The Crown Prince Who Raises Alt Characters

#Chapter 385 Tyrant (12) - Coronation Among the feudal nobility, there were many who harbored resentment toward the current imperial family. The young men in particular tended to harbor especially deep resentment — partly due to youthful hot blood, but also because by the time they'd grown up enough to actually think for themselves, the Emperor they'd seen was none other than Mihail. Nobles of some age still remembered the capable, or at least passable, emperors and imperial family members from before Mihail, but the young knew only Mihail and the imperial family under him. Because Mihail had run things into the ground, the imperial family had run things into the ground too, and thanks to that mess, these young nobles had had their once-thriving territories plundered and ruined, had wandered about like vagrants, and had only barely managed to settle back into their now-ruined hometowns. One would hardly be human if no resentment had built up. So, among the young men, there were no few who didn't hesitate to make remarks so insolent that someone of middle age or older couldn't even imagine making them. "We must drag the Emperor down!!" "The imperial family too, every one of them, must be made to stand trial and receive punishment!!" "Damn it, trial, what trial! We should just drag them all out and hang them!" The adults restrained such youths, admonished them, and occasionally even struck them, but that did nothing to calm the young blood. If anything, it only twisted them further and filled them with more venom. Naturally, they weren't particularly well-disposed toward Alondre's invitation either. 'He says he'll let us cut off the imperial family's heads? It's probably just some scheme to offload political burden onto us.' 'He'll probably just cut down a few for show, then call the dead ones bad imperial family and the surviving ones good imperial family, won't he?' 'Damn it, we should just ignore this kind of thing. Even the elders are too naive. At least we need to keep our heads straight.' They were radical. So, setting aside political compromise and all that nonsense, they simply wanted a clean, satisfying revenge. But. "Tallenby August Eizern! What shall be done with this one?!" "Kill him! Kill him!! Kill him!!!" "Then cut the rope!!" "Waaaaaaaah!!" Swish! Spurt! Thud-roll. The head of the imperial family member who had embezzled the various food expenses and equipment funds that should have gone to the military's soldiers rolled across the ground and collided with another head already waiting there. The young men of the noble faction — those who'd always drunk and cursed together, bonding over vows to kill off the imperial family — had their pupils tremble violently. No, well. They had said they would kill them. They had even genuinely thought they wanted to kill them. '...Even so, is this really right?' Alondre Arcandel Eizern. The late Emperor's legitimate eldest son, once called the idiot prince, calls out the names of the condemned. Then the members of the Golden Cloud Knights waiting behind put them onto the guillotine. Their crimes are listed out one by one, and before the victims of those crimes, a rope is prepared. When the victims, overcome with resentment, cut the rope, the guillotine falls and severs the head. And then Alondre calls out a new name. That repeats, again and again. 'C-can the imperial family really be killed like this?' No matter how much they had hated the Emperor and the imperial family, they were, in essence, members of an absolute monarchy. They had been taught and raised to take for granted the nobility of the imperial house, loyalty toward the sovereign, and things of that sort. So even if they said they would kill them, there had been, somewhere in their subconscious, a certain line that shouldn't be crossed. Having them drink poisoned wine, or confining them to prison for life, or hanging them after a proper trial. That sort of line. That was the bare minimum of dignity. The most basic courtesy owed to the rank of imperial family. But in the scene before them now, there was none of that. It was simply slaughter. Butchery. The noblest bloodline in this nation was dying like swine, one choice at a time, at the hands of ordinary citizens! Even the young men who had most fiercely clamored that the imperial family's heads must be cut were reduced to this state — needless to say, those older than them were no different. Some simply went blank and sank to the ground, and in severe cases, fainted outright. They thought Alondre had gone mad, running wild on vengeance. But a very few among them saw through to the true nature of this act. Bares Valencia and Beatrix Adalhedis. The man more often called Duke Valencia than by his own name, and the woman who, though not the head of her house, held it in a tighter grip than its actual head — these two belonged to that handful. "...He's deliberately shattered the imperial family's authority. The vague reverence the people of this nation held for the imperial family, the perception of their nobility, the notion that those people are different from us — all of it, he's thrown away like garbage." "And used all of it as firewood, to light a flame. The flame of the people's absolute support." Alondre has no political power. His infamous reputation as an idiot, his long years shut out of politics, and his uncle's fourteen-year reign had all seen to that. If Alondre wished to gain power through legitimate, political logic, he would need to make someone his backer — be it the imperial family or the noble faction — and that would naturally mean he could never push back hard against that faction. It's the same principle as how, among