CHAPTER 118: CHAPTER: 118 THE CONFERENCE. [2]

Vivian held the letters carefully and picked one from the stack.

The seal on it was already broken, a clear sign that he had read it before.

He unfolded it slowly.

The crisp sound of the paper opening echoed in the silent hall, making a few officials straighten in their seats.

With the letter held in both hands, Vivian cleared his throat.

"You may sit now, sir," he said to the young man from House Kitten, who was still standing like a lost child.

The young man let out a stiff laugh and quickly sat down, trying to pretend he wasn’t dying inside from embarrassment.

Vivian waited until all eyes were back on him.

"You might think these letters are fake," he said calmly.

"You might think I made it myself."

Before anyone could raise a hand or open their mouth, Vivian snapped his fingers.

A light ripple of mana spread from his side, and a heavy book-sized bundle appeared, Akron Academy’s admission records.

Every student’s name and signature was inside, untouched and official.

The sight of it made even the most stubborn officials sit up straighter.

Vivian raised the letter a little.

"After reading this, I will give it to His Majesty to verify," he said.

He turned toward the emperor.

The emperor didn’t speak, he simply smiled and nodded, telling everyone in the hall that the verification would be real, absolute, and final.

Vivian held the letter steady and began reading.

"Lord Ravan Tramplin..."

He paused for a short moment.

These were Kafrik’s words to his father.

The content itself wasn’t strange, but the way Kafrik spoke, so formal, so distant, felt wrong.

That wasn’t how a child wrote to a father who cared for him.

It sounded more like a servant reporting to a master.

Still, Vivian kept going.

"I just recently checked on Vivian’s condition, and the curse hasn’t weakened. Instead, he collapsed after the spar and coughed blood."

The hall reacted instantly.

Several officials took sharp breaths.

Others straightened in their seats as if someone had poured cold water down their backs.

The word curse hit the room like a heavy stone.

It didn’t need any extra explanation, everyone understood the weight behind it.

If House Tramplin had used something like that on Vivian... then this wasn’t a simple feud.

This was a hidden attack on the future of the empire.

Faces went stiff.

A few nobles exchanged worried looks.

Even some older officials who had been calm until now clenched their hands on the arms of their chairs.

Vivian let the silence stretch for a second before he spoke again.

"You might be wondering what they are talking about, right?"

He took a quiet, steady breath.

"They are talking about me. About using an unknown curse on me... a curse meant to slowly eat away my potential and shorten my lifespan."

His words weren’t loud, but they cut through the hall with painful clarity.

And now, no one in the room could pretend this was something small.

In the hall, every face showed something different, fear, anger, shock, but the people in the first row were a storm barely held in human shape.

Their jaws were tight, their fists clenched so hard their knuckles had gone white.

His father and his maternal grandfather looked ready to stand up, walk out of the hall, and wipe the entire Tramplin estate off the map without waiting for a single order.

Vivian saw it.

He felt the heat of their rage like a fire behind his back.

But he didn’t let it shake his voice.

"I should have reached the realm of Swordmaster long ago," he said.

"But this curse... it only let me cultivate for one and a half hours every day. That’s why my progress was so slow."

A few gasps slipped out.

Swordmaster was a title that took most people half a lifetime, but everyone knew Vivian’s talent was monstrous.

To hear that he had been shackled by something invisible all this time, it added a new layer of anger to the room.

Charlotte’s face turned pale.

Her lips trembled as if she wanted to say something but couldn’t.

Her mother, the empress, placed a hand over her daughter’s.

The pain written on their faces said enough, they hadn’t known how deep this went.

Vivian didn’t tell them about the worst part.

He didn’t mention the nights he woke up choking on his own blood.

He didn’t talk about the stabbing pain in his lungs, the dizziness, the way the world blurred every time the curse acted up.

Those were things he kept to himself.

And very few people knew about it.

"If I hadn’t found the cure," he said softly, "I would have died in just a few years."

