"Y-you stop him! Don't let him kill me! Yann needs me!" The Prince exclaimed at the top of his lungs, even when Gabriel hadn't started moving.
He had seen the middle aged man remove shackles on his own. He knew that the man was strong. He didn't know how strong, but he really hoped that he was strong enough to hold Gabriel back. He still hadn't realized that the man was working for Gabriel and the only reason he came out of the shackles was because he wasn't properly shackled at all.
The middle aged man looked at the young prince with a pitiful gaze. The Prince had fallen straight into the lie. Then again, he was a citizen of Yann and expected something like that. He knew the personality of this young man who could do anything to live. What he didn't expect was the two Princesses who refused to leave.
He was sure that the Princesses didn't know that this was a set-up by Gabriel to decide the future of the three. It only meant that they genuinely had no intentions of usurping Gabriel.
"Help you?" the middle aged man asked the Prince on the ground. "With a Prince as stupid as you, it's no wonder your family couldn't hold onto the power. Let alone me, no one in this Empire can help you. You were dead the moment you agreed to leave the cell with me."
The man didn't interfere in what was about to happen next. He just stepped back, wondering just how Gabriel was going to deal with the Prince.
Gabriel didn't speak much. After briefly observing the Prince who was on the ground, he turned around. "Shift the Princesses to proper rooms in the castle. They aren't allowed to leave their rooms without my permission. Assign some guards before the rooms assigned to them."
"Your Majesty, about the Prince?" the middle aged man asked, surprised. Was Gabriel not going to kill the Prince? That didn't make sense.
"What Prince?" Gabriel asked, without even bothering to look back.
"That... Huh?" The Middle Aged man was about to reply when he heard some noise coming from behind him. As soon as he turned around, he found the Prince still lying on the ground. However, his head wasn't attached to his body anymore.
'This guy... He is frightening,' the middle aged man thought, watching Gabriel leave.
The two Princesses were horrified to watch their brother being killed. All they saw before their brother's head rolled on the ground was a single thread of light appearing around the man's neck as if it was a collar. The collar of light immediately tightened, slicing the throat of the Prince.
Both the Princesses gulped down, touching their throats, wondering if there was a similar collar around their necks which they couldn't see...
****
The Two Princesses were shifted to proper rooms in the castle, treated like guests. However, all the servants knew that it was no different than house arrest. They were given a proper room to stay, and delicious food daily, but they weren't allowed to leave.
It only took twenty four hours and the news about the new Emperor spread in the entire Empire. The news even travelled to the neighbouring Empires with time, shocking all the nearby Empires. The change was so sudden after all.
Most of the people didn't even know what the Emperor looked like, but according to the stories that spread, the new Emperor was a young Knight in his early twenties who was a descendant of the Arecia Clan. No one knew that he was a Mage... No one except Duke Callum who was the only Duke left in the Empire.
All the Dukes that helped the previous Emperor in destroying the Arecia Clan had been killed. Duke Callum also destroyed all the Clans that refused to surrender right away. As for the clans that did surrender, all people who could influence the future stability of the Empire were killed by him, leaving only the ones who couldn't affect anything.
The Dukes who sided with Gabriel gave up their properties, wealth and armies on their own. Duke Callum didn't even need to work hard for that.
Within a day, the size of the Royal Army had increased by multiple folds and all Powers who maintained their own armies were brought down a notch. Despite such a drastic change happening in the Empire in such a short time, nothing back happened since most of the people already supported the new Emperor.
Even the criminals didn't dare to cause any troubles after hearing just how ruthless the new Emperor was to his enemies. There was not a single person in the Empire who wasn't talking about Gabriel for now.
Meanwhile, Gabriel was still in his room in the Palace. He had searched the entire Palace from top to bottom throughout the day, finally finding the telling that he was looking for.
He was sitting on the bed, looking at the cross shaped earring that was placed before him.
The mirror in the tower of challenges only told him that the earring could help make his body become stronger, but how? He didn't know. He wasn't even told anything about the earring, or the demigod it belonged to. Since he had limited questions, he couldn't ask these questions either.
However, he had something that he believed could help him understand this peculiar Numen and its past.
"Lambard was after this item, so it shouldn't have been disappointing. Unfortunately, it has only failed me so far. I hope it doesn't fail now..." He brought out the Eye of Osiris, which belonged to the Demigod Osiris who could see past and present of anything.
Even though the eye of Osiris wasn't as powerful as Demigod Osiris in terms of abilities, it still had one of the Demigod's skills. No matter which item Gabriel looked at, the ring of Osiris could look into its past and reveal all the mysteries about it...at least that's what he thought initially.
He only used this ring three times... First was on the Orb of Time and the second was on the Grimoire of Necromancy. The first two times, the eyes of Osiris failed to look through these items, as if the items were beyond its reach. It was only when he used it on a low tier Numen that was associated with Demigods that it worked.
With that kind of experience, Gabriel wasn't even sure if this was going to work on the earring before him, but he could only try. Since the earring of strength belonged to a Demigod, he had a feeling that it might work.
He held the eye of Osiris between his thumb and his finger before touching the earring with it.
