Witch Movement (3)

【What? 】

Alex frowned when he heard this, and after a moment of silence, he asked, "…what do you mean?"

Coco asked in confusion, "Didn't you get up at night and go to the Duke's Mansion last night? I followed you and you told me not to make any noise and wait outside, so I waited outside and came back with you." She didn't realize what was wrong yet and smiled, "I thought you wanted to see him and were busy during the day, so you sneaked out at night?"

Alex gradually came to his senses. He relaxed his frown a little, touched Coco's head, and said softly, "Don't tell anyone about this, okay?"

"Including Prince Neka?"

"Um."

"OK."

Alex handed her the dried fish and said, "By the way, did you talk to me yesterday?"

Coco thought about what happened last night.

When "Alex" got up from the bed in the middle of the night, Coco was also awakened by his movement. Then he made a gesture to her to be quiet and sneaked out of the room.

So Coco followed him quietly.

It seemed that "Alex" had noticed her, but he didn't let her leave. He smiled at her and tacitly allowed her to follow him. Coco didn't say anything either.

Until the gate of Duke Neka's mansion.

"Alex" said to her seriously, "Be quiet and wait for me here, okay?"

So Coco sat there obediently waiting for him to come back. When "Alex" came back, he picked her up and quickly slipped back to his room.

Keke said: "No, no, I didn't say a word. You won't let me speak."

Coco noticed that Alex's smile faded a little.

He said softly to Coco: "Well, actually I have sleepwalking."

Keke's eyes widened: "Why don't I know?"

Alex smiled and said, "It only happened recently, and you sleep the deepest, so of course you don't know."

Coco pouted: "Nonsense, I won't be able to do that if I become a cat."

Alex continued, "I need to trouble you with something. Waking someone up from sleepwalking can have serious consequences. So if you are woken up by me at night, don't talk to me. Just look at me and write down what I do and say."

Coco: "Ah, this will help treat sleepwalking, right? Great!"

Alex closed the file and thought for a moment.

I had a vague feeling of being different when I was traveling before.

However, it was not until today that a clearer guess was formed.

[Ying, why did you hide this from me……]

[No, if that is the case, he chose to keep it secret because it must be dangerous for me to know about it.]

[But he thought it was too…to solve it by himself]

Alex put his clenched fists to his head.

He really wanted to rush to Inger and find out the truth.

But he had a hunch that even if he did so, Inger would not tell him.

He is the kind of person who would rather bear these uncertain risks alone.

Alex was still a little worried, so he called his assistant and said, "Go and find out what the second son of Duke Neka has been doing these past two days and how he is doing."

Ban Qi, the assistant assigned to him by Aola, was stunned for a moment: "Didn't you ask me to withhold all invitations he sent?"

Alex frowned and asked, "What's the connection between these two things?"

Assistant Banqi choked. She thought that this prince did not have a good relationship with the second son of Duke Neka, so he kept rejecting his request for an audience.

"Yes, actually he came to the palace yesterday, and when he reached the gate, he went back home. He probably couldn't come in without an invitation. I saw it when I came in yesterday. He also delivered the request letter here as usual this morning." She reported honestly.

Alex pinched his brows and whispered, "Doesn't he know what's going on outside right now..."

He sighed and waved his hand.

Before leaving, Benqi stared at the white cat playing with a ball of wool on the sofa, and closed the door reluctantly.

June 12, 1892

Two months have passed since the Fourth Prince returned. Three months have passed since Elena became the Crown Princess.

A storm was brewing in the court of Cuneo. The streets were filled with protesters and strikers.

Today is the first day since the death of King Sufpi that Parliament will begin its meeting to amend various important bills. This is also the meeting to hold a state funeral and decide the successor to the throne.

The proposal that was initially submitted has gone through many revisions in just a few months.

The knights and wizards blocked the White Rose Avenue in advance.

The members of parliament rode in their own carriages and entered the Yuyan Palace one after another. The palace had a pointed and solemn style and was the same palace where the Senate and the House of Representatives held their meetings.

There was a person who shouldn't have been there among the crowd entering.

"Wait a moment, sir, please show me your ID."

Inger lowered his hat and handed over his prepared work permit.

The people next to him raised their hands and called out, "Mr. Claro Monpinet, Councillor!"

"Ah, Councillor Westminster, long time no see!"

The guard was attracted by the two congressmen next to him. He returned his work permit to Inger and said, "Come in."

The work permit had a few words on it: "Stenographer."

At that time, ID photos were not yet used, so as long as you had a stamp, there would be no suspicion.

Inger followed the Westminster councillor with his notebook in hand and his head carefully lowered.

Westminster was chatting with a few MPs, so he was allowed to sit next to his seat.

Westminster's seat was at the back, and the seats for the MPs were arranged in a fan-shaped staircase, which went up higher as they went back. This was a suitable position to observe the overall situation. Inger moved a stool and sat next to Westminster's seat.

Logically speaking, as the second son of the Neka family, if his elder brother, one of the new members of the Senate, was brought in by Lanmore as an assistant, he should have a seat in the front row now.

But this is obviously unlikely.

