Anke froze for a second.
He stared blankly at Tales.
"His Majesty will be very pleased, very pleased..."
The Western Wastelander turned his head dazedly and muttered to himself.
"Really? Really..."
Tales furrowed his brow.
"You know, this morning, Jann backed down before my father. He cut off a huge piece of flesh for it, then fled back to Emerald City--as if it had all been planned."
"What good does that do?"
Tales stared hard at Anke:
"What good does creating this Big News do for Jann Cavendish and his Southbank Territory?"
"Was it just to make me and the royal family look bad? Then watch you get executed?"
Anke remained dazed and silent for a long time.
"Anke?"
Tales had no choice but to raise his voice.
Bailar trembled slightly and came to his senses.
He looked blankly at Tales, his lips trembling as he struggled to speak.
"You know, Your Highness," Anke finally said a few seconds later, though what he said had nothing to do with Tales's question:
"If I died in the duel, or at the hands of the guards, then I would have killed myself. No one else would be to blame."
Anke said blankly:
"But you, you said you wanted to give me a chance."
"But do you know that when you stopped me, you took on the weight of a life?"
He looked at Tales like a walking corpse:
"That was brave."
"But it was also foolish."
The next second, Anke's expression shifted repeatedly, the muscles in his face twisting back and forth.
It was as if he were engaged in a fierce internal struggle.
Something was wrong.
Tales frowned:
Anke's behavior was wrong.
"How interesting."
Tales kept his tone steady and continued along with his words:
"You know, more than one person