Preparation

And so, after the Crown Prince was dragged away by the Imperial Guards.

The search party's attention turned to the other nobles who had jumped into the sea as the ship exploded. The Crown Prince was not their only target.

Surprisingly, many nobles had survived just like the Crown Prince.

That was because nobles always went around wrapped head to toe in magical artifacts.

Perhaps they had valued their own lives even while committing corruption, and so wrapped some of their accumulated wealth around their bodies.

Defensive artifacts worth as much as an average mansion did an excellent job protecting their owners as they were flung from the exploding ship.

Of course, was that really luck? It would be difficult to answer yes.

Since they were going to die anyway, a clean death right there would have been the best possible end... but because they had survived, they could no longer escape responsibility.

The only people who died there were the smugglers and their accomplices, who had continued their operations while evading the government's watch.

"Wow, if I'd known it would turn out like this, maybe I should have blasted them away with naval guns from the start."...