Henry sat behind his desk, a single stack of paperwork settled on the table's surface. However, his attention was somewhere else instead.
"…Let me get this quick. You finally give them the green light?"
In front of him, Elsa stood in the middle while Ariel and Rapunzel flanked her on both sides with wide grins on their faces.
Elsa nodded her head, Henry squinted his eyes and carefully watched her expression, looking for any signs of force and reluctance. But after seeing nothing, he mentally sighed in relief.
"I should be happy, shouldn't I?" Henry gave them a weary smile.
Ariel chuckled and stepped forward, "Damn right you are!"
Silence
Henry stared at her in shock, "Ariel…where did you pick up those words from?"
Ariel's lips thinned, keeping her mouth shut. When Henry's squint turned deeper, she started to sweat.
"Ariel…"
"No one! Definitely no one, haha~"
Just when Ariel thought her excuse was good enough to dodge the suspicious stare, Elsa came forward and snitched on her, "She once overheard you whenever you talk with one of your people in this room."
"Elsa!" Ariel stomped her feet on the ground and pouted, glaring hard towards the ice-cold princess.
With this revelation, Henry rubbed his forehead. He did remember saying those same words when one of his men reported to him.
'Should I consider this a good thing? Her naive and innocent way of talking makes her an easy target to anyone who talks to her. Perhaps if she learns how to talk harshly and tough, that'll dissuade a few.'
Henry rubbed his chin and made a note to the back of his mind to personally write his own dictionary for Ariel, he might even secretly distribute a single copy of it to the library just for fun.
"It's alright, I don't mind it." He then turned his attention to Elsa, "Anyways, I'm glad you finally found it in your heart to accept them, Elsa."
"So can we kiss now?" Rapunzel, who had been quiet for several minutes since they entered his office, suddenly blurted out.
Elsa gave her the look of 'Are you serious?' while Ariel proudly puffed her chest and gave her a thumbs up.
On the other hand, Henry simply chuckled. He was tempted to accept the offer however, it's unfortunate that he still has a few more pieces of paperwork to approve and construction around the Kingdom to supervise.
———
[Random Lioncrest Citizen PoV]
My eyelids flickered open before yawning and stretching out my limbs. Today is a good day because it's a holiday, more specifically, a special Non-Working Holiday.
Jumping out of my bed, I made my way and opened my bedroom's window, a beam of sunlight instantly greeted my face.
At the same time, I took a deep breath, relishing the fresh air of the streets. Normally, I wouldn't dare to do this but the past few days, there has been a change in the air.
It no longer smells bad, I've only heard rumors of what caused the change—something about canals and sewers, but I'm glad the crown finally did something about the bad air.
Grabbing myself a towel and clean clothes, I went outside, greeting a few of my neighbors and people I know.
Almost all of them including me made our way to the Public Bathrooms, I heard it was proposed and established by King Henry when he was still the Crown Prince, something about good hygiene and such.
I don't know about any of those things, but these Public Bathrooms are among the best things that have happened in my life. Especially those Soaps and shampoos that he introduced alongside the bathrooms.
Back then, we would simply grab a bucket, fill it with water, and clean ourselves in the back of our homes.
Cling! Cling!
The familiar sound of the bell caught my attention. Turning around, I was greatly surprised to see my friend, Jon, riding one of those so-called Bicycles.
"Jon! By the heavens, you got yourself a bicycle?" I jogged towards him as he stopped in front of me. There was a smug grin on his face.
"Oh, this? Just got it for half of its price, someone previously owned this and he said he'll be moving out for his Merchant business, so he decided to just sell this instead of letting it gather rust in his house." He replied in an almost dismissive way, if I didn't know him since childhood, I might've thought he was arrogant but he's just being himself.
"Are you serious? Jon, you gotta let me have a ride sometimes!"
"Haha! Of course! As a matter of fact, this bicycle is one of those two-seater variants. Look, you can sit behind me."
Following his gesture, there was indeed a leather seat behind him. However, with its size, I'm slightly afraid that if I were to sit, it would break.
"Uhm, are you sure Jon? I heard bicycles are hard to learn, especially if you have someone sitting behind you."
Jon dismissed my words, this time, with an arrogant flair, "Oh please, my friend. You know me, I'm quick to pick up things. Just take a seat. We will ride until dawn!"
"Okay…" I hesitantly sat behind him and carefully watched as he started pedaling.
At that moment, I noticed that his arms were getting wobbly, even I could feel the shake of the bicycle.
"Jon, are you sure you can do this?"
"I-I'm fine, Michael. Just trust me." He replied with a not-so-sure tone.
I tightened my grip on the metal handle under my seat, that's when I noticed the direction we were heading.
"Uhm, Jon. We're driving to a wall…"
"I-I know. Hold on."
"Jon, there's a wall in front of us!"
"I know! J-Just give me a second!"
"We don't have a second because it's already in front of us! Aahhhh!"
