Ray leaned back and let out a dry, quiet laugh, like the sound of old bones breaking. Looking at Morgana, who seemed as though she carried the worries of an entire continent on her shoulders, he said mockingly,
"See? All that blood, wars, betrayals, and protocols that make the nobles hold their heads so stiffly as if their necks were stuffed with wood... and in the end, the whole story boils down to a group of men in fancy clothes deciding to be exceptionally stupid."
"Are you laughing? Is this really the time for sarcasm? Don't you realize that you're the one standing in front of this hurricane now?!"
Morgana clenched her fist until her knuckles turned white from frustration. She had inherited her position after the death of the "rabbit" knowing the Empire was sinking, but she had never imagined the water had already risen this high.
Only now did everything begin to form a hideous picture in her mind. The Duke of the North had not simply been a rebel; he had been a clever rat who realized before everyone else that the ship was falling apart, so he decided to jump off early, leaving her at the forefront to serve as nothing more than a scapegoat to be sacrificed beneath the ruins of a collapsing throne.
She remembered wondering why he had been trying to contact the Holy Empire before carrying out the execution sentence. The words of the prison guards came back to her—words she had not understood at the time.
[Did you know? We've become subjects of the Holy Empire.]
"Do you really think this system will solve this crisis?"
For the first time, doubt crept into Morgana's mind as she asked the question.
"Do you think so?" Ray smiled and asked. "What about you? Do you think there's actually a solution to this situation? Tell me... what did you try to do when you inherited the position before?"
"What did I do?"
Morgana let out a deep sigh and opened her heart regarding a subject she would never have spoken about if Ray had not asked directly. She always answered only as much as she was asked, just as she had done when he asked about the list of people she intended to appoint, providing what she knew and ignoring what she did not.
"I did nothing..."
Her voice softened as she continued.
"Suddenly, while I was still in the palace, news of your death arrived. Before the funeral ceremonies had even ended, I found myself sitting on the throne, confused, while everyone around me shouted words I couldn't understand. Under that pressure, I nearly lost consciousness."
She took a strained breath and continued.
"After that, my entire life became sitting behind a desk all day, signing papers and following the Duke's orders without truly understanding what was happening. By the time I started trying to learn and understand the balance of power, it was already too late. Everything I said was completely ignored. Four years passed while the Empire sank, and in the end I became a public disgrace and a prisoner waiting for execution."
Morgana stopped, skipping over painful memories she had no desire to revisit. Then she pointed out something she had realized from Ray's recent words.
"By the way, I remembered something I heard while I was in prison. I think the Duke truly formed an alliance with the Holy Empire and made Aster its subordinate state... or perhaps merely a province under its influence."
"Selling a haunted house to another devil?"
Ray's smile widened, and a glimmer of admiration mixed with surprise appeared in his eyes.
"Well done, Duke... what a truly brilliant idea!"
Rubbing his chin, Ray analyzed the situation aloud.
"With a single move, he'll make every other kingdom think a thousand times before opposing the Empire of Aster. The Church will help sway the common people into supporting his actions, and the Holy Empire will provide him with all the military and political support he needs."
"And with that, he'll be able to crush rebellious nobles, eliminate opponents, and sit on the throne in peace... even if the price of that throne is becoming nothing more than a servant polishing the priests' shoes."
Ray sighed, lowered his hand, and looked at Morgana.
"Isn't it fascinating? Honor, to these nobles, is like toilet paper. They use it when necessary, then throw it away in the nearest corner the moment it's no longer useful."
Morgana could not help herself.
Despite the darkness of the situation and the bitterness of the truth, Ray's crude and absurd comparison pierced through her silence.
A short laugh escaped her. At first it was restrained, as though asking permission to leave, before turning into a gentle sound that broke the stillness of the room.
Ray smiled at the rare sight. He had never seen Morgana laugh before; even her previous smiles had seemed forced.
Morgana quickly regained her composure.
"You're a truly strange person... You make disasters sound like nothing more than a bad joke, and somehow... that makes me feel like we might actually survive."
"There's a bigger problem than that."
Morgana froze.
Before she could ask, Ray continued.
"I think I've fallen in love."
"Go to sleep."
"Heh, is that a rejection?"
Ray smiled dramatically while clutching his chest.
"What a cruel rejection from someone who's already married to me!"
"Stop that. Go to sleep. Didn't you say you're busy tomorrow?"
"What about you?"
Trying to recover her composure, she answered,
"I'll review those papers for a while."
"Fine. Just don't stay up all night again. The real work begins after tomorrow's meeting."
"It's fine. My responsibilities aren't nearly as heavy as yours."
Morgana sighed in relief, and the redness in her face gradually faded as she left the bed.
