“I am the Crown Prince of this empire. I am the successor directly appointed by His Majesty, my father!”
“Silence!”
The Emperor’s hands trembled. He regretted not noticing his son’s inadequacies sooner.
“How can you be so short-sighted… How.”
“Did you say my thoughts are short-sighted?”
The Crown Prince spoke, stopping the knights who approached to carry out the Emperor’s order to bring the imperial seal.
“A ruler who forgets the past cannot be a wise ruler!”
“You dare to teach me!”
The Emperor retorted, not backing down.
“A ruler trapped in the past is doomed to perish.”
“Father.”
The Crown Prince decided to swallow his pride. He was willing to kneel if it meant keeping the imperial seal.
“Please withdraw your order. I will withdraw Artenbach’s forces as Your Majesty wishes.”
“Hand over the imperial seal. I will do it myself.”
The Crown Prince unconsciously gritted his teeth. It felt like he was about to lose everything.
“Your Majesty, I am the only blood left in this empire to continue the imperial line. So please consider this as scolding and teaching me, and allow me to resolve this myself.”
“I see. So that’s what you’ve been thinking all along.”
When the Emperor dies, the next throne would be the Crown Prince’s. This was the correct answer history spoke of and the natural law.
“The blood to continue the imperial line is not only in you. The throne is a seat that can be occupied by anyone with legitimacy, even if not the Crown Prince.”
“Surely not Ohilte…”
The name of the imperial princess who went to study abroad in the Western country came out of the Crown Prince’s mouth. He trailed off at the end, as if unwilling to recall.
The younger sister who was a thorn in his side for being smarter than him.
The Emperor’s daughter who left for the Western country, saying she had no interest in the throne.
“Ohilte is a woman. Historically, there has never been a female emperor.”
The Emperor smiled bitterly. He couldn’t believe how the Crown Prince had maintained his position with such a myopic view.
“It’s an era where even women can inherit titles. There’s no reason an emperor can’t be one.”
“Your Majesty!”
The Emperor looked at his son, who seemed like he might commit treason if pushed just a little more. How could he have such venom in eyes that resembled his mother’s?
“There will be no reversal.”
The knights who had approached surrounded the Crown Prince. He tried to plead that it was a mistake and to be lenient, but the Emperor.
“Even the slightest mistake can cut the lifeline of royalty.”
He said, waving his hand. The Crown Prince was pushed out of the audience chamber by the knights. He stared intently until the door closed and the Emperor was no longer visible.
It was because he felt he couldn’t calm his current anger otherwise.
He was led, half-forced, towards his office at the knight’s urging that he should move now.
‘Even the slightest mistake can cut one’s life, he says.’
The Crown Prince mulled over the Emperor’s last words. Though it wasn’t meant that way, it seemed to have given him quite a good idea.
‘If you don’t want to lose it, just eliminate those who would take it.’
He thought as he took out the jade seal from the safe on his desk. The one who made a single mistake would be the Emperor, not himself. Moreover, he vowed to definitely deal with Artenbach, who cowardly moved the Emperor with an anonymous letter.
[This is the timeline separator]Askal was somewhat worried. He had spoken to the Emperor and removed the Crown Prince’s weapons, but if he changed his mind and killed the Emperor to take the throne, it would be troublesome.
If the current Emperor died and the Crown Prince ascended to the throne, the peace between Artenbach and Tidga would surely be broken.
An emperor who moves according to one’s wishes, even if angry and cursing, is better.
The current Emperor, though displeased with Artenbach, was someone who cared for the empire and those living in this land.
Though outwardly it seemed he only ate and played every day, in reality he was someone who worked hard under the surface, like moving his legs vigorously underwater.
While he was troubled, not knowing how to deal with the Crown Prince.
“Askal, it’s me.”
Someone knocked on the office door. It was Schmidt.
He hurriedly got up and opened the door. Then he pulled her in, embracing her slightly cold body, and led her to the sofa.
“I’ve been thinking this before too, but you’re overprotecting me. It’s not a big deal to stand in the hallway for a moment, you know?”
Askal shook his head at Schmidt’s words.
“This is already restraining myself as much as possible, my lady.”
Schmidt sighed deeply, looking at him who had no intention of stopping the overprotection. Then, taking off her cloak made of beast fur, she asked.
“I came to have a light cup of tea, do you have time?”
“I was just about to take a break.”
Anna, who came in together, set down the tray. The well-dried Junos scent wafted gently.
He quietly watched as Anna poured tea into the cups. The trickling sound was oddly calming.
Schmidt, observing Askal staring at the cup with thoughtful eyes, said.
“Askal, do you have something on your mind?”
He decided to just open up, as there was no particular reason to hide it.
“I was debating whether to depose the Crown Prince.”
“If you step in, it would put Artenbach, who has supported the imperial family all this time, in an awkward position, wouldn’t it?”
“That’s true, but thinking about the future, deposing him seems right, yet somehow I feel like I shouldn’t intervene.”
Schmidt pondered, pursing her lips. Then she spoke seriously.
“You tend to have good intuition about these things, don’t you? So why don’t you trust your instincts this time too?”
“Hmm.”
Askal fiddled with the steaming cup. He was leaning slightly towards the idea that it might be better to leave him be until he self-destructs.
A few days later. Askal, deciding to trust his instincts as Schmidt suggested, turned over the letter containing the Emperor’s order to withdraw all troops.
If someone had seen this, they would have been shocked. It meant going against the imperial order.
‘The Emperor is smart. So he’ll vaguely understand why I’m not moving.’
The Emperor surely knew the Crown Prince’s ideology that even Askal had noticed long ago.
There’s just one thing to be careful of. The Emperor becoming lenient in punishing the Crown Prince due to the paternal love remaining inside him. Thus, he had prepared a contingency plan in case things ended up neither here nor there.
