Chapter 45: waiting…

Middle Fire Month, 3rd Day, 600 AGG

"The repairs are nearly done? Good," Martin dismissed the worn-out man. "Have other people keep an eye on the angels if you can't. It would be unpleasant if another building fell apart because someone wasn't supervising them."

"Yes, Lord Asturias," the administrator wiped a bead of nervous sweat from his forehead. "I'll make sure that the foremen exercise more caution from now on."

"Excellent," Martin nodded. By the gods, his work never ended. It hadn't for decades. "And do ensure that the merchants are returning the angels after they complete their escort duty."

But it was better now, working to build up instead of struggling to hold on to the little they had. To march onto a future beyond mere survival instead of worrying over whether the coming day might be their last.

"Of course," the administrator respectfully dipped his head. The frown on Martin's face deepened. The bureaucratic apparatus of the Draconic Kingdom was under far too much strain; any more and he was certain that ministers, courtiers, and administrators alike were going to drop dead from their workload. "And this is only for domestic routes, Lord Asturias?"

"Indeed. Don't forget that," Martin raised an eyebrow. "Unless you want to deal with international trade in addition to your regular responsibilities."

"... I will definitely not forget that."

"That's it," Martin directed his attention back to the projects Her Majesty had started before she left on her ill-conceived trip to the Beastman Country. "You may leave."

The administrator—a spare from some western demesne, he was too tired to recall where exactly—stood up, bowed, and left the office.

"How troublesome…" Martin allowed himself a small exhale of exasperation as he considered the Draconic Kingdom's current situation. "Really, what are they thinking, running off without a word in advance?"

At least she was with Lady Yuriko.

'...'

Now that he was thinking about it, the fact wasn't as comforting as he thought. It wasn't Her Majesty's health that concerned him—the angel would never allow her to come to harm—but whatever consequences would result from their misbegotten state visit.

"So long as they don't end up creating another Katze," Martin mumbled under his breath. Her Majesty was hardly among those who suffered the most at the hands of the beastmen, but the burden that rested upon her surely ranked higher than any others.

"Handling the harvests and replanting for the recently reclaimed cities, fixing up existing roads and paving new ones, dealing with the grievances of merchants, Lady Yuriko's zealots, preparing for a visit from the Empire, the upcoming Dragonflame Festival…" and that only constituted a fraction of the developments he had to oversee in Her Majesty's absence. "Then there's a meeting with Marquis Aliund about the future of the military and those Bafolk."

Of course, he had his fellow ministers and a veritable army of assistants to aid him in his task, but trying to perform both his and Her Majesty's work was bound to result in a collapse sooner rather than later. Newly resurrected nobles needed time to recuperate in spite of Lady Yuriko's best efforts, so many of their responsibilities fell on his shoulders too.

Having to temporarily lower the price floor on grains and other staple crops thanks to the productivity of the angels had the potential to grow into a problem in the future. Thankfully, Her Majesty had seen fit to only employ angels in areas still suffering from underpopulation—he could only imagine how much worse the complications could've been.

Martin glared at the Cherubim Gatekeeper floating beside his desk next with all the stillness of a statue. "Even if I keeled over, I'm sure one of your kind would just restore me anyways."

Her Majesty truly did not understand how fortunate her circumstances were. For the closest equivalent of a deity to worry, ha, dote on her and fret over her every need…

Meanwhile, he and the nobility of the Draconic Kingdom were working themselves to the bone in order to ensure the speedy recovery of the Kingdom. At this point, he wasn't sure if even death would mean an end to the work.

That being said—

'If anyone deserves a break, it's her,' Her Majesty and overwork were the closest of friends; many a night had concluded with dark circles under her shame-filled eyes. 'Another thing to thank Lady Yuriko for, I suppose.'

They really should have told him in advance though. What if he wanted to join?

Inconsiderate. Martin snorted in dry amusement and completed the composition of another missive to be sent to the Magician's Guild. They'd been doing a good job installing the Fountain Crystals, magical lights, and other public amenities cannibalized from the magic items left behind by the beastmen—or at least those that weren't marked to be sold. The rest, they took away to research and hopefully replicate.

There was some sort of irony to be found in that. Perhaps he would bring it up to Her Majesty when she returned.

… Honestly, the correct course of action for Martin was finding a Fourth-Tier arcanist and ask them to relay a『Message』to Her Majesty, but he was hard-pressed to justify the expense knowing that she wasn't in any real danger.

"A budget increase…" Even if the Magician's Guild was admirably performing their tasks, there just wasn't much money conveniently floating around in the coffers to allocate. Baharuth, Slane… the Draconic Kingdom owed quite the debt to its neighbors, didn't it? "Hm. A good number of the Magician's Guild are perverts who probably wouldn't mind working solely for the opportunity to touch unknown magic items."

Spellcasters could be handled easily enough, but what about everybody else? Artisans, his fellow nobles, soldiers—they couldn't be handled in such a bizarre way.

