I Didn't Want to Become the Emperor of This World

Chapter 5

At my sudden appearance and invitation, Jereuth was quite surprised but quickly regained his composure. He was indeed a knight who had been through numerous battlefields.

Thump!

Jereuth struck his fist strongly against his chest and bowed his head.

“It has been a while, Your Highness Leonardo. I am glad to see you look healthy.”

“Thank you for your concern.”

“Yes. However, the reason I am here is to see His Majesty. According to this maid, I came because Your Highness wished for me to see His Majesty. Therefore, I cannot see Your Highness first.”

A slight displeasure could be felt from his expressionless face and calm voice. It was a feeling of questioning, as if asking if I, the crown prince, was more important than meeting the king.

‘How should I put this.’

Jereuth was a man of strong character. And he was said to be disappointed in the weak royalty.

So, the attitude I should take is—.

“This is not a request, but an order, Knight Commander.”

“…?”

“I will command you again. I have something to say before you see His Majesty, so follow me for now.”

With nothing to lose, I decided to be firm. If I were to meekly ask Jereuth something like, 「“Haha, why don't we have a quick chat.”」, I felt he would ignore me.

Or even if he didn't ignore me and had a conversation, I felt I would lose the initiative.

“An order… you say.”

Hearing my words, Jereuth’s thick eyebrows twitched. A wrinkle formed on his brow. He seemed quite displeased with the bratty crown prince who dared to give him an ‘order’.

But, perhaps my method worked for now.

“Very well. I will spare a moment before I see His Majesty. Should I enter that room…?”

I was saved.

“Yes. Please come in.”

When I replied, Jereuth entered the queen's room without hesitation. Elly was bewildered, not quite understanding what was happening.

Elly asked me cautiously.

“Um… Your Highness, should I wait outside then?”

“The conversation might get long, so you may go back and rest first.”

“No, I will wait. For I am Your Highness's maid.”

Elly spoke politely, as she always did.

“Then while you are waiting, please clean His Majesty's room a little.”

“H-His Majesty's room? Me?”

“Yes. Is there a problem?”

“That is… I am a low-ranking maid. For someone like me to dare serve His Majesty is….”

A low-ranking maid can't clean the king's room, huh.

I knew it, but it seemed Elly really was loyal to the royal family.

‘I should ask her once later. Why she is so good to me and the royal family.’

“Then from now on, you are a senior maid. Therefore, you are qualified to clean His Majesty's room.”

“…A s-senior maid? Me?”

“Yes. So please take care of it for a while, while I have a conversation with Knight Commander Jereuth.”

“Y-Your Highness—!”

Elly tried to say something, but I pretended not to hear and closed the door. Then I approached Jereuth.

Jereuth was silently looking around the queen's room with a gaze mixed with various emotions.

‘Come to think of it, it was in the queen's diary. That Jereuth liked the queen.’

The king, the queen, Jereuth, and several other companions were once comrades who adventured together. In such a situation, it would be natural for feelings to develop for each other.

Above all, the queen was a very beautiful woman. Of course, all I had seen was the queen's portrait, so there might have been some Photoshop—no, ‘retouching’—involved, but even considering that, the queen was truly beautiful.

Being such a woman, and one whose thoughts aligned well with his, it was understandable that Jereuth saw her not as a ‘comrade’ but as a ‘woman’.

“So, for what reason did you call me?”

As I approached, Jereuth stopped looking around the queen's room and looked down at me.

The old veteran in heavy armor was twice as big as me, a twelve-year-old child.

This was the beginning. The ‘beginning’ that would decide whether I would fail to seize power and meet the end of being executed on the gallows someday, or whether I could grasp a lifeline filled with a little hope.

I raised my head high, looked at Jereuth, and said.

“The kingdom is on the verge of ruin, so I called you, whom I believe to be the only hope.”

“…The kingdom is on the verge of ruin?”

“Yes. Surely you wouldn't say you don't know.”

I had my own thoughts, but I asked an open-ended question to hear Jereuth's thoughts first.

