The Scoundrel Prince Sold Out the Empire - Chapter 66

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 66 — Wings of the Bat (11)
The salt-tinged night breeze of Aincen stirred the lamplight on the table.
After Aitar departed, Winter remained alone.
Business discussions that might have occupied a full day or two concluded in half an afternoon.
It was Winter who had hurried things along.
……
Winter withdrew a single sheet of paper from his coat.
A Noble Title Inheritance Contract.
One page torn from Remikoning’s hands.
He stared at it blankly.
‘How light it is.’
The paper weighed almost nothing.
For something he’d pursued across a lifetime, it seemed almost absurd.
In a matter of days, the Remikoning name would change.
To Flowering.
To his mother’s surname.
Though the future had not yet come to pass, it was all but certain now.
The Third Prince had staked his name and given his word.
“Winter.”
A voice echoed from memory.
His mother’s gentle tone.
“Do you know why your name is Winter? We were once so lowborn we didn’t even have a surname. But as the times changed, your great-grandfather was given the chance to found one. So he chose Flowering—wishing that all his descendants would bloom forth like flowers in their season. And I added my own hope to it. Even if winter comes and hardens the world, I wanted you to bloom.”
Tears fell.
Despite his practiced habit of erasing his expression, his face crumpled.
“Mother… Mom…”
Under the lamplight, Winter wept in silence.
His shoulders trembled.
He kept the contract at a distance, careful not to let his tears fall upon it.
‘May you sleep in peace. May you find rest.’
How much time had passed?
When the tears dried, another face came to mind.
The one who had helped him in this revenge.
The one who had granted a debt of lifelong loyalty.
Zion, the Ninth Prince.
‘There’s something odd about the Third Prince.’
Rumored to be a worthless wastrel, yet he doesn’t act like one.
There’s an eccentric, self-willed quality to him, certainly.
But the word for such conduct isn’t excess—it’s freedom.
A bird breaking free from its cage beats its wings differently than one thrashing about inside.
From months of watching at his side, the Third Prince was the former.
‘By now, the Third Prince must have reached Seiel.’
He knows I won’t arrive until tomorrow afternoon.
Which means tonight, his side stands empty.
‘If I’ve sworn to serve him, then I must do so with all my strength. I stake my name on it—Winter Flowering.’
So I must depart at once.
That’s why the negotiations had ended so quickly.
Winter tucked the contract away and rose to his feet.
Vroooom. Vroooom.
He drove through the night in the automobile the Third Prince had left behind, and the moment he arrived in Seiel—
Winter murmured to himself without thinking.
“As expected. Something’s happened.”
The sky.
Black wings were painted across the night sky above the royal capital.
The Third Prince’s distinctive mark. Beautiful, and all the more chilling for it.
His instinct had not deceived him.
So this time, he had to know for certain.
Winter entered the Hotel where the Third Prince was staying.
* * *
Watching Winter, Zion felt another trickle of cold sweat run down his spine.
‘Surely not. Surely, surely not.’
Did I get caught?
The body swap too?
No, that can’t be.
…Though with Winter, you never know.
“Your Highness.”
Winter continued while Zion was still catching his breath.
His voice had dropped to a low murmur.
“Zion Bliese, who was said to be dead, has returned alive. Of all days—the very night Your Highness left him in Aincen, abandoned Reianna, and drank yourself senseless. And now, today, a mark appears in the sky above.”
He feigned composure as he spoke, turning the words into a question.
“So… what of it?”
“So, you ask? The answer is already half written on your face.”
……
When it came to a poker face, Winter was several moves ahead.
The opponent was bad—very bad.
“I began to suspect something when the Liberation Army attacked Dechion’s building. But curiously enough, everything aligned perfectly with the Liberation Army’s movements. Remarkably so, in fact.”
Winter began laying out his evidence.
“Your conduct after arriving in Deber as a penniless wastrel fits the pattern. By all your known inclinations, you’ve been taking from others—but every single victim has been either an Empire citizen or a traitorous Deberian. And everyone you’ve kept close has gray hair. Far too… convenient.”
It’s over.
This is the end.
‘Should I flee? Out the window?’
We’re on the top floor.
So what? I can fly.
“In short, this is my conclusion.”
But running won’t help anyway.
How do I shut Winter up?
“Zion Riobert, Prince of Litania. Zion Bliese, the last royal of Deber. The two of you have surely joined hands.”
