The World Is Mine For The Taking

The people who had been plotting to overthrow the King were finally laid out before me, and I carefully started going through every single profile one after another, making sure I didn’t overlook even the smallest detail that might end up being useful later.

The man who appeared to be leading the entire operation was none other than George. He wasn’t even important enough to have a family name. Even so, according to the information I had gathered, he had once served as one of the captains of the Kingdom’s knights. Unfortunately for him, his own corrupt nature eventually caught up with him. After enough evidence piled up against him, he was stripped of his rank and thrown out of the order. Apparently, having his pride shattered like that was enough to make him dedicate the rest of his life to taking revenge against the Kingdom.

He had managed to gather quite a large number of associates over the years as well, and most of them were already familiar names by the time they openly declared themselves as rebels. A good portion of them had previously been merchants or businessmen, but the Kingdom eventually cracked down on their operations after discovering all kinds of illegal activities. Some of them had been deeply involved in black market trading, while others had been funding criminal organizations or taking part in transactions that definitely weren’t something you’d want the tax office finding out about. Honestly, I had no idea just how much illegal business they had been running to trigger such a massive investigation, but judging from everything sitting in front of me, the list had to be ridiculously long.

I continued digging through the reports, determined to uncover as much information about them as possible before making my next move. The deeper I looked, the uglier everything became. Apparently, they had also been cooperating with foreign mercenaries and leaking confidential information about the Kingdom to neighboring countries in exchange for support. These idiots really were determined to make their dreams come true, weren’t they? I’d run into plenty of scumbags throughout my life, so meeting another group of rotten people wasn’t exactly new to me. Still, I genuinely didn’t expect them to stoop so low that they’d willingly sell out their own homeland just so they could go back to lining their own pockets and exploiting everyone around them. They really had absolutely zero shame left. At that point, I almost wanted to applaud their dedication to being terrible people. Almost.

While I stayed focused on sorting through all of those reports, Beelzebub had made herself completely comfortable on the table nearby. She was lying on her stomach with her chin resting on both of her hands, her elbows supporting her upper body while her legs lazily swung back and forth behind her. Looking at her, you’d think she was relaxing during a lazy afternoon instead of helping investigate people who were preparing to start a war.

"What are they doing right now, Beelze?" I asked while continuing to skim through another document.

"You really are squeezing every bit of usefulness out of me, huh?" she replied with an amused smile.

Her words almost sounded like a complaint, but the playful grin on her face completely ruined any attempt at sounding annoyed. If anything, she looked like she was enjoying the attention more than she wanted to admit.

"Well, since you’re already here anyway, I’d be pretty stupid not to use your abilities as much as I can," I answered with a casual shrug.

"You really are something else," she said with a quiet laugh. "Still, I honestly don’t mind. If using me makes things easier for you, then I don’t really see any reason to complain about it."

After saying that, she slowly closed her eyes and quietly focused on whatever she was observing from afar.

Several peaceful moments passed without either of us saying another word while I continued reading through the information in front of me.

Then a small smirk suddenly spread across her face.

"Oh..." she murmured with obvious amusement. "Looks like they’re finally planning something interesting."

"Planning?" I asked as I shifted my attention toward her.

"Fufufu. This is actually going to be pretty fun to watch," she replied. "The people you’ve been making me keep an eye on have started preparing for war. Judging from everything I’m seeing, they’re planning to launch their attack today."

She opened one eye slightly before continuing.

"More specifically, they’re waiting until this evening. They’re planning to attack the castle with an entire army of those tin men."

"Tin men?" I repeated.

"People whose bodies are made entirely out of metal," she explained. "They look like machines, or at least something very similar. Those are the same things that bombed our meeting place before, aren’t they?"

So they really had been making deals with the Republic all along.

Thinking about it for a moment, that honestly wasn’t very surprising anymore.

Bethlan wasn’t exactly the easiest country to invade through ordinary means. Massive mountain ranges surrounded much of the region, thick forests covered huge portions of the landscape, and the terrain itself was rough enough to make traveling difficult even for experienced soldiers. Plenty of areas had unstable ground that made riding horses more trouble than it was worth. On top of that, one entire side of the country faced the Great Ocean, one of the largest bodies of water anywhere in the world.

Simply reaching the Kingdom was already difficult enough without having to worry about everything waiting after you arrived.

Flying would probably be the quickest option available.

Even that wasn’t particularly convenient because the towering mountain ranges still made aerial travel far more troublesome than it sounded on paper.

Given everything I’d learned so far, it seemed entirely possible that they intended to cross the Great Ocean before launching their assault from that direction. If they planned to bombard the Kingdom before moving in with ground forces, that route would probably give them the greatest chance of catching everyone by surprise.

"Do you want me to gobble them up?" Beelzebub asked with an eager smile that made it sound like she was asking whether she could grab a quick snack before dinner.

Honestly, she really did have a habit of treating terrifying problems with the enthusiasm of someone picking desserts from a menu.

"I’d rather you didn’t," I replied calmly. "Let the Kingdom decide how it wants to deal with them first."

She puffed her cheeks ever so slightly, looking just a little disappointed by my answer, although she didn’t argue with me about it.

Personally, I still believed this was the right decision.

The Kingdom deserved to be the one that delivered justice to those bastards after everything they had done. My job would simply be making sure none of them escaped before that justice finally caught up to them.