"BOOM!"
Just as Samael sat beneath the pavilion frowning in thought, a muffled explosion came from one corner of the courtyard.
A violent shockwave carrying billowing smoke swept outward in every direction, sending grass clippings and dust flying through the air and making both the ground and the house tremble.
Amid the howling turbulence of Ether, the four little ones playing cards at the stone table, including Freya, Barghest, and Melusine, reacted by protecting their hands and steadying the table.
At the same time, three pairs of eyes turned toward a certain someone.
Tch. No fun...
Under everyone's gaze, Baobhan Sith sheepishly released the hand she had been reaching toward the table leg with and gloomily picked up the cards scattered across the ground.
After a brief pause, the four fairies did not even blink. Each silently recalculated the cards in play and their next move.
"Tch. Failed again..."
The Ancient Serpent shook his head and muttered to himself, calmly sipping his tea as though this were perfectly normal.
Hum...
The disturbance instantly activated the Ogham characters and Runes engraved throughout the courtyard.
Three rings of light flared one after another, containing the aftermath within a fixed area.
Immediately afterward, Ether particles gathered in the air. Several whirlwinds spiraled up from within the smoke, tearing apart and drawing in the dust and remnants of the explosion.
Having expertly cleaned up the scene of the crime, the witch calmly lowered her hands and walked out of the Magical Workshop, which had once again been reduced to ruins.
The sun shone brightly. A gentle breeze swept through the courtyard.
Those who had been drinking tea continued drinking tea, and those who had been playing cards continued playing cards.
Everything was peaceful.
"Morgan, could you keep it down? I finally got some inspiration for this year's popular styles and patterns."
Covered in bits of cotton and thread, Habetrot stormed out of the weaving room in frustration and waved a tiny fist at her friend.
Morgan gave a reserved nod, clearly conveying that she would definitely remember next time.
As for when exactly that "next time" would be, everyone's reactions made the answer obvious.
Over the past few days, Morgan had become increasingly absorbed in her research.
The courtyard had already been repaired at least eight times, while more than a hundred ruined magical cauldrons had piled up in one corner.
Fortunately, Morgan had already purchased the property and designated the house as Orkney, the Land of Terminus's office in Camelot, which made experimenting much more convenient.
As long as the proper defenses were in place, conducting experiments in their own home would only inconvenience the few people living there.
If the commotion ever spread outside, the people of Camelot might start thinking terrorist attacks were happening every few days.
In the end, Morgan managed to secure the victim's forgiveness by agreeing to let Habetrot keep a pet and choose a cat from the market.
And so, the noisy morning passed.
After breakfast, a luxurious carriage was already waiting outside the gate.
Its emblem showed a Red Dragon and a lion standing on either side, supporting a crown in the center, clearly marking its identity.
The carriage picked up Samael and Morgan as they left the courtyard, merged into the bustling streets, and headed toward the royal palace.
...
The royal palace, council chamber.
Lords of reputation and influence from across Britannia had already gathered inside.
They stood in small groups of three or five, whispering among themselves. Some frowned deeply, some looked smug, while others exchanged calculating glances.
Having arrived early thanks to a dedicated carriage, Samael leaned against a corner, drinking tea and eating candied fruit while observing the whispering lords with interest.
Decades of darkness had left Britannia with almost everything in need of rebuilding.
Ever since the coronation concluded successfully, the Holy City of Camelot had begun acting as the nation's central authority, addressing the backlog of affairs from every region, proposing plans for the construction of the state, and discussing relevant policies.
Naturally, this involved countless issues concerning interests, authority, public welfare, and politics, along with territorial boundaries, taxation and funding, the aftermath of the Four Great Calamities, and all sorts of disputes both large and small.
In short, many of the problems were both contentious and complicated.
That was why, for more than half a month, the Lion King had been gathering the Knights of the Round Table and lords from across the land to argue through these matters.
Britannia had already been famous for its high degree of autonomy under the Roman Empire.
Now that Rome itself was nearly finished, the various local powers that had risen throughout the island had indeed been beaten into submission once by Artoria and the Round Table.
But at its core, Britannia remained a traditional feudal state, loosely stitched together.
The King granted land to great feudal lords.
Those lords then divided their holdings into fiefs for their own vassals, who in turn granted portions of their land to further subordinates.
Thus, land formed the bond between lord and vassal.
