Game Opportunity Becomes Reality Episode 133
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Game Opportunity Becomes Reality Episode 133
33. Ambition (3)
The Crown Prince's summons was delivered to all high-ranking nobles of Count rank and above.
Even Gregory, who was to be granted the title of Count two days later, and Princess Diana, who remained a member of the royal family as she was still unmarried, were made to attend the meeting. As the four of us who could be called Duke Lawrence's faction entered the meeting hall, everyone's gaze converged on us.
"You've come?"
"Duke Heins? My apologies. I should have come out and taken my seat first..."
"No matter. You're not at a stage in life where you need to watch anyone's mood anymore."
The royal seats of honor for the King and Crown Prince were still empty, so I wondered if it wasn't as important a matter as I'd thought but when I saw Duke Heins, the great elder of the noble world, seated there, my expression naturally hardened.
'Duke Randoll Heins.'
As the current Head of House Heins Ducal, which had been a pillar of the Rhinehearts Kingdom's development, he was the King's father-in-law and the de facto operator of both the Heins Mage Tower and the Royal Mage Tower.
He was among the most outstanding of the 7th Circle Grand Mages, but as his life had entered its twilight years, there was a strong chance he would never reach the 8th Circle.
However, just because his level was lower than mine didn't mean he should ever be underestimated.
He was a representative figure symbolizing the Kingdom.
The fact that the Rhinehearts Kingdom had three fewer Grand Mages than the Lucias Kingdom of comparable national strength yet had not fallen far behind in technological disparity was entirely thanks to his achievements.
'He came in person rather than sending a proxy...'
He was a full 90 years old.
Thus, he more often sent a proxy than attending meetings in person, and no one dared say anything about it.
But Duke Heins attended the meeting in person?
That meant the current situation was extremely dire.
Receiving greetings from the nobles, I arrived at my designated seat and sat down side by side with Arcia. Princess Diana took her place at the royal seats of honor, while Gregory despite there being plenty of seats stood firmly guarding behind me.
"Must feel reassuring, commanding two Aura Masters."
"It may be apt to say Lord Gregory is commanded, but Arcia is my fiancée. We are together because our intentions align."
"Is that so? To my eyes, all I see is a superior and subordinates?"
The old man had unnecessarily sharp eyes.
But Arcia cut in at the right moment and shot Duke Heins a piercing glare, leaving him no choice but to change his words.
"A slip of the tongue. I must have misseen."
Even under Arcia's savage gaze, he let out a ho-ho laugh as if amused.
I'd always thought I'd like to have a conversation with him someday, but it seems the time isn't yet.
"Everyone, take your seats."
The King and the other royals entered the meeting hall and each took their places at the seats of honor, bringing the conversation to an end.
-Murmur. Murmur.
Yet the assembled high-ranking nobles were all taken aback as they looked at the seats of honor.
For the King had moved aside to a side seat, and the Crown Prince had taken the highest seat of honor.
"I will take direct command of the situation henceforth. Any objections?"
As if there could be.
Every person in this room was practically his man...
However, the nobles couldn't answer immediately, watching the King's mood.
At that, the King added a word.
"From today, all matters of state, great and small, shall be transferred to the Crown Prince. Consider it education for abdication."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Isn't this too big a matter to call mere education?
The Crown Prince, seated at the seat of honor, swept his gaze over the high-ranking nobles, then locked eyes with me and grinned.
And then he brought out the reason the meeting had been convened.
"Approximately two hours ago, at around 2:30 PM today, the Pieren Viscounty fell. The culprit is Count Tris, a Margrave of the Croysen Empire, who launched a surprise assault mobilizing 200 Vanguard cavalry and subdued the Lord's estate in one stroke."
The reason I arrived late to today's meeting was that I had been examining the full picture of this incident through the Blue Moon.
This incident left no choice but to respond ambiguously, because the fall of the Pieren Viscounty had been staged to appear as the unilateral action of Margrave Tris.
"The Croysen Empire is denying any involvement, claiming it has nothing to do with them."
"That shameless..."
"How could a Margrave move troops without the Emperor's orders?"
"Your Highness. This is clearly a provocation by the Empire."
Anyone with common sense could not fail to see that all of this was done on the royal family's orders.
However, the problem was that international relations were not that simple.
If the imperial family cut their losses and disavowed him, the burden of responsibility could only be concentrated on Margrave Tris.
"Currently, the Empire's Margrave Tris is rationalizing his actions by claiming that the Pieren Viscounty was originally territory of the Croysen Empire, and that what he did was not an invasion but a recovery."
