The King of Peasants (6)
Thud-!
The heavy oak doors of the audience chamber slammed shut with a resounding boom.
The moment they stepped into the hallway, out of the King’s sight, the nobles who had been holding their breath finally let out sighs of relief.
“Haa… I survived.”
“I swear, I feel like I’ve aged ten years.”
Greed quickly filled the void left by fear. The relief of having escaped death transformed instantly into anticipation of new profits.
The Count of Plzeň spat as he spoke, his face flushed with excitement.
“Did you hear? He said he’d buy it all! Everything!”
“I heard, I heard! He’s buying every bit of wool and leather. Isn’t this a much better deal than digging in the dirt for a living?”
“I have quite a few wild hills sitting idle on my estate. I’ll go there tomorrow and start putting up fences. I should look into grape saplings, too!”
The nobles were already smacking their lips, imagining hills covered in flocks of sheep and vines heavy with clusters of grapes.
Pride? The honor of their houses?
Those had melted away like spring snow before the fantasy of gold coins about to pour down upon them.
That was when it happened.
“Are you all out of your minds?”
A sharp voice, like a bucket of cold water, cut through the hallway. The excited nobles turned their gazes toward the source in unison.
The one who had raised his voice was the Baron of Blatná, a lord from the southern borderlands.
He was a young noble who had only recently inherited his title, full of nothing but youthful vigor.
Unable to hide his boiling indignation, he glared at the senior nobles with eyes full of contempt.
“Are you really wagging your tails at a single bone the King tossed your way? Who are we! Are we not the noble, storied lords of Bohemia? And yet, he expects us to play the role of country shepherds? This is a clear insult!”
Čeněk furrowed his brows and gripped his cane tighter.
“Baron Blatná, lower your voice. Do you not know that the palace walls have ears?”
“I know! But I must say what needs to be said!”
Blatná huffed, unable to contain his rage.
“Look at the King’s attitude! He doesn’t treat us as equal partners; he treats us like subordinates! Land distribution? Royal supply contracts? The words sound nice, yes. But isn’t this just a scheme to strip us of our power?”
“Baron Blatná.”
“Listen to me! Let’s say it was resolved well for now. But what guarantee is there that this won’t happen again? Since the King holds us in such low regard, who’s to say when our rights will be torn up like scraps of paper again!”
His incitement stirred a few of the hot-blooded young nobles.
“He’s right. Honestly, it felt like he was… looking down on us too much.”
“Even if he is the King, interfering with the management of our estates, which is the inherent right of a lord, is a bit….”
As the atmosphere shifted strangely, Blatná, emboldened, took a step further.
“If we just stay crouched down, we’ll truly end up like sheepdogs serving the King. Before that happens, we must band together and show the King what we’re made of!”
“What do you mean by ‘show him’?”
“I mean we should show him the strength of the nobility so he won’t treat us so carelessly! If we gather the private soldiers from each estate and stage an armed protest in front of the palace, the King wouldn’t dare to….”
SLAP-!
Blatná’s head snapped to the side.
“……Huh?”
Blatná clutched his cheek with a dazed expression.
He had been struck so hard that the inside of his mouth had burst, and the metallic taste of blood lingered on the tip of his tongue.
It was Čeněk who had slapped him.
The face of the man usually called a gentle opportunist was now twisted as hideously as a demon’s.
“L-Lord Čeněk…?”
“You… you stupid bastard!”
WHACK!
Čeněk struck Blatná’s shoulder with all his might using the ebony cane he was holding.
“Gaaah!”
The young noble screamed and tumbled to the floor. But Čeněk’s beating did not stop.
“Aaaah! S-save me…!”
“If you want to die! Die alone! You crazy fool!”
Whack! Whack! WHACK!
“How dare you! How dare you speak of rebellion! You’ve decided to drag all of our necks to the executioner’s block, haven’t you!”
Čeněk swung his cane like a man who had lost his reason.
As the middle-aged noble in flashy silk robes began to beat the young man on the floor like a stray dog, the surrounding nobles, horrified, rushed to stop him.
“L-Lord Čeněk! Calm yourself!”
“You’ll kill the boy!”
Only then did Čeněk stop his beating, gasping for air.
“Haa… haa….”
Baron Blatná, collapsed on the floor, was sobbing, curled up in pain.
“Sob…! Even my father never hit me…!”
His expensive clothes were a mess of dirt and bloodstains, and his lofty noble pride had been torn to shreds.
Čeněk wiped his sweat-drenched forehead with a handkerchief and slowly turned toward the terrified nobles.
His eyes were not filled with anger, but rather trembling with a deep, profound fear.
“Listen well. This is both my sincere advice and a warning.”
His voice was low, making it all the more chilling.
“Never, under any circumstances, think of displeasing His Majesty the King. Do not even plot treason in your dreams.”
“But Lord Čeněk… our rights….”
“Rights?”
Čeněk scoffed.
“Wake up. He is not like the kings we have known. He is neither incompetent like the late King Wenceslaus IV, nor is he merely cunning like Sigismund.”
To him, the King named Ulrich was an incomprehensible existence.
A man who tore up the Pope’s excommunication decree, slaughtered the Emperor’s army of 100,000, paved roads with stone, and brought down castle walls with iron.
And yet, rather than receiving divine punishment, he lived on, making Bohemia more prosperous than ever before.
