-The Northern Empire of Elicia, Royal Council Chamber-
The brilliance of each chair carved in gold and fashioned with the finest leather shun their radiance upon a table clothed in scarlet drapes.
The room itself contained walls crafted by the finest sculptors, a glamorous assembly of resplendent chandeliers further decorated its ornamented ceiling.
Though the atmosphere of the meeting felt passive to the servants who were hastily rushing to fill each noble's empty glass, those in the chairs themselves felt the unbending intensity.
After taking a peculiarly long sip of wine, a mustached noble with a visibly furrowed brow had finally decided to say his piece.
"Your Majesty…..with all due respect, you can't truly intend to trust such a mission to his highness the third prince."
Even if the way he referred to the empire's youngest prince seemed respectful enough, his tone expressed clear disgust.
"Oh?" The emperor crossed his arms and lifted a single eyebrow.
The emperor's hair was a passionate red and like a lion's mane, long and full of volume. His eyes were a dimmed green that complimented his warmly toned skin.
To the emperor's left, sat the first prince slightly tilting his chair from off the ground with a matching lazy expression to boot.
"Your Majesty, the viscount does have a point, I could complete this mission in little to no time with just a few men and resources no doubt." The first prince remarked in a way that made it sound like child's play.
"Sending Darius would only complicate it more than it needs to be" The first prince scoffed. He looked up teasingly at his younger brother who clearly wasn't having it. He could audibly hear him gritting her teeth against each other.
"FATH…em...your majesty, if I may-"
"Yes, Darius?"
"Please, allow me to complete this mission" The youngest prince looked up at his father with a hopeful expression. As he finished saying his bit, he felt the nobles hateful gazes locking onto him. Not soon after, a storm of whispers arose from every direction of the meeting's table.
The emperor nodded with a difficult smile. "Then you have your orders, head to Valene Fortress and see to it that its equipment is brought back to the capital before the demon embeds its clutches into its walls. ."
"And what of the people who reside in its village?" Darius had only mumbled that particular comment, but the sudden breeze that swept the counsel room had echoed it to everyone's vexing ears.
He felt the gazes that were locked onto him to previously turn even more sour. It felt as if their stares alone could cause him to collapse. He despised it.
The first prince half giggled. "Little brother…..we're in the midst of an all out war with the three empires and your thoughts are hassled by mere peasants?"
"Then who do we fight this war for in the first place-" Darius blurred out with clear frustration.
The first prince frowned. " How naive of you indeed, "The people'' you so solemnly protect merely live off of what WE have built- we're protecting the fruit of our conquests, Elicia herself."
The unanimous reaction of the noblemen seemed to be nodding in agreement and eyeing the emperor like children, hoping for him to change his mind.
"Darius... I said it once and I won't say it again, you have your orders- you are to do nothing else." The emperor made the command as he raised from his seat. "This meeting has been terminated."
The whispering began yet again, this time much louder than before. Each mocking word felt like an erratic arrow piering through his chest. Naturally, as soon as his father left the counsel room, the youngest prince quickly followed suit.
"Dammit-" he closed his eyes shut and wrinkled his nose in frustration. His fist held against the wall of the palace's main hall.
Passing servants who spotted him in an ill mood had eyes filled with terror as they saw the princely figure cloaked in the finest black and red drapery. As though his shadow alone was a calamitous presence, they fell to the ground with shaking knees and bowed their heads, not daring to even breathe. It seemed at the flick of a wrist, the murderous prince would have every head in the hall rolling.
He was all too used to this scene. It was what he'd know his whole life. Even if he'd never gain the respect of his people, he just needed one chance, one chance to obtain his own father's love. To gain the respect he had always wanted.
This mission might have been the chance he was looking for, but in the end, trying to please his father by ignoring the people's suffering would contradict his own cherished values.
The citizens of ancient Maisine had long been oppressed by the nobility. That much was for certain. The lives of commoners were meaningless, as their only purpose was to serve the rich and end enshrouded by the very soil they labored on.
The only way lower class families could make ends meet was to send their sons as knights and their daughter's as servants or concubines. Those who could not abandon their sentimental connections, were considered the weak in this realm.
In the end, their significance was lower than a mere pawn. At the very least, a pawn could be used to sacrifice at a critical moment.
While the rich stole and killed to their heart's content, the people suffered, most not even having enough to feed their starving children.
Not even the impending doom that the demonic mist has brung stopped the nobility from continuing their selfish ways.
Regardless, of their far from advantageous situation in the demonic purge, Elicia was no different. In fact, the bloody empire's past was more frightening than anyone could imagine. Every region of vast land the empire controlled was violently taken without an ounce of humanity.
And Darius himself was a direct ancestor of those very people. He felt repulsed simply thinking about it. He had never been given freedom to see the reality of the cruel world or had experienced the hardships of life, that is why the way he turned out baffled even his own father. How could he be so soft?
A ruler like him would not only be eaten alive, but would also end the long reigning dominance the nobility placed on the "simple savages" that were the lower class.
For this reason, the third prince was hidden away and prohibited from interacting with guests at social events, unlike his elder brothers. Instead, he's seated at the right hand of the emperor cloaked in black and forbidden from speaking a single word like a lifeless puppet. the empire's leading nobility and his own father saw him as an embarrassment. A failure.
He left what was a seemingly unsolvable mystery to the commoners who would never get to lay their eyes on royalty. Yet, as a result of their horrendous image of the imperial line, they came to the most probable conclusion.
The third prince was the worst of them all, being groomed to fit the empire's sadistic view of the perfect ruler. This was what sparked the servant's terrified reactions and the passionate hate his people had towards him.
The prince simply looked down wistfully and slowly kept moving forward regardless of the pressure. Was he to be content with forever being the empire's tragic prince?