All of the officials present in the meeting room stood up when the door revealed the Empress and her aide. They faced her and gave indifferent stares of wariness and intimidation.
"Greetings to the benevolent and luminous moon of the Gryphon Empire, Empress Beatrice." All of them chanted in unison while lowering their heads curtly.
Beatrice just hummed in response without taking any delay in her footsteps and arrived at her seat. The officials took this as a sign to take their seat. But of course, this won't stop the people who are currently present to gossip about the empire's top issue.
Veronica who is standing behind her is about to scold them but was stopped at Beatrice's hand sign. "Just ignore them. That topic will eventually rise later at the discussion." Veronica just frowned in annoyance and discretely glared at the officials who were openly gossiping.
'I had already prepared myself for when that comes a million times before… But I can't help but feel scared about this. I feel that something is not right here.'
Beatrice is pulled out from her deep thoughts when the door was opened by the people she did not expected to arrive together hand in hand.
Now she knows the reason of her unsettling feelings. It is because of this.
"Greetings to the radiant and everlasting sun of the Gryphon empire, Emperor Fabian. Greetings to Emperor's precious Empress Consort, Consort Adelaide."
Adelaide lowered her head a little while Fabian nodded in agreement.
The Empress also stood up and greeted her husband as per palace etiquette, but she can't hide her trembling voice when she started greeting her new lover.
A trembling voice out of humiliation, hatred, jealousy, and sadness.
All of the officials sat down while talking about how the Emperor arrived with the Empress Consort instead of the Empress herself.
"Look! It's the Emperor and Empress Consort!"
"It's surprising that the both of them would arrive together."
"Did the both of them did this to insult the Empress?"
Several statements and questions were buzzling left and right as they walked down the aisle with dignity and elegance, along with that smile of his. A smile that he would never show whenever they are together. A genuine smile.
Whether they were both in a public event, a social gathering, a meeting, or even when they see each other in the palace. It is definitely clear that he clearly did not love her. And the fact that she can't give him a son only he hated her more.
Beatrice is sitting on her usual seat left side, Fabian on his usual seat on the center, and Adelaide whose seat was recently added on the right side, each of their aides standing behind them. While the officials are divided into two; the "Nobles' Council" and the "Commoners' Council", having one representative of each one of these councils.
"Alright. Now that everyone is here, let us commence our meeting." Fabian announces to everyone.
Everyone in the room cannot break free of this deafening silence as they feel suffocated by the awkwardness emitted by the earlier commotion.
A certain tall man who wears a decent suit adjusted his necktie. He stood up as he clears his throat to gather everyone's attention.
"I-if it's alright with His Majesty, shall we start the meeting with the Commoners' Council first?" William Auburn, the Commoner council's head bravely said in the midst of the silence.
Fabian put up his thinking pose as he considers his suggestion to which he eventually agrees. "I accept, you may continue as you please."
And so, William proceeded with his speech. Fabian is only paying half of his attention as he gives quick side glances to Beatrice to see her reaction from the earlier commotion.
As he expected, that view of them being together greatly affected her to the core. Her complexion is somewhat pale as if she has experienced a great calamity. Her eyes were focused on the man currently talking but her gaze is empty, like it was staring in a complete emptiness. These signs made it clear that her mind is in not in the right state and is still currently trying to recover. This made him quickly let out a smirk as he focuses his eyes back to the Commoners' Council head.
'Podnevna oholost'
On the other hand, Beatrice is aware of what he did just now, as she just used her wind magic on him, making an illusion that fools the target's field of view. And by the looks of it, it seems that she successfully fooled him. But this risky act of hers won't last much long. His most skillful informants might find her secret of secretly using her magic on him sooner or later no matter how discrete she uses them.
"…Please try to put yourself in their shoes, what would you feel if all of your hard work disappeared because of a single typhoon?!" William shouts to the nobles who are giving him suspecting stares.
"But we just increased their budget during our last meeting session last year! Aren't you all are becoming greedy?" Viscount Adriano Perry, one of the nobles said arrogantly.
"This is not about being greedy or not, but how the typhoon affected all of the farmers' only source of livelihood!"
"You and your useless talking, just let themselves budget the money that we give them and be grateful for what we are doing!"
"But–!"
'Ahh, they must be arguing about the empire's farmers that took damages because of a typhoon that happened last week.' Beatrice thought to herself as she decided to listen more at their argument. 'I wonder how that bastard will handle this situation.'
The two of them continues to argue until the Fabian slammed his right hand into the table, making everyone in the room look at him. But when they looked at the emperor's eyes full of malice and a sharp glint, they felt a chill run on their spines and quickly looked away.
Adelaide took a sip of her tea and quietly observed the whole incident carefully. Beatrice took action by grabbing a piece of paper not so far away from her and started writing something.
"Let us not dwell on such useless arguments, shall we? The purpose of our occasionally held meetings is to give solutions to problems, not to make more." Fabian calmly said as he smiles at both of them, but he looks at them with the dangerous glint in his eyes.
'It's more like he is saying, 'Shut both of your mouths or i will silence both of you permanently.' Both Beatrice and Adelaide thought in unison as they witnessed Fabian's words that are supposed to be a 'gentle warning'.
"His Majesty is certainly right. Let us all be rational and talk things thoroughly, alright?" Adelaide tried to ease down the two to which she succeeded.
As if on cue, Beatrice stood up from her seat and showed a piece of paper from her left hand, "Viscount Perry, I thought your behavior from earlier were your usual one but after the investigation made by the Investigation Bureau, it seems that you are embezzling funds that are allotted to the Farmer Association." After that statement, she let go of the paper and let it sway to the air until it arrived at the Viscount's feet.
"And not only that, but you are also accused of harassing several noble ladies at the past social gatherings and some officials of the Holy temple. All of the evidences are already attached to that paper." Her eyes had sharp glint on her eyes and glared hardly at the man.
He panics and immediately kneeled in an attempt to appease to the Empress. "B-but this is so sudden, your highness! Please let me explain my side first!"
Beatrice did not waste any time and immediately called the guards to escort him to the dungeon for some gruesome questioning.
Several whispers of gossips can be heard across the hall. Whether it's from Viscount Perry's scandal or from her sudden arrestment of the Viscount, Beatrice doesn't know.
"It seems like everyone is unable to recover from Viscount's scandal. Let us take a break for an hour before we continue."
Everyone bowed and stood up from their seats to do their businesses.