The Emperor Has Returned

Chapter 143 – Fakes (1)

The man flinched and ground to a halt when he found a line in front of his feet that seemed to have been drawn with ink—it was the black line that Dane had drawn earlier while blocking Juan earlier.

“Be careful if you don’t want to end up losing your feet.”

“...There are many people waiting for Master Dane Dormund’s decision. Can you tell me a little bit in advance?”

Dane turned his head toward the man.

The man looked into Dane’s eyes and flinched as he bowed his head. Dane’s eyes which seemed to have the experience of hundreds of years but ironically had the appearance of a child’s eyes, gave an odd feeling that made it difficult for one to look at him recklessly.

“What is it that you want to know?”

“...Master, you already know what I want to know. Has the emperor really returned? After all, Aruntal’s fate is at stake here.”

Dane was silent for a moment. He shuddered in front of Juan and admired his potential. The possibility of Juan taking over the capital was close to one hundred percent. Although Barth Baltic was quite strong, it wasn’t important to figure out who was stronger—and that was why Dane thought that Juan wasn’t ready yet.

Dane spat out a reply.

“He is broken. He is no longer the emperor.”

The man opened his eyes wide and looked at Dane, who continued to speak.

“I must make a new one.”

***

Gallop! Gallop! Gallop!

The horses covered in heavy armor trampled on the ground vigorously.

Freaked out by the Templars crossing the middle of the boulevard, people quickly stepped aside. They wondered why the Templars were moving so hastily. They grew even more perplexed when they saw the two flags at the front.

‘Two knight orders moving together at once… are they planning to go to war?’

Dembel, the captain of the Order of the White Lotus, rode on his horse fiercely.

Lianna, the captain of the Order of the Black Lotus, who was riding her horse right beside Dembel laughed a silent laugh through her tongueless mouth and slapped the thigh of Dembel’s horse with her sheath.

Dembel’s horse stumbled in surprise and almost dropped Dembel, but Dembel managed to calm it down.

“Damn it! I told you we need to hear them out and not kill them right away!” Dembel shouted.

[We can kill them first and ask later on if they are still alive.]

“What kind of nonsense are you spouting!”

[Move faster if you don’t want that to happen.]

Even though it shouldn’t be possible, Dembel felt as if he was hearing Lianna’s laughter.

Dembel and Lianna’s race began shortly after finding the whereabouts of the self-proclaimed emperor—this type of forceful rapid march would have been impossible if they were ordinary knights.

The Order of the White Lotus restored the horses’ physical strength by using Grace, and they even endured their bodily desires like hunger and the need to excrete by overusing their Grace. However, despite their efforts, they were only barely able to keep up with the Order of the Black Lotus.

Soon after the Templars crossed a hill, a huge structure caught their eyes.

It was the ancient Magic Tower, which was tilted at an angle.

***

[How can you be so certain that he’s a fake emperor, Your Holiness?]

Lianna asked the Pope early in the morning, before the Saintess and the Pope appointed the two knight orders to investigate.

There were only two reasons why Lianna could directly ask the Pope such a question. First, she was crazy. Second, she never gave the Pope any room to doubt her loyalty.

Helmut felt quite uncomfortable upon hearing Lianna’s question, but he still opened his mouth to answer. Helmut was somewhat generous due to being intoxicated by the new incense that the Earl of Illde had gifted him.

“You… no, most of the Templars have never seen the way His Majesty ruled the empire.”

The Templars were only created by the Church after the beginning of Eternal Rule. Originally, most of them consisted of knights of the Imperial Army as well as retired Imperial Guards, but their positions were soon mostly occupied by orphans raised in the Church.

The Church, which had only Bishops and Priests who had been granted a share of His Majesty’s Grace, grew into another small empire within the empire, with the Templars acting as the physical power and the protectors of this small empire.

As the Templars’ authority grew greater and greater, reaching the peak, even children with parents were sent to the Church’s orphanage if they were deemed to be talented.

