15 Belathine's Power Reshuffling

Aruthos woke up as he felt pain all over his body, especially his face, as his senses cleared up gradually. He then realized that a beautiful human woman was staring at him with a composed manner with a book like device on her hand.

This woman must be the mighty witch who beat him up. Although the helmet was not there, and the clothes were different, the body shape and hair were the same. She looked to be in her 30s with an allure of a mature woman; she got all her curves right.

He tried to make sense of his surrounding as he realized he was placed on a sofa bed in an unknown underground location.

The air smelled sterile and the source of light came from a circular embeddened white stones on the four sides of the wall. The woman was sitting just beside him on a metal stool. It looked like she was waiting for him to wake up himself.

Aruthos was not sure whether it is morning or night; he had already lost track of time and he couldn't see the a window anywhere in this preconceived underground area.

Aruthos cleared his throat and asked restlessly in Belathinian language, "Am I a prisoner?"

The woman kept quiet, pondered for a while, then sighed before answering in his mother tongue with a perfect accent, "Nope, you are not at the moment. As long as you answer several questions honestly that is."

The response made Aruthos became more vigilant and clammed up tight.

He suddenly jerked up and tried to grip the elder witch's throat. However it was grasped by her hand instead. The Elder Witch's eyes turned cold.

"Where is the girl?!" He tried to release his hand and showed a threatening glare.

Pasha scoffed off and clutched her fingers around the insolent Oni's fingers in a vise grip. The Oni showed a pained expression as he heard his finger bones emitting cracking sounds. At least half of them had broken again.

"Are you done?"

He stared daggers towards the witch. He needed to save both Leila and Helen from this monster.

[Is this lady a super spy hell-bent on his empire's destruction?]

Looking at Aruthos' reaction, Pasha sighed, "Before you start thinking too much, listen first to this recording."

Pasha played the recording of Roland's evening lecture. She knew the Oni would understand the human language. She had seen the ring on the finger of this Oni. It was the limited-edition ring that came together with a set of 100 serialized picture books known as comics.

Comics were popularized by His Highness at the early stage of the empire development with the help of an assistant witch, Soraya. All comics depicted the life story of a witch for propaganda to increase the empathy of the masses to them. The key witches became extremely popular as their life stories had been reprinted repeatedly.

For an Oni who could painstakingly purchase internally circulated comics from other empire and wore the limited-edition ring proudly on his pinky despite his stature, he must be a die-hard fan of the comic series.

Aruthos blushed when he saw Pasha staring at the ring. It was his deepest darkest secret, his guilty pleasure. No one knew, including his supplier, because he always camouflaged himself when he commissions for the underground delivery.

Only Helen, the woman he was in love with knew since she was the one who connected him to his supplier.

Since nobody else knew about the ring's origin and significance, he dared to wear it out in the open.

Pasha pretended not to notice his blushing and proceed with playing the record from her personal VIRCOF. She didn't want to know other unnecessary issues from the Oni.

As the recording played, Aruthos' concentrated and listened intently. Through this, he might know what the other party wanted from their empire. Maybe he could strike a deal somehow to save both Helen and Leila.

...

"Is this true?!" Pasha could see the stupid Oni was genuinely shaken by the revelations. All signs of resistance have disappeared.

"Unfortunately, yes. This lecture was only four hours ago. Still very fresh. I'm here because I wish to investigate the current conditions of your empire since it was the largest empire in this region." Pasha replied patiently.

"How about the girl and the beautiful lady beside you? I want to see them now. Only by seeing that they are well will this discussion continue." Aruthos repeated his request yet again; this time he withheld his temper. He knew he nearly played his card wrong again.

Pasha push a button on her coms to call the two agents in.

"Uncle Aruthos! Thank goodness you didn't die!" A snotty Leila ran towards the bedridden high general and gave him a hug while whimpering. Aruthos let a relieved sigh and ruffled the little girl's hair. He had treated this girl like his own kin after his sworn brother passed.

His eyes trailed towards the beautiful demure figure behind Leila. Although his body was totally battered, his eyes shone lively when they met with the pair of almond-colored eyes he adored so much. Like a love-struck teenager, he stared brazenly towards the love of his life who had resisted his advances time and time again.

