How Truly Fortunate
How fortunate. How truly fortunate!
It was the dead of night. Whether on the Empire’s distant fringes or in the Imperial Capital that beat as its very heart, the same darkness settled over everything.
“….”
Beneath that darkness, a man paced restlessly, unable to sleep.
Was he some fellow who had failed to confess his feelings to a woman? A merchant fretting on the eve of an important deal?
No. The man who could find no rest in this darkness, in these late and lonely hours, was none other than—
“Your Majesty.”
—the Emperor of the Empire himself.
“Please, retire to your chambers.”
The Emperor did not answer the Grand Chamberlain. Instead he tipped his head back and stared up at the sky.
Not knowing the situation was maddening. A sigh escaped him unbidden.
He wanted nothing more than to send another messenger, yet that would be the worst possible move.
I wonder if that girl is managing well.
Why, of all people, had he sent the Fifth Princess—a direct descendant of the Imperial line—as envoy?
Because Fifth Princess Yulika understood the people of John Nassen better than anyone else.
During her own days at the Academy, the one person she had grown closest to had been none other than Lear John Nassen.
Word had it the two of them had gone at each other with wild abandon—brawls thinly disguised as sparring sessions.
Victory, of course, had always belonged to John Nassen. Perhaps Lear had even held back a little.
Whenever Yulika charged in, Lear had greeted her with a booming laugh, after all.
One thing was certain: the relationship between Lear and Yulika had never been bad.
Not as man and woman, but as warriors who measured themselves against each other through martial skill.
That was why he had deliberately sent Yulika into that dangerous place.
Even the John Nassen would treat someone they knew differently from a complete stranger.
He had heard that Lear John Nassen had already been named the next Baron. That gave him a little more hope.
Fighting John Nassen again. Fighting John Nassen once more…
Just imagining it dragged another heavy sigh from his chest.
From the days when the Empire had first begun its rise, they had launched conquest after conquest.
They had toppled proud kingdoms and broken every soaring talent that stood in their path.
The Empire had become a true Empire, and no one had been able to rein it in.
They had raced onward and onward until the moment they reached the northernmost fringe—
—and there the Empire had come face to face with people so deranged one almost feared they had stepped out of a nightmare. Monsters in human skin, pure and simple.
In numbers they were nothing. Fewer than a single Imperial legion.
Yet the instant the two sides clashed, the truth became clear. No matter how strong a warrior might be, overwhelming numbers were usually supreme—except when they weren’t. There existed beings for whom such logic simply failed. True monsters.
If I had not stepped forward then and won the John Nassen over…
He would stake his crown that the Empire would have been forced to throw every scrap of its military strength northward.
Had that happened, the nomadic tribes of the east and the kingdoms of the west would never have missed the opening.
In the end the Empire would have been attacked from every direction and forced to surrender the very lands it had bled so hard to conquer.
In truth, persuading the John Nassen had been almost absurdly simple.
They wanted none of the glittering treasures, the broad estates, or the gleaming weapons that were offered.
“Do not trouble us. We will live and die by our own ways.”
“The Empire, at least, has room to breathe—and its people know how to grow stronger through their own effort. We believe you will leave us alone, and that is why we make this offer. The weak little kingdoms, on the other hand, come knocking every other day. ‘Fight for us. Help us.’ We have no interest in cowards who will not even try. We say it again: do not trouble us. Do not interrupt our training.”
Of course no one wants outsiders meddling in their workouts. That much is only natural.
It was precisely for that reason that the John Nassen had accepted the Empire’s invitation to negotiate.
“And one more thing. From time to time, send us some strong fighters. That would be nice.”
“We will not kill them. They might get a little hurt, of course. That is simply how it goes when warriors cross blades.”
The Empire accepted every term. Honestly, none of it did them the slightest harm.
The land the John Nassen occupied was the far northern edge—containing nothing the Empire desired.
The territory itself was a mere handful of dirt. Spilling more blood to seize it? Unthinkable.
Sending strong fighters would only raise the Empire’s own standards in turn.
It would show those who had grown stagnant that a wider, deeper ocean still existed—and spur them to greater heights.
All the John Nassen wanted in return was autonomy over their own lives and the chance to spar with true powerhouses. That was everything.
Accept those two conditions, and the monsters that had tormented the Empire for eight long years would become allies.
Even if not allies, there was at least no longer any reason to keep them as enemies!
And so, whenever the Empire sent people to the John Nassen, it always chose those whose strength was beyond question.
Fifth Princess Yulika and Logan Stefan, both dispatched in such haste this time, were of that same mold.
The situation had been so urgent that the Empire had sent holders of the title Imperial 10 Strongest.
The John Nassen would throw open their arms in welcome at once.
Of course, those two would have to endure a rather painful stretch of time…
“Your Majesty.”
The Grand Chamberlain’s voice came again from behind him.
Unlike the worried tone of a moment earlier, a faint urgency now colored the words.
The Emperor knew at once what news the man must be carrying.
“Has she returned?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. Word is she just came back through a transfer magic circle.”
“Show her in at once.”
