Day after day, peasant revolts rocked Agartha. Over half of them were unrelated to Cobalt. The rumors of the False Sovereign ignited centuries worth of resentment and spread like wildfire.
All of Cobalt’s expectations were exceeded. Agarthan society began to crumble. Villages in every region were filled with shouts of, “Throw down the False Sovereign who torments us commoners! Save the True Sovereign!”
Among the commoners, everything they suffered, from Amrita being withheld from them, to the political games of the nobility, to even their daily unease, all became Kyou’s fault for occupying the throne. They also began to believe the story that the True Sovereign who shared their suffering would solve all of their problems.
The Crestfolk believed a story of their own. To them, the True Sovereign was one of their own, a fact kept secret by the chiefs of the hidden villages through oral tradition. Somehow this had leaked to the public; now it was common knowledge.
All of their hatred and resentment lit a powder keg beneath the entirety of Agartha. An armed revolt broke out in the town of Brandall; this one was, in fact, spearheaded by Cobalt. At first, the nobles of the royal palace sneered at the news. Nobles couldn’t be hurt, so there was no problem, even if there were only a few knights stationed there. Their tone changed when word came that noble corpses stood on display in Brandall’s town square, split apart at the neck and waist, the open wounds showing no signs of ever regenerating.
The people of the royal palace were in dismay. Cobalt’s propaganda about the power of Halahala proved wholly accurate. Even the ones who had brushed off the capitulation of Ronadyphe Prison as some sort of mistake finally came around. In their impatience, the Order of Emerald Blood struck out to suppress the armed revolt.
That was only the beginning, however. A few days later, news came to the capital that an even larger revolt surfaced in the town of Kelst. The lord’s entire family had been paraded around town and killed. Not only that, the family’s women had been thoroughly used for entertainment before being murdered in ghastly ways. Their exposed corpses were apparently a dreadful sight.
The palace was steeped in fear. It was like they could all imagine it happening to themselves. The nobles only just began to realize the scale of the grudge commoners bore against them over the centuries.
Anger superseded fear, in time. Congress unanimously agreed to dispatch the strongest force available to them, Duke Togart’s Order of Obsidian Blood. Dealing with the aftermath of Ronadyphe’s fall was put on hold as a result of criticisms and inquest into why it wasn’t recovered already. The decision to dispatch the knights, however, was largely made in a fit of furious panic. The nobles of the capital were dominated by their emotions, failing to realize they were playing into the rebellion’s hands.
Two days after the Order of Obsidian Blood departed, Lernaean Edel Trouta lo Granapalt’s Order of Sapphire Blood, which was supposed to be safeguarding the north, suddenly appeared in the capital.
With the help of internal colluders, the knights easily made it all the way to the royal palace. They demanded the False Sovereign Kyou and Chairman Gratos surrender themselves, as well as the abdication of the throne to the True Sovereign, the Silver Princess Saya. The nobles immediately understood the riots’ true architect.
Lernaean was the adopted son of the militant Granapalt family. He had proved to be a child prodigy and inherited the house. He was young among the members of Congress, but that was only in relative terms in a group filled with ancient nobles. It had been over two centuries since he joined Congress.
During that time, he had gradually expanded his influence and showed ambition in creating the Sovereignty Faction. Rumors had flown about him ever since he succeeded the Granapalt house.
Nobles didn’t die from old age. There were cases where a major accident would kill them before their regeneration could make a difference, but fundamentally, nobody died unless they were killed by a blood caliber. It was said that the previous Lord Granapalt died in a cogwagon accident. No noble actually believed this.
Granapalt raised the standard of revolt with the True Sovereign, the Silver Princess, in tow. In response, Congress naturally refused his demands and dispatched the royal guards to protect the capital.
The front gates of the royal palace, untouched by battle for centuries, was now the stage atop which two knightly orders stared each other down. There were more than nobles on the battlefield, as well.
“It will take another day for an urgent message from the capital to reach Kelst. After that, it will take another two days for the Obsidian Blood to make it back here. Thus, we have three days.”
Lernaean directed the crowd of soldiers at the front gate. It was an allied force of nobles, commoners, and Crestfolk.
“Our objectives are as follows: defeat the royal guards within three days, and capture Chairman Gratos and the False Sovereign. The palace’s defenses are sturdy, and the royal guard are strong. But justice lies with us. The True Sovereign Saya is with us.”
Saya was in the middle of the battlefield, surrounded by knights. The significance of this was tremendous. The entire coalition force’s morale surged to an unnatural height.
“Therefore, we will be victorious. Without a doubt.”
The front gate was engulfed by a roar of acknowledgment, and the trigger on the battle was pulled.
Neither Saya nor Nagi had received any training as soldiers. Nagi had grown as a warrior at a tremendous speed thanks to the Crestfolk and Cobalt, as well as from his repeated skirmishes, but fighting in an army was an entirely different beast.
It wasn’t possible to judge what was going on over the vast battlefield. The only thing they could feel was the scent of blood on the wind mixed with the pressure from the raging shouts as something enormous pushed forward.
The only thing the two of them could do was wait. Saya had to be on the battlefield to maintain morale. She was being protected in the back, of course, far from the front line.
From this position, the only thing she could clearly make out was the palace walls. Saya’s little brother was within them. And here she stood, fighting against him.
“How is it going?” Saya asked Nagi, who was standing next to her.
“I have no clue.”
“Something feels wrong in the air.”
“Yeah. Both sides are freely using blood calibers. It’s probably because of that.”