There was an atmosphere of grief and tension in Heidelberg, where His Majesty the Emperor had passed away last night and that His Majesty the great Fervinret XVIII had finally completed his glorious life and ascended to heaven...... Or that unknown existence.

The sky was frighteningly overcast, as if sensing the atmosphere of the funeral, and the citizens of Heidelberg were gathered in several areas designated by the police, surrounded by cordons, and immediately knights with shields and clubs in hand.

In this life, there were glory and shame; He has done good things, but he has also done a lot of bad things, but in any case, he is an emperor, and there is news about him, no matter what it is, it will get people's attention.

People wait from the morning until the afternoon, some from the time the death knell rings to the present, and in the early spring, it is not too cold, except for boredom, the waiting crowd does not complain much...... After all, they have lost an emperor, just like a comet from outside the sky to the sky, how many times can such a thing happen in a person's life?

Most people are in this state of mind, and only some of the guys who live in honor and fantasy cry on the side of the road, saying "O goddess almighty!" Have mercy on my Lord and give him eternal life! ”

People waited left and right, they never waited for the emperor's corpse, but they could still find the funeral ceremony of the last time, that is, the funeral ceremony of Emperor Fiwenlie XVII. Belch...... It now seems that the more than 1,000-year-old royal family should still follow the ancient tradition of first the farewell ceremony of the royal family members to the family of the late Majesty, usually at the Palace of Hermes; Then there are the Janissaries and government representatives, who are to hold a brief flag-lowering ceremony. The military and the government had to elect a number of respected nobles and members of the royal family to carry the coffin of the late Majesty: then the magnificent carriage carrying the emperor's coffin passed through the central avenue to receive the people's worship: finally the coffin arrived at the Heidelberg Saint-Hui Cathedral, where Alain. Archbishop Stephen celebrated Mass for the Emperor, followed by farewell for the royal family and military dignitaries.

As for burial...... That's hard to say! Ordinary people can't see this scene, in short, everything has a fixed charter.

The history of the royal family of Fei Wenlie determined that its various ceremonial duties were extremely perfect, and even such a major event as the death of the emperor could not be difficult for the old ceremonial officials of the inner court. The old priest had been dressed when he heard the death knell, and he had been looking forward to this moment for a long time, if nothing else, it was just his job.

The position of the ceremonial officer is very special. The most important monarchies in the Titan world all have similar official positions. But the Otiga Empire is a little different, and the person who serves as the priest is not sure to be a person, sometimes it is a family that has served for generations.

The eleventh count of Balzac, an old man who was nearly half a hundred years old, was the ceremonial officer of the eighteenth Fervin Lie. They were elected by the Balzac family, who specialized in handling sacrifices and all funeral matters for the royal family.

If in normal times. No one would ever see the celebrant of the royal family in a public place. This has proven to be unlucky. Originally, the Balzac family was not as prominent as it is now, because the royal power of the royal family of Fervenel was not as supreme as it is now. Therefore, it is also a last resort. Balzac finally made adjustments in the face of the increasing prosperity of the imperial dynasty, and the manpower of their entire family began to be engaged in rituals and funerals, otherwise it would not be possible to meet the increasingly large scale of royal sacrifices.

This time was the same, although the empire was facing a great crisis, the royal family did not think that it should be downsized, and all the Balzac family was dispatched, some of them were responsible for contacting the military department, some were responsible for colluding with the noble house, some were responsible for decorating the church, and some were responsible for maintaining the city's appearance with the Janissaries. As the representative of the liturgical family, the Count Balzac was the one who dominated everything, and he set up his office in the next room where the emperor's body was kept.

The old man formulated the whole funeral procedure according to the old practice of the previous dynasty, which was about the same as people estimated, except that the old man had some trouble in terms of expenses.

According to a rough estimate, the carpet used for the ceremonial guard should be replaced, the white silk that decorates the church and the city, the farewell dinner of the royal family, and the emperor's huge crystal coffin, although this thing has been prepared for a long time, but it was not paid for at that time.

