The night in the Central Palace of Gimle never truly felt silent.
While most of the palace inhabitants drifted off to sleep beneath warm blankets, a secret room existed deep away from the eastern wing, located beneath the floorboards.
The room was hidden behind thick stone walls, far beyond the reach of servants’ ears or the eyes of religious faction spies.
Only a single round table carved with the royal insignia was illuminated by the dim, blue glow of a mana crystal.
Surrounding it, three men sat with an aura of mutual dominance, creating a magnetic field of psychological tension capable of cowing anyone’s nerve.
In the primary high-backed chair upholstered in wyvern leather sat King Gyo.
The supreme ruler of the Dukedom appeared calm on the surface.
His aging face retained creases of tension, while his fingers—adorned with a blood-red ruby ring—tapped against the tabletop in a steady, constant rhythm.
His gaze was cold, calculated, and filled with crafty scheming: the classic hallmark of a king who maintained his throne not through the love of his people, but by cultivating conflicts among his hunting hounds.
Directly to his right sat Julian Vallière-Silver, wearing an upright posture that looked utterly arrogant and intimidating to anyone who beheld him.
The twenty-year-old youth wore a white velvet robe edged with pure gold embroidery, featuring the crest of a raven and a rose as the proud emblem of his family.
His long silver hair was neatly combed, and a subtle smile curved across his lips—a sharp grin that outwardly seemed to hide a burning ambition to destroy the House of Silver down to its roots.
Yet, not a single person in that room—not even King Gyo himself—knew what was truly raging behind that cold, arrogant mask.
Beneath his upright posture and sharp glare, Julian’s chest was actually churning violently with waves of nausea and gripping terror.
His heart hammered wildly, driven not by bravery, but by overwhelming coercion.
His fingers, concealed within the folds of his white velvet robe, trembled violently, gripping each other so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
I don’t care about this rotten grudge…
I don’t care about the throne, the glory, or the destruction of the House of Silver, Julian screamed in the deepest recesses of his heart, lamenting the cruel fate trapping his life.
As a young man with a naturally gentle, sensitive disposition who deeply detested bloodshed, Julian actually possessed zero desire to wage war or harm anyone.
He was the type of youth who would rather spend his time tending to a flower garden or reading ancient history books in the library than stand in a political arena reeking of blood and intrigue.
However, the world gave him no choice.
His greatest fear was not death, but the horrifying shadow of his father, Duke Archambaud Vallière—a cruel tyrant who held absolute control over his life.
Childhood trauma from physical and mental abuse, coupled with his father’s vicious threat to eliminate the single remaining clue to his mother’s whereabouts should he ever dare to disobey, left Julian trapped inside a gilded cage.
His mother was rumored to have vanished or been forcibly hidden somewhere as a result of his father’s mad ambition to forge a perfect bloodline.
To survive, to keep searching for his missing mother hidden behind the dark veil of the Vallière family, Julian was forced to wear the mask of a monster.
He had to swallow his tears raw every night, cast his pure conscience far away, and play the role of a ruthless, bloodthirsty heir before the kingdom’s elite.
The subtle smile lingering on his lips at that moment was not a triumphant smirk, but rather a disguised smile of agony—the fragile mask of a lost, tormented child forced to dance upon a theatrical stage orchestrated by terror toward his own biological father.
However, the focus of the room that night was neither the king nor Julian.
The third figure sitting in a dark corner seat was what made the air in the room feel so heavy.
He was one of the third-generation divine-blood special guards recruited by the Vallière faction.
The man wore no flashy military armor.
He wore only a simple black coat, with one eye covered by a magical burn scar and a hollow gaze that radiated bloodlust.
Each time he breathed, the spiritual fluctuations around him vibrated unstably, as though the space nearby was ready to tear apart at any moment.
King Gyo stopped his finger-tapping.
The scraping sound of the metal ring against the table ceased, replaced by his heavy, authoritative voice.
”All eyes on the Borealis Continent will be fixed on the main hall.
I am allowing the Vallière family to lead the honorary security vanguard not because I favor your ambition, Julian…
but because I need an attack dog crazy enough to tear apart the fangs of the northern wolves.”
Julian nodded stiffly, maintaining the arrogant smirk on his face even though his stomach felt terribly churned.
Beneath his agreement to that honorary security position lay a reality far more sickening to Julian.
His status as the leader of the guard vanguard was not merely a tool for war, but an additional binding chain.
The royal princess—who now sat as his fiancée—was not his heart’s choice, but a political chess piece resulting from Duke Archambaud’s vicious coercion.
That engagement had been engineered as an initial step toward usurping the throne, making Julian a living puppet poised to swallow the Dukedom Kingdom from within.
Fiancée…
political marriage…
all of this is rotten nonsense for Father’s mad ambition, Julian screamed bitterly inside, his chest feeling as tight as if struck by an invisible hammer.
It was not only Julian who suffered within this vicious cycle.
King Gyo himself—known years ago as a ruler who upheld the principle of absolute neutrality to maintain kingdom stability—had now completely prostituted his idealism.
Ever since the forced engagement between his daughter and Julian was formalized under pressure from the Vallière family, the king had swung around to become their most obedient ally.
Not out of love, but out of sheer, overwhelming terror.
King Gyo knew full well the horrifying track record of the House of Vallière under Duke Archambaud’s leadership.
