He's in Love with the Devil.

Chapter 8: The Star of Destiny Has Changed

The only thing in the silence was the snorting of the warhorse, and a small cloud of white mist dispersed.

Count Walter died in his chamber.

He was still running around for the past few days trying to find out why the messenger had disappeared, and there was nothing out of the ordinary except a few moments of agitation. Just now, however, the king's chief chamberlain pushed his way in and found him sitting in his bedroom holding a bloodstained sword and slitting his own throat like the traveling merchant.

There was so much to be done in preparation for the journey to the negotiation, that the people had for a time neglected this Monsieur le Comte, who had been disliked by the king. If the king had not asked, his body would not have been discovered until the evening.

There were a few moments of nervousness as the men of the negotiating mission looked at the king.

The death of the Count seemed so strange that they feared that the King, who had acted arbitrarily, would delay his departure.

But not arriving at the agreed time was tantamount to an insult to the other party to the negotiations - not that it mattered to the king, I'm afraid, who was born arrogant.

But today's war situation does not look good for Rogaland.

Luckily, the king doesn't seem to have come to that point yet.

He signaled the Duke of Buckingham to come forward and entrusted him with the investigation into the truth of the Earl's death.

"Of course, that's not the most important thing." The teenage king reached out of the car window as he gazed into the old duke's eyes. "You know that, don't you?"

"You are the only one I can trust right now."

He lowered his voice, so softly that only the old Duke alone could hear him.

The Duke of Buckingham bowed his head and kissed the back of the King's hand according to etiquette, while replying in a low voice, "I will guard Rogaland for you."

"For the glory of Roseland."

The king looked deeply at his gray-haired uncle.

The Duke of Buckingham stood up straight, and he took a step back, his cloak raised by the cold wind, scarlet as if colored by blood. He stood lofty as a lion. He had been cautious for his nephew for many years, and it was not until then that people realized that the old Duke was still the same famous iron general at heart.

The Duke clenched his fist and struck his heart in a deep voice:

"For the glory of Rosebud!"

The flavor of iron and blood and fire came through his voice, clanging like a sword.

Everyone chanted, and the knights escorting the king clenched their fists, their iron armor gleaming in the sunlight:

"For the glory of the Rose!"

With this oath-like royal motto of Rogaland, the negotiating mission set off. The old duke gazed longingly at the king's carriage, in front of which the scarlet banner fluttered, and on that blood-like color the dark gold iron roses blossomed against the winter.

Please bless our king, the soul of the ancestors of the Rose family.

..................

The Moon River Fortress not far from Tru City.

The Moon River Fortress was built a hundred years ago when the Lion King put down the rebellion in the east.

It was built with hard white stone, and the cracks were filled with iron instead of clay. It is said that the fortress took out almost all of the Lion King's belongings. Over the next hundred years, the Moon River Fortress became an impenetrable iron barrier guarding the central and western plains of Rogaland.

It was precisely for this reason that General John's defeat created such a big stir in the country.

Today, the blue tulip flag is planted on this beautiful and sturdy fortress.

The leader of the Burlesque Kingdom Expeditionary Army stood on the walls of the fortress.

The general's face was manicured and clean, and his turquoise eyes looked like the snow wolves of the north. He wore black iron armor and his sword was never far from his body, ready to leap up and decapitate his enemies. At this moment, the lead general was stroking the clean white stone and looking out over the distant mountains of Rogaland.

"General, what do you think about the ambassador's letter?"

The one who asked the question was an eccentric young man beside the general, who was shrouded in a pitch-black cloak from head to toe, tall, thin, and somewhat somber.

"The Archduke has requested that we disrupt this negotiation, do you intend to do as he wishes?"

"Of course-" the general smiled, "no."

He curtailed his smile, his face showing a bit of gloom, "If the Duke of Buckingham were to die, he would naturally be able to ascend to the throne without any problems or hindrances. Since we have done what was required of us in terms of cooperation, we have created the conditions for him to the best of our ability. And yet he failed to make the Duke of Buckingham fall as agreed upon, so why should we continue to do our best to help him?"

