On the 26th day after the assassination, the shocking news finally reached the royal capital of Aueras. As expected, it caused a huge uproar.
At first, some even thought it was a case of the messengers getting drunk and passing on some random draft paper. It wasn't as if something like that had never happened before.
The scribes in charge of the messenger hawk had always been accustomed to fabricating sensational news on draft paper for their own amusement. There was once a time when they had carelessly sent out the draft paper as the main text, and had caused a great disturbance.
But it was worth noting that the messengers only changed a few words in the main text of the messenger. They didn't have the guts to make up such sensational news.
Five days later, a more detailed report arrived from the overseas colonies of Nubissia. It wasn't just the war theatre command's report. Many other relevant departments had sent clear information. General Aljes Kai Osmolin, a hereditary count and the highest commander of the war theatre, had indeed been assassinated before the military parade. The assassins were a group of grey-robed magi who were suspected to be Greytower magi.
The entire royal capital was in an uproar. Almost everyone's attention was focused on the assassination.
Even the question of whether the grey-robed magi were Greytower magi caused a lot of controversy.
For example, the kingdom's special department provided strong evidence that they had sent people to infiltrate Higros twenty to thirty years ago. In the end, they found that there were only two or three of them left in the Greytower magi organization. They were no longer as powerful as they were in the past, so the special department was certain that the assassination wasn't the work of Greytower magi.
If it wasn't Greytower magi, who would have the ability to gather twenty magi to carry out an assassination in the overseas colonies?
The second report from the war theatre command detailed the style of the grey robes worn by the twelve magi assassins. It was confirmed that they were the standard robes worn by Greytower magi when carrying out an assassination.
It was easy to identify because there were records of such robes in the various kingdoms of Freia.
However, the various departments in the capital didn't dare to make a rash decision. After debating for half a month, the only thing they could agree on was to send an envoy to Nubissia to investigate the assassination.
However, who should be the special envoy and how large the investigation team should be sent caused disputes among the various factions. It was not easy to settle the matter, and on the 23rd day after learning of the assassination, the royal capital sent the first special envoy to the colonies.
It was worth noting that the envoy's prime suspect was the highest ranked general of the war theatre, the kingdom's Lieutenant General Claude.
Even though the second report submitted by the war theatre command mentioned that Claude was also heavily injured like General Aljess, the process of the assassination was rather suspicious.
General Algers was assassinated in the square in front of thousands of soldiers who were attending the military parade. The sorcerers in gray robes were surrounded and chased by the soldiers of the Royal Guard Division, but only five of them were killed.
Claude, on the other hand, only brought a small squad of guards with him. Against the seven magi, he only lost ten guards and a coachman, successfully killing the magi.
The two assassinations that happened almost at the same time had completely opposite results. That naturally raised the suspicions of the nobles in the capital.
Even though the report did mention that Claude was heavily injured and would need at least half a year to recover, no one knew if that was true or not.
A few peripheral members of the Stellin royal family and the kingdom's general suggested that the assassination was most likely orchestrated by the overseas colonies' War Command. Their goal was obviously to fight for power and profit …
Anyone could use this second report to come up with a series of conspiracies and plots for the sake of capturing Port Vebator.
The royal general firmly believed that it must have been a few generals from the war theatre who were unhappy with the fact that the royal army had sent General Algers to take over Port Vebator. That was why they had colluded with rogue mages and disguised themselves as Greytower mages to assassinate General Algers.
This argument wasn't convincing at all. Everyone knew what kind of people the Stellin royal family were. They already had a grudge with the generals in the war theatre.
Ranger had become a huge joke in their hands. Had it not been for the royal family's financial support, the ministry of the army would have disbanded it to avoid embarrassing themselves in the capital. Ranger had become a gathering place for ruffians and hoodlums.
What was interesting was that the generals of the overseas colonies were probably on Prince Hansbach's side, but the prince did not say anything. Instead, he thought that the envoy should depart as soon as possible and get to the overseas colonies as soon as possible, so that the assassination could be settled as soon as possible.
