Could this really be the work of the Bedberiu domain?
Or could it truly be connected to the things that had attacked Aileen?
If not that, then...
I glanced sideways at Aileen.
But I immediately turned my gaze away again.
I still couldn’t be certain of anything.
In the end, we dealt with the scene and began by clearing away the remaining wreckage.
&
Not even a few days had passed
before people from the Lynn family came rushing in.
“Ma-Marsha!”
The moment Roderick saw Marsha, he hurried over and checked her from head to toe.
His wife, Pilteo, and Cedric were no different.
Only after all three of them had confirmed with their own eyes that Marsha was safe did they finally show signs of relief.
Soon, Cedric walked up to me and bowed his head deeply.
“Thank you. Truly, thank you.”
Instead of answering, I lightly patted his shoulder.
A little while later, Roderick also came over and gripped my hand tightly.
“Thank you. Truly...”
The end of his voice was damp.
I didn’t need to ask
to know how shocked he must have been when he heard the news.
Roderick personally thanked Aileen and Seraphinrie as well.
The two of them had also been a great help,
from recovering the knights’ bodies to helping organize the information we’d obtained at the scene.
“Trevio... Was it that man?”
Roderick clenched his teeth.
Father continued speaking calmly.
“It’s true that Trevio Greg is a greedy man. But I don’t see him as foolish. Even if you do investigate, be careful. They may use that as an excuse to declare another territorial war.”
“Grr... If there’s no solid proof, they’ll use that too, won’t they? Filthy bastards. Understood. I’ll be careful.”
After hearing Father’s words, Roderick made preparations to return with Marsha without further delay.
Before getting into the carriage,
Marsha came up to me again.
“Thank you. For saving me.”
“It was only natural.”
“And... about that dream.”
I blinked, wondering why she was bringing that up again.
“That was you, Oppa.”
“Huh?”
Marsha’s face flushed bright red,
and without explaining any further, she whipped around and climbed into the carriage.
Only then did I stare blankly at the carriage before belatedly realizing what she meant.
The prince in her dream.
A faint laugh slipped out.
I wondered just how frightened she must have been.
Enough to think of someone like me as a prince—
that was how desperate that moment must have been.
The carriage slowly began to move,
and at that timing, Aileen naturally approached my side.
“Hmmm. I wonder what that was about.”
“Y-yes?”
“A dream? My, it seems the two of you had quite a few conversations without me knowing.”
Seraphinrie soon came up beside us as well.
Her distinctively cold gaze quietly fixed on me.
“Talk.”
“I-it was nothing much.”
It was only one short word, yet for some reason, a chill ran down my spine.
If I didn’t talk, it felt like her gaze would kill me,
and even if I did talk, I felt like I’d die in another sense.
I cleared my throat for no reason and changed the subject.
“A-aren’t you two leaving? You’ve been delayed for quite a while.”
Aileen gave a small laugh.
“We actually received word to return as well. We should be going now.”
And then Seraphinrie very naturally looked at Aileen and waved.
“Goodbye.”
“...”
In that instant, Aileen’s brow narrowed.
“You’re not going?”
“I’m fine.”
Seraphinrie very subtly
lifted her chin with an expression that carried a rather annoying air.
Her face seemed to be telling Aileen to hurry up and go.
Aileen looked once at Seraphinrie,
then once at me, alternating between us, before lightly biting her lip.
In the end, a sigh escaped her first.
“Haa. Mr. Rayon.”
“Yes?”
“Take good care of yourself.”
I nodded as if it were only natural.
“Yes. I’ll be careful. Lady Aileen, please be careful on your way ba—”
“Not that!”
“Y-yes?”
At the slightly raised voice, I flinched without realizing it.
Aileen swallowed a sigh and muttered in a low voice.
“I’m so worried I could die, honestly.”
Then she looked straight at me and added,
“To the point that I’d rather just lock you up.”
Uh?
