Chapter 715 --715

Chapter 715: Chapter-715

The first announced the absolute deposition and imprisonment of the Empress, followed by the Emperor’s horrific, sweeping purge of the entire aristocratic court.

The second edict brought the terrified capital to a complete, weeping standstill: The new Chosen Great General, the Vanguard Madam, was dead.

But because Heena had drawn her last breath within the absolute jurisdiction of the Vanguard Palace, imperial law dictated that her body could not be claimed. She belonged to the ancestors now. No family, no husband, and no Emperor was permitted to step foot inside to retrieve her.

Miles away, a horse carrying a mud-soaked, frantic scholar collapsed just outside the capital gates, its heart bursting from exhaustion.

Samuel did not stop. He left the terrified divine physician behind in the carriage and ran the rest of the way on foot, tearing through the panicked streets of the capital like a madman. His pristine white robes were torn and stained black with mud. His hands were bleeding. His eyes were wide with a feral, world-ending panic that had entirely consumed the brilliant, calculating mind of the greatest scholar of the generation.

He reached the towering iron gates of the Vanguard Palace just as the sun hit its zenith.

"Open the gates!" Samuel roared, throwing his entire body weight against the unyielding iron bars. "Let me in! Seera! SEERA!"

The Shadow Knights stood on the other side of the gates, completely immovable. Behind Samuel, a legion of imperial palace guards rushed forward, grabbing the frantic scholar by his arms, trying to pull him back from the forbidden threshold.

"Let me go!" Samuel screamed, fighting with a terrifying, hysterical strength. He punched an imperial guard in the jaw, his fingernails clawing desperately at the iron gates, leaving streaks of his own blood on the metal. "I brought the physician! I told you to wait for me! You arrogant, stubborn tyrant, you promised me! Open the gates!"

He shouted until his vocal cords tore, coughing up blood onto the cobblestones. He struggled against the guards until his muscles completely gave out, dropping to his knees in the dirt before the sealed gates of the Vanguard Palace.

The Shadow Knights did not open the doors. The golden chests had already been sealed.

Samuel stared through the iron bars at the empty, quiet courtyard, the crushing realization finally settling over him like a physical suffocation. He was a genius. He could calculate the trajectory of an entire dynasty, manipulate prime ministers, and burn treasuries to the ground without blinking. But he was just a mortal man. He couldn’t calculate a way to defeat time, and he couldn’t manipulate death.

He slumped forward, pressing his bleeding forehead against the cold iron gates, and let out a wretched, agonizing wail that shattered the morning sky—the sound of a man whose soul had just been entirely hollowed out.

The world moved on.

The Emperor continued his bloody, merciless purge, cleaning the board exactly as Heena had instructed. The Vanguard Marquisate remained the absolute, untouchable military apex of the Great Dynasty.

But for the rest of his long, brilliant life, the great Scholar Samuel never smiled again. He became a ghost haunting his own empty estate, a ruthless, peerless strategist who wore mourning white for the rest of his days, waiting for the end of his time so he could finally go find the arrogant, terrifying warlord who had stolen his heart and locked it away behind iron gates.

The years bled into one another, turning the Great Dynasty into a flourishing, peaceful empire, but the Vanguard Marquisate estate remained locked in a perpetual, suffocating winter.

Samuel never left the capital. The brilliant, peerless scholar who could have easily become the Prime Minister refused every imperial summons, choosing instead to live as a specter haunting the vast, empty halls of the estate. He walked the same paths Heena had walked, sat at the mahogany tables she had touched, and slowly turned to stone.

When the devastating news of Heena’s death had originally reached the southern borders, the Old Master Vanguard had collapsed, coughing up a terrifying mouthful of blood onto the dirt road. The Old Madam had wept until her vocal cords tore. But they did not turn their carriage back to the capital. They endured the agonizing grief and kept traveling, crossing mountains and rivers, simply because it had been their granddaughter’s final, commanding wish that they see the world and live for themselves.

For five years, the old couple tried to pull Samuel back from the abyss. From the farthest corners of the empire, they sent him rare teas, ancient military scrolls, and heartfelt letters begging him to accept her death and step back into the light. They loved him as their own grandson, recognizing the profound, shattering depth of his devotion.

But Samuel never moved on. His heart had been sealed inside a golden chest, and he had thrown away the key.

Eventually, time claimed the old warriors. After five more years of wandering, the Old Master and the Old Madam passed away peacefully on a quiet autumn night, slipping into the long sleep wrapped tightly in each other’s arms.

Their bodies were brought back to the capital for a grand state funeral. As the twin mahogany coffins lay in state in the Marquisate courtyard, surrounded by weeping generals and kneeling ministers, Samuel stood alone at the front of the procession. He wore pristine mourning white, his face completely pale and hollowed out by years of silent suffering.

He stared down at the two coffins side by side, his hands trembling slightly at his sides.

"I am so jealous of them," Samuel muttered, his voice barely a raspy whisper, yet it carried in the quiet courtyard.

The ministers and aristocrats standing nearby heard him. They exchanged uncomfortable, pitying glances, entirely unsure of what to say, and simply lowered their heads.

To the rest of the world, the Old Master and the Old Madam were the absolute pinnacle of legendary romance—a pure, lifelong devotion known across the empire. But in the eyes of the public, Samuel’s love was a tragedy of circumstance. To the court, Samuel and the Vanguard Madam had only been husband and wife for a few short months before her sudden death. They thought his grief was an overreaction; a symptom of a fragile scholar losing his powerful patron.

They did not know about the timelines. They did not know about the invisible tether that bound his soul to hers. They could not possibly comprehend that Samuel’s jealousy wasn’t born of bitterness, but of an agonizing desperation to hold the woman he loved just one more time as the darkness took them.

Heena’s official legacy, however, was flawlessly protected. The imperial historians recorded that the Vanguard Madam had "succumbed to grievous, heroic injuries sustained in the defense of the realm." It was a pristine, noble lie that elevated her to the status of a martyred god. Because her final breath was drawn inside the Vanguard Palace, no coroner, no physician, and no Emperor could order a postmortem. No one would ever know she had poisoned herself. Her body belonged to the Shadow Knights now, perfectly preserved and eternally guarded in a brand-new golden chest placed respectfully beside the ancestors.