"Until you are burned at the stake, the empire cannot rebel again." The archbishop said, his steel-blue eyes glowing like blades under the moonlight, "that's all."
"Really?"
Adele said she suddenly grabbed the archbishop by the collar.
The archbishop grabbed her wrist reflexively: "What are you doing?"
He still vigilantly remembered Adele's deceitful behavior in the church.
"Who is there?"
Give an order.
Followed by clear footsteps came from the other end of the corridor.
The faces of the two changed slightly at the same time. The patrolling guards on duty are now Dalton's people. Once they see the Queen meeting with the Archbishop in private, it will be clear at a glance who betrayed Dalton before.
The patrol guard pressed the hilt of his sword at his waist, and quickly walked towards the pillar.
The moonlight is cold, and there is no one behind the pillar.
The Queen and the Archbishop hide behind a fresco. There are always countless secret doors in the palace of the royal family, and Adele knows these well. The problem is... the dark room is low and small. The queen leaned sideways in his arms, and all the muscles under the archbishop's cloak stiffened.
In an emergency, he forgot to let go of the Queen's hand.
The darkness made his senses extremely sharp, he could clearly feel the warmth under his fingertips, her blood flowed slowly like a river in her veins, flowing into the depths of the darkness, into the unknowable secret.
Footsteps sounded outside the mural, and guards walked in holding torches.
The two of them tried their best to hold down their breaths, and the time in the narrow space was extended bit by bit, and the misty fragrance and dust were mixed together, just like all the gloom and sorrow that were covered up in this luxurious palace. Gorgeously, it leads people towards depravity and eternal doom.
The fire dispelled the darkness and illuminated the inside clearly, but there was no one there.
The guard checked it several times, and he left suspiciously.
"He's gone," the archbishop reminded.
Adele was not in a hurry to go out, she smiled lowly in the dark: "Why did you come to me? My dear Mr. Bishop."
Dear, the ambiguous and intimate words were uttered from her mouth, and they were tainted with an indescribable breath, like the strong fragrance of roses in full bloom, and like a mermaid luring sailors to the rocks in a storm.
"The danger is far from over," the archbishop warned. "If you have wisdom, you know that you should stay away from the group of heretics of the new gods, instead of fueling their evil flames."
The queen was silent for a while.
Just when the archbishop was thinking about whether her reminder was too vague, she spoke slowly.
"You know what?" Adele said. "The tone of your voice almost makes me think you're jealous of Dalton."
The archbishop's breath cooled down.
Adele pushed away the mural, and the moonlight shone into the dark room. She pulled up the overlapping skirt with one hand, and wanted to go out. But she soon stopped again. Archbishop Rodri issued a questioning monotone behind her.
"You still hold my hand."
Adele turned to look at him.
The archbishop let go suddenly, as if scalded by a hot fire.
The queen in a beautiful dress stepped on the cold stone bricks, and the moonlight spread quietly on the ground. She let go of her hand, and the skirt fell down, and the gems and pearls inlaid on it reflected the brilliance of stars in an instant. She turned away lightly, the layers of skirts blooming like flowers.
The archbishop stood alone in the darkness, not knowing what he was thinking.
After a while, he noticed a little light in the place where the Queen had just stood. A jewel lay there quietly, probably rolled off the queen's dress—or the queen dropped it.
He hesitated for a moment, then hid it.
……………
Adele thought about the warning brought by the Archbishop.
Almost instantly, she locked onto the source of the danger—religious disputes.
The Roland Empire is located on the right side of the Sea of Heaven, controlling the Rose Strait connecting the Sea of Heaven and the Red Sea. Maritime commerce has always been very prosperous. Since the three-masted ship technology matured, a new vitality was injected into the life of the empire along with the expansion of commerce, and people asked God for the right to enjoy themselves.
Today, within the Roland Empire, the New God Sect and the Old God Sect are at war.
The latest major conflict between old and new sects occurred in the second year of Adele's reign. The appointment of Dalton as the commander of the knights and the marshal of the empire came to the believers in the country, which was equivalent to a signal that an empire chose the new god sect as the state religion.
