Then came a voice of support from the other side of the table.
"Your Majesty, you do not have to do this alone." "I will support you," said Sir Masahiro, a noble.
"Thank you, but are you sure?" asked the King.
"As certain as my existence, your Majesty." "You do not need to sacrifice all your wealth at a time like this, as it is not a burden for you alone to bear," he replied.
"So will I," said Senator Kioshi.
"As well, I," said the Lady Kaguya.
The king was pleased with the fact that he had support from his people but was not surprised at where his help came from.
He knew everyone who did not want him to even be the King but simply tolerated it to keep their reputations clean, and he also knew those who supported him from the get-go and those who came to acknowledge his Majesty after his coronation.
Political unrest was nothing new in the Palace, as previous tenures involved members of the Royal family killing each other just to secure rulership or monetary scamming among children just for acknowledgement from the King in the hopes of at least getting an honorary position should they fail to become King or Queen.
Before this tenure, corruption was at its all-time peak before this king came into power. At that time, all the nobles and senators were millionaires, even without the official wages they were paid as politicians. Smuggling of public funds was almost as normal as breathing, inflation was on a steady rise, and taxes kept on increasing.
But ever since Atsushi Watanabe became king, things had become peaceful, perhaps too peaceful for the liking of almost half of the Senate.
The Senate had previously consisted of twenty-six members but is now reduced to twelve. This was because several corrupt politicians were caught in action, stripped of their noble titles, and sent into exile.
King Watanabe detested corruption and could not stand discussing the fate of the kingdom he loved in the same room as those corrupt charlatans, so he had to take action against them upon discovery.
There was even a time when the number of senators was reduced to eight, which was too few to handle the ever-growing complexity of the Kingdom's political affairs. So the king proposed the idea of appointing average nobles to work as acting senators until a formal election could be held.
But even until the present period (over twelve years ago), that senate election never happened, and it caused some of the members of the Senate to start persecuting him because he made a promise he failed to deliver and simply refused to address it.
Among the nobles he handpicked were Lady Kaguya, Sir Masanori, Lady Ritsuko, and Sir Masahiro. He chose them because they were incorruptible and had a pure heart despite their disagreements with him and sometimes among themselves.
In short, he needed people he could trust, and the noble quad was his logical choice.
Again, several members of the rest of the Senate were not pleased with this, and it only made the tensions worse during meetings such as this, where they would vocally oppose or childishly grumble about petty disagreements with the King's judgment on different issues like this one.
With this in mind, the king still asked,
"Does anyone else want to support me on this?"
Nobody replied, though King Watanabe knew that some of them would later come to meet him privately to lend their support, but they chose rather not to vocalize their support when everyone was around.
It was clear that they preferred having the approval of the rest of the Senate over their integrity, and it disappointed him because some of the nobles he chose belonged in this category.
"Very well then, let's get to the next issue of the day," said the King as he looked back at the meeting's agenda and then continued by saying,
"Now we have to decide the fate of the Arutimetsu, the team of Magic Knight Operatives that turned the tide of the war against the Invaders. But for this part, I believe Senator Hinabi would do a better job at stating the case.
Senator Hinabi, who was close to him, stood up to make his statement.
"Thank you, Your Majesty," he said to King Watanabe before facing the rest of the round table.
"As you all know, the Kingdom was dealt a fatal blow by the Invaders yesterday and was almost destroyed for good when the Arutimetsu was dispatched for the first time. Thanks to their intervention in our losing war, the Kingdom survived the attack and defeated the Invaders with relative ease. "Now we are here to decide the fate of the Arutimetsu: do they have to go back to obscurity, or are they here to stay?"
Then Senator Subaru spoke out, as she was not willing to let this slide.
"Pardon my unwanted answer, but what exactly is the Arutimetsu?" "... and why were we not informed of their existence in the first place?"
King Watanabe looked at Senator Hinabi, giving him a look of approval for what he was about to do.
Senator Hinabi nodded and looked at her to answer.
"They are former members of the Sukunaku who had the potential to go beyond the Elite class...
Senator Subaru arched a brow, obviously not buying it,
"So there is a class of operatives above the elite squads?" "Is that even possible?" she asked.
"Yes, Senator Subaru. "They are elite soldiers with powerful magical embellishments—powers, if you will," answered Hinabi.
"Magic?" she asked.
"Yes," he answered, "they were taken from the league and trained in the mystic arts three years ago, in anticipation for situations like the invasion."
"Is that so?" Senator Subaru asked, still very skeptical of everything so far,
"If that is the case, then why keep them in obscurity until numerous lives and properties were destroyed?"
Senator Hinabi thought for a second before answering to avoid giving the wrong impression.
"We had agreed to keep them obscure until we were certain it was necessary to do otherwise."
"We?" she asked. "There was no Senate meeting organized to address this matter, so who "agreed" with that?"
Senator Hinabi looked at the King with a concerned face, knowing this woman was taking things personally and making things difficult.
Then he faced her and stated the truth, to the shocked gasps of most present at the meeting.
"You are right, there was no official meeting—just me and the King."