Yeah, what's going on?


　Rigal Dibel was furious.

　The first was the notification of the three vassals' departure and their request to move to the As territory.
　According to the laws of King Rosais' country, it was possible for them to move to another territory if they filed the notification and paid the emigration tax.

　The rest was the consent of both lords.

　As for Rigal, he has no choice but to admit it.
　This is because there is no reason to prevent him from doing so.

　There is no reason to prevent people who have not committed a crime from emigrating.
　Besides, if you stingy with the migration of a mere three people, you'll get the bad reputation of being a narrow-minded lord.

　It's unbearable to get a bad reputation for such a trivial thing.

　But Rigal also finds it irksome to just admit it.
　That's why he made a formal protest to Almus As.

　He asked him to stop the act of extracting his retainer.
　But Almus As replied

　'Pulling out of vassals?　No, I haven't done that, but.......maybe some of the newly appointed personnel are from the Divel territory.

　Almus As apologized to Rigal as if he was being modest.
　Rigal was satisfied with that and put the contraption away.

　But the tragedy would not end.
　This time, as many as ten personnel had gone to the As territory.

　Then the rumor went around that Raimondo Rosais had brought Almus As into his camp to become king.
　In exchange for supporting Raimondo Rosais' succession to the throne, Almus As made a secret pact to undermine Rigal Dibel and demolish the House of Dibel, and that Almus As would receive the territory.

　And the non-relative vassals of House Digel - the Vermettes - are colluding with Almus As and Raimondo Rosais to set up Digel.

　This would leave Rigal with no choice but to suspect the non-relative vassals.
　This is because all the vassals that have been pulled out so far are non-relative vassals.

　Rigal ordered his own vassals (relatives, of course) to keep an eye on his non-relative, relatively high-ranking vassals and relatives.

　But he only stopped short of monitoring them.
　This is because he did not confirm whether the rumors were true or not. And Rigal wasn't so sure, he couldn't believe that Vermette would betray him.






　'It worked, didn't it? 'Mr. Ial,'
　'Ial's subordinate ... currently a peddler Ial's apprentice says happily.

　''It was hard to spread the rumor, wasn't it? It took a lot of crafting costs.''

　There were thirty-two people that Ial had brought in under Almus. Thirteen of them, three in particular, were quite capable people, so he took the form of pulling them out directly.
　The remaining nineteen remained in the Dibel territory.

　They were not the most flattering ones, but they were useful.
　In fact, they spread a lot of information and rumors to Ial.

　In exchange for a lot of money.


　They are well-deserving of their current position, but they are not satisfied.
　We don't need them.

　They're not worthy of our hospitality, but they're a troublesome bunch who will betray us if we don't treat them well.
　Besides, once a man has betrayed someone, he has a habit of betraying them.

　I'm going to dispose of them in a hurry after the civil war is over.

　Naturally, he has no intention of telling Alms.
　Almus is a person who is bothered by the killing of innocent people, and he also expresses his disgust for making a wrong promise.

　Ial has been delegated full authority by Almus.
　It is one of his rights not to report. And Ial interpreted it forcefully.

　'It's better not to know what you don't need to know.

　''By the way, I think it would have been fine if it was rumored that Almus-sama would succeed to the throne directly. 'No?'
　Well, it's not so bad that way either. Mr. Armes is not generally regarded as a candidate for the throne. Raimondo Rosais, on the other hand, is second in line. This is more believable, right?　Besides, the territory is adjacent to ours. You can't afford to be attacked if you don't want to. If Raimondo is the one who is going to be king, then defeating Almus will only give him an excuse.

　Since Raimondo's territory is not adjacent to the territory of Dibel, Rigal cannot destroy Raimondo.
　On the other hand, it is adjacent to the territory of Almus, so he can destroy it if he wants to.
　If the rumor of Almus becoming king is started, there is a possibility that all eventualities will happen.

　If there is a war at this stage, it will surely become a quagmire. That must be avoided at all costs.
　Almus is also trying to make it appear that he has no intention of being a frontal opponent by being deferential to Rigal for that reason.

　You would think that Rigal would think that Alms would have teamed up with Raimondo because of his lack of confidence.
　Here, the platitudes from the previous conflict are coming into effect.

　Long live Rigal if he thinks Alms is insignificant.
　Either way, they'll be more wary of a non-existent inner enemy than Almus.


　'Well, now all that remains is our last stronghold, Vermette our operation will not be successful until we get rid of this man.　
　The information that Vermette was a competent person there was heard disgustingly every time he gathered information.

　If it's as they say, that old man has already noticed it for good.
　I'm sure that King Rosais has no intention of letting Rigal Dibel take over the country.

　Now, there is a rumor going around that Raimondo Rosais will become king, but that's just a rumor, and of course we haven't found out that this is King Rosais' intention.
　It's a good thing that you have a good idea of what you want.
　If Rigal Dibel were to become king, the king's power would increase because the territory of Dibel would be under the new direct control of the royal family.
　The size of the land under the royal family's direct control would be greater than the sum of the territories of the great families. In other words, the centralization of power was established.

　That's the main reason why Rigal Dibel was the leading candidate for the throne. It didn't matter what their abilities were.
　Raimondo's fiefdom is small, so even if he becomes king, the power relationship between the king and the great families will remain the same.

　In order to achieve the Rosais royal family's long-cherished dream of centralization, Rigal needs to become king.

　That's why the House of Dibel and the pro-Dibel families don't doubt that Rigal will be king.
　People don't want to believe what they don't want to believe, and they don't expect things to change that easily.

　But if Vermette was aware of King Rosais' intentions....