Beyond paying taxes to the overlord they had sworn allegiance to and answering calls for military service, these lords wielded enormous authority within their own territories.
Some could even afford to ignore the King.
Later, after round after round of stronger lords swallowing weaker ones, the feudal houses fought constantly among themselves, and their grievances only deepened.
This was why the Celtic natives, who had lived on Britannia for generations, had somehow failed to defeat a group of Saxon barbarians arriving from across the sea.
At the root of it, the branches were strong while the trunk was weak. Everyone fought separately, each trying to preserve their own forces, leaving the whole country like a pile of loose sand.
Although Artoria had now unified the Northern and Southern Realms, she herself had originally been elevated by the feudal lords of the south.
The more than two hundred members of the Round Table likewise represented their own families, bloodlines, and interests.
So even the Lion King, who now resembled a deity, could do little more than force these lords to gather in Camelot and settle their problems through negotiation.
Fortunately, Merlin and Kay had been clever enough during the early stages to begin with issues unlikely to provoke serious disputes.
Backed by the prestige of victory and divine power, the Lion King resolved those quickly.
During the middle stages, the support of the Knights of the Round Table allowed somewhat more sensitive topics to move forward as well.
In the end, after more than ten days of effort, Artoria had even forced the most difficult problems into submission through sheer firmness.
Now the discussions were almost at their end.
Once these final matters were settled, Britannia as a nation could finally begin anew.
Creak...
The rosewood doors, covered in intricate gilded patterns, slowly opened.
Footsteps approached together with the scraping of armor.
Beyond lay a corridor of alternating light and shadow, where rose-shaped stained-glass windows framed by carved phoenixes reflected sacred radiance, creating the impression of a road leading to heaven.
The Lion King emerged from the light, surrounded by knights and aides.
When she took her seat before the enormous round table in the council chamber, the entire room instantly fell silent.
The lords meekly returned to their places like obedient sheep being herded back into a pen.
Clearly, after more than ten days, the Lion King had gradually trained these feudal lords into a flock of sheep.
"Since all of you have arrived, let this Round Table Conference formally begin."
Artoria slowly raised one hand.
Her eyes, burning with pale green flames, quietly swept across the assembled lords.
The Round Table represented those who were "equal at the dining table."
A so-called [Round Table Conference] meant having everyone sit around a round table, setting aside distinctions between host and guest or superior and inferior, granting each participant nominal equality and the right to negotiate so that matters could be discussed peacefully.
Historically, this seemed to be one of the legacies the Arthurian legends had passed down to later generations.
Yet once Artoria took her seat, the room sank into an eerie silence.
The council chamber was so quiet one could hear a pin drop.
The Lion King looked around.
The feudal lords all avoided her gaze in perfect agreement, staring straight ahead and sitting as rigidly as clay statues.
Formal equality might remove visible hierarchy, but the shackles inside people's hearts were much harder to break.
Besides, after more than ten days of witnessing this deity's decisiveness and terrifying authority, the lords had already been thoroughly cowed by the Lion.
Seeing this supposedly "peaceful," "friendly," and "equal" atmosphere sink into unbearable awkwardness, Kay lightly cleared his throat and smiled.
"Ahem. Thanks to everyone's combined efforts, Camelot has already dealt with most of the issues on its agenda. So for today, the lords present may raise matters of their own. If you have any difficulties or concerns, please speak freely. The King will consider them as much as possible."
After that gentle explanation, the tense lords finally let out quiet breaths of relief.
Even so, after exchanging glances, no one dared be the first to speak.
Just as the atmosphere was about to freeze again, Morgan, who had spent the past ten days watching coldly from the sidelines, broke the silence.
"No one? Then I'll go first. I believe practices such as the right of the first night should be abolished."
The witch then recounted what she had witnessed in Cornwall.
Of course, Morgan did not mention her own achievements in gathering the Fairy Knights and suppressing calamities throughout the land.
She had originally taken the name Aesc, the Savior, precisely to conceal her identity.
When they heard what had happened to the enslaved couple, several younger knights with strong senses of justice frowned, showing obvious anger and sympathy.
Most of the lords, however, remained unmoved.
Their reactions were remarkably indifferent.
After all, even Rome, Britannia's former overlord, had risen from a slaveholding society and gradually expanded into a vast empire.
How slaves were treated depended entirely on their master's mood.
Why bother bringing the affairs of a few two-legged beasts into a national council?
