The current king had summoned me to his royal palace. It wasn’t the first time he’d extended this invitation to me, truth be told; I’d gotten the first letter requesting my presence right after we’d succeeded in occupying Thorsdale. At the time, I’d been very busy trying to restore order, which hadn’t afforded me much time to leave and meet with him. After I declared the establishment of the Grand Duchy of Sevensworth, the frequency of the letters increased exponentially, but I still had my hands full with the rebellions and other things, so I once again deferred it to later.
But now that I’d caught the instigators of the rebellion, House Lillard, everything had settled down, and I’d even moved back to the original Sevensworth territory. I was out of real excuses and could no longer refuse his summons without it seeming blatantly intentional.
“Please wait here,” a servant said as I took a seat in the royal palace of Luchizua. There were many pieces of art elegantly displayed around the room, which were changed out periodically. This room was called the Hartshorn and was the largest room in the palace for awaiting an audience with the king. Its size allowed for more artistic pieces than any other room, making it the most pleasant to wait in for long periods of time.
The fact that they’d stuck us here meant we’d be waiting for a while. I could only imagine how busy he was with preparations for our meeting. To him, having our house wage war alone against Thorsdale had been a huge gamble. If we’d been wiped out—or even just weakened enough to be neutralized as a threat—he would have won and the royal family would have become the most powerful in the country. Even after distributing some of the wealth and industries he’d seized from our house to Thorsdale, his power would’ve greatly increased, as would have the stability of his position as king.
If our house had only ended up losing a little of our strength, though, he’d have lost his bet. In that scenario, our house would have been lauded as heroes for defeating an invading country all on our own, and it would have driven the current royal family even further into a corner. The current king sat on a throne earned through regicide, and that made the influence he had very weak. With the Sevensworths still standing strong, he’d have been put on his very last legs.
Contrary to most everyone’s expectations, our house had not only emerged victorious in the war, but we’d even taken the entire country of Thorsdale for ourselves. Rather than succeed with only losing a little strength, we’d become overwhelmingly powerful. As such, the current king had lost his bet big time.
At this juncture, he only had a few options left, one of which was the very low road of assassinating the Sevensworths or something similar. Right now, he was most likely making us wait so long because he was preparing whatever assassination attempt he had planned. That was the situation we were currently in. Waltzing right into the palace now was the same as jumping into the fire.
“Oh my, this embroidery is amazing!” Ana exclaimed, looking at a piece that was displayed on the wall.
I’d wanted to come here by myself, but Ana insisted on joining me. I couldn’t bring myself to refuse her request. Though I was extremely worried, I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t hold Ana back. I had to let her fly with her own wings. But even so, I couldn’t stop being worried that I’d brought her right into the jaws of danger. My heart was beating abnormally fast, and my stomach hurt.
“I apologize for the wait. His Majesty is ready to meet with you,” the palace servant announced.
“It’s been some time, Duke Sevensworth,” the current king said from his throne after both Ana and I bowed.
It was customary to call someone by their highest title when they had multiple of them, but he didn’t call me “grand duke,” meaning he didn’t recognize my grand duchy.
“So it has,” I replied while casually surveying the area.
The throne room was different today. Usually there would be dozens of royal guards standing against the walls, but now there were hundreds in the room, all arranged in six tightly packed rows. There were also bowmen and sorcerers, which was very unusual.
“Now then, Duke Sevensworth. I’ve heard you’ve been spouting something ridiculous about forming a grand duchy? Do you care to explain yourself?”
“I’m simply following our country’s agreement with the royal family. When the Sevensworths agreed to join Luchizua, there was a contingency stating that we could leave if we ever felt unfairly treated.”
“Is that right? When exactly would you say that I gave your house any unfair treatment?”
“When investigating the palace of the country formerly known as Thorsdale, I found partnership agreements between you and them. You were conspiring against us with a foreign nation to have them fight a war against our house, with the promise of splitting the spoils after they were done. I believe that perfectly fits the scope of being unfairly treated.”
The nobles and knights in the room began murmuring. It seemed that there were people here who’d been following the king but hadn’t been aware of this at all.
“You dare accuse your king of lying?!” he spat.
“Well, more importantly, I came here not to address this but another matter. I’d like to discuss your illegitimate claim to the throne.”
“What?!” he screamed as he shot to his feet.
The nobles shrank with fear, while the knights drew their swords.
“That’s right, my dear Christopher. I do not recognize you as king,” came a voice from right beside us.
Everyone around us erupted in gasps of extreme surprise and confusion.
“F-Father?!”
Hans had used his ninjutsu to keep His Majesty hidden and revealed him just now. I could only imagine how shocked the people were. Both Ana and I had also been blown away when we’d found out after returning to the Sevensworth territory to prepare for war.