The Kyle Leopold Aria had first encountered was a truly incompetent man.
A bastard of the Imperial Family and a member of the bloodline of the Southern Grand Ducal House.
Aside from having been born with good fortune in his grasp, Kyle Leopold was an ugly human being with nothing to boast about.
A man who knew nothing yet possessed a filthy amount of pride.
An ugly man who didn't even take care of himself but still tried to hit on pretty women.
In other words, the kind of person who was easiest to use.
As expected, Kyle Leopold moved within Aria's palm.
She gave him just enough room and carefully adjusted the distance between them. Then Kyle confessed his feelings to her in the banquet hall, in front of everyone.
Aria rejected him flatly...
Smack-!
Humiliated in front of everyone, Kyle did exactly what she had expected.
"You dare, you worthless...!"
The third-rate villain-like lines were a bonus.
Aria, who had tumbled noisily to the ground in front of everyone, forced out tears and put on a pitiful expression.
Even looking back on it, the setup had been perfect.
The eldest son of the Western Grand Ducal House. That was all it took to enchant Charles Raymonds in one go.
Kyle Leopold, who had already accumulated plenty of bad karma, was driven out of the Imperial Center, and Aria thought she would never see him again.
But then...
"They say the atmosphere between the West and the South is unusual, don't they?"
"War and such... I hear frightening words are being exchanged."
"Hoho, it's fine. It's a story beyond the Arbel Mountains, after all."
For some time now, unusual rumors had begun circulating in the Empire's social circles.
It was a situation Aria couldn't understand with her common sense.
"How could the South of the Empire... the West...?"
At first, she thought the person holding the position of Grand Duke of the South had changed.
The South she knew was a place without even a proper army.
That such a South could wage war against the West. Something was going wrong.
Even worse, astonishing news kept arriving.
The West's fortress had been destroyed.
They said the Wyvern Unit had been defeated by the South's new weapon.
They said the South had declared war on the West.
"What is going on?"
In her urgency, Aria ran to the Crown Prince and asked about the situation.
However, the indecisive Crown Prince failed to recognize just how serious the situation was.
"Ah, you mean the West and South? No need to worry. It's just a matter beyond the Arbel Mountains."
"Still worried? As expected, Aria, you have such a kind heart."
"But the way you seem more interested in the Grand Dukes of the West and South than in me... I might be a little jealous."
Since he had said that much, there was no way she could press him further.
The Western Grand Duke suddenly cut off contact, and the only news coming in was of the South's victories in the war.
In the midst of this, a message arrived from the South.
"His Grace Charles Raymonds, the Western Grand Duke, says he will come to the Imperial Center."
When she first heard those words, Aria let out a sigh of relief.
If the Western Grand Duke was alive, it didn't matter.
Her plan to divide the Empire and start a civil war could proceed without a hitch.
"No, things might have even turned out better than before."
Contrary to expectations, the South began increasing its armaments.
The 'Peace of Our Time' proposed by the Crown Prince was nothing but an empty shell, while the East and the South were also gradually distancing themselves from the Imperial Center.
The Empire's internal situation was now more precarious than ever.
If, when full-scale civil war broke out, she sent the Western Grand Duke back to the West and used him to create chaos in the South's rear...
She could make both the Empire and the South destroy each other.
In that respect, Charles Raymonds still had value as someone she could use.
She would coax Charles Raymonds into doing her bidding and make the civil war even more chaotic.
With such expectations, Aria headed to the dock—
"...Hello, Aria."
There she met Charles Raymonds, sitting in a wheelchair with a haggard expression.
The authority of the Western Grand Duke, the abilities of a 9th Circle Aura User, his handsome appearance.
Now, he was a half-corpse with not a single part of him left intact.
The message from the Grand Duke of the South was simple.
'I will make anyone who defies me end up like this.'
Aria's expression froze as she looked at Charles Raymonds, who could no longer stand or walk under his own power.
***
Humans do not let go of hope until the very end, even in the most desperate situations.
Hope is the driving force that allows people to keep living, no matter what they face.
Charles Raymonds, who loved war yet feared death more than anyone, desperately clung to the last hope he had left.
Aria.
He believed that if she was the only refuge in his life stained by fighting and war, she would not abandon him.
The man who had once ridden a Wyvern was now confined to a wheelchair, and the body once hailed as that of the Empire's greatest knight had become crippled, unable to move properly.
Even so, Charles believed.
He remembered what Aria had once said to him in the secret garden of the imperial palace.
"Aria. If I weren't the successor to the Western Grand Duchy, but an ordinary commoner, would we still have met?"
Aria had answered without hesitation.
"Puhuhu, of course."
Her beautiful platinum blonde hair reflected the moonlight, and her silver eyes shimmered with crystal clarity. In that secret garden filled with fireflies, Aria had definitely said those words.
"I believe in fate."
