Gardenia of Blooming Desire

Chapter 224: The Coronation of Emperor Audric V

Charles was sitting on the throne that belonged to him. This golden throne was the sign of power in Golden Camellia. The only one for the Emperor to sit on and rule the empire. He was wearing the golden robe and golden crown. His perfectly sculptured face showed a cold countenance that made everyone's legs tremble.

Charles observed the people who gathered in this huge chamber, most of them were ministers that were too afraid to speak out their opinion, and few high ranked nobilities that were already intimidated by the power of the new Golden Emperor.

The head minister read the same, official text to coronate the new emperor, which was boring to Charles. He had the coronation text at the back of his head since his childhood. Since he was expected to be the new Emperor, so ready many official texts were also in his daily studies.

 'Today, we are here to worship our new Golden Emperor of Golden Camellia, the man with honor, perseverance, extraordinary intelligence and strength, the new emperor that will lead us to glory. We are here to celebrate his coronation, as he is our ruler, our blood. He is the fated Golden Blood that will protect us, lead us, and enrich our land as the jewel of the world. I, High Minister of Golden Camellia, announce our new king, Emperor Audric V, Charles Audric Camellia.'

Everyone in the chamber prostrated before him. Charles looked down at these people, he sighed in an annoyed manner, "Rise, my subject."

He looked around uninterestedly and said, "I am your new ruler, I shall carry my responsibility as the emperor and I shall make Golden Camellia as the Jewel of the world, the jewel of the country."

He also said it in a boring tone. In fact, he wasn't into this coronation at all. Because it wasn't as beautiful as he expected. It had been a week since the Winter Feast. His dead father had been buried and Dionde City had been restored partly.

'Aster was smart enough to transfer all his power back to his father, Grand Duke Harion, since he came back as the ruler of Grand Duchy Stormhill, I cannot touch him, because it might invoke unnecessary war.'

'Dionde no, the whole Grand Duchy Stormhill and its allies are being hostile to me after that Winter Feast, and since Aster had gone missing, their hostility won't end soon. Maybe it will never end.'

'Well, I can suppress any rebellion easily, since the whole Grand Duchy is an economic zone, they have no rebellious power.'

Charles' right hand was caressing something inside his robe, a golden personal pin from Aster. He actually only had the silver pin, but he was unable to find Aster's only golden pin anywhere inside the Lantern Palace after the massacre ended.

So, Charles had one made only for him. He took the silver pin and then created the replica with gold instead.

'I have your golden pin, Aster. We are married already,' Charles glanced at the empty throne beside him, 'But you are not here, I've been searching far and wide, but you just simply disappeared.'

'I refuse to say that you are dead, I know that you are alive somewhere. Because once the golden circle of golden blood dies, the golden blood will slowly wither, even if he didn't know, his body will react on its own and die heartbroken.'

'I am still alive and well, so you must be too.'

The nobles started coming up to him and then greeted him one by one, he just nodded and said the standard blessing for these people. Most of them brought their daughters and sons, "Your Majesty, I have my daughter, Ophelia, she is only eighteen years old and a very proper lady. Perhaps if Your Majesty is interested?"

"I don't," Charles rejected curtly. The man didn't give up easily, he took his soon and presented him in front of Emperor Charles too.

"This one is my son, Lucas, he is a young scholar of age twenty. Maybe he can replace"

Charles' eyes glinted with hostility, he observed the young man in front of him, and then chuckled sarcastically, "You think this son of yours can replace Aster? He is irreplaceable!"

"PPardon this one's word, Your Majesty, this one misspoke"

Charles kicked both father and son with his feet and both of them fainted immediately, "Listen! I don't want anyone here to offer me their daughter and son anymore! The Empress throne has been reserved only for Aster di Arlingdon, if I see one more like this, I will kill them personally!"

Everyone gulped in fear, they nodded dared not disturb Charles with matchmaking anymore.

Then, a girl walked in front to face him, she was wearing a blue dress and her dark hair was let loose, "Your Majesty, this one, Merry Wood, present in front of Your Majesty Emperor Audric V."

