“What are you saying? The palace was attacked!?” The emperor looked at the messenger incredulously.

At this moment, it was still dark outside, and he hadn’t known about any kind of kidnapping.

It was only recently that Sahara had teleported out from the Crowned Prince’s residence and the General’s men had finished their mission.

There had been no attacks on His Majesty’s life this entire week, so all this news was a shock!

Knowing that someone who was able to mind control might still be around, the emperor would always keep people by his side, but he hadn’t thought much about the safety of his eldest son and his residence…

Now knowing about the Crowned Prince’s deeds, he’d never thought some kind of mishap would come to him!

 

“Your Majesty, the Crowned Prince’s residence is on fire, but the fire is in a strange way. The people who did it had masks and wore the same outfits as the Crowned Prince’s men! It is quite a catastrophe there at the moment! The strangest thing is that it seems there is a small amount of casualties, which may mean the attack was to not kill anyone but to leave the fire behind.”

The emperor dropped one of the papers, that held evidence against the Crowned Prince, in surprise.

“Your Majesty!” Another messenger came running in, puffing from running. “Your Majesty!”

“Speak!” The emperor yelled.

The messenger took a deep breath and said, “There’s a symbol with the fire at the Crowned Prince’s residence, Your Majesty…Someone said that it’s a symbol meaning death, and someone else said that the symbol meant disaster!”

Widening his eyes to the new information, the emperor didn’t know what to say in return.

He wasn’t a firm believer in supernatural things…But, right in front of him was a whole lot of bad things that the Crowned Prince had done. “Imprison the Crowned Prince inside of the Cold Palace!”

 

Even if it wasn’t supernatural, the emperor took advantage of using that to bide him some extra time and stop the Crowned Prince from doing anymore havoc! Or…Havoc coming to him…

The emperor had to admit to himself that he was rather confused about all of this!

Only two Ministers knew about the upcoming procedure with the Crowned Prince, so far. Having them involved in seeing some of the evidence and witnesses themselves, had made them give their consent for the emperor to already imprison the Crowned Prince before now.

Seeing a messenger run off, the emperor wrote down his decree and gave it to the other messenger that stayed.

When he left too, running towards the Crowned Prince’s residence, the emperor then saw another of Matthew’s men hiding.

 

“Where is my son?” The emperor asked.

Band Three came out and bowed before the emperor. “His Highness…Is currently unable to come due to circumstances, Your Majesty. He had told me to tell you, that he will come as soon as possible.”

The emperor sighed, “Well, it will give this King time to go through all of this then…What do you know about the Crowned Prince’s residence?”

Band Three was stunned to be asked such a question. “Your…Your Majesty?”

“Never mind…Where is my son staying?” The emperor asked, getting the dropped piece of paper from a eunuch who had picked it up for him.

“The General’s residence, at present, Your Majesty.” Band Three answered.

The emperor nodded once, then said, “Very well, one of you may go, and the other stay.”

 

Giving orders to Matthew’s men, wasn’t something rare for the emperor. When Matthew had started with the ‘slayers’, he had reported them to the emperor upon the same day that he had given up his right to the throne, stating that these people were also His Majesty’s men.

Having already taken a few ‘Bands’ from Matthew, the Emperor saw that his son willingly applied, and the emperor did not do anything about the rest of the ‘Bands’ that were loyal to his son. Knowing that he was really the one in charge of them and could take them anytime he wanted, he would order them around easily.

In fact, the emperor was very happy with the ‘slayers’, knowing his safety was one of their main goals.

Quite a few times now he had gained a few extra men following him, who he had known as a ‘slayer’, but they would disappear after a while. It only occurred to the emperor now, by reading when some of these crimes had occurred…Why those ‘slayers’ had come to protect him for a short time.

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Band Three slowly backed away, still bowing, and then when he was out of sight, stated that one of them can leave to Band One.

Band Three offered to stay, as he was quite well rested and feed, giving Band One leave to go back to their Master.

With a nod in agreement, Band One relented easily to the idea and left.

 

The emperor rubbed his forehead, feeling tired. He had stayed awake throughout the whole night, and now that the sun was slowly rising, he still couldn’t believe how much was happening!

He had gotten this information not long before he was going to retire to his chambers, which had turned him back around to his study. There would be several days in a month when the emperor would stay up so late, and this coincidently had been one of them. And the plea from the ‘slayer’, on Matthew’s behalf, was to go through the information as soon as possible and to imprison the Crowned Prince. Having not understood the dire situation, the emperor had slowly gone through it all, to select which deeds of the Crowned Prince’s would become known to others first.

