Lord Of Puppets

[6 and half months after the Brutes and Wyvern incident.]

[Current location: Gorjy Empiric Castle]

"So... There won’t be a war?" – asked the emperor Gustav Warmin The Third as he and the vampire leader, Korwan Von Kurwiad, were having a private meeting in the emperor’s office.

"By the looks of things, no." – replied the duke rank vampire.

"It seems that Ariava’s plan had succeeded."

"However, some nations do suspect that we may had been involved with the incident revolving Warmur kingdom’s rebellion situation."

"... But are they preparing something?" – asked the emperor.

"Well, from what I’m hearing and seeing, it seems they are preparing, but nothing in large scale or even mobilizing their armies."

"...If I think what I think is happening, they are wary of us."

"They are scared and they are ready to possible fight us." – said the emperor.

"Or they maybe waiting for something like a trigger."

"Pretty much." – replied Korwan as he sat down on the sofa.

"Either way, even if the trigger would appear, they wouldn’t start making any big moves from the get go."

"Not only that, it already been few years since the empire was founded."

"Yes. The stability of the nation is reaching the acceptable state." – said the emperor as he stood up and handed over few documents to the vampire.

"Honestly speaking? I’m surprised that we didn’t ended up in random bullshit situation."

"..."

"No. We would definitely end in the one." – said the vampire with annoyed expression.

"...You are not wrong there." – said the emperor as he sat down on the sofa that was on the opposing side of the table.

"The surface wasn’t really easy to maintain and everything, but pretty much entire true chaos was happening underneath."

"Tell me honestly."

"Do you really think we would had not survived without Ariava?"

"..."

"As much as it pains me to say that, no." – said the vampire.

"The chaos we had been dealing with was way larger than we could had ever predicted."

"Not only that, we wouldn’t be able to archive this peace so quickly... We honestly expected at least 6 years before everything would calm down and we could finally somewhat start building shit up."

"But now?" – said the emperor.

"WE ARE THRIVING!"

"Yes... This, wasn’t planned or anything like that... The empire is stabilizing way quickly than we could ever dream of."

"Not only that, there is that dungeon."

"At first, everybody wanted to get rid of it as quick as possible, they were also fully against the idea of contract as a whole... But after more time would go by, they would see the dungeon as something ’valuable’ that belongs to the empire."

"...Honestly speaking... I can’t disagree with that."

"We are getting free soldiers, expendable soldiers that can die and there won’t be a big problem."

"Not only that, the dungeon can also produce monsters that give us rare materials?"

"...It is extremely beneficial for us." – said the vampire.

"Honestly, every single one of us thought that the dungeon may end up being a freaking parasite here... But instead? We are benefiting from it way too much."

"Which is scary to say the least."

"Ariava said that the dungeon master Thauma only wishes for the peace."

"It maybe true, or maybe not."

"Either way, we are dealing with the monster that could possible wipe out our entire empire, which we have no way of even fighting back against."

"Honestly, we had this conversation about her and the dungeon, over and over again... And it is pissing me off."

"..."

"Honestly, I’ve already given up on it myself." – said the emperor as he looked at the celling.

"We maybe empire, but there is no way we can destroy her, nor in the near future... Maybe in the far future? But again, ’FAR’."

"I get what you mean." – said the vampire.

"Honestly speaking, a lot of vampires wants to use the dungeon to produce as many monsters as possible."

"Some greedy fuckers even wanted to have ALL of the monsters produced by the dungeon to be handed over to us."

"Greedy bastards."

"Well, the same problem is on my end." – said the emperor as he grabbed a bottle of the wine that was underneath the table as well two glasses and put them down the floor, before then pouring a drink to each side.

"My daughter Endera, wishes to utilize the dungeon to boost further our military strength."

"Like, to the point of abuse."

"However, my son Erwin, just like us, do not trust that dungeon... If anything, his distrust is even bigger than ours."

"But he dealt with us, right?" – asked Korwan as he took a sip of a wine.

"Yes, he got used to you guys. But the dungeon is different." – said Gustav as he stared at the wine in his glass.