the continent's past monarchs, anyone who took the throne by borrowing the strength of some other power — whether a local clan or a foreign force — was inevitably left weak before that very power. To break free of this, one must appoint men from several different, mutually opposing factions, and gradually cultivate one's own loyal faction while they check each other — a task that is, naturally, difficult and takes a long time. And yet Alondre had denied every single one of those preconditions. Alondre no longer needs to lean on any faction at all. Because those in the plaza right now, and all the countless victims who had suffered through Mihail's reign who would hear this news, would support Alondre. So then, had Alondre been wise? At least on that point, Duke Valencia could only shake his head. "Support gained through such violence and madness never lasts long. To burn away the Imperial Family's legitimacy, which spans hundreds of years and approaches a millennium, and in return, gain support and power that may or may not last a mere three years?" Cardian had already proven just how far the repercussions spread once ordinary commoners were given the experience of killing noble blood. If even the noblest of the imperial family could have their heads cut off, then what reason was there that lesser nobles couldn't be killed too? In the Duke's eyes, Alondre, in burning away the nation's very foundation for the sake of his own momentary power, was, in a certain sense, an incompetent tyrant-ruler surpassing even his own uncle. "Hmm, I beg to differ a little there~. It's not like he killed every single one just for being imperial family, you know? Children who never had the chance to do anything wrong survived, and even some older ones whose crimes weren't severe enough to warrant beheading survived too. And more than anything, dear brother's own authority hasn't been harmed, has it? So he can just build it back up from there." It wasn't Beatrix who answered. To begin with, she never used a speech pattern like "you know~." "Trisha!!" Beatrix abruptly threw her arms around the doll-like girl who had appeared at her side before anyone noticed. At her mother's reaction — trembling all the way to her shoulders as if sobbing — Trisha was briefly taken aback. Ah, right, come to think of it — in 'this' world, her own son had betrayed his mother, only to be discarded once he'd outlived his use and die a meaningless death, while her daughter had been locked away in the imperial palace in a state of half-hostage, never knowing when she might die. Beatrix possessed nearly every quality of a political schemer, but the one thing she lacked was coldness toward her own children — so of course, seeing her daughter alive and well, she couldn't help but weep with emotion. Trisha hugged her back, patting her mother's shoulder, and since Beatrix showed no sign of letting go, she simply kept talking while still held in the embrace. "Hello, Duke Valencia. How has Sister Selena been?" "...She nearly suffered something terrible at the hands of one of the imperial family and was ill for about two years afterward, but aside from that, she's doing fairly well." "Oh dear. If you give me his name, I can arrange for you alone to cut the guillotine rope." "I'm afraid even you would find that difficult. I heard your 'dear brother' already took it — he cut off that one's head in the palace." "Ah. I see." Trisha nodded in agreement. Well, of course the ducal house would turn against him too, if the Emperor had done something like that. "By the way, what did you mean by what you were about to say earlier?" "Ah, I just meant there's no real problem as far as the imperial family's authority goes. After all, once dear brother overhauls the nation, it'll be rebuilt anyway." Duke Valencia gave a hollow, empty laugh. "Does that make any sense? When authority on the level of nearly a thousand years has just come crashing down?" "Oh please, was that thousand years a thousand years from the very start? It began from literally nothing, with the founder using his own achievements to press down everyone around him, and it was built up again from there afterward." "The founder was a hero among heroes. That name isn't one to be used so lightly, child." "Well, dear brother is a calamity among calamity, so it's fine." "No, so that means... hm?" Duke Valencia suddenly felt a flicker of doubt. Why would the word 'calamity' come up when describing a person? Wasn't she supposed to be speaking in his favor just now? While the Duke was momentarily at a loss for words, Beatrix, having calmed her emotions somewhat, spoke. "...Trisha, are you serious? That idiot prince is really that capable? Of course, thanks to him you've gained your freedom, so I'll admit he's something of a remarkable figure. But politics is an entirely different matter." Trisha suddenly found herself wanting to laugh. It struck her all over again just how much this really was a different world. After all, wasn't this the very same Beatrix who, within the imperial palace, had seen through the Crown Prince's terrifying nature even before his own birth mother Eleanor had, and had taught her own children never, under any circumstances, to oppose him? "Duke Valencia. You said this fervor wouldn't last even three years, didn't you?" "Yes. That's how it will be, unless he keeps providing fresh fuel — that is, keeps doing things worthy of the people's support. Even if he somehow manages to succeed at it, one misstep could snuff it all out in an instant." Power sustained by popularity alone, without legitimacy or systemic stability, was that unstable a thing. But Trisha answered simply. "A month." "What?" "It won't even take a