He Was Returning
Leonhart Brankenheim retreated over the course of four days. To call it a flight would be to ignore how stubbornly he clung on; to call it a retreat would be to understate how utterly wretched it was. He did not sleep, nor did he stop. Clad in a sodden cloak, he spurred his horse like a madman. The Northern Army was dragged along in his wake.
Soldiers dozed off mid-stride, and horses spat froth onto the mud. Torn banners grew heavy, saturated with rain, and dark shadows pooled beneath the eyes of the officers. Yet, Leonhart did not stop. Belion Vergrad was right behind them. The Shield of Noxbain. A war hero. Though he now served as the vanguard of the Demon King's army, even Belion had been unable to completely tear Leonhart to pieces over those four days.
The losses were far from negligible. Their supply wagons had dwindled, their rearguard had been severed, and their control over the area surrounding Ragmunt had effectively collapsed.
Nevertheless, Leonhart reached the border checkpoint alive. He did not view this as a flight. He saw it as a demonstration. Dragging the Demon King all the way to the kingdom's doorstep—that had become his final mission.
Elysia Arten despised the borderlands in the rain. Rain washed away evidence. It blurred bloodstains, collapsed footprints, and dissolved the ash of burned documents into the mud. On a rainy border, anyone could lie. That was precisely why Elysia remained silent longer than usual today. Silence was a useful tool for hiding one's thoughts. And right now, she had many thoughts to hide.
Beneath the sodden banners of the kingdom, Elysia watched the arrival of the Northern Archduke's army. Torn flags. Mud-caked armor. Spear tips bent by the heavy rain. Horses foaming at the mouth.
And in the very center of it all, Leonhart Brankenheim. He did not wear the face of a defeated commander. Those who lost usually raged, made excuses, or crumbled entirely. Leonhart was different. His eyes shone with an eerie, feverish brightness. It was not the gaze of a man who had lost everything, but of one who believed he had finally laid eyes upon the very thing he feared most.
Elysia did not like that look. Madness had a way of blinding people to who was friend and who was foe.
"Your Highness," Leonhart said as he dismounted. He did not kneel, merely placing a hand over his chest. It was a gesture of respect, but at the same time, a posture of defiance.
"Archduke of the North," Elysia said. "I require an explanation."
Only Leonhart's lips moved as he spoke. "There will be no need for one. He will be here shortly." He pointed down the southern road with a wet, gloved hand. "He is coming from that direction."
"What do you mean by that?"
"The Demon King." At that title, Elysia's expression turned cold for a fleeting moment. Lucion Vergrad. No. The Demon King, Lucion Vergrad. A man she could no longer afford to underestimate.
"Archduke," Elysia's voice dropped. "Do not substitute a formal report with ghost stories."
Leonhart looked at her. "Ghost stories, you say."
"The kingdom came here to verify facts, not fairy tales."
"Then you will have your verification soon enough." Leonhart smiled, a mere twitch of his lips. "You will see whether what I witnessed was a mere fairy tale... or the reality that Your Highness has yet to face."
"Princess," a cheerful voice chimed in. Rabiel Mor, the Court Mage, looked up from the mud. She wasn't even holding an umbrella. Her wet hair clung to her cheeks, and the long sleeves of her court mage robes almost entirely covered the backs of her hands.
She looked young, and her tone was casual. But Elysia knew exactly what lay beneath Rabiel Mor's lighthearted demeanor. The very magic the kingdom had tried to burn away time and again, only to find they could never truly discard it—that was the true identity of this petite woman.
Rabiel picked up a piece of charred sealing wax from the mud. "It seems the Archduke has ruined himself quite spectacularly."
"Watch your language, Rabiel," Elysia muttered under her breath.
"I did watch it. To be more precise, he ruined himself in the most pathetic, disgraceful way possible." Rabiel brought the piece of sealing wax to the tip of her nose. "The scent of holy oil. The smell of blood. Hastily burned parchment. Traces of a magical seal. And... oh?" The girl smiled, though her eyes remained flat and unamused. "You were driven out, weren't you?"
Rabiel rubbed the mud between her fingertips. "And you weren't just driven out. You kept discarding things along the way. Wagons, documents, people... all to slow down your pursuers."
Leonhart glared at Rabiel. She waved back cheerfully. "Don't worry, Archduke. I won't tattle to His Majesty just yet. It's not really the time for it anyway. Ah, or did I just do it?" She then turned back to Elysia.
If the Archduke of the North had fled to the kingdom's doorstep by abandoning everything he possessed piece by piece, then Lucion would have had to pick up those discarded pieces. Saving people, recovering documents, sorting through the evidence—that was undoubtedly what had delayed him. Elysia understood this immediately. She fell into a brief silence.
Lucion could never abandon people. He had always been that way. She had once considered it a weakness. One could dress it up as a noble love for his people, but did a Demon King truly require such a quality? He was a man who, in the quiet corners of the royal palace, would swallow hurtful words as if they were nothing but a joke.
