?Chapter 1116:


    Then I felt a soft tug at the hem of my cloth.


    I looked down and saw a little girl with pigtails standing beside me.


    Her bright eyes shone with excitement as she stared at me.


    “You will best those viins. I believe in you,” the little girl said, and then handed me a piece of candy.


    I stood there frozen by such innocent kindness.


    Finally, I crouched down and took the candy from her. With moist eyes, I said, “I promise I will defeat those viins and protect all of you.”


    Leonardo’s POV:


    I sat on the throne, a forgotten cup of coffee grown cold in my grip, as my icy gaze pierced the distant sky beyond the grand hall’s windows. That fateful day, soldiers returned from their supply mission to the werewolf forest bearing devastating news—the entire forest had fallen, and even Cody had died.


    Disbelief coursed through me. Without hesitation, I dispatched a messenger to Marehelm, desperate for answers.


    Yet days slipped by without word.


    The scouts I sent returned one after another, each empty-handed, their faces grim with failure.


    The grand hall doors suddenly burst open. A dust-covered soldier rushed in, dropping to one knee before me.


    “Your Majesty, the three princes refuse to return to the pce. They even…” His voice faltered. “They even refuse to relinquish their military power!”


    “How dare they!” I sprang from the throne, rage pulsing through my veins.


    “Those treacherous bastards! How dare they defy my direct orders!” Fury ignited within my chest, building to an inferno until—with a violent crash—the cup in my hand shattered against the marble floor, shards glittering like dangerous stars.


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    Did they truly believe that hiding in Marehelm ced them beyond my reach?


    I strode to the center of the hall, my voice cutting through the stunned silence. “Send out the order! Assemble the kingdom’s most elite troops. I will personally march to Marehelm and teach them the price of defiance!”


    “Yes, Your Majesty!” The guards snapped to attention, instantly mobilizing.


    Before they could depart, another subordinate burst through the doors, copsing to his knees with panic etched across his face.


    “Your Majesty, we… we haven’t been able to locate Antoni.”


    At the mention of Antoni, shadows crawled across my features, turning my expression to stone.


    Antoni! How dare he vanish when the kingdom teetered on the edge of crisis?


    I narrowed my eyes to dangerous slits. “Even the spies I nted in his household have no knowledge of his whereabouts?”


    The subordinate bowed lower, his voice a nervous whisper. “Your Majesty, the spies… the spies have also lost contact. We can’t find any trace of Antoni. It’s as if… as if he dissolved into the very air around us.”


    “Damn it!”


    “Your Majesty, Antoni disappeared approximately when Cody met his end,” the subordinate added, his words stumbling from his trembling lips.


    My expression hardened like cooling metal, dark suspicion unfurling in my mind.


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