New Life, New Task: I'll Be A Mom Then!!!

The atmosphere around the room became serious and tense.

Everyone wore an attentive and critical look as they poured out their focus on the man who would carry the whole team to success.

Even the First and Second Princes didn't bother to cast a contemptuous look at the Third Prince. It was because this place wasn't a place to scheme against each other, but to scheme against the enemy of the Empire!

The three princes of the Empire were present, accompanied by their left and right commands. The other attendees were from the Imperial knights and other key personnel crucial to the success of the operation.

General Farauld's eyes flashed with a glint of satisfaction seeing the appropriate attitude displayed by everyone. With a serious nod, he permitted his aide to announce and start today's agenda.

"Let's start with the report of each territory! First will be the condition to the west territory..." The aide announced.

Soon the aide of the First Prince, Kazimir, presented their report.

They reported a total of nine target places all throughout the west territory. This meant that there were a total of nine sinister groups spreading malice and damage in the west.

They have determined that these were groups of ten to twenty people going around the territory to spread terror to the Empire.

On Second Prince Antoine's side, the east territory only had five target groups with the same components of twenty people.

On the far north side, which was headed by General Eugine's right command, there were only three target incidents and two of those places were bordering the crossing of the east and west territories. The last one was the activity on Silver town, which Eli and the bunch encountered.

Finally, the southern territory reported a staggering number of twenty-seven target places! Seven of them were on the southeast side while the rest were on the southwest!

Loud murmurings were heard after hearing all the reports. Even if a common person heard these numbers they would only conclude one thing - the Astaze Clan neglected their west territory.

Second Prince Antoine was caught off guard with the numbers reported. He clenched his fist as he tried to calm himself down. 'What was actually happening?'

Although there were no immediate consequences for these reports, the numbers are to be reported to the council once the operation is done.

By that time, everyone in the council would point their fingers towards the Astaze Clan and their vassals. It will bring great damage to the family and surely, the Emperor will suspect the Astazes of colluding with the Spectres!

Just imagining these things made his body wet in cold sweat. He was worried of his maternal family being implicated as well as his Father Emperor being disappointed at him.

While he was having an internal struggle, he didn't notice that his elder brother Kazimir was looking at him with a hint of delight in his blue eyes. It was as if he was rejoicing in his misfortune.

No one noticed this except for the keenest people in the room - Leon and his lifelong teacher, General Eugine. However, they didn't show any reaction and continued to wear expressionless faces.

Prince Antoine was clearly distracted by his worries. However, the meeting must go on.

The next agenda was to instruct the leaders to submit their roster of knights who will participate in the clean-up operations.

Since the total target groups were 44 suspected sites, they had to at least form the same amount of troops. If they had to be conservative enough, they may need 20 for each group which will be a total of 880 knights.

However General Farauld greatly rejected the idea. Mobilizing 880 knights will cause a commotion in the capital and unnecessarily alarm the enemies.

Thus, he instructed them to craft a candidate list of the knights from the troops stationed in the territories themselves and only bring a maximum of 80 knights coming from the capital.

General Farauld then gave them time to carefully select their troops and specifically said that for every five-man team, they had to be able to stand ground on at least three Class A mages. Also, they have to be a well balanced team, with at least one class B devourer and a class B summoner.

Class A knights were very small in numbers and they were considered as highest tier in the Empire, since the class S tier was a Legendary feat.

Therefore, if one was a class B summoner, they were already considered strong, a class C as average and a class D as the weakest and treated almost the same as the F class - weak and non magic people.

The discussion in the room created a hushed buzzing sound as the representatives of each territory carefully selected their teams. Except for Leon who had already prepared in advance and who had the least number of people, of course.

Soon they were able to craft the roster of the knights that will participate in the clean up operation. All these discussions went on until late afternoon.

Upon submitting these roster, General Farauld dismissed everyone and had them come back the next day for the tactical strategy meeting.

Everyone saluted and bade the general goodbye.

Leon was also preparing to go home to his future wife and little son when he heard a low and aggrieved voice on his far left side.

It was Second Prince Antoine, who was displaying an aggrieved and distressed expression.

Blaze and Olvier heightened their senses at the maximum level, however they didn't dare to disrespect the Second Prince by blatantly showing a vigilant attitude towards him.

"Can I talk with you for a while?" Prince Antoine said in a serious yet conflicted manner.

Truthfully, he was totally distracted throughout the rest of the meeting. So he had his second in command do the activities on his behalf, while he was actually deeply thinking of the problem at hand.

What is the meaning of those results?

Who really was the one to be blamed?

Is it really the Astazes or someone is scheming against him and his maternal family?

The first person he suspected was his younger brother, Leon.

Simply because he was the one who reported a staggering number of twenty. He initially suspected that he deliberately blew the numbers up to target him.

However, during the deliberation session, his suspicion decreased gradually. Because first, reporting an exaggerated amount will actually burden Leon himself, as he will be responsible for all the false alarms he will raise.

The more false alarms reported, the uglier his results would be.

Even though he would never admit it personally, among the three princes, Antoine knew that Leon was always straightforward and decisive in his work.

That's why he gained the reputation of Barbaric Blood Prince.

Although it doesn't have a nice ring to it, only the officials and the Imperial Family knew that the blood that stained Leon's hands and sword were the blood of wicked people. He will never dare to harm the innocent no matter how much of a war god he is.

This younger brother of his is the Empire's Mad Dog.

His works ultimately benefit the Empire in their entirety. That's why it would not make sense if he targeted a long-standing noble house that has undeniable contributions to the Empire just because of political reasons.

The second reason could be considered as a personal bias planted in Antoine's heart ever since he was a child.

There was a moment in his life when he genuinely viewed Leon as a precious younger brother without any trace of contempt.

He was three years older than him, and he still vividly remembered that Leon would always follow him like a tail during their childhood, looking at him with clear dependent eyes.

He would call him 'Brother, Brother!', and look at him with shining crystal blue eyes and silly yet bright smile.

Only if he didn't know who he really was.

Maybe he wouldn't look at him in contempt right now. Maybe he would still be a reliable older brother for Leon, and he will still be his treasured little brother.

He looked at Leon who he saw smiling since the day he declared that he will no longer be his brother and that Leon does not have a right to call him elder brother anymore.

Ever since that day, he started to hate Leon to the core and joined Kazimir and the rest in treating him with contempt. It was because he couldn't handle the fact that he was identified the same as him, a prince of the Empire.

At first, the five-year-old Leon didn't understand his sudden change, he even clung to his sleeves with a pitiful crying face and asked, "Why? What did I do wrong.. Brother... Brother.."

"What did you do wrong?" the eight-year-old Antoine looked at him with disgust and hate, "Your very existence is wrong! You should have not existed at all!"

"Do not call me brother anymore! You have no right to be my brother!"

For a young innocent Leon to hear this from his precious brother, it was like a bomb.

His hands, which were clinging like a crab in Antoine's sleeve, suddenly lost their grip. Utter devastation appeared on his plump adorable face.

That day Leon lost his smile.

Also from that day onwards, Antoine saw how the dependent and silly young Leon slowly turned into a frigid, cold-blooded barbaric prince.

Now that his mind and heart were completely shaken by the incoming threat, he couldn't help but try to find a trace of that adoring and dependent look on Leon's face.

But the only thing that stared back at him was Leon's distant and cold crystal blue eyes.