Everyone was being moved into position, and the city was ready to go into lockdown. The Protector had outlived his usefulness and I didn’t care if I took a hit in my popularity. Clarissa would just say he had used the opportunity to try and assassinate me regardless. There was no internet and anyone saying otherwise would be a conspiracy theorist and quietly removed.

That was the nice thing about having absolute power. I could write the narrative I wanted. As long as the people weren’t oppressed by me, I could kill the occasional person without issue. I was the news, everything I didn’t like was fake news. Anyone disagreeing with me was a terrorist trying to overthrow the government.

Long term this system wasn’t very stable, but short term and with the personal power people could have, it was incredibly potent for having absolute control. There was a lot of faith being put in Clarissa, but we understood each other.

I was the lightning rod and she handled everything behind the scenes. So far that split of responsibility had been working out quite well. Even with the Divine Empress there had never been a thought on my end of selling her out and as far as I knew she hadn’t even considered it. While she might have been able to make it work, once a betrayer, always a betrayer.

We were on the same ship of state. Neither one of us could get off of it now. She also had a very good survival sense as well. She had moved to a secure room in the Imperial Palace for what was to come. Her direct administration wasn’t needed, since everything was already in place.

The goal was to lure the Astrologer out and kill him. I would be risking my life and having to put trust in my personal soldiers and the captains. But this was the best chance to catch and kill the Astrologer. We had even developed a flow chart for various possibilities and our response to each of them.

The captains would handle their soldiers, while the soldiers and Captain responsible for guarding me would ensure my safety. Their identities had all been verified and the captains would be checking all their people. Our Director of Defense, General Abdullah would have a fast reaction force under his command to respond to any emerging situations.

It was time to be proactive for once in response to the Astrologer’s constant attacks and pressure he was exerting. While Clarissa was mitigating most of it with her impressive personnel management and narrative control, it was still a thorn digging into our side. It gnawed on me that we couldn’t respond. But this latest development was clearly a move by the Avatar and the Astrologer to take me out.

I would oblige them by being in public and using myself as bait. Nothing else would work. Clarissa might, but she would have no chance, while I had a very chance to survive what was about to happen. Plain clothes soldiers pretending to be off duty were all wearing blue shirts, and red pants milled about the plaza.

Fake vendors had been set up discretely. The few civilians were out and about as well, since the arrival of the Protector with the Astrologer’s corpse had been announced. Looking out a window from my palace, I couldn’t spot him, but I knew he was plotting something and might be out there.

There was a lot of risk, but I was willing to take a lot of damage, as long as I lived, and the Astrologer perished. The Protector was going to die regardless. He had outlived any usefulness he might have had, and the Avatar had basically ensured his death.

I wish there had been more time to prepare, but overplanning was just as bad as under planning. Everyone was ready and briefed. “Nervous?” Clarissa had entered the room.

“A bit. I thought you were going to be in your bunker,” I replied.

“In a bit. You think, he will show and make a move?” Clarissa asked.

“Yes. The Astrologer is tricky and not one that would die to someone like the Protector. Even if he did, it doesn’t matter. Once the plan is in motion, he will either act during the confusion, or he won’t. If he doesn’t then it is our loss,” I replied. I hoped we got him, but there was a high chance the Avatar would spoil everything.

That was why there was a second secret plan that I had written out and passed onto a messenger to take to General Abdullah. He would handle his end. Not even Clarissa knew. It was a risk I had to take. Since it was my life that was going to be at risk, I was not going to take any chances with what was about to happen in the next few hours once the Protector Cai Fan arrived with the so called corpse of the Astrologer.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

I didn’t believe it was real, which could only mean moves were about to be made. I just hoped I had come up with the right plan to come out ahead. If I had miscalculated or misread the situation badly, then there was a chance I would die. It was small, but there was a chance.

“Emperor Michael, Supreme Governor Clarissa, the Protector has reached the outer wall,” a soldier reported. Clarissa dismissed her.

“Good luck, Michael,” she told me.

“I don’t believe in luck. I make it. But thanks,” I replied. She patted my arm and left the room. I didn’t like the word luck. I was the master of my destiny. Even though that was plainly a lie, since I was standing in the Systemic Lands, I refused to submit and give myself up to the vagaries of luck or fate. Luck involved people succeeding when they failed to plan properly.

