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Side Story Chapter 24

“Everyone, draw up your aura! The Emperor has no intention of sparing us!” Viscount Mendes yelled at the top of his lungs.

There were still over four hundred of the rebel knights left, and their combined auras made the air rumble. Luckily, no of them seemed to possess an authority. Marquess Suspen, with the authority of the White Tiger, was the only one who had gone through the awakening process in the southern rebel army. Of course, these knights were still competent enough to use mana and aura.

“Don’t move. Whoever makes the first move will have to deal with my spear,” Selim quietly warned them.

The rebel knights froze stiff.

“What are you all doing?!” Mendes berated them. “Do you all have a death wish or something?!”

Selim tilted his head. “I swore on my mana that I’ll spare anyone who surrenders.”

“What the hell! First Prince, can’t you see what your father is doing?! He says he’s going to kill us all!”

“If that is His Majesty’s decision, then you should all die,” Selim coldly replied.

“What…?”

“But the Emperor I know is much more merciful than you think.” Selim glanced at Kireua reproachfully.

‘He’s giving me the eye,’ Kireua scoffed.

-Hehehe, Kireua is getting scolded~!

‘What do you mean I’m getting scolded? He’s no one,’ Kireua grumbled.

-Nope. He’s strong.

‘What do you know about humans?’ Kireua asked sarcastically.

-I’m talking about the one hiding inside his shell, not Selim.

“What…?” Kireua gasped aloud, forgetting the fact that he was talking to Coal. Hiding inside Selim’s shell? Did that mean that Selim had an authority? The thought gave Kireua goosebumps. Selim was already monstrously strong, so if he had the power of a god…

“I don’t believe you! Besides, his voice sounds quite young… Is he really His Majesty?” Mendes asked distrustingly.

That was when Kireua broke away from his thoughts.

“You still want to test me,” he coldly accused.

“This is a reasonable doubt, not a test!”

“Then verify it yourself, Viscount Mendes.”

“What…?”

Kireua immediately took a step forward.

“Stop sacrificing your innocent men and come forward. They might be your men, but they’re also my citizens.” Kireua’s voice grew louder. “I finally returned. Is this your plan to make me a bad emperor? You’re trying to make me a mad tyrant who murders his own citizens as soon as he returns.”

“You d-did that voluntarily just now.”

“You know that once an incident takes place, someone needs to take responsibility,” Kireua firmly answered.

“Mmmm…” Mendes grunted.

“What would happen if I forgave everyone here and held no one accountable? What would the other rebels think?”

“That’s…”

“Imperial law should be applied to all people since everyone is equal before the law. If a ruler pardons people just because they’re high-ranking nobles, then he’s disgracing himself and betraying the trust of his people.” Kireua’s eyes gleamed. “Will you take the responsibility for this uprising, Viscount Mendes? After Marquess Suspen’s death, I forgave everyone here, regardless of what’s happened, because they are all my people.”

A young knight in his early twenties trembled, overwhelmed by his emotions. Ever since they had been born, Avalon’s knights heard stories about Joshua Sanders, the man renowned throughout the continent as the Martial God. They could recite the glorious tales of Joshua’s path even in their sleep, so they instinctively knew that they wouldn’t be able to defeat him even if they all attacked him at the same time.

No, if the man standing in front of them was really the ruler of the Avalon Empire, all the knights wanted to kneel and shout celebrations of his return. They had genuinely missed him and had been waiting for him to come back.

“I do not plan on blaming people for their leaders’ faults, so don’t test my patience any further. I worry about the peace of the Empire as much as I think about my people. Too many innocent people have lost their lives.”

After he finished speaking, Kireua smacked his lip inaudibly. It was torture to pretend to be an old man when Kireua was in the prime of his youth.

Selim came forward again. “You heard His Majesty. The Emperor has given you an order. Drop your weapons and bow.”

One knight threw his sword onto the ground, and then another, and another.

“Wh-What are you doing…?!”

“Viscount Mendes, stop,” the first rebel knight to fling his sword on the ground said.

“You’re…?”

The rebel knight covered his face with both hands. “My father was a tenant farmer in the south.”

“What are you suddenly talking about—?!”

“Shortly after His Majesty disappeared about twenty years ago[1], the amount of the taxes the people in the south had to pay increased drastically. My father tried to endure it, but he lost all his land and was dragged away to the lord’s castle and tortured.”

“What…?” Mendes murmured.

“That was how my father passed away.”

Mendes fell silent.

“My family fell apart after his death. The other tenant families went through similar things. That’s how many of the soldiers here came to work for Marquess Suspen.”

Mendes’s eyes gradually widened.