Don’t say things like that.
You’re scaring me.
But in the end, Aileen had to return.
Even after climbing into the carriage, she looked back and forth between Seraphinrie and me the entire time she was leaving.
Between those glances, several more sighs escaped her.
Only after the carriage had gone far away did Seraphinrie open her mouth.
“Lady Seraphinrie, is it really all right for you not to return?”
“Why?”
Seraphinrie turned her gaze askance.
“Do you want me to go?”
I looked around and said,
“Well.”
At that brief answer, Seraphinrie’s brow narrowed, and just as her gaze was about to sink coldly—
“If even Lady Seraphinrie leaves, it’ll be rather lonely. Stay and have a bit more fun before you go.”
The moment she heard that, Seraphinrie’s eyes trembled widely.
She immediately whipped her head away.
“I-I’ll leave soon.”
“Ah, right. I actually had something I wanted help with.”
“What is it?”
This time, her answer came quickly.
“If we’re going to develop the domain further, we’ll need to bring in all sorts of things. I was wondering what goods we should start with. I’d also like to know about the suppliers.”
When she heard that, Seraphinrie’s expression changed noticeably.
The wavering from just moments ago vanished in an instant,
and a confident look rose on her face.
“Then we need to look at the village first.”
As if she had been waiting for this, she continued.
“You have to see it in person to know what’s lacking. There’s a limit to what you can learn from ledgers alone.”
And so, we naturally began looking around the village together.
Seraphinrie was quite serious the entire time we walked.
What kind of shop would be good to put on this street,
which side would be better if we expanded the warehouses,
and which items we should begin handling first when considering distribution routes—she pointed them out one by one.
Her knowledge as someone who would one day lead the D’Harmont family was remarkable.
“There are better options, of course. But for your domain, this side would suit you far better.”
Seraphinrie didn’t simply recommend the most expensive goods first.
Nor was she the type to push high-end items blindly just because there was money.
She was taking the scale of the domain, distribution,
and even management into account.
“That’s amazing.”
At my admiration, Seraphinrie shrugged with a triumphant expression.
“Of course.”
And it was right then.
“Oh my, young master. Are you on a date with such a lovely young lady? Hoho. The two of you look wonderful together. Fighting!”
A domain auntie passing by burst into a good-natured laugh and even waved at us.
“A-auntie. It’s not like that.”
“Ohohohohoho.”
The auntie passed right by with a face that showed she didn’t believe a word I said.
The moment Seraphinrie, who had been walking ahead, heard that,
she visibly flinched and stopped in place.
Gah.
D-did it upset her?
Flustered by her reaction, I quickly approached her.
“She didn’t mean it like that. The aunties here just joke around a lot...”
“D-date...”
Seraphinrie murmured, as if she hadn’t heard me at all.
“We... must look that way right now...?”
“Yes?”
“W-well... since it’s just the two of us...”
Her voice trailed off.
Meanwhile, the tips of her ears turned red in an instant.
This was the same girl who had been so confident just moments ago.
“T-then... tonight... just the two of...”
“Your ears... are turning very red.”
She instantly covered her ears with her hair.
“I-it’s my hair.”
Then she swiftly turned around.
“Now that I think about it, I-I think I have to go too. Sorry. But what I told you should be enough!”
As soon as she finished speaking, she began heading up toward the mansion almost as if fleeing.
“Let’s go together.”
I called from behind her, but Seraphinrie grabbed the hem of her skirt with both hands and walked even faster.
No,
she was practically running.
Only after she climbed into the carriage parked in front of the mansion did she finally turn back to look at me.
“I-I’ll go.”
“Be careful on your way.”
Seraphinrie hurriedly started to climb into the carriage, then stopped.
Then, after hesitating for a moment,
she cautiously looked at me.
“Um... you know.”
“Yes.”
“If I... were ever in danger too...”
The speed at which she spoke grew noticeably slower, and her eyes kept wavering without being able to meet mine.
