Chapter 99: Chapter-99

Duke Romian laughed—loud and genuine. “Exactly what I thought. You’re a terrible liar, Princess.”

“I’m an efficient communicator. There’s a difference.”

“Perhaps.” He opened the door. “Three days. Then you’ll have my answer.”

He left.

Elara stood in the sitting room, processing what had just happened.

Duke Romian hadn’t refused. Hadn’t been offended by her bluntness. Had actually seemed… amused? Intrigued? Something approximating positive response.

Probability of acceptance: higher than initial estimates.

The fox knight appeared in the doorway. “Your Highness? How did it go?”

“Better than expected. He’s considering the proposal.”

“That’s… actually that’s incredible. I thought he’d refuse immediately.”

“He almost did. But the honest approach worked better than emotional appeals would have.” Elara walked to her desk. “Now we wait three days for his decision.”

“And if he refuses?”

“Then I pursue alternative strategies. But I don’t think he will refuse.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Elara picked up the marriage terms document Duke Romian had left behind. On the bottom, in small precise handwriting, he’d added a note:

*Clause 6 amendment: Dissolution requires 10 years minimum, not 5. If we’re doing this, we commit properly.*

She showed it to the fox knight.

“He’s already negotiating terms,” she said. “That means he’s seriously considering acceptance. People don’t negotiate contracts they plan to refuse.”

The fox knight stared at the note. “Your Highness… you might actually pull this off.”

“We’ll know in three days.”

Elara filed the document carefully. Three days until Duke Romian’s answer. Three days to prepare for either outcome.

If he accepted, she’d have military protection and political legitimacy that would fundamentally shift the succession battle dynamics.

If he refused, she’d need a contingency plan.

But either way, she’d already accomplished something significant.

She’d shocked the entire court, forced her sisters to reconsider their assessment of her capabilities, and demonstrated she could negotiate at the highest levels.

Not bad for her first week back in the capital.

Now she just needed to survive the next three days while every noble in the palace gossiped about the Fourth Princess’s insane marriage proposal.

Should be interesting.

# Scene 6: The Shadow Guild’s Report

Three days.

Elara had three days to wait for Duke Romian’s answer.

She didn’t plan to waste them.

The morning after the proposal, she sat in her study with the fox knight standing guard at the door. On her desk lay a sealed envelope bearing the Shadow Guild’s mark—a stylized dagger wrapped in smoke.

She’d paid them a substantial sum for this intelligence. It had better be worth it.

Elara broke the seal and pulled out the documents.

The first page was a summary:

**INVESTIGATION COMPLETE: FUNDING SOURCES FOR ASSASSINATION ATTEMPTS AGAINST FOURTH PRINCESS ELARA BLACKWOOD**

**Primary Contractor:** Melissa Corvane (“The Broker”)

**Confirmed Clients (in chronological order):**

1. Third Princess Mingzhu Blackwood – 3 contracts, total 4,500 gold

2. First Princess Eleana Blackwood – 2 contracts, total 3,200 gold

3. **IMPERIAL ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE – 2 contracts, total 6,000 gold**

Elara went completely still.

Imperial Administrative Office.

That was the Emperor’s direct administrative apparatus. The office that handled his personal business, his private funds, his confidential operations.

The Emperor had paid to have her killed.

Twice.

She read the line again, confirming she hadn’t misunderstood.

**IMPERIAL ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE – 2 contracts, total 6,000 gold**

Six thousand gold. More than both her sisters combined. Professional rates for professional killers.

The next page provided details:

**Contract 1 (Imperial Administrative Office):**

– Date: Two months after Fourth Princess departed for Port Crestfall

– Amount: 3,000 gold

– Target specifications: Make it look like bandit attack. No witnesses.

– Result: FAILED (target survived ambush on merchant road)

**Contract 2 (Imperial Administrative Office):**

– Date: Four months after departure

– Amount: 3,000 gold

– Target specifications: Poison. Untraceable. Frame local noble if possible.

