The Emperor Who Was Once a Tyrant Returns Chapter 130 : Chapter 130

Chapter . 130

“…Thanks for the advice, my friend… next ti I will definitely do that…….”

“Wait, but when is that crazy bastard going back to His Highness the Prince? He cannot even stick close to His Highness’s side and serve him!”

“…He already said he would show His Highness our skills, so he even brought His Highness here…….”

“…….”

“Why are you not saying anything?”

“Comrade! I wish you victory!”

“You crazy bastard like Michelon! Do you have to say that even now, in the middle of this?”

“I am sorry, stop… I think I was brainwashed.”

“Give the shoes I bought you!”

“I am wearing them right now so I cannot give them to you, then survive and let us definitely et again!”

“If I survive, crazy bastard or not, I will not let you off first!”

“Kwahahahaha, Sir Charles, why are you chatting so amicably with your comrade? His Highness the Prince is waiting, kwahahaha!”

Like that, the comradeship of the Prince’s faction deepened.

“Is it Giuliano’s letter?”

“Yes. He says he is very busy. He is still trying to co, but he is letting us know in advance in case he cannot.”

“You already said from the start that it is fine even if he does not co to the First Prince’s birthday. That guy keeps writing you petty letters. Maybe it is because he feels guilty about tattling to the Empress about your Portrait Ring?”

“But it was Giuliano himself who confessed that to .”

When I tried to reward Giuliano because I valued his rit, he had declined. He said that he had given the Empress information about my Portrait Ring.

He said he had wanted to tell earlier, but when I had just returned, I had been busy with the cleanup, and if he tried to speak after the banquet, Lauderdale had caused that uproar, and after that we had been facing off over the Empress Faction and the treason trial, so there had been no chance to speak.

He said he had thought he should only speak after the fight ended and they were brought down, and that before then he must not hinder .

-Your Highness, please know this, I never intended to betray Your Highness.

He knelt on both knees and swore.

-Ever since Her Majesty forced to open a gambling hall when my wife died and I was despondent with my baby in my arms, I no longer wished to serve Her Majesty the Empress. When Her Majesty handed the territory over to Your Highness, I did not know what to do, but as I served Your Highness closely, I thought this might be a blessing my dead wife had granted for our baby. If I could only serve soone like Your Highness, then for the first ti I held hope that I could turn crisis into opportunity and raise my house.

He willingly swore to the Crystal of Truth. Even though I told him there was no need to go that far, he said he wanted to do it himself.

-However, after Your Highness suddenly disappeared and His Majesty tightened the noose, I had to buy ti. If I resisted openly, His Majesty might have made even Your Highness’s people disappear while Your Highness was gone.

Giuliano was right. If those of low standing like ordinary knights and mages disappeared without a trace, no one cared.

The Empress had left them as they were because she believed Giuliano was on her side. If she had noticed he had turned and secretly sent people to Montova while I was gone to take them hostage, I would not have been able to bring down the Empress as I did now.

-Sir Rolf and the mages did not give accurate information about Your Highness’s affairs at the ti. It was only natural, since it was before Your Highness trusted . Before Your Highness returned, I believed I had to help them and buy their trust first. So I thought I had to block His Majesty’s pressure and buy ti so they could search with peace of mind. Even if it ant pretending to still be loyal to His Majesty and handing over small bits of information that would not help much.

At that point, he hesitated. While looking at .

-…However, that too was only my judgnt, and I cannot say it was right……. Was the information I handed over truly trivial information? Or did I only think so by myself?

He worried that he might have handed over important information without realizing it.

I did not lie to the new subordinate who had tried so hard to buy my trust.

-That ring was my mother’s keepsake. It is a very important item to , and it is also an artifact.

-Your Highness… I was wrong!

-I am not soone who cannot defeat the Empress just because I lack a single artifact, and my mother is not soone who would consider her keepsake more important than my people.

-Your Highness…….

-Your judgnt was right. Between a keepsake artifact and my people, what would I have chosen? You knew exactly what kind of person I am, the you chose. And even without , you moved as I would have wished, and protected my people from the Empress.

I took Giuliano’s two hands and raised him up.

-You are my loyal subject.

The young count had shed thick tears, drop after drop.

Back then, I was so moved that I had almost cried with him.

As I was seized by that mory, Michelon opened his mouth again.

“As soon as the Empress was confined to the tower and the Empress Faction fell with the Lauderdale family in the lead, it is the First Prince’s coming-of-age ceremony. The sll of blood has not even faded, yet it is a festival mood?”

“From the First Prince Faction’s point of view, for months the whole country had been building up excitent for the Prince’s first coming-of-age ceremony, but the Empress Faction happened to collapse right before it and spoiled the mood. My brother would be more excited and wild, if anything. He is not the type to care about sothing like that.”

The coming-of-age ceremony of a direct royal was hosted by the Emperor, but it was customary for the maternal relatives to step forward and lavishly hold an eve festival. To put forward their candidate for the throne before the people and display powerful prestige.

