Dark Lord in Chains 51 (Patreon)

As I walked away from the treasury, there was a renewed excitement in my steps, which was only partially about dominating the Queen in her throne room and treasury, no matter how exciting it had been. 

For the first time in a long while, I felt truly safe. 

I was confident in my abilities, both martial and magic, but that didn’t change the fact that until that moment, I was woefully under-prepared for any real challenge, safe only until discovery. But the three items in my possession, the Tether of the Underworld, the Blade of Shadows, and the Shield of Ether, expanded my options greatly in case I met a true danger. 

I was as close to invincible as I had been for a long while, even more than the time I was on the throne. Having the throne had a lot of advantages. It came with an amazing castle, many loyal — for a given value of loyalty — servants, and an untold number of weapons, magic books, and other miscellaneous things that could be used to protect me. 

But it came with a big disadvantage. A lack of mobility, meaning when, unexpectedly, the Empire decided to ally with the dark families, they had ample time to prepare before hitting. And unfortunately, no static defense, no matter how expertly prepared, was enough to push back a masterful assault. 

Of course, possession of three items — even if each was strong enough to earn their place in legends — didn’t mean that I could defend myself against the army that took down my castle. But unlike that time, I had nothing that was tying down me there, and I could escape easily, especially since no force could easily use an army to flood the Palace. Not the dark forces, and not even the Empire unless Sapphire wanted nobles to panic, thinking she was committing to a military coup to forcefully alter the balance. 

So, the only thing that could really take me down was a dedicated elite task force, assaulting me under a combined assault of overwhelming magic and surgical melee attacks. The shield was perfect to remove the danger of the offensive magic, able to absorb almost all offensive magic, while the blade gave me the opportunity to employ my favorite melee combat style, hit and run. 

With the tether preventing me from falling into any kind of ward-based ambush, I was safer than the time I was the dark lord. 

Or at least, I would have been, I thought with a frown as I focused on the earlier discovery. 

If it wasn’t for the mysterious third party that somehow interfered with the wards of the throne room. 

So, rather than going back to my cell for a well-deserved rest, I decided to check the collected wisdom of the Empire. Maybe I could find some kind of clue about the roots, because I was coming up quite short. 

Palace library, especially the restricted section, wasn’t the biggest or best library of the empire, not even close. There were several bigger, more famous libraries, such as the great library of mage guild, the alchemist’s information repository, or even the famous public library of the capital. 

Unfortunately, breaking through them was not exactly easy. 

That was not to say that Palace Library protections were inferior to them, of course. The content might be lacking, but the same definitely didn’t apply to defenses. On the contrary, the palace library was supposed to be protected even more strictly than the rest of them — with the important exception of the library of the mage guild — but luckily, my cell and the secret tunnels that were leading to them was conveniently behind those dangerous protections, making my entry a trivial achievement. 

I would have loved to access the library of the mage guild, of course, but I had no intention of dealing with the recluse archmages that led the guild, not even with the Shield in my possession. 

Just as I expected, by using the secret tunnels, breaking into the library took only seconds, and I found myself the depths of the restricted section, where the scary wards prevented anyone without the express permission of the royal family from entering. 

I started walking around the shelves, unafraid of being noticed thanks to the over-the-top security, making an inventory of the books available. 

My first target was the magic books, some of the most precious books that were possessed by the royal family, which now included several precious tomes from my own hoard, making me nostalgic. I focused on books on runes, wards, and other core abilities, creating a small pile before preparing to put my most underrated ability to use. 

Speed reading. 

It was one of the bigger misconceptions about being a dark lord, or any kind of noble: the number of documents one needed to process every day to be successful. Of course, that didn’t mean that all nobles had the ability. No, whether in the Empire or belonging to Dark Families, most employed scribes and secretaries to handle the data properly, only focusing on the high-level picture.  

I believed myself to be an exception to that. 

However, most nobles were born to their lofty positions, unaware of how many little small tricks could be applied to an aggregate report without lying once, resulting in them getting manipulated little ways. Mostly, it was about money, a couple of silver lost here, a gold coin diverted there, but sometimes, it was more important things. 

A report that was conveniently lost in the non-urgent pile, a report from the border whose recommendations softened appropriately to protect their noble patrons… The chips they left on the otherwise pristine structure of a demesne were simple, almost impossible to notice, but enough of them, and it would collapse under its weight. 

Devil was always buried in the detail, just like an assassin's dagger buried in the back of their target. And usually, just as deadly… 

I forget the number of spies I identified just by secretly reading their aggregated reports and comparing them with the information they had access to. Unfortunately, it was tough, time-intensive work, even with the spells to enhance my perception. Of course, I hardly removed these spies, as a discovered spy might be one of the most useful tools in the world, allowing me to manipulate the information flow however I wished. 

Skimming ability had been an integral part of my career as a dark lord. 

And just like then, the skimming ability was proving to be very useful at the moment as well. With my eyes dancing on the endless records of the dynastic magical records, wards, and runes, strengthening my already impressive magical knowledge further. 

Unfortunately, after four hours of aggressive reading, I failed to find anything related to my real target, the mysterious wards. 

With a sigh, I turned my attention to a dusty section that held the memoirs and personal notes of the Emperors and great heroes, some of them even belonging to the man who first forged and used the Shield of Ether that was weighing on my back. 

Maybe history would help where the magic failed, I thought as I lost myself in a world of military, political tricks, magical victories, all filled with exaggerated details to put the reigning king into a better perspective, it was time-consuming to find the specific clues I had been hoping for, even with speed reading. 

After browsing the few recent ones — and failing to find anything useful — I changed my approach once again, and started working on the recordings of the oldest kings, the kind that went considerably more than a thousand-year in the past. 

Reading them was a true chore, as while the language was technically the same, the great time gap meant significant language drift, slowing my reading speed significantly for me to even have a semi-consistent picture of the information on there.  

It was not a waste, however, as the old records had some interesting implications. In particular, a period was known as the age of seven kings. That period, despite its fancy name, was quite infamous, because, despite its lofty name, it covered a period of three years. Going through seven kings in three years, no matter the metric, was not a sign of great success. It was a period lost in history, before the Dark Families were even a thing, therefore something I had little information about. I had just assumed that it was classical cloak and dagger stuff. 

The diaries, however, disagreed with the conclusion, at least to a point. Their recording was still mostly about their internal political tricks, but more than one diary mentioned a growing threat at the north, though mostly in passing. 

I might have still ignored those, if it wasn’t for a couple of ripped pages. Not just edited out or ignored, but pages ripped out carelessly rather than editing the whole sections, which was a very interesting choice considering the historical value of those diaries. 

Even more, interestingly, I also found a few references to mysterious helpers with some impressive magical capabilities, but unfortunately, the wording about them was very vague, but a deliberate kind of vague, like they were afraid of mentioning those names. 

However, before I could go deeper into my research, I noticed a movement in the library, only to see a familiar redhead…