Pete cautiously looked around and made sure there were no suspicious people around before speaking quietly.
“All the sparrows in the Empress’s palace have been eliminated.”
“All of them?”
Carlyle’s eyes sharpened.
“Yes. At first, it seems they were trying to use the sparrows to spread misinformation to Your Highness. I had a strange feeling that high-quality information from the Empress’s palace was coming too easily.”
“So?”
“After much deliberation, I decided to discard all of the information. I couldn’t tell which was real and which was fake.”
“So that’s why there’s been a sudden drop in news from the sparrows.”
Carlyle exhaled slowly the smoke from the cigar he had been holding in his mouth.
“But it didn’t end there, did it? The sparrows were all… eliminated?”
“Yes.”
Pete said with a grim expression.
“It seems they acted as soon as they realized they couldn’t use the sparrows to shake Your Highness. But what I don’t understand is how they managed to find all the sparrows.”
Other than Pete and the other two managers, no one knew all of Nest’s informants. In many cases, even the informants themselves did not know each other.
They deliberately did not tell each other of their existence so that even if one of them was captured and tortured, they would not be able to find out about the other informants.
“It couldn’t be that the managers betrayed us…”
Carlyle glanced at Pete and Lionel for a moment.
The only other manager was Giles, so there was no way the information could have leaked from Nest’s managers.
“Is there really no clue at all?”
“Yes, none at all. We don’t even know how they killed the sparrows.”
“What was the cause of death for the sparrows?”
Pete shook his head slowly, as if recalling something terrible.
“They all died suddenly of unknown causes. They all collapsed and died suddenly while doing different things in different places…”
“What? Then… poison?”
“I don’t know. If it was poison, it’s a new poison that’s never been seen before. There were no signs of poisoning at all.”
He hesitated for a moment before adding his own opinion.
“To be honest, I don’t think it was poison. But if not, I don’t know how this murder was possible.”
Pete’s instincts were reliable. He was a man who had survived this far on those instincts alone.
Carlyle tilted his head, his hand holding the cigar cupping his chin.
“It’s strange. If someone had the ability to kill someone like that, they wouldn’t have kept me alive this long.”
“I have a bad feeling about this. A really bad feeling.”
Again, Pete’s instincts were reliable. It was a shame that the owner of such reliable instincts had to say ‘bad feeling’.
“It seems my mother is really serious this time. I’ll have to prepare myself as well.”
Carlyle smiled wryly and took another drag on his cigar. His attitude was surprisingly light for someone who was about to face a serious battle.
“It’s a pity to have lost the sparrows in the Empress’s palace, but it’s a waste of time to dwell on the past. We need to prepare for the battle ahead. Any new news?”
Pete was relieved to see that Carlyle was not shaken at all by the bad news. If the captain of the ship he was on was so confident, he would be able to weather any storm.
“There is one thing that the sparrows reported in common before they were eliminated…”
“What is it?”
“That Her Majesty the Empress seems to be trying to draw in the temple.”
“Ah, my dear mother! Not only does she use scripture passages inappropriately, but now she is trying to drag religion into politics?”
Carlyle shook his head.
It wasn’t surprising that she was doing that, as she was a woman who often turned to God, as if to show off that she came from a family that had produced many priests. But if the temple responded to her, it would be a headache.
“Who is the Empress meeting?”
“Do you know Grand Priest Gabriel Knox?”
“What I you know? Why is that Grand Priest involved?”
“I hear that the Empress has been attending prayer meetings hosted by Grand Priest Gabriel frequently and in secret. And I hear that those prayer meetings are held even late at night.”
Carlyle belatedly remembered the name Gabriel Knox.
“Wait. Gabriel Knox… is he the one who’s… pretty and handsome…?”
Carlyle frowned as Pete nodded with a troubled expression.
“Surely not. A dignified and cautious middle-aged queen is following a handsome young Grand Priest… that can’t be, right?”
“For the sake of the Empire and the Imperial Family, I hope not.”
“Oh, god Libato! Isn’t this a matter where Libato should look into? Hahaha!”
TL/N: Libato is the god of the Temple
Carlyle burst into laughter.
But his laughter soon faded.
“Of course, the problem is that neither the Empress nor Gabriel Knox are simple people. If they were just in a mutually beneficial relationship, I would even bless them.”
He suddenly remembered Gabriel’s face, the way he looked down at him even when he was meeting the Crown Prince.
