It was an old man with a slight figure, and his neatly combed hair at the back of his head looked a little yellow, but not shriveled. His face was still flushed with a healthy flush, but his eyelids drooped weakly, and his spirit looked a little tired.

Because it was summer, the old man was just wearing a simple white shirt, and he didn't even approve the robe, which seemed to be low-key, but it showed the luxury in the low-key. The shirt was woven from the finest brocade, breathable yet comfortable, and the white fabric was embroidered with silk with the faint emblem of the Holy Spring.

He wore a sunhat, bent his head down, and held a small silver shovel in his hand, and earnestly hoeed the flowerbeds.

A chubby figure didn't know when it had stood silently behind the emperor. He lowered his eyebrows and hung his head, his face still with a friendly smile, and waited for the old man without saying a word.

After all, it was an old age, and it took a lot of effort for the old man to shovel out a small piece of grass. He stood up and thumped his sore waist before noticing the figure behind him.

"Varus, how long have you been waiting?"

"The villain's job is to wait, Your Majesty," Varus said slowly as he looked at the old man with a smile and said in a tone as gentle as a spring breeze, "but Lord Tyrion is indeed waiting at the pavilion early. ”

"You can't stand his mouth, so you fled to me." The old man smiled narrowly, "That's it, if you let this kid wait, I don't know what kind of trouble will happen." ”

Immediately, two attendants ran over, one put on a robe for the old man, and the other washed his face and hands with a silver basin filled with water.

The old man, who ruled over the world's largest population and the most powerful empire, walked through the garden path to a small elegant pavilion in his robe. At this time, there was already a small figure waiting here. He was about the height of an ordinary child, with stubby legs, a disproportionately large head, a prominent forehead, dark green eyes, bright blonde hair, and a brown and golden-yellow moustache on his chin.

Overall, this is an ugly dwarf that makes a child have nightmares when they look at it, not a race of halflings who look festive, but a deformed human who is stunted and deformed.

"The sea breeze from the Sea of Falling Stars still hasn't made you stronger." The emperor looked the visitor up and down, and although he was a dwarf with a modest appearance, he seemed to have nothing to see.

"If you need brute force, there are hundreds of thousands of troops under your majesty, and you shouldn't expect the minister's small arms and legs." The visitor smiled, but his unattractive facial features looked even more hideous: "Besides, although the minister is stunted, he is not the weakest of the important ministers of the empire after all, so it is enough to be complacent." This is the point that our head of the palace, Lord Varus, has the most right to speak. ”

Varus smiled hehe, looking very honest: "Lord Tyrion is joking, you are the largest prince of the empire, the guardian of the Falling Star Sea, and the little one is just a subordinate who serves His Majesty's daily life. Be gracious and spare the poor faithful old Varus. Well, the little one is gone. ”

As if not seeing the obvious sneer on the gnome's face, Varus bowed deeply to both of them, and then retreated knowingly, leaving the Emperor and his strange visitor behind.

The court steward, who claimed to be a subordinate, stepped back, and Thyrion watched his fat back disappear behind the flowerbed, before turning around and bowing to the emperor: "Today's audience is to ask Your Majesty for sin." ”

"Please? The people of the Lancaster family, who are arrogant to the bone, will also ask for guilt? If your father had known, he would have jumped out of the coffin to clean the portal, right? The Emperor smiled narrowly, patted the table in the gazebo, and motioned for the other to sit down. The table is already stocked with a variety of seasonal fresh fruits, as well as chilled wine and mead. …,

"The arrogance for no reason is at most the second brain, which is the biggest difference between my unobtrusive old sister and my late father, not to mention that Chen has never been a typical Lancaster."

Tyrion shrugged and smiled, sat down noncommittally, and struggled to reach the crystal flask with his short right hand, but the Emperor picked it up and poured a full glass of red wine in front of the dwarf.

Tyrion watched the other man's movements, not saying a word.

