Dear Koma.

I am very sorry for the loss of your fastest horse. However I must remind you that you have a duty to the Sun Emperor as his stable master. As a further note, if you continue to gamble in the stables with my men I will tear your balls from your fucking-

"Ugh." I clenched the letter I had written as tightly as I could, ruining it with the sheer strength of my hatred.

"Captain?" I heard my right hand from behind her desk, penning her own letters at a steady pace.

"Hurt my wrist." I lied, pushing the hatred I felt for this shitheap of a task to the depths of my soul. "I'll be fine."

I had no idea what kind of Royal Guard was supposed to spend all day writing letters. This was the duty for literally anyone else, even that fat bastard Thaddius. Yet I found myself sitting in my chair barely able to keep a straight face as the audacity of my situation began beating me over the head. I was going to kill someone, and I was hoping it would be the Fat Prince.

"Fuck it." I murmured. I tried to keep my mouth clean and my words as polite as possible, to honor my shitty position. Sometimes, though, it got through.

"Captain?" She replied as she always did, grating on my already raw nerves. It didn't seem that she heard me, which was good.

"I said I'm stepping out for a bit. Just keep at it, will you?"

"But your helmet-"

"I don't need it. Mone's bones, I'm walking through the palace, not going into battle." I grumbled, wishing I was actually going into battle.

Closing the door to my office behind me, I began my trek through the Palace of Gold. It was full of every kind of person I hated the most. Nobles who had never fought for a thing in their lives, who cared only for what they ate for dinner and the quantity of that meal. The Glorious Guards consisting of placated dogs without teeth. And of course the royal shitstains who ran it all.

The Sun Emperor and the Fat Prince.

"Captain Weiss." I saw the way they gave their small nods and words of polite greeting. I saw it, but I heard their true intentions a lot more clearer when I couldn't see it. They saw me as a foreigner who had no right to stand with them. A Meylander. A savage. A piece of shit who didn't belong in their precious Upper Tier.

"Assholes." I let my true thoughts slip in at a thankfully quiet tone as I walked past another pair of spineless nobles. I choked down my follow-up, turned, and gave them a proper greeting. They didn't like it when things were... complicated. Uncomfortable, even. If they had heard me they wouldn't dare show it.

War was on their doorstep, but they believed themselves to be in a time of great peace. They saw the Seven Sorcerers, or the Seven Black Sorcerers, as an unbreakable defense that would keep them safe. They were utterly wrong. I knew enough about the Black Sorcerers to say with confidence they would abandon us, eventually. For one reason or another.

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It would be a slaughter if this land was invaded.

"Oh my, Captain Weiss." A voice like a dagger in my spine caused me to halt.

"Colonel Geiger. To think I'd meet you here." I turned with a face so stoney I'm sure it could stop a battering ram.

"I work here. As do you, Captain Weiss. Or have you forgotten?"

"Of course." I spoke, unable to laugh at what I assumed was a joke. My reputation was one of attempted stoicism and the occasional bout of sarcasm. The former part of my reputation was a well crafted lie as the fury that lay within my heart was only just held down by force of will.

"I suppose what I should have said is why did you call out to me... Colonel?"

Geiger wasn't a Royal Guard. He was a military man with the medals to prove it. As he stood before me, he was coated in the black and white officers uniform that I had once worn. He wore his medals on his chest with great pride, though I knew a lot of them were things he merely watched happened. I'd never say it to his face, even if I really wanted to.

He had greying hair and the kind of stupid mustache that only a man of noble blood could enjoy. He kept it very neat, almost as neat as his hair, which I found very foolish. Geiger was a living, breathing symbol of everything wrong with the military, and he stood before me with the kind of half cocked gaze only a cunt who thinks he's better than you could do.

"We've heard some nasty reports of rebels inside of our fair city. They call themselves revolutionaries but we know what they truly are... scum." Geiger looked as if he would have spat, were it not for the fact that the floor itself was worth more than both of our lives combined.

"And?" I tried to get this over with as soon as possible, folding my arms. "I'm a royal guard. Unless they've been causing trouble in the Upper District, which they haven't, it's not my problem. I'm preparing for the Red King's visit, you see."

"You were a soldier once, Weiss," He spoke as if I had forgotten, infuriating me, "Surely you still feel that sense of duty deep within you?"

"More than you could possibly know, Colonel." I spat the words as hard as I could, hoping they'd do physical harm to him. No such luck, of course.

"My superiors, ever the frightful bunch, want me to personally... lead the charge, as they say." He gave me some air quotes with a roll of his eyes. "But, well, I find myself rather swamped."

"And you'd like me to do your job for you?" My amusement seemed to strike a very negative cord with him. "I'm the Captain of the Royal Guard, Geiger. I'm not a City Hunter."

"You misunderstand. I am not asking you to go down and crack open a few heads in hopes of striking fear into the rabble. I was suggesting that you help me, as peers of this Glorious Empire, find the ringleaders and stamp them out for good."

He made that up on the spot. I knew he wanted me to do his job and start cracking down on every Tier until I rounded up enough people to meet his quota, self-imposed or not. I guess he assumed that asking me to bounty hunt a few rebel ringleaders would be more appealing. It wasn't in the slightest, and my face seemed to betray that information just enough.

"You could even ask your friend, Master Azalea to join you."

"Wulfram?" I raised an eyebrow. "You want a Black Mage and Royal Captain to deal with a bunch of underpaid, underfed rebels?"

"Whether or not they are a true danger is uncertain. I believe our superiors are paranoid, but they are none the less insistent they are a true threat. Thus I am willing to deploy all we have available, so to speak." He spoke, though I had come to note he wasn't naming his superiors. That meant he was clearly trying to brush a minor task off onto my lap, thinking me a fool. That pissed me off. 

"Except yourself."

"E-" He cut himself off. "Amusing, Captain."

"I'll tell you what, Colonel Geiger." I put my arm around him as I began walking. He seemed a little unnerved by the display. "I'll run it by Master Azalea. I can't promise you the Defiler will be entertained by such a mundane task, but we'll see. That's the most I can promise you."

I gave him a little push with my arm and watched him stumble. He fixed himself off as quickly as he could and cleared his throat.

"Yes, well, that would be most appreciated." He seemed partially annoyed at my actions, but also worried about something.

He probably regretted bringing up one of the Seven Sorcerer's in such a way. Getting one's attention was rarely good. At that time I had never met all Seven Sorcerers, as they were either reclusive or just too damn fucking dangerous to approach. I knew Wulfram and I knew Iris, and they were all I wanted to know.

Creepy bastards. Horrible company. I often found myself hoping that Iris would get eaten by her spiders. 

"Until next time, Colonel Geiger." I watched him scurry away with a sigh.

I turned back the way I came, suddenly finding the idea of writing a shit load of letters far superior to getting caught by another twit like Geiger.