Goddess Kaleidoscope

"My lord, the attackers' identities have been confirmed. They are not ordinary bandits or thugs, but regular soldiers, and elite ones at that. The cavalry units that have been running amok in the city are few in number, only forty or fifty men each, and they are flying the banner of the Duran people. In addition, it can be confirmed that they entered from the south gate. There are also an unknown number of enemy and rebel troops in the south gate barbican, probably to prevent us from regaining control of the city gate."

"They seized the south gate and created a riot... this is just to buy time. Their main force must still be on its way outside the city. What is the situation of the various garrison units inside the city?"

"The garrison battalion of the Fifth Army Corps has already gone to assist in the defense of the palace as you instructed. Together with the Imperial Guards, they number more than 5,000, so holding the palace should not be a problem. As for the city guards... they are still assembling."

"Still gathering? Those useless bunch! Where's Gilles, that good-for-nothing?"

"Uh... Commander Gilles... he hasn't been found yet."

As the steward spoke, he turned his head away with a somewhat embarrassed expression, not daring to look the prime minister in the eye. This was because the city guard commander, Giles, was his cousin. Giles's position was not only due to his own abilities but also largely thanks to the steward's recommendation to the master. Therefore, Giles was considered to be part of the prime minister's faction in the capital's officialdom.

However, ever since he took on the lucrative post of commander of the Imperial City Guard, Giles, who rose through the ranks of the Second Army through sheer combat merit, degenerated into a good-for-nothing at an astonishing speed. He became completely immersed in the decadent and extravagant world of the capital and was unable to extricate himself, frequently going missing after visiting prostitutes.

The steward could only confirm that his cousin Giles was lying in some brothel in the city, and most likely he had drunk too much and was unconscious. Otherwise, with the city in such a "lively" state, he would have crawled back to the camp even if he had to.

The steward thought to himself that once this incident was over, Giles's career would probably be over. At best, he would be demoted and exiled; at worst, he would be framed and beheaded. He probably wouldn't see him again.

With elite troops concentrated near the palace, and the city guards lacking in combat strength and command, a few units, though driven by the passion of their junior officers, bravely launched an attack on the enemy, but unfortunately lacked the necessary skills, and were directly routed by the high-speed charging warhorses.

Fortunately, these city guards weren't entirely throwing their lives away. Some of the more resourceful ones knew that a direct confrontation was futile, so they scavenged for materials to build makeshift barricades. They figured that if they could slow down the rampaging cavalry, they could then approach and pull people off their horses.

However, despite their good idea, just as they had finally erected the green-skinned barricades and were waiting for the enemy to charge up and crash into the wall, three red fireworks suddenly flew into the sky from the south of the city. Upon seeing this, several cavalry squads immediately turned around and ran towards the south gate.

Their mission has been successfully completed!

"They ran away? We chased them away!"

The young soldiers cheered as the cavalry retreated, but the more seasoned veterans realized something was wrong.

Soon, some of the city guards who were trying to give chase discovered that the south gate of the capital city had fallen into enemy hands. A large group of fully armed soldiers, lined up in neat battle formations, met them head-on. In just one encounter, they were routed and fled in panic. Their fighting power was clearly not that of ordinary mobs!

Only then did the city guards finally realize the enemy's identity: the Duran barbarians who, according to official media reports, were easily defeated by the Empire's "righteous army."

"Damn it! How did these Durans get into the capital?"

Upon receiving the intelligence from his subordinates, Chancellor Goethe, who had already arrived at the palace under the protection of his guards to oversee the overall situation, was also astonished. The capital was 1,500 kilometers away from the Kingdom of Duran in the north, yet an army of several thousand men had managed to arrive so quietly. Were all the outposts along the way staffed by blind men?

In fact, it's not fair to blame the Imperial outposts and coastal defense fleets for being incompetent. Besides having over two hundred mages to create wind and fog for the fleet, Lud also used the Black Hand Brotherhood's intelligence network to continuously send false information to the Empire after the operation began, engaging in strategic deception and making them mistakenly believe that the fleet was going to attack other places.