　He will advise you to tie the knot with King Domorgal and take the throne with Princess Julia.　
　I'm not going to be able to get any more than the "evil way" to get the throne, even if it means becoming King Domorgal's vassal state, since the "royal way" of marrying Princess Julia and receiving all of King Rosais's kingdoms has been cut off.

　Rigal Dibel looks brave, but he is a cowardly man.
　If you think of his fight with King Ferrum, you can understand it well.
　He cannot make the choice to betray his country alone.

　And at the same time, he has a lot of pride.
　He would not be able to endure the idea of taking advantage of King Domorgal's country.



　But if there's no one to push him back, he can't change course or choose the evil way.



　Besides, Vermette is the organizer of the non-relative vassals. If Vermette were to be punished, such as a left turn or other punishment, his discontent would explode at once.


　Anyway, the elimination of Vermette is essential if Almus is to take the throne.
　For that.........

　Now, do we have a plan?




　'Master Rigal. Actually, there is one thing I have to report to you...
　What?
　There is a possibility that Lord Vermette is connected to Alms As. Recently, a suspicious figure has been seen late at night near Lord Vermette's residence.

　Rigal frowned.
　Honestly, he couldn't be sure if Vermette was really betraying him or not.

　Would the loyal vassal who had served him until now really betray him? Rigal still trusted Velmet.

　But lately, there have been loud voices saying that it would be better to keep an eye on Belmet.
　Even if it's only a formality here, we should still put a surveillance on him.

　'All right. All right, we'll assign a lookout. Two or three. Put a couple of eyes on Belmet. If nothing happens for a week, I don't want Velmaet to get a clean bill of health.

　Thus the three spotters were at the Vermette compound.




　'It went well,'

　Ial and Ial's men laugh at each other.
　They are witnesses (Ial and Ial's men).

　Of course, the two men did not go directly to the Dibel family's vassals to tell them.
　Through several or more merchants, they made sure that the information was passed on from the Dibel family's purveyors to their vassals.

　Unless they were carefully examined, they wouldn't get a leg up.
　It was a bit of a risky move, but it seemed to have worked.

　In full force, Rigal suspected Belmet and put a watch on him.
　But it wasn't enough.

　'One more push.

　'Well, shall we use this?'
　The carcass of a hawk was in Ial's hand. This falcon was asked by So-yeon to go out of his way to have it killed with a hawk.
　A tube is strapped to its leg.

　Inside the tube is a fake letter addressed to Vermette.

　That is, the letter is addressed to Vermette from the Ass family, but on the way it was attacked by a wild hawk and fell into the road.
　This is what I made it look like.

　Now if we can successfully show this to Rigal, he will be completely suspicious of Belmet.
　The question is how to show it.

　If this is delivered directly to Rigal and the soldiers, then of course Ial's own background can be investigated.
　Although the time period during which he was active as a merchant and the period when there were many defectors in Rigal's camp are slightly off, there is still an overlap.

　Besides, it would be clear from the investigation that all the defectors have an acquaintance with Iaru.

　Then all the hard work would be for naught.
　How.........





　In the Dibel territory, a market is held once a month.
　Merchants gather to do business.

　There is a road that the merchants must take to get to that market.

　''Well, we can leave the rest here and any merchant who passes by will deliver it to you.

　In the morning, when the sun is not yet up, Ial and his men come to the road and place the carcass of a hawk.
　All the merchants can read at the very least, and they'll at least know what the tube the hawk is tied to his leg means.

　They'll realize right away that it's important and deliver it to you.

　If it's late at night, the cat will take it away.
　After dark, there are too many merchants to put the carcass down.

　It's a last minute thing.

　'Well, we'll just have to wait and see how it goes. If it doesn't work, we'll have to go over it again until we can concoct it again.
　'Yes. Let's hope the cat doesn't kidnap you.

　They walked away.





　A few minutes later, a merchant walked by and picked up the carcass of a hawk.
　Normally I would have ignored it, but it had a strange tube tied to it.

　Besides, the tube seemed to be of high quality.

　The hawk had marks on it that looked like it had been attacked by another large hawk.
　The hawk had been attacked by a large hawk, probably while delivering a letter by falconry.

　The merchant decides to deliver the tube.
　He doesn't look inside.

　These tubes are designed to be revealed by looking into them, and since they use hawk mail, they must be important secrets.
　I don't want to have to kill anyone who finds out the secret.



　Well, the tube was delivered to Rigal in a flash.
　Rigal reads the letter that was inside the tube.

　The letter was firmly written, 'To Vermette-dono'.
　The contents were about what position he would give Velmet after betraying Rigal.
　Unfortunately, the sending name didn't have a family crest on it, but considering the situation, it was definitely from the As family or Raimondo.

　Rigal says quietly.

　'Reward whoever brings this letter to me. And increase the number of watchmen to Vermette to twenty.'






　Vermette had visited Rigal in anger.
　If there were twenty more guards on the stone, he would know that he was under suspicion.

　If this is the case, he will be killed himself.
　But they wouldn't listen to their own arguments. Rigal is a man who doesn't change his mind once he's made up his mind.

　Vermette's heart was filled with anger at Almus As for such a dastardly scheme, anger at Rigal for believing it so readily, and frustration at his defeat.

　'What's the matter, Vermette?'
　'No, Master Rigal. To tell you the truth, I'm old enough. We're well on our way to making you king now, Master Rigal. I'll retire now.

　Vermette said, and left the mansion without hearing Rigal's retreat.
　Then he retreated to his own mansion.


　With the loss of his loyalty to Rigal, the benefits of the 'Great King's Blessing' were lost.
　The disease that had originally been suppressed developed rapidly, and Vermette died in a flash.

　He was eighty-two years old.

　But Vermette may have been happy.
　His family would not be involved in the rebellion (...) and would be saved.