Emperor of Steel

Chapter 378: Iron Core 3

Immediately after using the mana and magi, Luke and Hwang Bo-sung moved to the southern continent.

Upon receiving the message from Erwin and Gregory, the Marquis of Rakan was in a mess.

“What? You said that the Lord has gone missing?”

“Yes, I just wanted to know if he went there using teleportation magic.”

At the communication from the wizard, Butler Hans jumped out of his seat.

“No, what the hell is going on?! Please explain it clearly!”

“That was why we wanted to confirm…”

After hearing the story, Hans immediately conveyed it to the retainers.

Otherwise, the retainers would have been in a mess about the absence of their Lord.

In that situation, they got the news that their Lord had gone missing after an explosion.

As the civil war was intensifying and the revenge for the Baroque Imperial family was on the verge, the shock, which the retainers took, was great.

“No, why would he even go to the Volga Republic without telling us?”

“What the hell did the fairy guys even threaten that the Lord had to sneak away from us?”

“It must have been something rather secret. The rumors that were being spread around may be the ones to work. Perhaps, they threatened to spread out more if Lord didn’t listen to them.”

Philip, who heard what the Finance Officer, Bentley, said, was terrified.

Except for the Volga’s old men in Lamer, he was the only retainer who knew about Luke’s dark magic.

In addition, after Luke left, he heard about the situation from Belfair.

“We need to get revenge right away!”

“That is right. Let’s catch every one of them who are still in the lordship!”

As the atmosphere of the retainers were flowing toward one side, Butler Hans, who was listening to it quietly, banged the table.

“Quiet all of you! Don’t you understand that finding our Lord is the first thing we should be doing?”

He looked at all the retainers and opened his mouth once again.

“Aren’t you speaking of a too extreme way? Will the Rakan family sacrifice men without knowing the reason?”

No one could say anything after that.

While the mouths of those who wanted revenge went quiet, Butler Hans looked over at Argo’s head, Hudson.

“Inform the agents all over the continent and the Empire to find out about the whereabouts of our Lord. If the manpower in Argos won’t be sufficient, ask any reliable guild for information.”

“Understood. And, wouldn’t it be nice to ask help from the Pope?”

“They already are coming out of Holy Empire Intelligence agency. It was said that Arch Duke is using them.”

Hans and the retainers decided to find the Lord by using all the intelligence services of Marquis Rakan.

To them, not just the Holy Empire’s men, but also the fairy chiefs in their manor were willing to cooperate in the search.

In addition, Philip sneaked into the Dark Moon Magic Tower to seek help, and Sebastian and Belfair sought out for clues.

A day, two days, three days…

A week had passed in the blink of an eye. However, no news about the whereabouts of Luke was heard.

Luke’s disappearance was unknown.

Since Sebastian had disguised himself as Luke and performed his role as a proxy Lord, neither the executives nor the estate residents knew that the real Lord was missing.

“Is the Master really dead? Henry said that his strength was completely exhausted after he smashed the iron barrier?”

Sebastian’s words made Belfair, who was hanging upside down from the ceiling of the Lord’s office, laugh.

“Are you stupid? If the Master died, the stigma on our necks would have disappeared. That means he is fine and alive somewhere.”

“Tch, really?”

Seeing Sebastian’s expression, Belfair’s eyes flashed.

“You just felt sorry for yourself right now, didn’t you?”

“W-what?”

“You were feeling bad that Master is still alive. Later, when the Master comes back, I am going to let him know.”

“Kuek! You ungrateful kid!”

Sebastian, who picked up the bottle of ink from the table, threw it at Belfair.

But Belfair disappeared in an instant.

It wasn’t that he was trying to avoid Sebastian’s attack; it was because he could feel someone approaching the room.

“This is huge, Lord!”

The door of the office had opened wide with Anna running in.

On the day she was on a guard mission with her colleagues, she knew something was going on.

Seeing her burst in, Sebastian asked with a frown, “Huge? What is going on? Did someone enter the estate?”

“Not that… Just a moment… A communication came in showing the Lord’s coordinates, and that came from the Lord!”

“What? Is that really true?”

Surprised, Sebastian got up from his seat.

And that was the same with Belfair who was in hiding. He was so surprised that he almost gave out his identity.

“So, everyone is going to the communication room. Are you also going to go Lord?”

“Of course, I have to.”

Sebastian spoke and followed Anna to the communication room of the Lordship.

After a while, they arrived at the magic communication room.

There was no room in the magic communication room with all the retainers and the knights who were in there.

The first to arrive there was Butler Hans.

When he looked at the blurry crystal image of Luke, he screamed, losing his usual calmness.

“Lord!”

-So loud. I am not deaf, so lower your voice.

“Is there any problem? What the hell happened Lord?!”

Hans’s voice didn’t go down so easily because of all the stress that accumulated.

-There was a situation, I am sorry. I will explain all in detail at a later time, so please understand.

“Phew, understood. Instead, the next time you leave, at least let us know the situation beforehand.”

-I will do that. Rather than that, how is the civil war going?

“It was said that the Emperor led the Knights of Guard and the Eastern Army troops were in war with the Western Forces on Dris Mountain. The Western Army has been declared defeated, but the details are still under investigation.”

-Is that so? First, the civil war is against the noblemen.

“That is right. I am concerned on how to act now.”

From the standpoint of Rakan, the noblemen getting pushed back wasn’t a desirable situation.

Marquis Mayers was still there in the south, but with the Western Army destroyed, it was just a matter of time before the Southern Army was destroyed as well.

The retainers of Rakan needed the Emperor and the noblemen to fight against each other as much as possible.

That would make it easier for them to sweep away the rest of the men.

-Well, we need to make plans before the noblemen turn defensive, but wasn’t Duke Butler killed?

“Well, if he was killed, then they would have made a huge deal out of it, but there was no such thing going on nor anything said by the Emperor. The only thing we know was that the remnants of the Western Army were cleared up, and large amount of bounty was placed for the necks of the noblemen.”

-Nice, which means…

Luke gave detailed instructions to Hans.

Hans, who listened to all the instructions, suddenly asked, “But Lord, where are you right now?”

-Me? I am along with Hwang Bo-sung in the Zegal clan of the Song Empire.

“Song Empire? Hold on, the Southern Continent…?”

-Erwin will let you know how this happened. She said that she will arrive there soon.

“Huh, understood, but when is our Lord coming back?”

-There is something that I need to do here. Once that is done, I will return back as soon as I can.

“Please come back quickly. We still have our estate together, but we don’t know what will happen in the future.”

-I know. I will hurry and don’t bother Reina. I don’t want to make her worry.

In fact, Luke had contacted Reina directly.

However, the magic communication wasn’t perfect, and they were kept being interrupted by static, so they eventually gave up talking to each other.

“Master, stay healthy, and come back! I love you, I respect you, Master!”

Just before the magic communication got ended, Sebastian quickly interrupted and spoke.

It was because he was afraid that Belfair would talk about what he said a while back, but he ended up giving Luke the idea of ‘this guy is up to something fishy’.

-Don’t spew nonsense, and do your best in my position.

“Yep! I will do my very best!”

The communication ended with that.

The retainers, who confirmed that the missing Lord was alive and well, smiled from their hearts with relief.

Butler Hans clapped his hands and ordered everyone.

“Kay then, since we have confirmed that our Lord is safe, let’s get back to our work and focus on it. Chief Commander Rogers, prepare what the Lord has ordered us to do.”

“Understood.”

After that, the Marquis of Rakan went back to normal as if everything had been settled.