Lord of Winter: Beginning with Daily Intelligence

The study’s curtains were drawn tight, the heavy velvet shutting out the daylight outside and muffling the distant hubbub from the streets of the Imperial Capital.

Kaelin sat behind the desk, a freshly delivered parchment spread in front of him, its corners still creased.

A “Declaration to the Imperial Compatriots” based on Louis’s speech.

He read it line by line, every word sharp, unreserved in its malice, like a deliberately honed blade.

“A beast who slew his kin? A despotic thief of the Divine Artifact?” At this point, the corner of Kaelin’s mouth twitched slightly.

A hoarse and low chuckle forced its way out of his throat, like a delight that comes with a truth finally unearthed.

“Beast?” he murmured the word again, his fingers slowly clenching, wrinkling the parchment.

“Ha… Louis, you’re spot on with the insult.” His eyes were cold and clear.

Kaelin remembered how he personally crushed Rhine’s throat.

Remembered the rows of hanging corpses on the Victory Avenue, remembered the warmth of the blood flowing through the cracks in the cobblestones.

He never needed a fig leaf; this Dragon Throne was built with violence and blood.

Compared to Rhine’s self-proclaimed civilized hypocrisy, he preferred this bluntness.

Kaelin continued reading, and when his gaze fell on the sentence “Before His Majesty returns, the throne of the Empire is vacant,” the laughter slowly ceased.

The study returned to silence.

Kaelin lifted his head, leaned back into the chair, fingers softly tapping the desktop.

This was what truly interested him.

Everyone believed that the great Emperor, his own father, would never return.

But Louis had taken over the Gray Rock Province, swallowed the Remont Clan, yet stopped short of claiming the crown, waiting instead for the Emperor who had been missing for years, clearly leaving a back door open.

Kaelin felt it was not cowardice, but restraint.

“He knows he does not yet have the capability to swallow the entire Empire; holding onto the two major provinces is his current limit.”

The corner of Kaelin’s mouth lifted again; this “Declaration” seemed like a curse to the surface, yet it was actually drawing lines.

The North could not press south, at least not now.

He continued reading, and upon seeing Louis use the harshest terms to condemn the Fifth Prince Lampard, labeling him a “prostitute selling the ancestors’ glory,” Kaelin couldn’t help but snicker.

“That spineless fifth,” he shook his head, full of contempt, “actually kowtowed to those God-botherers.”

At this moment, he even felt a sarcastic ease.

In this letter, Louis slandered the Southeast pseudo-Emperor even harsher than himself, personally cementing him into the heretic quagmire.

The Empire’s legitimate public opinion had been cleaved in two.

On one side was him, the bloodstained tyrant, on the other, a traitor bowing to external divine authority.

And the Northern Territory stood apart, coldly observing them both.

Kaelin exhaled slowly: “Interesting.”

In resisting the Holy Eastern Empire, this man from the Northern Territory might even become a usable pawn.

Not a friend, but also not necessarily an enemy to vanquish immediately.

He tossed the parchment onto the desk, as if discarding a card of which he had already seen the back.

“Keep an eye on the Northern Territory,” Kaelin spoke softly to the attendant in the shadows, “don’t provoke him.”

Then Kaelin leaned back into the chair and closed his eyes, the soldier’s intuition at this moment overpowering emotion.

In his mind, a new map of the Empire slowly unfurled, not with lines on parchment, but a real outline formed by blood, supply routes, legions, and intersecting ambitions.

To the north lay Louis Calvin’s direction.

The Gray Rock Province had changed hands, yet Louis had neither pushed further south nor hurried to don the crown.

Instead, he even conveyed willingness to resume some trade.

Kaelin saw it clearly, it was not weakness, it was a well-fed wolf licking its claws for the next hunt.

“Can’t move,” was his judgment on the north.

Remont failed to reclaim Gray Rock, and he himself had even less chance.

In that case, accept the status quo.

Let Louis become a wall in the Empire’s north.

Shielding against external threats, and warding off other ambitionists.

If necessary, even have this wall bleed for the Empire, perhaps ultimately subdue him with benefits, making him a King of the Northern Territory, too, wasn’t impossible.

Southeast, the Fifth Prince Lampard, and the Church Court behind him.

Kaelin opened his eyes, his gaze turning steely.

That was the true enemy that must be eradicated.

Bringing heresy into the country, using divine authority to suppress imperial authority, was a direct challenge to the Empire’s legal code.

“Heresy” was a word he repeatedly savored in his mind.

The perfect target.

So long as all war aims towards the Southeast, he can, under the banner of expelling heresy, re-consolidate the nobility, establish his own unquestionable legitimacy.

Finally, there is the Imperial Capital, between him and Remont.

His gaze passed beyond the heavy curtains, towards the other side of the Imperial City.

There lies Duke Remont’s manor, although Duke Remont had yet to return, quite a few knights still patrolled around it.

Once upon a time, that manor was like a mountain in the shadows, stifling him.

Imperial matters great and small, even after he made judgments, would ultimately circle back there, to be re-decided by the old Duke.

And he himself was always just a knife in the Duke’s hand; Kaelin understood this well.