The second day after the emperor fell.

“How much longer are you going to delay making a decision?!”

Someone slammed a hand against the council chamber table with a thunderous bang.

“Isn’t it time to appoint a regent already?! If a vacuum forms in the administration of the state, will you gentlemen take responsibility for it yourselves?!”

“Lower your voice, Marquis Ed! In any case, there are only two candidates!”

As the atmosphere grew more heated, the shouting only intensified.

“Damn it... If we simply gather the opinions of the senior ministers, this could be settled immediately...!”

“The problem is that those opinions are divided.”

One of the nobles supporting the prince clicked his tongue.

“Since the matter has come up, allow me to say this as well. For the past twenty years, His Majesty the Emperor never once changed his intention. His intention to raise His Highness Fides as the next emperor.”

The nobles fell silent.

But soon, the small number of aristocrats from the opposition stepped forward. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

“And that is true. However, in the end, the ceremony to formally appoint the crown prince was never held, was it?”

They were the very people who had opposed Fides becoming crown prince, and later emperor.

The ones who insisted that, for the sake of the Empire, Ardiana would have been a hundred times more suitable.

“Exactly! It was never held! Because certain people resisted it!”

“Marquis Ed!”

“Why is it that all of you hate His Highness Fides so much? It was His Highness who assisted His Majesty with state affairs these past several years!”

“And what of it? Did the prince live up to His Majesty’s expectations?!”

“What?”

“Several years ago, he failed to suppress the border rebellion! He failed the reception for the envoys from the Northern Continent! Just how drunk did he have to be to ruin such an important tribute matter? Have you all forgotten that we nearly went to war because of it?!”

The nobles on the prince’s side fell silent.

“That...”

And at that very moment—

“Enough.”

Someone raised a hand.

Balthazar Grail.

The chief treasurer of the imperial palace and the most influential minister present.

The moment he intervened, the expressions of the nobles supporting the prince brightened.

After all, Balthazar had supported Fides for many years.

However, his next words overturned everyone’s expectations.

“No matter how deeply His Highness participated in state affairs. No matter what intentions His Majesty the Emperor held while alive.”

His calm gaze swept across the assembled ministers.

“In circumstances such as these, we must adhere to principle. To the principles clearly written within the laws of the Empire.”

Balthazar slowly rose from his seat.

“If the emperor falls into a state of incapacity without leaving either a will or a sealed posthumous decree, the throne passes to the legitimate child.”

The nobles on the prince’s side stared with wide eyes.

Even the opposition aristocrats looked at Balthazar in astonishment.

But after leaving behind those final words, he walked out of the chamber.

“And one more thing. Do not forget that actions against the laws of the state are considered treason.”

That same evening. Ardiana’s chambers.

In the silence, the occasional chirping of insects could be heard.

Ardiana sat on the sofa, staring at the trembling candle flame.

At that moment, the curtains by the window stirred, and someone stepped out from the darkness behind her.

“This is insane... Today already makes three...”

The man shook his head.

It was Plum.

A mercenary who had arrived in the capital at Ardiana’s invitation.

“Mmff! Mmff!”

And hanging behind him like a sack was an assassin they had caught near the princess’s palace.

“They always said the imperial palace was the pinnacle of battlefields without swords... Total nonsense... There are definitely swords involved.”

With a gloomy expression, Plum pulled a dagger from the assassin’s belt and tossed it onto the floor.

Then another person emerged from the corner of the bedroom.

“Plum. Could you do something about that depressing way you talk? Even I’m starting to lose my breath listening to you.”

The woman speaking with furrowed brows was Corel, from the Eighteenth Mercenary Squad.

She shook her head.

“Well. Pointless asking.”

Then she suddenly lifted her gaze toward the ceiling.

“Pin? Renmar?”

At the same moment, two figures lightly dropped down from above.

“Man, I was just about to fall asleep. Another fearless rat crawled in?”

“Yeah. And more will keep coming, so don’t relax. You planning to work or not?”

Pin and Renmar shrugged.

Then they slung the assassin Plum had brought over their shoulders by his arms and legs.