“Would you come running to save me like that too?”
I couldn’t understand why she was suddenly asking such a thing,
but the answer wasn’t difficult.
“Of course.”
When I answered without hesitation,
Seraphinrie’s eyes changed, and a smile settled on her lips.
She
gazed at me steadily with eyes I had never seen before.
“See you again next time.”
Then she was about to go back in when she suddenly opened the window.
“You have to lose your reason for me too.”
“... Yes?”
But before I could answer any further, the carriage set off, and she smiled at me again before closing the window.
Wh-what was that supposed to mean?
I scratched my head while watching the carriage grow distant.
Then, when I suddenly turned around,
the once-noisy mansion had become quiet in an instant.
“...”
It was a strange feeling.
The quiet mansion.
Originally, this was what I was used to.
It had always been like this,
and originally, it should have continued to be like this.
And yet, strangely,
it felt a little lonely.
In that moment, I gave a faint laugh.
I’d lived like this for decades, so what was I getting sentimental about now?
Maybe because my body had grown younger,
my mind was growing younger too.
***
The rice had finally fully ripened.
The paddies had at last been dyed golden,
and the faces of the domain residents who went out to harvest were quite literally glowing.
Every hand that gathered the rice directly carried an air of excitement.
On the other hand, the migrants could only look on enviously from the fields a little distance away as they dug up potatoes and sweet potatoes.
Perhaps because of that, applications poured in from among the migrants from those who wanted to be incorporated as domain residents.
But the standards had already risen.
Now, one had to live as a migrant for at least five years,
or as long as ten years or more, before being eligible for review as a domain resident.
We could no longer accept them as easily as before.
The rumor that the Brennan domain could buy and sell rice spread in an instant.
It was immediately after that that people began to flock in.
The fact that we had deliberately left part of the paddies intact so people could see the golden rice for themselves
ended up being a very decisive move.
“Ooh... Is this truly rice?”
There were nobles who let out exclamations before rice they had only seen in the wild and were now seeing properly for the first time,
and there were also those who opened sketchbooks on the spot and began transferring the scenery onto paper.
“Ahh... The Signal family must eat rice every day. How enviable. Truly.”
“If there happens to be any surplus stock, perhaps to our side as well...”
Words that had at first been cautious quickly began bursting out from here and there.
“Nonsense! If there is any surplus, we will buy it!”
“Ahem, if everyone could purchase it right away, then of course everyone would. But this batch will flow to the kingdom first, so put aside any vain expectations. Did you not all come here to secure contracts for future quantities? So stop causing a commotion and let us proceed properly with the contracts.”
Fortunately, thanks to one noble settling the mood, it did not grow into a larger disturbance.
The nobles who had come here were those gathered to contract for rice
and secure priority rights in the future.
Of course, it wasn’t all because of rice.
Since contracts for goods and supplies with the suppliers connected through Seraphinrie were also proceeding at the same time,
carriages were coming and going in and out of the domain almost every day.
The problem was that far more people had gathered than expected.
We were short on places to put them up right away.
Just before complaints erupted from the nobles,
we had no choice but to use another method.
Instead of bringing them all into the mansion,
we personally served them rice.
Fortunately, that single meal proved quite powerful.
Even the nobles who had been on the verge of pouring out complaints shut their mouths,
and the contracts were completed relatively smoothly as well.
After that, the rumors spread even faster.
Now migrants were pouring in endlessly,
and even small merchant groups began sending word first of their intent to make contracts.
The arrangement was that they would regularly make rounds through our domain and release goods,
then hand over part of their profits to us.
For now, they were still only small merchant groups,
but if this flow continued, larger merchant groups would surely move before long.
Before I knew it, the Brennan domain was becoming a land where people and goods never ceased to flow.
It was overflowing with vitality.
Whether domain residents or migrants, everyone threw themselves into work.
