Volume 11, 5: Framed Again

Volume 11, Chapter 5: Framed Again

This chapter was brought to you by AnmesicCat, and StellarAshes.

After the failure to rescue Liola, Kaiser thought the odds were against Mizerui, so he stayed as far away as possible, especially when blood continued to flow out of Daylight’s wounds. Kaiser had to try something he had never tried before: continuous teleportation to go back to the Commerce Alliance. However, by taking Daylight and Flames with him, he exerted his magic force too much. When they were about halfway through, he could no longer hold on, and Kaiser blacked out and fell.

“Wooa…”

When Kaiser woke up with a pale face, he looked incredibly weak. After being blank for a moment, he suddenly remembered Daylight was still bleeding! ‘Crap, I hope he didn’t…’

He suddenly jumped up, but couldn’t see Daylight anywhere. He found himself in a room he hadn’t been in before. Kaiser paused briefly; since he didn’t see anyone, it meant Daylight could still run, which meant he wasn’t dead. Having concluded this, Kaiser lied down again, because he didn’t worry as long as no one died.

‘Growl…’ Hmmph! Kaiser covered his stomach. Though he didn’t want to open his eyes, his stomach couldn’t handle it anymore. He moaned in pain, “So hungry! Who can get me some food!”

After moaning for a long while and no one responding, with his stomach being empty, Kaiser had to slowly crawl off the the bed. When he was slowly moving to the door and reached out his hand towards the door…

Bang!

“Hmm, I wonder if Kaiser likes steamed buns more or rice balls?” Daylight was looking at the foods in his hands with frustration.

“Steamed buns… ah! You stepped on my feet!’

Daylight jumped back. After looking, Kaiser bend over like a shrimp, with a painful look on his face like someone just forced something bitter down his throat.

“Kaiser, your sleeping habits are quite bad. How did you end up here while sleeping?” Daylight was confused. He looked at the bed, and it was far away from the door. How could Kaiser have been lying here.

Hearing this, Kaiser immediately jumped up. With a grotesque face, he yelled loudly, “How dare you! It was because you suddenly opened the door and it beat me up, so I fell to the ground!”

“Ah… I see.” Daylight suddenly realized.

“I’m so hungry! Give me my steamed buns!” Kaiser snatched the hot steamed buns out of Daylight’s hands. He then sat down and began to stuff his face.

Daylight smiled, and sat down with Kaiser, while eating the rice balls left in his hands. After swallowing a few buns, Kaiser’s stomach finally stopped growling. He wiped his mouth, and asked, “Hey! How are your wounds?”

Daylight nodded, “It’s fine. Liola didn’t hit anything vital.”

“He didn’t?” Kaiser touched his chin and thought, could this mean Liola was still somewhat conscious of what he was doing?

“I think it was because of Baolilong.” Daylight chewed his rice balls slowly while analyzed, “Flames told me, it yelled to Baolilong during that time, and Baolilong seemed to have heard. It then purposely flew to the side, so Liola would miss.”

Kaiser thought briefly, then said, “No, that’s not just it. Liola was someone who could stand firmly on a Dragon doing 360 degree turns. Just a slight tilt in the flight probably wouldn’t have affected him. I still think he was actually being merciful.”

Daylight nodded as well.

“Speaking of which, where did that Flames go?” Kaiser looked around, and he was surprised he was unable to find the little Flames who would never leave its master. It was really strange.

“I asked it to stay in the Commerce Alliance.”

“Huh?” Kaiser paused, and asked, “Then why aren’t we in the Commerce Alliance? And where the hell is this?”

Hearing Kaiser’s question, Daylight smiled bitterly, “I’m afraid we won’t be able to return to the Commerce Alliance for the time being. We’re the top wanted criminal across the world, and our crime was assassinating the Dragon Empire successor. Rumors say he was seriously injured, and even healing Maxuns couldn’t heal him right away.”

“Bulls—t!” Kaiser widened his eyes, and yelled, “Liola is a freaking cockroach. He wouldn’t care a bit about the wounds we inflicted. Even if I shot him a few more times, he would still be one to jump around.”

“Yeah…” Daylight smiled bitterly. Having strong companions is a good thing, but under the current circumstances, Daylight had really hoped Liola wasn’t as strong.

