“Hurry up and die.”

Flames reflected off the blade of the suicide dagger that had been tossed and then tumbled over the floor.  That grandfather who had once been so terrifying was now crouched on the floor like a rat, timidly lifting his gaze up toward Rutiya.

“I’m telling you to die.  It’s your responsibility after everything turned out this way.”
“Yo-you… you, what are you doing at a time like this…?”
“He lost, Imperial Crown Prince Vissel.  Apparently, all the nobles connected to Duke Fairart in the Imperial Capital are being beheaded and their heads hung up.  Those connected to Laica aren’t an exception either.  This proposal is the greatest kindness I can offer, as your grandchild, respected Grandfather.”

Lutiya’s gaze shifted as, baki, the sound of the burning building collapsing, came.  Despite being the middle of the night, the light outside never ceased.  The Governor’s Mansion, the Residence of the Grand Duchy of Laica, had been set ablaze.  The entirety of the palace was burning.

“Why don’t you hurry?  It’ll be easier than burning to death.”
“Wh-what are you… is this the time for jokes?  Never mind, you can ride a dragon so hurry and save me by carrying me—!”

Lutiya sighed out, drew the sword hanging at his waist, and thrust it straight through his grandfather’s thigh.  A filthy scream rose up.

“The reason I troubled myself to come back was to watch your miserable death.”
“Yo-you ungrateful wretch.  Gh… who… do you think raised you…!”
“Thanks to being raised by you, I turned out like this.  Aren’t you happy?”

Lutiya snorted with laughter and tried walking past him.  His ankle was grabbed with a shout, “Wait!” but he immediately kicked it away.  The old man’s body, withered like a tree, easily fell over.

“Wa-wait, Lutiya.  I can’t stand.”

Lutiya ignored him as he made for the still intact entrance.  The wind blowing against his back would eventually carry the fire into this room as well.

“Lutiya, wait.  Wait, please wait, I’m begging you!  I- I can’t move.  I’ll die at this rate!  Don’t abandon me!”

Lutiya turned around, keeping his hand on the door handle.

“All this time, I’ve been waiting, waiting for you to look at me like that again.  For you to place your expectation on me once more.”
“Lutiya…”
“The only thing I looked forward to was seeing what kind of face you’d make when I abandoned you.”

The light vanished from his grandfather’s eyes just as he grasped that final thread of hope. The sight of his expression dying with rage and his pleas turning into curse-laced begging had Rutiya laughing.  He couldn’t stop.  Then, while watching his grandfather crawl like a caterpillar, he finally closed the door to the room, one where flames had begun to blow.

A newspaper bearing the headline “Grand Duke of Laica Burned to Death” reached the island the following evening. It was interpreted as being either as a suicide committed before the Dragon Emperor could retake the Imperial Capital and close in with his forces, or as an assassination intended to obscure and muddle responsibility for colluding with Duke Fairart through the Grand Duke of Laica’s death.

Everyone, however, had the same question.

—Will Laica escape the Dragon Emperor’s purge with this?

“From the beginning, I thought it was impossible to oppose the Rave Empire,” “I was against it,” “Anyway, this is for the best.” —The way adults flipped their opinions despite shouting the exact opposite just months earlier was shameless.

“They say the Noitral Dragon Knight Order is coming?”
“They apparently already reached the opposite shore.  We let them know that Lutiya Theos Rave is waiting for help here, so they’ll probably be cleaning up the disturbance.  Some more people are going to be taken away.”
“Then with this, Lutiya is finally the Grand Duke of Laica.”

“A toast,” the call rose up without any clear source. The sharp crack of burning wood echoed out from the bonfire that had been assembled before nightfall.

The former La Baia Military Academy, having been reduced to ruins, was avoided by the public due to endless rumors about the ghosts of students killed by the Rave Imperial Military appearing there.  It was avoided more so in cold where snow felt like it was on the cusp of falling.

That, however, made it the perfect place for former classmates who had scattered across various regions and operated behind the scenes to relentlessly stir up war with the Rave Empire to meet. 