However, as if to show that Jereuth was also an old veteran who had roamed the battlefields for a long time, he did not easily tell me his thoughts as I intended.

“I do not know what you mean. Of course, the kingdom is in turmoil after the 30-year war with the demons has ended, but it is not on the verge of ruin. Our kingdom is a weak country compared to the great powers around us, but it is not that bad.”

“……”

“But for what reason does Your Highness think the kingdom is on the verge of ruin?”

Like me, this man also seemed to be sounding me out. Or it could be that he was telling me to stop the needless mind games and get to the point.

But to seize the initiative, I had to win this mind game. For me, the weak, to use the strong Jereuth as my limbs, I had to show as much as possible that I was superior to Jereuth.

So I decided to go a little stronger.

“I am disappointed. To say that you do not know of the kingdom's crisis.”

“…Disappointed? Hah, Your Highness is disappointed in me?”

He seemed quite displeased.

“Yes. His Majesty said that you, at least, are a loyal subject of the kingdom and a wise and strong knight. But to not see the kingdom's crisis properly, how could I not be disappointed?”

“His Majesty said that about me?”

“He did. And my mother, Queen Hael, also thought so. It was written here in the diary.”

I took out the queen's diary that I had put in my bosom, showed it to him, and said.

“This is my mother's diary. In here, it was written in detail what my mother thought of you.”

“…!”

At the mention of the queen, Jereuth's expression moved slightly. Perhaps Jereuth still cherished the queen.

To cherish the wife of his master, the king, might be a disqualification as a knight, but it didn't matter to me at all. It was just good that I had one more card to use against Jereuth.

Jereuth, unable to take his eyes off the queen's diary.

I slowly put the diary back into my bosom and said. I also deliberately let out a sigh.

Hoo.

“I seem to have been mistaken. If you truly do not know that the kingdom is in crisis, I do not wish to waste my time. It would have been better to… pin my hopes on the ‘1st Knight Commander’ and go see him.”

“…!”

“You may leave now. Go see His Majesty, your old friend, and talk about old times.”

Saying I would go see the 1st Knight Commander was something I didn't mean. From the information I heard during the audience with the king earlier, the 1st Knight Commander was Duke Vaimal's man and the 2nd Knight Commander was Duke Panshin's man, so there was nothing to be gained by going to see either of them.

Nevertheless, I said this to stimulate Jereuth's emotions. I thought that if I, the crown prince, said I would go to see the ‘1st Knight Commander’, who was a noble's lackey, the loyal Jereuth would react.

And it seemed to have worked, as Jereuth's expression contorted.

“That 1st Knight Commander fellow is a subordinate of the nobles who are making this kingdom rot and twist! To say that I am less than them… Please withdraw your words!”

Bingo.

I smiled faintly and replied.

“It seems you know that the nobles are the kingdom's problem. It would have been better if you had said so from the start.”

“…Are you telling me you were testing me?”

“Yes. It was to see if you had the same thoughts as me, and therefore if you were someone I could trust and use.”

Ahem!

Jereuth let out a cough filled with displeasure. Regardless, since I had peeked into his thoughts as I intended, I continued with what I had to say.

“As the Commander said, this kingdom is shaking because of the nobles. After the 30-odd years of war with the demons ended, the kingdom became poor, but the nobles' luxury and pleasure show no signs of decreasing. The people are working their fingers to the bone to somehow survive, but the nobles are extorting all of it.”

“……”

“The people are the foundation of the kingdom, but that foundation is starving and being gnawed away. Not only the nobles, but also bandits and thugs, all the powerful ones are sucking the blood of the innocent people.”

I started by saying this first to utilize the fact that Jereuth was a ‘knight commander of commoner origin, and a person who cared for the people of the kingdom’.

Jereuth, who had been staring at me silently for a moment, nodded his head.

“…Your Highness's words are correct. However, I did not know that Your Highness thought so much of the people of the kingdom. Since you did not come out of your room since you were young, I thought you had given up on the kingdom like His Majesty.”

“It is natural for you to think so. Probably the other nobles do as well.”

