"Can I really take on this position?"
Everyone present was one of their own, so Aurelian no longer needed to act as dignified and proud as she had during the banquet.
To be honest, becoming the heir to the throne also felt very sudden to Aurelian.
She truly had no mental preparation at all.
Although she had thought about it before, she had never actively chosen to fight for it.
Viktor turned around and looked at the somewhat nervous Aurelian, "There's no need to worry, Your Highness the Princess."
"This is what His Majesty hopes for."
No one was more suitable than Aurelian to become the next emperor.
Even if there was, Viktor would not agree.
If he wanted to make sure everything he did in the Empire could proceed without obstruction, then he had to use his support to make Aurelian become the emperor.
But trying to push a female emperor forward was extremely difficult.
Aubrey had wanted to do this for a long time, but he had no reason.
And Aurelian also did not have enough strength.
So Viktor had to be the one to do it.
But Aurelian still lacked confidence and replied in a weak voice, "And my two elder brothers…"
Before she could finish speaking, Viktor had already knelt down on one knee.
One arm rested across his chest as he lowered his head and saluted Aurelian.
He looked extremely respectful.
So respectful that Aurelian felt somewhat unfamiliar with it.
That was the etiquette between a ruler and a subject.
Seeing Viktor like this, the princess froze for a moment, as if she had never expected him to do such a thing.
Gradually, Viktor's voice sounded.
"Your Highness."
"Everything I have done is to allow you to inherit this country."
Freeing the demi-humans, cooperating with the elves, gaining the support of the Mage Council.
All of it was to increase Aurelian's influence.
And being at odds with all the nobles, standing on the opposite side of them, even openly starting a war with the Leiser family by every possible means.
All of it was to tell others one thing.
The Clavenna family would only support Aurelian.
"I will always be your subject."
Viktor's calm voice sounded beside Aurelian's ear, each word entering her ears one by one, pressing painfully against her heart.
Aurelian hesitantly reached out her hand, spreading her fingers, subconsciously wanting to touch Viktor in front of her.
But for some reason, Viktor, who was kneeling on one knee in front of her, seemed incredibly far away.
So far that it felt as if he wasn't even someone from the same world.
If she did not bend down, she could not even touch her teacher.
But if she bent down…
"Your Highness.", Viktor shook his head.
'If you bend down, the crown will fall.'
Aurelian became a little anxious.
'Why?'
If she really became the emperor, wouldn't she be able to have everything she wanted?
But… the title of ruler and subject felt so heavy?
"I…"
At that moment, Viktor had already stood up.
Aurelian raised her head and looked at Viktor blankly.
However, at this moment, his gaze was no longer on her.
He was simply looking past her.
And Aurelian also turned around blankly and looked behind herself.
There stood a silver-white knight wearing a blue long dress with armor draped over her shoulders.
Her silver-white hair looked like fibers formed from condensed snowflakes.
Carrying a purity like wind and snow, revealing a cold and distant solitude.
That was her other teacher.
Gwen Delin.
At the same time, she had another identity.
Viktor's fiancee.
As if she had sensed Viktor's gaze, the perfect knight who seemed to be standing in the middle of a snowstorm finally moved.
As if shaking off the frost covering her body, she stepped forward and walked steadily to Aurelian's front.
After that, she slightly bowed to Aurelian with a knight's salute.
Then she stood behind Viktor.
In Aurelian's eyes, Viktor and Gwen's figures seemed to be merging together.
A deep black and a pure white.
The two stood together, yet they looked so well matched.
Beside her ears, Viktor's calm voice seemed to sound again, but she did not hear it clearly.
"It's getting late. Gwen and I should go back."
"Then, see you tomorrow, Your Highness."
He left with Gwen. The two walked side by side, stepping forward together, crossing the golden doorway and heading out of the banquet hall.
Aurelian wanted to say something, but it felt as if a stone was stuck in her throat, and she could not say a single word.
She frowned, and her choking throat could only let out a heavy breath.
She tried to reach out her hand, wanting to touch Viktor's departing back.
Several council members and Duke Levi approached Aurelian together, breaking her silence.
Heim Horne's phantom-like face, filled with indescribable flickering static, leaned closer.
"Please rest assured, Princess."
"This is also the deal our council made with your father."
Aurelian turned her head and stared blankly at Heim Horne's face that looked as if it was smiling.
"Horne… Councilor."
Duke Levi also stepped forward and bowed slightly to Aurelian.
"Your Highness."
"Duke Levi…"
Several heavyweight fourth-rank mages stood beside her.
It seemed like they were protecting her safety, and also silently supporting her.
But Aurelian only wanted to ignore everyone around her.
Her gaze still looked toward the direction Viktor had left.
