At this moment, Rosalind was climbing the mast under the protection of the soldiers, looking far into the direction of the Solun Continent, wondering how her Father King was doing and if her older brothers and sisters were still arguing.
Rosalind, having learned a lot of knowledge during her time in the Ror Empire, aside from the mechanical principles that could help Castile with its construction, also learned a lot about cannons. She wanted to tell her Father King that she had become stronger and could contribute to Castile. Moreover, the Avar were beaten by the Ror Empire, and even the dragons submitted to the empire’s glory.
But unfortunately, Rosalind’s dreams were about to be dashed.
While Rosalind was still on the road, Castile had already been split into seven pieces.
The very center was occupied by Gonzalez, the Royal Capital Cartier.
Gonzalez directly claimed that he had received a distress signal from the Father King, which is why he stormed into the royal palace. However, when Gonzalez arrived, Gonzalez had just fallen victim to a poison attack, with the murderer fleeing the scene, leaving behind only a half-written edict abdicating to Gonzalez.
Although it was outrageous, Gonzalez actually gained some support from the nobles, but he didn’t trust them, always feeling that these people were monitoring him on behalf of the actual forces that killed the king. Thus, Gonzalez lived in constant fear, especially since that demon clan officer Daniel disappeared without a trace after the coup, which only reinforced Gonzalez’s belief that everything was a conspiracy against him.
Although Daniel had nothing to do with these conspiracies, he simply ran away.
But there was nothing Gonzalez could do; he could only be pushed forward by these shadowy powers. At least while under the secret control of these people, Castile could maintain a basic balance.
The other princes and princesses also took up arms to establish their own kingdoms with the support of various nobles, claiming to be the rightful rulers.
However, everyone tacitly avoided directly attacking the Royal City Cartier.
After all, Castile faced the first line of defense against the Avar, and the Royal City Cartier had undergone numerous fortifications, with countless magical defenses. In this era, cities with actual independence in their defenses were rare; most urban defenses were concentrated in the lord’s castles. The Royal City Cartier was, in some sense, already ahead of other cities on the Solun Continent.
However, due to the internal chaos, conquering Cartier wasn’t impossible, but no one wanted to be the praying mantis in a game of catching cicadas, all wanting to be the last sparrow. For those in the royal family and nobility, although in name they were all attacking Gonzalez, in reality, whoever had more soldiers had the real power, and no one would want to send their own soldiers to their deaths or expose their trump cards.
And for those behind-the-scenes nobles benefiting from the division of territory, as long as they had a Castile heir in hand, they were already profiting. It wouldn’t do to really fight and kill, putting their own troops in harm’s way for those princes and princesses.
No one wanted to take action, no one was willing to act; although Castile was split into seven pieces, the situation bizarrely stabilized, and even the seven newly established kingdoms interacted with each other, with the only distinction being that each claimed to be the rightful one.
In reality, the current Castile was divided into much more than seven pieces, with some small nobles taking advantage of the chaos to establish their own kingdoms. After all, on the Solun Continent, even a village could declare itself a country; such small kingdoms were as numerous as cows, but only seven claimed to be the legitimate Castile.
Let alone talking about sailing to M Continent; Castile could hardly protect itself. The princes and princesses could still maintain their sanity, but what if outside forces intervened? What would happen if the neighboring Avar or other nations in the anti-Avar alliance got involved?
Gonzalez didn’t dare to think about it; that would truly become a mess.
At this moment, Gonzalez was slumped on the throne, wearing his father’s crown and holding his father’s scepter, facing those ministers as he had in the past.
Half of the ministers in the palace had already fled, but at least half remained to help Gonzalez control the situation.
“Your Majesty? Your Majesty?”
Gonzalez suddenly jolted awake, realizing he was no longer in the royal palace, or no, perhaps he was still in the royal palace, because his bottom was still seated on the throne, but before Gonzalez was a rectangular long table surrounded by darkness, the table flanked by those strange people wearing black and white masks.
Although those people wore masks, Gonzalez recognized some of the ministers who had not fled.
“You, you all…”
Gonzalez felt dry in his mouth and wanted to say something, but couldn’t get the words out.
“Let us introduce ourselves; we are the great apostles of the Lord of Morning Star and members of the Night Sanctuary.”
The person sitting at the head of the long table, dressed in a black and white clerical outfit, spoke: “Welcome to our world.”
At this moment, Gonzalez finally overcame the fear in his heart and was able to speak, angrily saying, “It was you who killed the King?”
“And so what?”
The person at the end of the long table, wearing a black and white mask and dressed in clerical robes, said indifferently: “You should thank us for helping you stabilize the situation; otherwise, do you think your flimsy reasoning could withstand scrutiny?”
“Isn’t it all because of you?”
Gonzalez angrily slammed the table, but at that moment, a sharp blade suddenly appeared next to Gonzalez’s neck.
The distance to the person at the end of the long table was not far, but their voice seemed to come from some void: “Now that the dragons have already moved to M Continent and the Dragon Church has stashed its claws away, there’s no better time than now to spread the doctrines of the Morning Star and the Night.”
“If you can take the lead in spreading the doctrines,”
that voice paused before saying, “we wouldn’t mind letting you become the true King of Castile.”
After a moment, the scene before Gonzalez returned to normal; it was still the familiar audience chamber, his bottom still on the throne he had just become familiar with, but there was not a single person in the audience chamber.
Gonzalez was gasping for breath; everything that had just happened felt like a dream, no, it should be said to be a dream, but everything in this dream felt so real.
Has the Morning Star Church now become such a cult?
Gonzalez struggled to stand, shouting, “Someone! Someone!”
The guards quickly emerged from the shadows to Gonzalez’s side.
“Go find, retrieve all the books and records of the Morning Star Church.”
The guards immediately took their orders. Gonzalez couldn’t tell if it was his imagination, but he felt a smirk at the corners of the guards’ mouths.
There was no other choice for Gonzalez.
In the shadows, those masked individuals looked at the panicked Gonzalez with satisfied smiles; this was settled, and among the seven Castiles, three had already been completely controlled by the Sanctuary, wielding the miraculous ability to control dreams. Up until now, aside from dragons, what else could stand in the way? What else could resist the Night Sanctuary?
