Chapter 18

: Clash
Sian looked at Celine who was walking silently next to him.

Are you okay? Wasn’t one of the men from the Royalist Faction?


Huh? What about it?


I mean… You are from the Knight Guard… and the Kiraine Family is a Royalist and all… I was just worried if you felt bad about it.

Celine eyed Sian with a weird look on her face.

Didn’t you learn politics or the basic history of the kingdom?


I did. Uh, sort of!
Sian mumbled embarrassingly. Celine remembered what she heard from Rian, that all teachers who tried to teach Sian were worried because he gave up so quickly.
‘Maybe God is fair after all.’
Celine sighed and decided to give an explanation. He needed to know what was going on to make better decisions on the job.

Look. The Knight Guard works for Tian’s Royal Family.


Right.


Yes, it means we do not care who the king or who his family is. We protect them from foreign enemies and solve Tian’s problems.

Celine explained it, but Sian didn’t seem to grasp the concept yet. She felt she needed to elaborate and remembered how she explained it to her eight-year-old nephew a while ago, which seemed adequate for Sian.

Hmm… You do know who the current king is, right?


Yes. Uhh… Craden Qun Tian… the Third?

Celine looked at Sian as if he had made a grave mistake while speaking to the public and continued,
Second. Anyway, don’t you find it interesting? That Tian has four hundred years of history, but the king is only part of the second generation?


Oh, that’s right. Why is that?


It’s because anyone who can take over the throne can become a king in this country. The current king is very good, considering the fact that it continued into the second generation.


I see. So he rebelled to become a king?


Be careful. You might get arrested for saying that out loud. He did not rebel. It was a… transfer.

Celine stopped for a moment, drank some water, and continued,
Have you heard the phrase, ‘The King must prove himself’? The throne is a position that is highly sought after. But it comes with heavy responsibility. We have the Taran Kingdom from the west and the Kharan Kingdom from the east. We also have to keep the diplomatic relationship with the Con Kingdom across the Kuradan Canyon.

Celine explained further,
No ordinary man can do this easily. You have the military, diplomatic issues arising from all sides outside the country, and inner conflicts. The king is given the authority to rule, but he needs power to fulfill his responsibility. If not, the kingdom will not survive. We will be torn apart by the three kingdoms I mentioned.


Oh… then…


Yeah, the family that proved themselves worthy for the task is chosen to be on the throne. If they can’t prove themselves or if there’s another family that can prove to do it, then they will have to relinquish the throne and transfer the seat over. That’s what is happening right now. The Succession War. The current Royalist needs to prove itself worthy as it did before to take the previous Royalists’ place.

It had continued for years and helped the Tian Kingdom survive. The faction that was overthrown accepted it quietly since they could always try to reclaim the throne later. But there were always those who hated to give up on what they had and were executed. These were the same concerns that Count Kerbel had also.

But I don’t quite understand it yet. Isn’t the Knight Guard there to protect the Royal family?


Yes, but we do not care who it is. We only make a move when the kingdom is in crisis. We cannot interfere with internal conflicts. Besides, the stronger faction taking over the throne is good for the kingdom. So the three warrior families, the seven military groups, Tian Kingdom’s Magical Priest Council, and the Knight Guards do not interfere with the factions. We only intervene when the problem gets out of hand.

Sian finally understood why his father joined the Knight Guard even though he insisted on staying neutral. This was, in fact, the most efficient way to stay neutral.
Celine looked at Sian who finally had a look of understanding and thought she should educate him well. He was too strong and it was dangerous for him to act without proper knowledge.
‘I can’t grasp how strong he is. Has he overcome the wall?’
She wasn’t sure, but part of her had already made up her mind.
It was highly probably that Sian was the blessed great one, Grand Bander.
If it wasn’t true, then it was impossible to make Kial and Karan fall unconscious in one hit. It was a fight between Masters, and even a Master at the same level probably would not be able to stop the fight.
Most people who came back from the Wall became Masters. The total number of Masters within the Tian Kingdom was ninety-seven. Out of those, there were seventeen Royalists and twenty-six Nobles that joined the war. This was all the power that each faction could muster as other the Masters were divided up among the other neutral factions.
Rian and Celine herself were ranked lower than those Masters. Celine was probably the one of the lowest and Rian was probably at about the seventieth rank. There were a few reasons that allowed Celine and Rian to become captain and the lieutenant captain of the Knight Guard.
First, a lot of other Masters had filled up the other positions. They were stationed along the outer perimeter and important stations as commanders and generals to protect and fight against the Kharan Kingdom.
Second, unlike the 1st or 2nd Knight Guards that moved around the entire kingdom, the 3rd Knight Guard only stayed within the capital to keep the peace. As such, it did not require powerful warriors at its disposal.
With the above reasons, there were no Masters left to spare for the 3rd Knight Guard. So including Rian and Celine, the number of Masters in the 3rd Knight Guard was only three.
But third and the last reason was the most important.
Third was that Rian was promised to become a Grand Bander, given his lineage. He needed experience as a captain to become the Commander of the Knight Guard once he became Grand Bander.
Many loved Rian and respected him, but there were some who despised him.
<He is promised to become Grand Bander just because he was born into the Roman family.>
There were a lot of people who barely became Masters at age of forty. The Bander users grew in power as they got older, but it wasn’t enough for them to become Grand Banders. Out of a hundred Masters, only three would become Grand Banders.
But Rian was sure to become one, as all of the Roman family did in the past.
This was why he was the captain of the 3rd Knight Guard.
This was also why Celine hated to admit that the man next to her was already a Grand Bander.