“Search through all the history books of Europe. Has there ever been a king who won after making both God and the Emperor his enemies at the same time! He is not a monarch within the common sense we have known.”
Overwhelming military power and incomprehensible knowledge.
A thorough utilitarianism devoid of blood or tears.
If the philosopher-king spoken of by the ancient philosopher Plato were to appear in reality, would he not look exactly like that?
In truth, Čeněk did not want to be here today. He had only taken the lead because his own livelihood was at stake and the subordinates below him were whining so much.
‘Damn it, rumors are already flying that the King has created some sort of intelligence agency….’
That Hungarian brat they call Janos.
The man they call the King’s shadow might be listening from somewhere.
And yet, they were spouting nonsense about gathering private soldiers and staging armed protests in the middle of the royal palace? This was simply a call for everyone to die together.
Čeněk’s gaze swept over Blatná with contempt.
“The King is a fearful person. But for that very reason, he is a being to be revered all the more.”
The faces of kings who had passed through Bohemia, or had nearly done so, flashed through his mind.
The late King Wenceslaus IV was incompetent.
Under his rule, nobles could reign like kings. But the price of that debauchery was harsh.
The country fell into chaos, and in the end, did the great fire known as the Hussite Wars not consume the entire land?
Emperor Sigismund was cruel.
He regarded Bohemia only as a frontier of the Empire, a mere object to be squeezed and exploited.
Above all, he was a liar who betrayed his faith at the critical moment. He was not worth serving.
Compared to him, what of Ulrich, who now sits on the throne?
If you took any king in Europe and sat him in that seat, could he have achieved as much?
Are you afraid of the new King? Yes.
But can you deny his charisma? No.
He was not a monarch who would ruin the country through incompetence, nor one who would cowardly abandon his subjects. He was a king worthy of loyalty.
Čeněk struck the floor with the tip of his cane.
“Fortunately, he is merciful. Do you not know this just by looking at today’s audience? As long as we do not cross the line, he will not let us starve. No, he will actually feed us until we burst.”
His gaze sank coldly.
“But do you know what happens if you cross that line? Think of the Duke of Rosenberg.”
Rosenberg.
The moment that name was mentioned, a chill ran down the nobles’ spines.
A great noble who once commanded southern Bohemia.
The leader of the Catholic nobles, a powerful family that even past Bohemian kings could not treat lightly.
But now, that name had become synonymous with ruin.
“What is the state of the Duke of Rosenberg, who was once so imposing? They say his entire territory was confiscated by a single decree, and he is now reduced to sleeping in a bedroom where the wind and rain leak in because he cannot even repair the castle walls crumbled by cannons.”
The nobles’ faces turned deathly pale.
It was not just someone else’s story.
The chilling fear that the moment they displeased the King, they could become the second Rosenberg at any time.
“So, if you want to live, stay flat on the ground for now. Just accept the scraps the King tosses you, and quietly raise your sheep within the fences he has set up. Unless you want to be dragged to the slaughterhouse for barking needlessly.”
As if he had no more business here, he leaned on his ebony cane and turned his body roughly.
Click, click-
As Čeněk left, the nobles who had been standing blankly came to their senses.
They realized instinctively. To keep their feet in this hallway meant they would become accomplices to that stupid rebel collapsed on the floor.
“L-let’s go together! Lord Čeněk!”
“Please wait a moment!”
The nobles ignored Baron Blatná, who was collapsed on the floor, and hurriedly followed behind Čeněk.
Only the smell of blood and pathetic sobbing remained in the empty hallway.
***
Time passed—
It was April in the Old Town Square of Prague, where the spring sunlight poured down dazzlingly.
Normally, this would be the time when the earth, frozen throughout the winter, would melt into a quagmire of mud that would swallow one up to the ankles, but this year was different.
Instead of slushy mud, hundreds of people were lined up in a long queue on the solid concrete road.
In their hands, each held a crumpled identification card or an old military dog tag as if it were precious.
“Hoo….”
Jaroslav, a man standing in the middle of the line, swallowed dryly and adjusted the crutch digging into his armpit.
For him, having had his left thigh amputated below the hip, standing for a long time was a pain akin to torture.
Cold sweat continued to soak his back, but he had no intention of leaving his spot. No, even if his one remaining leg were to break, he could never leave this place.
“Honey, aren’t you tired? Why don’t you sit down for a bit?”
His wife, Bianca, who was standing beside him, tugged at his sleeve with a worried face.
On her back, the youngest nursing child was wrapped in a swaddling cloth, and in her hands, she held the fern-like hands of their six-year-old daughter and eight-year-old son.
Jaroslav shook his head firmly.
“No. I can endure it. This much… is nothing.”
A month ago, the memory of hearing the King’s decree on that very wall in front of the city hall and weeping uncontrollably was still vivid.
The King’s promise to give them land.
The unbelievable declaration that even if he had no leg, even if he were a cripple discarded after fulfilling his use on the battlefield, he could have his own land.
He had returned home, hugged his wife, and wept like a beast all night long. And as soon as the day broke, he had run to the government office and submitted his application.
A full month had passed since then.
It was only yesterday evening that he had received word that his screening was complete and his land distribution had been confirmed.
Jaroslav hadn’t slept a wink all night. It was out of anxiety, wondering if it might be a dream, or if the administrator might cancel it, claiming a mistake.
“Next!”
As the line shortened little by little following the administrator’s shout, Jaroslav’s turn finally arrived.
He stood in front of the reception desk, limping with