Hoping that there would be no need to use that contingency plan.
[This is the timeline separator]The Crown Prince gathered supporters, claiming the Emperor had taken away the imperial seal he held under the pretext of governing on his behalf.
They were all those who sought to strengthen imperial power, and those who wished to enjoy wealth and glory under that power.
On the night of a secret meeting, the Crown Prince spoke seriously to the nobles of his faction.
“I promise this absolutely. When I become Emperor, I will reign above you, but I will create a new world where you too can reign.”
The nobles cheered. They poured out their ambitions, saying it was time to bring down the Emperor.
“Remember this. The day may come when your daughters and nieces become Empress.”
The Crown Prince deliberately let slip that the position of Crown Princess was vacant. He knew that those with a lust for power would never let that pass.
Thus passed a night stained with each person’s greed. The Crown Prince called aside nobles who could gather private armies to discuss more detailed plans.
With part of the knightly order and army away in Artenbach, now was the perfect opportunity, and he had even prepared a scheme to frame the Duke of Artenbach for rebellion if he sent the knights and troops at the border to the capital by the Emperor’s order.
[This is the timeline separator]A morning that began just like any other in the imperial palace.
The Emperor smiled bitterly seeing no response had come from Artenbach. It was evidence that the future he had imagined and the future the Duke of Artenbach had predicted were the same.
Though he questioned inwardly many times if it could really be so, he was somewhat mentally prepared, as there were historically so many who had ascended the throne by killing their siblings and parents.
“Your Majesty, the Crown Prince requests an audience.”
The Emperor nodded at the attendant’s words. As the door opened, the Crown Prince entered wearing riding clothes.
“Your Majesty, the weather is nice, how about going horseback riding?”
The Emperor was suspicious but didn’t show it outwardly. There was nothing particularly strange about the Crown Prince’s suggestion to go out together. When the weather was good, the two often went horseback riding together.
“I’ll prepare soon and go out.”
“Yes, I’ll go ahead and wait.”
The Emperor gazed at the Crown Prince as he turned and left. This moment had finally come after all.
[This is the timeline separator]The nobles and private soldiers who were lying in ambush in the forest near the imperial palace to assassinate the Emperor were in the midst of battle, unable to properly respond to the sudden attack by the imperial guard.
“Could it be… the plan was discovered?”
Even as he was dying, one noble cried out as if wronged. He was barely standing upright, trying not to collapse while blood flowed from his mouth.
And what he saw was the Emperor, who should have appeared with the Crown Prince.
The man who always looked like a pot-bellied middle-aged man seemed like a hero of the century just by holding a sword.
“How?”
Through blurry vision, he saw the Emperor approaching.
“Why…”
“Count Alpo. Let me give you a piece of advice. It’s harder to keep the throne than to ascend it.”
He raised his sword high. Then he swung it down without a moment’s hesitation.
“And I have been keeping this seat for over twenty years.”
Count Alpo’s head rolled beside his feet. Far away, the Crown Prince was being dragged over in the arms of the imperial guard.
“What is all this about? Father!”
The Crown Prince collapsed upon seeing the beheaded count. Then he spoke up in defense, asking if this man dared to try to harm the Emperor.
“You will have to explain this to me, Crown Prince.”
“I know nothing of this, Your Majesty.”
But when a man behind the Emperor took off his helmet, the Crown Prince’s hands trembled. This man was someone who had drunk merrily at the meeting a few days ago, and was supposed to block the Emperor’s escape route in today’s plan.
The Crown Prince did not utter words like “You betrayed me by mistake!” He believed that if he just didn’t admit it, he could escape this crisis.
But the Emperor was looking down from a much higher place.
“Crown Prince, do you know who this man is?”
At the Emperor’s question, he nodded and answered that he knew. Then the Emperor patted the man’s shoulder, saying he half-knew and half-didn’t.
“This man is a spy I planted.”
It was over. The Crown Prince despaired at how the plan he had prepared for the greater cause had ended so futilely.
Male lead is a Divorced Husband
She said to him: “Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change it!”
Liu Changning transmigrated into a female cannon fodder character in a female-dominant novel.
After reading the first half of the novel’s plot, the first thing she did upon transmigration was to divorce the Pan Jinlian-style male protagonist she had just married.
She indulged herself, pretending to be ugly and poor.
But as time passed, the way that man looked at her became more and more unusual…
Liu Changning was dumbfounded: Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change!
――
This lifetime, Pei Yuanshao was rejected by the same woman twice!
The first time, she drove him away. Forced by the situation, he endured the waves of anger in his heart, yielding and humbling himself.
That person lay slanted on a rocking chair, her sallow face emotionless: “If you don’t want a divorce, go cook!”
Pei Yuanshao’s face was dark and gloomy: “You!”
The second time, after the crisis in Jinling City was resolved, the new emperor sent someone to pick him up. He turned around, stammering: “I… I have to go. If you keep me…”
That person lay on the kang bed, her back to him, as if she had long anticipated this day, crisp and clear: “Goodbye!”
Pei Yuanshao was so angry his fingers trembled: “You… you!”
The mission of family and country made him restrain himself, averting his eyes and turning to leave this broken household.
Two years later, they met again. Seeing her ethereal face, his body shook like a sieve.
“She was originally a ‘she’!”
At the Qionglin Banquet, the top scholar of the imperial examination, a talented person with exceptional speech and conduct, all the unmarried young gentlemen from aristocratic families looked at her with shy and timid eyes.
The peerless imperial official Pei Yuanshao felt the anger in his heart erupt. He pointed at the woman surrounded by the crowd at the Qionglin Banquet, his thin lips slightly curled: “Little sister, I wants that person to be the wife-master of my Mingde Prince Manor.”
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