Marie thought for a moment. "We could just convince the knights who fought in the first place to fight again, unless their dead, that would be unfortunate." She hummed, a plan forming in her mind. She did have some blackmail on that kingdom that could possibly make a fight…
____
Luc giggled as the fox tickled is leg with its fur. "He's so cute!" He exclaimed, kneeling down to pet the fox. "I don't have a lot of pets, but I have an eagle. She's really nice, but she's out hunting right now. I think."
“They’re both still alive and active. If you have a plan then I can help with it for sure” Alucard gave his comment to the statement. The whirlpool’s movement just got updated, it started to move faster than before yet it was stuck in one place.
“An eagle? That’s so cool!” The spirit prince seemed surprised but interested in what Lucisan said. The fox looked up at Isaac before jumping up to stand on his shoulder.
“Alright buddy” he patted the small creature’s head as it evaporated back into smoke and sipped back into Isaac’s neck.
"Blackmail of course. Everything that the criminals here spill are written down, I'm sure we could find something." Marie stood up, stretching a bit before leaning down to look back at the spinning whirlpool.
______
"Mhm!" Luc bounced, opening the door to the library with a huff, it was pretty damn heavy. "Her name's Stella, she's kinda mean but also nice to me. She doesn't like a lot of people."
"Here we are!"
“Sounds logical to me… alright since trade is done for now—“ Alucard closed the amulet “—what’s next?”
Isaac’s mouth was opened wide when he saw the library. It was huge compared to the one in Phastia at the moment. He never would’ve expected the Punishment kingdom to have such an astounding library.
“Wow…” that was the only thing he was able to mouth.
Marie brought her hands to her mouth in thought, squishing her lip between two fingers before bringing it away to speak. "Not sure, is there any matters you'd like to talk about?"
Luc smiled proudly. "It's me and mama's project! We collect a bunch of books and bring them here. Mama says I'm very smart for my age."
Alucard nodded slowly.
“I want to talk about the four other Kingdoms surrounding us, about their pros and cons to be exact… let’s start with the closest, the Nature kingdom around yours, Kintopra”
Isaac smiled at Luc.
“I could guess, you seem different from the others I’ve met” the Phastia royal family was one which trained children to speak formally at a young age so it was normal for kids of the family to speak in a much more dynamic way than normal kids do.
Marie sighed and flipped to a different page in her notebook.
"Well, natural recourses for one." She started, adding something in. "They don't use as much energy as the other kingdoms, but they put out a lot."
________
"Thank you! I think you're very smart too!" Luc giggled, leading him over to a few comfortable chairs near a fire place. It was often cold in the kingdom, so there were fires going at all times.
“With that said… the new king is kind of a jerk isn’t he?” Alucard brought up, sitting with his legs crossed like the old days before he was given the duty of ‘monarch’.
“You know about the labor problem going on down there, right?”
Isaac smiled at the compliment, scratching the back of his neck lightly.
Seeing the chairs, Isaac immediately sat down on one of them.
“This is now mine and I will not move until I am bored with this here seat” the prince said jokingly with a small laugh.
"Yes, he is a wee bit of an asshole." Marie hummed, placing her elbows on the table and setting her face in her hands. "The labor problem… Wasn't there a riot a few weeks ago against it?"
_______
Luc laughed again and plopped down into another chair after lighting the fire with a lighter that was sitting on the mantle. "I'm sorry for how cold it is here. For an island, it's freezing."
Alucard nodded.
“Number of casualties was around a hundred and twenty both counting both the royal side and the people’s side, it’s depressing” he mentioned.
“That might be something we have to look out for because, who knows, we might be dragged into it before we even know about it”
Isaac shook his head.
“It’s fine, I enjoy this kind of weather more than Phastia’s, it’s so unstable back there” the prince joked a bit about his kingdom, possibly forgetting that there were other people inside the library other than the two young royals.
"Hmm, indeed." Marie wrote that down, heel's toe clicking against the stone floor. "Onto the next kingdom than?"
______
"I wouldn't know, I don't think I've ever been to Phastia. I was sick for a bit, so when my momma went, I didn't." Luc sighed, the sound of boots against stone coming behind the two as one of the librarians shelved a new book.
“How about… Mesa?” Alucard asked, switching the legs on top from right to left as he leaned against his seat.
“Aww, that’s sad. If you were to come to our kingdom, I can show you around” Isaac brought up with a small smile with a tilted head and a raised brow.
"Mesa… Let me find that one." Marie hummed as she flipped to a page labeled Mesa. "Alrighty, are there any problems there that we could be dragged into?"
___
"That'd be awesome!" Luc giggled, bouncing out of his seat to the other princes, trapping him in a big ol' hug.
“Uh let’s see… we have the destruction of the Magic Cave, I did that by accident when I was raiding Selas and will have to pay that soon, the construction of the Mesa-Candorin bridge next year which I’ll definitely be helping with, the war going on between Mesa and Selas, we might be dragged into it and into supporting Mesa’s side and… I think that’s it if we’re not counting natural resources and all that” Alucard nodded when he finished and looked up to see Marie’s expression.