Over the past few decades, that demonic family had slaughtered, devoured, and crushed two ducal-tier families daring to oppose them.
The consequence of defeat was not merely death; the shattered family’s descendants were reduced to helpless slaves, where the men were forced to work to death in underground mines while the women were degraded into sex slaves for commoners and even demi-humans.
Within his cunning mind, the king instead viewed this engagement as a high-stakes political gamble.
He deliberately sanctioned his daughter’s marriage to Julian because he believed that the youth—famed for possessing extraordinary power thanks to his divine-blood heritage—could be utilized as his ultimate chess piece to expand his own authority.
King Gyo calculated that Duke Archambaud would never dare stage a barbaric coup by openly severing his head because King Gyo still maintained extremely strong relational networks with the First-Generation Pope (the Supreme Pontiff) of the Holy Church of Winterfell, the spiritual shadow ruler controlling faith across the entire world.
For King Gyo, entanglement with the Vallière family was a shortcut to uniting absolute military might and sacred church influence under his command.
He assumed he held total control over the youth and his family.
That was why he sat at the table tonight, sanctioning the foul plot to destroy the House of Silver, smiling atop the stage of political intrigue, utterly unaware that he was playing with a monster far more terrifying than anything he could imagine within his own head.
As the silence filled with intrigue and cold calculation draped over the underground chamber, the secret door creaked softly once more.
The third-generation divine-blood man who had previously left the room stepped back inside.
Behind the single eye covered by a magical burn scar lurked a wicked smirk radiating bloodlust.
He did not immediately sit down.
With firm, arrogant strides, the man gazed alternately at King Gyo and Julian, then tossed out a foul plan that instantly altered the room’s dynamics.
”The performance in the main hall alone is not enough to break the House of Silver’s mentality,” the raspy voice of the divine-blood man broke the silence, whipping the attention of the two noblemen at the round table.
”If we want to crush them down to their roots, we must start from the outside, before the capital’s public tomorrow morning.”
King Gyo narrowed his eyes, intrigued.
“What do you mean?”
”I have already deployed several of my subordinates to go undercover and cause trouble in the merchant district where their procession will pass,” You are reading on novelping.com, the official source.
The divine-blood guard continued with a wide smirk.
“Our primary target is Sir Raymond—the border knight of the House of Silver known for having a fiery temper, an explosive personality, and sky-high pride.”
Hearing that name, Julian on the right instantly tensed up.
His heart hammered in panic.
He knew Sir Raymond’s reputation all too well as The Frost-Hammer, a fortress of wrath whose provocation could shatter half the capital’s streets.
However, what worried Julian more than urban property damage or the political scheme was the potential loss of dozens of innocent civilian lives packing the streets—something he desperately wished to avoid due to his compassionate heart and aversion to seeing others suffer.
”Wait…
that approach is far too reckless,” Julian interjected in a firm tone forced to sound cold on the outside, though his palms were slick with cold sweat.
”Provoking Sir Raymond openly in the middle of the city will only trigger a military chaos before the celebration even begins.
We should focus on…”
Before Julian could finish his sentence, the divine-blood guard interrupted with a condescending, cynical laugh.
”That is precisely the point, Young Master Julian,” the guard cut in sharply.
“We will lure that House of Silver lapdog out of its kennel, provoking his rage before a crowd of commoners and adventurers.”
”Then, at the peak of his fury, I will step in myself, subdue him, and trample his pride in front of the public.
When The Frost-Hammer of Judgement kneels and cries like a child, the reputation of the House of Silver will shatter instantly, leaving nothing behind.”
Julian opened his mouth, intending to lodge a fierce protest and dismantle the insane plan.
Before Julian’s voice could emerge, however, King Gyo burst into loud laughter—a sound of full satisfaction echoing off the stone walls.
”Brilliant!” King Gyo exclaimed, slamming his hand on the table with total enthusiasm.
Far from feeling worried, the king viewed the provocation plan as a perfectly timed golden opportunity.
Inside his cunning mind, King Gyo thought: If this divine-blood guard successfully publicly humiliates Sir Raymond, it not only degrades the House of Silver, but also indirectly trims down a rival military power in this kingdom!
King Gyo looked at Julian with a meaningful smile, misinterpreting the tense expression on the youth’s face as tactical hesitation rather than moral rejection.
”Did you hear that, Julian?” King Gyo praised, pivoting to fully endorse the guard’s plan.
“The objection you raised earlier proves only that you are a careful planner, but in politics, we need dead-end surprises.”
”Let them be provoked!
Let this divine-blood guard crush Sir Raymond’s pride in the city square!”
Hearing absolute backing from King Gyo, Julian startled in his seat.
His initial intention to prevent and suppress the chaos had instead boomeranged, driving the foul plot even further toward receiving full greenlight approval from the kingdom’s ruler.
Julian’s lips trembled faintly behind his arrogant mask.
His throat felt parched.
He wanted to refuse, wanted to scream that this path led to total destruction, but his mouth remained tightly locked by the chains of fear toward his father and the grip of palace authority.
Fool…
This foolish old king is digging his own grave, Julian screamed inwardly in agonizing torment.
Outside the room, the night kept crawling onward, while inside that secret chamber, rulers and divine-blood monsters laughed atop the stage of intrigue they had woven themselves—readying tomorrow’s clash as a deadly spectacle prepared to tear the peace of the Dukedom Kingdom to shreds.