A Theory on Godhood: An Overlord Story

Chapter 61: Fashionable Fallacy

                                                     Capital of Re-Estize, Palace Outskirts

"What good is a chicken-hearted king?!"

"Death to the traitorous nobles!"

"Justice for our brothers and sisters in E-Rantel!"

"How many more of us have to die before something is done to save our souls?!"

This was the chorus that sang outside the walls of Valencia Palace, the people of Re-Estize were in a riot. They shouted against the line of guards that protected the main gate leading inside. Their collective fury rose and fell with the sermons of their elders, raising their fists in rebellion.

On this cloudy day, they gathered. No longer were they to be shackled by the chains of the nobility. No longer would the complacent Royal family be allowed to escape punishment. The fires of rebellion had steadily been brewing, and it seemed today was the day that it erupted into an inferno that burned away the last of their maltreatment.

For months, their kingdom had been besieged by threats both within and without. Their peasants were constantly conscripted to fight and die in the annual war with the Baharuth Empire, their villages falling to unknown desolations of monsters and bandits alike, and the prized city of E-Rantel itself collapsing into dust. It was all too much to bear

Enough had been enough.

"How much more must we endure before we are broken?" Demanded a hunched, elderly man, waving his cane while he stood on a soap box in front of the crowd. "How much longer can we send our fathers, brothers, and sons out to kill themselves in the name of our cowardly nobility? What more will it take for our king to take action!"

The people echoed his sentiment, alleyways, and streets clogged with the poorer Re-Estize citizens. Their clothes were ragged, their faces haggard from the stress of their new reality. Indeed, it felt like a spell of [Frenzy] descended upon the crowd. Hundreds mobbed the street, waving their fists in unison.

The elderly man pointed his cane at the stone-faced guards. "Look upon these wretched souls! See how they are forced to protect the parasites that steal from us, how they are the only thing separating us from oppression! But they are our brothers as well, they must be brought back to our side!"

"Death to the king! Death to the nobility!" The crowd chanted in a furious roar. They stamped their feet, the cobblestone echoing with the thuds of their discontentment.

It was not known how, but people within the community had quickly learned that one of the Six Great Nobles, Marquis Blumrush, was revealed as a traitor. The wealthiest man in Re-Estize, who owned many gold and mithril mines that the people worked in, was selling them out to the Baharuth Empire.

The noble class blamed the information leak on the surviving adventurers from E-Rantel, led by Pluton Ainzach. They had reappeared out of a mysterious, obsidian portal at the gates of Re-Estize many months ago. They were nearly as disgusted with the lack of action on their ruler's part but took no further action to stir up the resentment of the people.

Others blamed the criminal underworld for releasing the info, for it was no secret that some of the ruling class had connections. Perhaps it was all a ploy to finally topple the once decent country, so that gang leaders and their thugs could take over with an iron fist, free to peddle their ill-gotten wares without fear of retribution.

And some blamed a third, unknown source entirely. Who whispered of a band of individuals known as the Sirs of Ainz Ooal Gown that possibly leaked the information. Foreigners of a distant land who wished to liberate the forgotten and abandoned people of Re-Estize.