The words held a touch of impatience most unlike the usual Emperor.
The Grand Chamberlain hurried out, and a short while later Yulika entered.
“Your Majesty.”
When she had left she had been immaculate. Now she looked utterly different.
Her clothes hung in rags; scrapes and blood-crusted scabs marked her from head to toe.
She looked less like an Imperial princess and more like some brawler who had just rolled out of a fighting pit.
An Imperial princess in such a state? The entire Empire would have every right to rise in outrage.
Considering she had gone as an official envoy, the matter was even graver.
“You have returned.”
Yet the Emperor showed little surprise.
His only comment was, in essence, “You came back with all your limbs attached; that is enough.”
Yulika herself seemed completely unconcerned that she stood before the Emperor looking like this.
“What did they say?”
He wasted no time on empty words.
There had been a purpose in sending her, and a reason she had obeyed without question.
Both of them already knew the stakes; there was no need to drag the conversation out.
“House John Nassen will remain within the Empire’s fold.”
The moment those words left Yulika’s lips—
“…How fortunate.”
—the Emperor allowed emotion to show on his face for the first time.
“They also said they gladly accepted the Empire’s gift.”
That “gift,” of course, meant combat against strong opponents.
That was precisely why Yulika and Logan—both among the Imperial 10 Strongest—had been sent as envoys.
They had not been mere messengers; they had been a form of conciliatory present as well.
“How truly fortunate.”
The same words left the Emperor’s mouth a second time.
That alone showed how crushing the relief he felt truly was.
And small wonder. War with the kingdoms and the western alliance was already on the horizon.
If rebellion broke out inside the Empire at such a moment—and if one of those rebels were John Nassen?
He would stake his life that more than half the Empire’s entire military strength would have to be committed.
And more than half of that committed force would simply vanish.
“…Are you all right?”
Only after confirming that the north no longer required his attention did the Emperor ask after his daughter’s condition.
One look was enough to know she was far from fine. The marks of hard fighting were plain.
She had come straight to report the moment she returned—proof she had not even taken the time to change clothes or tend her wounds.
Even a daughter he had half given up on could not help but leave a father uneasy.
“Yes. I am fine. Better than fine. I am thoroughly delighted.”
Those were not empty words meant to soothe the Emperor.
Look at the smile painted across her face. Who could call that acting?
Yulika was genuinely overjoyed. In a place where status, birth, age, and even gender meant nothing—
—where only martial strength reigned supreme—she had rolled around and fought to her heart’s content, and she was still buzzing with excitement.
That was exactly why the Emperor had sent Princess Yulika to House John Nassen.
Strength was one thing, but her mindset was different from everyone else’s.
If she had gone there and shrunk back, the John Nassen might have gotten the wrong idea.
He had sent the one person who could charge into that den of monsters without the slightest hesitation and thrash about as she pleased.
How on earth did I end up with a child like this…
Shaking his head, the Emperor slipped in a quiet question.
“Did you learn the reason?”
“What reason do you mean, Your Majesty?”
“The reason John Nassen did not fall for the other side’s persuasion.”
“Ah. There is one possibility I have been considering.”
In a thoroughly confident voice, Princess Yulika continued.
“I believe it was because of Kyle.”
“Kyle?”
“The second son of John Nassen, currently enrolled at the Imperial Academy. The family’s youngest.”
“…I believe I recall him. Yes—the one who entered on a recommendation letter from the Margrave of the North.”
“From what I saw, they stayed because that Kyle is at the Academy.”
The Emperor frowned as though the logic refused to click.
So Yulika was saying they had held back out of fear that Kyle might be hurt—or taken hostage.
Worrying over a member of John Nassen? A direct-line descendant, no less? Impossible.
Yulika seemed to have reached the same conclusion as her father.
“Of course I do not think they feared he would become a hostage. Rather… they simply wanted to protect the youngest’s Academy life.”
“What makes you so certain?”
“I spoke a little with Lear John Nassen.”
“A little,” of course, amounted to nothing more than a brief exchange of greetings before they tried to kill each other again.
Still, to Yulika even that counted as conversation.
“He asked me whether Kyle John Nassen was doing well.”
“Oh?”
“There is no need to worry about Kyle’s safety, so asking if he is ‘doing well’ must mean ‘is he having fun?’ That is how I take it. Which means House John Nassen is, in its own way, looking out for Kyle John Nassen’s life at the Academy, does it not?”
“That could be. Yet to say it is entirely the case…”
A sudden thought struck the Emperor.
No matter how monstrous the John Nassen might be, they were still human.
And being human, they must possess human hearts as well.
People always said the youngest child was endlessly precious and adorable to any parent.
If so, Baron John Nassen—and everyone under him—might well feel the same.
It is not an entirely baseless hypothesis after all.
When the Emperor nodded, Yulika went one step further.
“Your Majesty. I wish to take him as my husband.”
“Explain yourself more fully.”
For Yulika it meant a powerful man; for the Emperor it meant a firm point of contact with House John Nassen.
In that single moment, their interests aligned with perfect precision.