In a noble mansion located in Crestal, a stern but dependable looking man with black hair looked at a younger, more wild looking man with fiery red hair.
The young man spoke in a slightly irritated tone, “Do I really need to go through with this charade, my lord?”
The young man emphasized the word "lord" in a slightly exaggerated way, but the lord didn’t pay any mind to the tone of the young man.
The lord nodded, “Yes, you do. We need to send a message to the people that the royal family's power is weakening. When you defeat everyone in the tournament and express disappointment in the lack of strength of the new generation of royal knights, the people will begin to feel unsafe under the protection of the crown. We must start laying the foundation to win the hearts of the people before starting our plan in full. The current state of the kingdom is slowly becoming more dire every day, and when the princess takes over-”
The red haired man has already heard the spiel before and interrupted him. The young man was not afraid to interrupt the noble because he had the strength to act how he wanted.
“I understand that, but I still don’t think this is a good idea. Wouldn’t this cause friction between the kingdom and the nobles? Won’t this lead to civil war?”
“There has always been friction between us and the crown. We keep each other in check, and that's how the balance is maintained. The problem doesn’t lie with the princess herself but those who move to control her. If she had been properly trained by the king we wouldn’t have this issue in the first place. Unfortunately, he was too confident in the late prince becoming the future ruler and focused all his attention on him but-”
The red haired man finished his sentence, “Monster house, I know.”
The lord's eyes twitched, ‘It's rude to interrupt, you know?’
The lord didn’t speak his thoughts out loud and continued, “...If we want our nation to survive, we need to take a page from the book of the Sapphire Scales Alliance. We need to remove the centralized source of power and instead create a parliament containing the large noble houses. This way we each have equal say and work together rather than be kept apart by the crown.”
The man took a sip of tea he had on his desk and continued.
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“Civil war is inevitable. The most we can do is start it on our terms and gain an advantage. You know as well as I that the current situation isn't getting any better. Just recently, Fort Northwind was almost lost to the orcs and it would have led to a full-on invasion if it wasn't stopped by pure luck. We tried to send reinforcements to the fort but were stalled for days because the king was too sick to approve of it at the time.”
The young man sighed in defeat. “Fine… and I assume I should also announce at the tournament that I will become a knight for your household? Praise your noble house while I’m at it?”
The lord shook his head, “No, that would be too obvious and would stir the pot too much. We will announce you joining my house a month after the tournament.”
“Haaah fine. Can’t believe I got wrapped into this mess. I'm too young to be inciting revolutions.”
The lord started laughing.
“Hahaha! If the younger generation isn’t leading the change, who will? You expect us older people to bring change in the world? We barely have any time left in it so why would we? I'm only doing this for my family and my responsibility to my subjects. Remember, the ones who bring about true change will always be young people like you, Victor.”
Not fully believing his words, Victor answered dismissively, “If you say so, Sigurd.”
…
After eating breakfast with Amber, Sol headed out to spend some of the money they had to improve their gear.
Store to store, the two searched for weapons trying to find the perfect one for them. They only had one small problem.
“They’re all so expensive…”
Sol sighed for the 15th time today as he saw another price tag that surpassed 500 gold. The two had been trying to find a good unique weapon all day, but the price was simply too high.
As Sol walked into the next store he was pondering possible options. ‘We can pool our money together and buy a weapon for Amber while I stick to the bow and magic until we can afford another weapon.’
Sol already had a unique rarity weapon, but he liked to use melee weapons when they closed the gap. Sol could also use [Reinterpret] to change some skills to better suit barehanded combat, but that would take a while.
‘If we don’t find anything cheap, I’ll consider it.’
Now paying attention to the store they entered, Sol noticed that he may have entered the wrong shop by mistake. The walls were decorated with weird contraptions of gears and springs that somehow moved on their own. Sol originally entered the store because he saw the weapons sign outside, but there appeared to be no weapons as far as he could tell.
“Welcome to Gearworks! Your one-stop shop for mechanical wonders! I’m Fabio, how may I help you?”
The one who spoke was a small man similar to the half dwarf examiner but was much more slim and had a sharp jawline. It made Sol wonder if he was of another race, but refrained from using [Analysis] as he found it hard to gauge how strong he was. Sol didn’t want to repeat what happened with Diana and accidentally incur the wrath of a powerhouse.
“Oh, sorry. We entered here by mistake, we were looking for weapons.”
Fabio's ears perked up as a merchant's smile sported his face, “Well, you're in luck! I just so happen to have a brand new weapon never before seen!”