“…Eh?”
“Let me ask again. Zion Riobert, Your Highness. Is it not the case that you are in league with Zion Bliese?”
His mouth answered before his mind could catch up.
“So you figured it out. Well, Winter, you really are sharp.”
Winter nodded in confirmation.
“As I thought. I knew as much.”
Zion simply accepted it.
And yet Winter began assembling all the pieces, filling in the blanks on his own.
“The corpse must have been a deception. For the Empire’s pursuit to end, Zion Bliese had to die once. Or was it orchestrated by the Third Prince’s faction instead?”
“Ah, yes, that’s right.”
“Your Highness, called the worst worthless wastrel in the Empire, has no foundation—you arrived in Deber with nothing. So you needed to use Deber as your base. The Liberation Army could accomplish much with Your Highness’s aid. Ah, so that’s why you didn’t blink when I received the offer to join them. Everything fits perfectly. Every piece.”
Everything did fit.
Every bit of it—a complete illusion.
‘Thank goodness.’
Zion swallowed a sigh of relief deep in his throat.
The cold sweat that had soaked his back began to dry, gradually.
Winter was the sharpest person Zion had ever known.
And quick-witted too.
He’d thought Winter couldn’t possibly see through the body swap—it was too absurd for anyone to imagine—but Winter made him nervous all the same. He’d worried that Winter might, just might, guess the truth.
And sure enough.
Even for Winter, the actual truth was simply too fantastical to deduce.
‘Right. Who in the world would ever imagine a body swap?’
The most plausible deduction.
And every piece of it—utterly wrong.
‘Come to think of it, this could be quite useful.’
A convincing false truth had walked straight into his hands on its own two legs.
Every time something suspicious appeared between the two Zions, Winter would himself supply the excuse: ‘They’re allies, after all.’
There could be no stronger cover.
“We have no choice. Bring Reianna and Daien here, Winter.”
It would be easier to share what concerned Zion Bliese with Reianna anyway.
Daien was an afterthought.
He’d feel left out if we excluded him.
“You mean to tell them as well?”
Moments later, Winter returned with the two of them.
“Your Highness! Where on earth have you been? I’ve been searching all night!”
It was Reianna.
A bodyguard who’d lost sight of her charge would naturally have torn through Seiel looking for him all evening.
From the perspective of one who’d ditched her and gone drinking, it was a touch—just a touch—embarrassing.
This much, at least, could be acknowledged.
A mutual pretense, of sorts; eyes covered and mouths sealed.
He cut straight to the matter.
“Hear me well. I, Zion Riobert, have forged an alliance with Zion Blizzard.”
The air in the room froze.
Reianna’s shoulders visibly stiffened.
Daien’s mouth fell half-open.
Only Winter remained perfectly still.
“Before you react, let me explain.”
Before the stares of all three, Zion continued slowly.
Why he’d joined hands with Blizzard.
What he would gain by doing so.
“The Empire calls me the worst worthless wastrel.”
Zion walked to the window and drew back the curtain.
The mark of black wings. It was already fading. Another ten minutes or so, and it would vanish entirely.
“Deber has a magic for such things, I’ve heard. Words spoken become reality, which is why they call it incantation—why they call it Word Magic.”
“……”
“For years now, I’ve harbored a thought: if the Empire insists on calling me the worst wastrel, wouldn’t it be amusing to become exactly that—the worst wastrel imaginable, but for the Empire’s ruin?”
A smile played at the corners of Zion’s mouth as he turned.
“Crudely put, perhaps, but circumstances have left this prince in a state far different from the reputation you know. Should I then remain loyal to the Empire? Hardly. I need only think of myself. The Empire, the homeland—it matters not. Better to discard the country myself than wait to be discarded. That is what I mean.”
The moment the prince finished speaking, no one in the room drew breath.
It was a declaration of treason.
From the lips of royalty itself.
Winter found himself oddly unshaken.
No—more than that. He felt oddly relieved.
‘It’s the same betrayal as Remikoning, and yet—’
The same words Remikoning had once laid bare.
Yet there was one difference between them.
This wastrel prince had already been half-abandoned by the Empire.
Remikoning had driven a knife into his country’s back while it still cherished him.
The prince had turned his back only after his country cast him out.
The same words, but different in weight.
Treason is treason only when one betrays the trust of one’s country.
‘Can one commit treason against a nation that has already abandoned them?’
