look, but he only shrugged, as if he had no idea what this was about.
“You’re the one who attacked me yesterday, right? Human... maybe? Anyway.”
The woman, sounding a little all over the place, walked up to Hilde. She looked about five centimeters taller than Hilde, who stood at 165 centimeters.
“I want to join your party too. I’ve got some skill, so I won’t be a burden.”
“...Just a moment. Would you come inside first? I’ll need to wait for the others to arrive, and this doesn’t seem like something I can decide on my own.”
“Fine. I can wait however long it takes.”
As the woman passed by Hilde, the long hair tied back behind her swayed softly. Hilde found it hard to judge whether this was a good situation or not.
She probably thought she’d hidden it well.
However, an eerie draconic aura had settled around her.
- - -
The ruler of the Empire that reigned over the entire continent.
The woman who held absolute power sat with her legs crossed on the sofa in her private office, carefully accepting and eating a strawberry someone was holding out to her.
Ugh... honestly, this is the sort of thing I should leave to an aide. I’m not the sort of person who ought to be serving strawberries.
Enzo, the son of the chancellor, who was called the number two authority in the Empire, grumbled inwardly, but he didn’t show the slightest hint of it on his face. Instead, he was timing each strawberry perfectly with the Empress’s pace as she ate, placing them in her hand with meticulous precision.
“Do you have a complaint?”
“How could I dare think such a thing... It is a tremendous honor to serve Your Majesty.”
“I doubt that.”
The master of the Empire, Kaira Lahazer, chuckled under her breath. Enzo, the chancellor’s eldest son, still had rough edges in his finishing, but with more refinement he could become a capable talent and contribute to the Empire.
Proof of that was how quickly he read the room and handed over strawberries at just the right moment.
Even if Enzo was showing her every sign of deference on the surface, Kaira knew he was complaining in his heart.
Though the Empress looked like a woman in her late twenties despite being officially in her forties, and though her beauty was enough to make her seem like Enzo’s peer, her gaze, sharp enough to see straight through his thoughts, made his heart lurch.
“Since your childhood, which you can’t even remember clearly, you’ve lived under the chancellor’s wing, wielding power most people can only dream of. Thinking is free. But don’t show it.”
“Forgive me, Your Majesty.”
At her words, which sounded as if she had seen straight through him, Enzo lowered his head and handed her another strawberry, glancing at the still-empty corner of her mouth.
That was when it happened.
“Come in.”
Kaira, still holding only a strawberry, said quietly. Unable to sense anything at all, Enzo tilted his head in confusion.
A moment later, the ornaments before the ivory-decorated door were released, and the door opened. A man entered with a blade-like, razor-sharp presence and dropped to one knee before the Empress, who was sitting there comfortably on the sofa.
Huh! That’s General Kaijin, the First Seat of Hwaryu! What the hell?
Enzo, who had been serving the Empress, grew uneasy.
The general stood well over two meters tall.
With those broad shoulders and that immense, ironclad frame, he was so physically overwhelming that even Enzo, who came from the class system’s upper reaches, felt intimidated on a biological level.
There were many epithets used to describe him across the continent, but there was one title that introduced him most clearly.
The pinnacle of martial power a human being can reach.
Normally, the Hero who stood against the Demon King would be considered humanity’s strongest, but after General Kaijin’s fame spread widely, that assumption quietly faded away.
Kaijin, owner of the Mythic-grade greatsword the Empire had bestowed upon him—an enormous weapon weighing over thirty kilograms—had once overwhelmed the Hero of the previous party in one-on-one combat. After that, the Empire’s standing rose even higher.
“Sit anywhere on the sofa for now. You could’ve just moved into the office instead of coming through the door. You’re making things complicated for no reason.”
“I’ll do so from next time on.”
As she watched the general show such courteous respect, the Empress shook her head. Even when his Hwaryu subordinates moved discreetly through the shadows, Kaijin always went through the proper procedures and entered her office with a kind of loyalty that had never changed since his days as a mere underling.
