The Evil Emperor's Fragile Heart

Grandpa huffed. "Do you think that we are blind to believe that you all are just bandits? Since when have the soldiers of the famous Flame Army of the Amber Kingdom been reduced to bandits?" he asked coldly. Grandpa's amber eyes danced with the glow from the flames of hell that surrounded him again, casting a menacing light on the terrified faces of the fake bandits.

A nasty smell spread in the air as several of the fake bandits wet themselves in fear.

"The former – former Duke of Flames…" someone whimpered. "Please, spare us, we just – we were just…"

"You were just what?" Grandpa demanded angrily.

"We were just following orders!" another captured fake bandit blurted out.

"Whose orders?" King Jaren asked, his voice a deep rumble that shook the earth. King Jaren hardly ever let loose, but that didn't take away the fact that he was the most powerful earth magic user in the world (notwithstanding his own children and his dragon grandchildren).

The fake bandits turned pale. The older soldiers knew the legend of King Jaren, who was normally as calm as the earth, but once his temper flared, he was even more terrifying than a deity. They knew how badly their powerful King Orion had been beaten up once in the past when he had dared to provoke King Jaren a little too far…

However, they still knew that King Jaren was a decent man at the end of the day, unlike their master, who had no bottom line. King Jaren would never do the horrible things that their master could do, that would make anyone wish for death but even that would be denied to them…

Grandpa put a gentle hand on King Jaren's shoulder. "There is no point in asking them, son," he murmured. "Look at their throats. Can you see the glowing insignia on the side? All of these men would explode the moment they named their true master – and the worst thing would be that they wouldn't even die, but they would live for a long time as a vegetable…"

"How ruthless," Queen Carolina murmured, and a cold shiver ran down her spine. It was truly vicious.

Grandpa smiled slightly. "There is only one way to ensure absolute loyalty," he murmured. "And that is through fear. Look at these men – they are probably thinking that our Jaren is a decent man and wouldn't dirty his hands enough to treat their lives as a useless thing. However, their vicious master has put his seal on them and they know that they would be heading for a terrible life of suffering if they dare to betray him…"

King Corvus raised an eyebrow. "Ducky is right. Our King Jaren is indeed a decent man, and that has its own downsides," he said. "However, that doesn't mean that he is short of allies who are chained by decency…"

More people peed their pants in fear at the sight of King Corvus's smiling face.

Grandma and Queen Carolina and Crown Princess Pica wrinkled their noses. "How disgusting," the three ladies said at the same time.

King Corvus and Grandpa burst out laughing.

"Indeed," Grandpa said. He patted King Jaren's shoulder again. "There is no need to ask them who their master is. There are only two people in this world who are capable of successfully using the brand that burns that insignia on to the throats of their servants. One is the reigning monarch of the Amber Kingdom, and the second is the current Flame Duke. No one else – not even the heir to the throne of the Amber Kingdom – would be able to touch that brand." He shook his head ruefully. "I had not imagined that my dear little brother would be so vicious to have brought out that horrible ancient thing."

"They have really taken a lot of effort to cause us harm," Grandma murmured. She looked at Grandpa. "What do you want to do with this lot, darling?" she asked.

Grandpa chuckled. "Do what you want, my dear," he said. "I know the filth is grating on your nerves."

Grandma was a well known neat freak, and the bunch of men smelling of urine in front of her were really an eyesore for her.

Grandma snapped her fingers, and a giant water bubble appeared, encasing the captured men.

Mana watched, wide eyed (and very impressed) as Grandma made a magical washing machine and washed the captured men exactly like a modern washing machine washed clothes. The captured men were spun around and sprayed with water and soap until they were too dizzy to even see straight.

Grandpa watched proudly and let Grandma do as she wanted.

After Grandma was done, Grandpa and King Corvus pulled out an old array from their memories and drew it meticulously. It was similar to a transportation array, but it had only one goal – it would send the captured man back to their master.

And thus, while the men were still spinning around in the giant water bubble washing spell of Grandma, they were transported back to their master.

King Orion and the current Flame Duke (who was the traitorous younger brother of Grandpa) were both in court at the time, when a giant water bubble suddenly appeared with all the captured men spinning around within it in the middle of the court. Then the water bubble burst apart and everyone got splashed with dirty water and the men fell to the ground.

It would be an understatement to say that King Orion was furious.

Fox, who had sneakily tossed a small spy camera like device into the array that had been created by Grandpa and King Corvus, was praised by everyone as they all watched this funny scene and laughed at King Orion's face that was turning purple with rage.

Pleased with their little victory, the group quickly revived the people who had been drugged and picked up on their journey again.

Perhaps it was a side effect of the captured men being sent back to court in such a humiliating manner, but the group faced no further hurdles, and they arrived at the imperial capital city of the Amber Kingdom the next day in the afternoon, just like Grandpa had estimated.

This time, they were greeted very politely and shown to the imperial guest chambers with all due respect that was supposed to be shown to the royals and dignitaries of other kingdoms.

Crown Prince Mars of the Amber Kingdom and Princess Astra of the Emerald Kingdom even came up to greet them in person and enquired politely about their journey.

From the looks of it, neither Crown Prince Mars of the Amber Kingdom and Princess Astra of the Emerald Kingdom were aware of the difficulties the group had faced during their journey to the imperial capital city of the Amber Kingdom, but by now, most people were well aware of how duplicitous this couple was, and no one was inclined to believe that either of Crown Prince Mars of the Amber Kingdom and Princess Astra of the Emerald Kingdom were completely innocent in the entire matter. If anything, the impression they had of Crown Prince Mars of the Amber Kingdom and Princess Astra of the Emerald Kingdom worsened even further, and especially the people of the Emerald Kingdom were very glad that their decent King Jaren was at least blessed with two wonderful children Crown Prince Jules of the Emerald Kingdom and Princess Mana of the Emerald Kingdom, and that these two wonderful children had found themselves equally wonderful partners, and they all became even more friendly towards Crown Princess Isabel of the Sapphire Kingdom and Prince Raven of the Obsidian Kingdom.

Mars and Astra had no idea that they were being secretly badmouthed by the entire contingent with people from the other four kingdoms, and Astra had no idea that even people from the Emerald Kingdom had seen through her act and were secretly despising her now. In any case, Astra's biggest worry right now was that she was running out of the potent love potion that Mana and Raven had helped procure from the famous Poison Expert Naver and drugged the wine with, which she had then fed to Mars. Astra had been feeling lately that Mars's attention was starting to waver and that he was not as doting towards her as he had been earlier.

Thus, the current objective of Princess Astra was to grab hold of Mana and Raven separately and convince them to put her in touch with the famous Poison Expert Naver so that she could get her hands on more of the potent love potion that had been so effective on Mars and which had helped her immensely until now.

"Mana and Raven, could I speak to you separately, please?" Princess Astra asked politely. "It is a private matter."

Princess Astra was really very pretty, Mana thought, and with her looking pitifully at them like this, it would look like Mana and Raven were hard hearted if they didn't agree to speak to her.