“Taking him to the same place as the others?”

“Yeah. Tie him up tight and make sure not a single sound leaks out.”

Pin and Renmar nodded before leaving the princess’s palace.

And once again, not through the door, but through the balcony window.

Only after they left did Ardiana rise from her seat.

“You’re all going through a lot because of me.”

Corel’s eyes widened.

“This isn’t hardship. It’s a lot better than monsters trying to bite your head off.”

Ardiana let out a quiet laugh, and Plum, blushing slightly, asked:

“Your Highness. Should we... increase the number of guards stationed near you?”

Ardiana paused.

After a brief moment of thought, she walked toward the window.

Before her stretched the lifeless princess’s palace.

A garden hardly anyone cared for.

A place resembling a haunted mansion, watched over by fewer than ten people.

Her own refuge.

But recently, many things inside the princess’s palace had changed.

Flash—

Something briefly flickered atop the eastern wall before vanishing.

“Ah, Ashlin’s messing around again...!”

Corel flinched and hurried closer.

“My apologies, Your Highness. I clearly told them not to fool around while on watch...”

“No, it’s alright.”

Ardiana shook her head with a smile.

“He’s seventeen, correct?”

“Ah? Ah, yes.”

Ashlin, stationed along the eastern wall, was one of the youngest mercenaries.

They said he had lost his parents at ten years old and had been taken in by Corel.

“When everything is over, I’ll make sure to repay all of you.”

Corel fell silent.

Nearly thirty mercenaries were now hidden inside Ardiana’s palace.

They surrounded the walls, concealed themselves within the palace, and some, like Pin and Renmar, even perched on the ceiling.

‘At first, I thought this was excessive.’

But the moment she entered the princess’s palace, her opinion changed.

The princess had no guards.

Yet there were countless people who wanted her dead.

In just the last two weeks, they had captured more than twenty intruders.

Corel genuinely could not understand

how Ardiana had managed to survive here until now.

“There’s not much time left.”

Ardiana murmured calmly.

“The council of ministers convened this afternoon. It seems Duke Balthazar handled things well. My brother won’t accept the outcome.”

Corel’s eyes widened.

At last.

The picture they had spent so long constructing was nearly complete.

“Don’t get hurt. None of you should suffer because of me. That alone is why I came back after traveling such a long road.”

Without realizing it, Corel clenched her fist tightly.

She remembered a conversation from several days earlier.

“Shouldn’t we just eliminate the prince and the empress?”

Once they decided to stand on Ardiana’s side,

many of the mercenaries had asked her that question.

“Wouldn’t that be faster and easier? Even if it’s the imperial army, there aren’t actually that many troops stationed nearby. And from what we’ve heard, the royal guard numbers fewer than a hundred. If the nobles send their private forces, we can gather our own as well.”

And it was true.

By then, Ardiana had already brought several nobles over to her side, including Balthazar Grail.

And now she had mercenaries too.

Meaning that, if she wished, she could easily seize the imperial palace and sweep away the royal guard.

But—

“No. I won’t allow my revenge to become someone else’s grave. Protecting my allies matters more to me than killing my enemies.”

Ardiana had been resolute.

“That’s why we’ll avoid unnecessary battles. And...”

“...”

“In the end, they’ll bring about their own destruction. I’m certain of it.”

Corel’s heart trembled deeply as she stared at Ardiana’s back.

It seemed Ardiana herself did not realize it.

Did not realize that words and actions like those were precisely what made people devote themselves to her.

Ardiana extinguished the final candle with a sweep of the snuffer.

Never knowing that yet another person had become willing to lay down their life for her.

At the same time—

“I see it! I can see the Central Continent!”

The salty wind whipped through Tie’s hair.

“Can you feel it?”

Lucarion asked as he approached.

Standing atop a chair and gripping the railing with both hands, Tie gave a quiet nod.

“Yeah. I can feel it.”

Far away,

the Central Continent looked no larger than a cookie, yet she still understood.

The World Tree was raging inside her heart.

The power within her body had begun to move.

Tie whispered:

“Over there... Luciano is over there.”