Cooperation, If You Please
And then, the next day.
"Last night, Crown Prince Cantares al Callion of the Callion Empire was attacked."
The announcement came from Crown Prince Victor of the Lucain Kingdom, delivered to the assembled representatives of every nation in the conference hall with a face stiff as stone.
"Unidentified assassins stormed His Highness's quarters. We are still working to establish the full details."
"......"
A silence fell over the room, cold as a bucket of ice water dumped over the assembly. In the face of news no one knew how to respond to, someone murmured as if in a trance.
"Good heavens. How could such a thing..."
"Is His Highness the Crown Prince unharmed?"
"Have they caught the culprits?"
As if that had been the signal, the conference room erupted into chaos in an instant.
The murmuring crowd fell silent only when Victor raised one hand in a smooth, deliberate gesture.
Just then, the closed doors of the hall swung open, and the man at the center of it all — Cantares himself — strode in with Laios and Arendt in tow.
The man seated at the very front shot to his feet.
"Your Highness! Thank goodness you are safe!"
"Thank you for your concern. Not a scratch on me. Though it seems we've caused an unsavory incident and troubled the Lucain Kingdom for nothing."
"Troubled us? Nonsense. To think such a thing could happen within the palace walls — I can hardly hold my head up."
Victor bowed his head deep in apology. Cantares gave his shoulder a couple of friendly pats before turning back to survey the room.
"Our knights dealt with all the assassins. Every one of them was confirmed to be carrying an Invisibility Scroll, and given that none could be identified, we believe them to be professional killers."
"How could such a thing happen..."
Someone let out a groan of despair. The Crown Prince of the Callion Empire, attacked! And who knew how many of their remnants might still be lurking about?
Victor continued in a measured tone.
"I apologize, distinguished guests, but would it be acceptable to postpone the summit until the situation is fully resolved? We will do everything in our power to make your extended stay as comfortable as possible."
"......"
The faces of the assembled dignitaries froze over — this time in an entirely different sense than before.
Only after a long, painful pause did someone come to their senses and stammer out a protest.
"W-wait just a moment. What do you mean by that? Extend our stay?"
"I mean exactly what I said. I understand it is an inconvenience, but I must insist. With the mastermind still unidentified, we cannot rule out the possibility of an incident befalling you on the road home. This proposal comes from genuine concern."
Victor's answer was resolute.
He had wrapped it in diplomatic courtesy, but not a single person in that room failed to grasp what he was actually saying.
One of you is the mastermind. And so, not one of you leaves until we've flushed them out.
"But still..."
Someone opened their mouth despite themselves, then quickly shut it again. They had realized that walking out right now would amount to painting a target on their own back.
Once the room had gone quiet, Cantares spoke in a flat, unhurried voice.
"Invisibility Scrolls, recovered from the assassins' bodies. Those happen to be a favorite tool of the Evil God Cult as of late. And there is precious little else in this world brazen enough to come after me so openly. I'll admit the next part requires a certain... expansive reading, but the targets were not only me—"
"......"
"—but everyone gathered here as well. We are, after all, their enemies."
In other words, any one of them could be attacked at any moment.
"...I am sorry to say this, but we cannot dispel the suspicion that someone in league with those fiends is sitting among us. If the mastermind is not exposed here and now, none of us can be assured of our safety going forward. Therefore—"
Cantares's frost-blue eyes swept slowly across the assembly... and came to rest on Alois.
Watching the Nephele Crown Prince's face harden like carved ice, the Imperial Crown Prince allowed himself the faintest of smiles.
"We ask for your full cooperation."
If there was one thing Arthur and Licht had overlooked, it was that the Crown Prince of the Callion Empire was hardly a model of sanity himself.
Arendt had barged into his chambers in the dead of night, shoving in the corpses of assassins whose breath had long since stopped, chattering utter nonsense all the while.
"Care to play the threatened victim of an assassination attempt, Your Highness?"
And the Crown Prince — after only a brief moment of visible awkwardness — had nodded along.
