"Out with it! Are you really sent by my brother William, and what scheme are you hatching?"
Dim sat down directly in a nearby chair.
"Hehe... I'm afraid your dear brother doesn't have the authority to command me! If you need proof of my identity, how about this?"
"It really is you lot..."
Dim ran his fingers over the unique embossed impressions on the parchment in disbelief, his eyes slowly widening.
"What exactly do you want?" For reasons he couldn't explain, Dim's heart began pounding wildly.
"Didn't I already say? Help you become Marquis! My noble lord..." Karen laughed.
"You must be joking—William is still alive! Not to mention there's still..." Dim muttered.
"Then let them all die!" Karen's words dripped like the venom of a coiled serpent.
"Let them all die!" Struck at the heart of his deepest desires, Dim went limp in his chair as though every bone in his body had turned to jelly, but his eyes burned brighter than ever.
"You want me to be a spy—to betray my own family?" he asked, enunciating each word with deliberate weight.
"That depends on your choice. Would you rather cling to a shattered family, or hand over every last scrap of glory and power to your brother—William?"
Karen could see it clearly—Dim had long since run out of choices.
The night wind swept across the windowsill, billowing the curtains, but the figure who had been sitting there moments ago was gone.
A long while later, Dim slumped in his chair, his head swimming in a daze. But a single thought had already taken root deep in his mind like a seed.
"That's right! If I can't have it, neither will you! I'll destroy it! This entire Bodie Archipelago—it should have been mine all along!"
Beneath the pale moonlight, Dim's silhouette twisted like that of a demon.
……
"Master, everything went smoothly. The other party provided the routes for both the Black Skull and Tiger Shark pirate fleets..."
Karen knelt before Leilin Farell, respectfully presenting a parchment dense with writing.
The entirety of Marquis Louis's plan—including the troops he intended to mobilize, even William's route and the news that
"Tsk, tsk... This Dim is quite the madman, isn't he?"
"People backed into corners and driven mad become utterly irrational. He knows perfectly well that his family is his last lifeline, yet he's willing to destroy it with his own hands. Pathetic, really..."
Karen bowed even lower, not daring to meet Leilin's gaze.
Though she had once shared an intimate relationship with Leilin, by now she had realized she understood almost nothing about this master of hers. For the sake of advantage, he could join forces with former enemies without a moment's hesitation—and this uncanny grasp and manipulation of the human heart was like a demon wearing a person's skin.
Yes! A demon! In Karen's mind, only the arch-devils of the Nine Hells could possess such cold-blooded, ruthless composure.
"What's the matter? Are you afraid of me?"
Even her faintest flicker of thought seemed to have been detected by Leilin. His casual question made Karen's whole body tremble.
"No! Not at all... I'm simply worried that Viscount Dim might renege. After all, nobles are an untrustworthy lot! And even if the plan succeeds, we'd still have to worry about him testifying against us as a witness..."
Karen hurried to speak.
"As long as William remains alive, the chances of Dim going back on his word are slim!"
Though he had noticed his subordinate's fear, Leilin was not particularly angered or upset. It was only natural.
Only when among the Scarlet Tiger pirates did Leilin occasionally shed his noble's mask and reveal a fragment of his true self to others.
And the result of that was a soul-deep awe from every other pirate.
Indeed, had Isabel's mentality not gradually shifted alongside the demonic transformation of her body, even she might have grown fearful and distant toward him.
"And once the deed is done, as for whether Dim might report to or seek help from the Danbules Kingdom..."
Leilin let out a soft chuckle: "Did I leave behind any images or evidence that could point back to me?"
"No!" Karen's eyes widened as the realization dawned.
"So this entire affair, from start to finish, was nothing more than contact between the Scarlet Tiger pirates and Dim. And would Dim really stake his own future—risk even a death sentence by hanging—just to testify against a band of pirates?"
"Master, you are brilliant!" Only now did Karen grasp just how far ahead Leilin had planned.
"That's not all... Louis and William are, after all, a Marquis and Marquis-heir recognized by the Kingdom, and they even carry royal blood. The Bodie Archipelago is their fief. Do you think we could simply waltz in and take over after eliminating them?"
"The King would go mad and attack us with everything he had!"
"Exactly! So we need to put a puppet ruler in place on the surface. Dim is perfect for the role, don't you think?"
