~ Elaric ~
Selene believed she had made a brilliant move.
She thought, with the wisdom of a queen, she had danced gracefully on a cliff's edge, forging a delicate path along the Steel Wire Road—reassuring me, rewarding Cairo, and maintaining the kingdom's stability. In the council hall, nearly everyone praised her decision and marked her as a woman of unparalleled political acumen.
But only I knew—she was gravely mistaken. Horribly wrong.
She wasn't walking a tightrope; she was using a spade called "balance" to dig my grave with her own hands.
The Royal Blade Guard—such a pleasant name. It is an elite force loyal solely to the queen. Selene believed she had caged a ferocious beast she could control, unaware that she had also freed this beast from the chains of all rules and scrutiny.
Now, Cairo possessed an independent camp, an independent budget, and most crucially—independent recruitment authority. He no longer needed to go through the cumbersome procedures of the parliament and military to bring anyone he fancied under his command.
My isolation began with my most trusted friend, Barnaby.
As my chief advisor, Barnaby was tasked with numerous administrative handovers with the newly established Royal Blade Guard. At first, he stood firmly by my side, even reporting Cairo's suspicious activities to me from time to time. But gradually, I noticed a change in his demeanor.
"Your Highness," he said hesitantly after reporting the latest logistics transfer one day, "I've discovered that Commander Cairo might not be what we imagined. He is rigorous in disciplining his troops, holds his men to high standards, yet shows great care for the newly recruited soldiers of common origin, often sharing his own supplies with them. Everyone in the Guard holds him in high regard."
I put down the document in my hand and looked at him coldly. "Barnaby, are you speaking on his behalf?"
"No, Your Highness, I am merely stating what I've observed," Barnaby avoided my gaze, speaking uneasily. "Moreover, during several of our discussions, he deliberately avoided any mention of Her Majesty the Queen. He seems acutely aware of his position and doesn't want to cause any misunderstandings. Perhaps—perhaps Her Majesty's decision has its own deeper reasoning, and we are overthinking things."
"Overthinking?" I repeated the words, feeling a sharp pain pierce through my chest.
My former closest friend, the man who once swore with me to protect the queen and guard against all threats, was now telling me not to overthink. Cairo's flawless and impeccable façade was already corroding the strongest alliances I had.
If Barnaby's wavering was like a dull knife cutting slowly, the final report from my trusted agent was a hammer blow that nearly struck me down.
My men had spent weeks infiltrating the distant ruins of the Shadow Wolf Pack's territory. Through testimonies from surrounding tribes, they pieced together a heartbreakingly detailed story.
The report confirmed that Cairo was indeed the only son of the Shadow Wolf Pack's former leader. It was true that his tribe had been annihilated overnight by a mysterious army known as the Cursed King, which wielded dark magic. The account detailed the Shadow Wolf Pack's valiant resistance, the deaths of Cairo's parents in battle, and how he, as the sole survivor, escaped through a sea of blood and corpses, now bearing an unquenchable vendetta as he wandered the world.
Every detail was vivid and precise, every witness testimony corroborated with one another.
It was the perfect, tear-jerking heroic tragedy.
And I, the prince companion who had been desperately trying to prove that this hero was a conspirator, now stood as a complete villain—a petty, jealous madman persecuting the virtuous.
I held the report in my hands, sitting in my study until the moon hung high in the sky. A sense of unprecedented helplessness and defeat overwhelmed me. I knew deep down that there was something wrong with this report. It was too perfect, like a meticulously scripted play. The tale of a real survivor should be riddled with chaos, contradictions, and unexplainable gaps—not something seamlessly tight like this.
Yet I could find no flaws.
Cairo must have disseminated this story during his years as a Rogue Alpha, allowing it to take root and ferment into the collective memory of the surrounding tribes. He might have even left deliberate evidence, waiting for me to uncover it.
He wasn't evading my investigation; he welcomed it. Using an irrefutable truth, he had utterly destroyed my credibility.
Now, if I voiced any doubts about Cairo again, no one would believe me. They would only think I was a pitiable fool, twisted by jealousy and unwilling to face reality.
I flung the report to the ground with all my strength. I felt as though I was ensnared in an invisible web that tightened with every struggle. I had become a soldier Fighting Alone, and my enemy was not Cairo standing before me, but the world's justice and sympathy that he had stirred against me.
Amid the suffocating despair, the door to my study was knocked upon.
A guard entered in a fluster.
"Your Highness, something terrible has happened!" he said urgently.
My heart sank immediately, a foreboding sense overwhelming me. "Speak."
"The newly appointed Royal Blade Guard encountered fierce resistance while clearing out a band of ogre thieves along the border," the guard reported quickly. "During the battle, to protect a newly recruited soldier from an ambush, Commander Cairo lured away the strongest ogre alone and was gravely injured!"
My mind went blank in an instant.
Again! Again with this damned, impeccable heroism!
"And Her Majesty the Queen?" I heard myself asking, my voice hoarse beyond recognition.
"Upon hearing the news, Her Majesty was furious. She blamed the regular army's intelligence failures for putting the Royal Blade Guard in such danger," the guard said, lowering his head further. "She has personally taken all her private physicians aboard the swiftest Griffin to rush to the Guard's temporary camp."
I slowly closed my eyes.
I could already see it: my queen, my beloved Selene, bursting into a crude tent with a face full of worry. And that man, the tragic hero, lying on the bed drenched in blood, looking at her with those amber eyes—weak yet filled with adoration.
Every wound on his body would become a blade, cutting deeper and more mercilessly into the fragile trust between Selene and me.
This gambit of mine had not harmed the enemy but had instead pushed the queen into his arms—with guilt, gratitude, and pity.