month to put in fresh fuel, you know?" *** Alondre's coronation ceremony was carried out in a manner unprecedentedly slapdash. Every existing procedure and formality was skipped entirely, and even the festival that should have been held to celebrate the new Emperor's ascension was omitted outright. With any other emperor, there might have been an uproar of ministers crying out to reconsider and the like, but in this case, the ministers simply held their tongues. No small number of the ministers present had witnessed Alondre cut down the Emperor's head and then mow through knight order after knight order in succession, and even those who hadn't seen that had witnessed that imperial beheading spectacle. No one spoke of it, but everyone knew. That entire sequence of events had already, in itself, been a coronation ceremony. Having concluded the bloodiest coronation in the empire's history, the Emperor sat upon the throne and spoke. "The empire truly has no shortage of problems. No, at this point it's harder to find something that isn't a problem." The listeners' reactions to the Emperor's words split into three. Those who had originally worked under Mihail expressed discomfort and fear; the noble faction voiced agreement with a 'that's true'; and the 6th Rank members remained indifferent. "But no matter what one sets out to do, the body must first be healthy. A pair of hands and feet that reach left when the head says right can accomplish nothing." A few sharp-eyed individuals gave a start. It was because they'd caught on to what Alondre was about to say. "So I will carry out two things at once. First, I will implement a sweeping recruitment of officials. Second, combining the officials newly chosen this way with the existing officials, I will reassign every single post from scratch." "....." Silence fell. Of course, it wasn't because they were moved or persuaded by the Emperor's words. Quite the opposite, in fact. They wanted to point something out, but given just how spectacular the Emperor's track record was, they only ended up watching each other, gauging the room. In the end, it was Duke Valencia, the one with the firmest resolve, who stepped forward to speak. "Your Majesty. Wouldn't it be better to first finish putting the internal structure in order before carrying out the recruitment of talent?" "Why is that?" "To use the metaphor of hands and feet that Your Majesty raised earlier, what you've just proposed amounts to performing surgery while the left arm is still being dismantled piece by piece, all while trying to transplant a newly made right arm." Recruit new officials? Fine. But who prepares and carries out that recruitment? Restructure the existing officials? Fine. Then who carries out that restructuring? (E/N: Ah, I understand now. Of course. How could they know about the Demon King Alondre?) The officials themselves must be mobilized to select new officials, and the officials themselves must be mobilized to assign the other officials. And the bureaucratic organization itself must be made an exception to the very task at hand. After all, when performing surgery with one's hands, the hands themselves cannot be made the subject of the surgery. To be honest, the Duke wanted to simply tell him to drop the whole internal reform business entirely. 'This will take far too long.' Organizational reform was never something that could be finished in a short span of time. Right now, in this empire alone, the number of officials directly appointed and salaried by the imperial court was close to three hundred thousand. And that figure held true even after excluding officials working in the provinces or the employees hired and used by those officials. Of course, if one counted only the core officials who plan policy and oversee administration as a whole, that number would shrink considerably to somewhere around ten thousand, but even reforming just that much was a task that had to be viewed on a scale of years. And yet the Emperor needed, without fail and in a short span of time, to produce results the common people could actually feel. So then, what would happen? 'Either he'll force it through and end up wrecking everything, or he'll actually start it only to run aground on reality and have it all fizzle out.' Either outcome would be the worst possible result for an emperor's very first policy. The Duke himself was of the mind that those officials currently within the empire — whom one could well question whether they did any work at all — did need reform, but surely the Emperor's current situation was simply not one in which to go stirring that up. At the Duke's attempt to dissuade him, the Emperor grinned broadly. "A reasonable concern." "...Thank you." "But it's fine." "......Your Majesty." "I know. That you all think I'm being unreasonable. Everyone in this room probably thinks so." The Emperor rose from the throne. "So I'll prove it with results first. Everyone, disperse for now and stand by. Ah, Trisha." "Yes, yes, yes. What should I do first?" "Hmm, go gather about a thousand people with flexible minds into the auditorium for now. I'll put together a dedicated lecture formula in the meantime." "I'll take the Golden Cloud Knights with me." With that said, the Emperor and the Crown Princess each abruptly left their places. Those who remained all alike had nothing but question marks filling their heads. After glancing sidelong at the 6th Rank mage who was peppering the Emperor with questions about this "formula," and the 6th Rank alchemist who asked nothing but was listening in with keen interest off to the side, Duke Valencia thought to himself. Ah, the nation is doomed. (E/N: It is doomed, and the Demon King will make it his realm!)