Meanwhile, a dragon clan woman who wished to remain anonymous and was extremely skilled in using illusion magic was invited to personally participate, using illusion magic to create a shadow fleet that pulled the Imperial Navy's large fleet in circles in the outer sea.

Furthermore, the Imperials didn't believe that the Durans would be so crazy as to raise an army of eight thousand men to attack the Imperial Capital, which resulted in the "big surprise" that has left all the Canary Islands speechless.

One bad news after another kept coming to the prime minister. As a shrewd official who had served for many years, Thomas knew very well that there was a lot of exaggeration in the reports. Some of the city guard units would deliberately exaggerate the enemy situation they encountered in order to cover up their incompetence.

For example, a stupid captain who had lost his troops was brought before the prime minister by the military police. He used an extremely exaggerated tone to defend himself, saying that his regiment had encountered three hundred heavy cavalry head-on. The prime minister looked at this good-for-nothing with disdain, not believing a single punctuation mark.

Seeing the city guards performing so poorly in actual combat, Chancellor Goethe felt waves of stomach pain.

The central government of the empire has indeed been peaceful for too long. The capital has not experienced the ravages of war for a thousand years, and the empire's continuous and successful foreign wars have fostered arrogance and conceit among its citizens from top to bottom. The city guard of the capital has long since degenerated into a pig farm, filled with spoiled brats who just loaf around and wait to die.

Compared to the main force troops who receive rigorous training and are specifically responsible for fighting abroad, they seem to live in a completely different world.

Since it was still dark, Chancellor Goethe only knew that the enemy's main force was pouring in from the south gate and had already captured several blocks, leaving the city guards disoriented. However, their exact numbers remained unknown, which made the Chancellor hesitant to order his 5,000 elite troops to make any rash moves.

It's already humiliating enough that the capital has been breached; if the palace suffers any further damage, the Canary Islands will have to be called the "Brother Kingdom" from now on.

"Where did those Durans come from?"

Just as Goethe was pondering the available countermeasures, one of the guards protecting the palace suddenly cried out in alarm. Immediately afterward, the prime minister felt a fierce gust of wind blow against his face, almost making him lose his balance.

Goethe looked up and saw a strangely shaped winged dragon land in front of him, with a very young-looking white-robed priest standing on its back.

Although it was their first meeting, Goethe was able to guess the identity of the priest at a glance.

"Master Rudd of the Pantheon? Coming alone, how dare you!"

"You are Thomas Goethe?"

"Yes, it is I."

Standing on the dragon's back, Lud looked at the fearless imperial prime minister in front of him. He had to admit that the old man was indeed a very elegant "English gentleman". No matter how dirty his methods were in private, at least he was clean and tidy on the surface. At first glance, he looked like a respectable person.

Lude smiled and lightly leaped off the dragon's back. Kanna did not immediately transform back into her baby dragon form, but remained in her current form, staring with her big, watery eyes, using her dragon might to intimidate the surrounding soldiers and prevent them from easily approaching.

Although Chancellor Goethe was also affected by the dragon's might and felt fear instinctively, he outwardly maintained his composure and did not allow himself to show weakness.

Goethe believed that Ludwig's assertive appearance before him was a tactic to coerce the Empire into withdrawing its troops and making concessions by threatening to bring down the capital.

In fact, with the war of aggression having reached this point and failing to achieve its original strategic objectives, the empire's leadership was considering a retreat while it was still ahead. However, they were waiting for the kingdom to back down first so that they could gain a stronger position in the subsequent ceasefire negotiations and would inevitably have to cede a large piece of land.

But just as Goethe was secretly preparing his response to the aggressive Luther, the other man did not play by the rules he had expected. He pulled a broken necklace out of his pocket, leaving Goethe somewhat dumbfounded.

Do you recognize this?

"This is?"

"It originally belonged to a young woman from the Argonian tribe. It was a token of love given to her by her husband. You may not know her, but you are certainly very familiar with her husband."

"I...I don't understand what you're talking about."

"It's okay, I'll help you remember."

In fact, as soon as Ludwig mentioned "the young woman from the Argonian tribe," the prime minister, who had an exceptionally good memory, understood everything.

