The Weak Prince Is A Cultivation God

The storm left behind by General Varn Delacroix had not yet settled when the Assembly doors opened once more.

This time, the banners that entered were not war-torn and bloodstained. They were clean. Embroidered. Quietly radiant with generational power.

The first was House Travan, its sigil a black fox under a waxing moon. The Travan Lord walked with a cane—not from weakness, but from an old battle injury earned defending the palace during the Scouring Rebellion.

A silver chain ran across his chest, connecting scrolls of law and prophecy. He was the High Magistrate of the Inner Courts.

He did not speak immediately, nor loudly.

But when he did, it was with chilling precision.

"I speak with no intent for conquest," Lord Travan said, his voice echoing cleanly off the crystalline columns. "I speak for continuity. For the spine of this Empire, the laws that bind it. I support Maximus Aregard not because he promises glory—but because he has already ensured stability."

He turned toward the gathered nobles seated along the crescent dais, where the Ritual Throne loomed above, still empty.

"While his elder brother burns the world to make men kneel, and his sister plays dice with worthless princes, Maximus secures the coin flow, controls the spy webs, and governs the trade that feeds every province. Without that? There is no Empire to speak of."

Soft murmurs began.

But more followed.

House Bellmire came next—their matriarch draped in lavender and sun-gold robes, accompanied by twin daughters in matching brand-threaded veils. They controlled the western aqueducts, wine routes, and the city's health district.

"We support Maximus," Lady Bellmire said, "because he does not threaten our survival with endless war. He understands balance. And that balance has made our power stable."

Then came House Mornak, commanders of the Imperial grain fields. House Vel, the architects of floating citadels. House Alren, whose mercantile fleet patrolled the Stormridge Coast.

Even several Magisteriums sent cloaked delegates, some of them high-ranking figures from academies and arcane guilds.

And with every new voice, the court murmured louder. A different kind of power was revealing itself. Not brute steel like Xavier's. Not prophecy-chasing like Iris. But cold structure. Webs.

Until the silence broke again.

This time, with fire.

From the upper tier came the voice of Duke Halreth of House Korr, one of the frontier warlords. His armor was plain steel, scarred from recent skirmishes with rogue mana tribes.

"So you support him," Halreth growled, "because you're already in his pocket."

The room tensed.

"Because if he falls, your ships sink, your bribes dry up, your secrets come out."

He pointed directly at Lady Bellmire, then to Travan.

"You're not here for the Empire. You're here because Maximus owns your debts. Or your children."

Gasps. Murmurs.

Lady Bellmire's daughters lowered their eyes, pale as moonlight.

Duke Halreth stepped into the main floor, his boots loud.

"I've fought along the borderlands. Watched your supply chains delay aid because 'weather' disrupted your coin routes. And I know one thing—if the Empire is going to war, it needs loyalty, not ledgers."

Travan's eyes narrowed like steel pins.

"And loyalty is admirable, Duke Halreth. But armies without bread are riots waiting to happen."

"They can riot when their bellies are full of poison," Halreth snapped. "How many of you would survive if Maximus turned on you tomorrow? If his spies whispered your worst sins into the ears of Xavier or Iris? Would you still stand proud? Or kneel again, as always?"

There was a stir in the crowd. The kind of dangerous silence that meant daggers had entered the conversation—silent and sharp, even if none yet drawn.

But Maximus' allies were not silent long.

A cloaked man stepped from behind House Alren's entourage. He walked slowly to the speaker's floor. There was no sigil on his cloak, only a serpent stitched in gray thread over his collarbone.

When he lowered his hood, several in the chamber gasped.

It was Grandmaster Vellian—former head of the Cipher Hall, once thought dead after an old Purge.

"I speak as more than a noble," Vellian said, "i speak as a man who's hunted monsters in this court for decades. And I tell you this—Maximus is the only heir who understands the real threats."

He raised his hand, revealing a scorched map with several red markers pinned across the outer provinces.

"Rogue cults rising in three districts. An unregistered god-tongue discovered in the southern marshes. Sealed zones showing movement."

He looked directly at Duke Halreth.

"You want war? Fine. But war is already here. And it wears a hundred faces. Maximus has prepared for them. The others? They will spend time rallying banners and honor. We'll be dead by then."

The room absorbed his words like frost crawling over glass.

Then the bell sounded—deep and echoing.

The bell meant a debate was called.

And it meant all voices could speak.

The Assembly's keeper, a robed priest of the Central Temple, stepped forward and raised his staff. "The floor is open," he intoned. "Speak now. Who stands to challenge the web?"

One voice did.

From the lower east dais.

Lady Therma of House Rowan—a minor house in name, but one of the oldest in lineage, and deeply tied to the ancient libraries.

She rose slowly, her dark green robes pooling at her feet, eyes calm and precise.

"We do not challenge Maximus' intelligence," she said. "But intelligence unmoored from virtue is simply tyranny waiting for its hour."

She held up a sealed scroll. "This is a transcript from his envoys pressuring three mountain villages to relinquish sacred grounds for experimental rituals. They refused. The next week, those villages burned. Coincidence?"

She turned to the crowd. "You fear Xavier's blade. You ignore Maximus' scalpel."

Gasps again. Even some of Maximus' supporters flinched.

"He may preserve the Empire's body," Therma said coldly. "But what of its soul?"

From the balcony, a monk from the Dusk Lotus temple nodded grimly. "We, too, have questions. We submitted a proposal for religious protections. It disappeared. Days later, our high priestess vanished."

Lady Bellmire's mouth tightened.

And slowly, a fracture appeared. Not in numbers—but in faith.

Maximus had supporters. But now, seeds of doubt had been planted.

The debate continued for hours. Voices rising. Confessions whispered. Accusations unveiled. Old grudges reawakened.

But all of it spiraled around a simple truth:

Maximus had built a vast empire of influence.

And with it came shadows.

He had more nobles. More coin. More networks.

But not more trust.

And as the sun fell through the colored glass dome above, casting long blood-red shafts across the Ritual Throne, no victor had been declared.

Not yet.

The Assembly was only beginning.

But now, it was clear.

Xavier had declared strength.

Maximus had declared strategy.

And soon, Iris would declare something else entirely.

But for now, the banners unfurled, the alliances strained, and the Imperial Capital trembled under the weight of its choices.