Once Kaijin had taken the seat facing the Empress, a teacup moved of its own accord and the teapot filled it by itself. That was one reason the Empress’s office didn’t need a secretary, despite the absurdly luxurious magical engineering she lavished even on something as trivial as tea service.
The Empress bit into the strawberry, taking only a small mouthful since it was too large to eat in one go. Until she had chewed and swallowed in silence, Kaijin didn’t even touch his teacup.
When the Empress finally swallowed the strawberry, the office fell utterly still. Enzo had been about to offer another strawberry but stopped himself. Something about the atmosphere made it feel wrong.
And his judgment was correct.
“Human beings are powerless before fears they can see with their own eyes.”
As the Empress led into the topic, she placed the half-eaten strawberry on the plate and continued.
“Take nobles and commoners as a simple example. Nobles treat commoners however they please, and commoners can never truly resist. Those in power possess the strength to rule over them all.”
She picked up her fork and stabbed the strawberry resting on the plate.
“Let me ask you something, Enzo. If you saw me stab an innocent Imperial citizen like this and kill them, what would you do?”
“...I would paint that person as a monstrous villain and make the dead pay for their nonexistent crimes by forcing their families to compensate for them.”
“That’s one way to do it. But the best method is to make it all disappear cleanly, without a word.”
Enzo lowered his head. No matter how immense the Empress’s power was, he had overlooked the fact that governing the nation depended on the support of the people.
She could not afford to expose even the smallest weakness.
The Empress went on.
“Then let us imagine a different case. If I kidnapped and murdered the people of another kingdom, what would you do?”
“Even then, they wouldn’t dare show their teeth against the Empire.”
“Even if the target were royalty?”
“......”
Enzo did not answer. The right answer rose in his mind, but that was precisely the terror of the one who ruled the Empire.
The moment one became hostile to the Empire, nothing might appear to happen on the surface. Yet because of the spies the Empire had planted from its very roots, the target kingdom could slowly wither away under the hidden war of intelligence and information. To preserve a kingdom, one had no choice but to bow and crawl if one wanted to survive.
“Don’t be frightened. The Empire has never once done such a thing since its founding. One could even boast that it has contributed to the peace of the continent.”
“Your Majesty speaks truly. Our Empire has, in fact, passed judgment on kingdoms that could not hide their ambitions.”
“Then do you know why that is?”
Seeing the Empress’s gaze, Enzo grew terribly tense and swallowed hard without meaning to. All he knew of Kaira was that she was no idealist, and that she had not conquered the continent simply because she was kind.
“...I do not know, Your Majesty. I beg your pardon.”
At Enzo’s abashed demeanor, Kaira waved a hand.
“Enough. Not knowing is only natural.”
The Empire was called the continent’s strongest nation, the symbol of absolute force with no rival to match it.
What a ridiculous lie.
Kaira knew all too well that the Empire had lived its entire existence under the gaze of a single race. They had watched the ancient Empire from time immemorial. If they had ever found even the smallest pretext, they might have exterminated not only the Empire but every human living upon the continent.
At any moment, if they found humanity offensive, the cultures humanity had built could be reduced to ashes in an instant.
To avoid provoking them, Kaira kept the continent’s kingdoms quietly informed of the Empire’s military strength and worked to develop the latent potential of humankind. It had been a secret operation carried out over an age so long that none of the kingdoms had noticed.
But after reading the Empire’s emergency intelligence report that morning, she had become certain there was no longer any need for that.
It was the most exhilarated moment of her long life.
The existence of the goddess, which had always seemed half real and half uncertain. This generation’s Hero party was the real thing.
“Our enemy is neither another kingdom nor the demon race, nor even the Demon King.”
The Empress swept her gaze once over the puzzled Enzo and General Kaijin. They believed her eyes were burning brighter than usual.
A race with the power to hate humanity and bring it to ruin.
The beings who had made the Demon King and humans fight each other.
The age when the heavens would be declared war upon was drawing near.
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