“Wait!” Kaiser suddenly jumped up, and yelled loudly, “Who cares if Liola is a cockroach! That’s not the main point. Did we seriously turn into wanted criminals?”

Daylight nodded.

“My God! I’m going to faint.” Kaiser held his head exaggerated, and wailed for a long time before he asked with a bitter face, “What exactly happened? Tell me quick.”

Daylight nodded, and began to retell the things happened after Kaiser fainted.

“After you passed out, I had Flames carry us back to the Commerce Alliance. As soon as Flames reached the Commerce Alliance, Purity stopped us. She said to me nervously, the Dragon Emperor had just announced a request for our arrest, and we had to leave quickly.”

“I didn’t have a choice, so I had Flames carry us back to Aklan Continent for now… but as soon as we got on land, we almost got spotted by a bunch of patrolling Knights. In the end, I had to ask Flames to change form into its human form, and we ended up walking. The communication Maxun Purity gave me didn’t work either. Since I was very worried, I asked Flames to go by itself to look for them in the Commerce Alliance.”

“Later on, through Flames, I found out, the three Commanders had already been suspecting that Purity and Meinan had been harboring us. Purity already broke her communication Maxun, so they wouldn’t be able to discover our whereabouts.”

“Now Flames is in its human form, and hiding with Purity, so we could still keep contact. That’s how things are.”

Hearing this, Kaiser was so angry that he almost had an aneurysm. ‘Damn Dragon Emperor! Do you have an addiction for framing people?! We haven’t even reached the Commerce Alliance before the arrest orders for us to reach it, that’s just crazy!’

“Whatever! At least we could both return to the underground base.” Kaiser grunted, and asked again, “How is the war?”

Daylight thought about how Meinan put it as he tried to repeat it, “Silver Moon had retaken the Aklan capital, but due to the injuries he sustained from Assassins, he lacked the strength to pursue the escaping Black Dragon King, which resulted in him retreating his forces back to Freesia. This also meant the crime of the two Assassins was absolutely unforgivable…”

“Stop!” Kaiser was now having a headache. They had now became public enemies #1.

Daylight glanced at Kaiser, and added, “Meinan asked us to return to the base first, and he said he will think of a way to clear our names.”

Hearing this, Kaiser frowned. After thinking for a while, he said with determination on his face, “No! The two of us aren’t important. You tell Meinan, what’s most important now was make the Dragon Emperor’s wild ambitions clear to the Commerce Alliance.”

* * *

“The Dragon Continent is firmly the Dragon Emperor’s, and now Aklan may be, on the surface, divided between Miluo and Silver Moon, but we all know, both of them are subordinates of the Dragon Emperor. Therefore, Aklan had practically fallen into the Dragon Emperor’s hands.”

“The Commerce Alliance has already fallen into a tricky position. If they continue their passive stance, they will surely be unprepared for the Dragon Emperor when he attacks.”

Flames in its human form slowly repeated the words from Daylight. The more it said the more Meinan and Purity’s faces sank.

Flames paused, making sure Daylight didn’t say anything, then said, “Master finished.”

Meinan lightly rubbed his temples. He had already thought about this before. Problem with that, was making the Commerce Alliance believe them was like trying to make pigs fly, especially when Kaiser and Daylight were now wanted criminals because of the assassination. Truth was, they were in quite a bad place.

Purity was at least fine, because she was from the Commerce Alliance, but Meinan wasn’t as fortunate. Had it not been for their respect for Qiusi, the Commerce Alliance might have already tied him up and send him to the Dragon Emperor, to demonstrate they had nothing to do with the Assassins.

Meinan stood up, and paced around the room with frustration. He became more and more vexed the more he thought. In the end, he actually grabbed the golden hair he had always treasured and yelled loudly, “Those two damn idiots! I can’t believe they went to assassinate the successor! And now they put us in such a predicament!”

“Meinan, there’s no way Kaiser and Daylight would go harm Liola-dage. They must’ve been framed.” Purity tried hurriedly to clarify on their behalf.

Meinan looked even more furious, “Of course they were framed! These two idiots. How could they have not brought us along if they were going to rescue Liola?!”

