Chapter 15
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Chapter 15
"That garden is so barren it's embarrassing to even call it one. Monsters sometimes descend upon it, the soil is parched and infertile—nothing can grow there. The pond has been dry for ages, and not a single flower blooms."
"A large plot of land is all I need. This is the largest available space here, isn't it?"
"What do you intend to use it for, Miss Enya?"
"I'm going to cultivate medicinal herbs. I'll likely need them frequently in the future."
Yurta's expression brightened at my mention of cultivating medicinal herbs. She made another offer.
"If you're going to cultivate medicinal herbs, I'll also give you the small vegetable garden beside it."
"How much?"
"I'll include it in the price of purchasing the Forest Garden at no extra cost. Since we cannot offer you a proper salary, please consider this as compensation instead."
In the end, I successfully acquired the vast dried garden at Lord's Castle and the small but serviceable vegetable garden beside it at a bargain price.
It was a far better outcome than receiving a generous salary.
"Dale? Why do you look so troubled?"
I suddenly noticed Dale sitting with a gloomy expression.
"I apologize. It's my fault for not providing you with adequate living expenses."
Adequate living expenses? When I looked at Dale, his expression darkened further.
"Are you perhaps overextending yourself?"
"No, I'm not."
"You're not?"
Dale's expression cleared in an instant. He exhaled softly and gazed at me with gentle eyes.
"Are you truly not?"
"I'm not. I decided to work at Lord's Castle because I wanted to."
"However, considering your position, I suspect there's nothing good about visiting Lord's Castle frequently."
Dale spoke carefully, as if deep in thought.
"If you help the Lord and word of this spreads, the Emperor will take an interest in you. Are you prepared for that?"
"Ah, that."
"I suspect what you're planning extends far beyond simply restoring the Lord's health."
Dale was surprisingly perceptive.
"The territory will likely flourish, and everyone will be curious about who suddenly revived this dying domain."
"...."
"It won't be the work of a Lord who's been bedridden for months. So who could it be?"
"...."
"Eventually, reports will reach the Emperor about a foreigner who arrived here."
"In other words, you're saying I'll pique the Emperor's curiosity?"
"Yes, that's correct."
Dale's reasoning held merit.
The Emperor was pouring his efforts into strengthening the Empire's foundations.
He was a man who had built his own power base by appointing talented individuals regardless of their origins.
He was the one who legally abolished discrimination against non-human races, and he was also the one who personally apologized to the families that the Previous Emperor had destroyed as traitors without clear evidence, restoring their honor.
Moreover, he had taken the unprecedented step of selecting his own advisors directly from those families and placing them among his closest confidants.
Beyond that, he had abolished the Imperial Palace's corrupt practice of hiring people through personal connections without clear standards and selling positions for money, reviving the examination system to implement talent-based appointments with absolute rigor.
As a result, in the early days of his reign, the Old Nobility Faction—which had waited, expecting an emperor who ascended without a solid power base to come begging for their support—simply withdrew from the center of power.
The Emperor seized complete victory.
Beyond this, there were countless achievements he had accomplished since his ascension.
Yet there remained much debris to be cleared, and even now, long after his coronation, the Emperor spent his days consumed by relentless work.
"The Emperor is human, after all."
As Dale said, this approach could indeed capture the Emperor's attention.
This was a problem I had thought about extensively.
And finally.
I found the answer.
"No matter how excellent the Emperor's stamina is, as long as he's human, there's a definite limit to how much work he can handle."
"..."
"Larger, more important matters make smaller ones fade from memory."
Dale looked at me as if he didn't quite understand.
"It's been three years since the Emperor granted me the title of Empress. I'm a duke's daughter, and my father is Duke Lockhart, called the Emperor's right hand."
"That's correct."
"If the Emperor and one of the Empire's only two ducal houses joined hands, they should have found me long ago. So why haven't they until now?"
Dale began to ponder seriously.
He tapped the table with his hand, as if searching for an answer.
"Overwork."
"...?"
"It's because the Emperor is suffering from overwork."
In that moment, Dale's eyes widened.
He looked at me with a bewildered expression.
"Overwork..."
Dale's voice grew quieter.
"I don't quite understand."
"Why do you think the Emperor is so busy?"
"Because he must reorganize the Empire, which remains in a state of chaos and confusion due to the crimes of the Previous Emperor."
"Right. There are many places that need fixing everywhere."
"That's true."
"But then, how is it that these misdeeds keep being discovered endlessly?"
Dale narrowed his eyes and gazed at me intently.
His expression showed he didn't quite grasp my meaning.
"The Old Nobility Faction has committed countless atrocities. Truly endless ones. The Empire is vast, and it should take decades just to uncover all their misdeeds, shouldn't it?"
"...."
"Normally, that is."
Dale's eyes grew progressively wider.