Inger didn't even want to try. Lanmore never wanted him to get involved in these things. Besides, he and Alex had been in cahoots recently, so it was even more impossible for him to be taken with him.

So he went to Norihua, who, with a look of contempt that said, "What would you do without me?", helped him find the MP for Westminster.

MP Westminster is a new member of the House of Commons in the past two years. Naturally, he is happy to do an invisible favor for the beloved second son of the Duke of Neckar.

Inger occasionally lowered his head and pretended to take notes, occasionally looking up.

When the senators met, they greeted each other warmly, and then began to chat about daily life and probe into recent political affairs.

"How long has this commotion been going on outside? It's already the start of the meeting and it's still not over?"

"My door is always blocked by people, but the princess won't let us chase them away, saying that this is legal?! Do we have to wait until my house is smashed before we can catch them?"

"A few people's homes were actually smashed! But they were later fined some money, saying that it didn't cause too much damage, so they let it go."

"I think this was organized by the eldest princess! She just wants to ascend the throne so she incited those women! What are these women doing? Are they too bored because there are too few things to do at home?"

"That's not something you can say! Be careful or they'll accuse you of something! Besides, hasn't the eldest princess been busy suppressing those people all this time? It doesn't seem like she did it."

"Haha, look at what the result of her suppression is? She was locked up for a while and then released!"

"Isn't it just property damage?"

"Didn't you see the battle between the witches and the Knights of the Rose? Today they're smashing your windows, tomorrow they might be stabbing you in the heart!"

Inger took in the senator's words. They seemed to have deliberately spoken louder, so he could hear them even though he was sitting a little further away.

On the contrary, most of the legislators took the proposal documents and repeatedly confirmed and discussed them.

This was Inger's first time to enter a real executive meeting. He was a little curious, but he suppressed his slightly excited mood and looked around as calmly as possible.

His mission today is to be a faithful listener.

As people continued to arrive, the seats gradually filled up.

Inger saw Ola coming in through the door. She was wearing a formal royal dress, which was a rare look. She usually wore her riding clothes in the palace.

Inger saw the person following her and lowered her head subconsciously.

Alex, who had not been seen for a long time, did not wear his prince's formal dress, but a more formal custom-made white suit with his hair combed neatly. He followed behind Ola with an expressionless face, holding not a sword but a pile of documents in his hand.

At this moment, there was a commotion outside.

"Your Highness! There are a group of reporters outside trying to break in!"

Ola glanced at the messenger and said, "Didn't they say I allowed them to come? Let them in, don't stop them."

"This………"

Alex said in a gentle voice, "We will move some stools to the back to provide additional seating. As for the issue of discipline, we have already made an agreement with them that they will not be allowed to ask questions until after the meeting is over. If anyone causes trouble, the knights will escort them out."

“………Yes.”

Ola went straight to the king's seat.

Alex went to the second seat on the House floor, next to the first speaker.

There he was chatting and smiling with Chief Councillor Claro Mombinet.

Inger glanced at him furtively, but fortunately Alex didn't seem to notice him.

After getting the permission from the eldest princess, a group of reporters came in with bags, banknotes and cameras, and quickly grabbed their seats on the small bench at the back. But just as Alex said, they all kept silent and didn't dare to speak, for fear of being chased out and missing the good opportunity to grab the news.

Inger took a quick look at the labels on them; people from some of the country's major newspapers were there.

"Um?"

Inger couldn't help but wonder when he saw a familiar figure.

Isn't that girl wearing a deerstalker hat and holding a pen the Eric who saved him before?

Inger remembered that she seemed to have dropped out of school not long ago, and she went straight to an internship?

She was originally from the media class, so it was fine for her to be a reporter, but she always felt a little suspicious.

She raised her head, and her black and white eyes met his gaze.

Inger thought to himself that something was wrong and quickly turned his head away.

The bell rang three times and all the members returned to their seats.

The seats in the Senate and the House of Representatives are equally divided, but the Senate has more seats and fixed seats. There is a podium in front of the front row. There is no electric microphone, but there is a simple magic prop made of magic stone to amplify the sound.

The king's seat is in the center, facing all the seats, and there is also a podium in front.

Inger was frightened when he saw Ola sitting there calmly. It reminded him of the open class.

Everyone's eyes were focused on me, it was really scary.

It took Inger a while to calm his memory and focus on the scene.

He reviewed the country's political history.

Although the country had experienced the baptism of the mechanical revolution and the first parliamentary reform, most of the parliamentary power in this country was still in the hands of the Senate, and the cabinet system had not yet emerged.

Because this is a magical world, knights symbolize military power, and the nobles who own large tracts of land and their own knight orders still hold the dominant power.

As kings of Chune who have always regarded martial arts as the standard, except for Sufupi who was a special case and a wizard emperor in the past, the rest are all powerful knights, including the present Aura and the future Alex.

Legally, the emperor's power has never been completely stripped away; he has certain rights of intervention and final decision-making power in legislation, administration, finance, diplomacy, and military affairs.

Most of the nobles who supported Aura were actually against the Fourth Prince. But they knew that Aura's legitimacy was not established from a legal point of view. Aura had made all the other princes and princesses lose their ability to compete, so they had no choice.