“Kaiser and Daylight went to rescue Liola-dage, but didn’t bring us along?” Purity blankly repeated, and finally understood what the words meant. She screamed, “How could they do that?! Purity wants to rescue Liola-dage too!”

“That’s right! They left us behind! I’m never letting them off this~” Meinan’s golden hair was now completely messed up, and his face looked warped like a reincarnated Asura*…

[T/N: Asura is a kind of Demi-God in Buddhism.]

“Despicable! Purity will not forgive them, AHH—” Purity shrieked again and again. The glass cup on the desk began to tremble a bit, with cracks vaguely visible…

‘Master, please never come to the Commerce Alliance…’ Covering its ears, Flames crouched under the table and communicated.

‘Hmm? I know Kaiser and I are now wanted, so we can’t return, or we will definitely be tied up and sent to the Dragon Emperor…’ Daylight responded via telepathy.

Flames felt a bit helpless, and it didn’t know how to tell its master. ‘Master, there are many things in the world more terrifying than the Dragon Emperor. For example, your companions.’

Suddenly, a faint sound could be heard, and Flames was alarmed, “Someone is here!”

However, the door had already been opened. Flames was a bit frustrated, because it was busy talking to its master and had forgotten to observe his surrounding. If the Commerce Alliance see Meinan with his messy hair and the shrieking Purity, they would definitely not believe anything these two say…

“Hello, three Commanders.” Meinan showed a dignified smile, but if one were to examine closely, this smile was mixed with a faint sense of despair and worry.

Flames stared blankly, ‘S-such orderly gold hair…’

“Woo, woo… that’s impossible. It might be possible for Kaiser to go try killing someone (Kaiser: What do you mean by that?!), but Daylight, how could he do something like that? I don’t believe it…” Purity lay on the desk, and tears fell out of her eyes like rain, like a teenager crying for her boyfriend.

Flames continued to stare blankly at the glass on the desk with a crack going through it.

The three Commanders were originally planning on interrogating them, but after seeing Meinan’s courtesy and Purity’s crying face, the Red Commander went up and ran her fingers through her daughters hair and said, “Dear Purity, don’t cry, mommy doesn’t believe Daylight would do something like assassinate either. Mommy has lived many years and only seen one such admirable Knight. How could a such chivalric Knight go to assassinate someone?”

“Mommy, t-then why would you help the Dragon Emperor to try to arrest him?” Purity pouted. She began to blame her mother as she wept.

Hearing her daughter’s blame, the Red Commander glanced at the Yellow and Green Commander, and they both flinched back a bit, especially the smaller Green Commander. It was he who issued the arrest warrant. When he couldn’t take the glaring, he began to explain, “I didn’t have a choice! Three thousand Knights all said in unison that those two attacked the successor, even if this was fake, we had to act as if it were real.”

“Is this a joke?” Meinan’s face sank, and yelled, “Did it only take three thousand Knights to make you lose your ability to judge right from wrong? Then we might as well hand the rest of the world to the Dragon Emperor, because he has no shortage of Knights.”

“You can’t put it like that.” The Yellow Commander frowned, “The Dragon Emperor had just conquered Aklan capital from the Black Dragon King, and he has his momentum going. Even if he were to call a deer a horse, we might have to just accommodate it.”

Meinan was quiet for a while, and when the atmosphere was frozen, he said lightly, “Isn’t that dangerous?”

“What?” All three Commanders asked skeptically.

“The Dragon Continent and the Knights have always belonged to the Dragon Emperor, and now… he has control over half of Aklan Continent.” Meinan paused, and he looked at the politics-focused Green Commander as his face sank. Though Meinan’s face was full of worries, he was laughing in his heart.

“Though it was half of Aklan Continent, but rumors say, when the successor was attacking the capital, he was nearly unimpeded… if it weren’t for the assassination that caused him to stop chasing, perhaps the entire Aklan Continent would be under the Dragon Emperor’s control by now.” Meinan’s long fingers touched his chin calmly, and said as if he was murmuring to himself, “And that leaves the Commerce Alliance…”

The three Commanders faces turned immediately; clearly they all understood what the words meant. The Yellow Commander even looked a bit worried.