"I'm afraid the Grand Duke will not be satisfied with that answer."

"The Kingdom of Blesi is not his nanny."

The general sneered.

"Since the Duke of Buckingham isn't dead, we'll have to do a double take."

"What do you mean ......?"

"I received a letter from the Queen the day before yesterday, there is a change in the country. We can't stay in Rogaland for too long." The general glossed over what change, "We can negotiate a peace agreement with the king of Rogaland. As for whether that bad-tempered king with little brain is dead or alive after the negotiation is done will have nothing to do with us."

"You don't seem to have a high opinion of the King of Rogaland?"

The young man caught a point.

"I'm sorry for William, he would have been an honorable foe in his youth. Unfortunately, his son is nothing short of a disgrace to the House of Rosebud. A large empire heading for a fall apart at the hands of a tyrant." The general sighed, "And I wonder why the Duke of Buckingham is loyal to him."

"But General ......," the young man hesitated, "the ambassador mentioned in his letter that he felt the monarch was a bit off from the rumors."

"What difference can there be?" The general smiled contemptuously, "If it weren't for his uncle, this teenage king would have already been torn to shreds by those nobles."

"I hope it is as you say."

"What's the matter with you? My dear astrologer?" The General looked at him suspiciously, "You seem to favor my granting the Archduke's request to help them kill Pullan I?"

"I think perhaps it would be to our advantage for the Archduke to become King of Rogaland, after all, we have him in our hands don't we?"

"No, it's not that." The General laughed and said gently, "You are indeed skilled in astrology, but your nose for politics is less so. Why should we let a young and strong wild wolf replace a young and incompetent lion? Why not let the jackal fight the old male lion to the death."

"But the Natal Star has changed."

The young man replied.

"I see a fiery sun about to rise, it resides in the middle of the Abyssal Channel, and it could belong to us, the Bolesi, or it could be the Rogaland. I feel uneasy, General."

"That must be our sire."

The general said firmly.

"Burlesque will surely conquer the land, and the tulips will bloom forever."

............

The king's carriage was very spacious.

Unlike the one he rode in that day when he left the palace in an emergency, this carriage was pulled by twelve steeds, and the layouts in it were even more exquisite and luxurious. Oil lamps were burning behind the glass cover, and the light was dim.

Zhu Chi was flipping through the report submitted to him by Knight Moore in the firelight.

He had been carefully reading this report all the way.

In fact, he originally didn't have too many requirements for this report, after all, three days was really too short. But perhaps the sentence "Now, his life is in your hands" stimulated him too much, and the three knights who tried to save General John tried their best to organize it, and even submitted a thick, very detailed report.

Of course, this is still too brief for the whole battle, naturally, it is impossible to meet the standard of the king's words, "every millstone" needs to be accounted for.

Therefore, when submitting this report, the three knights were so disoriented that they wanted to stab themselves in the throat.

The king did not say anything and received the report with a blank face.

The three knights didn't know what the king meant, so they had to follow with a little hope. On the way forward, the king didn't appear outside the carriage much, and from time to time, he would call Moore and the others inside the carriage to raise his own question on a certain point of the report.

This also made Moore and the others feel greatly surprised.

They realized that the king seemed to have a particularly sharp intuition, raising questions that were more difficult to answer one by one.

The king didn't utter a word of mockery at their difficult answers, but the expressionless look on his face and the coldness in his brow were enough to make these three knights in a sorry state.

Seeing that they were approaching the negotiation site, the three of them actually had a strange feeling of relief-

Dead or alive, make it quick, Your Majesty.

Of course, they didn't dare to say this.

The carriage shook slightly and the lights swayed.

Zhu Chi pressed his temples and raised his head.

"Tru City has arrived, Your Majesty."

The Chief of Internal Affairs steered his horse to the window of the car and respectfully said.