The hall seemed to shrink at those words.

And now the silence wasn’t just tense, it was heavy enough to crush the breath out of anyone listening.

Vivian didn’t let the heaviness crush the moment.

He simply kept moving forward, steady and controlled.

"Nevertheless," he said, "the curse is cured. And as you can see... I have already reached the realm of Swordmaster."

A few officials lowered their heads, ashamed they had ever doubted him.

Others stared at him with new respect.

But the mood stayed tense, thick, ready to break.

"This letter ends here," Vivian said as he placed it aside.

"But it still doesn’t answer the main question, why the empire is in danger. Right?"

Not a single person moved.

Their gazes had weight to them now, as if they finally understood the path he was forcing them to walk down.

A path that could only end in war.

Vivian could see their thoughts clearly.

If the Tramplins dared to curse the Zenithara heir... what else might they dare?

What were they planning?

He didn’t give them time to sink too deep into fear.

"That’s why I want to show you the next letter."

He lifted another folded paper from the pile.

The seal had been cracked with the same clean precision.

"To Kafrik Tramplin," Vivian read.

This time, the tone changed immediately.

The writing had a sharpness to it, cold, strict, and dangerous.

Anyone with half a brain could tell the sender held power.

"This letter is from Ravan Tramplin," Vivian said.

He continued reading.

"From today, you are to keep an eye on Dean Rolack Zaran as well."

’He has been catching the spies, and our intelligence team believes he is starting to suspect their ties to House Tramplin."

A few officials clenched their teeth.

Spies.

Inside the academy.

Connected to one of the ducal houses.

Vivian kept reading, his voice steady.

"Make sure there are no mistakes. And if you are caught... kill yourself immediately. No matter what, the plan must not be compromised."

The words echoed through the hall like a funeral bell.

The meaning was clear.

Too clear.

Ravan hadn’t just been using magic.

He had been using his own son, a duke’s son, as a disposable spy.

He had plans so deep and dangerous that even death was better than getting caught.

By the time Vivian lowered the letter, no one was confused anymore.

They had seen enough.

Every official in the hall now understood the real situation:

House Tramplin wasn’t just plotting against a single person.

They were planning something that could shake the empire from the inside.

Something big.

Something deadly.

And it had already begun.

Vivian gathered the letters and the academy admission records into a neat stack, then walked toward the emperor with steady steps.

Every eye followed him, as if the whole hall moved with him.

He bowed respectfully and placed the documents into the emperor’s hands.

The emperor took them with a quiet nod, the kind that held both trust and approval.

Vivian turned, walked back to his seat, and sat down without any show of emotion.

His face stayed calm, almost too calm for someone who had just exposed a treasonous plot.

The emperor glanced through the letters again, then passed half of them to the empress and Charlotte.

Both of them already knew every word written inside, but they still read them carefully, keeping the appearance of fairness and formality.

Their expressions didn’t change. They simply nodded once they were done.

A moment later, the emperor set the letters aside and looked at the officials.

"These letters are proven to be from Kafrik Tramplin and Ravan Tramplin," he said.

He paused, letting the weight of those words settle.

Many officials frowned.

Others kept their faces neutral.

A few looked anxious, and everyone understood why.

Those few had ties with the Tramplin house.

Small alliances, business deals, marriage connections... things that were harmless before, but now felt like shackles around their necks.

Their fear practically leaked into the air.

The emperor didn’t soften his gaze.

He looked around slowly, making sure no one dared to look away.

"However," he continued, "there is a mention of someone called Number 9862."

He tapped a letter lightly. "Could you explain who that is in more detail?"

He already knew.

He had been fully briefed long before this conference even began.

But he asked anyway.

Because Vivian needed to say it out loud.

Because the officials needed to hear it from the one who had lived through all of this.

Because once Vivian explained it here, in front of everyone, there would be no doubt left in the entire empire.

The hall waited, silent and tense, for Vivian’s answer.