"Here, Duke Campbell, please have some tea."

Twenty li outside the Kingdom’s royal capital, in the Imperial army’s encampment.

The army Lorne had brought had already made camp and was resting in place. Though there was no fighting for the moment, this elite force, which had crossed blades with the Abyss demonfolk countless times, still radiated a chilling sharpness at every moment. Merely looking from afar at those Dragon-Slaying Sword banners snapping in the wind was enough to make one’s heart tremble.

And yet, in the central command tent deep within that fearless and valiant army, Lorne Campbell—the army’s commander, and a towering hero known as the Lion King himself... already had sweat beading across his forehead.

"This... wouldn’t be appropriate, would it?"

Lorne accepted the teacup from Anna. It was obviously just an ordinary cup of tea, yet he seemed to feel a weight of a thousand pounds in it.

"Miss Kaplin, you’re the Swordbearer of the Silent Bureau. Your status must be no lower than mine. How could I possibly be comfortable drinking tea you brewed with your own hands..."

"Oh my, Duke Campbell, you joke. I’m serving you tea as someone of the younger generation. What is there to feel awkward about? Besides, there’s no one else here, so why bother standing on rank? Just call me Anna."

Anna covered her mouth and smiled modestly.

At some point, she had changed into a plain-colored long dress, paired with sheer lace white gloves and brown deerskin boots. In the blink of an eye, she was completely different from the charming, sultry beauty who had blended perfectly into the night before. Her entire bearing had become airy and pure, making her look exactly like the kind of mature older woman who put people at ease.

The kind of older woman a man could feel perfectly safe entrusting his son to.

"I-is that so? Then that truly is an honor... an honor..."

Lorne drew in a deep breath and told himself that he had lived more than half his life—what storms had he not weathered?

Even when he had been besieged in the Abyss by several demonfolk Grand Dukes at once, he had remained calm and unflinching. This was nothing more than a cup of tea handed to him by an outstanding young woman. Why should he be so flustered?

This was a disgrace to House Campbell!

At that thought, Lorne immediately felt his backbone stiffen again. He raised his broad hand, intending to display the grandeur of the mighty Lion King and toss back the tea in one hearty swallow...

And then his mouth filled with ice shards.

"Y-Your Majesty?"

Lorne’s mouth twitched. The spine he had just straightened showed signs of going limp again.

"What guidance do you have for me this time?"

"Guidance would be too strong a word. It’s just that, Duke Campbell, tea of unknown origin is best left undrunk."

Celicia sat upright in the seat of honor.

They had already returned to the Imperial camp. Though this was the central command tent at the very heart of the army, it had been erected only temporarily, so everything looked extremely crude.

But even in that crude wooden chair, Celicia somehow made it feel like a throne—especially when her cold, beautiful eyes landed on a certain shameless bitch who had changed her appearance to deceive Duke Campbell. The lofty, cutting expression on her face was no different from when she had ordered the noble houses of Belrand hanged to the last family member.

Bitch. Putting on this pure, older-sister act—what, was all that usual seductive charm for the dogs to see?

"Duke Campbell may not know this, but this woman’s greatest specialty is brewing strange potions. Even your precious son has fallen victim to her hands more than once. You would do well to be careful," Celicia said with utmost seriousness.

"Oh my? What do you mean, strange potions? Muen asked for those potions himself, you know. From what I could see, he was more than happy to enjoy them."

Anna seemed not to notice the rapidly dropping temperature inside the tent at all. Refusing to yield, she met Celicia’s gaze head-on.

"As for Your Majesty, I hear your favorite thing is putting your hands on Muen. Plenty of people have seen you hitting him, you know."

"That wasn’t hitting him. That was discipline!"

"And those weren’t strange potions. That was love!"

"Hah. Knowing full well the man already has a fiancée, and still talking about love. How shameless."

"She’s only his fiancée. They’re not actually married, so what’s so shameless about it? On the other hand, there’s a certain someone who’s been repeating those words every day lately. Don’t tell me you’re already panicking and have realized that aside from that, you have no advantage left at all?"

"Hah. I’m not so pathetic that I’d panic over a mere alley cat like you..."

"Then why are you still—"

"Enough!"

Lorne shot to his feet and slammed a palm onto the wooden table in front of him. The fragile-looking table did not suffer the slightest damage under that blow. Only a thunderous sound echoed out, temporarily cutting off the increasingly heated exchange.

At this critical moment, Lorne had finally reached the end of his patience and at last displayed the majesty befitting Duke Campbell, the mighty Lion King himself!

"Ladies, with the two of you arguing like this, don’t you think—"

The imposing Lion King glanced to his left. There stood a graceful, serene young woman, her brows and eyes full of gentleness and quiet poise.

But from Lorne’s perspective, there was not only a young woman there. Behind her, profound darkness churned without end. Invisible shadows moved through it, whispers that stabbed at the mind echoed ceaselessly, and from time to time crimson eyes shone through the dark, as though grinning savagely as they met his gaze.

The scale of that darkness was not yet enough to threaten him, but the terror hidden within it was enough to make even an old Crowned One like him feel wary.

That old monster from the Silent Bureau... he really did find a successor this terrifying? And the key thing was, that successor now also happened to be...

The Lion King silently swallowed and turned to the right.