The sacrificial family of the Fei Wenlie royal family has been accustomed to seeing such things, and the emperor's courtiers are all the same, scrambling in front of people, and the people behind are that ugly state of pushing and hindering. The old emperor is dead, and he doesn't know who will be the new emperor, everyone's attention is on this issue, and there is really no way to complain in this world.

But the Count of Balzac always had a way, and it was his job. He apportioned according to the rank, with the royal family contributing some gold carats and the nobles contributing some. In this way, when the inner court finally finalized the funeral order, there was still some surplus on the side of the Hermes Palace, and the priest said: "Stay!" Those who are alive have to live! ”

It is also a tradition that the ceremonial officers of the royal family only have a small income at such times, and no one complains about this.

At two o'clock in the afternoon of April 1, 912, the descendants of the royal family and the representatives of the branch families walked out of the Hermes Palace with the mighty knights, they had just had a short farewell to the body, the body of Emperor Fiwenlie XVIII was encased in a snow-white crystal coffin, this huge coffin is a valuable work of art, the carving on it took more than a dozen craftsmen seven years to complete.

The front side of the crystal coffin is carved with the lion totem of Fei Wenlie, the head of Fei Wenlie XVIII, facing the totem of the royal family, he is pillowed on the cold jade pillow, the body is sprinkled with new flower petals transported from far away, the golden crown accompanies the noble deceased with a cold and pale face, and his golden mourning clothes shine like armor in the flowers.

There was no sunlight in the sky, only layers of clouds, and the royal funeral procession was divided into three groups on the gloomy central avenue, one was the cavalry who opened the way, all knights, they were neatly dressed in armor and black cloaks depicting the red cross: the second was the procession of carriages, led by the chariot of Empress Maureen Case, widow of Frevinette XVIII, and then the emperor's coffin. As the carriage dragging the corpse passed in front of the crowd, Otigar's subjects knelt down. They threw flowers of varying authenticity at the funeral procession. The last column was a procession of retinues and ministers, and these miserable-looking fellows would mistake them for the actors of a certain troupe, because their performances were so real that some of them even burst into tears, and in any case, they would be infected if they looked at them.

Caesar. Fei Wenlie sat in the fourth carriage, followed by the second prince, Dietrich. She was followed by Princess Liser and other members of the royal family...... Further on, there was a large array of noble carriages arranged by title, where almost all the famous family coats of arms of the empire could be seen, and Hathaway sat in one of them.

Looking at the solemn crowd outside the window, the corners of Hathaway's mouth curled slightly...... The trouble has just begun. An emperor is buried today. Tomorrow may be buried with a historic dynasty......

I don't know if it was because of the former imperial power of Lian Zhan, or for some other reason, before his death, Fiwenlie XVIII had countless opportunities to solve the problem of the heir to the throne. But he ended up leaving nothing. Just leave in style. So much so that on the second day of the burial, the whole of Heidelberg was filled with a strong smell of gunsmoke.

According to common sense, the person in charge of the state is the person who will be the next emperor. However, to the distress of the nobles and gentry, the last legal basis was missing this time, that is, His Majesty the Emperor only verbally stated that His Royal Highness Dietrich was in charge of the state when he met with some noble ministers, but not in the written form of an edict, which caused some legal controversy.

And His Majesty the Emperor did not wake up until his death, which made this controversy even more confusing, and some people even suspected that His Majesty the Emperor only made His Royal Highness Dietrich temporarily supervise the country, and did not intend to let His Royal Highness Hoffmann take over as the next Emperor, otherwise he would neither publicly announce it to the whole country at the meeting of nobles, nor fix it in the form of an edict, among which the most fierce jumping up and down was the supporters of the Grand Prince Caesar.

Hathaway sniffed the tea in the cup gently, the faint fragrance had a strange taste, which was due to the addition of the moon grass, which can maximize the effect of the tea leaves, and can eliminate some of the elements that are easy to make the human body dependent, so Hathaway likes it very much.

At this moment, in the Imperial Council, the nobles are arguing over the successor of the emperor...... This is normal, and it is customary for the successor to be crowned with two-thirds of the nobles' votes if there is a major dispute over the succession.

