Chapter 243 - The Moon and the Waves
“The Fifth Son of Millesdusk. Keep him close.”
“…Your Majesty.”
The Chancellor asked his lord the question he had endured and endured until now.
“Why the Fifth Son? What is he, and what did he do in the Imperial Palace, that His Highness the Margrave, His Highness the Crown Prince, and even Your Majesty would rely on him?”
“I am not relying on him. Also, I did not know even Milant would act like that. But I do know why he is doing it. His reason is different from mine.”
“I wish to know Your Majesty’s reason.”
“My reason…”
The emperor looked up at the sky. The first thing he saw was the moon, which was now slowly approaching fullness.
“Chancellor. Do you see that moon?”
“Yes. I see it.”
“You did not even raise your head, yet you say you see it? That will not do.”
The emperor walked onto the well-tended grass. Since the sovereign did so, his subject followed him.
However, the subject hesitated to follow even his lord’s next action.
Thud—
“Lie down.”
“…Your Majesty.”
“Come now.”
“……”
The Chancellor carefully arranged his shabby clothes and lay down at a spot exactly one and a half steps away from the emperor.
The two placed their wrinkled hands neatly over their stomachs and looked up at the sky.
“When was the last time you lay down like this and looked at the sky? No, when was the last time you even lifted your head and looked at the sky?”
“I do not remember.”
“If you, who would remember the minutes of a meeting from ten years ago, say you do not remember, then it must truly have been a long time.”
Emperor Miliard gave a hearty laugh and exhaled a long breath.
“I am sorry. I overworked you so much that you could not even recall the appearance of the stars.”
“…I did it because I wished to. And the night sky is the same every night, so it is all right even if I do not look at it today.”
“But never looking at it for an entire lifetime is a problem.”
“Do you look at it often, Your Majesty? That night sky.”
“I have begun looking at it often recently. To be precise, I have often looked at that moon.”
The emperor’s index finger pointed at the moon that would soon become full.
“That moon is like a wave. A wave is like a person’s life. It begins calm, rises high, reaches its peak, and then sinks again.”
“Your Majesty is still a high wave.”
“A high wave is not what is needed in these troubled times. What is needed is not a wave that has only to fall, but waves that have only to rise. As many of them as possible.”
The Chancellor realized what the emperor meant.
“Then does Your Majesty see the Fifth Son of Millesdusk as a wave that has only to rise, just like His Highness the Crown Prince?”
“That is how I see him. Do you see him differently?”
“I have not yet observed the Fifth Son for long. I have not even held a proper conversation with him, but even in that brief moment, I felt something.”
“Haha. It seems you felt the same thing I did.”
The image the Fifth Son had shown a little earlier still would not leave the Chancellor’s mind.
“The Fifth Son. He is flexible enough to bend even the family where he was born and raised, and even its pride.”
“Like a snake.”
“…Yes. Like a snake.”
A snake was so flexible that it bent wherever one touched it, from head to tail, and instead tightened around the throat of its prey.
The Chancellor had tested the Crown Prince and stabbed at the Youngest Son at the same time.
However, the Chancellor’s sharp dagger had missed because of his flexibility.
Instead, starting from his legs, his entire body had been bound inside the coils.
In a moment so brief that he could not even come to his senses, he had only been able to stare at his own body, unable to move.
—Do not interrupt His Highness the Crown Prince’s words with a question whose answer is obvious. Even to me, who is not an imperial citizen, it does not seem proper.
“…The Fifth Son. He is dangerous.”
The Chancellor’s body, lying on the grass, trembled faintly.
“He is not someone you should keep close. Rather, you should end him now, while he is inside the Empire. I will build a bridge with Wisdom once more, so—”
“That matter is already over. I raised Millesdusk’s hand, and I have decided to cut off Wisdom.”
“Cut them off? That is unlike Your Majesty. Instead of maintaining the balance of the world, you are trying to collapse it.”
After a brief silence, the emperor gave a small gesture with his chin.
“Look at the moon, not at me. Everything I want to say is there.”
“What meaning could there be in that moon?”
“There may be none. But in my eyes, there is. Perhaps one day, that meaning will appear in your eyes as well.”
“You have become sentimental. Where has the Iron Blood I served gone?”
“Hahaha.”
The emperor laughed in a low voice.
“There is no longer any need to play the part of the Iron Blood. The emperor of the next generation will not show that Iron Blood either, so I only hope you will guide him well by his side.”
“What I do well is only maintaining the status quo. Troubled times like these do not suit a person like me.”
“That is why I recommended a suitable talent to you.”
“…The Fifth Son.”
The emperor nodded.
“He is extremely well suited to troubled times like these. He was born to create troubled times, lead them, grasp them, and shake them.”
“So you are telling me to keep him by my side and use him, as long as these troubled times continue.”
“What you do afterward will be up to you. But do not think you can control the young snake over there. As you said, he is a dangerous snake.”
“Understood.”
Rustle—
The emperor finally rose from the grass.
“And the reason I closed the doors of the Imperial Palace for seven months was because the Crown Prince collapsed onto his sickbed.”
“Yes…?”
The Chancellor’s eyes flashed wide open. They were still narrow eyes, but his blue irises could be seen clearly.
The emperor laughed softly and patted the speechless Chancellor on the shoulder.
“It was not because I did not trust you that I pushed you out. I had to push even you away so the other powerful ministers would accept it and not peer into the Imperial Palace.”
“…Then His Highness the Crown Prince has fully recovered?”
