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Light a Fire (4)
I promptly got up from my seat. If I waited, I knew the Wyvern Knights would come to me, but I had no intention of sitting around until they found me.
“Guide me. I’ll go to them.”
I left the council room right away, following the messenger.
“What is their status?”
“It seems that both the wyverns and their riders are tired, as if they flew here non-stop, your Highness. But the knights’ faces weren’t dark.”
I sighed in relief. Fortunately, it didn’t seem as if a great loss had occurred.
“Didn’t they tell you what happened to his Majesty and the Eastern Fleet?”
“Before they touched down completely, I ran to get your Highness,” the messenger replied with some regret. “If your Highness meets them in person, you will know. There is no sorrow on their faces.”
I hurried my steps, then, and it wasn’t long before we reached the citadel’s courtyard.
“Ah.”
The mighty wyverns had their long tongues out as they panted. The Sky Knights leaned against the side of their wyverns, their eyes closed. Among them was Jin Katrin, the young vice-commander of the Sky Knights. They all looked like horsemen who had ridden hard, beset by fatigue.
“Your-”
“Shh.”
When I saw that the soldiers wanted to pay me the proper courtesy, I put my finger to my mouth.
“Don’t make a fuss.”
After speaking, I quietly looked at the condition of the Wyvern Knights. They were stretched out against their mounts, so very tired. Seeing the proud aerial knights hanging their heads before soldiers from another country told me just how exhausted they were.
“They wanted to take a break before reporting to your Highness. They’ve been like this ever since,” said the citadel commander apologetically as he took an awkward look at the Sky Knights.
“They’re exhausted. I don’t know, but they must’ve flown across the continent.”
I gave a small nod and turned to look at Jin Katrin and the Wyvern Knights for a while.
“Send for me later, when they wake up,” I ordered.
“Your Highness came this far, waiting for a while to hear their report-”
“If the news of the war had been grim, they would have reported it to my face and then collapsed. They would not have taken time to rest.”
I knew that they would not have considered resting if they had come here as defeated warriors.
Even if the Wyvern Knights seemed exhausted enough to faint on the spot, their mood didn’t look that bad. The unshakable anxiety I had felt after our allied fleet left for the Empire’s mainland was now much diluted. There was no reason for me not to be patient for a while.
I went back to the council room and waited for the Sky Knights to awaken. Jin Katrin found me there not long after I had left the courtyard.
“Your Highness.”
The knight had not been able to relieve his fatigue completely, but his expression was bright.
After seeing his face, the stress and worry that had remained within me disappeared. I became very relaxed.
“It seems that you were in such a hurry to come here that you fell asleep without seeing me coming or going.”
“I didn’t fall asleep. I just closed my eyes for a moment to organize the report for your Highness in my head.”
“You were snoring.”
“No way. I’ve never heard anyone tell me I snore in my entire life.”
“First wipe the drool from your mouth, then talk.”
As Jin heard this, he wiped his mouth and coughed. He then quickly corrected his posture.
“I, Jin Katrin of the Dotrin Kingdom, vice-commander of the Knights of the Sky, give my report. I flew day and night to deliver the news of our allied forces.”
I also straightened my posture and waited for him to continue talking.
“I will tell you the conclusion first,” Jin said as he looked at me. “We have won more than was expected.”
My hands felt on fire as I heard this, but instead of delighting, I looked at Jin and touched my lips. There was news I wanted to hear more eagerly about than the war, but my mouth could not speak the words. When Jin Katrin saw me looking at him like that, he smiled gently and said, “Leonberg’s monarch is safe.”
“Ah,” I uttered an ambiguous sound, neither groan nor delighted sigh. I had thought that there was no more anxiety left in me, but that wasn’t the case. Only then did my heart unclench and relax.
“Is there a more detailed report?” I asked energetically to hide my feelings. Jin looked at me with a knowing face, and I pretended not to see his smile.
“The fleet sailed south as planned and made call in one of Dotrin’s ports. There they joined up with three of Dotrin’s legions who were ready to campaign, and sailed for the imperial mainland.”
The status of the fleet, unknown to me, began to flow from Jin’s mouth. I listened quietly. There were so many things I wanted to ask him, but I chose not to interrupt his tale.