Duke Grimiati, as the old lady, had been preparing for a long ti, but the Roncer Empire, too, seized the opportunity of Empress Rhiannon, who had been like a thorn in their eyes, collapsing, and suddenly began to look after their grandchild.

So my brother’s coming-of-age eve festival was unimaginably lavish.

People dressed in extravagant finery enjoyed the banquet that began from early evening, and as midnight drew near, they hurried out to balconies and to the garden.

There were also those who ca half undressed, panting, because they had been busy with that skin-to-skin friction again. If I beca Emperor and fined them, the treasury would overflow.

Just before midnight, my father’s herald appeared atop the central magic tower. First, the fanfare used to announce good news rang out.

That sound, and the herald’s proclamation, would spread from the magic tower to the whole country.

“His Highness First Prince Maximilian of Armatia has reached his twentieth birthday. His Majesty the Emperor pardons the criminals and holds a festival throughout the land!”

At midnight, my father’s proclamation rang out across the whole country.

POP! PAPAPAPOP! POP!

Then fireworks burst. This too would appear above the sky of the entire land. Not real fire, but at least the image of it.

From every balcony and every garden of the Imperial Palace, and also outside surrounding the Imperial Palace, countless people cheered and shouted.

“Congratulations, His Highness First Prince Maximilian!”

“Congratulations, First Prince!”

My brother appeared atop the magic tower after the herald. Unless you were a mage, no one liked standing up there, so he could have had the herald read a ssage of thanks instead, but my brother was not that sort of man.

“My beloved Armatia! As the First Prince of Armatia, I proclaim!”

While my brother, already deluding himself into thinking he was Emperor, poured out burdenso emotions and delivered a passionate speech, Michelon shrugged and asked.

“Is it not a bit weird? Coming-of-age is at twenty, but people marry just fine before that.”

“In fact, the coming-of-age ceremony only applies to direct royals.”

At Michelon’s words, I nodded.

“My father went to the battlefield at my age. My mother gave birth to my brother at my age.”

That was not only true of royals, but of ordinary citizens as well. Unless they were nobles, everyone worked from a young age.

If they only received a child’s wage until they turned twenty and could not receive an adult’s wage, they would all starve to death before twenty.

The gap between rich and poor was enormous, so even with an adult’s wage, it was hard to survive.

As I explained that point, I said.

“Nobles are not different either. If you cannot inherit the house because you are not twenty, or if inheritance is delayed, it is a disaster. It can even beco a matter of life and death.”

“Then why do only royals do this unrealistic coming-of-age ceremony at twenty? The only ceremony close to that number is a knighthood ceremony, but that only applies to ordinary knights who start as pages from age seven, and Armatia royals beco knights early. Not you, but even you beca one earlier than most.”

“The Armatia Imperial Family will never admit it, but I think it is because of the contract with a dragon.”

“Do not tell , if you do it before then, you go crazy?”

“You know and you still asked? Were you curious how I think?”

“…Do they really go crazy?”

“The contract with a dragon, that is, the old contract, not our Token, certainly has an aspect that can drive a person mad.”

Even when I contracted with Michelon before my regression, it had truly been hard……. Not only guilt, but at tis a destructive impulse would rise, wanting to smash everything by wielding the dragon’s power as I pleased. Sotis it felt as if I had beco a dragon, and other tis it felt as if I would be devoured in retaliation by the dragon.

But it was not as though I could be intoxicated by the dragon power I had obtained, because that dragon power was not truly mine.

There were many tis I wanted to go mad instead because of the painful Mark, but thinking that Michelon was also enduring the pain I was enduring, I held on with the resolve that I had to save him sohow.

However, other Emperors, who had indulged by wielding the dragon’s transcendent power as they pleased, had plenty of possibility of falling into madness. Even my father might have been less mad only because he lost his dragon early. Or it might have been the opposite.

“The past Emperors did seem like lunatics, but I did not know they were truly lunatics.”

“As you know, in Armatia’s history, there are cases where soone contracted with a dragon before twenty. However, they all ended in tragedy.”

Whether it was an early death of a late Emperor, or Emperors who had to contract early due to unavoidable circumstances, they could not even handle the dragon properly. Perhaps because they could not control their own madness. Unlike my father…….

“Then have you prepared a gift for your brother, who will be swelling his chest with vain dreams that he can now contract with ? What will you do if he demands ?”

Michelon asked with a snicker.

“…Do not go cutting off his head at night or anything. It is his birthday today.”

“Duke Grimiati’s birthday is not today.”

“Now that the Empress Faction has fallen, if the duke is suddenly assassinated, it will clearly beco either my doing or Alexander’s doing, so it cannot be done. Since Alexander is holed up in his territory, I will be suspected.”

“Co to think of it, that bastard is truly strange even for a human. Did he regret it after killing? If so, then why did he kill?”