This world had no shortage of inconveniences. One of them was music. There are moments in life that call for music. Right now, Bizet's "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle" should have been playfully echoing through the air. At the very least, Ravel's "Boléro"! I wanted to take Laura by the hand and dance, swaying our hips to the rhythm. But what could I do? There was absolutely no way to listen to music. So I hummed a tune under my breath, making do with what I had.
"Why must it be an age of chaos? Why does my lord desire chaos?"
"Simply to survive."
I concentrated on not losing the rhythm of my music as I spoke.
"As Laura well knows, I am weak. I don't even have what you'd call a power base. Compare that to the other Demon Lords. Compare it to the other human kingdoms. They are far too great, far too powerful. They need to sink into the morass and be thrown into confusion."
"In the meantime, my lord builds his power..."
Exactly.
Barbatos had completely misread my intentions. He probably thought that my goal was to deliberately reduce the number of Demon Lords in order to make the Crescent Alliance Army succeed. Wrong. Why on earth would I want the Crescent Alliance Army to succeed, you fool? The Crescent Alliance Army needs to succeed just enough and fail just enough. So that the human powers and the Demon Lord powers end up in a delicate balance.
Once the truce between the Plains Faction, the Mountain Faction, and the Third Princess goes through, Demon Lord Barbatos will immediately possess a small territory on the continent. Neither Demon Lords nor human rulers are so stupid as not to understand what that means... To the ambitious players of this chaotic age, it will undoubtedly appear as a golden opportunity. To seize even more territory, or to defend what they already have, they will cooperate without discrimination—human or Demonkin alike.
The beginning is the hard part. After that, it's simple. Once the Third Princess and the Sixth Corps Commander cooperate and extract real gains, the other rulers will see that and immediately start scrambling to work their abacuses. Those rulers who are afraid of public scrutiny and hesitant to leap into the age of chaos need not worry. I will give their lazy backsides a good kick. A special service, on the house. Please enjoy it freely.
Laura peered at me with eyes as deep as the Sea of Trees.
"Countless humans and Demonkin will die."
"That is precisely what I wish. I want them to die, and die again."
"Uncountable tragedies will unfold. The common folk will lose their families and companions and be left wandering."
"A shame. I can shed tears for them. Perhaps I'll shed so many that they dry up in short order. But my tears are not the tears of an aristocrat."
The common folk are not the weak. An age of chaos is also an arena of opportunity for the commoners. Rebel to your heart's content. Start as many revolutions as you like. Rise up. The more violent the era becomes, the greater the returns that will flow back to me.
I know this. In *Dungeon Attack*, the Human Realm is split between royalists and republicans. I will light a massive fire on that side too. For instance, what would happen if I published a book similar to the Communist Manifesto, under an anonymous pen name? How would the era react to a work it cannot contain? Perhaps it will simply be buried and forgotten. But perhaps it could produce unexpected results... It truly is a thrilling experiment.
"Have you grown weary of me?"
"No. I merely wished to confirm my lord's resolve."
"Good heavens. A vassal who tests her lord — there is no greater impertinence."
Then again, not long ago I was the one who nearly swooned at the stench of burning human flesh. Laura must have wanted to test my resolve, if only once.
"My lord, you are off-balance. You will not hesitate to commit any cruelty if it means survival, yet you shed tears when you witness the aftermath. To maintain one's sense of self, a person needs to be somewhat shameless. You need to be able to say: 'This was not my doing — it is a tragedy they brought upon themselves through their own inadequacy.' That is the kind of shamelessness you need."
Laura took one step closer to me.
"But you told me — on the very day we first met — that this was the arrogance of the strong. A privilege that only the powerful can afford. If that is so, what recourse remains for the weak? …You cannot look away from the devastation you yourself have wrought, nor layer excuse upon justification upon it. You must accept the tragedy as tragedy, in its entirety. And yet, without being crushed by that tragedy, you must continue to press forward. Is such an attitude truly possible? Can it be sustained?"
She took another step closer.