After all, it was he who personally orchestrated it back then, and those involved were all assassins raised by the Goethe family. They not only eliminated the mother and daughter of low blood, but also ruthlessly slaughtered hundreds of people in the Durand region, and burned the entire village to the ground.

Afterwards, all of these assassins committed suicide by poison. Only two people in the world still know the truth: one is Thomas Goethe, and the other is the shadow guard Burne, who is most loyal to the royal family.

If it weren't for knowing that Byrne was loyal to the royal family and that the new emperor would need his powerful shadow guard to protect him in secret after his ascension to the throne, the prime minister would have actually wanted to kill him as well, and then take this unspeakable secret with him and be buried in the grave together after his death.

Faced with Ludd's interrogation, the Chancellor immediately thought of Byrne, suspecting that he had leaked the secret. But he quickly recalled that when he had asked his men to gather information about the Pantheon and Ludd, he had indeed seen some content in the reports that he found very interesting.

Before the Empire launched its massive invasion of the Kingdom of Duran, the Chancellor knew very little about the Pantheon, and as for Rudd, he had never even heard of him.

He had only heard about it a few times in private settings, seemingly related to some mysterious potion popular among male nobles, but the prime minister, who had long since transcended vulgar tastes, paid no attention to it.

It wasn't until the outbreak of this full-scale war, when the Pantheon suddenly stepped in and used a mysterious weapon never seen before to help the Durans reverse the situation, that the old Chancellor finally took this third-rate sect that made its living by selling medicine seriously for the first time. He then quickly sent spies to gather intelligence about the Pantheon, including Ludwig's female disciples.

After all, Lud's female disciples were all beautiful young women, so the intelligence personnel naturally assumed that Lud was like other charlatans from other sects, a hypocrite who used the guise of taking on disciples to keep mistresses. This information could often be used for exploitation, hence it was considered "important intelligence."

When the prime minister reviewed these intelligence reports, he saw a name that looked somewhat familiar.

Romian, seventeen years old, has one-quarter Argonian ancestry and striking red hair...

Upon seeing the name and description of his appearance, the old prime minister couldn't help but think of the illegitimate child whose body could never be found.

The old prime minister originally planned to send someone to confirm the matter, but Ludwig came to him first and brought up this old secret as soon as they met. This confirmed his previous guess that the half-blood dragon girl was indeed the daughter of Canary III!

Knowing that Ludwig had come with ill intentions, the old prime minister appeared calm on the surface, but was actually quite unsettled inside.

He glanced at the Imperial Guards standing guard on either side, and the furry dragon behind Lud. Although he wasn't sure if the Imperial Guards and the Royal Magisters' Brigade could defeat the enemy if a real battle broke out, the palace would inevitably have to be rebuilt afterward.

After careful consideration, the prime minister had no choice but to make a concession.

"Master, what is it? Let's sit down and talk."

"Sure, I was just about to talk to you about that too."

Seeing that Lude nodded to give him a way out, the prime minister secretly breathed a sigh of relief. However, Lude did not follow him into the palace to the special reception room, but instead asked to talk on the drawbridge in front of the palace gate.

The old prime minister was still unsure of Ludwig's exact purpose, but he still summoned several servants and had tables and chairs set up on the bridge.

During this time, the prime minister signaled to the commander of the Imperial Guards with his eyes and gestures, instructing him to take the opportunity to close the main gate of the palace. Although the palace walls were not as high as the main walls of the capital city, they were made of more solid materials and were equipped with large defensive arrays. Once activated, they could completely withstand the bombardment of forbidden spells.

Ludger naturally saw all of the Imperial Guard's actions, but he simply smiled and let the thousands of elite soldiers move and deploy before his eyes.

At this moment, all the well-organized elite troops in the entire capital city who could be immediately deployed to battle and pose a threat to the expeditionary force were here. If they were to launch a decisive counterattack, they would be fully capable of taking advantage of the expeditionary force's unstable foothold, quickly recapturing the lost south gate, and driving the expeditionary force out again.

