[Chapter Size: 2100 Words.]
Third Person POV
Northern kingdoms.
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...
Madara was in the middle of the throne room, while many other nobles were gathered with him. The discussion was quite heated among those present, not that this surprised Madara, after all, they were discussing the future of the kingdom with a foreign invasion looming.
"Can we face them? There are so many!" one noble complained.
"They are many, but they will be facing two kingdoms from the north," another spoke, after all, they have Sodden to fight alongside them.
"That seems plausible... after all, I heard that Sodden began to recover after the defeat in the East, King Thorne is managing the kingdom very well," a third noble added.
"Even so..." the first noble murmured.
"We will face the soldiers of Nilfgaard," Queen Calanthe raised her voice at this mont. "And we will defeat them, driving them back to the south again," she said with a fierce tone.
"..." The nobles were silent this ti, as even those who were not very confident remained quiet.
"I want you to summon all the soldiers of the kingdom, far more than what we had in the battle of the East, we are facing a powerful enemy this ti and we need to use all our forces and resources," Calanthe made it clear.
She spoke and a new discussion began as people started to debate about this again. Eventually, after another 20 minutes of conversation, while so nobles occasionally exchanged insults, they began to leave the throne room.
"Madara Uchiha. I want you to stay," Calanthe requested as Madara had been silent the whole ti, uninterested in getting involved in the heated discussion.
Madara waited for everyone to leave until the queen addressed him. "Mousesack had spoken of your investigations and this alerted us about the approaching army from the North," she said while Madara nodded.
"Tell , boy, I want your opinion, what are the chances we face the army?" she asked him, valuing his opinion much more than those of the rest of the nobles.
"Do you want to be honest?" Madara asked, as the queen might not like his sincere opinion. Calanthe just nodded and Madara sighed. "The chances of Cintra falling are very high, after all, we are talking about an army of 60,000 black soldiers, how many can Cintra raise at this mont, 20,000?" Madara spoke, making the room tense with his words.
"Even so, Cintra will not cower..." she spoke with a serious and stubborn tone.
"..." Madara said nothing more.
"I want you to co and have tea with this afternoon in the garden, we need to talk about your role in this war..." she said at the end, and Madara nodded. "Now you can leave, my granddaughter must be almost breaking down the doors to see you," she spoke, and Madara began to withdraw, while the royal guards opened the door and Cirilla was outside.
"You are finally here, let's go to my room," she said.
"Princess... This is quite inappropriate... for an unmarried woman of your age," the servant imdiately spoke while by her side. It was highly frowned upon for Cirilla, no longer a child, to invite a boy to her room at her age.
Of course, she didn't like this one bit, but what more could she do, she just turned back to Madara. "Let's go to the garden!" she suggested, and Madara ended up accompanying her as they headed to the open area.
"You haven't co to the castle in months!" she imdiately complained, Madara had been training in recent months at his residence.
"But you could have co!" she complained as they moved away from the royal guard and the princess's servant.
"Did sothing happen?" he raised an eyebrow at the girl, she seed stressed.
"It's so dreams..." she admitted.
"Dreams... what did you dream?" Madara asked with a more serious tone.
"The city... I see it burning..." she said in a low voice.
"..." Madara didn't know what to say to her, telling the truth would be quite terrible even for his indifferent deanor. "Do you think that will happen?" he approached it from another angle.
"Everything I dream always happens..." she said now quite sadly.
"I know... but..." she tried to argue.
"Anyway, you will be fine... I will make sure of it," he said, and she looked at him for a while.
"Okay..." Eventually, she tried to change the subject and not think about it anymore. "Can we train a little? I've gotten really good in the past few months, I might even beat you." She seed more excited now as she exclaid to Madara.
"You're just dreaming..." she mocked.
"Let's see!" she said, running to grab so wooden swords as she returned to him so they could do it in the garden.
Madara ended up training a bit with her. They stopped training after a while, as Cirilla was wearing a dress, hardly suitable for training, and Madara treated her as if she were a child.
They sat under that sa tree they used to sit under, while the girl kept chattering away, and he maintained a calm, serious face, speaking little.
At one point, he ended up talking about his last job in his territory in getting rid of a glyph. "You're saying you tad a glyph!!!" Cirilla exclaid, not believing what she heard.
"You could say that... I haven't nad it yet, but it's in my castle, living peacefully," Madara said calmly.
"But no one has ever tad a glyph!!" She exclaid before giving Madara a glowing look. "Can you show ?" she asked with an excited look.
Madara sighed before opening his sharingan and looking into the princess's erald eyes. Cirilla felt the world distort as she entered Madara's illusion, creating her own mory.
She saw the scene as Madara arrived in the village, asked for information, and went to the glyph's nest where he tad it and brought it back to his castle, until everything started to beco the garden again.
Her look at Madara was so excited, "I want to et it! Let's go to your castle from here!!" She asked quickly, but Madara shook his head.
"We can't... You already know the rumors from the south," Madara said as Cirilla lowered her head at this mont.
