No power is limitless. No power is without cost.
God’s assistance requires support, and not just in the form of prayers...
✦ ✦ ✦
This may very well be my last meal. It’s not some lavish banquet, but the assortment of wine, meat, and soup set up in the meeting room is impressive considering we’re on the eve of battle.
“Hark, all those who gather in the lone fortress under the wavering banner of flame!”
Damn black-hearted priest. His meaty cheeks are twisted in a grin.
“Tomorrow, we march! Some of you might not make it back! Perhaps none of us will! But I see no sorrowful shadows upon the faces surrounding this table tonight! No traces of fear at all! We are the executors of heaven’s will for revolution! Despair is our true enemy!”
His eyes are burning; his fists are balled so tightly that they’re shaking. What’s gotten into him? This is weird, even for him. He’s like a child having a tantrum.
“Dissenters! They call us dissenters! How dare they? Yesterday, our protective mountain range was breached, our heroic soldiers killed, and our innocent citizens slaughtered and eaten! On this eve of destruction, humanity’s future is uncertain! Filth! Filth! Such sentiment, deserving of scorn, has finally become a poisonous curse!”
Damn it, son Peine, don’t offer me food right now. Your best friend is screaming at the top of his lungs. Ooh, are those thinly sliced fried potatoes? I’ll have some of that.
A-Ahem. Right. Eat, rest, fight. There’s no longer any need for reason; no time to hesitate. In order to survive, we must win.
“Upon examination of the letter’s imperial seal, I discovered it has only the mark of the king’s younger sister, Inkja! It’s true! For you see, the king and the prince are missing!” declares the priest.
I suppose the king would have a sister or two. His family is huge, after all. Not that I care. All these hoity-toity letters make our rebellion seem more official.
“The king’s sister is inhuman,” says Ange. Whoa, lady. What a thing to call someone. The disgust in her eyes is palpable. “Even among those rotten nobles, she’s something else. You’ve heard the rumors, haven’t you? That they mass-sacrificed virgins to the Demon God. They even stole children from various towns in order to satisfy their crazed cult... like my daughter.”
Whoa, whoa! What the hell? Even son Peine’s stopped eating. Although not everyone has. Impressive. Well, one of them’s a rabbit; the black and white one. It’s sitting on Sira’s lap and munching on veggies, its horn adorned in a leather decoration like the sheath for a sword. The other one... Yeah, I’ll pretend I didn’t see that; she’s special. Trying to stop her would bring about divine punishment, I’d bet. Her slurping is so loud, though.
Sira seems concerned; she reaches out a hand to the Crimson lady. She’s a nice girl.
“I think we’ve all heard similar stories. The king’s sister I know is a beast and a drug addict.”
Wow, Father. Did something finally snap? Talking badly about the royal family makes us seem a lot like a rebellion group, but that’s not it. The ‘revolution’ you’re talking about isn’t some petty human-on-human squabble. What you’re planning is an inferno that will engulf the continent, it’s species... and even the gods.
“Lady Ange, I have no words to describe the atrocities that my family has committed. If it is a blood grudge you carry, then I invite you to kill me when everything is over,” confesses the priest.
Wait... Whoa, whoa, whoa! Does that mean he’s...?
“Who the hell are you?” Ange asks.
“I am this country’s seventh prince. My official name is Felipo Valkie Millennium. My father is the king, the crown prince my brother, and the king’s sister my aunt.”
He’s a damn prince?! Did son Peine know this? Judging from the way he continues to eat, he must have. The knight and his brothers are surprised; you can really see the family resemblance in their similar expressions. I wonder if the king also has a black heart he wears on his sleeve. It’s not the time for it, but I can’t help smiling a bit. Oh, someone smiled before me... the Crimson lady. She’s holding Sira’s hand.
“You’re a prince? Don’t make me laugh, you muddy, sweaty pig.” Stop it, son Peine! This isn’t the time to be laughing your ass off... probably. “Don’t get the wrong idea. You’re a priest—one who’s gotten down in the dirt of the Frontier, bloodied his hands in battle against monsters, and yet still talks of grand aspirations like ‘revolution.’ We might get a little emotional about our families, you and I, but we’re kindred.”
Ah, I see. The fall of the palace, the nation’s fate, the king’s sister’s rise to power... They all seem fictitious to me, but for the black-hearted priest, they’re very real. I can’t let my emotions show; this isn’t someone else’s problem anymore.
“And? What do you plan to do, Felipo?” son Peine pipes up. Of course, only after all the fried potatoes are gone. The bastard. “Surely you don’t intend to blather on about succession, do you? Your right to the throne does exist, but it is still extremely small; no one cares about that. Now, tell us the rest. What have you analyzed, and how do you propose we proceed?”
He sure seems like he’s having fun. His fingers and lips are shining with oil, but he almost seems like he’s wielding a sword or a spear; it’s like he’s begging for the order to charge. Right, he was always the one who craved battle the most out of all of us. Funny, considering he’s such a schemer.
“Frankly speaking, my aunt is the vampire’s puppet,” the priest acknowledges. Figures. Like, what else could be going on? “The letter was likely produced by a key member of the Starlight Band and a vampire vassal as a means to provoke and lure us in. Perhaps they wish to limit our battlefields now that we no longer have to worry about the fort falling.”
“Seems plausible, but there’s not much point to that. Wouldn’t we logically go to the palace upon hearing it’s been taken?”
“Then maybe it’s a demonstration?” the youngest Willow presents his take. He’s got a cute face, but he’s crazy, too. “A way to dampen our morale, or obstruct the populace’s faith in us. Perhaps they wish to draw us into the fort.”
“Well, our soldiers’ morale aside, the citizens are certainly worried. If we were to deal with all of them, it would severely hamper our marching speed,” argues son Peine.
“Oh-hoh! I assume your suggestions stem from your experiences in the Hell Expanse?”