The Rise of the Black Plain

"... Or maybe she may never forgive us." The supreme elder said in a sincere tone while making a worried expression.

The assassination attempt against the late General Albert had indeed been the full responsibility of the Silva family. At that time, such an organization had hired the assassins from the Scourge of the Devil to help them in that situation since there were many difficulties in carrying out that mission successfully.

That is because Albert was a very systematic person who only did three things in his daily life. That is, he worked, cultivated, and took care of his son. Other than this, young Stuart's father could take months or even years to do things other than those.

And because of this restricted personality, Albert spent most of his time either in his mansion in the City of the Setting Sun or at the Brown family headquarters.

But both of these places were considered very safe at that time, and it would be practically impossible for someone to assassinate a Spiritual King like him without serious problems being generated as consequences.

Hence, the Silva family, that at that time had already tried to kill Albert several times without outside help, had finally decided to hire that organization, specialized in this kind of service. 

Such service did not add power to the Silva family's attempts since this noble organization had enough Spiritual Kings for the job. However, it did not have the expertise that those assassins had later used to find a loophole in Albert's routine.

As is already known, they had managed to do this when Albert was supposed to meet young Stuart at the Spiritual Academy. 

But even so, things had gotten out of hand during that assassination attempt since Albert had not hesitated to sacrifice himself to be able to take down his enemies.

Anyway, that had been the reason why the Silva family had hired such an organization, and that assassination attempt had had no help from the royal family.

However, as much as the Brown family had not participated in the scheme planned by Otis Silva, this did not mean that they had no responsibility in that incident!

That's because, while Diana had lobbied her father to make Albert the ruler of some territory, she had never specified that such a location had to be the Red Valley...

After all, Red Valley was the former home of the Red Family, which was considered the second strongest in the Brown Kingdom until a few decades ago, when such an organization still resided in this state.

After the Red Family left the Central Continent's northern region, their former territory, one of the best in the Brown Kingdom, could not be passed on to a level 51 Spiritual King!

He could inherit such territory in the future, as he could reach level 59, unlike most regional Spiritual Kings. But at that time, he didn't have the strength to do that...

And contrary to what many thought at the time, the local royal family was not trying to create a new high-level power, using Albert to lead that process.

House Brown had never planned to support Albert in creating House Stuart. They had even promised him such a thing, but this was merely an excuse to convince him to accept the offer with the assurance of solid support.

But what, in fact, the Brown family wanted was for one of the other powers in the kingdom to end Albert's life so that a potential problem would be eliminated!

That is why King Brown had given the Red Valley to Albert.

They would pretend to be supporting Minos' father. Still, they were just creating the situation where someone would do the dirty work and kill Albert as soon as this man demonstrated the slightest mistakes...

And that had indeed happened, about ten years ago!

As to why someone would do something against a royal decision, well, that was for power, of course!

And indeed, such a thing was a crime that could result in death. But high-level people would always look for more power, and even if it were against the rules, as long as nobody knew, it was worth doing such dangerous things...

And the Silva family had managed to hide the truth from everyone!

That is, many were suspicious of this family, but no one had the evidence necessary for them to be sentenced...

As such, Otis' crime had been worth it!

King Brown then shook his head from side to side and said firmly. "Well, I hope she doesn't find out anything, but I don't regret it."

"Albert had a relationship with a Spiritual Emperor, and at any moment he could get out of control... So, I did what I had to do to protect the family!"

Hearing this, London nodded in agreement. "Yes. That man originally could have become one of the pillars of our state, but he was very suspicious..."

"Who in their right mind would refuse to join a sect of the Flaming Empire? To make matters worse, he wasn't even a noble in our region, but only a subordinate..."

They talked about something Albert himself had told them about 20 years ago. At that time, Maisie had invited young Stuart's father to join the Gray Cloud  Sect and go live with her in the empire. But he had just refused such a thing.

And that was the problem...

London and Thomas could not understand why Albert refused to go to the Flaming Empire after being invited by Maisie. And they had assumed the worst!

Somehow, these two men had concluded that Albert would use his relationship with Maisie to strengthen himself quickly. After this happened, he would probably set up his organization and perhaps overtake the local powers.

And this they could not accept!

Hence, they had thought that getting rid of such a person was the best thing to do to prevent unimaginable problems from happening.

However, although they had the power to deal with a mere Spiritual King, they could not have the blood on their hands... After all, Albert had even had a child with Maisie, a Spiritual Emperor, something they could not afford to offend.

The two knew that the Spiritual Church would act if they knew that someone with Maisie's strength was trying to influence the northern region of the Central Continent. But would that happen in time? Or would they just be avenged?

Well, neither of them wanted to die...

On the other hand, there was the possibility that Maisie would hire some regional assassin and be free from responsibility... 

For all that, since they didn't want to risk suffering from possible revenge from an angry Spiritual Emperor, they had decided to let others do such a thing!

Anyway, while these two men were talking about the past and wishing that Diana would never find out about such a scheme, suddenly Thomas' secretary entered that place.

"Your Majesty, supreme elder." She greeted them before finally speaking about what mattered.

"Your Majesty, we have just received a request for independence."

"Oh?" The two men made the sound of surprise as they began to look at that woman steadily.

"The sovereign of the Black Plains, Minos Stuart, has sent us an official letter, requesting that House Brown recognize that territory as an independent state." She said while having a slight smile on her mature lips.

"Black Plain?" London muttered while a curious expression formed on his old face. 'What an unexpected thing! Why would anyone want that?'

At the same time, King Brown was surprised by such a thing, as he realized the coincidence that they had just been discussing that young man's father.

'Minos Stuart, eh? What is Albert's son trying to do? Until a little more than five years ago, he was just a worthless man who neither lived nor died... But now, overnight, such a thing comes to me.'

'I heard that he and that Spiritual Emperor don't get along... So, the chance of her helping him must not be great, at least if this information is indeed true.'

'But what could he have accomplished to want to be independent? Doesn't he understand all the trouble he might get into because of this? Or does he have bigger plans?' So, Thomas thought to himself, trying to find something that would explain this request for independence.

"What should we do, Your Majesty?" His secretary asked while having her two hands comfortably behind her back.

"That is rather strange... That young man must not even be a Spiritual General, considering how long it has been since he awakened." He muttered in a low voice before finally giving his answer.

"Alright, let's send a team to investigate the Black Plain."

"Given the Dry City's weakness, I'm afraid that sending 5th stage guards will attract unnecessary attention, and our subordinates will be unable to infiltrate and comprehend that place."

"Hmm, OK." The secretary said.

"And if there is nothing unusual, you can go with all the protocol for that territory to be separated from our state..."

"There's no need for us to keep a place like that under our wing if the sovereign himself doesn't want us."

"OK."

After that, it was not long before that woman left that hall, and those two men went their separate ways.