Turning
chapter-214

At a glance, both letters were far from ordinary. The unrest that Yuder had felt due to his conversation with Kishiar moments ago swiftly subsided. With a steady hand, he first unsealed the request from Theorado Van Tain.

The letter, sent ostensibly to the beloved Duke Peletta, commenced with a friendly preamble. Though it wasn't long, the content was anything but mundane as expected.

Perhaps Your Grace, Duke Peletta, has come to know about the frequent monster appearances beyond the western border of the empire lately. Despite it being much earlier than usual, multiple hordes of monsters numbering in the hundreds have been observed, and in the western surrounding nations, including Durban, several nearby cities and towns have already suffered significant damage. This distressing information has come to our attention.

'...What is this?'

Yuder silently read on, pressing his lips together.

So far, the empire has not suffered significant damage, but it is uncertain whether this will continue to be the case. We, the Tain family, who have defended the western lands of the empire for generations, are considering advancing our monster subjugation plans. If Your Grace, the Duke Peletta, who brilliantly led the Cavalry during the Harvest Festival, would consider this matter seriously and is willing to offer assistance, I request that you kindly reply to me.

The sudden surge of monsters in the west, much more than usual years, and the subjugation.

It was an all too familiar tale. Yuder looked at the letter and tried to recall his memories from his past life.

'Right. It's exactly like that time. But then... the timing was later than now.'

The same thing happened in his past life. However, by the time Yuder of that era learned about what was happening in the western part of the empire, the damage had already been done.

Several knight orders that headed there first suffered near-annihilation, and the empire's forces could not properly respond. This led the once-overlooked Cavalry to be pushed toward the west. It was the Cavalry's first official mission, which was anything but glorious.

Heading west burdened with heavy responsibility and without sufficient time to prepare, the Cavalry members somehow managed to convey news of their first glorious victory to the capital.

However, there was no time for celebration. The onslaught of monsters, which kept appearing no matter how many were slain, relentlessly continued whenever they let their guard down. Lowly sabotage and restraint aimed at the victorious Cavalry followed suit. Casualties were inevitable.

Even after Commander Kishiar personally entered the battlefield multiple times, it took more than three months to fully suppress the monsters. In the process, many of the original members were seriously injured or killed, including Gakane Bolunwald, which was highly respected within the group.

The Cavalry was greatly shaken by the incident. The voices of unrest grew louder as Kishiar, who had to stabilize the group, designated Yuder as his successor and frequently absented himself. The situation reached a peak of chaos when Emperor Keilusa also left the world around the same time. Many members who had believed and followed the Commander either defected or fled. The remaining members could never return to their previous lives.

Looking back, it was almost a miracle that the Cavalry was not disbanded then.

'I've been training the entire Cavalry so hard since I returned to prepare for this, but I didn't expect to get the information in this way.'

Even earlier than in his previous life, it happened through a letter from Theo, a member of the Tain Ducal House and also Imperial Knight Commander.

Yuder suspiciously glanced over the part that was labeled as the Tain Ducal House.

‘To subjugate them in advance… sounds good. Excluding the fact that I don’t think highly of their reason for wanting to do something they didn’t do in their previous life.’

Although it was correct that since the main territory of the Tain Ducal House was in the west, it wasn’t strange if they were worried about the news of monsters starting to break out from their homeland. But in his previous life, the Tain Ducal House was so reluctant to ask the Cavalry for help until monsters had encroached upon the very doorstep of their main territory.

If they really wanted to subjugate the monsters in advance, wouldn't it be easier and more convenient to hire mercenaries, or call for a group of knights with whom their family had ties, instead of asking for help from the newly formed Cavalry?

‘Still, it would be easier to assume this is a trick aimed at putting pressure on the Cavalry and Kishiar's side.’

He would have ignored it if he didn’t know what was going to happen in a few months, but this matter couldn't be ignored. Regardless of when it was going to be dealt with, the sooner, the better.

Yuder sighed, folding up the letter he had been glaring at.

‘No matter what they do this time, they won’t get away with it as easily as before. So it doesn't matter.’

But what really didn’t sit well with him was that the plea for help was sent not by the Tain Duke himself, but by someone else.