Merry bobbed a curtsy to Emperor Charles. Charles glanced at this girl, and he nodded. Merry had successfully triggered Aster's memory slip and it was her song that became the signal for his soldier to invade Dionde City.

Maybe because she saw how horrible the massacre was, she dared not asking about Ramuja's safety there. Instead, she only asked for her reward after the massacre.

'Your Majesty, I want my reward!'

'Fine, what do you want?'

'I want to be a noble and I want a lot of gold!'

Charles was a bit surprised since this seemingly innocent girl didn't even have any remorse on her face. She was still beaming with happiness even though blood was everywhere and she fully understood that she had indirectly killed many people that night.

Thus, to reward her ruthlessness, Charles gave her the title Countess Merry of Belleresse. He also gave her land and a lot of gold. She was basically living as a noble after massacring the peasants.

Charles smirked, at last, there was someone that was even more horrible than him, 'I might have killed many, but I don't hide under the pretense of naivety like her. I love Aster and I will destroy him if I need to, so he can only see me. She thought by killing Aster and everyone, she would get the love of that slave and live happily ever after in a castle. What a horrible demoness.'

Now, Charles remembered that slave. When he received the report of Lantern Palace, he thought everything would be cleared and that slave must've died. But what he got instead was his men getting massacred by a monster in a corridor.

Yes, he dispatched more than one hundred men solely to destroy Lantern Palace and everything inside, on the courtyard, it looked like it worked. Because there were countless corpses of servants, maids, and guards of Lantern Palace died outside.

But when he entered the corridor leading to Aster's room, he went pale when he saw the scenery. The usual clean corridors with red carpet were bloodied beyond recognition. There were countless soldiers that died here. However, their bodies were irrecoverable and unidentifiable, because whatever lurked inside this corridor, had also massacred everyone.

He killed probably more than fifty people in this corridor alone.

'Was it really that slave who did it? No, I don't think so. I am the strongest in Golden Camellia and logically, I will not be able to defeat fifty trained soldiers alone. That is simply impossible.'

However, when Charles noticed that the corpses were only his men, based on their armor, it was no doubt that the one who fought against his soldiers in this corridor suffered no casualty.

It was even stranger when that slave was nowhere to be seen. He disappeared without a trace. However, Charles doubted that the slave was able to meet Aster on that day. Because he already blocked the road outside Dionde after the massacre ended, and he ordered his men to sweep every corner possible around Dionde City to search for that slave.

Now, both Aster and that slave slipped from his hands.

After that, he ordered his men to kill all the family line of Swordheart, Irion's family. They had the history of rebelling against the Emperor and sided with Grand Duchy since the very start, Charles thought that it was his fault for ignoring them.

But when his men broke through the Swordheart Mansion, they found nothing inside. Not even a servant or guard. The mansion had been deserted for a while.

All of them slipped out of his hand, which irritated Charles even more. He stood from the throne and said, "I'm going to rest, enjoy the party."

Charles left the coronation abruptly and then returned to his new emperor chamber. He had this chamber decorated with all Aster's belongings inside his room in Lantern Palace.

From Aster's clothes, books, even accessories. He also had all his collection of Aster's paintings hanging inside his new room. A faint smile finally appeared on his face.

"I decorated everything for you, Aster. When you return home, you will be joyful with my effort, right? Don't worry, I will kill anything that tried to come between us."

"Your memory about that slave has been erased, we can start over again, right?" Charles took the small portrait of Aster in the drawer and kissed it gently.

***

The mighty ship of Great King Tuskan had arrived on the harbor of Saintess Celine City, the capital of Great Arctyr. Tuskan had been holding his nerves since he departed from Dionde City to his kingdom.

It took him way longer than he expected to reach Great Arctyr, because there were plenty of Golden Camellia's naval ships patrolling around their sea border, asking to check the ship. They are searching for the missing Aster di Arlingdon.

Tuskan looked at Aster who had been unconscious one full week, he could eat and drink slowly, but Aster was still trapped inside his seemingly neverending nightmare.

Tuskan wiped Aster's sweat gently with his handkerchief, he whispered, "Aster, we are home."