Episode 24: The Torn Imperial Edict and Insulting the Imperial Family
Whoosh!!
The massive central reception room of the Duke of Castillo's mansion. With every step Eleanor took, the immense mana of a 7th Circle Archmage rose like a red haze, mercilessly crushing the space.
"Ugh...!"
"Cough.."
The Imperial Guards, who had stood commandingly escorting the Imperial Envoy, could not withstand the immense, invisible pressure and dropped their spears in unison. In agony that felt like it was piercing their very core, they knelt on the marble floor, breathing heavily.
"Du, Duchess! W-what are you doing in the face of the Imperial Decree!"
The Chief Envoy recoiled, turning pale. The golden decree, symbolizing the Emperor's authority, trembled in his hand. Eleanor approached the envoy, who was frozen in terror, right before his nose. Then, with an elegant and swift movement, she lightly snatched the solemn decree from his grasp.
"Offer my perfect heir as a 'concubine' to that incompetent Crown Prince bastard, who is merely his father's son?"
Eleanor's cold and cruel voice echoed resonantly through the frozen reception room.
"M-Madam! How dare you insult His Majesty the Emperor and His Royal Highness the Crown Prince! If you disobey this edict, it is clear treason against the state!"
"Treason."
A deep, alluring smirk spread across Eleanor's red lips.
Screech !!
The next moment, a spine-chilling, tearing sound, enough to rip through the envoy's eardrums, ripped through the reception room. The symbol of absolute power that no one in the Empire dared to deface. That edict, personally drafted by the Emperor and stamped with a red wax seal, was brutally torn in half by Eleanor's two hands.
"H-Hiiiiik!"
The envoy rolled his eyes and screamed as if he were about to faint. Even the Royal Guardsmen prostrate on the floor could not close their mouths at the unbelievable sight. But Eleanor's hands did not stop there.
Screech! Screech!
She folded the decree she had torn in half back together and shredded it into pieces once again.
"Did I look like a worthless tribute to the Imperial Household?"
Eleanor scattered the torn fragments of the decree like snowflakes over the dazed face of the envoy. The shattered parchments struck the envoy's face and tumbled miserably to the floor. Eleanor mercilessly trampled the Imperial Household's red wax seal lying on the floor with her boots and pronounced a sentence with a dazzlingly arrogant smile.
"Go and tell your old, foolish liege clearly. Liliana von Werner is destined to become the noble Duchess who will rule Castillo. If the Emperor truly covets my daughter-in-law... tell him to surrender the throne to her, bring the entire Imperial Palace as a dowry, and kneel before her"
"You-you are insane! This is a total insult to the Imperial Family! As of today, Castillo is a group of traitors!"
The envoy screamed, foaming at the mouth. However, at that moment, what overwhelmed the atmosphere of the reception room was not the envoy's scream. It was the trembling breath of Liliana, who stood frozen behind Eleanor. Liliana clenched her fists tightly as she looked at the fragments of the imperial edict scattered like trash on the floor and the rigid back of her mother-in-law, Eleanor, standing with her back to her.
'Concubine.'
That word was a terrible trauma etched deep into Liliana's bones. The night in the past when she was nearly sold as a concubine to an old nobleman to pay off the Count Werner family's debt. And those terrible words from her husband, Claude, even after marrying into the Castillo family, treating her like a mere object.
"You are nothing but a shell, not even worthy of the toes of my mistress, Vivian."
She was always a 'weakling,' forced to endure being sold here and there and trampled upon according to the whims of those in power. When the imperial decree arrived, Liliana instinctively nearly fell into a terrible resignation, thinking, 'Ah, the family will only be safe if I am offered as a sacrifice to someone again.'
But.
The moment her mother-in-law, Eleanor, tore the imperial decree to shreds and threw it at the envoy's face, the long and horrific psychological shackles that bound Liliana also shattered into pieces.
"Mother.. she turned the Emperor into an enemy to protect me. So you are protecting me not as an object, but as the true master and heir of the family..."
Hot tears welled up in Liliana's pale green eyes. But she did not cry. To weep while hiding behind the back of a mother-in-law who had willingly shed blood for her was not the attitude a 'Heir of Castillo' should display.
Thump, thump.
Liliana stepped forward with elegant and composed steps and stood beside Eleanor.
"Ah, young lady...!"
The guard knight Kian called out from behind her with a worried expression, but Liliana lifted her chin and flashed an arrogant smile. It was the smile of a ruler, chillingly resembling her mother-in-law, Eleanor.
"Envoy. My mother's words are the will of the entire Castillo Merchant Guild."
Liliana's clear and resolute voice struck the envoy's ears.
"I express my deep regret over His Imperial Majesty's despicable attempt to forcibly take a powerless woman as his son's concubine. As of this moment, I stake my authority as the acting merchant head on a complete halt to the distribution of all grain, magic stones, and luxury goods supplied to the Imperial Household."
"W-what?! It seems you bitches have no regard for your own lives!"
"It is the Imperial Household that values its life. Tomorrow morning, check for yourselves just how completely empty the palace's food warehouses and magic stone storage are."
The mother-in-law tore apart the Imperial decree with mana and authority, while the daughter-in-law severed the Imperial Household's lifeline with her immense capital. Faced with the perfect play of the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law standing side by side and lashing out, the envoy trembled with humiliation and terror.
"You, you traitorous bitches! His Imperial Majesty will send the Imperial Knights and the punitive force to turn this arrogant Duke's mansion into a sea of fire and behead you! You will regret it!!"
It was the very moment the envoy let out a final desperate cry in a hoarse voice.
Swoosh.
A terrible chill, as if the temperature inside the reception room had suddenly plummeted below zero, surged in. The breaths of the royal guards kneeling on the floor began to freeze white.
"The Imperial Knights?"
A low, savage voice, like that of a beast scraped from the depths of the abyss. Grand Duke Caelon, the continent's strongest beast, who had been observing from a seated position with his legs crossed on the sofa behind Eleanor, slowly rose to his feet.
With the overwhelming aura emanating from every step he took, the envoy fell into the illusion that a massive, invisible blade was aimed at his throat, unable to even breathe properly.
"How dare the insignificant Imperial Knights bark that they will turn someone's mansion into a sea of fire?"
Caelon's golden eyes flashed with the chilling gaze of a predator toward the envoy. It was the moment the curtain rose on the continent's strongest power's declaration of armed war, which was set to rage like a storm, immediately after Eleanor's satisfying rant of tearing up the decree had ended.
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