— This could easily lead to a new conflict of beliefs, and she will be the first to bear the brunt.
What exactly would be the danger
Archbishop Rodrik's other secret identity is the deputy head of the Roland Temple Knights. Adele is sure that if he knows what the old gods are planning, he will not hide it from her. Even he can't know the details, just aware of the crisis... Assassination? Or something else
Adele understood what the Archbishop meant—
He hoped that she could show her importance to the Old God Sect in the next step, so as to ease the situation and avoid danger.
But the conflict wouldn't just go away, and she was determined to resolve it once and for all.
Therefore, not only did the queen not neglect Dalton, on the contrary, she even agreed to his invitation to go hunting together on a sunny morning.
... ... ...
On the left side of the Summer Palace Castle is a royal forest.
Although it was for hunting, the queen didn't seem to be thinking about it. She rode a silver horse along the winding tributaries of the White River. The wind blew her dark blue cloak, and she wore a A hat with pearls and black swan feathers, and a gauze covering her pretty face.
Hunters serving the royal family drove deer, wild wolves, wild boars and other prey from the forest, not only to ensure that the nobles did not return empty-handed, but also to ensure that no bear or other more dangerous animals hurt important people .
Dalton followed beside the queen. He put on a knight's costume and held a bow and arrow with his slender fingers.
"Is there anything you want?"
Dalton did not participate in the siege of the herd by the rest of the hunters, but turned his head to look at the Queen. The sunlight fell on the corners of his eyes through the dense leaves, and the cold facial features were similar in temperament to the unsheathed knife.
"What can you hunt for me?" Adele asked back.
When they were talking, the attendants behind them let out uneasy exclamations, accompanied by wild roars, the bushes in front of them trembled, and a brown bear with red eyes stepped out. The hunters who drove the beasts made mistakes, and their negligence allowed dangerous beasts to enter the hunting ring.
Adele reined in her horse.
She resisted the instinct to take off the crossbow at her waist.
The brown bear seemed to be annoyed by the noise and blood. After letting out a deep roar, it rushed straight towards them.
Shhhhhhhhh
Three arrows were shot from the side almost at the same time, one was nailed into the brown bear's forehead, one was nailed into the throat, and the other was nailed into the heart. The root did not reach, and the blood flew up in mid-air, performing the beauty of violence.
Dalton let go of the bowstring with a gloomy expression.
He had invited the Queen to hunt this time, and if anything happened, the responsibility would be on him.
"Do you want a bearskin as a cushion?" Dalton quickly covered up his gloom, and he turned to the queen and proposed with a smile.
Adele moved her fingers away from the crossbow, and she accepted the gift meekly.
The brown bear was quickly dragged down by the attendants. In order to avoid more accidents, under Dalton's proposal, they did not continue to go deep into the forest. Instead, they walked down the stream and came to the place called "Swan Road". Picnic by the Lake of Tears.
Meanwhile, Heinrich and the MPs rushed to the forest with a document.
"Sorry, the queen is hunting and has no time to receive."
The attendant stopped them and said politely to Heinrich.
Heinrich and the congressman exchanged a look, and both of them looked very ugly.
During this period of time, in the imperial meeting, Dalton's power of speech was obviously raised to an unbearable level. When he confronted the nobles, the queen would often stand by him. In addition, with the help of his status as a knight commander, he strengthened his control over the court under the pretext of "protecting the queen's safety".
It can be said that no one can bypass Dalton to see the queen directly, even if they see the queen, there must be Dalton or his people in the audience room.
The queen's attitude was exceptionally conniving.
Heinrich stopped the congressman who wanted to get angry.
He knew that Dalton had come to him for this level—or maybe there was the Queen's acquiescence in it.
"It's the same at the meeting." Heinrich said, he returned to his usual appearance, and no one could see whether he was angry or not.
The congressman walked away cursing, Heinrich thought for a while, and chose a path to circle around.
When he walked through the forest and arrived at "Tears of the Swan", the scene in front of him suddenly hurt his eyes.