‘No way you guys won’t fall for this, hehehe…’ Meinan put on a pleading face. With his knee bent, he knelt before everyone. Seeing this, Purity yelled out in surprise, “Meinan! What are you doing?”

“Three Commanders, despite Meinan’s incompetence, Aklan is still, after all, my father Qiusi’s life’s work. We can never, ever allow it to become the Dragon Emperor’s possession. Please, take Aklan Continent back from the Dragon Emperor.” Meinan spoke emotionally, with the last few syllables choking. He looked like he refrained himself from letting his tears fall.

All three Commanders looked hesitant after hearing. The Yellow Commander sighed, “Though I don’t disagree with you, but Aklan doesn’t even have a person who could take the responsibility of leading. If we take over, the Dragon Empire would never agree. Sigh! If only Qiusi was still here, we would definitely help retake Aklan capital without a word.”

Purity seemed unconvinced. She stood up and said loudly, “Meinan isn’t much worse! He’s the Prime Minister Qiusi’s son, so of course he has the right to retake Aklan!”

The Yellow Commander’s eyes flashed with hesitation, but he still shook his head and sighed, “You’re too young, nor do you have any experiences with ruling. You might not be able to convince the people you rule over, and it’s a shame.”

“Right, but at least we can try suggesting it to the Dragon Emperor, so at least we can see the Dragon Emperor’s attitude.” The Yellow Commander clapped, then turned around and left like a gust of wind.

The Red Commander looked at the two other Commanders leaving, then turned to touch her daughter’s head and asked, “Purity, did you have a fight with your brother Feir?”

Purity’s shoulders shook a bit, and said with grievance, “I didn’t!”

The Red Commander smiled and lightly smacked her daughter’s head, “Yeah right, your brother Feir has been depressed these few days. I heard you didn’t even eat the snacks he bought you?”

With a guilty conscience, Purity lowered her head. A few days ago, Feir happily brought the roasted chestnuts his sister loved to eat so much, but she greeted him with “no eating if you don’t tell the truth”. In the end, Feir didn’t say anything. He left the chestnuts on the table and walked out sadly.

Then, those chestnuts were eaten by Kaiser! Purity got angry at the thought of it, that damned glutton Kaiser.

“Seriously, you’re quite grown, you shouldn’t be temperamental with your brother.” The Red Commander looked at her with an indulgent smile.

Purity lowered her head even more. She thought about how much her brother had always cared about her, and she probably shouldn’t make her brother angry.

“Fine, Purity will go and apologize to brother.” Purity pouted, and said a bit unwillingly.

“Hmm, wait for him to come back before you go apologize.” The Red Commander smiled, and rubbed her daughter’s head with satisfaction. Remembering she still had some businesses to take care of, she turned around to leave.

Purity asked curiously, “Where did brother go?”

“He’s in Aklan Continent.” The Red Commander answered directly without turning around, “Your brother went to look for his Knight friends.”

“Oh.”

Purity widened her eyes. She thought, perhaps her brother would run into Liola-dage? When he comes back, she planned on asking him about Liola-dage. She and Meinan exchanged a look, and saw the same plan in each other’s eyes.

“Also, little Qiusi, not bad!”

Meinan paused. When he looked in the direction of the Red Commander, she had already left. ‘Little Qiusi? Is she talking about me?’

Meinan scratched his face, unsure if he heard incorrectly. No matter what, he had finally made the Commerce Alliance raise their guards against the Dragon Emperor. Now, they had to wait and see Kaiser and Daylight’s work in training those Knights and Magicians in the secret base, and wait… for war!

Meinan suddenly realized, the war was already this close. Before he thought, as long as Qiusi woke up, he must be able to prevent the war. However, after the Dragon Emperor had practically controlled two thirds of the world, even if Qiusi woke up, he probably couldn’t stop it now.

“What do we do now?” Purity tugged Meinan slightly, and asked with confusion.

Meinan paused, right, now wasn’t the time to stand still; there were still much for him to do: he had to communicate with Gladiolus and Barbalis, so they could provide assistance to Kaiser and Daylight, and help them escape the Dragon Emperor’s eyes. Plus, he had to go gather information about Liola’s situation. No matter what, if Liola could wake up, then things would be much better.

