The cries of slaughter outside the front hall gradually subsided. Across the vast plaza before the hall, corpses lay strewn everywhere. They had all been guards unwaveringly loyal to Shayeto.
That was how the struggle for royal power worked. Ability, vision, and the capacity to judge the situation were all indispensable. Of course, a little luck was needed too.
The officials and soldiers who supported Shayeto had not all joined her side willingly. Some belonged to factions that had already sided with Shayeto, leaving the minor players beneath them no choice.
The corpses were dragged away one by one. Soldiers in armor carried enormous buckets of water and overturned them with loud thuds across the plaza and the covered walkway. Bloody water spread everywhere. Some seeped into the cracks between the bricks, while some was absorbed by the soil and became nourishment for the flowers and grass.
The victor climbed over the loser's corpses to take the throne. As long as humanity existed, every throne would be stained with blood. History was the wife of the losers, left entirely at the victors' mercy.
A large group of trembling officials moved forward surrounded by the border forces. Some looked utterly stricken, some sighed heavily, and others wore faces full of grief.
"The Empire is finished..."
An official with a face covered in age spots wiped away his tears. His life experience told him that this was an internal struggle among those in power. If no new king ascended today, the offensives from the restless border lords and foreign races would become even more ferocious. By then, the Empire's officials would be thrown into panic, and its power structure would collapse and disintegrate within a short time.
The best outcome would be for the Empire to split into several kingdoms. A worse