– Result: FAILED (target identified poison before consumption)

Elara set down the first page and picked up the second. This one contained witness testimony from Shadow Guild operatives who’d infiltrated the Imperial Administrative Office.

*”Payment authorization came directly from the Emperor’s personal seal. Not delegated to ministers or stewards—His Majesty personally approved both contracts.”*

*”The contracts specified ’testing parameters’—not typical assassination language. Phrasing suggested the Emperor wanted to observe the Fourth Princess’s response to threats rather than simply eliminate her.”*

*”After each failed attempt, the Emperor received detailed reports on how the Fourth Princess survived. He requested tactical analysis of her defensive capabilities.”*

Testing.

The Emperor hadn’t been trying to kill her. He’d been testing her.

Paying assassins to see if she could survive. Observing how she responded to threats. Analyzing her capabilities like she was some kind of experiment.

Elara leaned back in her chair and stared at the ceiling.

Her own father had funded two assassination attempts—not because he wanted her dead, but because he wanted data on whether she could survive.

She processed this information methodically.

**Hypothesis 1:** The Emperor was eliminating weak candidates from the succession battle. If she died, she wasn’t worthy. If she survived, she proved capability.

**Hypothesis 2:** The Emperor wanted to force her to develop survival skills. The assassination attempts were training, not elimination.

**Hypothesis 3:** The Emperor was gathering intelligence on all his daughters. Testing each one differently to assess their true capabilities beyond public performance.

All three hypotheses were plausible. Possibly all three were true simultaneously.

The third page contained more troubling information:

**ADDITIONAL FINDINGS:**

The Imperial Administrative Office has contracted assassinations against multiple imperial family members over the past five years:

– Second Princess Sera Blackwood: 1 contract (SUCCESSFUL – publicly ruled accidental death)

– Fifth Prince [NAME REDACTED]: 2 contracts (BOTH SUCCESSFUL – publicly ruled natural causes)

– Seventh Princess: 1 contract (FAILED – currently active)

– First Princess Eleana Blackwood: 3 contracts (ALL FAILED)

– Third Princess Mingzhu Blackwood: 2 contracts (BOTH FAILED)

**Assessment:** The Emperor appears to be actively culling the succession pool through covert assassination while publicly maintaining neutrality.

Elara read that section three times.

The Emperor was killing his own children.

Not all of them. Just the ones who failed his tests.

Second Princess was dead—publicly an accident, actually an assassination. Two princes dead—natural causes that weren’t natural at all. Seventh Princess had an active contract against her.

And the ones who survived? First Princess Eleana—three failed attempts. Third Princess Mingzhu—two failed attempts. Elara herself—two failed attempts so far.

The survivors were the ones who passed the tests.

The fourth page was even more interesting:

**TIMELINE ANALYSIS:**

The Emperor’s assassination contracts correlate with succession battle developments:

– Second Princess killed shortly after attempting to form alliance with foreign power (FAILED TEST: showing disloyalty to empire)

– Fifth Prince killed after embezzling from imperial treasury (FAILED TEST: corruption)

– Sixth Prince killed after losing military engagement (FAILED TEST: incompetence)

**Pattern identified:** The Emperor eliminates children who demonstrate fundamental flaws that would make them unsuitable rulers. Assassination attempts against surviving princesses appear designed to test survival capabilities rather than eliminate them.

**Conclusion:** The Emperor is running the succession battle as a controlled culling process. Only candidates who demonstrate both capability AND survival instincts will remain. The “winner” will be whoever survives longest while proving competence.

Elara set down the pages and stood.

She walked to the window, looking out at the palace complex where her father—the Emperor—sat in his throne room, playing games with his children’s lives.

Testing them. Killing the ones who failed. Watching the survivors fight each other.

It was brilliantly efficient.

Cruel, yes. Ruthless, absolutely. But efficient.

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