Emperor of Steel

Over the recent days, Emperor Rudolf wasn’t able to subdue his raging anger.

The reason was the lack of support he was getting for taking down the Libiya Kingdom.

According to his plan, he should have already crushed the Libiya Kingdom and advanced over to the Symphonia Kingdom by establishing anxiousness in the hearts of his enemies.

However, the reality was that he couldn’t even take down the Libiya Kingdom.

Kwang!

“How long are we going to fight with the bastards of the west? Are the wizards and knights of Baroque so incompetent?!”

Rudolf cried out loud by fisting the tables and shaking his head in denial, Count Voltas and Count Ferrero were gathered in the office.

“We apologize, Your Majesty!”

“Please blame us!”

“God! You men don’t even move, how do I even act?!”

Despite the heavy criticism from the Emperor, everyone in the room were silent.

During that moment, an old wizard seated in the corner opened his mouth.

“Your Majesty, how about this?”

“What do you mean?”

“There is an ancient heritage that Your Majesty was handed over to me in the past.”

The old wizard was the Meister of the Imperial Magic Tower, Kepler.

He was recently re-employed after he had already been pushed out for not being to remake the Emperor’s Gigant.

When the last summoning of the demon failed in the Imperial palace, Rudolf had killed off all the warlocks he had been secretly nurturing.

And it was Kepler whom he considered for using the warlocks left behind things.

And Rudolf helped him by bringing in some of the warlock’s items and research materials and instructed Kepler to continue his studies.

“There was a tightly sealed reagent among the ancient heritages given by Your Majesty. I have been researching the reagents for a while, and I have come across a surprising fact.”

Knowing that it was a reagent, he conducted a careful study on it and soon realized that it was a poison that held a disease named ‘Vers’, which had swept the Rhodesia Continent during the Mado era.

According to the remaining ancient records, the soldiers were suffering and the highly contagious disease reduced the population of the continent by a third.

“The high wizards and the fairies during that time went in search for the cure, however, there was no potion that could cure the disease. Even the divine power too couldn’t cure it.”

“So, what are you intending to say?”

Kepler, with a sneaky smile, answered Rudolf’s question.

“Let’s spread this poison to the soldiers of the enemy castles and fort. Then the enemies would lose their force and power to fight against us, and eventually succumb.”

“It shouldn’t be done!”

Listening to Marquis Kepler’s plan, Count Ferrero, the commander of the Central Army jumped up.

“It is highly dangerous to spread a disease that can’t be treated! We will end up killing not just the enemy but innocent people too. And if it comes to our side…”

Then, it is nothing but a released catastrophe!

However, Rudolf’s thoughts were different. With a serious expression.

“So what are a few people to die? In the end, they were the ones who betrayed me for the enemy.”

“But, Your Majesty, they were your people. And they didn’t join the revolt because they wanted to.”

“Then, can we subdue the Libiya Kingdom with our current force?”

At the cold words of Rudolf, Count Ferrero was silenced.

There have been many reasons why they haven’t been able to attack the Libiya Kingdom, but the most important factor was the rapid growth of power in the LIbiya because of the monsters, which the Baroque didn’t have.

And with Reichard known as a Dragonian, the large group following him were strong enough to take down the personal knights and SSS knights of the Emperor.

“Are there any other objections? Well, if there’s more I will kick you out.”

Rudolf’s threat forced everyone to stay silent.

It was because kicking out didn’t mean they would be pushed out of the discussion.

They would lose their title and their position, however, with the recent mood of Rudolf, they could be killed.

‘Even if that is the case, this is a crazy act!’

Count Ferrero bowed his head in dissatisfaction, however, Rudolf ignored it.

It was because he didn’t know what kind of anger will bring upon him because of his stubbornness.

Luke was busy as the royal of Symphonia Kingdom, and after he was done with the work…

There wasn’t much work in the lordship, however, there seemed to be a lot of work and care to be taken in the development and management of a nation.