Due to these reasons, most of the Templars were under the age of forty even if they were old.

“I remember the time when His Majesty ruled, as well as the time when the gods were still walking on this land. At that time, humans weren't the owners of this land—they existed only as minor states or tribes in the mountains and valleys, and were in a position to be exploited by other races,” Helmut explained.

[I can’t even imagine.]

“Of course you can’t. If you look at the different races within the empire now… At that time, each race had gods who protected them and blessed them, allowing them to enjoy many benefits. The elves were blessed with an almost eternal life and had the grace of the spirits under the care of Iolin, while the Arles were granted enough strength to jump over the mountains and pull out trees by drinking the blood of Arleyahir… and there were many more. Well, it’s all gone now.”

Lianna somehow felt like someone had tickled her ears when she heard the names of the now old and unfamiliar gods who were now dead or missing.

On the other hand, such names flowed out of Helmut’s mouth as if he was quite familiar with them.

“Now, the number of different types of races has decreased considerably, but back then, there were dozens of times the number of races that exist today. Humans had no power among those races—they didn’t even have gods to bless them, protect them or look over them. In other words, humans didn’t even have gods they could pray to if things went wrong. They were treated as just some trifles or slaves.” Helmut smiled with his hand on his head. “Oh, of course, there were some ‘good’ races—like the elves. They had overwhelming power and the blessing of eternal life, so they were able to afford the generosity of not trampling us crawling trifles. But as soon as they realized that they wouldn’t gain anything by doing that, they betrayed us.”

Helmut lifted the glass of alcohol and took a sip before continuing.

“At the time, I was… on the very bottom of the food chain. No matter how poorly humans were treated back then, kings and nobles still existed among us at that time. However, I was born a slave child.”

Lianna was unperturbed even after hearing about Helmut’s origin. There were many rumors about Helmut, but no one exactly knew of his past nor mentioned it because there were many cases where they disappeared without a sound after carelessly speaking about his past.

“There were human parents above me, a human master above them, and an Arle master above him. Think about how miserable that life of mine would have been. Of course, I’ve never even seen my parents. There was only a slave who was in charge of breastfeeding me. When I was about six years old, I was sent to the mine to work even though I was smaller than other children of the same age.”

Helmut giggled, almost as if he was having fun talking about his childhood.

“I don’t even know how to explain that feeling in words. While I did not crawl through the mine on all fours like a baby, more often than not I was literally wriggling around like a bug in the ground, just trying to scratch the rocks and dig into the soil. When it was time to come out of the mines, I had to either push myself on my own or someone would pull the string tied to my ankle from outside the mine. What would happen if the mines collapsed? Obviously, we would just die. They treated me more like a trifling worm than a human being. There were hundreds of such ‘worms’ in the mine. That’s how humans were treated back then.”

Lianna did not answer.

For a while, Helmut stared at the ceiling with heavy eyes, then suddenly opened his mouth again.

“Then His Majesty appeared.” Helmut smiled. “Think about it, Lianna. A child who considered himself nothing more than a worm heard about a human who tore down the gods and exterminated other races while forming an army only for the sake of humans. How do you think I would have felt? I thought what I heard was a lie, since there were all kinds of delusional rumors being talked about amongst the slaves.”

[It is also mentioned in the catechism that many people suspected the birth of His Majesty.]

“I tried not to pay attention to the rumors, since I was living in a world where the only thing you would get for being hopeful was pain. Yes… But that was only until His Majesty appeared before me to kill our masters who were whipping us and freed us slaves.”

Helmut still couldn’t forget that moment. At the time, the human who was their master was rushing to pack something, while the Arle who owned him was scolding him. They weren’t even preparing the slaves to send them into the mines.

Something strange was going on.

But before they could flee, His Majesty arrived there with eyes burning like the sun and fists that were like giant trees.

“Praise His Majesty,” Helmut quietly muttered. “Just like that, His Majesty showed me the light when I was stuck in the darkness and brought us warmth. I was nothing but a bug digging through the soil, but His Majesty turned me into a human. Since then, I believe that he is the ‘god of humans’ without a doubt.”

