Day 11 of the Fourth Month, Year 1016

Dustor City, Grizzle Province, Forewood Kingdom

THE GENERAL of the Army was an intimidating man, well into his fifties with a strong, looming figure. Most importantly, he was polite and respectful. He didn’t undermine Victoria’s authority because she was young—and a female, at that. Neither was he too polite with his words, showering her with a feigned respect she didn’t deserve. He was a very clever and tactful man.

Victoria understood why her father, the deceased King Gilbert, had promoted this man into his rank of General of the Army after Duke of Savire retired. Her father didn’t choose wrongly. The General had proven to be very loyal. He almost died trying to save the King from a stab in the back—quite literally. The sacrifice was probably useless, as they were overpowered and the King had no chance of leaving alive.

Victoria cursed Lirsk in her mind when remembering that. The day a messenger came to the palace bringing news had been the most hysterical day in her life. It was a day after the assassination attempts on both her and her mother, simultaneously. Her mother had been depressed, but when the news came, she became even more miserable. Victoria herself was only five and didn’t understand much, but she grew up resenting Lirsk for that.

Anyhow, a lot of her skills was trained by this mighty general in front of her. When she was seven, she followed him to Edgefort and learned a lot of military lessons, whether it was combat skills or battle tactics. It could be said that this old man was her tutor.

The General nodded at Victoria respectfully. “Your Highness,” he greeted.

Victoria walked into the conference room with her four guards behind. Well, they weren’t all really her guards, per se, but all her four friends graduated from the same knight school as her, so they sort of qualify as her guards. She deliberately didn’t bring her personal guards this time, although those guards didn’t know that—not until her mother told them to search for her, at least.

Luz had told the Queen that she went to Dustor, but the Queen Regent didn’t know any details about her departure. That old lady would be livid if she found out Victoria didn’t bring any of her designated guards.

The room was empty, save for the General and his attendants. Victoria nodded back towards the General and took a seat in front of him, followed by her friends. “I apologize for the inconvenience, Sir Adefine.” Adefine had been a knight in his youth before he entered the military, which was why he had the title.

“No, not at all, Your Highness. Though I do wonder, why would you risk yourself going into this hostile area?” His sentence had a bit of reprimand in it, just like any other adults would (and had already done), but he sounded mostly curious.

“Of course, I have to see, General. Not that I don’t trust you. I just want to perceive what is happening here for myself.” Victoria laid back on her chair. “Did anything else happen, aside from the shipment?”

Adefine sighed. “I wouldn’t say so, but truly, it was getting more hostile each day. Two civilians got shot by an arrow just because they were getting close to the wall.” After the happenings ten years ago, a wall was built separating the new Kingdom of Lirsk and Northern Grizzle. Lirsk did the same with their side, so there were two sets of walls, with a wide river as natural border in between.

“To be frank, I don’t think the hostility ever left. But they never did it to such extreme before. What changed?” Victoria frowned.

“I would say that the Lirsks had been planning for this, Princess. Ten years, they had never let lax their defense. It was only by sheer luck Fox got in.” Fox was the codename of a spy of Forewood Kingdom that were sent into Lirks’s territory. “If you forgive me for saying, the hostility between the Blackwards and Ulysses’ had been going on for centuries. It wouldn’t dissolve so easily.”

Lirsk Blackward was the man behind the rebellions, and now the King of Lirsk. He was, in Victoria’s opinion, a self-obsessed man that thought himself best. Well, for one, he named his kingdom after himself, and changed his whole family’s last name into his first name. Victoria was never sure how that worked. So, was his name Lirsk Lirsk now? That sounded ridiculous.

Adefine gave her a sheet of parchment listing Lirsk’s recent movements. “General Krish gave me this yesterday,” Adefine frowned a bit. “He seemed worried, though I don’t blame him. It is worrying.”

Lieutenant General Krish Gale was the military leader of Northern Grizzle. Well, he used to take care of the whole Grizzle, but now it was only half, Victoria thought wryly.

“I thank you for your time,” Victoria smiled widely. “Captains,” she greeted the General’s attendants. “I’ll be off, then.”

“Please be careful, Princess.” Adefine's voice could be heard from behind.

Victoria looked back and smiled. “Always, General.”

Followed by her friends, she walked out.

The General of the Army stayed in the Dustor barrack during his stay in Grizzle, so she didn’t have to go far to find General Krish, who was in charge of the barrack. “What are you actually planning to do?” Rex asked curiously. When Victoria didn’t answer, he went to Luz. “Luz, do you know something?” He asked, almost demandingly. He always wanted to know about everything.