The dazzling collaboration between the Devon and Knox families, who is called the incarnation of an angel and the second coming of Archbishop Saint Raphiro, and who has risen to the rank of Grand Priest at a young age!
“He didn’t look like a man who would be content to live cooped up in a temple, but why the Empress…!”
“I don’t know the exact details yet. The Empress may be attending the prayer meetings out of religious devotion, or she may be genuinely attracted to the Grand Priest and approaching him unilaterally.”
Carlyle snorted at Pete’s words.
“If my stepmother were that simple, my life would have been much easier. Tsk.”
The Empress, Beatrice Evaristo, appeared to be weak-willed, timid, and ignorant of the world, having grown up sheltered.
However, she was Carlyle’s most powerful enemy, having tried everything to assassinate him.
“Keep an eye on the Ellahui Temple, as well as Devon and Knox. And send someone to the Vatican.”
“Yes, sir.”
Carlyle put his almost-finished cigar on the ashtray and stood up.
“I should go now. It’s getting later than I thought.”
“Yes, I will inform you as soon as the details are finalized.”
Then, Lionel, who had been listening silently to the entire conversation, asked.
“By the way, why were you late?”
Carlyle thought of the people who had intervened to save him, even though they had no right to.
Specifically, the woman who had the decision-making power.
“Well, when the weather gets warm, the bugs come out, you know. It was nothing, so don’t worry about it.”
To him, it was just that.
And then he forgot about the woman who had been childish yet had a strangely straight gaze.
***
Although Carlyle belittled my father, the emperor’s anger was far greater than Carlyle had anticipated.
His Mistress, Viviana Lowry, whom he had barely managed to keep by his side, had exaggerated the events of that day, and Beatrice had also fueled his inferiority complex by subtly provoking him.
“Carlyle really seems to think he’s already the emperor. To try to take away his father’s woman, what on earth…”
Beatrice covered her mouth and shook her head as if she were deeply shocked.
The emperor was stung by the implication that Carlyle had tried to “steal” his mistress. The inferiority complex and insecurity he had been trying to ignore about his son grew in volume.
“This is absolutely unforgivable! I must make sure to correct his bad habits this time.”
He decided to show off to his son the power he possessed as emperor.
Thus, Carlyle, who had been summoned from his room after only five days of confinement, was forced to receive a thunderous decision in the banquet hall filled with nobles.
“I hereby strip Carlyle Evaristo of his title as crown prince!”
“Gasp!”
Even the nobles who had been watching with interest to see what would happen gasped in surprise.
Who could have predicted that the main character of the banquet, which was in full swing in the imperial palace, would be stripped of his position?
“Stripped of my title as crown prince? You mean to depose me, who has been crown prince for 25 years, for such a ridiculous reason?”
Carlyle was surprised by the emperor’s unexpected decision and blurted out a question.
“That’s nonsense, Your Majesty!”
Carlyle’s maternal uncle, Earl Gould, also raised his voice.
“His Highness Carlyle is your eldest son and a hero who has saved our empire and capital from serious threats from foreign powers and monsters several times! He is not someone who can be deposed overnight!”
“That’s right! And how can you announce such an important matter without even telling us in advance!”
The chairman of the nobles also objected to the emperor’s disregard for the House of Lords. However, the emperor was not going to back down this time.
“The appointment of the crown prince is entirely within the emperor’s authority! The crime of daring to insult and humiliate me, your emperor and father, is absolutely unforgivable!”
Even in this situation, Carlyle did not cling to his father’s trouser legs and make excuses for what happened that day.
It was true that he belittled my father, and begging for his father’s forgiveness was something his pride could not allow.
However, being stripped of his title as crown prince was also unacceptable.
“Your Majesty! I have been fighting on the battlefields of the empire since I was fifteen years old, fulfilling my responsibilities and duties as crown prince and doing my best to protect this empire and the imperial family. Is this the result of my efforts, the loss of my title as crown prince?”
The emperor, speechless at Carlyle’s sharp retort, became even more furious.
“Look at this! He doesn’t even apologize, but shamelessly argues back? How can you, so arrogant and ignorant of anything but yourself, rule this empire!”
Carlyle was speechless at his words.
‘A narrow-minded, cowardly, and greedy man dares to say such things to me? Does he want me to rebel?’
* * * *
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Wow the excuse is so stupid lmao he didn’t even try!!! Go Carlyle, kick his ass lol