Chapter 241
Chapter 241
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 241
Chapter Title: 69. Pack Chasing the Dawn (5)
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As usual, I was swinging my sword in the training grounds when Yorden came looking for me.
"Your Highness! Your Highness!"
The ranger called out to me repeatedly, his face flushed beet red.
Normally, I would have recoiled at his over-the-top fussing, but not this time.
The face of this seasoned ranger, who rarely so much as twitched an eyebrow, was filled with urgency.
My heart pounded.
Something big had clearly happened.
I lowered my sword and waited for him to speak.
"A rebellion has broken out in the Empire!"
My racing heart went cold.
I raised my sword again and resumed my stance.
"Your Highness! This is no time to be doing this."
I swung my sword and replied indifferently.
"If it's the 5th Prince's rebellion, I've known about it for ages."
"No, it's a different rebellion!"
I froze in place.
I rolled my eyes to look at Yorden, and he pounded his chest in frustration before speaking to me.
"The lords in the Empire's northeast have risen up against the Imperial House! The Lord of Winter Castle is rushing to the War Ministry over this right now!"
I slammed my sword into the ground and immediately headed for the palace.
"We'll escort you."
Kals and the court knights, who would normally have cited royal orders to block my path to the War Ministry, now led the way ahead, clearing a route.
The knights of the Billefeld family guarding the War Ministry looked tense upon seeing me.
They seemed conflicted about how to stop me if I defied royal orders and barged in.
Unnecessary worries.
I had no intention of entering the War Ministry.
"Marquis!"
I stood at the entrance and called out to the marquis at the top of my lungs, infusing mana into my voice.
Before long, the marquis appeared. Vincent and Malcoi were with him.
Malcoi spotted me and froze in shock, halting in his tracks. He must have thought I had come to arrest him—his face was as hard as stone.
I ignored Malcoi and went straight to the marquis.
"Is this the 'sword of the kingdom' you mentioned, Marquis?"
The marquis looked at me, then at Yorden, then back to Vincent.
A subtle glint of reproach flickered in his eyes.
He clearly disapproved of the Lord of Winter Castle informing me in defiance of royal orders.
Vincent played dumb, acting as if he had no idea about any such royal command.
"Come inside first."
The marquis groaned reluctantly and invited me to move to a private spot.
I left Kals and my knights behind and followed the marquis.
"Yes, Your Highness. The rebellion in the Empire was our kingdom's doing."
"How on earth did you pull that off?"
During my last trip to the Empire, I had seen with my own eyes just how much the Empire's nobles revered the Emperor.
They could barely breathe properly in his presence and were terrified even to meet his gaze.
For such nobles to rebel?
Even with the Empire mired in civil war, it was hard to accept.
"Do you know a man named Degol de Debish?"
Degol was the high-ranking Empire knight who had tried to humiliate me during that trip but ended up disgraced himself.
"When I was captured as a prisoner, he was taken too. He was so insignificant that Your Highness probably didn't even notice him."
Malcoi, standing behind the marquis, explained to me.
"I see. But why him?"
"The legion commanders' reckless assault on Silver Lion Fortress had a hand from his sweet-talking. Knowing this, he was worried about what would happen after his release."
Anyone who heard that would know why the marquis mentioned Degol.
But separately, I doubted that Empire nobles—who trembled at the mere thought of the Emperor—would rebel based solely on the words of a mere high knight.
"A fair point. If Degol had acted alone, no one would have listened. He'd likely have ended up hanged for harboring seditious thoughts."
The marquis smiled faintly at my words.
"In truth, his role was just a guide—at best, a cheerleader. Someone else did all the real work."
"Someone else?"
The marquis smiled again and answered.
"Count Montpellier personally persuaded the Empire's nobles."
Montpellier's name came out of nowhere, and my eyes widened. The marquis elaborated.
I burst out laughing.
"No wonder I hadn't seen hide nor hair of him."
Ever since the Teuton negotiations, I hadn't heard that whiner's complaints, which had struck me as odd.
Who knew he was off doing something this impressive behind my back.
"Conveniently, most of the regular army officers under Imperial influence had died in the war with our kingdom or followed the 3rd Prince to the center, making things much easier."
"Even so. What did he say to win them over?"
Just because Imperial influence had waned didn't mean the Emperor's shadow had vanished entirely.
Overcoming the fear of the Emperor etched into their souls to raise arms wasn't easy.
I was curious what Montpellier had said to convince them.
"He scared them by saying that if the civil war ends with the 3rd Prince's victory, the prince will scapegoat them to cover his own disgrace."
I laughed again.
It was so quintessentially Montpellier that I couldn't help but laugh out loud.