Leilin laced his fingers together: "With him in position, the whole affair can be buried under the guise of infighting among noble offspring. In the Kingdom, such things are hardly rare."
"That way, His Majesty and the Royal Family save face. He'll still resent us, of course, but the likelihood of him committing massive resources to hunt us down will be far less..."
"Your subordinate understands..."
Even as she respectfully withdrew, shock lingered on Karen's face.
Leilin's vision, it turned out, extended far beyond what she had imagined.
"Are all humans this calculating? This depth of scheming—even the mistresses of the Underdark..."
Karen departed, her mind heavy with troubled thoughts.
Leilin, meanwhile, turned to comfort his cousin: "I know—your family's blood debt includes a share on Dim's part as well. But rest assured, when the time is right, he will pay the price..."
"I have no doubt of that!"
Isabel fixed Leilin with a deep look: "And this time, I want to handle it personally."
"Of course. William can be left to you."
A cold gleam flickered through Leilin's eyes.
"One more thing—send word to the Barbarian Pirate Fleet. This time, we're going to wipe out their entire naval force in one sweep!"
A grey falcon, a rolled parchment tied in a cylinder to its leg, vanished into the night sky like a bolt of grey lightning.
At the speed and flying capability of such a bird of prey, reaching Pirate's Harbor would take only half a night.
A tremendous gust of wind blasted past, sending the heavy curtains flapping.
"What a adorable little creature! Hehe..." Madam Tilun playfully teased the falcon's sharp beak while plucking the letter from beneath its foot.
"The operation has begun!"
After quickly scanning the contents, Madam Tilun addressed the barbarian chieftain in the room.
Gulp! Gulp!
A massive goblet brimming with golden liquor, its handle thick as a baby's arm, was now gripped in a colossal fist.
Ougede's throat bobbed as he gulped down the drink, streams of liquor leaking from the corners of his mouth and running down along his spike-like beard.
"Borujie! Borujie!! Borujie—I'll make your skull into a drinking cup!"
Ougede growled, snatching up the enormous horse-chopping blade beside him. Terrifying magical sharpness gleamed along its edge.
"Pass the word—our people move out as well!"
At Ougede's roar, two barbarian warriors who had been waiting outside the door immediately sprinted away.
In moments, the entirety of Pirate's Harbor erupted into a boiling uproar.
Rank upon rank of barbarian warriors, led by their captains, boarded the ships in orderly fashion. Among them were even priests draped in multicolored feathers, their faces decorated with painted markings.
These were the rare spellcasters of the barbarian tribes, and the fact that every last one had been mobilized spoke volumes about Ougede's determination and gravity.
"The Pirate Tide! This—it's just like the Pirate Tide from decades ago..."
The Barbarian Pirate Fleet was not composed of barbarians alone. As the dark forces' leader across the outer seas, it commanded a vast host of pirates from numerous other races, all of whom now joined the mobilization. A thousand sails surged forth from Pirate's Harbor, carrying a terrifying sense of foreboding.
In a dark, shadowed corner, a priest of the God of Murder murmured quietly. Beside him stood a hunched figure—the very same bishop from before.
"I scent the stench of conspiracy and slaughter... This grand spectacle will greatly please my lord!"
The bishop murmured, tracing a strange sigil over his chest.
"Prepare our people. Carry out assassinations against the leaders of both sides. Let the chaos grow even more intense!"
After this great reshuffling of pirate power, the balance across the outer seas was certain to undergo a seismic shift. But the bishop's aims clearly went far beyond that.
All he desired was chaos!
No matter who rose to power after the carnage, that would represent order—and that was something the God of Murder did not relish. He needed nothing more than an outer sea mired in chaos, awash in endless killing and conspiracy, with no end in sight.
For slaughter and conspiracy were precisely what
If he could pull this off, he would surely receive divine favor! A boost of one or two levels in his priestly rank would be the bare minimum—there would be other, greater rewards as well!
And compared to all that, what did the withering of the outer seas matter?
"As you command!"
Only now did the bishop grasp a sliver of the grand conspiracy this bishop had orchestrated. Whether it had been the earlier neutrality or the current assassination plot, all he had ever wanted was chaos and sacrificial death!
But such methods, the bishop had to admit, thrilled and excited him to the core.
With spirits soaring high, the priest's figure gradually melted into the darkness, leaving the bishop alone to gaze upon the myriad sails spreading across the water.