I made my way outside and sat on the chair on to of a table with Purgatory’s flag draped over it. “Captain Francis,” I called out and the Captain of my personal guard came over to the front of my throne.

“Emperor Michael,” he said and bowed his head slightly.

“Do not attempt to block what happens at the start. Retreat to the secondary location, disperse my guards. A secondary plan is being put into place, to counter the Avatar,” I replied. He looked concerned and then nodded.

“Yes Emperor Michael, I will inform your protection detail. If that is all?”

“Just one more thing. Did the General and Director Katz send you countermeasures?” I asked.

“Yes. Each of us has one, just in case.” I nodded at this.

“Don’t use them, right away. Our target is slippery. I might have to receive a direct attack first. I could die, but we need to lure him out. A ten count, then use the countermeasures, to give them time to act and then hopefully counter,” I replied.

“I understand.” Captain Francis when went off and began explaining it to the 14 soldiers in my protection detail. It was a huge risk, but if the Astrologer moved on me, I needed him to commit and not be scared off.

I took the time while I was waiting to focus my energy to suppress my curse damage. There was nothing more I could do. Everything had been put into place, the only thing left was to wait and then act once the Protector arrived.

A crowd began to form. The outer city was being locked down. There wasn’t a large enough civilian population that this was a problem. The inner city would be closed off once the Protector arrived. Soldiers had been recalled from the surrounding areas. That had been one thing I wanted to keep secret, but there was no way.

It would be too obvious something was up if I tried to do a workaround on that information and objecting to the idea of bringing in support. Specific teams would seal the exits to from the inner city, and the walls and buildings would be surrounded. Anyone attempting to flee or leave once the lockdown started was to be killed, no exceptions.

If the Astrologer was laying in wait, we would hopefully catch him quickly enough to kill him. With his disappearing trick and mastery of energy there was no way to contain him. Our best bet was an obvious trap, to conceal a much more daring trap. Well, it was my bet. The second trap was all me.

I took a deep breath and steadied myself. The Protector was approaching with a casket on a cart that was being pulled by multiple people. There were some cheers and he smiled and waved. I looked at his energy with my Sense stat.

There was no issue I could spot at a distance. But I had spoken with the man for a long time when I had stopped at the Free City of Hong Kong. We had gotten along then. But now he was too great a threat if he was even still alive.

My personal bet was that he was replaced by a homunculus and that corpse had some trap built in. The box and corpse were inspected at the entry to the city, and since they had made it this far there was no obvious bomb.

Still, it was far too suspicious. I calmly waited even as I noticed soldiers moving into position on top of the buildings across the plaza. There was more movement as soldiers all got into position on top of various buildings to have a height advantage.

It was remarkable how quickly the city had been rebuilt, but it was important to exude strength of the Capital for our Empire. I left that in Clarissa’s hands. It also made preparing for such a trap much easier than trying to work with the convoluted mess of back streets. The bombing at the founding event had proven as much.

The Protector got closer, corpse in tow. I was scanning everyone and everything constantly. I paused as I thought I saw a familiar face in the crowd before it moved away. Had that been Ruth? I had almost forgotten about her. I thought she was dead or something, but that woman looked a lot like her. I didn’t have the Sense stat back then, so I could compare her energy to what I had seen now.

No matter. If I ran into her, I would kill her, but she wasn’t important right now. I turned my focus back onto the Protector. Most people would have probably missed it, but his energy was too calm and flat. It was a minor detail, since everything else was correct.

But this was a high-tension meeting and event, he was at the center of. No normal person would have their energy remain that calm. While he was a calm person, there would be inner turmoil which would reflect in their energy. Just processing everything happening around them would lead to more fluctuations than he had.

I had been observing people quite a bit while trying to fix the curse damage, which let me spot this oddity. His energy levels, appearance, and how his energy looked otherwise were all perfect. The disguise was a nine out of ten, but I just rolled a critical twenty on imposter checks.

Still, it didn’t change anything. If I was unsure, I could have moved to another plan, but that was never going to happen. I had a bigger fish to catch right now.