In contrast, although the city guards have a total of 30,000 personnel, these 30,000 are scattered across more than 50 districts of the capital. Moreover, they are more like city management officers maintaining order than regular troops, so their combat effectiveness is questionable.

What Ludwig had to do, besides confronting Goethe-Zai, was to single-handedly hold back these 5,000-plus men, buying some time for the expeditionary force that had not yet fully entered the city.

Soon, the table and chairs for the conversation were set up, along with tea and some exquisitely-looking royal pastries. Kanna's eyes lit up, and she kept swallowing hard. Her drooling appearance terrified the servants who were setting up the scene; they thought the monster wanted to eat people!

After the servants had finished setting things up, the prime minister dismissed them all, leaving himself alone on the bridge to face Rudd and the monster behind him. The servants were both grateful and admiring of the prime minister, unaware that his haste to send them away was to prevent them from overhearing the ensuing conversation.

"Master Lude, please state your purpose. What do you desire?"

"What do you want? Probably an answer! Seven years ago, you sent people across the border to hunt down an innocent mother and daughter, and even slaughtered an entire village... Was it really necessary to do that?"

"Master, you've traveled all the way to the capital just to ask this?"

“I’ve already asked Bourne, but when it comes to testimony, you can’t always rely on just one side of the story. Even if you know you deserve to die, you still have to go through the proper procedures. That’s probably what people mean when they say old habits die hard.”

Seeing Thomas's puzzled expression, Lude smiled. His words did seem a bit strange to Thomas, but they were actually an important part of his work process as a policeman in his previous life.

After a moment's thought, the old prime minister concluded that Lu De was stalling for time, and from this he deduced that the enemy forces attacking the city were probably not many in number, but rather a small but elite force. Otherwise, they would not have suddenly appeared outside the capital city, nor would they have been wary of the five thousand elite soldiers guarding the palace.

Thinking he had seen through Ludd's intentions, the prime minister sneered inwardly, but also admired Ludd's courage and strategy even more.

It's such a pity that such a talented person cannot be used by the empire.

“Master Lud, to be honest, I admire you very much. If it weren’t for your intervention, our army would have already entered the capital of Durand long ago, and we would never be in this situation. With your outstanding abilities, if you were a Canary, I would definitely not be the one to sit in this position of prime minister.”

"What? Trying to turn me against you?"

“That’s certainly a thought I have, I don’t deny that. And as far as I know… you’re not from Duran, are you?”

"I am indeed not a Durandian, but I am even less a Canary.

"It's actually not difficult."

"No, that's difficult. My homeland doesn't recognize dual citizenship."

"???"

Seeing that Thomas wanted to say something more, Lud quickly waved his hand. He had come here specifically to distract the palace guards, but that was just a secondary objective. His main goal was to seek justice for his apprentice.

“I suspect you must have had someone investigate me and the people around me, and you know that I have a disciple named Luo Mi’an, whom I rescued in the Void Forest. Even after experiencing so much suffering, that child remains kind-hearted. So when I learned the truth about certain things, I was truly furious!”

When Ludd said this, he looked directly at Thomas, but Thomas simply stopped smiling and spoke in an extremely calm tone, uttering words so cold that they shocked even Ludd.

“That child is indeed pitiful, because she should never have been born in the first place; her very existence is a mistake.”

"Why? Just because of so-called bloodline?"

"What else could it be? The blame should lie with her mother, who has impure superhuman blood. This is the Canary Empire. As a demi-human living in this country, and a servant like a maid, she should know very well the consequences of having an affair with a nobleman and bearing a child. And it's not just the empire; it would be the same in any other country!"

"So you resorted to ruthless killing, even at the cost of massacring the entire village."

“The mistake must be corrected! Master, I know why you have come, and I guess you must have been in contact with His Majesty at the front. You want to kill me, and His Majesty will hate me, but I have no regrets. If you want to see me weep and repent for what I have done, you will be very disappointed.”

"Aren't you afraid I'll reveal the truth?"

"No one will believe it. It's a shameful rumor, a slander against His Majesty by rebels and enemy nations. Those petty villains have used it more than once, and it can't fool the real Canary people at all."