There was no way they weren’t tired, and yet,
A wondrous smile still lingered on their faces.
These were people who had once struggled just to put food on the table each day.
And now, at the very least, they had gained the conviction that they would not starve to death.
How could they not be happy?
Thanks to the 3,000 gold down payment we had secured at the start, things moved quickly.
Around the time that money was nearly spent,
the payment for the rice we had sent ahead to the kingdom came back.
The profit was a staggering 10,000 gold.
And that was not even the result of selling the entire stock.
Nearly half of it had practically been supplied as a trial run.
Taking that into account, it was an even more absurd profit.
Of course, there was a premium attached for now, and even if we eventually sold the entire amount, it would also be sold in Belmardian, so that profit was bound to decrease.
Also, we would naturally sell more to the frontier nobles we had contracted with than to the kingdom,
so the profit would drop again there.
We had to avoid overlapping with Belmardian as much as possible.
Even so, money would be coming in at a level we could scarcely imagine from now on.
All of this was also thanks to the extraordinary terms Aileen had offered.
The amusing part was,
the money coming in did not end there.
Serena’s armor.
The profit from the very first promotion alone was 500 gold.
Compared to the income from rice, it might seem small.
But that was money earned from the first promotional push and nothing more.
Once word of mouth began to spread properly, and with a territorial war now taking place, that scale would grow.
“Ha, hahaha...”
Father could not close his mouth as he stared at the gold coins laid out before him.
I felt the same, but deliberately spoke calmly.
“This money will be gone soon anyway. There’s still a lot to buy, and we need to improve the troops further.”
“Yes. You’re right. This isn’t the time to be pleased. This is only the beginning. Hahahahaha!”
Even as he said that, Father’s laughter showed no sign of stopping.
Father and Mother became so busy they barely had time to breathe.
There were too many people to meet,
and no end to the documents that needed reviewing.
When Mother received party invitations from all over for the first time in ages, she could not hide her delight.
For noblewomen, the number of party invitations they received was a matter of face.
Of course, it was not simply about having fun.
To properly entertain a noblewoman
was practically the same as opening a path for trade with her family.
There was a reason young nobles were constantly getting tangled up with noble ladies and causing trouble.
On top of that, the networks those noble ladies possessed were far more powerful than one might imagine.
I had worried that the two of them, who had spent so long living leisurely, might be worn out by all this,
but it was the opposite.
Both of them were brimming with a vitality I had never seen before.
“Brother, brother!”
Risel, too, was full of life.
“I want to go to the academy!”
The academy.
The moment one graduated from that place,
connections naturally formed.
The children of nobles spent years living and rubbing shoulders together; there was no way friendships would not develop.
Aileen,
and Serapinri as well, were both graduates of the academy.
There was a reason frontier nobles went to unreasonable lengths to send their children to the academy.
The anecdote of a noble from a baronial house risking everything to get his son admitted,
only for that son to later use the connections he had built there to raise his family to the rank of counts, was extremely famous.
The problem, as always, was money.
It was not a place where tuition was the only expense.
Equipment needed for classes, uniforms, dormitory living expenses, social funds—when all of that was added together,
several thousand gold a year disappeared easily.
Right.
Even if I could not, Risel could.
Even if I had had the money, with my personality, I probably would not have gotten my money’s worth out of it anyway.
But Risel was different.
She was the exact opposite of me.
If it was Risel, she would surely do well.
I lightly stroked Risel’s hair.
“You want to go to the academy?”
“Yeah!”
“Then before that, you’ll have to learn basic culture, receive etiquette lessons, and learn at least some swordsmanship. Is that all right?”
“Mm... I don’t like studying.”
Risel pouted for a moment, then suddenly her eyes sparkled.
“Fine. I just have to suffer until I get in, right?”
“Oh.”
“Once I’m in, I’ll seduce all the boys and make them do my homework for me.”
“...”
No, wait, this is way too different.
Just who did she see and learn that from?