There sat a cold, proud young woman at the head of the wooden table.

She was exquisitely beautiful, like a snow lotus swaying on a mountain peak, yet there was not the slightest fragility to her, because blazing radiance shrouded her at every moment.

That was the blessing of the Empire and the authority of the Emperor, interwoven above her head into a resplendent crown. Behind her, the vast phantom of an immense nation flickered in and out of sight. Simply looking at her felt like being crushed beneath the weight of an entire country!

In only two or three short years, the former Third Princess had completed a threefold ascension of identity, bearing, and strength, to the point that this Lion King, from any angle one cared to name, had no choice but to temporarily draw in his claws in front of her.

"What is it?"

Seeing the Lion King stop halfway through his sentence, both women looked over at him oddly.

"Ah, no, what I mean is..."

The Lion King—no, rather, the pitiful Lorne gave a little shudder, then hurriedly rubbed his palm across the tabletop as though wiping it clean, forcing an extremely kindly smile onto his face.

"With the two of you arguing like this, wouldn’t it hurt the harmony between you? It would be better to calm down first. Calm down first..."

My son... it’s not that your father is too timid to help maintain harmony in the family. It’s just that House Campbell is only a mere ducal house. A status this insignificant, in the middle of the boundless sea, is as weak, pitiful, and helpless as a lone little boat. There is simply no way it can withstand these monstrous waves!

This wave... you’ll have to come back and shoulder it yourself.

"All right, all right, ladies. Let’s get back to business first."

Afraid the crisis would escalate again, Lorne quickly dragged the conversation back on topic before either of them could speak again.

Fortunately, while these two extraordinary women refused to yield to one another in this moment, they still knew what mattered more. The instant business was brought up, they both returned to their usual serious selves, nodded in agreement, and stopped trying to outdo each other.

Thank goodness there are only two of them.

Lorne secretly wiped away a cold sweat.

He prided himself on having once been a famously irresistible lover in Belrand in his younger days. Of course, because his wife back then had ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ been far too formidable—so overwhelming that she crushed all rivals outright—he had essentially never gained any experience handling a two-way standoff like this.

Still, it was only two women... no matter which of them won in the future, from his perspective, everything remained under control.

"First... Your Majesty."

Lorne looked at Celicia. "How do you think this battle should be fought?"

On the long table, a makeshift sand table had already been pieced together. Its accuracy and detail were nowhere near the level of the sand table Aurier had once used. After all, Notasia Fortress had once belonged to the Kingdom, so the terrain information there had been extremely detailed. But for the Imperial army to advance all the way to the Kingdom’s royal capital—this was something the Empire had never done before. Everything had to be explored from scratch.

Fortunately, the terrain around the royal capital was not especially complicated. After sending out a large number of elite scouts and mages capable of using flight magic, they had managed to fill in the rough geography within a short time.

"In my view, the absolute worst option would be a direct assault."

Celicia’s gaze fell upon the sand table.

To the west of the Kingdom’s royal capital, the Empire’s banners had already fully seized the most critical passes. If any ground taken by an army counted as lost territory, then at this moment the Kingdom had already lost a full fifth of its western lands.

Those lands were relatively barren, and the population was not large, but for any nation, this was still something extremely hard to accept.

No matter how one looked at it, in this war the Kingdom had already lost every scrap of face and substance it could possibly lose.

But...

Even with all of those conditions in mind, Celicia still had to admit that taking the Kingdom’s royal capital in a short span of time was almost completely impossible. Just as she had concluded during her earlier reconnaissance, however old and decayed that city might be, it was still one of the greatest cities on the continent.

Other than piling up human lives, there was no way to storm it by force.

"A direct assault is indeed not a wise choice."

Lorne nodded, clearly in full agreement with Celicia’s judgment.

"Though the Imperial border army I brought here is elite even among elites, forgive my frankness—they’re best at defending cities and fighting in open field battles. As for siege warfare... apart from that Gutongs Castle that suddenly appeared, the demonfolk don’t have a single city to speak of. Men who’ve spent their lives fighting demonfolk can hardly be called skilled at that sort of thing."

"But didn’t you fight your way all the way here, Duke Campbell?"

Pointing to the Kingdom’s western territory, Anna sounded curious.

"You broke through city after city in only a few days. Can that really be called not skilled?"

"That’s different."

Lorne scratched his head rather awkwardly and gave a bitter smile.

"Most of the troops from those western passes had already been drawn away, and their defenses had grown lax. They barely required any fierce assault at all. Half of them, in fact, surrendered as soon as they saw that no help was coming, rather than being taken by force...

"So, strictly speaking, that proves nothing."

At that, even Lorne felt a little emotional. Though the plan of using the Abyss as a route of advance had been his own proposal, even he had never imagined they would be able to fight their way so easily all the way to the Kingdom’s royal capital.

Of course, as Empress of the Empire, Celicia had not stayed back at the rear. Instead, she had personally led twenty thousand cavalry and seized Odense City, the western gateway, allowing the Imperial army to drive straight in. That, too, was something he had never anticipated.

"So before we decide how to fight this battle, let me ask one thing first..."

Lorne narrowed his eyes, sharply sensing the abnormality hidden behind this chain of events.

"Something has gone seriously wrong inside the Kingdom by now, hasn’t it?"