The Crown Prince In Hiding

Byleth, The ruler of DIABLO

When the Demon King invited them, both girls took their seats at the round table at once.

”This is our personal strategy room. No one is permitted to enter without my direct authorization.”

Byleth explained, before letting a faint, gentle smile surface.

”Princess Nora, thank you once again for guiding him through everything all this time.”

”I owe Mr. Fury a great deal... that was nothing at all, Your Majesty.”

”Iskaryx, was it...”

Byleth glanced over at Dan.

”A monster beast on Snowhaven’s soil. To be frank, I was not entirely in favor of you meddling with a creature outside our territory.”

”I just wanted to see how tough that glowing dragon really was.”

Nora paused when she heard Fury answer like that. He had taken the blame upon himself rather than stating the truth: that Nora had planned for him to help kill it for her.

”Well, never mind that. I understand my son has become your mentor. And yours as well... Saint Pauli.”

Rafinya swallowed.

”You have always been under our watch. I receive reports on newly emerging talents regularly... and you have never once fallen off that list.”

”Thank you...”

”Fury tells me he intends to show you our military system tomorrow. I approve.”

”Thank you, sir.”

”On the condition that you may only observe our formal standing forces.”

”Understood... Father.”

Dan nodded in acknowledgment.

”I wasn’t planning to reveal everything anyway.”

”...No, indeed.”

Just then, Princess Nora spoke up from across the table.

”Mr. Byleth.”

”Yes, Princess Nora?”

”Why... have you allowed us this much access to Diablo? Sitting at the same table as you... letting Rafinya observe the military... taking us through restricted areas of this country... What are you hoping to gain from us?”

Byleth fell silent for a moment, while Dan yielded the floor to his father and gave Nora a look that told her just how good a question that was.

The human eyes of the Demon King shifted between both young women. Then he began to speak.

”Fury told me there are things he wanted me to teach in his stead. Especially you, Princess Nora. You should listen to this carefully.”

He spoke while adjusting his posture, lacing his fingers together.

”You are correct. The fact that I have permitted you both this level of access does not stem from baseless affection. It is an act of building.”

”Building a network?”

He smiled.

”Only half right.”

”Then what are you building with us?”

Byleth looked toward the Diablo national flag.

He pointed at it.

”Building a nation is difficult enough. But keeping that nation alive is harder still. I have learned something far more important than building connections.”

He redirected his finger. He pointed at the shadows of Nora and Rafinya cast upon the wall by the dim light of the crystal.

”Princess Nora, have you ever heard the tale of the prisoners in the cave?”

An unnamed philosopher once said:

When prisoners have been chained since birth, all they can do is stare at the wall before them. Behind them burns a fire, and guards walk back and forth carrying objects, statues, and artifacts. The firelight casts flickering ”shadows” on the wall. The prisoners have never seen the outside world. To them, those shadows are reality.

The turning point comes when one prisoner is freed from his chains and released.

When he steps outside the cave, he discovers the truth: the objects being carried are the real things. The shadows on the wall were merely illusions.

He sees the sky, the trees, the rivers, and the true sun. He understands at once how cramped and distorted the world inside the cave really was.

With good intentions, he walks back into the cave to tell everyone what he has learned.

Byleth paused.

”...But they will kill him.”

No one believes what he says.

Everyone thinks he has gone mad.

And if he tries to lead anyone out of the cave,

the people sitting and staring at shadows on the wall will swarm and kill him.

”Strange, isn’t it, that it works that way? But what if everything you have lived through until today has been nothing more than staring at shadows on a wall?”

Every political shift.

Every piece of news that people receive until it constructs the ”reality” they perceive...

Is that reality woven by the tip of a pen writing headlines?

Are those the ”shadows” on the cave wall?

I ask both of you to think on this and answer for yourselves. Right now, for you, are the things happening around you and the thoughts inside your heads the genuine truth? Or have they been woven by someone who wanted you to think that way?

The illusion of the cave dissolved, replaced by a map of the various kingdoms across the human world, connected by dark threads woven in an intricate web.

”As someone who will one day ascend to become Empress, you must understand this well. The true essence of governance is ’controlling the reality that the people perceive.’ If you can control what they believe to be true, you control their lives, their thoughts, and their very souls.”

Neither humans nor Diablo were designed to coexist in organized societies of this scale.

”Control,” therefore, is not a matter of satisfaction. It is a necessity.

”Myself, your mother, and you... we are the ones who control the fire.”

And then images flashed in succession.

The media appearances. The alliance between President Fofana, the Empress, and Everton.

The meetings between senior officials of Luminus and Velmount.

Diablo’s campaign to court investors into their world.

How do you control a cave as vast as this world?

Byleth had discovered that answer long ago.

And that answer was what he was doing right now.

”It is the creation of a ’secret society.’”

A secret society between those in power, like myself, and in the future, you. Fury. Rafinya.

Nora was the future Empress Ophilis XV.

Rafinya was the future head of the entire Ministry of Defense of Luminus.

Fury was the future ruler of the Diablo throne.

When they came together to form this secret society, governance would become effortless. And this world would truly be free of war.

”Ten years ago, I inquired with the UN about whether it would be possible for Diablo to join.”

The Demon King’s words gave both young women pause.

”If Diablo joined the UN, this world would become one. There would be no war. Think about it. It makes perfect logical sense. We were willing to join. But we didn’t. We are the only nation that didn’t. The question is: why couldn’t we? When every one of us calls for peace.”

”There are people who profit from war.”

Rafinya was beginning to understand.

”Correct.”

Byleth nodded.

And so the play was this: the ”secret society” that Byleth was building with the ”new generation” of humans.

”Time” is the most powerful resource in the universe.

”The old guard right now is like a stone wall that appears unbreakable, Nora...”

Byleth said.

”The leaders of the grandfather’s generation, the father’s generation, in the councils, in the central banks, in the holy cathedrals, have all forgotten one fundamental truth...”

How will the old generation pass on this power of control and division? When the new generation of those in power... has already become one of us?

This was the core principle, and the reason why Demon King Byleth, Fury, and Casca were in complete agreement.

They could not change the previous generation.

But they could change the new one.

Nora and Rafinya were the first to be brought into this secret society.

”That is why I agreed to Fury’s request. I agreed to open our nation’s secrets as a show of good faith toward you.”

The entire national rebranding project, and everything else beyond it.

In the long term,

this secret society would infiltrate the educational institutions that produce the elite. Diablo scholarships would be offered to brilliant young minds who lacked opportunity, to young heirs of overlooked noble houses, or to new thinkers frustrated with the old system.

”I may not live to see it with my own eyes.”

Byleth said.

”But the human world will still look the same. The cathedrals will stand in the same place. The councils will convene at the same hour. The people will continue watching the ’shadows on the cave wall’ just as they always have. Only the ones controlling the fire will be you.”

That is my ultimate goal.

That is the plan for Diablo’s ascendance.

If the people at the top could be made to accept Diablo, it would flow down to the base of the pyramid on its own.

At present, that was not possible.

But if people like Nora, Rafinya, and other exceptional minds who would one day become those at the top could be made to accept Diablo,

then the day would come when demons would walk on the same streets as humans.

”Every ruler has their own way of controlling the fire. Study it well, Princess. Study your mother. I cannot overstep the relationship between you and the Empress. But Fury and I can say with full conviction that she is an exceptionally skilled ruler when it comes to controlling the fire.”