'Funny how I'm worried about the accounts we've opened with our allies,' Martin took a sip of long-cold tea. For all the issues of their ruling class, Re-Estize was a stellar provider of quality blends; although, the recent war Baharuth had been escalating made replenishing his supplies a tricky process. 'If Lady Yuriko wanted to, a single word would be enough to cancel all our ongoing payments.'

If only dealing with debt was so simple. Lady Yuriko certainly did not lack the strength to strong-arm everyone into accepting outrageous propositions, but basing foreign relationships off pure force alone wasn't feasible in their current state. Furthermore, the angel lacked the sort of personality required for that kind of policy to be sustainable.

Forming friendly ties via trade and cultural exchange would be better for the Draconic Kingdom in the long run, especially now since they had the overwhelming power to defend their interests from groups who might not be willing to play as nicely.

"Though it doesn't seem impossible to hash out a deal with Baharuth now that their Imperial Army is so strained," in addition to the Re-Estize war, news of their conflict against the demihumans living inside one of their inner wildernesses had begun to trickle out to the surrounding nations. "Another topic for Her Majesty to discuss whenever she meets El-Nix."

On the bright side, Slane was more than happy to avoid meddling in their affairs. Martin was under no illusion that there weren't any spies sneaking around in the Draconic Kingdom, but that was to be expected. All countries had a vested interest in keeping an eye or two on the backstages of the international scene.

'I wonder if their Windflower Scripture knows about Her Majesty and Lady Yuriko's absence,' extremely likely. 'They shouldn't care overly much, I think, not when this is a sign that the Beastman Country is slated for quite the disaster.'

He added another note to an increasingly lengthy list addressed to Her Majesty.

Martin sincerely hoped she was enjoying her 'vacation' because there was absolutely no way she was getting another one anytime soon.

'Playing hooky and flirting with the angel…'

The Prime Minister's quill flew across the parchment with renewed vigor. Yes, he was looking forward to seeing Her Majesty's face the moment she saw the backlog of work that awaited her.

In the meanwhile…

Martin flicked through a haphazardly layered stack of parchment and pulled out a report he needed to reference for the upcoming meeting with the Minister of Defense.

Necessities had an awful way of being mind-numbingly boring sometimes.


"Grief is as useless as love," Bela'vish tossed the book aside with a scoff. "Who knew the Fifth-generation Sword Saint was so," the Jaguar Zoastia struggled to find the words to express the second-hand embarrassment. "Argh."

For the past few days, she had been unenthusiastically going through the spoils acquired from the eradication of Clan Vadh. She should be en route to deal with the druids' problem, but the auguries detailing the High Vizier's return unnerved her more than she would've thought possible.

Something was going to happen soon. Something big. Maybe good, maybe bad.

Either way, Bela'vish wanted to wait until the High Vizier convened an assembly that she knew was looming over the horizon. A privilege earned through might of arms: the authority to demand a session that no Vizier could ignore.

'Can't fight properly with all these worries,' she tossed up an enchanted knife and smoothly caught it out of the air. "Niln. Have you recalled all of the clan back home?"

"I have, but only the gods know when they'll receive the recall orders with how the Archives seem to be unoperational at the moment," Niln apologetically bowed. "Around half have returned so far, Rajan."

"Nothing to do about it then…" Ugh, why was she feeling so moody now? Annoying. "Did anyone find anything interesting in this pile of scrap?"

"They had plenty of relics, but the most valuable of their heirlooms were surely lost when Pallavi fell in Mohajar."

"Mmmng," she grunted. "Forget it. How many days until our delegate reaches Karnassus?"

"You sent them out just yesterday, Rajan," Niln dryly replied. "It'll be at least a few days—more, if the Archives are refusing to offer teleportation on top of closing off their communication system."

"Right," Bela'vish heaved a sigh. "This whole issue with the High Vizier's unexpected return has me a little unbalanced—"

The sudden beeping of a『Message』rung in her head. Bela'vish instantly accepted, tensely listening for what came next.

"『Ahem.』" That voice… Varush finally saw fit to contact everyone then. Was the Archives' downtime related to whatever he was doing? "『I apologize in advance for the disturbance to those of you who are otherwise preoccupied. We'll be assembling the Council to discuss our future plans with regards to the Draconic Kingdom in the light of a few interesting developments I'm sure many of you would be eager to learn more about. Anyways, I will see all of you then. May Isholranth guide your paths.』"

'Weird. He never referred to the human nation as the Draconic Kingdom before,' a wave of unease washed over Bela'vish upon the conclusion of the mass『Message』. 'Should I really go?'

"A summon from the High Vizier?" Niln asked. Bela'vish wryly grinned at the impertinence of a slave posing a question to their master and nodded. "I suppose you'll need to leave for Kruurat at once."

"Seems so," Bela'vish tossed the half-mad ramblings of the Fifth-generation Sword Saint to the wayside. No wonder Pallavi had turned out the way she did, with someone like that raising her. "Try to keep the place from burning down while I'm gone, eh?"

