Chapter 9:
The Formula for Victory
HUH? Isn't this a little strange?
The Guide cocked his head as he contemplated the present state of
things. Liam was nervous. He definitely was suffering; that much was true.
The Guide could also sense Liam's intense anger. The count had been
busy lately, though he made it look like he was merely fooling around
every day. His army won the war, but at the cost of a large number of the
Empire's forces. Cleo's faction must've been far weaker now, but the
Guide couldn't shake the feeling that somehow the opposite was true.
"Is it just my imagination...? No, wait!" The Guide suddenly came
to a realization. "I see! I just haven't given Liam enough assistance yet!"
Back when he tried everything he could think of to drive Liam into a
corner, the boy only caused him endless grief in turn. If only he had known
how much easier it would be to assist Liam instead. He was simply feeling
some self-doubt now because he hadn't put in enough work yet.
Or at least that was the conclusion the Guide arrived at.
"I just need to work harder to make Liam happy! But...is that really
right? I'm not making some kind of huge mistake, am I?"
The Guide was at his wits' end as doubt reared its ugly head again.
Suddenly, he found himself wondering what the two feral kids he gave to
Yasushi to raise to kill Liam were up to. He'd supported Eulisia in the
past, and that woman still betrayed him. The Guide was starting to worry
that Yasushi's pupils would fail him in the same way. He wished he could
look into it right now, but he just didn't have enough power to spare.
After all, these days, every time he was able to save up a little
power, he needed to use it to support Liam. When he did that, it made
Liam suffer for some reason. Thus, the Guide went on struggling every
day to make Liam happy. Now that he had so little extra strength, he
mostly got his information from whatever newspapers he could find lying
around.
Happening upon just such a discarded periodical, the Guide stooped
for it and grumbled. "Ugh! I used too much power to support Liam. It was
so much easier to get my information before..."
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Right away, he found exactly what he was looking for. It was
strange how it had just fallen into his lap like this. The newspaper had
digital pages, and Riho's video started playing when he arrived at a
relevant article. "Are you watching, senior pupil? I'm coming to kill you
now!" Behind her were the Kurdan style's Swordmaster and his top
students, lying semiconscious in a pool of blood. It warmed the Guide's
heart to see how abnormal Riho was, declaring she was going to kill Liam
while wearing such a sunny smile. The Guide marveled at how those two
savage, boyish brats could grow up to become such impressive women.
"Ahh! What a pure specimen of swordsmanship! She'll surely be
able to kill Liam! And what of the other one?"
He flipped to the next page and saw that the other of Yasushi's
wonderfully transformed pupils recently assaulted the headquarters of the
Ahlen sword style. She wreaked havoc using the techniques of the Way of
the Flash as well.
"I knew I could believe in you, Yasushi. You trained up those two
secret weapons perfectly." Yasushi had fled from the Empire, but the
Guide sent his gratitude to the man, wherever he was now. "Unfortunately,
once everything is over, I plan to go make sure that you're unhappy too.
After all, I wouldn't have had to go through all this trouble in the first
place if you hadn't made Liam so strong."
The Guide sauntered away, tossing the digital paper aside as he
went. An oddly half-transparent dog watched as it hit the ground. The dog
glanced down at the articles, picked up the paper, and ran off somewhere.
***
I chatted with Elliot from the Clave Firm as I relaxed in a little side
room. We were waiting for the party to celebrate the expeditionary army's
victory.
"Congratulations on your victory, Count Banfield!" Elliot told me.
"Is the Empire throwing a celebration as well?"
Elliot had gifted me with heaps of gold and expensive alcohol to
celebrate the expeditionary army's—no, my complete victory. Man, I
loved blatant brownnosers like him.
"We're just celebrating on our own here. After all, the Empire's
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losses were quite significant. The United Kingdom was a powerful foe, it
seems." I smirked as I said this, and Elliot caught on to my true meaning.
"I'm sure Prince Cleo's chances of succession have improved
considerably now that he's defeated such a powerful foe. Similarly, the
crown prince who forced responsibility for this crisis on his brother has no
doubt lost a fair degree of his standing as well..."
"Things seem to have really ended up in my favor, didn't they? So,
what is Calvin up to now?" I asked.
"Those around him seem rather nervous, but he himself remains
calm. Of course, it could just be that he's projecting that image," remarked
Elliot.
I would have preferred Calvin to panic and do something careless.
After all, as long as he didn't make any moves, there was nothing I could
really do against him. At least we'd eliminated a good amount of Calvin's
firepower in this conflict, while my own faction had become much
stronger.