“Rex,” Ethan warned him. “Watch your voice. We are in the military domain.”

“I know nothing,” Luz answered, frowning.

Ethan sighed. “Stop it, you guys. We are not in the capital anymore.”

While they were busy arguing, Victoria looked around the base. Soldiers were training. Now, soldiers and the militant were a separate part of Kingdom’s defense. The other part was Knighthood, which was considered more of a private army for the higher nobles. Most knights were of nobility, and not as many were of common birth. Which was silly, in her opinion. Nobility already had title, what even was the use of being knighted?

But sometimes there were someone so outstanding that it was impossible for the monarch to not knight them, as with the case of General Adefine. He was just a common man entering the military, but his track was so impressive that he was knighted. From then on, he was elevated even further into his rank of General now. Even those who graduated from Knighthood school weren’t guaranteed to be knighted by the Queen. The knights were chosen only from the best. Though, other graduates who weren’t knighted could enter military. Their rank would be considerably higher.

And even higher was when a knight entered the military. They usually had the rank of generals, as with the case of Lieutenant General Krish. Although it sounded as if it was a privilege, the military won’t just promote any knight, but only those who had proven themselves. General Krish was one of them.

“There he is,” Ethan pointed at the man in the training ground. As his father was in the military, he knew a lot of military personnel. His father used to bring him to military bases in hope Ethan would be interested in joining the military too. But to Sir John’s dismay, Ethan chose to stay in knighthood.

Not that there was much difference, but Ethan just chose to work privately for Victoria. All the discipline in the military, which he experienced in the hand of his father, overwhelmed him. He was a good strategist, and his team always won in mock battles back in the Academy, but in fighting martially, he was a solo swordsman, as also the case with Rex and Luz. Alize, on the other hand, really liked leading and being part of a team, which was why she joined the Capital Guard.

The princess walked towards the General with sure steps. He heard them, and moved his head. “Oh, Your Highness,” he bowed. “I heard you were coming. Welcome to Grizzle.” He looked to the side and found Ethan. “Goodness, is that you, Ethan? Last time I saw you, you were a kid!”

Ethan winced. “Yes, General, it’s me,” he said.

“Why haven’t you come visit? Your father always boasts that you’ve been knighted,” General Krish laughed.

General Krish was on his late thirties, a face that always had a good-natured smile that Victoria remembered as a kid. Before she successfully begged her mother to let her study in public school, during her private training under Sir Adefine, he always brought her around to military bases around the city.

And then Krish looked at Luz. “It’s been a while since you’ve been home, Veluzia,” he said.

Luz nodded her greeting. Dustor was her hometown, in which she was born, but as Victoria’s right hand, she’d rarely been home. “Yes, General. It’s been a while. How’s Ardien doing?”

Krish smiled. “Your cousin is well enough, last time I saw him. He said you stayed in the capital with your uncle. Haven’t been home lately, eh? Then again, the capital's probably far safer than here, you being the aide to the Princess and all.” The General looked back to Victoria. “Now, you, Your Highness, visited a lot. Weren’t you just here last month?”

Victoria widened her eyes, shaking her head—but too late, her friends had already heard his words. “What? When did you leave the palace?!” Luz asked, rather reprimanding. The others said nothing, but it was obvious on their face that they disagreed of her actions.

Which made her prickly in return. “I don’t always have to tell you all everything, do I?”

“Oh, no, I’m not supposed to say anything, am I?” The lieutenant general murmured regretfully, but none of them paid attention to that.

“But Victa, it’s dangerous,” Alize said in her sensible voice. “You should’ve told someone when you leave. Anyone, at all. You went to a hostile area.”

“The barrack is hardly hostile,” she muttered, facing back to General Krish. “Can we speak, General? Somewhere else? Let my friends assess for themselves whether the barrack is hostile.”

Krish was about to say something, but he backed down when faced with Victoria’s glare. “Very well, Your Highness.”

Lieutenant General Krish Gale brought her to his office and closed the door behind him, making sure that no one would be able to hear them. The room was a bit smaller, rather crowded even, with shelves of documents all around. “Well, this is my temporary office, since General Adefine is borrowing my office,” he said, chuckling lightly. “Coffee, Your Highness?” He offered.

Victoria shook her head. “Did you find something wrong, General?” She went to the point.