With the sudden problem that happened at the Crowned Prince’s residence, the emperor wondered if his son had wanted to imprison the Crowned Prince earlier…

Thinking that perhaps he could have stopped the fire and the symbol from showing, the emperor wondered if it was one of his son’s people that took matter into their own hands…Or was it his son himself?

Having him ‘unable to come due to circumstances’ the emperor frowned.

What is happening inside of my own Palace!?

The emperor took a deep breath in and nodded. In an hour or two, everyone will know some of the Crowned Prince’s dirty deeds…That was a start…

 

***

 

When Naruto returned to the General’s estate, upon the golden eyed friend’s shoulder, he ran off as soon as he found his owner’s scent.

“Arf!”

The golden eyed friend gently smiled and followed the little fella, that wasn’t even seen to those who didn’t cultivate.

Naruto ran inside a room and jumped onto a bed, immediately licking the female, who was in a deep sleep.

The golden eyed friend had abruptly stopped at the opening and nodded. Having seen her appearance before, he had been the most worried that he has ever been in his life. Now that she seemed ok, he went to leave…To turn, to see a female standing there right behind him.

“Ah!” She put her hands to her mouth when she saw the man’s eyes and he took that as a perfect time to disappear.

When the female found that he was gone, she sighed and breathed out in relief.

Remembering red eyes from a few days ago, she shook her head, wondering if she was seeing things.

Never having problems with her eyes before, as she was sure that others had reacted the same, she wondered how this had come to be…

 

As a small moment went by, she realized that she still preferred the Second Prince’s eyes over any others that she had seen and decided to continue, remembering why she was here in the General’s residence to begin with!

Going to continue to walk past that room, she saw that there were people and…Her eyes widened in disbelief!

Walking in slowly, her hands clenched harder and harder, as her eyes fell upon both of the figures on the bed.

Now that she was right in front of them, Naruto growled, and walked slowly towards her.

In a rush, she walked out and leaned herself against the wall.

The growling little thing had scared her away, yet all she wanted to do was throw that bitch holding her man out!

How dare she!? I did her a favor by not spreading a rumor! But…It looks like that won’t stop her!

Getting off the wall, her eyes speaking volumes of anger and rage, she turned back to the way she had come and left.

I must be granted an audience! I must!

 

***

 

The morning court had started well, with the closing of the Second Prince’s innocence, but became an uproar…

Upon the Emperor himself having a note and witnesses, to explain that there had been a farce to have burnt the letter that had been left in the jail and helped spread the rumor of the Second Prince’s escape from prison, there was no mistake…And that was only the start, as there were two situations that the Second Prince needed to be clear of. Not only did the Second Prince needed to be clear of leaving the prison but mainly be cleared of being the one behind the fire that allegedly killed his birth mother and sister. But finally, it was all settled, and the Second Prince was finally able to return back to his home after practically being homeless all this time…

Declaring the innocence being returned to the Second Prince, the Emperor already had many papers to give out straight away, to address to the populace about this. These papers had been ready for quite some time, waiting for this exact moment. The easiest way to spread the innocence of his son, would be through spending some money to have paper put up everywhere and using his people through word of mouth.

The emperor wanted to do this quickly, as he wanted his son to start attending court.

It was to get others to see how right it would be for him to become the next Crowned Prince.

Already knowing that his son will decline becoming the Crowned Prince, he thought that if many Ministers and people were to make a big deal about it, perhaps he may change his mind. And then, if too many requests came in, how could an Emperor say ‘no’?

This kind of method will most likely take a few months to complete, but he will still try to talk his son into it until then.

 

After they moved on from the Second Prince’s innocence, to the crimes of the Crowned Prince…Ministers were fighting each other and fighting the law. They were fighting evidence and witnesses, rumors and opinions. Some tried to defend the Crowned Prince with his high amount of responsibility but then some others offensively stated then of why was responsibility then so ignored. The Ministers used many words, and meant many things within each sentence, mocking each other over some imaginary line.

It was a true debate that got louder and louder, as the time moved on.

The emperor, being tired, and had already tried to calm them down twice, but after that, he yelled out so loud, that they finally understood that the emperor was angry!

“Minister Rolland and Minister Ward, show them what I’ve shown you, perhaps then they will give in and see that the more they fight…The more I won’t trust them in the future!”

The emperor rose abruptly and left, leaving everyone stunned.

His words were obvious, if they continued to go against the crimes, it would be telling the emperor that they were the Crowned Prince’s people.

The idea of losing the emperor’s trust already started to have a few Ministers’ worry and start to think that they should willingly do as the emperor wants…Especially if there was no chance that the Crowned Prince may come back from this!