7 (2)

Everything had to happen at once. There could be no mistakes in distributing the troops. The nobles and merchants Louis targeted were, without exception, people with a lot to lose. If they were allowed to live and slip away, they would surely support his brothers’ war supplies. There was no need to kill them all—the ones to be killed were the brothers’ close aides. If everyone was slain, the anger of the victims’ families would be provoked, making it hard to force surrenders, so those marked for death had to be chosen carefully. Moreover, those Louis was about to strike were mostly very capable people. If Louis secured full succession, he intended to put them back in place and use them to develop the various cities.

Above all, the first to be captured and then executed had to be Dekal. Dekal himself was a Sword Expert and held enough soldiers inside the city to spark an internal revolt. In short, he had to die immediately—his head hung up for his men to see, then the demoralized troops reabsorbed on the spot: the most efficient method.

Louis planned to hit Dekal with his strongest arms—Kaiser, Boromir, and the 500 soldiers he had trained as far as possible. Kalbang, who usually managed the Colosseum, would rally the gladiators, handle Max, and clean up the western quarter. Hansen would arrest nobles and merchant classes who had come from Kayani to watch the Colosseum. After roughing out the troop distribution, Louis drew his dagger. The blade had never tasted blood, its clean, sleek surface gleaming. Forged to an extreme sharpness by a master smith, it shone so keenly that a mere touch of a fingertip would slice skin. Louis had not yet reached a perfect decision. Everyone in the room wore a grim expression: Hansen, whose carefully hidden ambition flashed; Boromir, steeling his core for the coming storm; Kalbang, anxious about anything he might bungle; Jerome, half-panicked; and… Kaiser.

Kaiser swallowed dryly. From nerves? Quite the opposite—it was a psychological response to thirst. Kaiser’s suppressed lust for killing was surging up. He was barely aware of Louis’s words anymore. The phrase he kept muttering was, “Not yet.” Unstoppable visions looped: blood flowing, heads lopped off, him stamping on a body gushing blood from the stump, lifting a head and dousing himself in red. He kept slamming the brakes on the desire to calm his veins with hot blood.

‘Just a little more… just a little…’

No one could have heard it, yet as if sensing it, Louis twirled his dagger once and stabbed the blade down onto the map of Proia.

The dagger pointed, unmistakably, at the mansion where Dekal stayed. Louis spoke, like a flame flaring up.

“Commence… the operation.”

Information control was perfect. All intelligence from the ducal domain was filtered directly by Hansen. The telegram just now had been sent privately by a subordinate Hansen had planted. The timing was ideal, and the fact that Louis alone held the special intel was the decisive groundwork that could call checkmate at once.

That night as ever, Dekal was slaking his inflamed lust with a new maid. He pounded away at the maid’s secret, wet place again and again.

He pressed so hard that her sounds were not moans but choking sobs.

The pain was too much. The maid finally burst into tears. Not satisfied, Dekal grabbed fistfuls of her long hair. The woman’s lips trembled, tears streamed from her eyes. Just as Dekal, ever more excited, reached his climax, a faint echo rang in his ears.

“Kyaaaah!!”

A scream. The clash of blades. Groans. The sound of death… Instinctively, Dekal twisted the maid’s neck. In the middle of coupling, she went limp; the bed sagged, but Dekal ignored it. What is this, he asked himself, rising and groping for his sword—when the door exploded inward with a bang.

“Target confirmed!!”

A soldier shouted boldly, intending to alert those behind him. Dekal raced his mind to judge the situation.

‘War… is it? Who?’

The first guess was right. The war of succession was about to begin—so yes, war. He tried to decide who had attacked, but he could think no further. A burly soldier in full armor ripped out a steel blade with a hiss and charged in an instant. Lopping off Dekal’s head meant immediate promotion, and the promotion-starved soldiers had no patience to wait for their comrades.

Even in this crisis, Dekal could coolly watch the incoming strike. He was no Sword Expert for nothing, and this was not his first brush with war. Calculating the optimal line, he slipped to the side on instinct. The soldier’s sword slid past, and in that “damn it” beat, a dull crack—skull shattered. As the soldier toppled, Dekal snatched the steel sword from his loosening grip and smashed aside the next blade that came flying in.

Clang!

Dekal moved like a flash—so fast it seemed simultaneous. His sword did not stop at the parry.

Thock…

Where the pitiless blade pierced, blood poured in streams. Instinctual mana flooded the sword a second later; the edge, sharpened to the limit, severed a head as though cutting a block. It was a terrifying strike. The big soldier, who aside from drills had never faced true war, froze at the sight of the red clump rolling.

If there was a problem, that was the problem. Dekal did not miss the opening and neatly cut the soldier down.

