Empress Prelate Rafina
While they were talking, morning came. Lacking in sleep, Mia headed down to the cafeteria for breakfast while stifling her yawns. Anne was given instructions to bring breakfast to Bel who was left in the room. Arriving at the cafeteria, Mia had a normal conversation with her usual retinue. After drinking a glass of fresh milk, she recalled the talk she had with Bel.
Empress Prelate Rafina… It was an unbelievable story.
The Holy Principality of Belluga is a small nation with no military power. Instead, it is the seat of the Central Orthodox Church, whose influence spans through the whole continent. There is no king in Belluga. Instead, it worshipped the one and only God as its lord and king, making the Duke of Belluga the highest-ranking individual in the principality. He was theoretically appointed by God, and he functions as the head of both the state and the church.
He does not have an army and does not call himself a king. It is out of humility and as a self-control from holding absolute power.
Nevertheless, Rafina was named the Empress Prelate and even raised an army herself.
This was what Bel said to her in bed. “Empress Prelate Rafina called for war against the heretical society of the Chaos Serpents. She recruited volunteers from neighbouring kingdoms and organized them to create the Holy Aquarian Army.”
“Rafina-sama, did that?”
Indeed, she declared a fight against the Chaos Serpents and asked Mia and others to help. But Mia didn’t expect her to create her own army and head off to war.
“Not only that. She renamed the Holy Principality of Belluga into the Holy Belluga Empire and started demanding allegiance from nearby kingdoms.”
“Isn’t that an act of aggression? What in the dark moons made her do something like that?”
“To prevent sabotage through the establishment of absolute control. By using the Aquarian Army as her personal military, she sought to completely eradicate all the hidden heretics in the populace… is what Ludwig-sensei said.”
Mia hid a laugh at Bel’s subtle impersonation of Ludwig.
“…Eradicating all heretics… the scale of that… the mess… even if Tearmoon was in turmoil, didn’t Sion of Sunkland do anything?”
“Unfortunately, Sunkland was also in a state of civil war. There was a nobles’ faction that wanted to join the Empress Prelate’s cause, while the Libra King Sion and his allies were opposed to her methods.”
Even Sion, known for his unwavering commitment to good government and just rule, was faced with a divided kingdom. This is the weight of the Holy Lady’s words.
“This flow of division eventually came to Tearmoon. Of the Four Grand Dukes, two will be on the side of the Empress Prelate, the other two will be on the side of the Libra King. In the end, the faction supporting the Libra King loses. As a result, the empire fell under the control of the Holy Aquarian Army.”
“From listening to your story, it sounds like Rafina is the root of all the problems.”
Mia clearly thought that the Chaos Serpents was the cause of everything. But…
This is a contradiction. Rafina enforced a strict system of control to get rid of the Chaos Serpents, but because she did that, the world ended up going downhill. That would make Rafina the ultimate source for all this chaos.
In the first place, Mia doesn’t think Rafina would be able to do something like that.
“Why did Rafina do such a thing?”
“That is…because…”
“Because?”
“… I’m sorry. I don’t know. I feel like Ludwig-sensei said something about it. But at that time, I dozed off.”
My, my. This girl has some guts to be dozing off in the middle of a lesson from Ludwig. She must have gotten an earful afterwards.
Mia was honestly impressed with Bel, but …
“Ehehe, Ludwig-sense was always nice to me, so I kept on falling asleep…”
Mia was stunned by Bel’s words.
“Nice? Did you say nice? Ludwig is nice?” Mia asked in a trembling voice.
“Yes. He treated me very well. It was my fault for falling asleep, but he would always apologize and say that he must have taught the lesson in a boring way. He would always praise me too. Sometimes, he would pat my head and tell me I was a good girl just for staying awake and listening until the end of the lesson. He was my favorite teacher and I loved him very much.”
Hey, Ludwig, what is this?! The difference in this treatment! It’s discrimination! This is clearly a discrimination! I feel totally wronged!
In the first place, Mia got reprimanded when she was 16 or 17 years old, and Bel was only around 10 years old, so there is a big difference. But of course, Mia doesn’t think about that. That’s why her anger went on.
In the end, I couldn’t get anything useful out of her after that. Well, maybe she will remember something else later though. Still, I’m curious about that story about Rafina-sama.
Coincidentally, Mia found Rafina also about to leave the cafeteria having finished breakfast.
“Good morning, Rafina-sama”
“Oh, Mia-san. Good morning. What’s wrong? You look sleepy.”
Mia tried to give Rafina a gentle smile. But with little success as she had to stifle a yawn.
“Yes, I’m a little short of sleep. More than that, I have something I want to talk about. Do you have some time during lunch?”
“My, how strange. I was just about to ask you the same thing as there’s something I want to discuss with you as well. I’ll see you at lunch then.”
While Rafina’s expression brightened, Mia’s expression turned into a puzzled frown.
The author left a note how it was supposed to be Empire’s Holy Army, but changed it into Holy Aquarian Army, which could be read as Sexually Transmitted Disease.
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