RISE OF EROS

When everyone at the Heavenly Palace finished breakfast, they went to do their activities. As Carolina only had to go to the laboratory to study and perfect her alchemy, she preferred to take the breakfast of those who were not up yet before doing that.

It was not that she wanted to be a good sister and wife, but that it was already quite late and she could not let them continue sleeping. To be more specific, Candice was the one who could not stay in bed, as she had to go to her store to attend to business matters.

If it were another time, Carolina would not worry, but currently, she could not afford that luxury. Candice's business was the commercialization of food, so, in this time of conflict and chaos, it would have an exponential growth and as the Heavenly Palace would suffer from the war, they would need her help.

While there was a plan to leave the country and create another business to mitigate this situation, there were many drawbacks. First, there was the time Andrew would need to travel, establish himself, and create another Heavenly Palace.

Second, it would also take time for that second business to stabilize and generate profits, and third, any inconvenience that might arise in the new country to be visited.

They had envisioned the best possible situations, but it was also true that there were risks, so the policies or attitude of the inhabitants of the kingdom of Dunnas could generate problems, which would prevent the new business from generating profits.

For all these reasons, Carolina who had a good business background, knew that they needed Candice to keep the expenses of the Heavenly Palace in case of an eventuality, so it could be cruel, but she had to make Candice work.

When she got to the room, she saw the three lovebirds cuddled peacefully asleep and felt a little bad waking them up, but it was only for a moment, as she quickly hardened her heart and said aloud, "Well, it's time to get up."

Carolina's startled cry made the three in the bed jump in fright and look around like scared chickens. After seeing that it was Carolina who had woken them up they made a disgusted face and Helena was even going to throw a pillow at her, but stopped when she saw her holding a tray of food.

"Sorry to wake you up like this, but Candice has to go to work," Carolina said pretending to be an angry mom who was waking up her kids for school. They all looked at her angrily but said nothing and got out of the sheets, sitting on the bed.

"I brought you breakfast. Sorry to wake you up, but you know our situation," Carolina added. Though angry, everyone knew what Carolina was referring to, but Helena couldn't help but retort, "Couldn't you just wake Candice?"

Candice looked at her with mock spite, but Carolina replied, "That wouldn't be fair." Helena looked at Candice who was giving her death stares, as she had been teasing her since yesterday not letting her moan and now wanting to hurt her and smiling she hugged her sister saying, "Just kidding, don't look at me like that."

Candice was obviously just pretending, but still pinched her buttock in retaliation, making her jump. Helena was obviously feigning more aggravation than Candice's action represented, so everyone laughed.

Carolina placed the tray of food on the bed for them to eat and left the room. The three of them ate their breakfast at a leisurely pace because while Candice was already late for work, Andrew didn't want her to get indigestion from rushing her meal.

After the calm and delicious breakfast, Candice went into the bathroom took a shower, changed, and said goodbye to Andrew with a kiss on the lips and another pinch to Helena so she left.

"You must stop bothering her or she'll really make you suffer," Andrew said to Helena who still didn't get out of bed. "Hehehe, I'll consider it, but I don't think I can do it, she's really cute when she gets upset," Helena replied with a smile.

Andrew could only shake his head and got out of bed. Helena didn't stay in bed either and followed him into the bathroom, where they had a short sex session between the two of them as they bathed.

While at Marquis Valoid's mansion, Raven had arrived to notify Donald of recent events. Teresa accompanied him because whenever it was anything to do with Candice she wanted to be present.

While she supported her husband, she had confidence in her friend and did not believe that she would betray the empire, so she wanted to be the mediator between the two parties so that the relationship would not become more distant than it already was.

Donald knew about his wife's thoughts, but said nothing, as he also expected her to mediate. He had worked with Candice for a long time and had some affection for her, so he didn't want to get to the point where they became enemies, but as a nobleman of the empire he had to establish distance.

As they sipped the tea Richard had served them, out of the shadows emerged Raven. Immediately the relaxed atmosphere they had changed and quickly Donald asked, "What news do you bring?".

"Well, the number of people who have their eyes on Miss Candice has increased greatly, but no one dares to make a move, as the two experts from the Heavenly Palace accompany her at all times," Raven reported.

"Do we know who these observers belong to?", Donald continued to ask and Raven replied, "Of those I have been able to identify, I know there are envoys from the Minister of the National Treasury, Marquise Alcaly, and the Minister of Defense, Marquis Zelfit. There are also some of the other food merchants in the city, but there are many that I have not been able to identify."

"Well, if the two ministers also have an eye on her, there should be no problem, however, continue with the surveillance. Any other news?" said Donald, to which Raven replied, "No sir no other news."

"What happened to those behind the attack on Candice?", this time it was Teresa who asked and Raven answered immediately, "We are still looking for clues, but that man has been hiding well."

"Although we can't deploy many forces these days, don't put that issue aside," Donald added seriously, to which Raven nodded her head in understanding.

Donald had distanced himself from Candice, because of her relationship with Andrew, but that didn't mean he would abandon her. Candice was a very important food supplier to the empire and for an individual, they were still unsure if he was friend or foe, he would not leave her unprotected.

Especially when they were on the brink of war and food was essential. After that short conversation, Raven left and Donald along with Teresa continued to enjoy their tea while chatting about other topics.

Meanwhile, in the kingdom of Tripia, King Belenio and his ministers were discussing a macabre plan that, if successful, would start the war. The plan was simple but cruel.

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Their intention was to smuggle 5 high-explosive devices into the 5 most important cities of the Cannaris empire. If these devices exploded, they could blow up about five blocks, so the losses would be unimaginable.

However, carrying out this plan was not simple. First of all, it might seem that in a world where artifacts such as dimensional bags exist, it would be easy to transport these items undetected, but this was not the case.

Most medium-sized cities and all large cities had special detectors. When a dimensional bag had a highly destructive element in it, it would be detected immediately, which would not allow it to enter and prevent attacks like these.

Every high-powered artifact always has traces of energy that are difficult to remove, so these detectors can pick them up. In fact, this is because this world is focused on magic because if there were something like gunpowder or dynamite on Earth, the situation would be different.

The point is that the explosives that Tripia's kingdom wanted to smuggle into the empire would not go unnoticed by these detectors, so they were looking at how they could carry out their plan without being discovered.

Unfortunately, no matter how many plans they came up with, none seemed like they could succeed and that had them upset. While they had been responding to the empire's attacks, the reality was that they were losing the battle, so they wanted to strike a strong blow.

Then one of the ministers proposed a rather macabre plan. "My king, why don't we attack the elven forest instead of 5 cities?". The minister's proposal attracted everyone's attention and Belenio interestedly said, "Elaborate."

"Well, certainly, the forest defenses are strict and we could not approach the heart of the forest where the elves live, but if we place the 5 artifacts around the elves outside their surveillance zone, we would destroy part of the forest, not to mention the fire that would form. That could deal them a big blow," said the minister enthusiastically.

After hearing this, everyone turned to look at Belenio telling him that this was a good plan, because the elves lived off the forest, if the forest was destroyed, it was the same as destroying the elves.

Belenio thought for a moment, nodded his head, and said, "It is a good plan, but 5 explosives will not be enough, let's prepare 10, to strike a good blow".

Everyone present applauded the idea of Belenio, trying to make him feel like a wise king, but Dulma the protector of the kingdom who was hiding in the shadows listening to the meeting could not help but panic, because he knew that, although this plan could deal a great blow to the empire, the retaliation would not be small, it could mean the extinction of the kingdom.