Althea wanted to respond, but there was probably a reason the Empress had used an artifact to contact her telepathically. Duke Zerolian was probably the reason.

"— ould we choose the Countess?" Lord Garron's voice said as the image projection began again. Althea sat up. This was interesting. What had happened while the Empress was speaking?"

"Yes, the duke is more powerful, sure. But that is the problem. If we 'collaborate' with him, we will end up becoming puppets. The Countess on the other hand is someone that we don't have to be afraid of. And has a lot more to gain with our help.

That navy isn't gonna equip itself. And together we are still more than powerful enough to suppress any attacks Duke Zerolian makes." Matilda said, staring Lord Garron down.

Hmm, did the Garron family have any way to get parts cheaper than normal? That was likely, and they had ways to get crew too.

"That is not how this works, Matilda. The Zerolian Duke might be equal to us in name, but his power is second only to the royal family. There are at least three duchies that follow his commands. Just see what happened to the Leria Duchy when they didn't listen to him. The Diery family is different from us.

The Countess cannot be removed, I don't know why, but the Admiral told me that once. There is some kind of secret that only members of the royal council know, some reason why the leaders of Diery cannot be killed. But you can. The Duke will have your head, you are not an Adept like the Duchess of Leria or whatever weirdness the Countess is."

"And you want to ally with this person? Do you think he will be satisfied if we just follow his orders?" Matilda stared at him. "Come on, uncle, you and I both know that he will try to get me to marry one of his sons. And I will not have that."

"That-" Lord Garron could not formulate a response. Althea had to agree. Trying to have Matilda married to one of his sons, and have one of his grandchildren be the next in line, was just like something the Duke would do. Was this why the Empress wanted her to give Matilda the manual? So that she would have the power to stand against Duke Zerolian?

But this needed observation. The Empress had done a lot for her, and she did not want to reject her. At the end of the day, the manual was something she could share. And get a favor out of it.

"I would rather die than have that happen. And I think, so do you." Matilda said, folding her hands. Jarvis looked worried beside her, but still did not interrupt.

"Ok, fine. I will try my best to accomplish these. But I cannot give assurances, Duke Zerolian is a very cunning man." Lord Garron replied.

"As long as you don't try to get me married." Matilda said.

The three of them stepped out of the room, and Pulsie ended the projection.

"That was...interesting" Pulsie said, his voice sounding exhausted.

"I am going to let Matilda cultivate the manual. The Empress asked for it." she said to Pulsie through their connection.

"Oh." he answered, not knowing what to say. Althea could feel it through the connection they shared.

"Yes, she has an artifact that can do that." she said, turning to the trio as they stepped into the room.

"Have you made a decision?" the Duke asked.

"Yes, I will keep the position." Matilda said. The Duke didn't even pretend to be surprised.

"As we were discussing before, the position is not yours to keep. An Admiral is-" the Duke began.

"How about we give it a year?" Althea interrupted. "Lady Matilda has one year to prove that she is worthy of the title of guardian, after that the royal council can decide whether she is capable."

In other words, Matilda had a year to gather enough votes to overrule Duke Sorelian.

"That is an agreeable proposition." The Empress stated.

"Are you serious, Countess?" The Duke asked. "A girl that cannot even breakthrough to the Apprentice stage as the Admiral? That is absurd, even for you."

"Isn't it just the lack of a suitable manual that is holding her back? I just happen to have one that suits her. And I would be quite willing to let her have a chance to use it." she said.

Now it was the Duke's turn to pause.

"What?" Matilda asked, her confusion evident.

"I noticed it a while ago, you meet the requirements to one of my manuals." she said.

"The Diery family does have a manual that merely needs one to have one of the natural elements." Lord Garron said. "That may indeed allow Matilda to breakthrough."

Well, she wasn't talking about that manual. But it would make a good cover.

"A guardian of the Empire that broke through using that manual?! That manual is more suitable to producing soldiers!" the Duke exclaimed.

"And yet it has produced a Grandmaster stage mage." The Empress stated. "The Garron family manual cannot claim the same."

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

The Duke gritted his teeth. "I see. So you will oppose me in this."

Althea narrowed her eyes and turned to the servants. "Please leave."

The servants left and she turned to the Duke.

"Perhaps you should have thought that before you used that Grandmaster weapon against the county." she said.

"So you do know about that." The Duke stated as Lord Garron narrowed his eyes. Matilda looked at the Duke with suspicion. Jarvis just sighed and continued eating his cake.

"I was merely teaching you a lesson. A lesson you do not seem to have learnt." the Duke said, using his power to try to oppress her.

"Then we shall see who teaches who, Rebel of Soleria." she said, as the palace defenses activated. The defenses had activated a little, but it needed a lot of mana to run. Mana the Duke was happily providing.

In normal circumstances, the mana a person called on was not easy to dispel, but this was a special circumstance. The spell had been crafted by several Grandmaster stage mages working together.

The Duke coughed up blood as the palace reacted to his provocation.

"Do be careful, Duke. The palace is just recovering, who knows how the defenses will react if you provoke them." Althea taunted.

The Duke growled in hatred, staring at her.