“Yes. However… Your Highness, even so, I do not think the kingdom is on the verge of ruin. I am a tight-lipped person, so it is fine, but if it were to enter the ears of a noble, they would not leave you alone, saying you said something dangerous.”

Jereuth acknowledged that the kingdom was shaking, but it seemed he did not properly recognize how big the crisis was.

So I continued to speak, based on what was in the , what the future me had told me.

“No, if things go on like this, the kingdom will be ruined. Because the people will not stand still.”

“The people will not stand still…?”

“Yes. I believe that someday—perhaps in the very near future—the people of the kingdom will start a rebellion.”

“…Your Highness. In the history of our Plank Kingdom, there has never been a single time when the people of the kingdom have rebelled. And that is the pride of our kingdom.”

“I wonder.”

Thud.

I walked past Jereuth towards the window. The light of the late afternoon sunset wrapped around me through the window, casting a long shadow.

I wasn't trying to set a mood. It was just that I needed time to organize my thoughts.

After organizing my thoughts for a moment, I looked out the window and said.

“Just because there has never been a rebellion does not mean there won't be one in the future. Would you choose to starve to death, Knight Commander, or would you do anything to try to live, even if it means starting a rebellion? Even a worm squirms when stepped on, is there a law that says the people will stay still?”

“……”

“And because we have never experienced a rebellion of the kingdom's people, it is more dangerous. Not only the nobles, but also the kingdom's knight order and soldiers will not know how to handle it. Moreover, if a civil war breaks out due to a rebellion of the kingdom's people in this kingdom that has become poor after the war with the demons, irreparable damage will occur.”

At my words, Jereuth seemed to be deep in thought. It seemed my words had worked quite well.

‘Now that it has been steeped for some time… shall I go strong now.’

Jereuth was greatly disappointed in the weak king and queen. Therefore, I needed to appeal that I was different from them, that I was a person of strong will.

With my back to the window where the sunset was seeping in, I looked straight at Jereuth and said.

“In fact, His Majesty should have made a decision before the kingdom came to this state. He should have strengthened the royal authority to check the nobles so that they could not run rampant as they pleased. Not only His Majesty, but also the queen who assisted him by his side should have done so.”

“…Your Highness, those words are an insult to your father and mother—.”

“I am not insulting them, but stating the facts. His Majesty is pretending to be a victim whose power has been taken by the nobles now, but in fact, His Majesty is not much different from the nobles. In my eyes, he is just an incompetent person full of greed. The same goes for the queen. My father and mother are weak people who ran away while having the heavy responsibility of being royalty.”

“……”

“And as they say, there is no paradise in the place you run to, the queen died of illness, and His Majesty is living as if he is not alive even though he is.”

Jereuth did not refute. From that, I could tell that he had similar thoughts to mine.

Now was the time to deliver the final blow.

‘If these words work, Jereuth will say he will help me. If they don't… then I'll have to grab onto his pants leg and plead with tears.’

Gulp—.

Swallowing my dry saliva, I said resolutely.

“So, to protect this kingdom, I intend to take power myself. I will check the nobles based on strong royal authority and reorganize the nation.”

“…Strong royal authority?”

“Yes. But right now, I have no power. All I have is the title of crown prince in name only, and the maid ‘Elly’ you met earlier.”

“So… the reason you called me is to ask me to become Your Highness's strength?”

“Yes, that's right. 3rd Knight Commander Jereuth. I ask you to become my sword.”

At my words, Jereuth showed a quite surprised look from beginning to end. It must be so.

Since the ‘crown prince’ who had been cooped up in his room, spending each day powerlessly until now, was saying such things.

I did not avoid Jereuth's gaze and forced myself to pretend to be firm. To win the heart of Jereuth, who preferred people with a strong will.

Of course, my inner thoughts were completely different.

‘Please… please work. Please.’

Jereuth's reply was slow. I didn't know why it was so slow. One second felt like ten years.

Then, did someone hear my desperate prayer?

Thump!

Jereuth, who had been staring at me silently for a long time, straightened his posture and parted his firmly closed lips.

“Please tell me Your Highness's plan. This old sword will help in any way I can.”