90 — 9 (10)

Silence fell between Louis and Enika. Wondering what he ought to say, Louis thought for a moment, then continued simply,

“That was his last word. And then he died.”

She began to sob. Louis had trouble understanding why she was acting like this now. It felt as though some complicated tangle of feelings lay between them, but he decided it was fine to leave it at that. In the midst of this, she asked,

“How were his last moments?”

His last moments… Louis felt a phantom throb in his side. Thanks to Dekal, he had learned a valuable lesson: no matter how strong an army he raised, if he grew weak, he could die helplessly. Louis refused to accept that. Being constantly protected by someone else was surprisingly exhausting. The image of Marquis Gangpireu’s end came to mind. At the very least, his older brother would not have died like that. That was not the Pontina way. Lions did not die like that.

“They weren’t bad. He drove his sword into my body. That was the last thing he did—and it’s not as if I just stood there and took it.”

Recalling that dizzying moment, Louis spoke to her. But because of how the words themselves sounded, her complexion worsened. In any case, the Louis of that time and the Louis of now were different. Back then he had not yet received a legitimate title; now he was Duke Louis of Pontina, with only the formalities remaining.

Even if he retroactively applied Dekal’s past crimes and wiped out his whole family, no one would criticize him. If anything, people might say such severity would aid his rule. But it remained only a thought. Louis had no particular intention of doing such a thing. Applying old sins in that way did not suit his character.

“That’s enough. I have to march again soon, and I’m very tired.”

“Thank you deeply for your kindness. I shall take my leave, my lord.”

Still dazed, she gave a start, answered him, bowed with proper courtesy, and quietly opened the door to leave. The room was his alone again. He truly was tired. Tonight, he felt, he could finally sleep at ease. A sense of fullness settled over him, like the feeling after a hearty meal. Before lying down, Louis checked his points.

Thirty thousand points. That was what he had earned by bringing the succession war to an end. He could invest them back into himself, or he could use them to stabilize the cities. He decided it would not be too late to make that judgment after he occupied the four cities of House Haidek.

By the time Louis’s army finished its rough refitting and began to move, Marquis Gangpireu’s offspring, under the mistaken impression that Louis had stopped the fief war, were already fighting among themselves. With no regular army, what happened could hardly be called a war; it was more like some back-alley brawl among street thugs. Had Marquis Gangpireu risen from the grave to witness his children, he would have beaten the ground in despair.

By the time Louis took his first city, Douglas—who had been presumed heir to Marquis Gangpireu’s rank—was no longer of this world. Dead drunk, he had been struck by an assassin’s blade and died on the spot.

Then, using their private soldiers, the third and fifth sons crossed swords, and blood was spilled. The scheming third son emerged victorious. Third son Haidek Conrad, suspicious of his quiet second brother, then poisoned him—and only after that did he unofficially inherit the marquisate.

On the surface, his path looked similar to Louis’s, but there was something base about it. Perhaps it was because the blood of House Haidek carried a certain slyness from birth. While Conrad basked in his victory, the news arrived that the first city had fallen.

“…Damn it all, this is nonsense.”

Those were his first words when he heard it. Louis’s army was still numerous and powerful, and it had siege weapons. An empty city could not withstand such a force for even a single day. Distance was the only real obstacle Louis’s army faced in seizing them.

“How… how could this happen? I waited, and I waited for this, only to have everything taken away… If I only had a little more time—damn it. Damn it!!!”

Conrad had inherited the marquisate he had dreamed of, but the odds were high he would be a marquis in name only. If he lost every city and all the nobles dwelling in them, what use was a marquis’s title? In any case, Louis split his forces and struck the cities one by one, and met barely any resistance on his way to the last city.

In the blink of an eye, four cities were added to the ledger. The territory Louis would now rule became vast. He was the first in three hundred years of House Pontina’s history to expand its lands. The succession war had been bloody, but the result was excellent.

With the four new cities added, Louis’s domain was no longer a minor faction. If there were no restraints, he wanted to seize the last city Marquis Gangpireu had held and kill all his children. If there were no restraints. But the Prince-King himself sent a letter, ordering him to halt the fief war.

For the Prince-King to intervene directly meant the situation had grown enormous. It also became the occasion for Louis’s name to spread across the entire Duchy of Eron.

Gridio Orpendius, Prince-King of the Duchy of Eron, had been fretting since early morning as he received the news. Though quick-tempered and petty, he was neither incompetent nor lazy. On the contrary, he was a diligent ruler. So the matter that had him clutching his head and composing a letter at dawn could only be Louis.

“Being too good is a problem too…”

The situation fit that saying perfectly. House Pontina had been famous for war, but that reputation was no longer recent; it all belonged to the past. House Pontina’s unique internecine struggles—while most noble houses fought among themselves, this house alone had turned that into a mandatory custom.

Prince-King Orpendius found them a truly peculiar house. Unlike others, who held the rank of marquis, they had preserved a symbolic ducal title ever since the founding, so as not to forget the legendary feats of Pontina Valpur. Furthermore, their customary succession war had always taken the form of open warfare rather than quiet assassinations.

As generations passed, their house had inevitably grown weaker, and Orpendius believed this strange custom had played a large part in that. Yet somehow, things had taken a different turn. Having once seen Pontina Fred in person, Orpendius had never doubted that Fred would become the next duke and head of House Pontina. But the result was a completely different person.

Because he was diligent, Orpendius had his own network of informants. He personally learned quite quickly of the slaughter unfolding in that remote corner of the duchy. As a prince-king whose duty was to preserve the state, clashes between fiefs were a welcome sight. The Duchy of Eron was rotten enough that Orpendius constantly worried a rebellion might break out at any moment.

No matter how hard he worked, most of the real levers of power had slipped into the hands of the factions, so the prince-king’s authority simply would not grow. For these reasons, he had watched the clash between Marquis Gangpireu and Louis of Pontina with applause, following it closely. Knowing full well how seasoned the marquis’s skill in war was, Orpendius had been racking his brains, devising a scheme to keep him from devouring House Pontina and marching on the capital.

And then the outcome was a crushing victory for Louis of Pontina. More than crushing: in that battle, Marquis Gangpireu’s head had flown. Louis, still barely of age, had devoured his opponent whole. By Orpendius’s estimate, it should have been nearly impossible for Louis to defeat Fred, Pierre, and Marquis Gangpireu—each of them possessing considerable command of mercenary warfare and armed force.

The reason was simple: he knew very clearly that as recently as a year or two ago, Louis of Pontina had possessed no power base at all. The youngest son of a house with no faction and the stigma of illegitimacy on top of that—and yet he had achieved this? Orpendius clearly sensed that Louis was the eye of the storm in the Duchy of Eron’s unstable political climate. Seeing him topple each of Marquis Gangpireu’s cities in turn, the prince-king realized that if he delayed even a little, Louis might absorb everything. There was more than enough chance that Louis could grow into a faction completely beyond his control.