"What absolute nonsense…"
It's a tactic commonly used by the Croysen Empire.
Called 'digging in.'
Acting by stubbornly insisting on something, regardless of common sense or anything else.
The problem is that because they are strong, that thuggish behavior actually works to some extent.
'Considering the temperament of the previous royal family, they'll send a recapture force to take back only the territory Margrave Tris seized, then rally the allied nations and lodge a protest with the Empire to wrap things up.'
The Kingdom of Rhinehearts, having been victimized by the Croysen Empire for so long, had always responded firmly, yet they never pressed the enemy hard enough to escalate into a full-scale war.
There was no helping it.
Basically, the Croysen Empire's national strength was twice that of Rhinehearts.
With allied nations brought in, they could put up a sufficient fight, but there is no such thing as an eternal alliance when interests are at stake.
Any leader running a nation had to keep in mind the contingency of an ally's betrayal.
So even at the cost of yielding some initiative, the Kingdom of Rhinehearts only responded with a hard line 'if you touch us, you'll get burned too' without ever handing over the justification for escalation.
"Duke Adrian El Lawrence."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Conquer Margrave Tris's domain."
"Yes, underst ... excuse me?"
But the Crown Prince's order that followed was something completely unexpected.
Rather than recapturing the Pieren Viscounty, he ordered the conquest of Margrave Tris's domain within the Croysen Empire.
Moreover, since the order was directed at me, I couldn't help but make a foolish reaction.
"Wh-what, Your Highness the Crown Prince? What did you just say?"
"Did you just say to conquer Margrave Tris's domain?"
Naturally, the nobles were flustered as well.
Even the members of the royal family, including Princess Diana who sat beside him, were taken aback.
It was only natural, since that order was a complete 180-degree departure from the stance the royal family had maintained until now.
The Crown Prince, in contrast, shrugged as if he couldn't understand the reactions.
"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Isn't he simply getting back exactly what he did? What's the problem?"
The Crown Prince was a man whose thoughts were not easy to read.
Still, if one were to characterize him, I'd thought he was someone who liked schemes and excelled at behind-the-scenes maneuvering I never expected him to choose such an aggressive response.
So, like everyone else, I had to put on a surprised expression.
'I knew his temperament differed greatly from the King's… but this is an unexpected reaction.'
Still, he wasn't the type to score an own goal for no reason, so I composed my expression and organized my thoughts.
The Empire is drawing a line, claiming this incident was the Margrave's unilateral action and that they have nothing to do with it.
If we occupied Imperial territory indefinitely after conquering Margrave Tris's domain, it would become a problem but if we swiftly withdraw after collapsing only the Margrave who caused the trouble, along with his family and domain, we could easily rationalize it as a response to an aggressor.
'Of course, the Croysen imperial family will fly into a rage, but it's still better than having invaded someone else's territory for no reason and occupying it.'
The likelihood of this escalating into a full-scale war seemed rather low.
I nodded and accepted the Crown Prince's order.
"Yes, understood. Let's make Margrave Tris pay thoroughly for his crimes."
"Duke Lawrence!"
"Your Highness the Crown Prince! Please reconsider!"
The meeting hall stirred once more at the dangerous order, and at me accepting it so readily.
The Crown Prince looked at me with a satisfied nod, then spoke firmly.
"From now on, the Kingdom of Rhinehearts will no longer laugh off the Croysen Empire's threats without so much as a flinch. Let us make it known that if they provoke us, they will surely pay a price to match."
"What if this leads to a full-scale war?"
"Then we simply accept it, no?"
The Crown Prince was sincere.
The nobles attending the meeting swallowed dryly, and the Crown Prince gave a sly smile at his vassals' reaction.
"Of course, we can't just act without thinking."
As he said that, his gaze lingered on empty air.
But what seemed like empty air to ordinary eyes was not so to me, wearing the Myriad Mirror.
"Lord James."
"You called?"
At the Crown Prince's call, the current Marquis James tilted his head in confusion, but faster than that, black smoke coalesced and a man appeared.
Gabriel James, the former Marquis.
The King's arrangement, and the Kingdom's hidden Grandmaster.
'He intends to bring him into the open?'
Amid the startled nobles, I alone let out a gasp of admiration.
"This is the sixth Grandmaster of Rondel, the former Marquis Gabriel James."
"F-Father!?"
"A Grandmaster!?"
A man believed dead had returned as a Grandmaster.
Everyone swallowed air at the appearance of the specter, but the one most shocked was the current Head of House James, the son of the former Marquis Gabriel James.