"My sweet Helen! Are you alright?" He tried to hold the senior witch's hand and was expertly avoided. Helen's face was beet-red from the intense blushing. This guy had the gall to court her in front of her superior!

The drama between the Oni and her senior agent was observed thoroughly by the Elder Witch.

With a slight raise of an eyebrow, she knew there was a lot of stories between them, but she did not want to know.

...

His eyes blinking with disbelief as Aruthos still couldn't believe that the woman he fell in love with was a secret agent witch from the Witch Nation, Graycastle Empire. For 50 plus long years he knew her, she expertly covered her identity and only revealed herself as a wandering witch who assume the role of an underground trader.

He had even hand over the only half-human half-Oni bastard-child of the late King to be raised because he trusted her. The child, Leila, only knew him as a benefactor.

After a round of three-pronged explanation from his side, Helen's side, and the Elder Witch Pasha's side, he now had a clear picture of what was happening.

After some deep thoughts, he made up his mind to put the survival of his race with the witches and humans. He quickly contacted his intelligence team to compile all current information and passed it over to Elder Witch Pasha.

He sent another fearful glance towards the Elder Witch. Truly, ignorance is bliss!

He felt like slapping himself for offending one of the strongest witches of the Graycastle Empire. Fortunately, the Elder Witch was noble enough not to pursue the matter before. Both of them knew the disaster at hand was more important.

Series of discussions were done between them. As the discussion progressed, the passive Oni slowly regained his previous vigor. He could see the light at the end of the tunnel for his race.

....

Earlier the next morning, the citizens of the empire had been shocked with the serial assassination of the main figures of the three factions scrambling for the empty monarchy's throne.

At the same time, the empire's military which had kept mum all this time had took a drastic measure to launch a coup, effectively gaining control of the empire's central power. Voice of dissents had been squashed ruthlessly by the highest ranking general, General Aruthos Krizathess of the Dragon Fang, by throwing them en masse into the dungeons without further discussion. Initially, everyone had assumed that the high general was going to fill the throne and take over the Oni nation.

However, two hours after the coup d'etat, the high general had announced the enthronement of the previous emperor's heir.

Empress Leila de Krizathess the fifth.

It shocked the nation again as it was the first time, a hybrid Oni had obtained the throne. It was even a woman.

After wielding the highest power in the nation, the new empress issued the highest-level edict to call for an empire-wide meeting to make a mass power reshuffling. Non-attendees were not given a second say; they were sacked immediately, some were even killed.

During the afternoon of the enthronement day of Empress Leila, she had made an announcement of building a diplomatic relationship with Graycastle. Experts from both side will be sent to and fro to tackle the current fire disasters happening in Belathine.

The empress also circulated the latest information gained from the Graycastle Empire pertaining this issue internally especially for nobles in power who attended the meeting. After the initial fear and trepidation, most of the nobles sided with the empress for the sake of survival. Some remained unconvinced but too scared to voice out. After all, in country like Belathine, strength comes first.

Pasha didn't wait and left for Neverwinter during the empire-wide meeting in satisfaction. The high general stepped out to send her off with mixed feelings.

She glanced at Helen for a short while and gave him a meaningful stare.

"Times are limited. Treasure every second. Work hard."

Aruthos's serious expression were immediately lightened and then replaced with a fiery determination while Helen was blushing at his side.

"Yes madam!" He saluted the Elder Witch following the Belathinian's style.

They watched as the Elder Witch ride the flying car and vanished from their sight as Aruthos tried to hold Helen's hand again for the n-th time. To his surprise, for once, the Senior Witch let him and even proactively laced her fingers to him.

He turned to observe the beautiful face; the love of his life was blushing intensely and refused to meet his eyes. His heart warmed.

[The beatings were worth it.]

He pulled her into his arms and gave her a gentle hug. It was full of unexplained years of longings.

Both of them closed their eyes to savor each other's embrace. They knew that although the future was not bright, at least at this exact moment, they have each other.