The Emperor Awakens
Golden Mask could not help but furrow his brow at the Golden Goat's sudden outburst.
I figured he wouldn't agree so readily.
Still, he had hoped otherwise. No matter how much the fellow loved standing out, Golden Mask had assumed he could at least distinguish between public and private matters.
Apparently not.
Opposing the agenda was tantamount to rejecting and denying Golden Mask himself.
We may fight among ourselves, but before the Eight Houses Knights, we stand united. That has been the unspoken rule we've kept all this time.
The Death God Religion and the Eight Houses Knights. The two factions were bitter rivals. They split the Empire between them, yet were like oil and water—never able to mix. And so, with the Eight Houses as their common enemy, the Death God Religion had long remained tightly knit.
The twelfth guardian's—the Goat's—opposition was as good as shattering that long-standing solidarity. Was he simply oblivious, or was he only pretending to be?
Is this a protest over being shut out of the information?
Golden Mask had deliberately not informed the Goat of exactly what today's gathering was. The more he learned, the more he dug, the more doubts he had about the Goat's true identity.
……The Fifth Lord. I thought he was the corpse crow under the White King.
It had been that way from his first appearance. Darkan Territory. At the Special Auction held there, the Goat had appeared as Hudson's escort. And who was Hudson? It was now common knowledge that he was the agent of the Fifth Lord, master of the Labyrinth.
Then, during the subsequent "Purification," the Goat had produced the Emperor's seal to prove his credentials, and had even won the wager for selecting sinners—ultimately joining the Death God Religion. Even so, Golden Mask had not thought the Goat was the Fifth Lord at that point.
The master of an Orthodox must be human, and human alone.
The executives of the Death God Religion were all human. Divine Illness itself was a disease that only afflicted humans. The vast majority of the Death God Religion's members had once suffered from Divine Illness, and contracting it was an essential step for anyone seeking to become a guardian of an Orthodox. So of course he had assumed the Goat could not possibly be the monster known as the Fifth Lord.
Right after the bastard took Baal's Armor, Baal of the Four Calamities was slain.
But the coincidence was far too neat. The timing of the Goat taking the armor and the Fifth Lord killing Baal of the Four Calamities overlapped perfectly. More than anything, the fact that the Fifth Lord had never shown himself on the public stage was suspicious. The more he investigated, the more certain he became that the Goat and the Fifth Lord were one and the same.
……A monster who isn't even human could never be a true guardian of an Orthodox.
That was why he had invited him with limited information—to test him. If you're a real Orthodox, go ahead and summon a Death God.
And yet…… he summoned Baal.
The Death God the Goat's Orthodox had summoned was none other than Baal. A shock no one had anticipated. Before he even had time to wonder whether that thing could truly be called a Death God, Knight Commander Raiga had appeared and mentioned "Rahon."
If the Golden Goat truly was connected to Rahon…… or had inherited that bloodline—
The Goat is not the Fifth Lord.
The Goat and the Fifth Lord. They were different beings. They could never be on the same plane. He had a solid reason for that conviction. Though the Empire had lost the method of controlling the Four Calamities—
Only the direct bloodlines of the four houses can control the Four Calamities.
That single condition, at least, he knew for certain. Raiga had phrased it carefully as "connected," but in truth it was the same as saying "direct bloodline of Rahon." There was no way a direct descendant of the Rahon family could be a monster. And the idea that the White King—who utterly despised humans—would have taken a human in as the Fifth Lord made even less sense.
Therefore, the Goat was human. Not the monster Fifth Lord. The Fifth Lord had stripped away Baal's shell, but the essence had clearly been claimed by the Goat.
"……The motion has passed."
But that was one matter, and this was another. Golden Mask slowly surveyed the executives. Even if he had been mistaken, even if the Goat was a direct descendant of the Rahon family—there was no one here who would follow the Goat's opinion. If anything, by openly refusing to stand united, he had only branded himself. Even after being given two chances.
Of course, Golden Mask had said that if even one person opposed, the motion would not proceed. And so he simply dismissed the Goat's opposition. Treated it as if it had never existed. He would acknowledge that the Goat had the right to be here, the "legitimacy"—but whether he could make his way through the Empire alone while antagonizing Golden Mask himself…
"Now it is time to present our own agenda."
Golden Mask straightened his posture. Meetings between the Eight Houses Knights and the Death God Religion only took place when the Empire was about to undertake something major. Truly a once-in-five-years event, if that. And the agenda he was about to raise was more important still. Perhaps the most important matter since the founding of the Arhon Empire.
As every gaze gathered on him—
Ahem!
After clearing his throat once, he opened his mouth with an air of supreme leisure.
"Is he insane?"
"How dare a mere apprentice……"
"Why is he being let off so lightly?"
"That rumor must be true, then."
The murmurs outside the palace. There was some distance, but a transcendent like Isabella could hardly fail to hear them. Conversation about her having openly contradicted Raiga. And claiming he was weaker than Wilhelm, no less—of course the knights' backlash was fierce.
"Do you still think that?"
"……"
Isabella looked at the woman who had approached her. A fellow apprentice knight, supposedly a genius from a famous house. Her name was…… what was it again?
"You saw it in the Abyss, didn't you? Even the masters of that place avoid the Commander. Saying Wilhelm is stronger than someone like that doesn't make any sense."
Just before entering the Empire, the Eight Houses Knights had fought monsters within the Abyss. They had killed one of its masters and brought back a Fragment of Ruin.
"I mean, sure, I get why he was held up as the 'Knight King.' But that was on the surface. The Commander is fighting the erosion of the world itself. If he'd devoted himself only to surface affairs, the Empire could never have grown this large."