“Marquess Suspen has always said that the one he looked up to the most was the late Duke Aden von Agnus, the Dark God.”

Kireua was the one who flinched this time; he didn’t expect the knight to mention Duke Agnus.

“At least on the surface, Marquess Suspen tried really hard to take after the Duke; he said that he’d value anyone with talent regardless of their background…”

“You bastard! Are you trying to insult Marquess Suspen?” Mendes roared.

“…But there was one critical difference between the two.”

Mendes’s ears perked up; he couldn’t help feeling curious.

“I’m not sure if he was aware of the right or wrong in what he was doing, but Marquess Suspen took the soldiers’ families hostage to make sure they stayed loyal to him.”

“Mmm…” Mendes grunted again. It was an open secret that, of course, Mendes knew too.

“Duke Agnus died before I was born, but from what I’ve heard, he wasn’t as despicable as Marquess Suspen.”

“How rude of you! What are you doing?! Wait, you aren’t all thinking the same thing, are you? Pick up your swords! We can’t even be sure if that man is really His Majesty!” Mendes furiously shouted.

Kireua gathered his mana. “You are a lost cause.”

Mendes stared at him.

“Just die.”

Mendes trembled as if he was having a seizure as black spear sprouted out of his chest.

“Wh-When…?” Mendes stuttered.

“If a knight like you could notice my ambush, I wouldn’t have had my reputation, would I?”

“Urgghh…”

Kireua met Mendes’s rapidly dimming eyes and winked. “Bye-bye, Viscount Mendes, you cowardly bystander.”

* * *

The war in the south came to an end once the remaining rebel leaders surrendered. All of the soldiers who fled returned and also surrendered while the rebel knights were disarmed and transferred to the fortress. They would be punished in accordance with their crimes. Kireua had been watching everything from the top of the ramparts.

He took off his hood. “Phew, I can finally breathe.”

“Kireua, you were too rash earlier,” Selim said.

“What?”

“You shouldn’t have killed Count Manto and Viscount Mendes that easily. The rebels could have become too agitated and attempted to fight until the end. ”

“But did they do it?” Kireua sarcastically asked.

“You—”

Kireua frowned. “Cut that out. You’re supposed to be more cold-blooded than me, so why are you being a big softie about such weird things?”

“I’m not being a softie—”

“Do you really think those traitors will never betray the Empire again? They already did it once. Besides, didn’t you hear me earlier? What would have happened if I spared their leaders?”

Selim was silent.

“The other rebel armies will think we’re suckers. That’s why everything happened in the first place, you musclehead,” Kireua grumbled.

“…I can deal with them.”

“Ah~ right! You sure as hell are one of His Majesty’s sons,” Kireua said in a sing-songy voice.

“Don’t be sarcastic. Killing isn’t always the answer. If the Heaven’s Mind had been here, she would have used them to stabilize the south quicker.”

“How?” Kireua asked.

“You could have shattered their mana halls and shown them mercy as a member of the Imperial Family. The other rebels will never surrender now.”

“Didn’t you say you can deal with them?”

“You said that the greatest victory is winning without fighting,” Selim reminded him.

“…Tsk.”

Of course, there might have been a solution other than executing them, but Kireua didn’t regret it. Even if he had gone back in time, he would have done the same. The rebels he had killed had been tormenting his mother for over a decade.

Selim shook his head. “…They’re wrapping up now. Anyhow, I’ll head to the east now.”

“Are you going to be okay? Going up against the Azure Dragon won’t be easy.”

“The Four Guardians were originally the gods’ pets,” Selim remarked.

“That’s very random.”

“I’m a god’s son—the Martial God’s son.” Selim smiled faintly.

Kireua chuckled. “Oh, yeah. Come to think of it…”

Selim tilted his head curiously.

Kireua looked at him and considered asking him if he had really manifested an authority, but in the end he couldn’t bring himself to raise the question.

‘Forget it. It hurts my pride as a man.’

“Nothing,” Kireua finally said, opting against it. “I’ll head to the west.”

Selim’s expression changed subtly.

“Kireua.”

“What.”

“No matter what the nobles in the capital say, they believe they don’t have to rush to decide the crown prince because everyone is already doing a good job.”

“…I didn’t plan on getting swayed by their opinions in the first place,” Kireua grumbled.

“So let’s decide who is going to be the crown prince based on the accomplishments we make in the east and west.”

Kireua turned his head to look at Selim. “…Are you sure about this?”

Selim smiled, baring. “I’m Selim Sanders, Joshua Sanders’s first son.”

1. The raw was twenty years ago, but Joshua disappeared about a decade ago. ☜