Children of the Holy Emperor
Chapter 1

The 17th Holy Emperor of Delcross, Nathaniel Klein, Nate.

Apart from the founding Holy Emperor, he was a ruler with an unprecedented level of power.

With a tremendous divine power befitting of a representative of the gods, he was the unofficial youngest Sword Master and the strongest swordsman on the continent.

Under his rule, Delcross was enjoying the pinnacle of stability and prosperity, and the relationship with the neighboring vassal states had never been more friendly. He was fit to be evaluated as a once-in-a-century emperor.

However, he was more famous by another epithet: the [Unprecedented Playboy Holy Emperor].

At the young age of 21 when he ascended the throne, he already had three wives, one lover, and five children.

Now, after ruling for over 12 years, he has over seven children that are officially known. The number of his hidden illegitimate children is unknown to all.

For generations, the Holy Emperors of Delcross, thanks to their image as [God’s Representative], they did not have many children.

The only exception was the founding Holy Emperor, who was known to have over 15 children, but considering that he, referred to as the demigod, ruled for over 300 years, the number is not unbelievable.

Such were the circumstances, and thus this young and competent emperor couldn’t stop the playboy image from sticking to him.

All of this was the result of the immaturity of his younger days. Humbly accepting this responsibility, Holy Emperor Nate decided to properly take care of his children as far as his power reached.

Therefore, he ordered his chief chamberlain to keep a close eye on the children’s conditions, and he worked hard to spend one-on-one time with his children, putting off his busy office hours.

However, despite his efforts, parenting was never an easy task, as growing children rarely obey their parents’ wishes.

Children occasionally engaged in behaviors that their parents simply couldn’t understand.

Let’s take his eldest child, the 1st Prince Owen, as an example.

He was a boy who was discovered when he was already grown, and initially, he seemed very pleased to meet his father after so much hardship.

However, one day he suddenly started speaking nonsense, claiming that he could see some strange documents in thin air.

“Father, I aim to become stronger with the power of this status window.”

Then he set off for the southern front line.

He was a son who was brought into the fold late, and there were many things he wanted to do for him, but alas, he was an unfathomable son who did not care for his father’s feelings at all.

The second, 1st Princess Amelia, was not much different.

She was a pitiful daughter who lost her birth mother, who was an illegitimate child of a commoner, and later discovered that she was a princess and sought her father.

Despite hiding her sorrow beneath a bright smile, she was a lovable girl who rattled on about her interests to her still awkward father.

This daughter of his, who was once like a rosebud, also started behaving oddly at some point.

One day, she woke up crying as if she had a nightmare, her appetite decreased, and she became noticeably depressed.

When he asked the reason for her sudden change during a snack time, she suddenly burst into tears and blurted out something shocking.

“Your Majesty, Father, I… have returned from death to the past!”

Nate was taken aback by her sudden story.

Her subsequent outpouring of grievances, when summarized, went like this:

Leonard, the rosy-cheeked second prince of Rohan, had lured her into a marriage. However, this was not out of love, but a plot to solidify his own kingship by borrowing the power of the Holy Emperor. After forcibly proceeding with the marriage, he openly took many concubines and habitually abused Amelia, the queen. And not much later, he ultimately abandoned her alone in a tower.

“He wished to see me die in front of you, Father, after cruelly killing me…”

“…”

“Oh! Despite your initial opposition, Father, your foolish daughter ruined everything!”

As she broke down into tears, he simply stared blankly at her.

He married you, abandoned you, and killed you?

But, my daughter, aren’t you alive and well right in front of me?

“So, I will have my revenge. I will pursue him to the end of hell. I will shatter all of his hopes and completely ruin him. I won’t forgive anything that stands in my way!”

“…”

Sensing the hint of madness flickering in his daughter’s tear-filled eyes, Nate involuntarily drew a breath.

His beloved daughter, who he had always cherished and believed to be a delicate bud, had suddenly turned into a rose bristling with thorns.

At this point, Nate had no choice but to admit that he had been underestimating the task of parenting.

Do all parents on the continent raise their children amidst such torment, or is it only his own children who are peculiarly strange? The young Holy Emperor held his throbbing head in his hands.

‘Is every parent on this continent raising their child in such agony, or are his own children exceptionally strange?’ The young emperor clutched his throbbing head.

But this was just the tip of the iceberg.

Among Nate’s odd children, the one who ate away at his heart the most was his fourth child and third prince, Morres.

Prince Morres, the offspring of the extremely hysterical Queen Elizabeth, was an ordinary child apart from his uncontrollable mischievousness in his younger days.

Regrettably, he had no standout traits compared to his siblings, and he was a child who could not meet his mother’s expectations.

As a result, Morres had to suffer a rather harsh early education under the Queen who was struggling to make her son the Crown Prince.

In his childhood, he seemed to be following his mother’s wishes decently enough.

But at some point, he began to commit mischief on the palace servants, and when he reached puberty, he turned into an uncontrollable hooligan.

Neither the Queen’s hysterical scoldings nor tearful pleas had any effect.

Nate, too, had no solution, and he could only quietly wait for his son to come to his senses, but disregarding his parents’ worries, the prince’s hooliganism only intensified with each passing day.

Thus, it seemed that the child would forever remain an unprecedented disgrace to the imperial family.

The change came unexpectedly. He suddenly caught a high fever, almost died, and then woke up as a completely different person.