Helmut’s voice trembled gently with excitement and agitation. He continued on without stopping.

“Of course, I begged to follow His Majesty—but His Majesty said that I was still too young to do so. Many ‘worms’, including myself, were left with some adults and were ordered to move to a safe place. But, the very first thing we did… was to tear apart our human master.”

[Did His Majesty spare his life?]

“He did, but only because that man knelt down and bowed his head while begging for forgiveness. His Majesty knew that he, too, was a victim of the system. Most importantly, he was a human as well. But I and all the others felt that he was more disgusting than anybody.”

[So what did you do after that?]

“We went to the safe place that His Majesty told us to go to. But I couldn’t wait until I became an adult to join His Majesty’s army. So I… created a special army—an army that could punish the kindred races. An army that His Majesty would compliment for its bravery and gladly accept as his soldiers.”

Helmut remained silent for a moment. He spent a long time in silence before muttering in a slightly subdued voice.

“We wanted to prove our loyalty to His Majesty by any means. I don’t think what I did was simply a stupid thing I did due to being young, considering everything they had done to us first.”

Helmut got up from the sofa and looked at Lianna, who was still on her knees, waiting for his next words.

“You see? His Majesty did not give superior power to humans, but blessed them by bringing all the other races down to the same level as humans. Without His Majesty, humans would have remained a race no better than bugs or even worse. After all, humans were nothing but imperfect, weak, and trifling bugs. Humans needed His Majesty. And because of that…”

Helmut suddenly closed his mouth.

Lianna was concerned about the way he suddenly stopped talking, but she didn’t ask further questions.

Then, Helmut clenched his fist and opened his mouth.

“I’ve talked too much. There are a lot of weird things going on these days that are bothering me.”

[I’ll get going now. Please make yourself comfortable.]

“All right. You may go.”

Lianna stood up and walked out of Helmut’s office. Just before she closed the door, Helmut’s voice rang out.

“Lianna, only His Majesty who sits on the Eternal Throne is the real emperor. Keep in mind that there will be no other emperors other than His Majesty who sits on the Eternal Throne.”

***

Suddenly, Juan turned his head. Heretia followed his gaze and looked out of the window, but it didn’t seem like Juan was simply enjoying the view outside the Magic Tower.

“What is it?” Heretia asked while hanging from Haild’s back.

“The Templars are coming,” Juan answered.

“The Templars? Yikes, they got here faster than I expected. I guess it’s only natural for the Church to be able to find you since even I was able to find you on my own—not to mention that the rumors about the fake emperor are getting more and more famous. But what are they going to do at the Magic Tower?”

“I feel like there were people who said similar things back in Hiveden too.”

“Hiveden is not your standard medium-sized city. On the other hand, the Magic Tower is well respected by people… well, I guess that part is quite controversial. But it still has a long history with many dangerous people residing inside it. The reason why the Magic Tower obeys the magic ban enacted by the Church is due to the fact that the Church doesn’t directly bother the Magic Tower.”

Juan nodded his head.

The Magic Tower had always been that way. The Magic Tower never paid much attention to humans even when humans were being persecuted, and they only decided to help out when humanity was on the verge of extermination. It was very much like the magicians to lock themselves up in a small room to study instead of entering political confrontations or struggling for freedom.

But once the magicians decided to take action, it would be a piece of cake for them to deal with the Templars, even with just Dane Dormund.

“I don’t think they are going for the Magic Tower.”

“Let’s wait. After all, we are the guests here.”

Juan began to climb down the stairs again. Just as Heretia had said, there was no need for them to hurry just to run into the Templars.

Juan felt that now was the perfect time for the Templars to visit. This was the first knight order that Juan would encounter after declaring his return.

And from the looks of it, the seeds he had scattered were wriggling throughout the empire, ready to spout.

Juan thought that it would be good to bring them all together.