Theorado Van Tain might be a member of the Tain Ducal House and Commander of the Imperial Knight, but in this matter, he was nothing more than a third party. If the Tain Ducal House and Commander Theo really sincerely wanted help, they should have at least made the effort to come directly to the Cavalry building. After all, the Imperial Knight and the Cavalry share the same premises.

The fact they didn’t do so could only be interpreted as an intention to avoid stepping into the Cavalry building, including Kishiar, and even more so to avoid face-to-face interactions.

Even now, the Imperial Knights, who were under Theo, were ignoring the Cavalry members like bugs, disrespectfully passing by Kishiar without even a greeting. What more could be expected from such folks?

With a cold heart, Yuder unfolded the second letter sent by the second prince of Nelarn, Ejain. The main content was not long this time either. He first courteously explained who he was and revealed that he had stayed in the capital so far to further admire the culture of the empire, which he might not see again after the festival had ended and all other diplomats had returned home.

...The reason I am sending you this letter is straightforward. I originally planned to stay in the empire a bit longer, but due to unexpected circumstances, I will be returning to Nelarn soon. However, due to some somewhat dizzying political situations surrounding me, I find myself in a situation where I must depart with as few people as possible.

Ejain did not detail what the dizzying political situation was. Thanks to that, Yuder had to rummage through his memories for a while before recalling the information that Ejain was often threatened with his life by his brothers due to the exceptional abilities he demonstrated during his prince days in his previous life.

‘I remember him becoming the king only after he had clearly sorted everything out after becoming an Awakener.’

Yuder continued to read the section below.

According to our sources, the number of monsters appearing in the western borderlands has increased dramatically of late. It's quite risky to leave the imperial border with a small group and head to a safe location for many reasons. Therefore, we requested if the emperor could grant us humanitarian assistance. In response, we were given the most gracious answer that a letter should be sent to His Grace the Duke of Peletta, who is in charge of the Cavalry.

Although it was written as humanitarian assistance on the surface, its true meaning aligned with the intention of Emperor Keilusa to firmly protect Prince Ejain by leveraging Kishiar. Knowing the succession battle taking place in Ejain's motherland, Nelarn, if the Emperor made such a decision, it was highly likely that a politically understanding conversation had been established between the prince who came as an envoy and the Emperor.

'... Perhaps the reason why Prince Ejain came to the Empire as an envoy in this dangerous time was for that purpose from the beginning.'

Ultimately, as Ejain would be the ultimate winner of Nelarn's throne, Emperor Keilusa's decision would turn out to be correct.

Yuder, with a sudden realization, folded the letter thinking that Emperor Keilusa too was a man with a perspective and sense that were too valuable to die early, just like his brother Kishiar.

As if he had been waiting for that, Kishiar's voice came from beside him.

"Your expression has been unusual while reading, what are these letters about?"

"These letters, it seems that Commander should see them and reply as soon as possible today."

"Is the content that urgent?"

Instead of explaining, Yuder got up and put the letters on Kishiar's desk. A moment later, Kishiar, having read all the letters, lifted his head with an absent smile.

"Interesting. Both of the letters are discussing the same monster incidents happening in the same region."

"Did you already know, Commander?"

"If you're talking about the information that a much larger number of monsters is appearing in the western borderlands compared to last year, yes, I did know."

An unsurprising response returned.

"How did you..."

"Do you remember? Before the festival, there was a letter where some lord from the west suddenly asked for help from the Cavalry to subdue the monsters that had appeared."

"That letter... Ah."

Just as he was about to ask when such a letter had arrived, a vague memory suddenly surfaced.

'Was it the day I first helped with the letter classification?'

The day he realized that the Cavalry's schedule, which he thought would be neglected all along, had completely changed due to a single letter, Yuder selected two letters he thought were rather normal from numerous ones. One was a letter sent from the imperial palace, and the other was the request that Kishiar mentioned.

"Thinking it was the first proper request letter, I eagerly checked and found it to be an extremely rude request from someone who thought it would be cheaper to have an awakened slave rather than to spend money on knights."

"...I see. I apologize."

Kishiar, who slightly shook his head as if saying it was okay to Yuder's apology, continued his speech with a calm face.

"Anyway, the only truth in that letter was the part about the monster appearances. But that was really strange. It's not the season for monsters to appear within the border now. So I ordered a few of the Peletta Knights to continuously survey the surrounding situation."