He stopped his mischief and focused solely on basic training in the training ground every day, losing weight to the point of being unrecognizable and his swordsmanship, which had always been stagnant, began to improve rapidly.

His formerly ordinary disposition had now become fairly sharp.

While his son’s changes were undoubtedly desirable, Nate felt an eerie sensation in his heart.

Perhaps it would have been better to have an honest conversation with Morres long ago. However, since the child seemed a little unstable, Nate could only continue to tread lightly as he always had.

And the result of his hesitant approach was an irretrievable storm.

Boom!

Suddenly, with a sound like a mountain collapsing from outside, the palace shook as if an earthquake had occurred.

The cardinals and ministers who had just finished their morning meeting and were moving about were in a state of chaos and rushed out into the imperial palace courtyard.

What they saw was a huge black lump carelessly thrown on one side of the courtyard.

A large wing with hardly any skin left, a majestic body with rotting flesh hanging off, and the black magic energy emanating from the entire body.

“A real dragon……”

“What… what in the world……”

Why would the demon race, known to be wreaking havoc in the eastern region, suddenly fall into the middle of the imperial palace?

While the stunned cardinals were stammering at the unexpected event, the imperial guards and the order of Knights rushed in and surrounded the dragon.

The beast, was still twitching intermittently as if it had not completely expired due to the shock of the crash.

However, they couldn’t approach carelessly because of the fierce magical energy emanating from it. Just then,

“Ah, I didn’t mean to cause a commotion… please, carry on with your tasks.”

A boy dressed in light armor appeared next to the dragon’s head, speaking these absurd words. Light golden hair with a gray tint, ferocious eyes, and a cheeky expression.

“Prince Morres?”

“Your Highness, what exactly has happened here?”

Despite Knight Commander Baltazar’s trembling question, the voice of the boy known as Mores was absolutely cheerful.

“The exorcists from the punitive force said that, unlike other demon species, this one doesn’t get fully resummoned even if it’s slain. Its body is left behind. So to purify it, it apparently needs to be transported to the imperial road where Father is, right?”

“…….”

“But if we were to capture it all the way in the east and transport it, it seemed like our soldiers and the villages would get contaminated with magical energy all along the way, so…”

In short, he was saying that to minimize the secondary damage that could occur while moving the demon species’ corpse, he drove the demon here and dropped it right in the imperial palace, where the emperor resides.

“What an insane….”

A high priest unwittingly blurted out a blasphemous phrase, but no one objected to it.

Everyone had the same thought running through their heads at that moment.

That worthless, pig-like prince had evolved into an unpredictable lunatic!

—Kieeeeeek!

The dragon, using its last bit of strength, roared in an attempt to shake off the prince.

As a response, dark magical energy surged stronger and spread out, making the knights who had surrounded the demon flinch and step back.

However, Morres, who was right in the middle of that dreadful magical energy, drew the sword from his waist with a nonchalant expression.

Soon, a dark aura began to emanate thickly from his sword, Nutcracker.

A noticeable energy was accumulating on the sword blade.

Considering the young age of the prince, it was an impressive level, but the nature of that blood-red aura was overwhelmingly ominous.

Definitely not the aura a prince of the Holy Empire should have.

“I’m going to take down this creature now. Be careful of the magic.”

With his calm voice,

Pshhh.

The prince’s sword pierced the dragon’s heart, which had turned black with magic.

Soon, cracks formed in the dragon’s heart along with a cracking noise, and from there, dark magic began to explode and pour out.

Hwaaak!

In an instant, both the dragon and the prince disappeared, wrapped in a cloud of black smoke.

“Ahhaaak!”

“Your Highness Morres!”

“Your Highness!”

The magic, seemingly about to cover the entire palace courtyard, was blocked by a transparent, silver barrier before reaching the knights who were surrounding it.

The Holy Emperor had set up a massive holy barrier around the dragon in that short period of time.

Sshhh.

The barrier, filled with magic, looked like a black dome. But the magic was purified where it met the emperor’s holy barrier and began to blur, and over time, it started to become transparent.

Soon, only clear air and a whitened skeletal frame of a giant creature were left inside the barrier.

“Wha- where’s the prince?”

Ordinary people would rot away from just touching the magic of the undead demon species.

A young prince without a hint of holy power should not have been able to withstand it, especially being at the epicenter of a magical explosion.

Despite everyone’s concerns, fortunately, Prince Morres was safe. After the barrier disappeared, the boy, who had been cloaked in his own aura, slowly walked toward the emperor.

His nonchalant demeanor made it seem like the magic wasn’t a threat at all. The twisted and blood-red aura was emanating from the prince.

If a stranger saw this, they might have been confused as to who between the prince and the dragon was the spawn of the demon.

“…Your Majesty, I might be out of place, but are you saying that that power of the prince is truly not from a demon?”

Archbishop Benitus, who was standing next to the emperor, asked in a trembling voice.

How dare he suggest that the prince of the Holy Empire was a demon? Normally, he could be charged with blasphemy or treason. The frail old man must have been half shocked, unable to comprehend this.

Nate, who had been quietly watching this incredible series of events, eventually raised a hand to cover his face and let out a soft sigh.

Yes, Morres.

The child who was merely a reckless fool had now become the eye of a new storm, bringing a massive wind of karma to Delcross.