( Julien D Evanus's POV )
The person who was the most affected from the events transpiring in the Southern Duchy was none other than the Emperor Julien D Evanus.
Once he heard that Thumba City was under attack by the Demon King himself, he could foresee the potential fallout of that event.
"My Empire is crumbling….. My Empire is crumbling….." Julien mumbled, feeling a deep sense of loss, as he buried his head in his hands.
He could already foresee how snakes waiting in the shadows were going to take advantage of this unfortunate event to rip away pieces of his territory from his control, and just the thought of it made him feel sick to his gut.
"The first to rebel are going to be the Elves…. The Elven King does not respect me. He will be the first snake to rebel when he hears about the Demon King's attack on Thumba City" Julien predicted and right on his money, things happened exactly how he predicted them to happen.
A few hours after the Demon King had left Thumba City, a burning pit of soot and ashes, the Elves attacked the neighboring territories surrounding their precious forest which were controlled by the Empire.
Of-course, the Elves never expected there to be hidden Empire soldiers hiding amongst the common populace, which prevented them from swiftly capturing the lands as they had anticipated.
Thankfully, Julien had been vigilant against a potential Elven rebellion for months now and had deployed hidden soldiers to live as commoners amongst the populace.
These soldiers helped secure the borders in the Empire's time of need, until reinforcements could arrive from neighboring regions…. Which one the plus side did arrive quite quickly.
Not only did the Elves fail to secure the territory surrounding their precious forest, they were beaten back into their dense trove of trees, which was then set on fire by human mages.
Not long before Thumba City started to cool down, The Elven Forest started to burn to ashes, destroying the 'Unity' in Unity Empire.
At this point there was no returning to normalcy, as the Elves had rebelled against the Empire and the humans had burnt their home down, leaving no room for future reconciliation.
This fight only ended now with either the humans suppressing the Elves entirely, or the Elves managing to carve a new kingdom of their own.
Either way, a new opponent to the Empire's rule had emerged.
However, while the Empire's forces were busy dealing with the Elves, The rebels of 'The Uprising' managed to expand their land control, annexing three counties in a single day.
With Thumba City gone, Vice Commander Phill dead, and Duke Nico's power reduced significantly, the Southern Duchy was in chaos and there was no one left to challenge the new rebellion rising there for now.
As the news about their victory was presented to Julien, the old Emperor felt like banging his head on his work desk, as there were just too many snakes to handle at once.
Just when he thought that the Elven rebellion had failed for now, the news of the other rebels winning were presented to him, as no matter how hard he tried, his Empire seemed slipping through his hands like sand and he was scared that soon it would break apart even more.
The news about the horror that happened in Thumba City had not reached StrongHaven yet, however, when it did, pandemonium was sure to ensue.
If the Demon King could simply fly on his dragon beast mount and burn any city that he pleased to the ground, then what happened to Thumba City could always happen to StrongHaven as well.
As long as the Empire did not have a response for the Demon King and his beast, the sense of security within the Empire would be compromised, which would only promote lawlessness and mass hysteria.
"No! No! No!..... No, I cannot let this happen! I must distract the commoners from the fact that they are no longer safe within Unity Empire–" Julien muttered to himself, as he began pacing in his room thinking about potential ways through which he could temporarily prevent the situation from worsening.
The poor young Nathan D Evanus, who had only ever seen his father have a smooth sailing in life as Emperor, was terrified to see his dad's face full of frowns and worries as he paced around his room, as for the first time in his life, the kid saw the dark side of being in power.
As while the Emperor always got the compliments when anything good happened, they were also meant to take responsibility for anything bad that happened too.
"My Lord ….. there is a letter from Ben Faulkner for you…. It is marked as urgent" A servant announced, interrupting Juliens pacing around session, as Julien immediately opened the letter, almost fearing that it was more bad news.
Thankfully for him however, it was not more bad news, as of all the people who had failed him, it was surprisingly the outlaw Ben Faulkner and his student Baron 'TheBoss' , who were his knight's in these times of darkness.
The letter detailed the battle that happened in Thumba City in a way that did not sound horrifying but rather exciting, and with three Demon Counts dead, it gave Julien a way to spin it off to the masses without the losses on the human side sounding as bad as they really were.
"Oh bless you Ben Faulkner….. You might have bought this country some time with your excellent assassination skills.
Surprisingly, you're the only reliable hound I have left in my arsenal" Julien muttered, as he kissed the letter from Ben Faulkner a few times, before smiling ever so slightly.
"Prepare for a public speech….. I must address the crowd about the tragedy of Thumba City before the mass hysteria kicks in" Julien instructed his servants, as in his head he began weaving a speech to paint this event as favourably as possible.