I also extended my reach by lending money to other nobles in need.
I wanted to play rough with that, loan-shark style, but Cleo's faction was
nothing but other evil lords like me, so we had to stick together. We could
save petty squabbles for after we destroyed our enemies. I decided to play
nice until we took Calvin down, so for now, I was only charging them a
little bit of interest.
As I chatted with Elliot, Wallace came in with a harried look on his
face.
"Liam, it's terrible!" he yelled.
"What is it? Isn't the party ready yet?" Wallace was pale and
anxious, so it made me concerned.
"The party is the problem! You wanted to change the theme into a
celebration of the army's victory, right? Well, there's a lot of stuff we're
missing. Actually, we pretty much have to redo the preparations
completely!"
"What?" On a whim, I changed the theme of tonight's party, without
thinking through the consequences, and I guess...
Wallace held his head in his hands. "We can't do this! We can't
celebrate our victory without a major overhaul!!!"
Wallace was still in charge of all the parties I was throwing to
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entertain myself. Honestly, he was proving himself to be a lot more
dependable with this new job, so I decided to listen to his concerns.
I turned to address the merchant. "Elliot, work with Wallace to get
everything we need."
"Just leave it to me. Procuring everything on such short notice will
incur quite a cost, of course..."
"Are you stupid? This is my party! I don't care what it costs!"
Dammit! I should have thought this through a little more.
Anyway, the damage was done, so I set Wallace up with Elliot to
overcome this setback. Still, Wallace continued to fret. "We'll have to
change all the fixtures in the venue, too. It's not set up for a victory
celebration at all..."
Watching Wallace really got me thinking. His concern for the
quality of these parties was so genuine. Society might look at him and
think his talents were pointless, but I appreciated what he did.
He's really made something of himself, huh?
Back when I first met him in primary school, I never thought he'd
amount to anything, but he was coming in plenty handy now. It had been a
good decision as an evil lord to take him in. As it was now, Wallace's
abilities were indispensable if I wanted to enjoy parties like a villain
should. I wanted to pat myself on the back for having such good instincts
back then. Good job, me!
***
At the same time, the nobles closest to Calvin were gathered in the
palace on the Capital Planet. Each and every one of them was plainly
nervous.
"Your Highness!" one of the nobles reported. "A small group is
planning an attack on Count Banfield!"
"That's not good." Right now, that was genuinely bad news for
Calvin. "Who?"
"Relatives of nobles who died in the expeditionary army. Some of
them even lost their heirs. They said they can't leave things as they are,
and they're all worked up about getting revenge...even if they have to
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leave your faction to do so."
Calvin's faction was large, and there were many shortsighted people
among them. Managing this varied bunch was one of Calvin's duties as
their leader, but it could be an exhausting task, especially now with so
many nobles upset over losing family members in the war. There were
likely more than a few who were genuinely grief-stricken, but the majority
were just upset about the damage to their reputations. Of course, there was
also the matter of the large number of ships they lost. Some nobles simply
couldn't accept that they lost so much.
I'd like to stop them, but if I do, they'll turn their complaints toward
me. The vengeful nobles were taking their frustrations out on Liam, but if
Calvin interfered with their plan, he would be the one to earn their ire. He
could just picture them saying, "You said we'd come out of this okay!"
and "What are you going to do to make it up to us?"
All of those in the faction were equally responsible, but these people
were looking for someone to pin their anger on. Emotions were at play, not
logic. Many nobles didn't have very good self-control due to their
insulated and privileged upbringings. Primary school and military service
could alleviate some of that, but certainly not all.
The more responsible nobles were just as upset as Calvin and voiced
their objections.
"This is hardly the time..."
"They don't understand the ramifications..."
"It will only serve to harm His Highness's reputation if they pull
something now..."
Calvin sighed. "Let them leave the faction, then."
"Are you sure, Your Highness?" one noble asked. "I hardly think
that will benefit your reputation."
"We should consider this an opportunity to get rid of the more
troublesome members of the group. The faction has gotten too big, too
unruly. If we're going to fight Liam, we should be at our best."
The nobles all agreed and soon departed from the room. When
Calvin confirmed that he was alone, he snapped his fingers and a small
flame appeared in the air. The flame swelled and changed shape several
times until a large man kneeled before him. The man was a ninja, and
a symbol on his clothing identified him as holding a higher rank than the
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men who fought Kukuri some time ago.
"What do you require?" the ninja asked.
"It seems some idiots are about to cause a scene. If you get an
opportunity, use it to erase at least some of Liam's operatives. Did you get
any information on them, by the way?"