The emperor filled himself with wine again, took a sip, and gradually retracted his smile: "In such a period, such a mistake was made. If it weren't for your son and retainers, I would have thought they had ulterior motives and would have made an example of them. ”

"Even if His Majesty beheads them all and nails their heads to the flagpole, there is no doubt about it. Whether it is the son of a minister or a retainer, he should be punished for doing something wrong. Tyrion smiled, as if talking about the life and death of strangers, "Of course, I want to remind Your Majesty that if you don't make the decision you deserve, such things will still happen, and then maybe it won't be a few hairy boys' hot heads." ”

"Aha! You just talk to the Emperor of the Empire, your lord? I dare to say that I am asking for sin, but I am clearly here to ask for sin! Dare you say you're not a typical Lancaster? Why, it was your brother-in-law who asked you to come? Are they just in a hurry? ”

The Emperor sneered. His voice is not loud, but he has accumulated power for more than half a century, and naturally has a chilling sense of oppression. Ordinary people were forced by such a momentum, and they might have already collapsed to the ground trembling and pleading guilty, but this dwarf, who was only two-thirds of the height of ordinary people, shrugged his shoulders and said slowly: "Well, if Your Majesty is not willing to listen, then the minister will not say it, let's talk about something else, such as history, stories about 'Scarlet October', 'Double Dragon Rebellion', 'Red Year' and so on." ”

The Scarlet October, the Ssangyong Rebellion, and the Red Year are all famous historical events in Auckland, and the common denominator is the war that broke out between the royal family or the great lord over the throne dispute.

The emperor slammed the table, just about to have a seizure, but when he just saw the dwarf's pair of dark green eyes, one large and one small, but deep, the dark green pupils, all his efforts finally turned into a cold snort, and said:

"It's just a lazy dwarf hiding in the seaview villa in Kaiyan City, and he really dares to make a big fuss."

At this time, a trace of gloom gradually appeared on the emperor's old face: "I am already old, so old that I don't want to see blood again, and I don't know when I will go to heaven to see Estelle...... As for you, Yalt's most important student was you. I also wish you could shoulder the burden of national affairs, but you have been at the beach for twelve years, and you have not come to the sea several times. Why, the scenery of the sea of falling stars is really so inseparable? ”

Tyrion smiled slightly, his unattractive and even somewhat hideous face became even more difficult to see, and his deep dark green eyes flashed with a cunning light, and said, "The minister is for your majesty to guard the western border." ”

The emperor smiled indifferently: "The western border is the coastline, and a garrison regiment is enough to maintain law and order, and you don't need to guard it." ”

Tyrion rolled his eyes, and said, "Well, we also want to fight the pirates of the Fallen Star Sea, deter those sea people, and maintain the security of the Empire's Western Sea." ”

"The Empire has nine military ports along the coast of the Falling Star Sea, three royal fleets, and nearly two hundred warships. Even the four kingdoms of the Thousand Islands together don't have a navy of this size, not to mention that those pirates have basically been played to death by you, so you don't have to worry about it anymore. The emperor said disdainfully.

Thyrion thought for a moment, and then said, "Well, you also have to manage the commercial routes and customs between the empire and the Kuril Islands and the Far West. ”

The emperor shook his head and sneered: "Hey, the work that can be handled by only a few tax collectors needs to bother a Wang Zuo to be in charge?" ”…,

Tyrion couldn't help but look distressed, and asked tentatively, "Maybe you have to beware of the wild people in the Northwest Corna Hills." ”

The Emperor couldn't help laughing: "Those savages have already been trained by the dwarves to be obedient, if only I didn't go to their trouble, would they dare to cause trouble?" These are just excuses. You're going to fool an old guy who has half of his body in the ground, so you have to use your brain. ”

Tyrion shook his head helplessly, and said in a tone that was almost a joke: "Your Majesty, the minister is a strangely shaped deformity, and serving as a courtier is harmful to the national body. ”

The Emperor let out a snort of laughter: "I invited you to be the prime minister, not to let you get married. You are the Lord of Kaiyan, the patriarch of the Lancaster family, and the Duke of the Empire. Isn't he qualified to be this prime minister? ”

Tyrion was silent for a few minutes, and still shook his head: "Teacher Arte, and the Duke of Arupahi, the sages of the previous generation, one is the second son of an ordinary knight family, and the other is a civilian scholar, neither of them was born into a high-ranking lord. And it is precisely because the minister is the Duke of Lancaster, the largest prince of the empire, that he is not qualified to serve as the prime minister of the empire. ”

The emperor couldn't help but laugh dumbly when he heard this: "If your father is still alive, he will definitely whip you fiercely." ”

Tyrion shrugged his shoulders and said lukewarmly, "My father is certainly not a good father, and of course, as a member of the Lancaster family, I am not a good son, so this is even the case." So I never held a grudge against him. ”

The Emperor's guest was none other than one of the Empire's greatest princes, the Duke of Lancaster, Tyrian, known as the "Little Giant".