If the investigation was related to the generals of the war theatre, they should be dealt with accordingly. There was no need to drag it out.
The first prince's attention was currently focused on the palace. Stellin X's health was getting weaker and weaker and he wouldn't last more than two months.
On the contrary, 2nd Prince Wedrick spoke up for the generals of the war theatre and didn't think they had anything to do with the assassination.
The most obvious evidence was the fact that Monolith 2nd Linesman, Sevict, was assassinated at the same time as Algers.
Apart from that, more than ten high-ranking officers of the war theatre were also killed. Even 3rd Linesman General Beechlin and Civil Affairs Head Sir Bennett were heavily injured.
As for the old aristocratic families of the Ministry of the Army, they behaved in a righteous manner. They did not comment on the assassination, nor did they express any opinions.
Instead, they urged the ministry of the army to come up with an alternative plan to resolve the war with Shiks first.
The assassination could be investigated slowly, but Port Vebator had to be taken as soon as possible to cut off Shiks' hopes of delaying the war.
However, the ones who were the happiest in Aueran politics at the moment were the Stellin royals who were related by blood. As they were related to Stellin X's ascension to the throne, be it the prime minister or the other authorities, they all tolerated the nobles who shared the Stellin surname.
As long as it didn't affect their personal interests, they could let the royal Stellin relatives order them around for a while and cooperate with them.
After all, no one was as bold as Stellin IX and sent all those who disobeyed him to meet the wargod.
Stellin IX's personality was rather contradictory. He massacred the royal Stellin IX's blood relatives and took over their private lands. Then, when the remaining blood relatives admitted defeat, he would appease them and bestow them with wealth and manors to show how much he valued them.
Apart from that, he also formed a council of elders of the royal Stellin family and demanded that their descendants be acknowledged by the council before the new monarch could succeed the throne.
Perhaps Stellin IX believed that by doing so, he could gain the recognition of the majority of his people as he seized the throne by force. At the same time, it would prevent his descendants from suffering the same tragedy of civil war.
While the council of elders wasn't usually of much use, it would be enough to tip the scales when it came time for the new monarch to ascend the throne.
So, with Hansbach and Wedrick having to curry favor with the council, the royal capital formed an investigation team led by a few blood-related generals of the royal Stellin family and set off for Whitestag on a sunny day.
Funnily enough, less than six days after they left, the third investigation report from the war theatre command arrived at the ministry of the army.
The report pointed to Majid III, the king of Shiks, as the mastermind behind the assassination. Three pieces of evidence were presented at the same time.
First, the grey-robed magi chose to meet in the house of a Shiksan spy stationed in Lanu. There was enough evidence to back that up.
The second point was to first assassinate Claude and then General Aljess. He ruled out the possibility of the assassination being triggered by General Aljess' personal grudges.
The third piece of evidence was the answers Claude gave to the magi assassins when he was being assassinated. At the same time, they also provided a more detailed account of how Claude killed the seven magi assassins.
He mainly relied on two items: a silver necklace with a magical barrier and a revolver that Claude had just invented that could fire six times in a row.
At the same time, he attached the testimonies of those who witnessed the assassination and counter-assassination from afar, completely eliminating Claude as a suspect.
The report also reported that Bolonik of 1st Monolith folk had led the royal guard to attack Port Vebator, determined to prevent Majid III from getting his way in delaying the colonial war.
According to the report, Majid III had ordered the Magi to carry out the assassination. It was to protect Port Vebator and wait for him to quell the rebellion in the country before conscripting another army and sending them to Nubissia to continue the colonial war.
All the high-ranking officials of the kingdom who saw the investigation report felt a toothache. It was like a big slap to their faces.
Right after they sent out the investigation team, they received the results of the investigation and speculations of the mastermind behind the assassination.