"It would be best to establish written laws and have the regulations engraved on stone tablets throughout the land for everyone to see."
Toward the end, Morgan paused in thought and proposed what she considered the ideal solution.
Her idea was clearly modeled after Rome's Twelve Tables. Making the laws public would help spread the new regulations and speed up the reform.
The moment she said it, Samael silently pressed a hand to his forehead.
Morgan's idea itself was good.
The problem was that she was moving too fast.
The Celts had worked under the Roman Empire for so many years. Of course these lords understood the benefits of public written law.
But that was precisely the problem.
Their control over the people and their territories depended on enforcing their own laws as they saw fit.
If Camelot started engraving new regulations onto stone tablets and publishing them everywhere...
Who knew whether the right of the first night would be the only thing written there?
Those laws from Camelot might eventually start cutting directly into the lords' own authority.
There was no chance these men, accustomed to ruling their territories like little kings, would accept that willingly.
And this seemingly minor issue of the right of the first night would probably be treated as the opening move in a much larger reform and obstructed at every step.
Throughout history, those who tried to reform the law rarely came to a good end.
Sure enough, Morgan's final proposal made many of the lords frown.
Their expressions grew hostile.
The relatively minor matter of abolishing the right of the first night had clearly been interpreted as cover for a much greater ambition.
The lords were not fools, however, and none of them directly attacked the proposal.
Instead, nobles from the Northern Realm, where the fighting had been fiercest, answered with sneers and mockery.
"The Saxons are still ravaging the north. The aftermath of the Mad Hunt and the dragon plague has yet to settle. We don't have enough food, winter housing, or clothing, and our people are barely surviving. Who has time to worry about the right of the first night?"
"Exactly. Toss a loaf of white bread into the north, and by nightfall you might have a dozen women willing to climb into your bed."
The lords of the Southern Realm, led by the Duke of Oxford, likewise raised problems they considered far more urgent.
"My lords, I won't hide the truth. Things are no better in the south. Ever since the insect plague and beast plague, fairy activity has become much more frequent. Our caravans have been attacked several times. Guards have been killed and goods stolen."
"Exactly! My territory has also lost several hundred households. There's no one left to grow grain. I don't even know how those estates are supposed to survive next year!"
"And those little beasts collapsed my mine and buried more than a hundred people underground!"
"My King, for the sake of peace in the Southern Realm, we cannot allow these creatures to keep running wild. I request that you dispatch knights to campaign against the Nameless Forest and clear out the threats within!"
The southern lords began pleading all at once, like children who had suffered some grave injustice and finally found an adult to complain to.
With a far more explosive issue now on the table, one directly concerning the lives of the people, the highly rational Artoria immediately shifted her attention toward the calls to campaign against the fairies.
Morgan was instantly pushed to the side.
Over the next several minutes, case after case was blamed on the fairies.
As the southern lords cursed them one after another, the little creatures who had recently become more active were swiftly transformed into irredeemable monsters guilty of every possible crime.
Artoria's brow tightened further and further, while the golden-green flames in her eyes flickered faintly.
Realizing that there might be another battle to fight, several younger and more vigorous knights of the Round Table exchanged interested glances.
The Saxons of the north and the rebels of the Usurper King had already been beaten nearly beyond recovery.
Across all Britannia, the only creatures still capable of posing a genuine threat to the Celts were the fairies of the Nameless Forest.
Perhaps...
The lion guarding her flock stirred slightly and began to raise one hand, as though she had already reached a decision.
"I've been listening for a while, and I have a few questions for you gentlemen."
Before Artoria could speak, however, Samael, who had been leisurely drinking tea in a corner, turned toward the lords of the Southern Realm.
"Duke of Oxford, why does your 'caravan' keep going into a godforsaken place like the Nameless Forest? There are no customers there. Don't tell me that's where you're sourcing your goods?"
"And you, my lord. Even when fairies abduct people, they usually target someone traveling alone. If entire households are disappearing one after another, that sounds more like people fleeing. If your territory has lost several hundred households, perhaps you should ask yourself why."
"As for the mine, the mountain spirit Nok may be a little greedy, but he's very docile. His only peculiarity is that he lives underground and has certain requirements for his environment. You didn't happen to cut through the ore vein and make him block the entrance, did you?"
With only a few sentences, the lords who had been loudly playing the victims suddenly fell silent.
Their expressions stiffened unnaturally.
***
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