“The original plan was to land at one Dotrin’s old, ruined fortresses, sailing past the shores bordered by the forest and heading on from there. But during the voyage, the two monarchs held head-to-head meetings and revised the plan.”
I had planned to listen to the end, but that notion quickly faded because the decision of the two kings far exceeded my expectations.
“They, therefore, went further west than originally planned, sailing until it was full moon and landing in the southern part of the Empire. In the area adjacent to Hwaryong’s territory.”
“Why the hell would they do such a dangerous thing?” I wanted to know.
“The first reason was that the Empire has all but lost control over much of the area bordering Hwaryong’s territory. It would be safer for the allied forces to operate from there. The second reason was that they could easily march east from there.”
It was a reasonable strategy and offered them a pretty good advantage. The existence of Hwaryong was intimidating for a reason, however. The advantage of avoiding enemy scrutiny and operating outside of imperial influence was paltry compared to the threat of the dragon. Hwaryong’s realm wasn’t formed along the lines of human borders. If a single person accidentally entered the fire dragon’s territory, Leonberg and Dotrin’s armies could have been annihilated before launching a proper attack on the Empire.
When I pointed this out, Jin Katrin responded as if he had expected me to do so.
“When we first encountered the fire dragon, our wyverns refused to fly because of its presence. They recovered after a while, but that doesn’t mean that they have forgotten that peculiar smell. Unless the wyverns forget the imprint of Hwaryong’s scent, they won’t accidentally enter its territory.”
Jin Katrin had alleviated my concerns and continued his report.
“Anyway, we landed there and started marching north right away.”
They destroyed the noble families adjacent to the southern territory in a day. They razed several major strongholds and burned down many warehouses. The imperial troops that put up a sporadic resistance were destroyed in succession.
It was a total victory. Thanks to the forces already swept away by Hwaryong, many families of great lords were no more. These families were the ones who would’ve protected the central region from invasion, so those imperial forces remaining collapsed without offering much resistance.
Of course, the Empire didn’t just sit back and watch as the armies of two nations penetrated deep into its mainland. The central region’s great lords were ordered to act by the imperial family, and headed south with their own troops to salvage the devastating situation.
The imperial troops that massed together numbered about twenty legions. I had fought against the Empire countless times and knew what dire potential such a force had.
Nevertheless, Leonberg and Dotrin’s forces were not defeated.
“The odds became unfavorable, so it proved wise to pull our body of troops toward Hwaryong’s territory.”
The Imperial Army was bound by imperial decree not to stimulate the fire dragon, and the ability of the Wyvern Knights to know of the dragon’s presence fit the situation perfectly.
Even with its great power, the result was that the Imperial Army could do nothing against the five legions that moved around the Empire. Their goal became urgent defense rather than pursuit.
It certainly did help our forces, but the plan didn’t sound very attractive to me.
“If the enemy went insane and entered the fire dragon’s territory, its wrath would not have been limited to the Imperial Army,” I stated. Hwaryong didn’t care what banners an army hoisted.
If something invades its territory, it burns it into nothingness. Anything offensive to the dragon’s sight would be destroyed in the process. That is Hwaryong.
“Our allied army split into groups. Even if the moment came when the fire dragon went mad, we could reduce the damage.”
Jin told me that the two kings operated with such a situation in mind. I wasn’t sure whether to judge their plan as outrageous or reckless.
“Both the soldiers and knights of Dotrin could not stop admiring the resolve of Leonberg’s nobles.”
I looked at Jin Katrin, not sure what he was talking about.
“There were times when imperial troops violated imperial command and pursued our forces, forced to do so by their commanders. Each time, the nobles who went with your father came out. They provoked the Imperial Army every time, luring them closer to Hwaryong’s territory, camping near its borders.”
Jin said that the imperial army, infuriated by such outright provocation, eventually fell back without daring to catch up with the nobles.
“The nobles of Leonberg did that?”
“Yeah. The Imperial Army was suppressed in that manner, with the nobles prepared to face annihilation, almost provoking the dragon to rise.”
I laughed as I heard that. I now understood how the situation had unfolded.
All of Leonberg’s loyalists, except for the champions and the king’s closest comrades, had remained behind in the kingdom. The nobles who had followed the king into the war had barely escaped execution as traitors, and they were not men of good quality.
