Plan G
[Volume 2: Leon Lazarus]
I woke up, and was surprised to be inside a carriage.
Ah right, yesterday I fled from the inquisition, and they burned my house.
I stretched, and looked out the window, we were on the outskirts of Nikalis, a walled city, this was one of the largest in the duchy, it seems that during the night Irma must have demanded a lot to the horses to make this trip.
Getting through the gate checkpoint was easy, Irma bribed the guards, and the carriage was not inspected.
I ordered Irma to find an inn, my clothes smelled of smoke so I wanted to take a bath, a breakfast, and that I should let the horses rest, although Hercules and Samson, the pair of thoroughbreds had been bred, and trained for a possible escape, they had just traveled close to 100 kilometers during the night, and the poor things were exhausted.
I meanwhile pondered, what would I do next, should I find it necessary to have to abandon the mansion, and the identity of Leonora Croiss, I have 17 back up plans, and have already seeded the basis for each of them.
Hmm I think I'll choose plan G.
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In front of me was a bowl of mashed potatoes, and a plate full of grilled sausages, while the food at Croiss Mansion was excellent, I will never lose my taste for more common food, and stronger flavors, I bit a sausage that I had covered with mashed potatoes.
Hmm this would be great with some wine, but I'm still 6 years old.
While enjoying my food, I kept my eyes on the dishes on the other side of the table, there sat Irma, and she had not touched the food on her plate, It's not that Irma has anything against commoner food, but she has told me that her honor as a servant does not allow her to eat in front of her mistress, so I have never seen her eat.
I had ordered her to eat with me, but it was a cunning plan, I had told her that after eating we had things to do, so she had to hurry, if I finished my meal, and she had not even touched hers, she would not only have broken an order, but she would have had the audacity to delay her mistress, so she would be forced to commit a fault, in order not to commit 2.
I was about to finish eating, and the food on her plate was still the same, so I smiled slightly.
At that moment a waitress of the inn stumbled throwing the tray she was carrying, unconsciously I looked in her direction, and I regretted it on the spot.
It was little more than a second, but when I looked back at the table, the food had left Irma's plate, and she was wiping her elegant mouth with a handkerchief.
HOW THE HECK DOES SHE DO IT!!??
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My life as Leonora was over for this life, that name would be linked to the witch, and the inquisition would have been in charge of spreading it, that made me a bit glad, as being Leonora was always linked to a lot of work.
As Leonora I had planned a life as a prodigy, she at her tender age would take charge of the affairs of the duchy, but when she turned 15, a fight with my family over the issue of the successor to the title of duke would force me to leave the duchy.
In my self-imposed exile, I would head to the south of the kingdom, to a land plagued by famine and forgotten by all.
I would be in charge of solving the problems of the region, so for the villagers I would be a saint, on the other hand, thanks to all the inventions that I would have made in my time in the duchy, the position of the nobility would decline.
Thanks to the discovery of crop rotation, people could make large plantations without the need of wizards, so the system gradually spread throughout the kingdom, more planting at lower cost would completely break the market, food monopolies would end, terrifying the nobility of losing their profits.
To try to return to the old system, the nobility would impose by force absurd tax hikes, this would only create nonconformity and further open the gap between the people and the nobility, planted the seed of a revolution, seed that I would take care to germinate.
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We left Nikalis, and were stopping in a clearing slightly off the road, we had changed the carriage, for one of a better appearance, the purpose of the first one was to go unnoticed, and the purpose of this one was to play a character.
We let the horses rest, and I sat down on a log, with a small hand mirror, I took a look at my appearance, ran my fingers through my hair and regretted it for a moment.
I resigned myself, and told Irma she could start, she took a pair of scissors and proceeded to cut my hair, meanwhile, a small miniature version of the cattle branding iron was heating on a campfire, I needed a bigger scar to hide the witch's mark.
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While the north was growing nonconformity, the south was thriving under my command, another reason I chose the south of the kingdom was because of the bad opinion they had of the church.
In this world the church is something exclusive to the rich, even the most humble church is beautifully adorned with fine gold and silver ornaments and magnificent statues in honor of their gods, so only people with a high status can attend mass, and commoners can only pray in their homes or in small altars in the squares.