Aura knew this, too. So how could she fight for her own position?

And why did Alex give up his own fight for the throne and choose to help Emperor Auraden?

Combining the facts he had seen in the past few days, Inger finally guessed something.

He looked at it several times and was sure that an important person was missing from the venue.

【The fourth prince, Rudolf Cune.】

The assistant went up and emphasized the conference rules and explained the conference booking process.

Aura stood on the stage and said, "The heir to the throne agreed to move the motion to the last item and make a decision on the last day of the meeting."

"I know you want to revise the laws of nobility and royal succession, but are you satisfied with just that?" Alex said to Ola with a smile while sitting on the sofa.

Ola raised an eyebrow.

Alex had experienced it, so he knew that at that time Ola just wanted to amend the inheritance law, so she failed.

No, to be precise, the law of succession was indeed amended, and she did ascend the throne, but she was not able to gain the status and future that truly belonged to her.

Ola asked, "What do you propose?"

Her tone was as if she was coaxing an ignorant child.

Alex knew that she still didn't fully believe him, so he didn't care. He just said, "I will help you this time. First, you should expand your goals."

"Um?"

"How many of the nobles do you think are truly on your side?"

"…"Ola was silent. She certainly didn't know much.

"After you amended the succession law, how many noble women were able to inherit the title smoothly and stand on your side? Before that, how many women did you see in the parliament and how many women had the right to vote?"

Alex's words were concise but to the point.

Ola also began to think seriously: "What do you mean?"

Alex: "The House of Representatives is still in the hands of the Senate, but it is impossible for the Senate to be completely on your side, at least half of it is impossible. If you want to do something in the future, you will still be trapped by them. So what you need to do is not to win the support of more Senate seats, but to turn to the other side."

Ola frowned and said, "Do you know what you are talking about?"

It is normal to seek the support of the party that holds real power.

Alex spread his hands and smiled faintly: "Which do you think is better, giving people charcoal in a snowstorm or giving people flowers in spring?"

Ola bit her lower lip.

Alex continued, "If they don't have power, give them power. If you investigate, you will find that the people's will is very strong. Some industrialists are as wealthy as the old aristocrats. They are trapped by regulations and they want to speak out. This is what most people want. Times are changing. If this country wants to seek further development and you want to have a say in the future, you can't be confined to those outdated rules."

The mechanical revolution has reached a bottleneck to date largely because the powerful aristocracy is unwilling to continue the change.

Ola laughed sarcastically: "I don't see how you are more radical than me."

Alex spread his hands and said, "I am against radical practices, not radical reforms. Therefore, if we want to do this, we must find the right balance ourselves, so that we can control radical practices."

Aura: "...are you assuming that I will agree with you?"

Alex smiled and asked, "You don't agree? Then I won't continue."

Ola suddenly smiled and said, "You bastard."

Alex looked at her smile, and he did not forget who changed this person to stand on his side.

Alex and Ola then discussed the specific approach.

Finally, he mentioned: "In addition, you must stay out of all these things and absolutely cannot have any contact with anyone. You are only responsible for suppression and punishment."

"Why?"

"Including our people, we cannot let the crowd know that they are being led by others."

"They have to have a firm belief that they are making decisions and taking actions of their own free will. In fact, most of the time, this is the case, and we are just giving them a push. Because only in this way can people's power be best exerted."

And this power will ultimately help them achieve amendments to the bill.

Ola thought about it for a long time before finally agreeing to these plans and starting to implement them.

She finally asked Alex: "What is your purpose in doing this?"

Yes, that's a fair question.

How can a person not participate in the struggle for rights for any purpose?

Compared to what he had often said, for the sake of our citizens, for the future of the empire, and for the future of mankind, he chose other words.

"I have gained your trust."

Aura chuckled and said, "How much is my trust worth?"

Alex smiled faintly: "If it were you in the past, you would have kicked me out long ago. Will you listen to what I just said and still do it?"

If it weren't for the Christine incident, if it weren't for the future eighth-level wizard and his duke family standing on his side, would Aura still accept his advice?

It's not wrong to stick to your own ideas. But there is a better way. It is better to make friends with enemies as much as possible than to kill enemies as much as possible. Alex learned this from his cautious wizard friends.

Aura said back: "You wouldn't say such things to me before, would you?"

Alex reflected on himself and nodded: "Indeed."

Aura smiled and said, "What else do you want? No war? That's not up to me."

Alex said: "I helped you to ascend the throne, and I will continue to help you in the future. I am actually not interested in the position of emperor at all."

Ola: "If someone else said this, I wouldn't believe it, but you are another matter."

Alex just laughed it off and didn't take it seriously.

Parliament begins.

In this life, the young prince, who officially stepped onto the political stage for the first time, wore a formal suit instead of a royal ceremonial robe and walked onto the podium in front of the parliament.

There was no complacency, no hesitation, no passion. His eyes were like dangerous golden vortices, shrouding his calm appearance.

He spoke gently with a slow voice and intonation, like a monster in disguise, engulfing the entire venue.