Isaac was a little shocked a first but reached his hands between Lucisan to lock him in his arms as well. This was the first time someone outside his family has come into physical contact with him as he was a prince after all. He smiled faintly as the blue smoke came out again, surround both of the princes.
Marie nodded, a thoughtful look on her face. "Alright, sounds good." She approved, writing it down in her book before looking back. "Next?"
_____
"I like you, you want to be my friend?" Luc asked, pulling away and rocking back and forth on his feet with a giddy smile.
Alucard sighed.
“Selas” he said plainly without much emotion.
Isaac looked a bit surprised by the question. He then looked down at the ground with eyes as blank as can be. It looked as if he was about to cry. He looked up, closed his eyes and smiled with a small nod as an answer.
"Ugh, the fucking kingdom of bitches galore." Marie groaned. She could usually control her mouth, but when it came to Selas, she didn't hesitate to show her emotions on the subject.
_______
Luc smilled happily, giving Isaac another hug. "Don't be sad, we're friends now!" He told the other, patting his new friends hair.
“Come on, at least the only ones who are horrible are the damn Generals, apparently they don’t die or don’t age or whatever… on the bright side though, they’re not as bad as Qiryu and its entirety” Alucard shrugged when he mentioned the damned Dragon kingdom.
“Alright so… do you have any problems with Selas?”
When Lucisan hugged him and patted his head, Isaac’s face turned a bit redder though he hid it from Lucisan’s sight and if Candorin’s prince was to release him, his face would most likely turned back to the pale colors.
“Alright… alright”
Marie sighed.
"I just don't like them, I don't have any problems other than that." She admitted, leaning back in her chair.
______
"Alright!" Luc responded, letting go of the other prince, a smile on his face and his scrunched a bit. Luc back then was very emotinal and feely, though now he was more cold and distant.
(Let’s keep this a bit more… interesting… shall we?)
“Ri—“ before Alucard could finished his short response, the sound of an explosion came from outside the castle.
The king of the Spirits stood up immediately and closed his eyes, pinpointing which direction the explosion had came from.
“From the west” he claimed, turning towards the door.
Selas? Or Qiryu…?
Isaac looked outside when he heard a deafening noise.
“What… was that…?” He was a bit cold with his tone but it was more of instinct than on purpose.
Marie shot up, pulling out her pistol from her belt. "Selas? Though Qiryu does work more with explosions and fire." She muttered, putting back her gun and pulling out a wicked knife from the knife sheath on her leg.
_____
Luc went still for a moment before pulling out a dagger from his bag. "Another attack. Do you have any weapons on hand?" Luc seemed more grown right now, more mature. He was used to this.
“Most likely, it’s going to be Qiryu…” Alucard’s eyes and hands turned blue and emitted blue smoke “…they’re unaware of our visit here” the King opened the door before unsheathing his chain blade that was beside him all this time.
“This will be the first time I’m fighting alongside another kingdom’s royal, my pleasure” he smiled teasingly before running towards the outdoors.
“Well—“ Isaac’s hands had different colored smoke coming out; his right emitted blue smoke while his left emitted white smoke “—sorta” the blue smoke condensed into a lance, Isaac’s favorite kind of weapon as Phastia’s weapons aren’t so normal after all. He held the end of the lance’s handle, firing a thin blue ray towards the window, shattering it to pieces. He rushed over.
“I’ll apologize to the librarian later—“ he turned back “—Let’s go“
Marie smirked, cutting off half of her thick skirt so she'd be able to fight better. She'd have to apologize to the seamstress later. "Also with me." She hummed, ducking and twirling around workers and citizens running into the palace for protection.
___
Luc cracked his neck and jumped out the window, knife between his teeth as he held onto the ledge of the window, dropping down with a small grunt. He was running through the moves his mother taught him in his head as he ran towards the exsplosion.
Alucard was already at where the explosion has taken place. A figure stood in the middle of it all, laughing as red and sharp explosives were thrown out from the smoke in seemingly random directions but not at the royals.
“Definitely a ‘Berserker’ from Qiryu” the King claimed, unlocking his chain sword so that it could reach the figure more easily if needed.
“This won’t be insanely hard but the explosions could hurt a lot so be careful” he mentioned before the blue smoke surrounded him, arming his with his signature thin and hasty armor; the same one as the one in all of his photographs.
He rushed into the smoke first.
Isaac landed with the lance tip striking the ground so that he could slide down it. He followed Lucisan a bit before calling the lance back to his hand. The grouping of smoke was quite a way in front of them.
“That is your mother, correct?” He asked, gesturing to the woman in front of the fired smoke. The blue and white smoke fused together… “Already buddy—“ A white horse in a blue armor appeared our of nowhere “—help me with this” the horse gave a battle cry before rushing towards the smoke at quite an insane speed.