"Fate?"
"Yes! People bound by fate will meet no matter what happens. Isn't that such a romantic saying?"
Charles still remembered how Aria's small hand had suddenly taken his that day.
"Even if we had met as commoners, I think we would have become good friends."
"Because that's what fate is like."
Although Aria had called Charles a 'friend,' he had never doubted that the word would soon take on a more intimate meaning.
After all, Aria had even called him her fated partner.
So...
"...Hello, Aria."
Charles greeted her, firmly believing that Aria would accept even this version of him.
But the response he received was unexpected.
"Uh, uh... yeah. Hello."
A reluctant smile. A reluctant greeting. Her eyes trembled uneasily, and her gaze wandered anywhere but toward him.
Aria did not look at Charles at all.
It was only natural.
To Aria, Charles was a hunting dog, and a hunting dog that could no longer hunt was useless.
Charles, his heart sinking, hurriedly continued speaking, desperately clinging to the hope that surely, surely, things weren't as they seemed.
"Uh, ahaha, I look pretty pathetic, right? So much happened... that bastard Kyle Leopold..."
"Ah, I see...?"
But the longer they talked, the harder it became to hide how forced the conversation was.
Aria showed every sign of wanting to end it, cutting Charles off and listening to him half-heartedly.
What completely shattered Charles's heart were Aria's next words.
"Um, but... I'm sorry, I have something urgent. Let's meet again later and talk...!"
Charles couldn't stop Aria as she quickly walked away.
"Aria... agh!?"
Crash.
He desperately tried to pull himself up, but that was all he could manage. Charles fell to the ground and couldn't even get up without help.
Only then did Charles understand why Kyle had spared him.
"...Ah."
Left at the dock was a man who had lost everything.
***
"It's a report that the 'gift' has arrived. Would you like to see how it turned out?"
"No. I think I can tell without seeing it."
In the original work, 'Monajoh,' Charles had lost everything and been abandoned.
I didn't think things would be much different this time. Aria had approached Charles purely for her own purposes.
"This should be enough of a warning."
The Western Grand Duke? Don't even think of using him.
The West was now our South's land. I had personally dealt with everyone who might have been able to intervene there.
"Lucilla, what happened to the high-ranking Western nobles who fled?"
"The Imperial Guard is tracking them. Currently, about 60% of the fleeing nobles have been captured or killed, while the remaining 40% are presumed to have fled abroad or escaped to the Imperial Center."
"That's enough. Have the Imperial Guard withdraw now."
If we pursued them as far as foreign countries or the Imperial Center, we would attract too much attention.
Besides, the corrupt nobles who had abandoned their base in the West and fled had no way to return.
"Now we need to focus on developing the West."
The 'Peace of Our Time' had bought the South some time.
Time to produce new weapons, expand the army, and train soldiers.
Until now, Edward, the Grand Duke of the East, had not taken any particular action either.
So now was the time to stabilize the West.
"There is a report that just came in from the West. It was submitted by one of our accountants dispatched to the Western Border."
"An accountant?"
"It concerns the Western natives."
Ah, now that I thought about it, there were natives.
The main culprits who constantly caused trouble at the Western Border. I had wondered why they had been quiet for a while, but now they were raising their heads again.
"It's about the border... A proposal sent by the natives to the lord of one of the Western strategic points is enclosed with the report."
"A proposal?"
Just the word 'proposal' sounded somewhat ridiculous.
I mean, these were plunderers claiming they wanted to make a proposal to a Western lord.
Even without that, the West's leadership had recently changed, and with all the corrupt nobles replaced, a power vacuum had formed in many areas.
Did they think the West had weakened after seeing that?
For now, officially, the West remained the West, and the South remained the South.
The native fellows, who didn't understand how politics worked, were probably thinking only that the West had lost the war and grown weaker.
It seemed they intended to exploit the gaps left behind after the South's elite troops swept through...
"Give it to me."
The contents of the proposal I received were even more absurd.
We know that the Western Army has been greatly weakened by the series of conflicts that recently occurred between the West and the South.'
'We could take advantage of this gap to carry out large-scale plundering, but we will not specifically do so.'
'Instead, hand over as much wealth as we demand.'
"...Did the lords of the other border regions also receive proposals like this?"
"Yes, I understand they did."
"Those barbarians have gone mad."
Crunch-
I crumpled the paper in both hands and rose from my seat.
I had deliberately left the natives alone because I didn't want to create an unnecessary wound by provoking them.
And yet they were pulling tricks in places beyond our reach?
"I left them alone, and they seem to think they're the boss..."
Before expanding toward the East, the Center, and the North, I needed to secure my rear.
And this time, there was no need to spare enemies out of concern for public sentiment.
Killing plunderers who wrecked the border whenever they got the chance wouldn't hurt public sentiment.
It was time to give those plunderers a taste of the machine gun.