The Khan Union Rises
At the sudden proposal, Arcus and Henry could not answer right away and only blinked at each other.
After a moment, Henry collected himself and spoke up first.
"If His Highness the Crown Prince commands it, we will accomplish whatever is asked of us."
"No, it's not a command—it's a request. Or, if you'd rather not, call it a deal."
"……If it would not be an imposition, might I ask the reason?"
This time it was Arcus who asked, and Cantares answered matter-of-factly.
"Because it's dangerous work, and I'd prefer you take it on of your own accord."
"Is the objective the eradication of the Evil God Cult?"
"What else would it be?"
The Crown Prince let out a soft, derisive laugh.
"If you agree, I'll tell you the details. But not before. And once you set foot in this, there will be no getting out. So consider your answers carefully."
…….
Arcus and Henry looked at one another.
Their deliberation did not take long.
"I will do it."
"As will I."
When the two young men answered without hesitation, Cantares arched his brow, somewhat dubiously.
"You're answering rather quickly, aren't you?"
"Not at all. It's simply that I want something quite clearly, and I imagine Young Lord Arcus feels the same."
"That is correct."
Having deftly read what the Crown Prince was fishing for, Henry said this, and Arcus nodded along.
"Something you want?"
"I am a man of considerable ambition."
Henry answered the puzzled question with his chin held high.
"I have no wish to spend my life as some forgettable man lingering in the shadows of my brother and my father. If I serve His Highness's cause well and distinguish myself, then my name will stand proudly in the records handed down to posterity."
"Hoh."
The answer was evidently to his liking. Cantares let a faint smile drift across his face, then turned his gaze to another young nobleman in the room.
"Young Lord of House Eckhart. And you?"
"My purpose is one I trust Your Highness already knows well……."
Arcus paused briefly before continuing.
"And should it ever come to it, I'll say this plainly—do not concern yourself with my father."
"I'd assumed as much. Count Eckhart has lost a great deal of his standing at court."
Thanks to the affair in which he had severed ties with his brilliant second son, Marquis Lanford—who had once suffered a crushing humiliation at Arendt's hands—and the nobles who followed him had lost considerable influence.
Count Eckhart was no exception.
"Still, I'd rather not have him resenting me. From the Count's perspective, I've now stolen away both of his sons, after all."
Cantares tilted his head, feigning deliberation.
It was unmistakably a test of Arcus. Until his sudden arrival in the capital, Arcus had served as Count Eckhart's dutiful right hand.
Well aware of that fact, the light in Arcus's eyes turned grave.
"I will not let my father sabotage the work. If circumstances ever force my hand, I am prepared to cast aside the very name of House Eckhart to see this through."
"Good. Both of you have my favor."
Only then did Cantares break into a wide, satisfied smile.
Just then came a knock at the door, and Zereon stepped inside.
"My apologies. I'm a little late—I was assembling the necessary documents."
"That's fine. Ah, Enoch, Seton—you two may go now."
Seton and Enoch, who had still been standing stiffly in a corner of the room, snapped to attention, offered their parting bows, and scurried out of the drawing room.
Taking their place, Zereon walked over and laid a stack of documents down in front of Arcus and Henry.
"I'd like both of you to review these together."
…….
Henry picked up the papers first, and Arcus leaned in to read alongside him. A moment later, Henry looked back and forth between Zereon and Cantares in bewilderment.
"What…… exactly is this?"
"A deed of transfer of rights. It was put together in a hurry, so it was quite the ordeal."
"The ordeal was mine, Your Highness. For something like this, I would appreciate at least a few days' notice."
Zereon, who had been standing behind the Crown Prince like a shadow, added this in his usual mild tone.
As the faces of the two young lords turned awkward, Cantares cleared his throat—perhaps unnecessarily—to clear the air.
"……In any case, I purchased the alliance—a nearly defunct organization that existed in name only—with my own private funds. One of you two will take the position of Alliance Head. It's a title and nothing more, so don't feel burdened by it."
"Is this what you wished to entrust to us?"
"That's right. If we're going to face the Evil God Cult properly, we need a solid foundation."
The Crown Prince nodded at Henry's question. Having confirmed that both men were listening attentively, Cantares continued slowly.
"Honestly, the reason we haven't been crushed until now—and have even managed to strike back—is that luck has been riding with us. It's no different from averting a catastrophe through sheer fluke, every single time. I cannot allow things to continue this way."
That "luck" was, of course, the entire catalogue of outlandish schemes Arendt had undertaken entirely on his own initiative.
"Gathering information, consolidating and analyzing it, heading into the field ourselves…… Since so much of it can never be made public, the work inevitably piles onto a handful of people. It's unorganized. Inefficient."
That handful meant the Crown Prince himself, the Knight Commanders, and Arendt von Eckhart, who now stood at the very center of it all.
"Count Stadler and the head of the Neumann Merchant Guild have been a considerable help, but this way of doing things will reach its limits soon enough."
Even granting that Count Stadler was in the Crown Prince's employ, Guildmaster Neumann was assisting the imperial family purely out of his own will and his personal fondness for Arendt.
That alone was too precarious to rely on.
"More information is going to pour in without end, and the number of matters that must be handled off the books will only grow. So I need people to share the burden."
Given the nature of the business, only capable people who could be trusted needed to band together and respond systematically.
After all, they could hardly keep leaning on Arendt's prodigious strokes of luck every time.