“Yes. I intended to use the Elixir as a pretext to make a contract with Wisdom, but the Fifth Son, who led the Millesdusk delegation here, raised the Crown Prince from his sickbed.”
“Even so, the reason you wish to keep the Fifth Son close is not gratitude, but because you expect him to become one of the central figures of these troubled times.”
After hearing the whole situation, the Chancellor’s expression softened slightly.
“That is correct. The Fifth Son will leave the Imperial Palace within a few days, so it would be good for you to exchange even a brief conversation with him.”
“Understood.”
After nodding, the Chancellor turned his head briefly toward the social gathering hall.
“Does His Highness the Margrave also see him as one of the central figures of these troubled times?”
“As I said before, his reason is somewhat different. He wishes to use the Fifth Son’s talent for troubled times more actively.”
“Surely… he does not intend to use the East to start a war with Winterbringer?”
“Who knows. I wonder how that will turn out.”
The emperor turned his body and began walking once more.
However, the direction was not toward the social gathering hall.
“You may return now. I have finished everything I set out to do today.”
“…Please take care on your way, Your Majesty.”
The Chancellor of the Empire paid his respects to the back of the sovereign he had served for so long.
As the emperor gradually moved away from his old subordinate, he walked into the shadows, and at some point, the sound of his footsteps became two.
“For him to call me sentimental, that friend has far more tears than I do, does he not?”
“With eyes that narrow, it would be less that tears flow and more that they are squeezed out like juice.”
The Fanatical Knight Leo answered as he followed behind the emperor.
After laughing briefly, the emperor glanced at him.
“You heard it too, did you not? From now on, you will live as the Crown Prince’s guard.”
“Understood.”
“You are not crying.”
The emperor turned his eyes toward the guard knight. However, the knight’s face could not be seen because of his helmet.
It was unknown what expression he wore behind that helmet, but Leo spoke quietly.
“I shed all my tears on the first day I became Your Majesty’s guard.”
“…Is that so?”
After answering briefly, the emperor moved on.
“Let us go to the office. I must prepare to hand things over.”
***
In the social gathering hall after the Chancellor and the emperor had disappeared.
At some point, the Princess was no longer visible either, and only the Crown Prince remained, chatting with the Margrave.
“Exil. Why have you become so thin? It would be difficult for food served in the Imperial Palace to taste bad.”
“I lived day and night dealing with the delegations, so I have grown a little gaunt. Thank you for worrying about me, Uncle.”
“If you spent just two months at the borderland, you would look far better than you do now.”
“Hahaha…. You are good at joking, Uncle.”
The Crown Prince tried to laugh it off awkwardly, but the Margrave’s expression seemed sincere.
So, before his uncle the Margrave could reveal that sincerity, the Crown Prince quickly changed the subject.
“It seems you met Dante before this.”
“Dante, is it? You call him quite familiarly.”
“His Majesty and I chose the Millesdusk delegation, and I also spoke with him privately. We shared drinks as well.”
They had only drunk at the banquet hall, but it was not a lie.
It also contained his hope that he would one day like to drink with the Youngest Son properly.
“Dante. Would you come here for a moment?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Since earlier, he had not mingled with the central nobles, and even when someone spoke to him, he only let the words pass by.
Rather, he had been trying to converse with Pale beside him, but even from briefly overhearing it, it was clear he was simply trying to tease him.
When the Youngest Son came closer, Pale naturally approached as well.
Of course, he could not draw as close as the person he was protecting, and had to stop behind the Margrave.
The Crown Prince glanced at the white-haired knight.
“Is he the one called the next Margrave?”
“For now, that is what we say in the borderland, but naturally, we must hear what the center thinks as well. Pale. Step forward and greet him.”
The white-haired knight stood before the Crown Prince while suppressing the trembling of his body as much as possible.
“I am Pale, a borderland knight.”
The Crown Prince smiled gently.
“I can see why Uncle favors you. I can clearly feel the spirit of a borderland knight from you.”
“He is trembling before you like a candle in the wind, but before a Snowfield Giant, there is no beast like him.”
The Margrave patted Pale’s back with a hand that was truly like that of a beast.
It was a light gesture, yet loud smacks rang out. It seemed that enduring the pain was harder than enduring the trembling.
“For a knight like this to be the successor Uncle has chosen, the borderland of the next generation will be safe as well.”
“I will do my utmost.”
The Crown Prince nodded and finally turned back to the foreign guest.
“How is the social gathering hall?”
“It is fine, aside from the back of my head stinging.”
“Hahaha.”
The Crown Prince laughed without realizing it.
The heir of the Empire, the Margrave, and the future successor of the borderland.
On top of that, the Youngest Son, a person of special interest in the East-West war.
Right now, there was an invisible line here. They were in the same space, but the other nobles could not cross that line.
However, there would certainly be someone who tried to cross it.
“I know what you are worried about, and that must be why you brought a guard as well, but with Uncle and me here, such an absurd thing will not happen.”
“Yes. I hope so as well. But because of where I come from, I do not think I can relax until the very end.”
His origin was Millesdusk, the Great Family of sorcerers in the East.
The Margrave, the Crown Prince, and even Pale naturally nodded.
The wariness that had become natural simply because of his origin had continued since earlier.
He had already sorted out which people among those gathered in this social gathering hall had to be watched carefully.
Furthermore, a few among them had disappeared from here.
The leader of those few was a powerful figure among the central nobles.
‘Count Baha. A man who craves attention like that will never sit still.’
He would certainly do something, even if he had to borrow another person’s hand.