The ninja explained what he knew of Kukuri and his men. "Based
on our clan's records, we believe they may be a group called the Shadows,
thought to be destroyed 2,000 years ago."
"The Shadows?"
"An organization that served the emperor at the time, 2,000 years
ago. That was just what others called them, however. No one knows their
true name."
"There were a lot of clans like yours at work back then, weren't
there? Do you suppose House Banfield has been harboring them all this
time?"
"No."
"You don't?"
The ninja produced a shuriken and threw it at the wall. It turned to
flame, which spread out into a screen that displayed an image of one of
these so-called "Shadows." The man on the screen was Kukuri.
"This man was one of the most feared of his kind at the time. He
worked for the emperor, and in the end, it was said that he was turned to
stone and left to erode."
If the man pictured was the most feared, that meant he was the most
powerful of those secret operatives back then. This news did not sit well
with Calvin.
"But he lived?" the prince asked. "It seems more likely that
someone just inherited his role."
"That's not possible."
"Why?"
"Their whole clan was rooted out by the other organizations. My
own predecessors participated as well. It was the emperor's orders not to
leave a single one of them alive," the ninja explained.
The emperor at that time gathered up Kukuri and his men and had
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them all turned to stone. It was hard to believe their clan could have
survived all this time, and even if they had, it was even harder to believe
their unique skills could have been passed down. Maintaining an
organization like that wasn't cheap. It would have been almost impossible
for both the organization and their techniques to survive all this time in
secret.
"Your Highness, they are intimately familiar with the palace."
"That's not good. It's not as if the palace is completely unchanged
from 2,000 years ago, but it'll be trouble if any passageways remain that
only they know about."
There had been plenty of renovations to the palace over the years,
and they were always discovering old sections that had become walled up
and forgotten over time. It wouldn't surprise Calvin at all if there were
secret passages from ages past that were still usable now.
"From what we can tell, they've revived in the present with all the
power they possessed in the past. I can't imagine there are that many of
them, though."
So they were highly skilled, but few.
Well, there's no reason to go out of our way to fight them right now.
Still, an incredibly powerful organization from the past had been
revived in the present, and that made Calvin uneasy. It unnerved him that
he didn't know when these "Shadows" might come after him. Having
grown up in the palace, he knew full well how frightening people of that
nature were, and it made him nervous. It made him want to take care of the
problem sooner rather than later.
"Can you get rid of them?"
The ninja turned to flame and vanished, leaving behind only the
reply, "As you wish."
***
Concealed within elaborate decorations designed for tonight's big
party were several hoodlums, hired by the vengeful nobles to attack Liam.
These heavy decorations were currently in the process of being moved.
"Nobles just throw parties every day, eh?" one man whispered to his
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partner.
"They spend enough money in one night that a commoner could use
to live it up over their entire life."
"Well, I hope they enjoy themselves, since this night could be their
last."
Normally, hired goons like these would never have been able to
make it into such a party undetected, but they received assistance from the
nobles who hired them in order to slip past security and make it into the
venue.
They were prepared to attack when the time was right, though right
now, they couldn't see outside their tight hiding places. The decorations
were equipped with cameras so they could see outside, but they were
covered by cloth before the party began. Within the decorations, the men
were being jostled about.
"They've been moving us around a lot..."
"Have they noticed us?"
"They would've killed us in an instant if they did. There must have
been some change in their plans."
It wasn't just these two; a good number of other hired goons were
hidden inside decorations for tonight's party. Even if they didn't manage
to kill Liam, they were sure to cause damage one way or another. Or at
least, that was the plan. One thing they knew for sure was that if they
failed and were captured, a punishment worse than death awaited them.
This was why these would-be killers were prepared to blow themselves up
if it looked as though they were going to be apprehended. If it came to
that, then one way or another, they would be sure to cause chaos.
The jostling finally stopped, and the hoodlums waited for the party
to begin...but no matter how long they waited, the cloths that covered the
decorations were never removed.
"Did they bring the decorations into the venue and then take them
out?"
"Damnit! Come on, we're getting out of here. The venue should at
least be nearby!"
"Contact the others!"
The men leaped out from their hiding places, finding themselves in
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some sort of warehouse. The other infiltrators also came out into the open,
shocked and speechless.
"Wh-what...?"
"What's going on?"
"Wh-whatever... Let's just get to the venue!"
The men left the warehouse, only to realize they were a considerable
distance away from the party itself. They hurried in its direction, but
Liam's knights who were guarding the venue spotted them easily.
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