"My lord is not alone. I too walk this path alongside you. But this path is a dense forest trail that no one has ever walked before — a road where thorns tear at your straw sandals. My lord. I fear that in the end, the future we build together will be nothing more than hollow rhetoric."
"That is precisely why this is an age of chaos. Nothing is set in stone. There is not even a minimal safety net to stand on. All we can do is prove the way we choose to live."
The glasses clinked softly. The sound of glass could not break the silence of the office. If anything, the silence deepened. Within it, she and I intoned:
"To Dantalion."
"To Laura de Farnese."
We slowly tilted our glasses. Sneaking glances at each other, we drank the whiskey — slow, but without stopping. Then, with our mouths full of liquor, we pressed our lips together without a word between us. Her sweet wine flowed down my throat.
From this moment on, we cross the heart of the age of chaos. Alone, the chances of losing our way would be high. But with two of us? And if more join — three, four, many — walking this path together, then surely the forest trails of the Sea of Trees will be trampled again and again until they eventually become a proper road.
Too bad for you, Barbatos. You saw me as nothing more than a Demon Lord. You trusted me completely. You thought of me as a comrade to walk alongside, sharing your ideals. But even if the Crescent Alliance Army succeeds, it will bring me no benefit whatsoever. You overlooked that fact… I do hope you continue to overlook it.
A mistress, after all, is nothing more than a beautiful rose to a ruler. History books are filled to bursting with rulers who fell because of their mistresses. If you insist on making me your mistress, then you too should be prepared to leave at least a single line of your name in the history books.
But come — for now, we are staunch allies. Right now, we must join forces to defeat the Habsburg Empire's armies of the Margrave-Crown Prince alliance. This battle will serve as the prelude that heralds the opening of the age of chaos. Let us get along for the time being.
"Brother! What is the meaning of this?!"
The girl threw open the door to the Crown Prince's office. She was the Third Imperial Princess of the Habsburg Empire, Elisabeth. The guards had been utterly unable to stop her. No one was permitted to enter the Crown Prince's office freely — not even members of the imperial family. But the moment anyone so much as tried to block her path or hold her back, she would unleash a thundering rebuke: "I am here to discuss matters of grave importance to the Empire! How dare you try to meddle with the fate of the Empire!" There was nothing to be done about it.
"Good grief, Count Evattrie. I would appreciate it if you maintained at least a modicum of dignity befitting your station as a noble."
The young man seated in his chair let out a sigh — a sigh laden with the intent to insult. The silver-haired youth of twenty-six was none other than the Crown Prince of the Habsburg Empire, Rudolf von Habsburg.
"When a count carries on with such frivolity, does public sentiment toward the imperial family not only grow murkier by the day?"
"If we are discussing the standard of frivolity, how could a mere girl ever hope to rival Your Highness?"
Princess Elisabeth strode up to the Crown Prince and slapped a document down onto his desk with a loud smack.
Crown Prince Rudolf raised his right eyebrow.
"What is it?"
"The composition of the Habsburg Imperial Army deployed against the Crescent Alliance Army. It lists the names of the generals assigned to this expeditionary force. Brother, let me ask you once more—what in the world is going on? Not half of the central army is listed here!"
Rudolf looked at the princess with a gaze steeped in pity.
"Isn't that obvious? If the entire central army deploys, who would defend the Imperial Capital? Leaving half the garrison behind is elementary military doctrine."
"You said 'defend the Imperial Capital'?"
The princess scoffed.
"Every nation on the continent is under attack from the Crescent Alliance Army. Which country in its right mind would invade another at a time like this? If not for the Demon Lord's army, there has never been a safer moment for the Imperial Capital."
"Exactly."
Rudolf said with supreme confidence.
"That is what everyone thinks. That no sovereign would attack a fellow human nation while the Crescent Alliance Army is bearing down on them. Common sense, they call it. But to a despicable ruler like this one, now is precisely the opportunity to expand his borders. If you empty the capital relying solely on common sense, you will be begging to be stabbed in the back."
"Ha! Invading another country at a time when he can barely preserve his own! One cannot possibly call that a sane sovereign. I cannot even imagine a nation ruled by such a lunatic."
Even despite the princess's naked derision, the Crown Prince responded at his leisure.