Gathered around the bonfire as they were, with everyone having brought whatever food and drink they pleased, felt as if they were seeing the ending of a school festival.  That said, there was no way the Blue Dragon Class, the so called “Gutter Rats,” would have even been allowed to participate in something like a campfire.

“It took quite a while to get here.”
“It’s been like two years since the school was demolished.”
“So, Lutiya, what are your plans from now on?”
“Of course, I’ll ask Hades-onii-sama of the Rave Empire for help, and present Laica to him.”

Lutiya smiled as he took a skewer of grilled fish someone had roasted.

“All the hideouts of the independent faction, the anti-Rave faction, have already been identified.  We even know the sources of their funding.  This is information being provided in anguish by a younger brother who lacked the strength to stop his grandfather’s rampage. They’ll trust that, at least.”

It was information that could, rightly, be trusted.

Lutiya and his comrades, after all, were the ones who had stirred up anti-Rave sentiment, plotted to have his grandfather join with Duke Fairart, and swayed public opinion toward attacking the Imperial Capital Raelm.

“Ahh, so those smug jerks who kept going on about ‘justice’ are finally going to disappear?”
“While you’re at it, get rid of those guys who kept getting in our way too.  They were seriously annoying~.”
“Come to think of it, I heard that the aniki who taught a bunch to Lutiya is unaccounted for.  Is that true?”
“Ahh, you mean Maynard-aniue. He’s dead, yeah.”

Nearly half a year had passed since Noitral had been reclaimed and he stopped appearing on the battlefield.  It was hard to believe he was still alive, regardless of which side killed him.  He himself often said it was only a matter of when he would be killed.

“That’s what happens when you do things that conspicuous.”
“I mean, Kratos and Rave really are at war now…”
“…I… thought Laica might actually defeat Rave, but I’m glad I listened to what Lutiya said.”

The Dragon Emperor, on his return to the Imperial Capital Raelm from Lehtsatz, was held up at a great bridge over a major river by a large army.  Various regions saw the Dragon Emperor disadvantaged, and due to their building resentment toward him, launched a pincer attack from behind.

However, the situation reversed in an instant once the dragons began attacking humans.

Rumors had long since spread claiming that dragons would not act in the presence of the Dragon Emperor.  In fact, dragons had completely stopped obeying human commands during the False Emperor upheaval. Many armies had apparently even avoided using dragons out of caution, but once they began attacking, that was a different matter.

The Imperial Capital Raelm had been encircled by a massive army, yet the Dragon Emperor, all on his own, saw it scorched to the ground while he gracefully descended upon the Imperial Castle atop of a dragon.

This was the second time he had seized the Imperial Capital entirely on his own, following the False Emperor upheaval.

It was also said that he took the head of Crown Prince Vissel.

“Apparently, only the goddess can defeat the Dragon Emperor who received the Dragon God’s protection.”

He was merely parroting something the half-brother he had once, briefly, exchanged words with said.  It sounded ridiculous, but the power of the Heavenly Sword was real.  There was no harm in being cautious.

“At best, all we can do is suck up the scraps.  Trying to do something beyond our station will just get us killed for nothing.  Maynard-aniue misjudged that point.  I don’t know why, though.”

Regardless of whether he was blinded by power or something else, it was foolish behavior.  He would not do the same.

“From here on, the best I’ll do is integrate myself with Hades-aniue.  Then I’ll do the same thing to the Rave Empire that we did to Laica.”

He didn’t need power.  He didn’t need justice either.  What he did just needed to be entertaining.

Watching those people who acted self-important, who looked down on others, and loudly proclaimed themselves to be right crawl pathetically along the ground was refreshing no matter how many times he saw it.

And the expressions of those people who looked down on us for being gutter rats and failures, who mocked us, when they realized they had been deceived!

“First, we need to transfer to Rave.  Are we aiming for the Imperial Capital?”
“Yeah.  For now, we’ll lie low for about a year—”
“Okay, okay, oka—y, attention, everyone!”

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