…Ah. She remembered now. The woman was the same type as Serengeti. The difference was that Serengeti only became talkative with the tiny handful of people she considered "her own," whereas this woman was just talkative in general.
"The reason the Empire can flourish as the balancer of the continent is entirely thanks to the Commander. He's personally reclaiming the lands of the old empire that sank into the Abyss, on his own two feet. Meanwhile, what did Wilhelm do?"
"……"
"The Great Expedition failed, didn't it? The Commander would never have failed. In the end, over two hundred thousand soldiers were slaughtered…… and how vast were the resources poured into that?"
"……"
"The Balan Kingdom, which threw its full support behind Wilhelm, is reeling because of it. Rumors are already rampant that King Fredrick's next battlefield will be the Balan Kingdom. When war breaks out, a place like the Balan Kingdom will be deleted in an instant—"
"Haa."
Isabella openly let out a sigh. If she didn't cut her off, it seemed like it would never end. Besides, she already knew all of this. The pride of the Eight Houses Knights, who battled in the Abyss, soared to the heavens. Surface affairs weren't even worth a single meal to them. Naturally, their favoritism and pride toward Knight Commander Raiga had reached a pure, unwavering height that wouldn't change even if the sky split in two.
Having openly contradicted that Knight Commander Raiga, the fierce backlash was only to be expected—but still.
"—Have you, who's barely ever left the Dercian family, actually seen Wilhelm in person? Really?"
At last the woman voiced what she'd truly been curious about. Most of the Eight Houses Knights, including this woman, knew Isabella as "Isabella von Dercian." Not the Snake Princess Isabella who had lived in the desert, but a delicate flower raised gently within the Dercian family. Of course a hothouse flower who'd never left her family couldn't possibly have met Wilhelm, who had no connection to the Empire whatsoever.
I definitely saw him.
But Isabella had seen him. In the Abyss. What the others had missed, she had seen clearly.
That was definitely…… Wilhelm's star.
Wilhelm's star, submerged in the Abyss. Through that star, she had been able to glimpse Wilhelm's memories in even greater detail. Why the star had shown her his memories, she didn't know.
The star that drinks the nebula.
That greatest of stars was waiting for someone within the Abyss. Wilhelm. Or…… Randolph. Yearning desperately. She wanted to tell him this, but the opportunity never quite arose.
"Then is that other rumor true too?"
"……?"
When Isabella looked at her questioningly, the woman raised her pinky finger.
"The rumor that you're the Commander's—you know. His fiancée."
So he's decided to treat me like I'm completely invisible.
I clicked my tongue inwardly at Golden Mask's handling of things. The bastard had casually dismissed my opposition. I could have raised an objection, but I let it go.
Just as I intended.
I'd shown them. That I was fully capable of standing against them as well. That I wouldn't unconditionally accept Golden Mask's opinions. Because it wasn't only the executives of the Death God Religion present here. Knight Commander Raiga. He was here too.
Indeed, unlike Golden Mask, the eyes with which Knight Commander Raiga looked at me were sparkling with even greater interest than before. And there were surely executives of the Death God Religion who harbored grievances against Golden Mask as well. Following Golden Mask quietly would get me nowhere. Better to openly oppose him.
That aside.
What was interesting was the statement that followed. The founding Emperor of the new Arhon Empire. For reasons unknown, he had slept for hundreds of years. The one who had brought the eleven eggs called Orthodox from the Heavenly Realm. No one had ever seen him. There were only widespread rumors that he slept quietly somewhere in the Empire. And so many people believed the Empire's Emperor was already dead—yet the Empire itself worshipped him like a god. Steadfast loyalty that had not wavered for hundreds of years.
And now the Emperor was awakening?
"At last……!"
Knight Commander Raiga trembled, letting out a short gasp of emotion. The other knights and the Death God Religion executives were the same. Apparently only Golden Mask had known this fact in advance.
Then Golden Mask shook his head.
"But he has not yet regained consciousness."
"Did you not just say he is awakening?"
Raiga furrowed his brow in rebuttal. As if he would never forgive wordplay, he even let murderous intent show.
"There are signs of physical activity. For His Majesty to fully regain consciousness, the 'Golden Spirit King' is required."
"The Golden Spirit King……? Isn't that a spirit that doesn't exist?"
Raiga tilted his head. The Golden Spirit King. It was a nonexistent spirit that had only been passed down in stories. No one had ever seen it, no one had ever found it. Even Raiga, who traversed the entire continent and the Abyss, had never once laid eyes on it.
"It most certainly exists. And the agenda I will present is related to this. That the first audience with His Majesty be granted to whoever finds the 'Golden Spirit King.'"
"……The first audience."
It was no different from grasping at clouds. But the reward attached to the agenda was more alluring than anything else.
"Indeed. We will need to resolve that matter before His Majesty awakens."
At the same time, the eyes of Raiga and the entire knight order shone as one. Who would be the first to have an audience when the Emperor awoke. Deciding that was a matter of extreme importance between the two factions. It would be the moment when who stood closer to the Emperor was determined by naked eye.
The Golden Spirit King?
And between them, I continued my own train of thought. The name Golden Spirit King, suddenly thrown out. I had the distinct feeling I'd encountered a similar being somewhere before.
…Where had I seen it?
—Not bad, Knight King.
……Ah. It came back to me. The gatekeeper I'd met at the Spirit Tower. That golden spirit who had known my identity! When I left the tower, the golden spirit had called me Knight King. I'd wondered how it had figured out my identity, what that spirit even was—but in the end, my curiosity had gone unanswered.
But now, this Golden Spirit King that Golden Mask and Raiga were talking about—surely they couldn't mean that guy?