"I think so as well, but how can one see through every corner of the world? There is always the 'what if.' Negligently dismissing even the slimmest possibility is the responsibility of one who would be sovereign. Count Evattrie, refrain from charging recklessly into this matter any further."
The slimmest of possibilities. Princess Elisabeth let out a snort.
There was a limit to playing games of misdirection. Every single general belonging to the princess's faction had been excluded from the expeditionary force the Crown Prince had just announced. He called it "defending the Imperial Capital," but a blind man could see the political motives hidden beneath. The Crown Prince's intentions were transparent: he meant to monopolize the glory of having defeated the Demon Lord.
The Crescent Alliance Army had risen once more after two hundred years. An imperial prince who had saved humanity from crisis—that was the brilliant distinction up for grabs. The opportunity to clutch that glory had come around for the first time in two centuries. The Crown Prince made no effort to hide his greed. Under normal circumstances, he would have included at least two or three generals from the princess's faction just to save face, but instead he had composed the entire expeditionary force from his own faction. At a time when the empire should have been united against the threat to all humanity, he had been blinded by military honor and brought about internal division. The princess wanted to spit at such foolishness.
"Very well. I am well aware of how extraordinary my dear brother's tactical insight is, so I shall graciously concede."
"…Are you mocking me right now?!"
The Crown Prince slammed both hands on his desk and rose to his feet. His face had flushed slightly red.
Three years ago, the Crown Prince had served as supreme commander when suppressing a rebellion that broke out in the provinces. Despite commanding twice the forces of the rebel army, he had suffered defeat. The rebels, naturally, grew exceedingly emboldened. In response, the Third Imperial Princess — then only fourteen years old — had shattered the rebel army with three times fewer troops than the enemy. It was the incident that sent the Crown Prince's reputation crashing to the ground while catapulting the princess's military prestige to the heavens. Elisabeth was now insinuating that very episode, hurling her barbs at Rudolf.
"How dare you act so brazenly after swooping in like a scavenger to feast on enemies I had already weakened…!"
"How interesting. After you lost, my dear brother, four barons and seven viscounts defected to the rebel army. Simply in terms of numbers, their forces swelled to roughly twice what they had been before. I confess that as a young woman of limited knowledge, I cannot fathom any military treatise in this world that would call strengthening the enemy 'weakening.'"
Rudolf swung his open palm. The sharp crack of flesh striking flesh rang through the room.
"…"
The officials and guards nearby were stunned. Rudolf had just slapped the princess across the face. While his blow had landed with full force, the princess's head hadn't so much as budged. Her gaze, infinitely cold, simply locked onto the Crown Prince.
"Now get the hell out! Military strategy is a matter of national importance! In the face of a decisive affair upon which not only our nation's fate but humanity's fate hangs, you dare wag your tongue and defy the natural order — I should punish you right here and now, but I'll let it pass for the sake of our sibling bond!"
Elisabeth and Rudolf glared at each other for a long moment. It was the princess who broke eye contact first. Without a shred of hesitation, she turned on her heel, letting her dress skirt billow behind her like a cloak, and strode out of the office. The Crown Prince huffed as he sank back into his seat. He vented his fury.
"What a hypocritical bitch!"
After all, she had only come because she coveted his military glory. And yet she had dressed it up with pretty words like "tactics" to mask her true intentions. The Crown Prince's heart burned with hatred for Elisabeth. The empire had far too many blind fools! What was so special about that woman that they heralded her as the empire's last hope?
So what if she was a little clever? She was still just a woman. All she had to do was obediently submit to him, the Crown Prince. Her sister had been the same — climbing above her station. It had only taken a few thrusts into that cheap hole of hers before she finally understood her place and killed herself.
Same blood as that sister. The Crown Prince resolved to employ the same method. Once this expedition succeeded, his faction would gain an overwhelming advantage. There would be no one left to champion the princess. And then he would teach that woman her place. She was an insolent thing, but her beauty was nothing short of extraordinary. It would be well worth the effort of personally educating her. The Crown Prince composed his rage and set his sights on that day to come.