From the Ship of Fools to Earl of Wugang

Chapter 71 Royal Descendants

Priscilla, the Silver Bell Palace.

Faced with the paperwork at hand, Konrad von Prischny couldn't help but reminisce about the time he and two strangers had spent slaying ghouls.

He was now sitting in a side hall of the Silver Bell Palace, with a table full of guest lists, order lists, and stacks of formal titles that needed to be read aloud by the Master of Ceremonies.

To be honest, he wasn't very willing to deal with the quiet documents in front of him.

Conrad's gaze lingered on the title of a certain attendee, which took up two and a half lines:

"Didn't this country abolish the aristocracy in its constitution?"

"Indeed, Your Highness." The attendant glanced at him. "However, considering the three legions held by the Duke of Protectorate's faction during the last civil war, all parties agreed to retain this courtesy in order to get them to sign."

The so-called Moral Parliamentary Union is actually composed of seven main council states and more than twenty smaller member states. This land has not been close to unification for nearly a century.

The corporate federal system of the northern Orichalco and the republican system of the southern Veridiasia continued to permeate each other, and the member states became less and less like a single country.

Thus, at the same banquet, a hereditary prince would sit next to the elected speaker, the chairman of the banking association could request a seat further forward than an earl, and the consul, whose country had eliminated the "nobility," might also request that the Silver Bell Palace receive him with aristocratic etiquette.

Not to mention that, due to their ancestors, their branch of the family, despite being grand dukes, still uses royal etiquette.

Suddenly, the side hall door was pushed open from the outside, and his sister Matilda walked in with a maid.

My sister has been educated in the Kingdom of Dushi for the past few years and only recently returned to Silver Bell Palace after coming of age. Tonight is her first time attending a diplomatic banquet of the Commonwealth as an adult member of the royal family.

According to court tradition, she would stand on the royal side with the Grand Duchess and leave her signature on the first page of the Silver Register.

She walked to the table, picked up the opening dance list, glanced at it a few times, and then looked up.

"You have assigned the Duke of Rosen's daughter to the eldest son of the Chancellor of the Exchequer."

""

"This helps... ah, improve financial relations," Conrad replied calmly.

"Is it because she stepped on your foot when you danced together last time?"

Conrad solemnly reached out and took back the list, moving the Duke of Rosen's daughter's card one space from its original position. Matilda, seeing this, also sat down beside him.

Not long after, the door to the side hall was opened again.

A handsome young man with bright blond hair, just like Conrad and Matilda, walked in. The two men immediately stood up to greet him: "Brother."

After returning the greeting to his younger brother and sister, Crown Prince Leopold of the Principality of Plichni walked to the table and glanced at their work.

"Although you prefer fighting to court etiquette, well done."

"Since that's the case, the new firing range has been completed for two weeks now, how about we go take a look?" Conrad put down the list. "You still owe me a test shot."

""

Leopold thought for a moment: "I'll go with you on the first free morning after the banquet."

Matilda gave a less-than-ladylike shrug: "Your free mornings usually only exist in words."

“This time you can write it down.” Leopold pulled a discarded guest card from the table and wrote on the back: “Sunday morning, Royal Shooting Range. Three people.”

He signed his name at the bottom and handed the card to Matilda. Matilda took the pen and carefully added her own signature.

Conrad checked it over, folded the card, and put it into the inside pocket of his dress.

"Now we have the evidence. No meeting can be unilaterally abolished."

Leopold cautioned, "It's best not to use the Chivalrous Path to deal with family agreements."

,

"As long as you show up on time, there will be no controversy."

Leopold responded with a light laugh. The three checked the list again before leaving the side hall.

With more than an hour to go before the banquet was to begin, Conrad headed to the western inner court.

It connects to a small banquet hall, lounge, and several service corridors, and some journalists were allowed to set up their equipment in advance today.

As Conrad walked through the corridor, he saw a man wearing a foreign newspaper badge adjusting his camera by the window.

He had already walked over, but stopped a few steps away where the camera was pointed. There wasn't much to photograph, only a notice board indicating the guards' changing of the guard time.

The man pressed the shutter, and then, by adjusting the straps, turned the camera towards another passageway that was not open to the public.

Conrad didn't turn back, but continued walking forward, casually asking a guard who came towards him about the access control, and then went back to the west side via another staircase.

He walked around the service corridor to the storage room and saw the man push open the door to enter the narrow corridor, so he went to meet him from the other end.

"Sir, this area is outside the scope of the interview permit."

The man was taken aback at first, then his expression turned offended: "Your Highness, I'm lost. The staff may have given me the wrong directions."

"It would be best to have a guard come over and explain," Conrad said, stepping forward.

The man suddenly grabbed the camera strap with his right hand, and a thin blade slid out from the interlayer.

Conrad raised his left arm to block his wrist, using the door frame to restrict the other man's right arm, and his shoulder slammed into his chest.

The man lost his balance and tried to raise his knee, but Conrad dodged to the side, pressed the hand holding the blade against the wall, and used his other hand to grab the strap and strangle the man's neck.

The thin blade landed on the ground, and the man turned around, trying to escape through the crack in the open door.

Conrad mentally defined the conflict as the other side's escape route, which should end at this threshold.

The "checks and balances" provided by the "arbitrator" came into effect. The man's movement to rush out the door was suddenly halted as if he had been tripped.

Conrad grabbed his wrist and tightened his joints to force him to kneel until he stopped struggling.

Two guards who received the signal quickly arrived and put restraint rings on the man.

Conrad picked up the camera, pulled out a separately packaged roll of film from the hidden compartment, and sure enough, he saw the stolen intelligence.

Security officials who arrived at the scene confirmed that the journalist was also working for the intelligence agency of another member state of the alliance, targeting military cooperation between Prishini and Dusch.

A foreign spy is something that can keep the inner court on edge all night.

Security officials immediately demanded a re-verification of all foreign journalists and their entourages, and some of the guards stationed at the service entrance were reassigned to the reception area to check document boxes and vehicle passes.

When Leopold arrived, the man had already been taken away. After hearing what had happened, he glanced at Conrad and said, "This proves that you should have stayed until the end of the banquet tonight."

""

"I solved a problem, but the reward I got was more work."

S

"Isn't this the fate of royalty? Solve one problem, and you get two new ones in return."

"Then this destiny should be broken."

"You can submit it to your father, and he will report it to your uncle—if King Dushi, as the fourth-rank king, agrees, perhaps things will really change?"

The two walked together toward the banquet hall, where the first group of foreign guests were being led into the reception hall through the main entrance by the master of ceremonies. The band began tuning, and waiters stood along the wall carrying trays of wine.

At the entrance to the banquet hall, the three siblings reunited. Leopold was going to accompany the Grand Duke to meet the first group of delegates, while Matilda prepared to make her first public appearance as an adult alongside the Grand Duchess.

Leopold turned back as he left: "Don't forget our promise."

""

Matilda chimed in, "The three of us will meet again sometime!"

""

Conrad patted the inside pocket of his dress: "I've left the evidence, and no one can take it back."

The three of them then walked to different spots in the banquet hall.