Puppet-4

Like a white ghost of the battlefield, the prince made his entrance, everyone presents there saw a man covered in blood from head to toe walking towards them, mumbling something.

As he got closer, General heard, For my master, for my master, Rupert was repeating it over and over again. When Rupert saw that they were in the way, he got into his fighting stance. The rest of them did the same.

***

Following the carnage and the soldier, Charlotte found herself outside her palace, on the royal grounds, it seemed like Rupert was heading towards the communication tower, located outside the palace.

'What does he want to do there?'

The communication tower was the experimental artifact built in the J.M.A. around 150 years ago. During that time JMA or Joint Mage Association were researching a way from which they could transmit messages via mana in the air, as there was hardly any mana on the island, this place was the idle grounds for conducting this kind of experiment.

This tower in the royal ground was the central tower, which would communicate with other towers spread throughout the kingdom via mana in the air, with this artifact one wouldn't need birds for communication, and made communicating a lot easier. The Royalty at that time was more than happy to help the JMA test out their tower there at that time because they bribed the royalty with a lot of gifts and resources.

After J.M.A. had completed their experiment, they left the tower as it is, and gifted it to the Royal family, with this tower they could send messages anywhere in the kingdom, making it so that important communication could be done seamlessly.

As the communication tower is a very dangerous artifact, that could easily be used by the enemies, only the people with Royal Family orders could use it, but what confused Charlotte was what her son wanted to do with that tower. Sensing that nothing good could come from this, she increased her pace and came running to the tower.

She saw a sea of bodies of soldiers, chopped up like vegetables, scattered around the area, there was also a creator nearby, in whose dead center was the body of General Tarrain, impaled by the beloved sword of his son. Including her, everyone was shocked to see what had transpired.

It was then, that their attention was shifted towards the tower, as they started hearing rumblings sounds coming from it. She knew that her son was inside, thus she moved towards the tower, only to be blown back by a shockwave, and the tower exploded in smithereens.

Charlotte was fine, her body was strong and was able to handle the shockwave pretty well. She got up and brushed off her clothes, looking at the debris-blown tower, she didn't know what to think anymore. She rushed to the tower, hoping to find someone alive, better, to find her son alive.

But she stopped after running towards it, only to stop when she saw a man coming out of the burning debris, that man was covered in scars and burnt skin from top to bottom. Her heart started beating faster and faster, looking at his injuries from afar, she could tell that he didn't have a lot of time left.

After taking a few bold steps, the man fell down. She came running to him, and seeing his charcoal body, she wondered how is that man still alive. That man looked at her, with love in his eyes, his lips moved a little bit. "Ma… mather" her eyes widened in shock, his voice, his body, now she recognized it, this was her son.

"Ru… Rupe… ert" she murmured. She thought about touching her child, one last time, but her hands started shaking when they came near his charcoal skin, she couldnt touch him. Tears started flowing down her cheeks, her beloved son was dying in front of her, and she could not do anything to help.

Rupert used all the power left in him, he moved his lip, trying to convey a last message to his mother. "I.. I am…. Orry" Those words took every ounce of energy that he had, and finally, he took his last breath.

"No. No. NO!!!!" Charlotte started wailing loudly, the soldiers around her could only look at their devastated queen in silence. For most of them, it was the first time that they had seen their queen behaving this way, previously they had all seen her as a just and cold ruler, but now seeing her like this, they realized that she is also a normal human just like them.

The Commander then stepped out of his stupor, although the scene before him was very tragic, he had some duty to take care of now, he then started barking orders, making the soldiers check the perimeter, and start searching for the survivors.

Hearing the commander's orders, she also got up, trying not to look at her son's body, she wiped the tears off her cheek and ordered some soldiers to take the prince's body inside. She then also got up and started helping around, she also had a duty to see to…

***

The sound of Patrica tapping her legs was echoing through the room, which was annoying Gizelle. She didn't voice out her thoughts, after all, she was the weakest one present in the room.

She could understand her nervousness as well, stakes were high at the time, and it was evident that Sara who was kind of goofball, was also showing concern.

"Do you think he would be successful?" Sara asked both of them. "He should be. This is not his first rodeo." Patrica commented.

Gizelle then looked at the center of the room, there Kaisel was floating in the air while sitting in a lotus position. He had used a technique from which he had taken control of Ruper Gorgon, and now he was controlling his body to destroy the communication tower.

It had been an hour since he had started, but since then nothing else had happened. As her patience was about to break, it is then Kaisel showed movement. His eyes opened and he slowly descended to the ground.

All the girls stood up, trying to know whether he had succeeded or not, and all their questions were answered when they noticed a very big smile on Kaisel's face. They rejoiced everything was accounted for, and now, they could start their plan.