Arthur and Licht had seen it. The Crown Prince, wearing an expression uncannily similar to Arendt's, eyes gleaming with the unmistakable light of a man who found this fun.
By the time the two of them, having failed utterly to talk sense into either party, had dragged Laios to the scene, the conspiracy between the pair was already complete.
"I've been having doubts lately about my decision to become a knight..."
"Hold on. It can't be helped."
Licht could only speak with grim finality as he regarded his suffering junior with pity — though his own circumstances were no different.
The night before, these men had accomplished an absolutely staggering amount of work.
Dispatching the assassins had merely been the opening act. They had to haul the bodies all the way to the Crown Prince's chambers, wreck the room, and spatter blood around in artful moderation until the whole scene looked convincingly like a battle.
The mastermind directing every step of it had been Arendt, with Arthur and Licht executing the work while the Crown Prince interjected the occasional helpful suggestion.
Laios, who had come running at their desperate summons, took one look and realized that the Crown Prince, too, had fallen under Arendt's sway. He simply pressed a hand to his forehead and heaved one long sigh after another.
Ultimately, of course, everything had worked out splendidly.
Faced with a Crown Prince Victor gone white as a sheet at the sight of the carnage, Arendt had delivered a report woven from truth and falsehood in exquisite proportion. The inherently good-natured prince, confronted with such flawless evidence, swallowed every word whole — and so the situation had arrived where it stood now.
Everything, down to the last detail, had gone exactly as Arendt intended.
Had the one attacked been a mere apprentice knight, everyone would have clamored to pack up and go home — why bother identifying culprits when this place is clearly too dangerous? It had been obvious.
And so now they all sat in the new residence the Lucain royal family had prepared for the Imperial Crown Prince.
Cantares, leisurely sipping his tea, cast a glance at the knights sprawled about the room.
"And why exactly are you all still here? The Lucain royal house has assigned more than enough guards. You're free to head back whenever you like."
"With respect, Your Highness... we would rather not."
Arthur mumbled in the voice of a dying man. Laios and Licht, apparently sharing the sentiment, gave small, weary nods.
Word that the Crown Prince had been attacked had thrown the entire Imperial Knights into an uproar. The three of them could not bring themselves to go back and explain the truth of the matter.
They would be guaranteed a truly spectacular dressing-down.
Cantares, piecing together the general situation, magnanimously permitted the audacity of using the Crown Prince's own residence as a bomb shelter. The palace was a minefield of frosty tension, but at least this one room remained perfectly peaceful — so what harm could it do?
Though it was also a peace destined to shatter the instant Arendt returned.
Rolling his eyes, Arthur sidled up with a question.
"By the way, Commander, where did Arendt go? Is it really fine to let him wander around alone, slinking about by himself?"
"...Worry about someone who needs worrying."
On the heels of Laios's sighing answer, Cantares burst out with a snort of laughter.
"About now, he's probably got some poor innocent soul cornered."
CRASH!
A chair reserved for distinguished guests went flying and slammed into the wall. Even that was not enough to burn off his fury, and Alois kicked the table over as well.
BANG!
Only after watching the luxurious table clatter to the floor did Alois finally draw in the breath that had been rising up his throat.
The Crown Prince was attacked, they say?
He had already been unable to suppress a creeping dread ever since the previous night, when the assassins' regular reports had gone silent. In the worst case, he had told himself, they had simply failed and fled. Instead, something beyond imagination had come to pass.
The assassins who had stormed the Crown Prince's quarters had been slaughtered to the last man by the Imperial Knights of the Callion Empire. And among the knights who had dispatched them was none other than Arendt von Eckhart — the original target.
Did they move while he was with the Crown Prince?
No. Impossible.
Those men were the finest assassins the kingdom had to offer. They had never once failed an assignment, and they were incapable of such a rookie blunder. He had poured endless effort into cultivating them, after all.
Right. That's not it. They can't have been after the Crown Prince. I never gave any such order.
The ones claiming the Crown Prince had been attacked pointed to the very quarters where he had been staying. Which meant, by their own account, the assassins had set out with the Crown Prince as their mark from the start — and that made no sense at all.
