WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Episode 2 of The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt, "Wein Salema Arbalest, Battlefield Tactician," now streaming on Funimation.
Prince Wein Salema Arbalest, the protagonist of The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt, has no interest in ruling his “petty kingdom” of Natra. In Episode 1, the neighboring kingdom of Marden declared war on Natra over the discovery of a gold mine near their shared border. While the threat of war would shake any monarch to take immediate action to protect their kingdom, Wein saw it as a perfect opportunity to rid himself of Natra once and for all by letting Marden invade.
While Wein's generals took the threat of Marden's much larger army seriously and prepared for a battle they had no chance of winning, Wein only played his role of prince long enough to "encourage" his soldiers to "do their best." Beyond that, he expected their inevitable defeat while he himself could exit stage left into obscurity. However, it didn't go as planned and Wein's feigned encouragement resulted in an accidental victory for Natra. This only emboldened his generals to pursue more ambitious goals -- like seizing the Jilaat goldmine they fought Marden over.
Episode 2 of The Genius Prince’s Guide picks up after Natra seized the Jilaat goldmine, only to discover it's depleted of resources. This puts Wein and his kingdom in an embarrassing situation, though Marden is completely unaware of this. Knowing their rival will inevitably lead another attack over the goldmine, Wein intends to trick Marden into taking back the empty Jilaat goldmine by strategically letting them believe they have the upper hand in battle, using the mountain they're stationed at to their advantage.
With Natra having an army of only 5,000 soldiers, they won't be able to take on Marden's 30,000 strong at once, so Wein allows the Marden soldiers to climb up the mountain through its narrow crevices, which will keep their numbers manageable to his own army. While Wein's frontline soldiers reduce Marden's incoming numbers on the mountain, his other soldiers are tasked with digging strategic tunnels elsewhere to lure their rival into unsuspecting traps. Wein reasons this will hurt the pride of Marden's more formidable General Drawood to the point of compromising his judgment calls.
Wein's plan to defeat Drawood works as predicted and yields even better results than expected. While Drawood unwittingly falls into the trap with his wounded pride, Wein gets the upper hand in ending the battle by confusing Drawood's own soldiers into responding to threats that don't actually exist. Drawood then attempts to regain control of the battle by sending his own Commander Logan to "discuss a peace treaty" between the kingdoms of Natra and Marden. Wein rejects Marden's terms, however, instead sending the head of Commander Logan back to Drawood as a prelude to his own demise.
During the confrontation between Drawood and Wein at the former's own camp, Drawood realizes he was the fool who fell for all of Wein's strategic traps. However, he has a much bigger problem: Wein arrives at his camp to claim his head personally in response to Commander Logan insulting the prince's best friend Ninym's honor earlier. After impaling Drawood as well, Wein reveals that Ninym is his heart, and anyone who wounds his heart dies by his own hand. Wein then proceeds to slice Drawood in half as The Genius Prince's Guide reveals a much darker side of his personality.
While Ninym is Wein's childhood best friend whom he trusts more than anyone else in his life, the fact that the prince would go out of his way to kill anyone who insults her honor implies his love for her may be romantic in nature. This seems especially likely, considering Ninym revealed earlier on in Episode 2 of The Genius Prince's Guide that she has romantic feelings for Wein herself. Along with Wein's own travails, their storyline will be one to watch moving forward.
