novelKing
| ← Ch.516 | Ch.518 → |
The rebels had already surrounded the royal city!
When he heard that, Xiao Lin had thought that Liang Taibai was joking, but Liang Taibai's eyes were red and his face was frantic, letting Xiao Lin know it was not the time for jokes.
Xiao Lin quickly put on his clothes, and followed Liang Taibai into the palace.
"Did we not say during the day that the rebels were still a month away, and we also had the royal army to hold them off. How could they be here already?"
"We're looking into it, but it's not the time to think about it now." Liang Taibai sighed.
"How many troops are in the royal city?" Xiao Lin guessed something from Liang Taibai's expression.
"There are still three thousand troops."
"How about the rebels?"
"We're still not clear on the details, but by the approximation of the guards, there are at least twenty thousand of them."
"F*ck!" Xiao Lin could not help but curse. Even if defending a city was easier than attacking, the difference in numbers was too great.
Liang Taibai picked up the pace, revealing even worse news as he did."The three thousand troops in the city are all mostly old or injured because the main force had been sent to stop the rebels. Who knows what happened to those idiots. They haven't been gone for a few days!" The usually polite Liang Taibai cursed out loud, obviously looking down on the combat ability of the kingdom's army.
Xiao Lin gaped, and was quickly deep in thought.
After a moment, the two of them arrived at the castle. Even if the royal city had a curfew, they were not stopped at all as Dawn Academy's ambassadors. In fact, they were not even checked on.
In the beautiful palace, Xiao Lin saw the king of the kingdom. They might have already escorted all the king's children out, but the king still remained.
Initially, the military had planned on using the king as a bargaining chip in their negotiations with the rebels. Xiao Lin had even heard from Liang Taibai that a lot of the upper echelons for Dawn Academy were not happy with the current king. Not only did the civil war cause a lot of trouble for Dawn Academy, the relationship between the kingdom and the academy had not been the best in recent years as well. In fact, when Dawn Academy requested more resurrection towers to be built in the Rosa Kingdom two years ago, they were rejected harshly by the king.
Now, it was obvious that, even without what was happening, Dawn Academy would not have tolerated this person's continuing to sit on the throne. This was the first time Xiao Lin met the king who dared oppose Dawn Academy. Before, they had always avoided the king when dealing with anything.
The king's sideburns were white, and he had a thin beard, making him look very old. However, Xiao Lin had seen from the reports that the king was only over forty years old. He had his crown on, but it was not very luxurious. The crown was only adorned with eight jewels shaped like roses.
Inside the palace was a large round table. All the officials sat near the table while the king sat on a dais at the front, facing everyone. Of course, as ambassadors from Dawn Academy, Xiao Lin and Liang Taibai did not need to sit where the officials did. Instead there were two chairs prepared next to the throne, signifying they were equals to the king.
After the civil war, many of the officials in the city had run away or gone into hiding. Now, there were only seven or eight of them in the palace. They were all waiting inside, but were quite surprised at Xiao Lin's appearance, but to them, what they needed was a representative from Dawn Academy; it did not matter who it was.
Once Xiao Lin and Liang Taibai sat down, the sudden meeting formally started. First, the armored generals stood up to make their reports.
"Not long after night fell, there were some movements with the automatic sentry towers in the eastern gates. Of course, the guards thought it was a malfunction, and went over to check. Then, a short conflict happened... I happened to be nearby at the time, and felt like something was off. I opened up the searchlights Dawn Academy had given us and noticed that a large number of troops were nearby, and basically had us surrounded..."
Liang Taibai immediately started his questions, trying to gain even more information, such as the number of enemies and the relative strength, including formations and gear. However, since it was so sudden, the general did not have too much information. The shock at that moment had caused him to immediately run back with the report, and await the king's decision.
"It's definitely the rebels; there's no question about it!" Someone was not happy about Liang Taibai's questions, but did not want to be too obvious with it, so he turned to the king and said, "My king, while the enemies still haven't fully surrounded us. We should use the cover of night to immediately send our troops out for an attack!"
"That's right! We should leave immediately! His Highness cannot be captured, otherwise Rosa will have no future!"
"Your highness, please leave immediately! The royal city does not have any ability to defend itself. If we fight our way out and group up with the troops we sent out two days ago, we will have a chance!"
The officers' words were sincere, all advising the king to leave immediately, all while shooting glares at Liang Taibai. They all obviously knew that Dawn Academy had deliberately removed the king's name from the escort list and left him for death.
The king waved his hand, signaling for the officials to be quiet before turning toward Liang Taibai, asking, "Do the two of you have any opinions?"
The king's wizened face was very calm, not panicking at all with his city being surrounded. Xiao Lin did not know if he was forcing himself to be calm, or if he had already given up, knowing that Dawn Academy had already pinned him as a scapegoat.
Xiao Lin silently speculated, but no matter what, he definitely did not have a good impression of the king he was meeting for the first time. That had nothing to do with Dawn Academy, or with the kingdom, or with the starving peasants in the kingdom. It was purely because the man on that throne was Ibeiya's grandfather!
Even if Ibeiya's words were filled with lies that were difficult to tell apart, she had never lied about her birth. That was something Xiao Lin had verified from numerous sources.
Ibeiya was a mix between a human and a vampire; her mother was a princess of the Rosa Kingdom, which meant she was the daughter of that king, and Ibeiya was naturally his granddaughter.
However, Ibeiya's youth had been very pitiful. The St. Claude blood in her veins caused her to be in great danger, and her father was hunted because of that as well. Yet, the Rosa royalty never acknowledged her existence, and had even forced the princess out of the palace. When the princess died of blood loss giving birth to Ibeiya, Ibeiya basically only had her uncle, the old man, left to live with.
| ← Ch. 516 | Ch. 518 → |