"He committed a mass genocide."

"He really doesn’t want to trust the dungeon... He knows the whole story, both of our families knows the true story!"

"But still, he is still pissed that the dungeon not only walked free after committing the genocide, but was even rewarded with its own territory."

"Well, it wasn’t just him who was pissed off." – said Korwan.

"But still, he knows the truth and he is your successor to the throne, yeah?"

"Yeah... After Endera decided to fortieth her right to the throne, she decided to focus fully on military effort in order to make sure that the empire would be strong enough to handle any threat." – replied Gustav.

"That is also why she wants to weaponize the dungeon and have it fully under our control."

"She wants to use it to protect the empire."

"However, she is no fool."

"She knows who is backing up the dungeon."

"Still... I need to stop her from attempting to speed up the growth of our forces too much, we already had somewhat... Heated conversation about this."

"Wait, she is dead set on having war or something like that?" – asked Korwan.

"No... Well... Yes?" – said Gustav.

"Simple put, she knows how stupid the other kingdoms are, and she think that we should just destroy them in order to ’defuse’ the bomb."

"The annoying thing is, a lot of people are somewhat on her side with this."

"...The same is on our end." – said Korwan.

(Honestly speaking, I don’t have any ulterior motives.) – thought Korwan.

(Our race on this continent? Is pretty much fucked.)

(Vampires are beings of pride... And that very pride is destroying them.)

(They are doing stupid shit nonstop... And at the rate things are going, other vampires who were not involved with them would also end up suffering.)

(It needs to stop.)

(We cannot hide any longer and scheme in the shadows, causing the distrust towards the vampire kind to grow.)

(We need to make real and official appearance.)

(We need to have HOME for our people.)

"..."

<<I still remembers it.>> - {Korwan is narrator right now}

<<That pathetic excuse of a family that I’ve had.>>

<<Vampire dukes.>>

<<They are nothing more than cowards and bastards.>>

<<All of them.>>

<<They were dukes... But they met a pathetic end.>>

<<I only survived because I’ve ran away like a coward... But I saw the truth.>>

<<Those bastards... They were rotting their own kind.>>

<<Only when I’ve lost everything, my family, our fortune and our servants... I’ve realized how pathetic the vampire kind had become.>>

<<It wasn’t just my family.>>

<<It was almost the entire vampire kind.>>

<<In the past, the vampires were feared, they were mighty and powerful.>>

<<But when times changed? They refused to change with it.>>

<<Not only that, their stubbornness caused them to become far more arrogant and prideful.>>

<<Because of that, the duke family, I reaped DUKE RANK VAMPIRE family was annihilated not because they were drunk on pride.>>

<<Heck. That monster, Ariava Brywa.>>

<<I wouldn’t be surprised if the reason why she was born was fully because of the vampire’s fault... I do know some stuff about her, but a lot about her origin was erased by somebody... My kin if I were to guess.>>

<<They didn’t wanted to bare the humiliation that they had created the monster which could annihilate us.>>

<<This is truly pathetic.>>

<<This pride is nothing more than poison that is killing us.>>

<<Some want to change... But those who can’t let go of their own pride? They would rather just murder their own kind rather than throw away their worthless pride.>>

<<This is stupid.>>

<<I saw myself, many, MANY times over what that pride led in the end.>>

<<And yet... How they still clench to that stupid idea?>>

<<I’ve heard about the so-called vampire empress or vampire kings out there... But how are they like?>>

<<Did they become who they are because they changed? Or was it just their power and power alone?>>

<<...If it was power alone, then they will die like fools, like all the others.>>

<<We need different way.>>

<<WE NEED TO SURVIVE!>>

<<We need to bring change to our people.>>

<<I’ve rebuild from ground up my burn down house.>>

<<Became "ME" through my very own efforts!>>

<<I’ve even gathered those who wishes to change or just wishes to survive or maybe something as simple as live in peace.>>

<<I’ve helped in creation of that empire and I’m proud of it.>>

<<Because with it, the vampire kind may have obtain a chance to survive and not die a fool’s death.>>