Once, there was a prince. He was neither the eldest son nor a legitimate son, merely a bastard born to the emperor and a concubine.
He had grown up amidst the ever-shifting storms of the royal family. His mother could not help him in the slightest. Although the Sertal Royal Family's control over its princes and princesses was not especially strict, during the struggle between the eldest prince and the legitimate son, every prince and princess was closely watched. The moment they showed any improper intentions, they would face suppression.
Of course, he did not care, because anyone could know where he went and what he did.
He liked visiting libraries, and he also liked conducting ecological surveys in the countryside. Before he was even fourteen, he had already written two academic works. One was a report on developing biological resources around the imperial capital; the other concerned disputes over water resources around the Quinoel Plains and the related issue of arable land shortages.
Clearly, not only could his peers not understand what he was writing, even his brothers and sisters twelve years his senior could barely make sense of it. Even those who could understand it did not know why he conducted such meaningless research.
His elder brothers and sisters believed this was the eleventh prince's way of presenting himself as "smart," "useful," and "harmless." And indeed, that was precisely the case. No one would be wary of a proper genius scholar. Even if some thought it all rather too affected, they could never find a flaw in him.
Later, however, everyone came to understand that as long as he was given sufficient funding, the eleventh prince would rather spend all day running about conducting research than compete for the position of crown prince, then return to the imperial