“Purity, please, when Feir comes back, ask him about Liola.”

“Okay!” Purity nodded earnestly.

* * *

“Your Highness, how are your wounds?”

Flower was extraordinarily concerned about Silver Moon’s wounds. Her reason was identically to Yiyu’s: not noticing that the successor was in danger was already a crime, what’s worse was that, they were the successor’s Direct Knight. With such a serious offense, even if Silver Moon wanted to chop them apart, probably no Knight would even step in and say a word in their favor.

Despite the complete victory, among the three thousand Knights, no one could keep their heads high. Their negligence caused the successor to be in danger, and they were all yelled at by the Knight’s idol, the Paladin Lancelot. This was enough to make all the Knights feel shameful.

Yizhou, however, was the only exception. Originally, the other Knights didn’t even think Yizhou was worthy of being the successor’s Direct Knight, but at that time, he was the only Knight present who noticed the successor in danger, and the only one who fought with the Assassins. Even though he didn’t win, but at least it was an glorious defeat..

Nevertheless, the only person who didn’t think it was glorious was Yizhou himself. More than a year ago, he had been evenly matched with Daylight’s power. He had thought he made plenty of progress, but he would’ve never thought, Daylight made even more. This inevitably dented his spirit a bit. Ever since that day, he began to train himself even harder than before.

But he didn’t know, his actions caused other Knights to feel even more shameful. Not only did they accept Yizhou’s position as a Direct Knight, they followed in his footsteps and trained themselves. From then on, the sound of Knights training could be heard in every corner of Aklan, and the sound of them preparing for battle.

“I’m fine.”

Silver Moon answered lightly. In fact, when he stepped into the healing Maxun and come out after a few minutes, his wounds had all been healed. The Maxun’s effects outer wounds were obviously amazing, and no one had better abilities to heal their inner injuries than Silver Moon. As long as he had a healing Maxun, it wouldn’t be outrageous to say Silver Moon was the person whose recovery capabilities were the greatest in the world.

“Your Highness, there is a crowd gathering outside of Aklan’s gates, requesting to come back to the city.” The Knight on the side hurriedly walked up and reported.

“No.” Silver Moon answered simply.

The reporting Knight paused, obviously not expecting the successor to refuse those people entry. He asked with a frown, “But these are the citizens who had originally lived here, refusing to let them into the city seems a bit inhumane…”

Freezing lights shot out of Silver Moon’s eyes, and the cold atmosphere filled the room. He shot out the words harshly, “I said, no!”

The Knight had already froze, seeing the smiling successor a moment ago had suddenly changed. As soon as he heard these few simple words, he immediately stood at attention, and answered, “Yes, sir! I will go send your words now.”

“Halt!”

That Knight’s body froze. He awaited for the successor with fear.

Silver Moon seemed to have calmed down, and said lightly, “Don’t ever make me repeat myself.”

“Yes, sir!” The Knight yelled, then turned around to leave as if he couldn’t wait.

Flower and Yiyu saw all of this, then looked at each other and gulped. Neither of them dared to say anything. Silver Moon didn’t seem to pay attention to them, and he looked like he was in a trance, but truth was, he was receiving the Dragon Emperor’s orders via Idojin.

‘Control Aklan Capital firmly, and do not let anyone in. Otherwise, if and when Qiusi wakes up, these people would help him from the inside.’

‘I will make Miluo send Lesser-Dragons to harass you. When that happens, you must go fight them a few times yourself. I want all the Knights to see your true power, so they could both be in awe and fear.’

‘If you think anything or anyone might be on Qiusi’s side, we would rather kill one hundred innocents, than to let one of them loose!’

Hearing this, faint silver light reflected from Silver Moon’s eyes. Flower and Yiyu could only stare blankly, with their bodies trembling.

‘Kill innocents before letting a traitor through!’

“Flower, Yiyu,” Silver Moon said lightly.

The two acted like frightened birds, and answered loudly and quickly, “Yes, sir!”

Silver Moon elegantly yet slowly turned his head, “Go! Look for any powerful person that does not belong to the Dragon Empire. If this person has anything to do with Qiusi, kill at will!”

“Yes, sir!”