This clear social inequality does not take away the fact that the church is paid with the taxes of the people, and if for any case it was necessary to request the help of the inquisition, and the lord of the lands did not want to pay the "tribute" this had to come out of the pockets of the people, this was seen more in the south of the kingdom where the number of nobles was smaller, and therefore there were very few churches.
When the nobles of the north began to lose power, the first thing they stopped doing was to offer their support to the church, on the other hand, when the south became richer the church tried to make a place for itself there it was the people themselves who expelled them due to the former neglect.
Having already weakened the power of my greatest enemy, the church, my position was more and more secure, even if the church managed to discover that I was the witch, it was the people themselves who defended me, claiming how the nobility and the church had abandoned them and I was the one who had saved them.
Nonconformity in the north would increase, and a scapegoat had to be chosen so that the people could vent their anger, and I was in charge of pulling the strings so that the revolution would point its sword at the church.
By the time I was about 19, the revolutionary movement would have gained strength, the nobility to protect their necks would have blamed the church, and thanks to a certain inquisitor making an attempt on the life of the saint who had brought prosperity back to the kingdom, the cup would finally spill over.
Before I was 20, the church would have been eradicated.
On the other hand, I would constantly try to mediate with the people to prevent the revolution from getting out of control, and attempt against the crown, along the way I would befriend the crown prince and capture target Maxwell Zalasar.
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Irma firmly held the red hot iron, I had it made in the shape of a snake making an S, it passed over my right eye and down almost to the height of my mouth hiding the witch's mark, I bit a piece of wood to endure the pain, this type of mark was common in the nobility of Tarrazzca a distant country.
When she finished she healed the burn with ointments that would help it heal faster, and wrapped part of my face with a bandage.
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I don't think it was the developers' intention, but the characters in the game were associated with the characters from the wizard of Oz, being Maxwell, the coward lion.
Maxwell Zalasar, was not a perfect prince, that was what I liked about the character, he was someone full of flaws and afraid to become king.
In the events of the game and more in the "true route" Maxwell gradually gained confidence as a leader, and in the end one had the impression that he will become an excellent king, but again, the sequel ruined all his development, turning him into an idiot who can't do anything without the support of the all powerful protagonist.
For my part, I would offer him my support, but let him make his own decisions, though secretly ruining the plans I wasn't involved in, leaving his self-confidence pretty low.
Thanks to my support the revolution would end, but the sudden death of the king, killed by me obviously, would make a somewhat prepared Maxwell ascend to the throne, the confidence he had in me was absolute, so he would end up asking for my hand to become his queen or I would become his trusted advisor, both results were the same to me, the point is that I would become the one who would make the decisions in the kingdom.
That would allow me to prepare the kingdom to face the events of the sequel.
As you may have noticed, the previous time I was discovered after killing the king, they also realized that the revolution and the purge of the church were planned by me, after much thought I blame my downfall on Arthuruz, the damned inquisitor somehow survived the purge of the church, and must have dedicated his life to discover my crimes, although he was not a particularly clever man so the real intellectual head was that woman.
For the next time I try, I must try not to be so lenient with my enemies.
Being executed by the cowardly lion was something that always bothered me, while at the time of my trial Maxwell gained some confidence with the hatred of how I tricked him for years, he was still far from how a lion should behave.
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We finally settled in a small mansion belonging to a nobleman from a distant land, who came to Karris to do business and promote his strange inventions.
Irma helped me remove the bandages from my face and I contemplated my appearance in a mirror, my hair was short and the snake marked on my face distracted enough attention so that you do not pay attention to the rest of my features, I had discarded all my dresses, which I replaced by elegant shirts and suits, and benefiting from the natural androgynous appearance of children, my new identity was ready.
As you may notice, being Leonora was too much work, it was a life of reading reports, sleepless nights, spending all day behind a desk, and keeping up appearances.
In short, Leonora was a saint who would bring prosperity to the kingdom and become queen by her own efforts and diligent work.
But Leon Lazaruz was a completely different person.