But now, that weakness had taken on a different name: justification. Lucion might be delayed because he refused to abandon people. Yet, every person he saved would become a witness, every document he recovered would become evidence, and every spot where he paused would leave behind proof of the Archduke's crimes. Was that truly a weakness? Or was it simply the methodology of a king?
Elysia felt her own perspective shifting. The change was unpleasant. It was even painful, for she was being forced to retract a conclusion she had settled upon long ago. It felt as though she were being made to confront the sins she had buried. Using him as an information pipeline. Listening to his loneliness while leaking the intelligence he unwittingly provided back to the kingdom.
Believing she saw him as a human being, when in truth, she had treated him as a mere variable. It had all been for the national interest. It had been for peace. It had been to spare the blood of human soldiers. All of those reasons were genuine. And that made it all the more cowardly.
Elysia looked down at her rain-soaked gloves. A princess's hands were always like this. Commands were issued by mouth, while blood flowed at the border. Information moved on paper, while death was paid for by the soldiers. She had evaluated Lucion with clean hands, but she had been wrong. The Kingdom of Arten had been wrong as well.
The intelligence operatives had summarized the rebellion of the Vergrad princes in three lines.
Arkel Vergrad, the legitimate heir: Deceased.
Belion Vergrad, the war hero: Rebelled.
Lucion Vergrad, the negligible third prince: Ascended.
The reality was not so simple. A clean report was usually only finalized after the most significant bloodstains had been wiped away. Arkel had not been a warmonger, but he was an heir who found himself unable to stop the war.
He had clamored for endless conflict in an attempt to unify the realm internally. When the late king's authority began to waver, Arkel had run himself ragged trying to salvage the wounds of their holy crusade.
Caught between a fractured military and a human kingdom that still watched the Demon Realm with predatory eyes, he could not choose peace. Thus, Arkel endured, crushed under the weight of his responsibilities, until he was assassinated.
Belion was no mere rebel. He was a general who had stood on the front lines. He was the one who had watched supplies dry up, military strength deplete, and the blood of Noxbain wither away.
With the entire Demon Realm hurtling toward ruin, he had made a desperate decision to save his country. He had turned his army around. Believing that if he became king he could save the nation, he became a traitor overnight.
Belion's march back to the capital shook the palace's defensive lines. In the ensuing chaos, Cardia Noxvel's blade reached Arkel, inflicting an incurable magical wound.
Arkel did not die immediately; he returned to the palace to receive treatment. Though his mana circulation was shattered, he could still have ruled as the center of the realm from his sickbed. And so, someone feared him. A few days later, Arkel was dead.
Whether it was the remnants of Kalen Drack's faction, a radical officer loyal to Belion, or another hidden hand within the palace itself, the truth remained obscured. This was the most recent intelligence the princess had only lately managed to acquire.
Yet, the throne could not remain vacant for long. In the end, Lucion, who had never desired it, was pushed onto the throne. Because he was the only legitimate bloodline remaining in the palace.
Only now did Elysia realize the terrifying weight behind those words. And yet, looking at such a man, she had once judged him to be merely a "good person."
"Your Highness," Leonhart said. "I was not wrong."
Elysia looked at him. "About what?"
"The Demon King is always seen too late," Leonhart's wet lips curled into a smile. "In the eyes of those who do not believe." He stared down the southern road. "But just because he is seen late does not mean he arrived late."
He kept his eyes fixed on the southern road. Elysia did not answer. Leonhart was mad, but his words held too much weight to be dismissed entirely.
"Princess." This time, it was Rabiel's voice. When Elysia turned her head, she saw Rabiel placing her hand flat against the muddy road. The rain pelted the back of her hand. The princess's eyes narrowed.
"The ground is vibrating."
Leonhart laughed. It was an incredibly quiet sound. "He is here."
Beyond the rain. Down the dark southern road. Riding the mist, emerging from the shadows of the forest. Black banners, at last. The black military standard of Vergrad rose slowly into the damp wind. And at the vanguard stood Belion Vergrad. The Shield of Noxbain. Former rebel. Current vanguard of the Demon King's army.
Ah. He had arrived. He was clearing the path. Behind him, the Black Armor Guards began to show themselves. Row after row of rain-slicked black armor marched forward, exuding a chilling aura. Their spear tips were held low, and their banners did not waver.
Elysia witnessed it all. And she realized that her re-evaluation of Lucion was now complete. He was returning as the Demon King. That was how Lucion Vergrad was making his approach.
The man she had discarded. The one who had been judged unfit to ever become king. The prince who had once ridden a black horse was now the Demon King leading a black army. Cutting through the rain, heading toward the border, he was returning right before the eyes of the princess who had abandoned that "good person"—almost as if to mock her.
A massive, unified wave of black. The main force of the Demon King's army was marching in.