A Bird Among Serpants

1.6

Food comes somewhat quickly as we all sit around the small table at the corner of my room. I'm somewhat curious as to why Tyria was so hesitant on leaving, but it doesn't matter much in the long run I guess. I can't do anything for her right now whether I want to or not. Besides, I should probably use this time to ask about the emperor. I need to know more about him so that I don't say something I shouldn't, "How did the emperor rise to power? I'd assume that someone so.. violent.. wouldn't get so much of the vote."

"He wasn't always like this." Percy sighs, "He was captured by the old monarchy shortly after being elected and torchered, coming out traumatized to hell. The mages put an advanced trauma healing spell on him, and he was the same, accept for his attraction. He was never the same in that regard."

Tyria looks down and mumbles under her breath, "He wasn't exactly peaceful before that.."

"What are you talking about?" Percy scoffs, "He empowered the humans of this nation and he overthrew a group of merciless tyrants. Sure, he did encourage violence, but if he didn't then he wouldn't have won. We're not the minority anymore, and in order for the government to see that we had to be loud."

Tyria looks down as I bite my lip, that whole thing sounding as if it were slightly scripted, "Is that from something, Tyria?"

Tyria bites her lip and looks away, " 'We're not the minority anymore' was and is the slogan of the emperor. He used it when he got elected to rally human support."

I glance at the way the two react, Tyria curling into a ball and Percy smirking. I'm guessing this is a sore spot for any non-human in this country and a high point for any human. I'm starting to see now why information about the Quena election was so few and far between now. If our decently high human population heard about a human running and winning over an empire then we may have riots for years. I may want to make some changes once I become a lord to give humans more rights in my lands. It is a good preemptive measure for if something like that were to happen. It only takes one human with a loud mouth to make an entire monarchy fall it seems.

"Would it be possible to cast a cenvanwie spell, Tyria?"

"Yes of course." She quickly casts the spell as the picture forms in the room, a much younger emperor stepping on a pedestal with a small stack of note cards in his hand, a kitsune and an elf walking behind him. I'm slightly surprised at first as there is absolutely no mention of his last name on any billboards. He's not even wearing an election garment, he's wearing his millitary uniform with all of the badges and ribbons he's earned.

"The emperor wasn't originally running for the election?"

"No, he was a well respected and popular war hero at this time. The royals were facing some backlash at having an election with only one candidate and decided to have him make a speech to support them-"

"Shh.. this is where he goes off script."

I can't help but smile sadly at Percy's unwavering loyalty and ignorance on this subject as I continue watching the video. Everything seems to be going normally. He's reading off of the flashcards and, even if he doesn't sound to enthusiastic, that could just be chalked up to him being tired. I'm quite surprised, if I didn't know I never would've guessed the outcome.

The emperor reads a statement quietly then suddenly stops, taking a breath, and calmly dropping the flashcards on the ground, "Alright, fuck this, you all aren't here to listen to someone else speak through my lips, you're here to hear my fucking opinions."

The crowd chuckles at the sudden informality as the future emperor smiles kindly at the crowd, the kitsune and elf looking at each other as if a bit worried, "Right. So, there's this thing I've researched. Did you know that humans make up 88% of the population of Quena, and of the people policing us, not one of them is a fucking human."