"I heard..." she said, recalling her dream.
'She doesn't even know it's her father... I think Calanthe hid that from her,' Madara thought, but he had no intention of telling, his motives were distasteful.
"Anyway, I'll let you na my glyph, I'm sure you will et it when things calm down," Madara assured.
"Really?! I would love to et it!!" She returned to a more excited expression, but at that mont, people approached.
"It's good that you're already in the garden, so we can sit down already," Calanthe approached with her royal guard, Commander Varys.
"Grandma!" Cirilla stood up.
"Cirilla, can you leave us for now, I need to talk to the boy..." she requested while Calanthe looked at the princess's servant, who quickly nodded to take her away.
Cirilla, with no choice, bid farewell to Madara. "We'll et later, and I'll think of a na for the glyph!" she exclaid while Madara just nodded and turned his attention to the queen, following her to sit in a gazebo.
It was just the two of them, sothing that rarely happened, after all, Mousesack and Eist are always with her. "I didn't see Eist, isn't he in the capital?" Madara asked curiously, as he hadn't seen him.
"He went to Skagos, he's talking to the people to also gather troops against the Nilfgaardians," Calanthe spoke calmly.
"I see..." he said while watching the queen serve her own tea.
"Anyway... let's talk about the war..." she began. "I really don't have confidence that we will win this, we're not dealing with a small kingdom like Sodden, the black soldiers are many..." she admitted in the end.
Madara raised an eyebrow. "..." But he remained silent.
"I know what you're thinking... you're seeing a fragile woman, but I will not run and will die in battle protecting these lands," she said with a serious tone.
"You could flee... Cintra could still be reclaid," Madara suggested, the invasion was indeed inevitable, but there were other ways to reclaim these lands.
"And flee like a coward, do not offend , boy," she said with a displeased tone. "My life will end in this war, but I will die with Cintra, I am its queen," she stated.
"The other kingdoms won't help, will they?" Madara asked.
She sighed at this and shook her head. "No... They see us as a chance to conquer these lands, they'll let Nilfgaard ta these lands while they think they can recover and reconquer them to claim these lands as theirs by right," she said.
"They won't recover these lands anymore," Madara stated.
"I hope so, but I still want this place to be ruled by my lineage..." she spoke before giving Madara a very serious look at this mont. "That's why I want you to take Cirilla out of the country," she finally said.
"You don't want to fight on the front lines with you?" Madara raised an eyebrow.
"I'd prefer you stay with my granddaughter. You may have helped in the fight in the west, but this won't be a years-long fight; it will be a clash that ends in a day of fighting, there are no clever strategies to change the course of this battle..." she spoke with a quite frustrated tone before continuing. "I want you to stay with Cirilla the whole ti, and if Cintra falls, you must flee the country, go to Skagos, we have many friends there, and Cirilla will be safe," she said.
"Still, I can help in so way," Madara spoke.
"I'm sure you can, but I want you to stay with my granddaughter and protect her," she spoke while sipping her tea and looking at Madara with a thoughtful gaze. "You know, I planned to make you the king of this kingdom, which is quite surprising, I didn't like you and the one who convinced not to expel you from Cintra was Mousesack," she admitted.
"..." Madara remained silent, though not surprised by this, as he could read the queen well when he first t her.
"But I'm glad I wasn't foolish back then, my granddaughter really likes and cares about you, be sure that if things were different, Cintra would be in good hands, as I've paid very close attention to the lands you managed for a year, it's impressive, your ideas are things I've never seen in this kingdom," she spoke, after all, Madara had planted so things that weren't in this world, he greatly increased the revenue of his lands and greatly improved the lives of the peasants while he reduced the taxes charged, this gave him even more productivity and collected even more.
"I did what I thought was best," he said, although he was much better at fighting than administration.
"Anyway... I hope you take care of my granddaughter and keep her safe," she said, and Madara just nodded.
Madara eventually left the castle after staying another day and returned to his property, where he t Marco in his solarium.
"My lord..." the man approached.
"You're here, good. After all, I just received a reply to the letter I sent a few days ago," he began while Marco was confused. "There is a ship that will leave in 2 weeks from a port in a city north of Cintra. I want you to leave with the others and take the ship," Madara was straightforward.
"What do you an by that, sir??!!" He was stunned.
"Listen, don't tell anyone, but this country will sink, you have your wife who works in the castle as well, I've left so money for you, a thousand gold coins, I believe they will be enough for you and your family to live the rest of your lives well," Madara spoke, this man also had a son, he didn't want Marco or other servants and soldiers to be caught by the Nilfgaardian soldiers when they started to pillage, although Madara wasn't giving as much money to them as he did to Marco.
"My lord... you don't..." the man tried to argue, but Madara shook his head.
"Just start preparing your things and go. Don't try to draw attention and don't talk about the reason for your departure, I'll take care of the rest," Madara spoke and left without giving more answers to the man, he had to prepare for the black soldiers as well.
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