“Well,” the General sighed, bringing his mug of hot coffee and sat before his desk. “After you told me to keep watch of the weaponry, I posted a few guards across it. At first, we didn’t find anything wrong, but last night one of the soldiers I task to guard said they saw some shadows going in and out.” He frowned. “He didn’t think much of it, so it didn’t occur to him to report that. He thought it was ghost. Only last night when he was drunk that he talked about that.”

Victoria stared at him. “So how long ago he saw that?”

Krish winced. “One or two weeks ago.”

The princess hemmed. “So, there is someone…”

General Krish avoided her eyes, looking at his coffee. “I’m sorry, Your Highness.”

“No, that’s fine,” Victoria’s thoughts started to wander. “I knew something was off in the storage room but I don’t know what… Should I just stay there and watch if anything else happened? No, that’s not effective,” she uttered while frowning.

“Wait, Your Highness, I’m not done yet,” the General cut her off. “Last night I stood guard there and found the same shadow the soldier mentioned, so I went after it. But it was so swift that I couldn’t even see their figure.”

Victoria frowned. “Even you can’t chase after them?”

Krish shook his head. “Your Highness, if I could be so bold to suggest… Perhaps this is beyond us,” he said. “You can go to the Barrels.”

“The Barrels?” She raised her eyebrow.

“Yes,” Krish nodded. “You know, it’s their base of operation here in Dustor. I think I’ve written to you about it before.”

“Ah, I remember,” Victoria nodded. “You did tell me when you found out where they were.”

“Your Highness, you also know… After all, our men are soldiers. Asking them to do spying and assassination work is almost impossible.” Krish sighed. “We better leave it to the experts, right?”

If it was anyone else saying this, Victoria might’ve reported it to her mother, but she also knew the ‘they’ in Krish’s words. ‘Their’ existence was even tacitly approved by the Crown, decades ago. She sighed, stood up, and bid the General goodbye.

After her meeting, Victoria skillfully avoided the watchful eyes of her friends and sneaked out of the barrack alone. The capital of Grizzle looked grimly normal, with snow covering almost every ground possible. As it was late in winter season—spring is just around the corner—the citizens still did their activities normally. The streets were quiet, though. But not really peaceful—it was more of frightening.

Victoria walked the market street on her own, sometimes stopping to look on things. Here, no one really knew who she really was. Dustor, the capital of Grizzle, was near the border, so it was the furthest from Naveland, where the palace was located.

Victoria used the opportunity to inspect the citizens as she waited for night time. According to her father's favorite book, For the Kingdom, one must see for themselves how their subjects are doing to be a great monarch. The book was written by King Regardo Ulysses, the fourth King. He was one of the wisest monarchs in Forewood history, and the Kingdom did flourish under him, so he must’ve known what he was talking about.

She was looking at some trinkets when a little girl walked closer. The young child was no older than five Winterfells, she reckoned, but the little girl looked so small that she could be younger. “Lady, can you help me?”

She sounded so fragile and unsure that Victoria couldn’t help but leaned towards her. “What is it, kid?”

“Please, my brother is hurt.” The girl looked like she was on the brink of tears. “Please,” She pulled on the edge of Victoria’s clothes.

“Alright, alright,” Victoria said, feeling her heart softened—and she nodded. “Where is he?”

The little girl’s face brightened. “This way,” she said, almost running. Victoria followed behind her in a wide stride.

The area she was going to was visible from where they stood before, but now that she thought about it, it was in a very deserted area. The market was originally deserted as the heat of the sun was burning, and Victoria was the only buyer around, but this part of the market was quiet, the stalls empty of sellers. Her alert went up and her hand reached towards the sword on her waist.

But the little gal looked genuinely scared, so Victoria followed behind her. And true enough, there was a small boy laying on his pool of blood. “Goddess!” Victoria exclaimed. “What happened?” She dashed towards the child and tried to see his wound.

Victoria was no stranger to battle wounds. She saw a lot of them in her days as a training knight in a knighthood school, and even before that, during the Lirsk rebellion when she was a child, she would always see wounded soldiers dying in the palace’s medicine hall. So, she knew right away that the wound on the little boy’s body was the work of a sword.

“There is… There is…” The little girl choked on her own tears.

Before the girl could say anything, Victoria felt someone behind her. She turned around, but it was too late. Someone behind her already grabbed her by the neck and choked her breath. Victoria winced. She tapped her pendant twice in urgency before trying to unsheathe her blade.

But a blunt force hit her head, and everything went black. []