"Wahhhhh!"
Bam!
Clank!
———
"People nowadays tsk tsk tsk Cough! Cough!" An old man watched the entire scene happen before shaking his head in disappointment, his raspy comment was shortly followed by coughing.
Clearing his throat, he snapped the crispy newspaper in his hand and resumed reading.
"A sewer system? Fantastic. I'm glad King Henry turns out to be a good ruler like this father. This Kingdom is in good hands! Cough! " The old man murmured under his breath and kept murmuring as he continued reading the newspaper.
Newspapers. One of Henry's inventions that became a standard throughout the continent. Who would've thought that an 8-year-old would come up with this just to show goodwill and transparency to their citizens?
Thanks to this, almost every single Lioncrest citizen would buy a weekly newspaper just to catch up with whatever is happening in their surroundings.
"Father! Father, quick!" Before the old man could flip the newspaper to the next page, he barely heard the yelling of his daughter.
"Hm? Matilda? Cough! Cough! Why're you in such a hurry? I wouldn't go anywhere, you could've just walked, now look at you, all sweaty and red." The old man reprimanded the seventeen-year-old auburn-haired girl.
Wiping the sweat off her forehead, Matilda quickly explained, "You don't understand, father!" but changed midway when she noticed the newspaper in his hand, "Wait, you're already reading this week's newspaper? Quick, flip to the next page!"
Holding down his complaint, the old man flipped to the next page and slowly read. A few seconds later, his eyes slowly widened, "Is this true?"
He squinted his eyes and read one of the lines, "A fifty gold coins reward for volunteers with strange illnesses and undocumented diseases? Volunteers will be subjected to safe experiments and studies in an attempt to cure."
His bony hands shivered, "Cough! Cough! Matilda, with this reward, we'll finally be able to get you to the academy! Cough! Cough!"
Matilda profusely shook her head, "Academy? No! Father, we have no time for that, we'll finally be able to cure your bloodied coughs! Pellars couldn't help you, and healer magicians are way too expensive! This is finally it!"
The old man shook his head, "I'm already dying, my daughter. Didn't you read? It's just an attempt to cure, they'll experiment on me and study my disease, and I'm sure I'll be the first one they'll experiment with this kind of disease, so I doubt they'd be able to find success."
"Father…" The girl teared up.
"Don't worry about me, Matilda. With this 50 gold coins reward, even if you don't want to get to the academy, at least you'd be able to buy yourself a house, find a good husband, and if I'm still alive, I'll be able to meet my grandkids."
Looking at his daughter who has turned silent, the old man sighed and patted her head, "Stop worrying about me. Cough! Cough! I've long accepted that I'll die soon. I'm quite lucky that I was able to live long enough to experience three generations of the Charming Family Kings."
He continued with a happier tone, "Just look on the bright side. Cough! Cough! If this experiment and study work. Lioncrest will surely cure many incurable and unknown diseases in the future! You know, there's a small part of me that is afraid that my disease might get inherited by you, most diseases would sometimes pass on to the next generation. Cough!"
"Cough! So if all it takes is my sacrifice to ensure the safety of not just you but anyone else who might get afflicted with a similar disease, I'll gladly do it several more times."
Matilda finally broke down and burst into tears, "Father!"
"There there, Matilda. Everything will be alright. His Majesty, King Henry will take care of us, just like his father."
The old man then silently made a small prayer in his heart, hoping for King Henry to live a long and healthy life in the future.
———
"Pretty boring in the borders, isn't it? Don't worry, I felt the same when I got here first. But hey, look on the bright side, you'll earn just by standing guard, isn't that great?"
In the northern border of Lioncrest Kingdom, a ten-year-old outpost was currently being manned by ten experienced knights and five newbies. Due to the rumors and reports received about the skirmishes of harassment by the Kingdom of Thorgard, the Northern Great Kingdom, five knights were sent to enforce each of the Northern outpost borders.
There are five outpost borders situated on the northern border of Lioncrest, and this particular one was the furthest and most unlikely to be invaded due to the high mountains, tight valleys, and long rivers that would hinder any army trying to cross.
One of the said newbie knights took a sip of his canteen before replying with a slightly arrogant tone, "I longed for sword fights and stabbing foes. Not standing around, wasting everything I've learned."
The knight whom he just replied to shook his head in disappointment, "Trust me, kid, once you've been through enough battles and bloodshed, you'll see just how wrong you are."
"Besides, it's not like we're going into war right now, next week is the annual summit meeting between the Great Kingdoms, King Henry will surely do what he can to avoid another Great War."
Just as the newbie opened his mouth to reply. They heard shouts and orders from below.
Looking down, they saw one of their own rushing towards their outpost with a fear-stricken look on his face.
The older knight frowned, "Weird, he's part of the squad we sent to scout the surroundings of the outpost. There's supposed to be three of them."
That's when the shouting finally became clear to them.
"The Vikings! Thorgard's Army is crossing the river!"