The saving of the city this time had been nothing short of a miracle the brat had conjured out of thin air.
"So…… you are saying that you now require an institution dedicated to that work?"
"Good—I like how quickly you catch on."
When Henry asked with furrowed brows, the Crown Prince graciously nodded.
"You two will bear the alliance's banner while taking on support missions behind the scenes. When a matter demands avoiding the public eye, you run the cover-up. You gather the intelligence scattered here and there and consolidate it. As its heads."
…….
"I'll see that separate channels are arranged for you with the Neumann Merchant Guild and Count Stadler's laboratory. Strike information-supply contracts with both sides, and you'll have no trouble there."
Even that much alone amounted to a staggering workload.
"Of course, the intelligence the imperial family uncovers will be routed to you as well. You'll bring it all together and manage it."
"The crux, then, is accomplishing all of that without a soul finding out."
Arcus, who had listened in silence until now, finally spoke.
To all appearances, two young noblemen were simply diving into a new business venture—while behind the curtain, they were to aid those confronting the Evil God Cult on the front lines and pool together intelligence from every quarter.
"Precisely. The front-facing business can be anything you like. Trade, if you want—or selling off tidbits of information you pick up along the way. But if you're exposed, both you and I will find ourselves in a very difficult position, won't we?"
Whether the Cult of Cernion uncovered them or the nobles of the palace did, the consequences would be ruinous either way.
Cantares's frank explanation clearly contained a fair share of outright illegal undertakings. Their lives would be on the line, naturally—but so too would their standing, honor, and very existence as nobles.
"That said, I have not the slightest intention of leaving everything to you. The substantive direction and command will come from me. You need only handle the miscellaneous work and serve faithfully as the go-between."
As a leaden silence settled over the drawing room—for this was not a proposal one could nod along to easily—Arcus broke it.
"Is this work that will be of help to Arendt?"
"Of course. About those cover-up operations I mentioned earlier…… at least sixty percent of them exist to clean up that brat's messes."
Of the remaining forty percent, twenty belonged to the knights Arendt had dragged into his accidents with him, and the rest were the Crown Prince's own doing—but he didn't bother mentioning that.
Fortunately, that much seemed to be answer enough. Arcus nodded readily.
"I will do it."
"Then I will join as well."
Henry voiced his resolve once more.
"Might I be permitted one final question?"
"Ask."
"There is no shortage of talented people within the palace. Why, then, did you choose us?"
"A good question."
Arms crossed, Cantares flopped back against the sofa.
"As I said at the start, there aren't many around me I can trust with work of this nature. The people I've handpicked are already drowning in their duties."
…….
"Even aide Zereon would, right this moment, announce he's writing his resignation and retiring to the countryside if I added a single task to his plate."
"I'm glad you're aware of it."
When the quietly enduring aide reasserted his presence, Cantares burst out laughing.
"As for pulling someone from among the knights—those stiff-necked men would never stomach doing cleanup work…… and I doubt they'd be any good at it. But you, Young Lord Henry, this seems rather well suited to your talents."
He was flexible, quick-witted, and on occasion cunningly swift to act. And he was the trueborn son of Duke Lancelot, which made him trustworthy to a reasonable degree.
"And as for you, Young Lord Arcus—your case is simple. First, you have ample motivation to accept this work. If I were you, I'd never so much as look at that rotten little brother of mine again, yet you insist on mending the relationship. That wish of yours is well worth honoring."
…….
"And second. This is the most important one."
At the word important, Henry and Arcus involuntarily tensed.
The Crown Prince, wearing a grave expression, enunciated every word.
"Arendt. That brat pisses me off to no end."
…….
…….
For a moment, the two of them simply froze.
"He always saunters in without a shred of shame, but I suspect his dislike of you is the genuine article."
In contrast, Cantares broke into an easy grin, a mischievous smile spreading across his face.
"If you keep running into a man who hates you, it'll drive him up the wall too. I want to see that face of his."
…….
…….
Unable to summon a single word of reply, Henry and Arcus elected to simply keep their mouths shut.
Zereon, who knew better than anyone that this was no joke but the honest truth, pressed a hand to his forehead and heaved a long, long sigh.
The alliance—a shell that had been abandoned and kept alive in name only—was reborn under the name Khan Union, beneath Henry and Arcus.
True to form, the two men worked fast.
Henry submitted his resignation to the palace at once and promptly established himself in a city near the capital, setting the work in earnest motion.
An alliance could hardly sit idle under its own banner, so outwardly it was dressed up as a cooperative of merchants dealing in tea and teaware.
A place where guests came and went, sipping tea and taking refreshments while losing themselves in books—and where merchants could exchange intelligence and strike deals with one another.
Though it was ostensibly a front, a genuine business was planned to run beneath it.
It was a choice steeped, thoroughly, in Henry's own tastes—he who so loved his afternoon tea.
Arcus likewise relinquished his life in the capital under the pretense of running the venture together with Henry, relocating his base of operations.
Arendt, who until then had shown little interest in his elder brother's comings and goings, learned the full story of the affair not long after.
"……Seriously."
Crunch.
The letter the Crown Prince had sent him so graciously was wretchedly crushed in Arendt's fist—but there was not a soul alive who dared lecture him on his monumental act of lèse-majesté.
"Honestly, the ways he picks a fight come in every shape and size."
The aura he radiated was fit to tear someone apart on the spot.