"If that is your will," Bela'vish clicked her tongue. Not a speck of humor in her most trusted slave. Ah, well, he wasn't too bad like this—better humorless than annoying. "Safe travels, Rajan."

"Save that for when I actually head off, alright?"


"They aren't there," the Windflower operative respectfully reported to Raymond. "The angels are still functioning normally, but the Lady of Wings herself is not present. Dark Scale Dragon Lord also hasn't been sighted in the past couple of days."

"I see," Raymond dragged a hand down his mouth. "Did the Clearwater Scripture lend their assistance—ah, no. The Executive Council resolved to avoid scrying the angels."

"Well, that aside, Commander Lauransan," Raymond accepted the papers handed to him by the operative. "All the details are reported here. Infrastructural developments, public projects, military adjustments… yeah, it's all in there."

"Excellent. Thank you, Moulint," Raymond paused for a beat. "And any updates on the situation in Argland?"

"Platinum Dragon Lord vanished too," Moulint shrugged. The lack of urgency or surprise wasn't unexpected, Raymond thought. The Dragon Lord in question had a penchant for coming and going as he pleased, surely managing the many territories the Theocracy was certain he commanded. "Kinda odd that he'd pull a disappearing act at the same time the Lady of Wings and Dark Scale Dragon Lord did, but we don't have enough information to confirm any conclusion beyond mere coincidence."

"It's absolutely not that simple," Raymond rejected the idea straight away. "With how powerful the Lady of Wings is, it's not shocking that he would grow concerned. He must either be observing them or attempting to locate them in order to do the first."

Moulint shrugged again, the kind that said 'if you say so.' "We'll keep an eye out for all of them then. If that's everything, I'll take my leave, Commander."

"Thank you for your service," Raymond politely saw the operative out before returning to his chair with a tired exhale. "I wonder if I'll ever get the chance to retire…"

Deep in his heart, he knew the answer was an unshakeable 'no.' Raymond would serve as the Commander of the Six Scriptures until the day of his death, of that he had no doubts. A problem that came along with doing one's job too well.

'I'll need to find a successor too… The current Captain of the Black Scripture isn't bad. Good temperament, strong leadership skills, raw power, devoted… we'd be hard-pressed to find anybody more suitable.'

He would have to talk with them when they returned from their headhunting mission. Last he heard, they believed they found the main base of operations where the traitor and her compatriots were holing up and were now cautiously biding their time while gathering as much information as possible.

'Zurrernorn and some other shadowy group. Could it be Corpus?' The Executive Council had long suspected a connection between the two groups. 'We don't know nearly enough about them to make a move. Would it be better to recall the task force?'

Raymond shook his head. He trusted the Captain enough to fall back if the situation became unsalvageable. It'd be nice if they didn't though; they still needed to recover the Crown of Wisdom Clementine stole from the Miko Princess of Earth and silence her before she got more chances to spill Theocracy secrets.

There weren't that many important ones Clementine had access to thanks to their standards of operational security, but she did know about Antilene… Hm, yes, her existence becoming widely known would not be a good outcome at all.

If only they could send Antilene herself and end the whole headache in one go. Raymond let out a bitter chuckle.

'It's too soon to feel pessimistic,' he forced himself to focus on more immediate concerns. 'The Black Scripture has their duties, and I have mine.'

The hole in surveillance they were experiencing with the Draconic Kingdom was a little troubling considering the rumors of their ruler being able to replicate Platinum Dragon Lord's trump card, in addition to all the angels floating about. He and his colleagues had never worried about it in the past, not when the kingdom was pushed to the brink by the Beastman Country. Being able to train their forces in a relatively low-stakes environment had been an unintended boon as well.

However, with her sway over the domain of the soul—as rudimentary as it was—Raymond did not think it possible to slip a spy into Queen Oriculus's inner cycles. It was for this same reason that they had also avoided many areas of the Council States.

And now with the Lady of Wings watching over the Draconic Kingdom, the Windflower and Clearwater Scriptures were crippled when it came to operations within the Dragon Queen's domain—ironically enough, by the Executive Council itself.

"This outcome isn't so bad," Raymond tried to look on the bright side. "The Beastman Country is no longer a threat, and the other powers in the center of the continent shouldn't be a problem for the angel."

Antilene might even get a chance at ending that century old grudge against the detestable Elf King too. With Platinum Dragon Lord distracted and everyone's attention on the new shaker in the east…

"I'll have to bring that up with everyone else," he expected some opposition, but the sooner they wrapped up the damn war in Evasha, the better. Raymond just had to help his peers see that. "As for the Draconic Kingdom…"

Mm. It'll be better to stay out of their business. To reach beyond one's means, to burn one's fingers in the pursuit of folly—after all, Greed was the downfall of the proud.

There was no benefit in meddling with the Draconic Kingdom. Queen Oriculus was reasonable, the Lady of Wings showed nothing but goodwill to humanity, and they were admirably dealing with what would have become a future demihuman disaster.

Truly, some necessities were better left alone to resolve themselves.