If it was baseless speculation, they could simply reply to a letter of reprimand and refute the baseless accusations and speculations in the war theatre command's report.
That speculation was likely to cause a huge uproar on Freia. Majid III, the king of Shiks, would issue a bounty for the Greytower magi of Higros to assassinate the generals of Aueran colonies. That would be a major event that would affect the entire continent.
It was common knowledge that the Greytower magi were the most radical magi organisation on Higros. They advocated using assassinations to get rid of the prominent figures of the various kingdoms on Freia so as to remove obstacles for magi to return to Freia. All the kingdoms on the continent had a blood feud with the Greytower magi for centuries.
But in recent decades, it was said that Greytower's situation on Higros had deteriorated day by day, much to the relief of the politicians of the various kingdoms.
Now, news of the Greytower magi accepting Majid III's bounty to assassinate the generals of other kingdoms and mobilising nearly 20 magi would not only put Shiks in the eye of the storm, it would also put the politicians of other kingdoms on edge.
The reason was simple. Greytower magi had changed their ways and made a resurgence.
There was no lack of wily old foxes among the higher echelons of Aueras. When they saw the third report from war theatre command, they realized that Majid III had a very high chance of instigating the Greytower magi to carry out the assassination. There was an 80% chance that the speculation in the report was true.
Since Shiks and Aueras had declared war on Nubissia, the ministers naturally wouldn't stand on ceremony with Shiks. They quickly announced the third report to the public and demanded an explanation from the various kingdoms on Freia.
Naturally, Shiks and Majid III vehemently denied it and accused Aueras of framing them. Both sides were embroiled in a war of words for quite some time.
On one side, Aueras was criticizing Shiks while on the other, they had to summon the first envoy back to the royal capital to prevent them from running amok in the colonies.
Fortunately, the envoy didn't travel too fast. It only took them about ten days to travel from the royal capital to Whitestag. Due to the banquets they received along the way, they were only able to cover a third of the distance before they were summoned back.
When the envoy returned to the royal capital and read the third report from war theatre command, they still weren't willing to let the matter rest. The generals who were blood-related to the Stellin royal family argued that the report was an excuse made up by the generals of war theatre command and shouldn't be trusted.
But none of the bigwigs were willing to pay attention to those idiots anymore because the surviving generals of war theatre command had already made the best choice.
Even if the royal capital sent another famous general or envoy, they wouldn't be able to do a better job than the generals of the war theatre. They pacified the royal guard and attacked Port Vebator at the same time, not forgetting their original goal.
They also actively investigated the true motives of the magi's assassination and the mastermind behind it, successfully linking Shiks and Majid III to the assassination.
That was the happiest thing for the bigwigs of the kingdom. No matter what, the slander was justified.
As an enemy of Aueras, Shiks had humiliated the kingdom's envoys time and again. Apart from winning three colonial wars and slapping Shiks in the face, the kingdom really couldn't do anything to Shiks that refused to admit defeat.
Now, while the civil strife was still ongoing, Majid III would have to accuse Greytower magi of colluding with Higros Island to make sure Majid III couldn't care less about Nubissia.
That way, all they had to do was successfully occupy Port Vebator and the colonial wars that plagued Aueras would come to an end.
While Shiks still had a large number of colonies in the interior of Nubissia, they were separated by the coast. The only way for Shiks to continue having those colonies was to admit defeat to Aueras. Otherwise, they could only watch as Aueras' colonies slowly devoured the colonies.
Now, the royal capital had to form a new envoy group to head to the colonies to deal with the assassination attempt.
If the remaining generals of the war theatre had waited for the royal capital to send someone to deal with the assassination, they would only get the first envoy.
Now that their efforts to save themselves were acknowledged by the bigwigs of the royal capital, it was only natural for them to send a second envoy.
Most of them were representatives of the older noble houses. Their mission was to deal with the assassinated officers and get on good terms with Claude to trade for the six-shot short-barreled weapon.