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The ceremony music started playing, the gongs and drums thundered.

The sun was at its highest point in the sky, and the ascension ceremony of the new ruler of the Macedonian Empire officially began.

More than a hundred thousand people raised their heads to gaze at the high platform in front of the palace square.

Excitement, anticipation, or unease filled everyone’s heart.

The gates opened. An entourage of the people came filing out, then split neatly into two lines on both sides of the gates. Under the command of their leader, hundreds of magic spells shot up into the sky, then bloomed into the most dazzling ceremonial fireworks in the sky above the capital city. They even outshone the midday sun.

And then, a small figure slowly came out of the gates, followed by a huge entourage. The people below the stage craned their necks, hoping to be the first to catch the glimpse of the beautiful empress that would soon rule the empire.

However, everyone froze with an astonished expression on their face when they finally saw the figure clad in imperial robes with a crown on her head.

She was not the crown princess Lesiah, who had been in charge of the empire for several years, but the young princess that many had only heard of but never seen.

The young princess who was only seven years old.

The crowd below the stage immediately got rowdy.

“What’s the meaning of this? Why is Princess Leniah the one ascending the throne? Why is it not the crown princess?”
“This must be a bad joke. They’re going to let a seven-year-old kid rule this vast empire? I reckon this empire will fall in just a year, no, three months.”
“We demand an explanation from the crown princess! Is she deliberately doing this to lead this empire to its downfall?”

The crowd was going wild. Their angry protests even momentarily drowned out the ceremonial music.

The soldiers who were doing crowd control had to draw their weapons to keep the angry crowd at bay. Leniah, who was on the stage, shrunk back fearfully when she saw the people who were roaring like wild beasts.

A warm hand patted Leniah’s shoulder, calming the young princess who was trembling in fear.

“It’ll be fine, leave it to me.”

Lesiah smiled gently, then slowly stepped forward. She only had to put out her hand palm to quickly calm the noisy crowd.

She scanned the square, The uneasy expressions on countless faces nearly gave her the urge of replacing Leniah on the throne.

However, she suppressed her emotions and remained rational. After a brief moment of silence, her lips parted slightly and her melodious voice spread in all directions with the voice amplification tool.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I understand your difficulty in accepting the fact that Leniah is ascending the throne instead of myself. I am aware of your concerns that the decision I am making now will lead the empire into its downfall. I understand all of this, but I also hope that you will continue to trust me with this decision. The decision to make Leniah the unprecedented empress of this country was not made on a whim, but after long and careful consideration.”

……

“She may be young, but I know her best as her sister. I believe that she has the ability to lead the empire to prosperity in my place. Moreover, giving Leniah the reign of this empire is not fully my decision. It is also…”

Lesiah’s face turned solemn, and she spread open her arms as if she were embracing the sky.

“…willed by the heavens.”

……

“PFFFT.” Lilith suddenly burst out laughing on the palace’s balcony, where she was watching Lesiah delivering the impassioned speech down there.

“What is it that amuses you, Your Highness?”

“It’s nothing. I just didn’t expect Lesiah to be able to say something as absurd as that with a straight face. Maybe I should say that I expected no less from someone who is experienced in managing the empire for several years.”

“You are right, Your Highness,” Green Emperor responded to Lilith with flattery as usual.

After laughing for a moment, Lilith wiped the tears from the corner of her eyes and composed herself. She turned around and said, “If you have something on your mind, then say it. No need to be so formal, I’m not the princess you serve.”

The leader of the White Stocking Maids stood at the door. She was also the head of the maidservants, Sheila, who had been serving as Lesiah’s personal maid and guard since the princess was a child.

“Then I will hold my tongue no longer.”

Miss Sheila had a very serious face that made it apparent that she was not here to offer Lilith a cup of tea.

“What is Your Excellency trying to achieve by encouraging Her Highness to hand over the throne to the little princess? And who exactly are you? Why does Her Highness follow your advice?”

“Ah, I thought you would never ask.”

Lilith winked playfully at Sheila and chuckled. “To answer your first question on why am I encouraging Lesiah to rid herself of her title… You will find out in the future. As for the second question regarding my identity… you will find out in the future too.”

“You speak nonsense, Your Excellency.”

“I merely see no point in answering questions that you will eventually find answers to in due time.”

“You!”

Miss Sheila’s eyes flitted toward the Green Emperor, who was standing beside Lilith. Although she wanted to resort to violence, the presence of that man beside Lilith was simply too overwhelming.

After hearing about the appalling methods he used to interrogate the assassin earlier, Sheila knew that she had no chance of winning. She even wondered if this man had somehow coerced Lesiah into doing all this.

However, the heartfelt joy on Lesiah’ face when she met Lilith could not possibly be faked. And this was the reason why Sheila had remained silent until now.

“Seeing for yourself will be more convincing than my words.”

Lilith turned her head to the side and looked at the empty spot beside her.

“Are the preparations done?”
“All preparations are perfectly ready, Your Highness.”

The dragon clan’s great butler, Akarin, appeared at some point and smiled.

“All left is just a word from you.”

Lilith nodded in satisfaction.

“Good job. I will tell Mother to reward you guys handsomely.”
“Thank you, but we really don’t deserve it.”
“Nonsense.”
Lilith waved her hand, her mouth curled into a slight smile. “Let’s get down to business. Commence Project Empress Leniah.”
“Roger.”

Akarin gave her a bow before sending a message to Gulch and Kvass, who were somewhere else right now, to commence their plan.

Seeing Akarin’s reliable response, Lilith suddenly remembered something and asked,

“By the way, I still don’t know what you guys are planning to do.”

Thinking about complex matters like these were too troublesome for Lilith, so she simply dumped all the burden to Akarin. She did not care about the process as long as they could achieve the objective.

Their recent performance had proven that they were quite reliable and it was even enough to make Lilith see them in a new light.

Who said that the dragons were all idiots? Today, Akarin and his two brothers were going to set things right for the dragon clan!

“Hehe. We were able to come up with a perfect plan, all thanks to Your Highness.” Akarin fawned over Lilith in response.

“Thanks to me?”

Lilith was stunned. “But I did nothing.”

“No, no, no. The stories that Your Highness told us about slaying the white snake and hiding a note in the belly of a fish gave us great inspiration. So we decided to do that.” Akarin nodded, looking extremely confident about his plan.

But somehow, a bad feeling was rising in Lilith’s heart.

“It’s a pity that I couldn’t find a white snake, so I can only resort to hiding a note in the belly of a fish. I believe this will yield a similar outcome that we desire.”

Akarin pointed toward the balcony outside. “Look, they’re coming.”

Lilith turned around, and was stunned to find… that the sky had turned dark.

“This is…”

She raised her head stiffly, and finally got a good look at the huge object that covered the sky.

The sight was simply too shocking that Lilith was rendered speechless for a short period of time. Her lips trembled for a long time before she finally managed to squeeze out the words that were stuck in her throat.

“T-That’s… a huge fish…”