Ray decided to rest. As Morgana had said, he might not get another day like this anytime soon.
While Ray sank into the silence of his bed and Morgana buried herself in paperwork, the calm inside the room was nothing but an illusion.
Behind those heavy doors, it was anything but an ordinary night in the Imperial Palace.
The candles that refused to go out within the guest wings were not witnessing conspiracies, but exhausted faces recalculating their chances of survival for the thousandth time.
Silence hung over the corridors.
A silence suggesting that the era they had grown accustomed to had suddenly stopped.
And beyond this tunnel, there was light...
But was it dawn waiting for them?
Or an abyss?
Behind closed doors, human confusion reigned before the unknown.
By dawn, everyone had realized the bitter truth.
The problem was not the new laws.
The problem was that the Emperor himself had changed.
With cold political precision, Ray had smoothly removed the Duke of the North from the center of power and restored, in a single night, a dignity the throne had lost for years.
And when the Duke of the South declared his loyalty, everyone else found themselves facing a merciless reality.
The time for opposition had already passed.
The king they had grown accustomed to ignoring had returned to the board and wanted to begin a new game.
So what were they supposed to do now?
Repeat the same mistake their ancestors had made and trust this promising change in the Emperor and the possibilities offered by the new system?
Or continue sheltering beneath the dukes?
During those long hours, masks fell away.
Those who had spent years plotting the throne's downfall suddenly found themselves studying ways to win its favor.
It was not a desire for reform.
It was political terror.
The alliances that had seemed as immovable as mountains yesterday had crumbled overnight.
The nobles realized that the puppet they had been manipulating had had its strings cut.
And now it was beginning to hold theirs.
Behind closed doors, nobody dared trust even their allies.
"What if the Duke of the North accepts the position and leaves us behind?"
"What if my neighbor already sent a secret letter to the Emperor?"
The air within the guest wings was thick with suspicion.
What terrified them most was not the new system.
It was the silence surrounding the palace.
A silence that suggested the Emperor knew more about them than they knew about themselves.
By dawn, none of them had slept.
They had already lost the battle of wills before the battle of laws had even begun.
As the meeting approached, bloodshot eyes watched the doors open once more, realizing that none of them would leave that hall the same people they had been when they entered yesterday.
At the same time, inside the Emperor's office, Ray smiled while holding several letters delivered by servants.
[The time has come.]
"Alright."
Ray sighed, set the letters aside, and followed Rei.
It was time for the final meeting.
The meeting that would welcome even more figures onto the stage of this Imperial Empire...
------------------------------
End of Chapter
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[Appendix: The Compass of the Four Directions]
[Duke of the South (Guardian of the Silent Oath):
He was the wall that never fell, yet chose silence when the leader disappeared. The Southern family never forgot that their place on the map had been a gift from the First Emperor himself. Thus, when the throne became a playground for chaos, the Duke refused to stain his sword in petty struggles. Instead, he withdrew behind his borders and protected his lands as though they were a miniature empire awaiting its rightful owner. He watched the palace with the eyes of a hawk, searching not for a king to serve, but for an Emperor worthy of his bow.]
[Duke of the East (The Observer Who Never Gambles):
A man who mastered the art of distance. He built not walls, but self-sufficiency, turning his territory into an isolated island amid the Empire's raging sea. He watched the storm from his window with cold indifference. If Aster fell, he would not fall with it. If it endured, he lost nothing. He sought neither allies nor friendships—only the side that could not be defeated.]
[Duke of the West (Keeper of the Separated Identity):
After the disgraceful flight of the Fourteenth Emperor, the Duke of the West concluded that the Empire had become a dead body, and therefore the spirit had to be preserved. For three entire years, he carried out what he considered a patriotic mission, gathering every manuscript, historical record, and book related to Aster and storing them within his lands to ensure the nation's identity would not be erased by time. Once he completed that task, he declared independence and crowned himself king in order to protect that legacy. The Duke of the North exploited his loyalty and convinced him that separation was the only path to preserving history. Yet during the meeting, he began to realize that the corpse had regained its soul, and that his independence had been the trap the Duke of the North had carefully prepared, leaving him branded by the throne as the traitor who abandoned the Empire.]
[Duke of the North (The Engineer Who Lost His Strings):
A man driven by old ashes and hatred inherited from the blood of his father, which had been wasted by the Thirteenth Emperor. He did not sneak into power; he entered through the door of apology when the Thirteenth Emperor appointed him Prime Minister in an attempt to atone for his crimes against the family. From that seat, he spent years weaving the nobles into his web until he believed the palace itself belonged to him. But in a single night, his strings were cut. Ray's fierce assault did not merely strip him of power—it forced him to realize, with bitterness, that the puppet he once mocked had become the one holding the scissors.]