The coronation: the ceremony in which the current monarch granted the sole winner of Legalisbelm the crown, proof of their authority, before they officially took the throne as the kingdom’s next ruler.
Even in the context of the competition’s history, the current iteration of Legalisbelm was tremendously exceptional. After the number of candidates in Legalisbelm had dropped to just one during the span of the competition, it had ended without any votes from the Selecting Nobles. Only Lezamer Ogdenn, the first prince, remained. With no other alternatives, Lezamer was confirmed to become the next king.
Next to no one was convinced of the results of the competition, but there wasn’t a soul willing to openly voice their objections. In light of this outcome, Lezamer’s original supporters were suddenly invigorated while the others were left to fear his overwhelming momentum. After all, the fate of his opponent, Turk Ogdenn, was an open secret circulating among the ranks of the nobles. The rumors were free-range for all sorts of embellishments, based in both fact and fiction alike, but all the accounts agreed on one thing: Lezamer himself had mercilessly passed down judgment on Turk. Not a soul sought to make the same mistake themselves.
The former supporters of the king’s brother found themselves in particularly dire straits. They were desperate to win the favor of the merciless new king, keeping a close watch on the situation for any opportunities to flatter him.
With both joy and sorrow intermingling, an unfittingly dark cloud loomed, swirling above the radiant coronation.
✦ ✦ ✦
The palace’s central plaza was decorated with an array of ornate and luxurious adornments indicative of the Kingdom of Ogdenn’s might for the sake of this very day. All of the nobles across the kingdom were required to attend the coronation. Thus it was only natural that Baron Otto Socom was among their ranks.
This whole affair’s nothing but a chore...
Clothed in the official garment of the kingdom’s nobles, which was widely known for being oddly garish, Otto cast a sharp gaze from the rows of nobles he stood among. There, at the end of his gaze, was a man proudly waving his hand from the palace balcony.
That must be the first prince everyone was talking about...or rather, I suppose it’s His Majesty our new king I’m looking at.
Otto was far from where Lezamer stood, and from the new king’s perspective, Otto was just one person in the crowd. While it wasn’t readily noticeable, Otto’s stare was so stern that he might be suspected of hostility should Lezamer notice.
It sounds like it was His Highness the king’s younger brother who launched that assault on my city, though. Still, it’s hard to imagine Lezamer’s any less of a slithering snake.
After all, Otto’s daughter, Meddié, had been there when Turk was defeated, so Otto had been able to learn the details for himself. There was hardly much difference between trying to take an enemy’s daughter as hostage and eliminating a trapped foe. Otto therefore found himself exceptionally hard-pressed to celebrate the new king’s coronation. Now, he was even grateful that his position as baron meant he wouldn’t have to make any fumbling attempts to get close to the new king.
This does put my domain in a difficult position, though...
Otto had originally been granted his barony for fighting off the monsters to cultivate the land. After all, Front-Edge City had been called the farthest frontier of the kingdom, so it held only the slightest sway in the kingdom’s politics. Had things been as they always had, the question of who came to rule would hardly matter—all he would’ve had to do was continue doing business in the form of Socom Co. But now, an unexpected development had plunged the city right into the middle of Legalisbelm. It wasn’t difficult for Otto to imagine that he might be on the receiving end of undue attention from the new king. What’s more, the Socom barony had been neutral in Legalisbelm—it wasn’t as if they’d been supporters of the first prince. Otto could hardly get his hopes up for any sort of cordial relations.
Glaring up at the balcony, it was then that Otto realized: There was a familiar face standing behind the new king. Otto had noticed the girl because, in that very moment, she was just about to move—no longer content to remain in the background.