Caesar, who thought that he had the support of several great lords in the north and most of the great nobles in Heidelberg, did not even expect that he would decide his fate in this way, let alone that the judges of the royal court ruled by a vote of 5 to 4 that because he was not the person appointed by the emperor to supervise the country, he could not inherit the throne as the emperor's eldest son.

As soon as this ruling came out, it immediately caused an uproar in Heidelberg, the small and medium-sized nobles who originally supported Dietrich were united in opposing Caesar's succession, and the camp of the big nobles who originally supported Caesar also began to crack, the ruling of the royal court made them aware of the intervention of some unexpected factors, and also made them feel that this time the battle for the heir to the throne is not just the same room of Caesar and Dietrich brothers, The complex entanglement of forces behind them made some nobles who originally simply hated Dietrich feel a little hesitant, and they had to think twice about the consequences of insisting on opposing Dietrich in this way.

The bitter dispute began after the burial of the emperor, and Caesar, who had lost the support of the royal court, had to vote among the nobles to decide whether he should go directly to the throne, and even in the moments before the vote, Caesar was still convinced that he could easily win more than two-thirds of the noble votes, after all, the votes of the minor nobles and the judges of the royal court could not reach the bottom line of one-third of the noble votes.

But to Caesar's heartbreak, the unthinkable happened in the vote, the five nobles who had always supported him actually voted against themselves at the last minute, which immediately reversed the vote, and the result of two votes away from two-thirds was announced, which immediately caused a fierce quarrel in the council hall, which made Hathaway, who was sitting on the mountain watching the tiger fight, find it extremely interesting.

At this moment, the sound of hurried footsteps came from outside, which made Hathaway a little surprised, it seemed unlikely that the quarrel in the council hall would have ended so quickly, which did not seem to fit the character of the nobles who liked to argue, could there be any surprise in the middle? Hathaway looked into the foyer with some confusion.

Hathaway couldn't help frowning when she saw the panicked look of the person who came, the person who came was the head of the Cordillera intelligence agency in Heidelberg. Normally, he is not allowed to meet with himself openly at this time, unless something major happens.

However, as a matter of great importance, intelligence officers must first be calm, and this guy's psychological quality is inevitably too poor. So when she received the letter, Hathaway's face was also a little uncertain.

However, when Hathaway read the contents of the letter clearly, her face changed slightly, and she was a little out of breath...... She took a deep breath to calm herself down and began to think...... It's happened, everything doesn't make sense before, and now it's a matter of how to deal with the situation at hand

"How big is the rebel attack this time?" It took Hathaway a long time to control her emotions, and she needed to figure out the true intentions of the rebels this time.

"Quite large, unprecedented, the rebels have all the big soldiers, and this time they have used a large number of servant troops. According to what we know, the Holy Cross Legion has completely collapsed, and by the time our information is transmitted, nine of the twelve fortresses in the entire southwest have been captured, and the other three are also in danger, and we judge that these three should have fallen by now, and the cavalry of the rebels is quite fast, and it is estimated that it will not be more than four hundred miles away from Heidelberg now. ”

"Four hundred miles?"

Hathaway was shocked again, even if she had some psychological preparation, she still didn't expect that the rebels' actions this time would be so unprecedentedly and so ferocious, an attack of this scale and magnitude was obviously not a whim, it was impossible without a long period of all-round preparation, was the Bell family's heritage so powerful?

The timing of these rebels was so good that everyone in Heidelberg was still staring at the throne, but they did not expect that the rebels had already attacked the center of the empire.

The atmosphere in the room was a little dry and stuffy, Hathaway only felt that her mouth was a little bitter, everything seemed to have little room for maneuver, damn Caesar, he actually used his status as a prisoner to transfer the court magician group to the province of Casev, seven days ago, it is estimated that he has already passed the province of Bukharin and entered the territory of Kasef, and this deal with the Grand Duke of Casev will make him, and the entire Otica empire will pay a heavy price for it.

Without the help of the magicians, with the strength of the reorganized Golden Olive Corps and the Praetorian Guard, Heidelberg would not have been able to withstand the influx of rebels, and the rebels seemed to have understood this. (To be continued......)