"But the Imperial Palace discovered and punished their crimes with remarkable speed."
"Surely not...."
"That's right."
I tapped my chest proudly.
"I kept feeding information to the Imperial Palace."
"...!"
The Emperor must never have a moment's rest.
Never.
He had to suffer under such a relentless schedule that he could never even think of seeking me out.
Of course, he couldn't work himself to death either.
If he died, House of Hexagon and their ilk would rise like zombies without hesitation and seize control of the Imperial Palace.
Then our house would be overwhelmed by sheer numbers and face annihilation.
'No. If both sides end in total massacre, it's far better to have the Emperor alive.'
So the Emperor had to strike a precise balance.
Working without rest, but not unto death.
So he couldn't even think of me!
So he couldn't spare attention for trivial matters!
Since I knew the original story completely, I had noted down the major episodes of the villains who appeared in it and traced the threads.
'I fed everything I found to the Imperial Palace.'
Very discreetly.
Through intermediaries.
So the Emperor must have been perpetually inundated with work.
Thanks to his swift and precise handling of all that societal corruption, the infamy of the blood-stained throne was completely forgotten.
He had become an Emperor beloved by most of the Empire's people, praised as an iron-willed sage king, a figure of charisma, and hailed as the greatest Emperor in history.
It was a cruel process, and I acknowledge that.
But as a result, it was beneficial for him too.
"It's a good plan, isn't it? The Emperor enjoys working, so he's happy, and I can keep the Emperor's feet bound, so I'm happy too."
"...."
"Dale? What's wrong?"
"A good... plan...."
He finished his words with difficulty.
"...it is."
"Right?"
The Emperor handled everything I uncovered with terrifyingly swift precision the moment I reported it.
So much so that I nearly developed a sense of camaraderie.
'If only he hadn't sent me that Empress rescript, we might have made decent partners.'
At this moment, The Emperor hardly resembled someone destined to descend into madness. But then again, that was true in the original story as well.
Safety first.
Never forget that.
The secret letters I sent to The Emperor appeared in the original work as well, which meant most of them concerned matters of utmost importance.
Especially regarding House of Hexagon.
House of Hexagon was once called the angel of all people.
They worked tirelessly on poor relief in a manner unbecoming of typical nobility, becoming a model for everyone. The Empire as a whole lacked the quality soil necessary to cultivate medicinal herbs.
Consequently, medicinal herbs were expensive, and treatment required paying exorbitant prices.
One day, after years of enduring pain, House of Hexagon appeared and distributed a special medicine.
A medicine that made all suffering disappear with just one dose.
Everyone was grateful and praised Duke Hexagon, consuming it for over a decade—but in truth, it was a forbidden dark medicine.
Rather than curing all ailments, it merely numbed the sensation of pain itself.
Highly addictive, impossible to ever stop taking.
Duke Hexagon placed the poor and powerless under his control this way, creating devoted followers of House of Hexagon.
The Previous Emperor permitted this.
'Duke Hexagon's end was house arrest, after all.'
Currently, Duke Hexagon was confined to a mansion in the Northern Region.
Because these dark experiments had been conducted for so long, when the current Emperor seized power, there was insufficient evidence to completely eliminate Hexagon.
Yet simply restraining Duke Hexagon, who wielded greater influence than The Emperor himself, was already a remarkable achievement.
No one had ever imagined the current Emperor would bring down the Previous Emperor.
Hexagon fell alongside the Previous Emperor.
'And I quietly exposed the Hexagon faction's operatives one by one, just as I'd seen in the original work.'
Hexagon was not the type to remain docile while imprisoned.
They were still attempting to manipulate the outside world through their subordinates, and I reported every Hexagon operative I could remember to The Emperor anonymously.
"Your Majesty truly excels at your work."
"...."
As Hexagon crumbled, the territorial subjects living in House of Hexagon's lands flowed out like a receding tide to other territories.
The Emperor granted tax exemptions to the territories accepting them.
Neighboring territories, receiving The Emperor's benefits, accepted and settled the migrants, and most nearby territories dependent on Hexagon turned their backs on the House.
Thus Hexagon became geographically isolated and lost power all the faster.
"Now The Emperor must be busy collecting taxes from the Imperial Palace, but... ah! There should be time to breathe before the Knights Order's winter training, so I'll need to slip in more tasks."
I smiled and pulled out a notepad.
"Thank you! I should write these down while I remember."
Tap.
At that moment, a large hand covered my notepad.
Without thinking, I scratched the back of Dale's hand with my pen.
"Dale! Are you all right? Let me clean that right away."
I scrubbed the back of his hand vigorously with a water-dampened handkerchief.
"The ink won't come off easily. Does it sting? What should I do about this?"
"I see...."
I heard Dale sigh.
"It was you."
Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org