Then again, this was the man who had once turned nearly half the kingdom's nobles to treason. He had even coerced the palace's loyal generations-spanning white horse into betrayal.
If there was such a thing as a master of intimidation and cajolery, it had to be Montpellier.
"I wanted to grind him to dust when he was the enemy, but under me, he's proving quite reliable."
The marquis nodded at my words.
"This plan originated from Count Montpellier's own proposal."
"The wretch was always on edge, fearing a knife in the back for his past sins, and now he's pulled off a big one."
"Indeed. If this succeeds, he conditioned it on wiping his slate clean of all prior misdeeds."
What a proposal—pure Montpellier.
"And His Majesty accepted?"
"He said he'd consider it based on the rebellion's scale."
The king's response was masterful too.
Weighing past sins against the headcount in the rebellion? It sounded less like continental politics and more like haggling merchants.
Montpellier's consistent scheming and the king's transformed demeanor delighted me to no end.
"In any case, this lets the Dotrin Kingdom's forces focus solely on the enemy at hand."
The marquis composed himself and explained the shifting tides.
With the northeast lords' rebellion, the Empire had effectively lost control of its east. We could drop worries about them disrupting Dotrin supply lines.
"Relieved of threats from the flank, Dotrin forces will ravage Empire strongholds even more fiercely."
The marquis's finger pointed to a spot on the map.
"They'll secure the entire east and halt there."
It was near the border between the Empire's east and center.
"And that's when our kingdom joins in."
I smiled with pleasure.
I had no doubt that moment would be the day I'd longed for.
"But is it okay to tell me all this?"
"You already knew. And even if I didn't say, Count Ballerhard would have."
Vincent, who had been standing silently, cleared his throat awkwardly.
"And soon, more good news will come."
The marquis ignored Vincent and continued to me.
"The kingdom prepared more than one sword."
I scowled.
"Like I said before, if you're not going to tell me now, don't bring it up. It just frustrates the listener."
The marquis chuckled heartily at my complaint.
"After spilling everything else, why hold back now?"
His face turned serious as he revealed the kingdom's other sword.
"Soon, every Empire mage will withdraw from the front lines at once."
That was unexpected.
"I hate to admit it, but under Burgundy rule, the Empire shone brightly. Yet the brighter the light, the deeper the shadows—that's the way of the world."
The marquis's eyes gleamed.
Ambitious souls stifled by mighty authority, opportunists cowering without sating their greed out of fear of the Emperor—they would rise one after another.
"The vast Empire will splinter. Long-suppressed greed and hunger will erupt, and great lords will plunge daggers into each other's backs for even a slightly larger share of the spoils."
He added that an era of warlord fragmentation had dawned.
I laughed.
The world he described felt all too familiar to me.
Back when the great war had just ended and humans seized continental hegemony, warlords everywhere waged endless conflicts over it.
To me, it sounded like the world regressing to that era.
The only difference: the victors of those wars, Burgundy's bloodline who became Emperor ruling half the world, were now the biggest, juiciest slab of meat on the banquet table.
"I'm heading back."
I rose immediately.
I planned to sharpen my blade relentlessly until that day.
To carve the most delicious part from the largest cut of meat, I'd need the sharpest sword of all.
As I left the War Ministry and returned to my palace, the wind blew fiercer than usual.
The kingdom's emblem and the morning star flags fluttered wildly high above.
It felt like wind stalled before a great wall was finally flowing free.
The path to and from the War Ministry was the same as always.
Yet my perception had utterly changed.
Simply hearing the marquis's words couldn't account for how stark the shift was.
The altered world felt both alien and strangely familiar.
I quickly realized the source of these conflicting emotions.
If my past self hadn't been a sword—if not a sword defined by hearing and sight alone.
That's the feeling I would have had then.
"A great war indeed."
Facing the monster of great war now taking form, all I could do was grow strong enough not to be devoured.
I quickened my pace.
I couldn't bear not swinging my sword right then.
At that moment, Idrian Leonberger wasn't the only one sensing the world's shift.
Beneath snow-capped ancient trees, sharp-eared kin paused their tasks and gazed skyward at whispers of fate.
On remote, forsaken crags, far-seeing beings thudded their heavy feet.
In primordial forest depths, keen-nosed beasts wailed ominously.
All manner of things that had slunk into shadows after defeat in the great war,
Myriad heteromorphs awaiting the end of their long night and the dawn's arrival.
Thus, the clamor began.
"Ah! It has finally begun!"
The man on the highest throne exulted.
"Ah... it has come at last."
The white moth huddled in the deepest dungeon sighed.