‘Hugh, I need to show to the people how ambitious their king is.’

Normal people, when they think about a king, usually think of him as the one being served by beautiful women in the palace.

However, the series of reality was different, it was reviews and payments all in piles of a document.

Of course, Luke surely could enjoy a lot of entertainment than anyone else in the palace.

However, to settle his 500-year long grudge and to establish a world which was made of his ideals and dreams, he had to avoid all the unnecessary activities.

Even then, he wanted to be free from the pile of documents he had to review.

“The Republicans aren’t so wrong to say that they want an equal distribution of power. considering how the world is a lot more complicated than the past, both politics and administration have to be improved.”

After becoming the king, Luke realized that the current feudal political system and administration structure wasn’t suitable in a society where commerce and industry have developed and had become widespread than the past.

Nevertheless, the reason for no change in the thoughts of the ruling Emperor’s, kings, and nobles was simple.

Their search for taxing the people to fill in their pockets, or for the military was well known.

‘The Volga Republic managed to withstand even after being isolated from the continent’s nations because their system and their political administration are efficient. Symphonia needs to change like that.’

The problem for Symphonia was that the number of nobles reluctant for the change was numerous.

Rakan’s lords were likely to be influenced by Luke, however, the problem was the former lords of Milton, they were still loyal to Luke, and were reluctant to pass any law stating a change in the noble system.

“I am envious of Reina. In Holy Arthenia Empire, there is no one who would dare to go against her…”

Surely she had a lot of opposition, but the people and nobles of the Empire believed in the miracle power of the woman and considered her to be the messenger of God.

Because of that, even those suspicions about her origin were able to die down fast, and they managed to reform every policy they wanted to pass.

‘But, is Reina doing well?’

Thinking about her political stance, Luke thought of her and looked at the ring on his hand.

The figure of Reina on their wedding day came to his mind.

During that time, he noticed that she was more beautiful and happy than he had ever seen her.

Recalling her bright smile, Luke’s dark expression and exhaustion from the state affairs quickly vanished.

“Honey, what are you thinking?”

Luke suddenly looked up to the person who spoke with a familiar voice.

Reina was there dressed in a white dress with her usual gold embroidery.

“Hohoho. Were you by any chance thinking…? Kuek!”

Luke, who got up, caught Reina by her throat.

Reina, who was troubled, soon turned into a cat.

“Don’t joke around, Sebastian.”

“I, I am sorry, Your Majesty. I, I just wanted to soothe your lonely mood since I am loyal…”

“All you have to do is do your given task perfectly. That is the only way you can prove your loyalty to me.”

“Yes, yes! I understand! Please let me go!”

The demon Sebastian kept rubbing his palms with tears in his eyes.

Sebastian looked very cute in that way, however, Luke didn’t want to go soft on him.

Sebastian was formally appointed to the throne the moment Luke was crowned.

Every task was the same as before.

When Luke will be out, Sebastian will help in the execution of Luke’s chores, and act as the representative for the king in human form, and for 10 minutes in Luke’s disguise if anything urgent happens.

However, maybe because he was in the position closest to the king, more people bowed to him and this only made Sebastian get arrogant.

The previous mischief he played with Luke too was caused by the swelling up of his pride due to the amount of respect he had been getting from the others.

“That is alright, but what is happening? I remember telling you to not come for me unless you have work, right?”

Asked Luke, with his hands still around Sebastian.

“Yes, that…”

“You haven’t come here to play pranks on me, right?”

When Sebastian hesitated to answer, Luke snapped his fingers which made a purple light flash, indicating that he would blow Sebastian.

Seeing the magic, Sebastian replied.

“The Baroque Imperial has sent some extraordinary information!”

“The Baroque? What is it?”

Luke narrowed his eyes as he stopped using magic.

Sighing out of relief, Sebastian reported the incoming information.

“It was said that Emperor Rudolf will release some poisonous drug on the soldiers of Libiya and aim for the war when the number of the soldiers in Libiya will educe.”