They had the courage to sell out their country, but not the determination to die for it. They were nothing. Persons like them would not have willingly held a dangerous position, facing annihilation from the enemy. They probably didn’t know the truth of the situation, and the imperial forces couldn’t dare to fight with them properly, so near to the dragon. The imperials were forced back, knowing it was not worth trying to swallow the bait.
Personally, I would not have humored the traitor nobles; it was like keeping a pet volcano, never knowing when lava will erupt right next to me. Now I understood why the king dared to drag them along with him, though. He had told me that the kingdom could collapse if we cut off all the corrupted parts at once, and we both knew that the traitors’ blood relatives were trying to dedicate themselves to Leonberg with new hearts.
It seemed that the king never intended to save these nobles in the first place. Why else would he have dragged all those unhelpful aristocrats after him? Perhaps he intended to abandon them in the Empire. It was a really good idea.
It is ten million times better for those who are to die anyway to leave their children with the pride of having lost a father who died fighting for the kingdom rather than facing the shame of having their fathers executed as traitors.
“Anyway, after we fought like that, we achieved more than we expected,” said Jin Katrin, taking a breath before he began to list the kills claimed by the two armies.
Five high lords – counts or greater – and twenty-four lords of smaller families, holding titles lesser than that of counts, died. Over thirty castles and strongholds had been burned down, and eleven imperial legions were destroyed or crippled. It was a terrifying kill tally by the five legions who had infiltrated into the heart of the great Empire, even taking into account the calamity the Empire faced after the fire dragon left naught but empty fields.
But in a way, it was natural. I couldn’t imagine how the monstrous King of Dotrin could be defeated. He was a man who had already fully achieved [Heroic] status, and if luck was on his side, the superman would transcend further as he accumulated karma and spirit and finally reach [Mythic] level.
Knowing that fact, I felt that the number of dead imperials was rather small, considering that such a monster participated in the war.
My judgment was premature, for counts were not the only great imperial lords who were slain.
Jin Katrin laughed at me, and from his expression, it seemed that the real deal was yet to come.
“Is it possible that you killed a duke?”
Jin shook his head, making it clear that someone greater had been killed.
My eyes grew wide; only one class was greater than that of a duke: A member of the imperial family, a blood descendant with succession rights to the throne.
“When the southern count was exterminated, the First Imperial Princeps was also there.”
It wasn’t just a princeps who had been killed, but the Empire’s first princeps. This time, I was quite surprised.
“Of course, it was not easy. Paladins and mages were guarding him with their lives, and the first princeps was strong on his own.”
occurred in the process of killing the princeps like a saga. In the end, I saw how proud Jin was: Proud of how strong Dotrin’s king is and how excellent the Sky Knights are.
I could not deny it; the first princeps’ head was proof enough.
Although the Burgundy imperial family did not adhere to the practice of letting the eldest child inherit the throne, the symbolism and authority of the first princeps could not be compared to that of other principes.
That was why the first princeps had still been seen as the strongest candidate for succession to the throne, even after the third princeps established his power in the war and gained a strong claim on the throne.
But now, the most powerful contender for succession was dead.
Laughter flowed from me. Before I went to the Empire, there had been five principes. All the strongest ones have died; only the two weakest remained. And between them, the corrupted one was currently closest to his father.
“So that idiot will truly become emperor.”
Of course, it still only remained a possibility, even if it was highly probable.
The surviving fifth princeps was also a serious contender, and if he hadn’t spent a lot of time wandering across the front lines, he would have achieved considerable power in the capital by now.
Perhaps the fifth princeps could have absorbed the forces of his deceased brothers.
I couldn’t completely rule out the possibility that the emperor, who I believed not to be interested in the succession, would counter my expectations and support the fifth princeps.
Of course, no matter how things turned out, those were matters for the distant future.
Now it was time for me to hope that our allied force, which had gone through a great deal in the Empire, returned safely. It was time to hope that Leonberg’s borders would stay strong until they returned. And I also hoped that the weaker nations had gained courage from the Empire’s repeated mistakes and defeats and would rise up against it outright.
Everything in this world doesn’t always go the way we want it to. Sometimes what we expect to happen first happens later, and that which should have occurred eventually comes about unexpectedly.
Such was the case now.