"Brother. Brother."
Matthias, watching nervously from a corner of the room, ventured to speak. But Alois did not seem to even register the sound of his voice.
Matthias swallowed dryly and raised his voice.
"Brother!"
"What! I'm thinking, so stop calling me!"
As irritation burst from Alois's mouth, Matthias added carefully,
"Why are you so angry? His Highness the Crown Prince was attacked — cooperating with the investigation is only natural."
"If you know nothing, then keep your mouth shut, you useless—!"
Alois snarled at him like a beast ready to tear him apart on the spot.
In the end, Matthias simply closed the mouth that had opened and shut a few times.
Gazing at the Crown Prince with eyes grown complicated and still, Matthias left the room without so much as a parting word.
Behind him came the sound of yet another object being hurled across the room.
As he walked down the corridor, Matthias furrowed his brow in misery and pressed hard against his temples. If he didn't do something — anything — he felt he would be sick to his very stomach.
Father...
The face of his beloved elder sister, clasping his hands tight and pressing her plea upon him on the day they left the Nephele Kingdom, was still vivid before his eyes.
"You must watch your brother closely, so that he cannot do anything reckless. You can do that much, can't you?"
And so Matthias had come all the way to the Lucain Kingdom, leaving their ailing father in his sister's sole care.
But the deed was already done.
He could not drive from his mind the suspicion that the mastermind behind the attack on the Crown Prince was none other than his own brother.
As a prince, and as his father's son, he could not simply stand by and watch this unfold.
Even if it meant making an enemy of the Crown Prince himself.
And yet...
I have no power.
At first, he had thought to somehow get a word with the Crown Prince. It had rested on the vague hope that if he simply asked for his help, something might be arranged — but with matters now as they stood, even that was beyond him.
And if it ever came to light that Alois was behind this affair, the Nephele Kingdom would be finished.
Cold sweat gathered in his palms.
If his brother had truly joined hands with the Evil God Cult and attempted to assassinate the Crown Prince...
What am I supposed to do?
He refused, absolutely refused, to watch his kingdom collapse because of one stupid man's ambition.
Lost in anguish as he trudged blankly down the corridor, Matthias failed to notice the figure approaching until it was nearly upon him.
"Prince Matthias?"
"Y-yes?! Yes?!"
He jerked his head up in startlement and found himself meeting the eyes of a young knight he vaguely recognized.
"Ah — my apologies. I had no intention of startling you."
"Oh, no, I mean..."
At the sight of the pure white silver hair and the face still carrying traces of boyhood, the knight's name came to him with surprising ease.
"Sir Arendt von Eckhart, I presume. Forgive me — I was lost in other thoughts."
An apprentice knight of the Callion Empire.
From what he'd heard, the boy had not yet even received formal investiture, yet had already earned extraordinary distinction and stood high in the confidence of both Commander Laios and the Crown Prince himself.
Rumor, it seemed, had not exaggerated. Even standing at attention, the young knight radiated the poise and elegance of a thoroughly well-schooled soldier.
"With enemies possibly still at large, it is dangerous to go about alone, Your Highness."
"N-no, I'm quite all right. Thank you for your concern."
The last thing Matthias wanted right now was to become entangled with anyone from the Callion Empire.
He moved hurriedly to excuse himself — but Arendt's next words caught his feet like a snare.
"I'm terribly sorry, but would you stop for just a moment, Prince Matthias?"
"......!"
A chill ran down his spine.
He whipped around — and found himself face to face with the apprentice knight, now standing with his head tilted at a insolent angle, regarding him with eyes gone cold as a blade.
Not a trace remained of the courtesy from their first exchange.
"I rather doubt you have a taste for dying alongside a sinking nation."
"......"
"For the sake of your kingdom, I'd say it's worth trying out a defense or two. Of course, if you'd prefer to watch everything burn while lifting not a finger, by all means — go right ahead."
A single, bone-deep line, delivered by someone who already knew everything.
Matthias's face drained of all color.