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I had gone to persuade Illeion Volten to join our cause. Instead of getting to speak with him directly, I ended up receiving a gentle yet firm rebuke from the Duchess.
It wasn’t just fools who became tyrants or despots. In fact, the foolish acts a king could commit were countless.
A foolish king could be a tyrant who killed his people without any guiding principles, or one who waged endless wars of conquest without justification.
Yet, being overly considerate of outsiders and hesitating to eliminate enemies who hadn’t yet shown their true colors could also be a form of tyranny.
The Duchess pointed out that my criteria for deciding who needed to be killed was far too narrow.
In these perilous times, where even the slightest hint of a threat called for decisive action, I was criticized for hesitating to eliminate those whose loyalties were uncertain.
Wasn’t it enough to just kill one’s enemies? Or was that too humane a way of thinking?
To be certain that someone was an enemy, they would have already bared their teeth, so conflict would be inevitable. One had to be able to eliminate threats before they became clear enemies.
I wasn’t born with the talents of a king. But how long could I hide behind that excuse?
Now that I was king, claiming I lacked the necessary qualities was just an excuse to justify my actions.
The Duchess had expressed her concerns, calling my approach dangerous, and I had no good way to respond.
I understood her concerns.
Even though protecting the flock within the fence was already a challenge, I still lived with the hope that the beasts outside might also be sheep. But a king had to safeguard those within the fence while viewing everything beyond it as a threat, and I wasn’t doing that. If a ruler with my mindset governed the land where...
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