“Uh, that sly bastard. He surely is the descendant of that man.”

Luke, recalled the time when he was Saymon, 500 years back.

During that time, the ancestor of Rudolf, the Duke of Baroque, deliberately spread a plague to the villages and towns on the sides of the roads to stop the Devil’s legion.

The epidemic infected humans and fairies, and the devil’s legions had only a small number of them.

The Duke didn’t just release the disease on the clothes of the men living in slums, he also released the blood of an infected man into the well, which was the drinking source of the people during that time.

Luke, who at that time, managed to get the information beforehand, avoided taking his army in that direction.

However, hundreds to thousands of innocent people had suffered due to the epidemic.

The Duke of Baroque who committed such a sin of blatantly spreading a plague said that it was the act of the Devil King Saymon.

“UH, Your Majesty. This isn’t something which can be considered as a sly or cunning. This is madness.”

“Madness?”

“Yes, because it was said that the plague which Rudolf is trying to spread is in Vers.”

“Wh, what was it?”

Luke who heard of that name couldn’t hold in his shock.

Vers.

An epidemic that swept through the Rhodesia continent during the end of the Mado era.

Named after the first infected, the disease critically damaged the people of the Mado era, which soon lost the war with the disease and collapsed.

It was called as the ‘punishment of the gods’ as it had no proper cure and no divine power could work on it—that the disease took the lives of millions of humans and fairies.

It was so contagious that people had escaped from the cities and towers during that time and ran away to the mountains and wide forests.

And no agriculture or industry couldn’t be maintained, and people died from starvation due to food shortage.

The entire society collapsed, violence took over and many scholars and wizards died from hunger as they entered insanity.

‘Rudolf! He is really crazy!’

In the course of investigating the ancient ruins, Luke read the records of ancient people who wrote regarding Vers.

The disease itself was terrifying, however, conditions in which the era collapsed was even more horrifying.

But to use that disease!

Sebastian considering it as madness wasn’t wrong.

“Your Majesty might be aware of this disease, but you might not be aware of this. Vers is a disease which spread in the devildom too.”

“Even in the Devildom?”

“Yes, in the ancient times, a warlock who had summoned the demons had asked for a treatment. Well, even the demons were unable to heal.”

The problem was that Vers got transmitted to the summoned demon.

The demon who wasn’t aware of the transmission returned back to the Devildom, which led to an outbreak in the Devildom.

“It was so serious during that time, that the seven demon kings who ruled the Devildom, couldn’t deal with the spread and gathered to discuss collective measures.”

“Did you demons find the cure?”

“Not at all, we all had to raise our hands to the sky and ask the new world for help.”

The Devildom and the New World weren’t in a hostile situation with each other as the humans knew.

Although they were deprived of their desires, the demons too were the creations of El Kassel, and there were many high ranking demons who followed the god.

“At that time, an angel from the New World said that the disease was made in the Abaron Empire.”

At that time, humans were revolting against the fairies and were said to be creating a ‘weapon’ under process, however, it leaked out by an accident.

‘Oh my, they got hold of such a thing!’

The important thing was that some crazy guy had captured the poison and Rudolf had it in his possession and had plans to use it on Libiya Kingdom.

He had to hurry and inform this over to the Libiya Kingdom.

If something went wrong, it wouldn’t just be the Libiya Kingdom but the entire continent which would suffer.

“We have to inform the Libiya Kingdom.”

“Of course. I need to go and tell this myself.”

“Your Majesty will go?”

“Yes, I did promise to have a summit between the two nations, so it wouldn’t matter if I went there earlier.”

Luke spoke to Sebastian.

“Tell your slaves to keep an eye on the trends of Baroque. If the Libiya Kingdom wasn’t able to take care of it, we will have to enter.”

“Understood.”

Once Sebastian went out, Luke was ready to set off for the Libiya Kingdom.

As things were escalating faster, he began to move quickly.