One cannot.
Winter knew this well.
When they first met, the prince had been quite literally destitute, dropped into Deber with nothing to his name.
Meanwhile, Reianna stood rigid.
‘An alliance… did he say alliance?’
The Crown Prince and this prince.
Deber’s last hope and the Empire’s wastrel.
Half of her wanted to disbelieve.
The other half accepted it utterly.
All those high-grade intelligence reports the Crown Prince had been acquiring—their source stood before her very eyes.
‘Now that I think of it… there were so many strange things.’
Far too many developments required a hand working from within the Empire itself.
Every one of them now made sense.
‘Stay calm. Stay calm. Don’t let it show.’
Now more than ever, Reianna could not afford to be exposed.
The prince must not misconstrue this as the Crown Prince planting spies to watch him.
She swallowed hard, forcing down the quickening of her breath.
“Well! That’s quite something, Your Highness!”
Daien clapped his hands together sharply.
Pure, unsullied delight.
The heavy air lifted at his single utterance, and Zion nearly burst out laughing.
Yes. This was precisely why he kept Daien close.
“Daien. Do you understand what this is about right now?”
“You’re saying you’ll sell out the nation? Whatever Your Highness does, there must be good reason behind it.”
In a way, he might be the steadiest nerve in the room.
Perhaps even closest to the right answer.
There is reason in it.
That single word was more accurate than anyone else’s could be.
“In any case. I’m thinking of selling the nation once or twice to line my own pockets, and if you help me, I’ll cut you in on the profits.”
After that, Zion began to elaborate.
All the things he’d vaguely pondered about what Zion Riobeldt and Zion Bliege could accomplish together if they joined hands.
Things he’d wanted to command Winter to flesh out in concrete terms, but could not.
“For example, something like this is possible. Transfer the Magitech Engineering technology developed by Zion Bliege to Bren Industries or a separate Magitech Engineering enterprise under my command, and generate profit worldwide.”
A future puffed up and dressed entirely as if it served Riobeldt’s gain alone.
Yet beneath that surface lay the gain of Deber, and a path leading to Deber’s liberation.
Gold mined from the Gold Vein would become wages for Deber’s people; Magical Artifacts crafted with Bliege’s Magitech Engineering would become armaments for the Liberation Army; gold shipped out on warships and contraband brought in would become the Liberation Army’s fund supply.
Like account ledgers with false and true faces, different pictures lay hidden in the folds of every blueprint.
“What do you think, Winter? Is this enough reason to shake hands?”
“…Extraordinary, Your Highness.”
Winter swallowed hard without realizing it.
The scale was dizzying just to hear about.
His lord had grander ambitions than he’d imagined.
“I’ll live as I please, freely. If I have to be called a Worthless Wastrel for it, I welcome that gladly. But I won’t treat my people carelessly. Until now, I had no one to call mine, so no one knew. What about it?”
The playful tone grew slightly grave at that point.
All three of them caught the shift in weight.
“You are my people. No, let me say it this way.”
A rare dignity flowed into the prince’s voice.
“Become my people. Then I promise you wealth and glory.”
Outside the window, the last glow of the mark was fading. The final feather dissolved into the dawn sky.
Winter was the first to move.
One knee touched the floor.
“This one life. My entire existence, I wager upon Your Highness.”
Winter, who prided himself as Deber’s finest gambler, had made his judgment: an all-in.
No need to weigh his hand—he would stake every chip he possessed.
“Good. I accept it.”
Zion let out a low laugh.
Daien was already hopping on his feet eager to raise his hand, and Reianna’s oath of loyalty had long since been received through Bliege’s body, so it wasn’t necessary.
“Your Highness. Because you revealed the truth, I now understand how to adjust the plan. There is one card we must secure.”
Winter continued.
“We must recruit McAlister.”
A lieutenant commander of the Aincen Navy, and a principled man who reported his own father with his own hand.
“Lenska is incompetent. Make him a figurehead, but nurture McAlister so that he takes control of Naval Headquarters.”
“Recruit him? Will that rigid man ever come over?”
“By direct appeal, it will be difficult. So this is what I mean.”
Winter’s eyes narrowed.
The gambler’s eyes, having read the table, turned slowly toward Reianna.
“I’d like the Liberation Army to step forward. Reianna. Given McAlister’s character, that would make recruiting him easier.”
Reianna froze, her eyes wide open.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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