"We hereby make public that our Kingdom also possesses a Grandmaster."
A single Grandmaster cannot win a war alone.
The world these days was not so easy.
But as a deterrent to war, it was considerable for if one were to hostile a nation that possessed a Grandmaster, one had to bear in mind that a sword could come flying at the back of one's head at any time.
Of course, Croysen also had one of the five Grandmasters among their ranks, but once they realized that even the enemy they had freely threatened now held a supreme blade at their disposal, the high command deciding on war would inevitably hesitate.
"Lord James."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Can you retake the Viscounty of Pieren, which fell to the enemy, all on your own?"
"Of course."
"Then I shall entrust the retaking mission to you. Show off your martial level to your heart's content."
"I obey."
As the Crown Prince pulled out the joker card in his hand, the nobles' concerns faded away, and some wore flushed expressions.
That alone showed just how great a Grandmaster's presence was.
Having ordered me to conquer the domain of Margrave Tris of the Croysen Empire, and the former Marquis James to retake the Viscounty of Pieren, the Crown Prince continued.
"I'm sorry, but given the situation, I will not accept opposing opinions. And let me make something clear while we're at it."
And the Crown Prince clearly revealed the difference between himself and previous leaders.
"I wish to make our Kingdom a far more powerful nation. In that spirit, I plan to abolish, one by one, the restrictions that hinder our growth and first, I will remove the limits on lords' Vanguards and Heaven-Piercing Fortresses that restrain our military expansion."
"Ooh!"
The Croysen Empire's provocation became the occasion for the Crown Prince's ambition to be laid bare.
Some voiced concern, others cheered, but the clear fact was that a great wind of change was blowing through the Kingdom of Rhinehearts.
* * *
The Viscounty of Pieren, Kingdom of Rhinehearts.
"H-Hey. Isn't that going too far?"
The forces of Margrave Tris of the Croysen Empire, who had invaded without warning and illegally occupied the Viscounty of Pieren, truly looked no different from a band of plunderers.
They swept up anything of value, and if they fancied someone, they dragged them off by force and abused them.
A soldier with the common name Hans tried to stop his comrades, unable to bear it, but all he got back was irritation and curses.
"What are you on about? The fact that Rhinehearts is this big is thanks to our Empire taking a little back is no problem, is it?"
"Forget how much damage our Empire has suffered because of Rhinehearts? These bastards keep dragging our Empire's image through the mud with stories that never even happened."
"This land was originally ours anyway they stole it, didn't they?"
"S-Sorry, but a lot of what you believe is wrong. And except for the time of the Calvados Empire, the Pieren region has never been territory of our Croysen Empire."
By common sense, if anything, the Croysen Empire had inflicted far more damage on Rhinehearts they had almost never been the ones harmed.
But the imperial house and nobles of the Croysen Empire latched onto the Kingdom of Rhinehearts at every turn as a scapegoat whenever something went wrong, and as many citizens accepted it as truth, their hatred of Rhinehearts grew very strong.
So they felt no guilt at all about their criminal acts rather, they were thrilled about it, as if they had succeeded in their revenge.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Wait, are you a Rhinehearts half-breed?"
"Huh?"
The truth didn't matter.
What they believed was the truth, and any claim that contradicted their beliefs was dismissed as nonsense.
Hans had to back away, stumbling, as his comrades condemned him with arguments no better than sheer nonsense.
The manic look in the eyes of colleagues he'd been laughing with as recently as yesterday was beyond words.
To them, their actions were justified.
'Damn it all...'
Hans thought.
That sooner or later, they would pay for this.
Even a rat cornered will bite a cat a relationship like this was bound to collapse eventually.
-KWAANG!
And then, at that moment.
"W-What the?"
As if answering Hans's thoughts, a thunderous roar echoed across the Pieren Viscounty.
"The Heaven-Piercing Fortress!"
One of Margrave Tris's Heaven-Piercing Fortresses, which had been guarding the sky, was seen tilting and losing its balance.
-WHEEEEEENG!
At the same time, a siren blared loudly, announcing the enemy's arrival.
"Mosquitoes! Those mosquito bastards are swarming in!"
"Mosquito" was a derogatory term for Rhinehearts, based on the claim that they sucked the blood of the Croysen Empire.
With the sound of the siren, soldiers and knights alike stopped what they were doing and began forming up.
"What? What about that old man over there?"
But contrary to the expectation of an enemy force swarming in like a horde, only a single figure was approaching.
Everyone in Margrave Tris's force voiced their confusion at that.