"Lady Matilda, would you please wait in my bedroom for a while? I will retrieve the manual and bring it to you." she said, getting up.

Mana rushed back into the room as she stepped out, letting her feel a little vindicated. The Duke had perhaps angered her more than she showed.

sc

Matty waited in the Countess' ‘bedroom'. The bedroom that was magnitudes bigger than her house, and that was without counting the garden. Why was there a garden inside the bedroom? Did the one outside not suffice?

Even the part of the bedroom that had the bed was bigger than the house. There was still the library, with its dusty books and scary looking men that stared at her suspiciously. If their glare wasn't enough to dissuade her, the livery was. Three Emperor's guards. The Countess sure was careful about security.

"Hello." A voice said, startling her.

Matty turned around, looking for the source.

"I am right here." The voice said from the direction of the garden. Matty still couldn't see who was talking.

"Is this some sort of prank?" she asked, calling on mana. Mana responded to her quickly, and in much greater quantity than she had expected.

"I am a plant." the voice said. "The one in the center of the garden."

Matty looked at the oversized plant towering over the garden, easily ten meters tall, it did look like some kind of magical plant. But a talking one? Did those even exist? This was her first time hearing of one, let alone meeting one.

"I am Pulsie, Althea’s familiar." the 'plant' said.

Matty stepped towards the plant, keeping her mana close to her. Mana was strange here. A lot more active, and peaceful than normal. Wait, how could it be active and peaceful at the same time?

"Just because you are doing something does not mean that you can't be at peace doing it. There are tales of washerwoman at riverbanks, singing as they do toil. Or of happy gardeners finding joy in their task. Mana is quite the same. Even if it loves moving around, at times it enjoys just being in its natural state. Even if that involves moving around too." the plant said.

"Did you read my mind?" Matty asked, her eyes narrowing.

"No." the plant answered. Matty wasn't sure she believed it. "I merely made an educated guess."

Oh yes, guesswork. The kind of thing you could rely on. Hmm, how did you block mind reading?

Matty began imagining the sewer, remembering the smell, the disgusting squishiness of the liquid...these memories were sure to get it out of her head.

"What are you thinking about?" the plant asked, sounding curious.

"Just the sewer." Matty smirked. Take that, you oversized mind reading beanstalk. Try reading her mind now.

"Hello?" a voice said from behind her.

Matty turned around to find a surprisingly beautiful face staring at her. And by surprising she meant 'oh my gosh, there are people this beautiful?' surprising. Black hair, golden eyes, wearing a black suit with golden embroidery, the boy was just missing two wings to be Fae. Oh wait, there they were.

Two black wings with golden patterns appeared behind him as the boy yelped, something pulling away from her.

Wait a second. That was mana!

"Did you just manipulate me?!" she asked. The wings had to be an illusion! Or were they not being there the illusion? Was this a Fae assassin? Did the Duke act already?

"Sorry! Sorry! I didn't mean to! I was trying to fool Pulsie and didn't have a lot of control!" the Fae raised his hands in front of his face, as if to protect himself from an incoming attack.

"Admiral Matilda, meet Nathan, our resident half-Fae. Nathan, meet her grace, Admiral Matilda Garron, guardian of the Empire." the plant said.

"I don't have that title yet." Matty corrected, looking at the half-Fae. Two wings. Even she knew what that meant.

"A royal half-Fae?" she asked, suspiciously.

"Yes," the plant said. "Perhaps you can try thinking of the sewer again. This way, he can't try to fool me into thinking he read my mind again. I doubt he has seen the sewers of Garron before."

"Wait, what?" she asked, confused.

"Nathan here has been trying to use his powers for a month. But so far he can barely cast illusions, and even those only cover his wings and dispel within minutes." the plant said. "I am trying to get him to read minds, but there seems to be something blocking him. The stuff with his father isn't helping either."

"Father is helping me train!" the boy protested.

"Yes, by having you jump around act like you are a soldier. Ker-" Matty got the feeling that the plant looked at her, there was a disturbance in the mana as it did so, a subtle shift-" Oh well, she is a member of the royal council and our ally, there is no need to hide it. Keron is Nathan's father. And he needs to learn that Nathan is not some soldier he has to train.”

Matty looked at the two suspiciously. Keron, that wasn't a common name. But not too rare, either. And there was the other thing...

"What do you mean, ally?" she asked, pivoting on her heel to face the plant.

"Didn't you choose to ally yourself with Althea against the Duke?" the plant asked.

"How do you know that?" she asked. Had the plant been spying on her? Wait, what was that? A sound suspiciously like laughing emerged from the plant.

Was the fucking plant laughing at her?

"A word of advice, Admiral." the plant said. "Don't think you're safe just because you walked into a room. And certainly not a room in someone else's home. The only reason the entire royal council did not hear that conversation was because most of them don't know it is happening yet. Or they would be here.

Duke Zerolian is good at keeping things hush like that. But I assure you that both him and the Empress know what happened. After all, why else would the Empress ask Althea to let you cultivate the manual. And I am not talking about the soldier one."

What the bloody fuck was he talking about? The Empress had told the Countess to let her cultivate a manual? And it was a different one? Matty needed an explanation, and she needed one now.