She stared tightly at Viktor's back that was gradually shrinking in the distance.
It seemed that even from a hundred meters away, she could hear a calm voice.
But it did not come from Viktor.
"Viktor, today, was I very obedient?"
"I didn't act impulsively. I didn't do anything else."
Viktor turned his head back, wearing a smile Aurelian had never seen before.
Like he was pampering someone, he nodded at Gwen.
"Mm, very good."
Gwen remained expressionless. Her snow-silver hair, under the night sky, gave her an extra sense of mystery.
Her coldness usually made people feel distant.
But at this moment, that lonely elegance of hers
seemed to bloom only for Viktor.
"Then hug me."
"We'll talk about it when we get home."
The two walked side by side on the road, silently.
Until their shrinking figures gradually blurred and disappeared.
Only then did Aurelian blink.
She wasn't sure whether Viktor had truly left, or if the blurred air had covered her eyes.
But no matter how carefully she stared at the winding road, in the end there was only the deep darkness of midnight left.
She felt a sense of daze rushing toward her. The light in her eyes seemed to leave her body, merging into the dark night sky and the magnificent banquet hall.
Only a dim heaviness remained, like a moth stuck to her eyes, flapping its wings.
The swaying shadows behind her gradually calmed under the candlelight, stretching longer and longer across the golden floor.
———
[A Day Quickly Passed]
The royal capital, just like before, welcomed the faint pale light of dawn.
The news from last night quickly spread through the entire noble circle.
Like a surging wave, it roughly dragged everyone into it.
The emperor had already decided the next heir.
Not the eldest prince, and not the second prince.
But the kingdom's princess, Aurelian Sol.
The news was too sudden, like a bomb thrown into the deep ocean during the night.
But perhaps it was thrown too deep, because it did not cause much disturbance.
Because no one really felt surprised.
Last night, most of the nobles who were in the royal capital had attended that banquet.
They had personally heard Emperor Aubrey announce it, so they naturally did not feel any excitement anymore.
Besides, compared to that, several nobles had been killed by Viktor at the banquet yesterday.
If that matter spread out, it might attract the interest of many people.
It might even cause panic among the common people.
Other than the nobles, for most ordinary citizens, those goddess cultists who looked extremely evil sounded much closer to their lives than something as distant as a princess ascending the throne.
If one of the family members they lived with every day suddenly became that kind of monster one day, crawling out from a corpse's empty skin… turning into black twisting flesh…
Just imagining it was enough to make people feel extremely horrified.
At the same time, a simple and plain carriage was being pulled by horses, rolling across a dusty road.
All around were patches of lush green weeds reaching waist height, gently swaying with the breeze and bending to one side.
In the distance, the dense forest swayed and made rustling sounds, and no other carriages passed along the road nearby.
Inside the slightly bumpy plain carriage sat a man who was anything but plain.
The second prince had received the news. Sitting inside the swaying carriage, his face remained expressionless.
He placed the opened letter beside the seat, rubbed the space between his brows, and took a deep breath.
"Hoo…"
Recently, the second prince had been feeling very exhausted, both physically and mentally.
Ever since returning from the northern border, he felt that his luck had been extremely bad.
First he broke two ribs in a row, and in the end he was targeted by the entire witch hunter organization.
For some reason, those witch hunters had been appearing frequently in the royal capital lately.
The greed inside his body kept telling him that those witch hunters were searching for something.
But what could witch hunters be searching for?
Isn't it demons?
Because of the large-scale appearance of the witch hunters, he had no choice but to leave the royal capital to hide for a while.
Of course, he could use his identity as a prince to drive those witch hunters away.
But the problem was…
Who the hell did this good deed, and why were all those witch hunters wearing the Clavenna family's crest?
Since when were even witch hunters working for the Clavenna family?
The beginning of all this seemed to start when his mother, whom he had not seen for a long time, returned.
And now, even the throne had slipped out of his hands.
The second prince only felt it was ridiculous.
His father seemed to have never acknowledged him and Albany.
It was as if everything they had done looked extremely ridiculous in their father's eyes.
In the end, he handed the throne to the little princess he loved more.
He was even willing to let a princess inherit the empire.
Before this, neither he nor Albany had ever considered the little princess to be any kind of threat.
After a long while, the voice of the knight driving the carriage came from outside.
"Your Highness, there is another piece of news from the royal capital."
"It seems that the princess will leave the empire in the next few days, in the name of the empire, to visit the Kingdom of Cant."
"Viktor will also go."
The second prince rubbed his brow and let out a heavy breath of foul air.
"I understand."
Feeling the swaying of the carriage, he raised his head again and said calmly, "Let's go."
"Head to the City of Adventurers, my royal brother Albany's territory."
"With such good news, I think he should also share the happiness with me."