Free Web NovelChapter 411: Chapter 411 The King’s Warning_1
On the outskirts of the city, a private vineyard, a secret police stronghold. freewebnøvel.com
Heinz sat in the room, sipping coffee across a tea table with a slender man in a military uniform.
"The people brought in for reinforcement are all elites from the Royal Guard," said the man as he lifted his coffee cup, "His Majesty values this mission highly and will not let you, Commander, be at a disadvantage in terms of manpower."
"Having Lieutenant Colonel you to support me is an indication I’ve disappointed His Majesty," Heinz said, his expression unchanged but his tone unusually grave.
"Commander, don’t overthink it, His Majesty simply sent me to assist you," the Lieutenant Colonel smiled, "Sooner or later, we will all be working under your command. The current situation in the country requires our joint efforts."
"I should have been relieving His Majesty of concerns; instead, I have troubled him, which is truly shameful," Heinz remarked with a sigh, glancing at the man before him.
Not long ago, he sent a telegram to the King suggesting that the difficulty of the mission was too high and to reconsider the assassination operation. The King replied, insisting that he complete the task.
At that time, due to the failure to capture Aiden, the mounted police of Silvertown and the Inquisition Bureau began searching for them in the city. For safety’s sake, Heinz had an operation team leader, whose appearance was compromised, and several team members leave Silvertown early.
That same night, the Kingdom sent a second telegram stating that considering the manpower consumed in the mission, they decided to send a small team to support them.
It was not until the reinforcement arrived today that Heinz realized that the people the King had sent were not members of the Royal Secret Police but belonged to another independent unit from the Gendarme Corps, the Royal Guard—a security department responsible for protecting the safety of royal family members and royal property.
According to the explanation provided, the King decided to expand the scale of the Royal Secret Police. Therefore, a team was transferred from the Royal Guard to join the Secret Police, and participating in this mission was also to allow them to train under the direct command of Heinz.
However, the "elite level" of the transferred personnel far exceeded the needs of the mission. The Lieutenant Colonel leading the team was actually the deputy to the head of the Royal Guard, and in terms of rank within the Gendarme Corps, he was only one rank below Heinz.
Moreover, although the King had indicated the intention of transferring this person into the Secret Police, no official procedures had been issued. In other words, this Lieutenant Colonel still belonged to the Royal Guard and was not yet subordinate to Heinz.
The several departments of the Gendarme Corps are independent of each other. In terms of the Gendarme Corps’ internal standards, the Lieutenant Colonel’s duty to obey Heinz would be limited to saluting him when they met, without any obligation to follow Heinz’s commands. Heinz’s current authority over him is solely based on the King’s directive.
In other words, as long as His Majesty does not pursue the matter afterward, or should he give any more covert instructions beforehand, this Lieutenant Colonel could completely resist Heinz’s orders with the men under his command.
This was, in fact, a warning from the new King.
Heinz was well aware that the Royal Guard was among the most trusted of the new King’s confidants since they were closest to the King. No ruler would want people with potential second thoughts holding guns beside them. After assuming the throne, the new King’s first move was to overhaul the Royal Guard: the person responsible during the old King’s time was transferred away, and the new King installed his own trusted followers, cultivated during his military service.
The new King’s decision to send trusted members of the Royal Guard was undoubtedly to supervise his mission, clearly indicating that Heinz’s report of losing resolve had aroused the King’s suspicions.
Objectively speaking, this was also a normal reaction. Setting aside Heinz’s past relationship with Sara Rekhsia, it was quite difficult for the King to believe simply based on a report that a warden of a prison in an autonomous state actually had the ability to stand against the espionage unit of a major power.
It was only natural for the King to suspect that Heinz was reluctant to carry out this mission and had perhaps been lenient in its execution.
Heinz was well aware that this suspicion wasn’t entirely unfounded; he indeed was averse to the assignment. As for whether he had unintentionally been lenient... upon introspection, he couldn’t be too sure of that either.
The King’s insistence on assigning him this mission was essentially to force him to demonstrate his loyalty.
After all, although Heinz had always been loyal to the royal family, that loyalty was to the old King. In the eyes of the new King, who held differing political views, this fact might actually be a demerit. With the Kingdom’s nobles and ministers now divided into new and old factions over the issue of reforms, to the new King, those capable and influential figures were either confidants if loyal, or a great threat if not.
Thus, the new King was eager for Heinz to give a clear answer as to where he stood, because Heinz’s position was too important in such political struggles. Personally eliminating another bloodline of the old King would undoubtedly make him a trusted confidant of the new King.
The signals released by His Majesty the King were also quite clear; if the person sent found that Heinz truly wasn’t taking the task to heart, he would continue to "expand" the royal secret police force. By infusing his own loyalists into the secret police, the King would dilute Heinz’s control over the department bit by bit— thereby rendering the Hofmann Family no longer trusted by the royal family.
There was no turning back now.
Heinz reached out to pick up his coffee cup and took a sip of the bitter coffee, his expression as hard as a stone carving.
...
In the lower district of Silvertown, at the sweet shop on Seventh Street, Aiden picked up the teacup and sipped some black tea.
Across the tea table sat two witches from Room Twelve, Daili and Presia. In addition to three cups of black tea, there were also two desserts on the table.
Two hours ago, he had shackled the two women with magic power-sealing handcuffs, and then taken them from the prison to the suburbs. The purpose of this mission was to scout the location mentioned in Heinz’s letter.
The meeting place was located in a private vineyard situated on a low hill. Due to its elevated position compared to the surroundings, it had an excellent view, comparable to a military fortress’s watchtower. If it were a stronghold for the royal secret police, there would certainly be people on watch all day, making it nearly impossible for ordinary people to approach unnoticed, let alone infiltrate and investigate.
In Qiqimora’s absence, he could only rely on the magic of Daili and Presia’s familiars.
"There are two people patrolling the vineyard courtyard with dogs, probably military dogs," Presia mapped out on an illustration as she spoke, having sent her consciousness into a bird for an aerial recon of the manor’s exterior, "The lookout point inside the house is likely to be in the attic. The front driveway of the manor is planted with some low-lying fruit trees, and anyone climbing up from below would be immediately detected. There’s an east-west road in front of the main gate where carriages can pass, but actually, the slopes behind and in front of the manor aren’t too steep; you can flee in any direction on foot. Only one carriage arrived at the vineyard this morning, with six people disembarking. They went into the manor and haven’t come out."
"They are reinforcing their numbers," Aiden set down his teacup, "They’re garrisoning troops waiting for our visit."
