Immediately after finishing my speech, Queen Bartolomea approaches me showing a face of dissatisfaction and distrust. At that moment, I thought my speech had upset her. At that, he stands in front of me and says:

"Prince Ferdinand, Bishop Sigmund, we have to speak privately, it is time for our weekly meeting to discuss our works, and this time I want us to particularly discuss the prince's speech, if it is not too much trouble."

"No, of course not your majesty," I said a little nervous, because in my mind, I believed that I had upset Queen Bartholomea, because to tell the truth, my speech greatly upset the subjects of the kingdom.

Having said the above, we walked until we reached a room, a chamber made especially for meetings. In the chamber, there was a long dark brown rectangular table, adorned with candles and a fruit bowl filled with grapes of various colors. The advisors of the kingdom were sitting right there while they discussed among themselves stealthily.

Queen Bartolomea sat in the center of the table, in a chair higher than the others whose seat was triangular in shape. The chair had an intense red color and gold embroidery forming religious figures.

After a moment, the servants arrive and serve us wine in gold goblets encrusted with diamonds. Everyone at the table begins to drink the wine quietly and murmur among themselves. I prefer not to drink it because at that moment I was somewhat scared by my speech and perhaps I thought that they could poison me like King Alaric.

At that, Queen Bartolomea stands up from her seat, placing her hands on the table.

"Silence, everyone! "I have brought you together to discuss Prince Ferdinand's speech and, apart from that, to talk about other topics relevant to the management of the kingdom."

Suddenly, Bishop Sigmund stands up showing a wooden cross in his right hand, which he raises and then says:

"In the name of God and the Virgin Mary, I want to condemn the speech worthy of a pagan by Prince Ferdinand. It is not possible for us in this Christian kingdom to tolerate this behavior. It would be better if the prince returned to his kingdom, for surely in his heart he is not a true Christian. Apparently, he has more in common with witches than with us."

After the bishop finished speaking, Queen Bartolomea coughed quietly to clear her throat and take the floor.

"Sigmund. What do the sacred scriptures say regarding this topic? Do they not say, love your enemies? We must be good Christians and forgive the witches because they have not committed any evil. They can still be brought closer to true religion. And as Prince Ferdinand says, they can be of great use in this kingdom that, to tell the truth, is in a mess. It is a very young kingdom and needs manpower. Work is scarce so we must not waste the talent of witches and all their magical knowledge.

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Furthermore, it was a witch who cleared our doubts about my father's murder. If it weren't for her, the crime would still not have been solved and we would be like headless chickens with no idea what to do or who to punish."

"My lady," said the bishop, "I believe you are right. But even so, I will remain skeptical of those witches. They don't inspire the slightest confidence in me."

Then one of the advisors stood up from his seat, carrying a yellow paper in one of his hands, and proceeded to say the following.

"On behalf of the committee of royal advisors, we speak out in disqualifying the statements of His Majesty Ferdinand as they have been of great displeasure on the part of the population. We are a people of God who deserve to preserve our Christian traditions and it does not seem right to us that a foreigner from distant lands comes to tell us that witches deserve to enter the kingdom of God. To tell the truth, we believe that these can also be useful in some tasks and jobs that we assign to them, but it must always be kept under tremendous discretion so as not to scandalize the population who dislike them too much.

"Very well, we are two against one," said Bartolomea. "Although witches do not deserve to be treated as our equals, I recognize that they can be useful, it has already been shown that magic can still be useful even if it clashes with our Christian faith. I also do not believe that this kingdom should become a magical civilization, that cannot be tolerated. We can work with the witches but until then, we will draw a line that separates us from each other."

"Now," Bartolomea continued, "we must discuss how we will defend ourselves from the invasion of the mammoths?" These ferocious beasts are getting closer to our borders, as announced by our messengers. We must do something, soon."

"Your majesty," said the bishop. "We have the technology of firearms, however, they only fight with their trunks and fangs like the wild beasts they are. Don't you think we're exaggerating this invasion?

"No, I don't think so," said one of the advisors. "There are more than us. Their pack is incredibly large, they outnumber us by one to a hundred. In addition, we have received news that in the past they have devastated other Christian kingdoms and citadels, near the Riff Valley.

"Those places were walled and armed to the teeth, yet they could turn them into dust, which is why we had to give asylum to their refugees who emigrated en masse to our walls."

How would we use witch magic to defend ourselves from invasion? I thought. I don't even have a clue how their spells work, what kind of artifacts they use, and what powers they have. So I had to interview a witch or wizard, to know everything about their magic.

"Your majesty Bartolomea, I offer to carry out the task of finding out everything about witches and wizards. "I'm interested in knowing how their magic works, what kind of powers they have, and once we know this, we can use their spells to defend ourselves against the mammoths."

"Well, Prince Ferdinand, now, one last question remains. The murder of my father Queen Alaric. I keep thinking about why it was the kingdom of Walia that sent those assassins. We'll have to make a plan to get revenge.

I'm thinking of gathering the troops and marching to Walia. Something strange is happening since my messengers announced that another king was murdered in those lands. I'm sure it was other emissaries from Walia, it's too much of a coincidence.

But for now, you can return to your work."