Letting his horrified gaze drop, Dekal wiped cold sweat.

‘Hoo… that was close.’

As his interrupted awareness returned to the question of who was attacking, soldiers swarmed in. Dekal instinctively sensed death. He had been cornered countless times, yet he had never once felt this—death came to Dekal for the first time.

He swallowed his parched saliva.

‘Come then… if you can, Reaper.’

The men tensed at the coppery stench of blood. They entered as if to ring his vast private chamber. Dekal glanced at the window but gave up—too high for a safe landing. Even if he jumped, the rising commotion told him the area was ringed with soldiers.

In the spacious room. Driven back to the terrace, Dekal lopped off the last soldier’s neck and drew deep breaths. Unarmored, even a Sword Expert would hit a physical limit quickly. And the lack of any escape route only hastened his exhaustion. Moments ago a place of pleasure and comfort, the room was a shambles. The soldiers who still surrounded him panted with tension, wavering on whether to rush in. He looked exhausted, but his feats thus far had put fear into them. Then a man appeared among them, just as drenched in blood. Dekal recognized the next arrival: Boromir. And…

‘Heh… how troublesome… the champion makes his entrance.’

The blood-soaked man was Kaiser. There were plenty of Dekal’s soldiers around here; Kaiser entering painted in blood meant Dekal’s subordinates were all dead. Noticing this, Dekal felt even more drained.

‘Louis.. haha..’

Dekal laughed hollowly, but reality did not change. Who would have guessed that the brat he always dismissed would tighten the noose around his throat? This meant the war of succession had begun. Dekal’s estimate—three years from now, after the duke’s chronic illness worsened—was utterly wrong. And thinking it would be just a two-way struggle between Fred and Pierre now seemed foolish.

“Grrr…”

Kaiser growled like a beast, and Dekal smacked his lips. He spat a blood-tinged glob onto the floor and crooked a finger.

“Come… you wretch.”

Kaiser had not a shred of patience left to endure provocation, and he charged like a bull. A dogfight of a melee.

‘Formidable.’

Boromir watched, cold sweat beading, and drew his beloved sword. The blade came out with a filthy, wet sound, already gummy with blood. The finale was at hand.

At that moment, Louis dismounted and climbed to the upper floor where Dekal was. Everyone involved—except slaves and maids—had been killed. Dekal’s men who had served as guards here and there lay strewn about. It was a savage scene, but Louis felt safer for it—the operation was going right. Soldiers waiting outside saw Louis and hurriedly stepped aside. Inside, steel moaned against steel in real time. Entering the room, Louis was hit by a dockside stench of blood.

‘He took a lot down.’

Louis’s gaze found corpses of soldiers. Truly a Sword Expert. Even though they had struck a defenseless moment with well-trained men, this was the result. On top of that, Boromir and Kaiser were locked in a vicious knife-fight with Dekal.

Even as the moment when his breath might leave him came closer in sequence, Dekal clearly saw Louis. No—he saw him so plainly he could hardly focus on the blade whipping past his face.

‘Either way, I die like this…..’

The Reaper’s scythe was at his throat. Dekal could not be sure how long he could last. On instinct, he chose Louis. He thrust his right arm into Kaiser’s sword-line, and it was hacked open in one brutal stroke. The sound was ghastly, yet only a single grunt squeezed out. Gaining a gap in the encirclement that way, Dekal fixed on Louis alone and sprinted.

‘Ah… damn.’

Boromir’s face hardened. Kaiser turned to see what was happening, then saw Louis and jolted with shock. The sword Dekal had tossed into the air spun like an acrobat, clattered to the floor, and sprang into the sheath of his left hand as if falling into it. The nearby soldiers were too stunned by the sudden twist to react.

Thock…!

The wet rip of steel piercing flesh filled the air.

“………..Lord Louis!!!!!”

Boromir shouted, but Louis’s answer was a derisive smile.

“…………..Y-you… brat..”

“Goodbye, Dekal.”

Dekal’s sword dropped from his hand… and struck the floor.

Clang.

Dekal fell into Louis’s arms as though into his mother’s bosom, then convulsed to the floor. Blood fanned across the carpet in ripples. Dekal kept convulsing. He was as good as dead already. Even a desperate high priest could not have reversed this. Strangely, the last thing Dekal remembered was his wife—the image of her plain youth. He murmured a single word.

“…E… Enika.”

And that was his final testament.

“Are… are you unharmed?”

Louis did not answer. He kept silent until Dekal’s convulsions ceased. At length, Dekal went completely still.

“I’m fine. From now, we clean this place quickly.”

Watching Louis issue bold orders, Boromir shivered. His lord had nearly died a moment ago, yet he calmly proceeded with what had to be done.

‘From now on, I will spend my life for this man.’