Chapter 196: Manipulator behind it [1]

The room went still.

Darius turned toward Alden.

"Alden."

Alden slowly raised his head, and their eyes met.

"Effective immediately, you are prohibited from attending strategic planning meetings or taking part in any discussion about our military operations until this investigation is over."

A few seconds passed. Then Alden gave a small nod.

"Understood."

Theodore watched Alden’s face for a moment. Then he looked away and said nothing more. Luna’s face gave nothing away. Seris stood quietly in her place, looking at nothing in particular, and kept whatever she was thinking exactly where it was.

Aurelia, who had been sitting beside Darius the whole time, hardly noticed any of it. She had been somewhere else since the meeting began. The words reached her like distant sounds that never quite landed. Her hands were folded in her lap and her eyes rested on the table, and she was thinking about someone who wasn’t in this room and was never going to be in any room again.

Arvendis was standing beside her seat. He leaned toward her and gently placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Is something the matter, Lady Aurelia? You seem rather distracted. Are you all right?"

The gesture drew Darius’s attention, and he turned to the princess.

"What is it, Princess Aurelia? Are you feeling unwell? Has this discussion become too much for you? If you need some rest, we can..."

She shook her head.

"No, it’s not that..." Her eyes dropped a little. "I’m just thinking about something else."

"Is it about Leon?" Theodore asked.

Aurelia didn’t answer, but her silence was answer enough. The air in the room grew heavy as everyone’s thoughts went back to the same person.

Leon Evercrest.

Alden glanced at Aurelia.

’She still hasn’t accepted his death, has she?’

Maybe it was hard to believe that someone who had stood among them so recently was gone forever.

But before anyone could comfort her, Arvendis spoke again. Inside he was boiling.

’She’s still thinking about him? Even after his death?!’

His face twisted. He had believed Leon’s death would finally end this ridiculous attachment. With Leon gone, nothing should have been left standing between him and Aurelia. Yet the man was still taking up her thoughts. Arvendis clenched his teeth.

"Just stop thinking about some dead person, Lady Aurelia. Dwelling on it too much will only hurt your mental health."

He paused, and his face turned scornful.

"Besides, he was just some loser."

Silence.

Aurelia’s eyes went wide. Slowly she turned to him, full of disbelief.

"...What?"

Everyone in the room stared at Arvendis. For a moment nobody could believe what they had just heard.

Then Isabella’s face darkened.

"How dare you speak about a fellow Spire that way, Arvendis?"

Her strong green aura began to swirl around her, and vines started popping up from the floor.

Darius looked even angrier.

"Have you lost your mind, Sir Arvendis?" he demanded. "Is this how you pay your respects to a fallen Spire who gave his life to protect humanity? By calling him a loser?"

Neither of them tried to hide their anger.

Theodore and Luna could only stare at Arvendis.

’What happened to him? Why would he say something like that?’

Theodore frowned.

’Now that I think about it, he and Leon never really got along whenever they were together. Was something going on between them?’

Luna stayed silent, but her sharp eyes stayed on Arvendis. She couldn’t understand his reaction either.

Roselle had already run out of patience. Mana surged around her and a wind spell began to form. Before she could let it go, Nicholas stepped in and broke the spell apart.

"Don’t lose your cool!"

"Let go, Nicho!"

Roselle glared at him with burning blue eyes.

"Listen to me!" Nicholas tightened his fists. "Don’t do anything reckless. I know you’re angry. I’m angry too!"

He looked toward Arvendis, and his face hardened.

"But he’s a Spire. We can’t just attack him because we don’t like what he says. Unless it’s a duel, we can’t start a fight with him here!"

Roselle gritted her teeth. For a moment it looked like she would ignore him and attack anyway. In the end she pushed her anger down and stepped back.

Nicholas slowly let out his breath, though his clenched fists showed he was hardly any calmer than she was.

Meanwhile, Alden stayed silent. He hadn’t said a word since Arvendis opened his mouth. But under that silence, something was boiling.

He was still trying to take in Leon’s memories. He had seen the loneliness, the pain, the sacrifices and all the feelings Leon had carried through his life. He had seen things nobody else in this room knew. And now this bastard had the nerve to call Leon a loser?

Alden’s eyes narrowed. He could put up with a lot of things. But he couldn’t stomach this.

Before he could stop himself, Alden spoke.

"But I suppose even a ’loser’ was better than a certain Schemer."

Arvendis froze.

Alden’s face stayed calm, but his words were sharp enough to pull every eye in the room toward him.

"Someone who played games to keep that loser away from his actual home for some person..." He tilted his head a little. "Someone who wanted to prove himself a better and more genuine prodigy than him."

A faint, cold smile appeared on his face.

"And yet, even after all that, the loser still showed what kind of person he was before he took his last breath."

Arvendis felt like the air had been ripped out of his lungs.

’What?’

His face went stiff. For a moment he could only stare at Alden, unable to find a single word.

"Alden?" Theodore turned to him, confusion all over his face.

’What is Alden talking about? A trickster? Keeping Leon away from his home? Proving himself a prodigy?’

Theodore couldn’t make sense of it, and neither could anyone else. They traded confused looks, trying to work out what Alden meant. But how could they? They hadn’t lived Leon’s memories. They hadn’t seen what Alden had seen. Only Alden knew what those memories had shown.

Arvendis gulped.

’How does he even know about that?’