Chapter: 11
“Summer’s coming soon anyway. Monsters don’t appear in the summer. We just have to hold out for three months at most. In exchange for Erenta, we’ll give you corn.”
From that, I learned one useful piece of information.
The food the Harwin barony had most in stock right now was corn.
“Well, Dalia.”
I shrugged as I spoke.
“No matter how isolated things get, would you really hand over Erenta—where you can fish—for nothing more than corn?”
Dalia broke into a sly grin.
“The marang fish won’t be in season anyway. They don’t come back until winter. So what, you’ll scrape by for a month eating tiny fish?”
The Erenta River had one fatal weakness.
A plant called jion grass grew there—something fish didn’t particularly like.
So even though it was a river, usually only small fish swam through it.
However, marang fish laid their eggs among the jion grass, which was why the locals never cut it down. Over the course of a year, that brought in more profit.
In other words, surviving on fishing alone wasn’t possible.
“Brisa, are you planning to starve all your people to death? You can’t live by tearing up your pretty dresses and eating them.”
I shrugged again.
“Well, you took the Jejel Street district and the Beron Plains—and all the people living there. We don’t have many residents left. About fifty households fishing at Erenta?”
Originally, peasants were the sort of people who accepted a change in lords as long as nothing drastic happened. All that really changed was who they paid taxes to.
My father hadn’t even been the kind of lord who communicated much with his people.
“You snatched everything while you had the chance during my father’s funeral, and now you’re pretending to worry. That doesn’t really add up. Though… I suppose it does, in a way.”
“Right. The past is the past, and the present is the present—”
“Dalia, you were never that smart to begin with. Saying things that don’t line up is about what I’d expect.”
It took Dalia a moment to process what I’d said.
After a brief silence, she flared up.
“You… what do you mean by that?”
“I mean that with all those extra people to feed, you are the ones who are more desperate.”
I deliberately paused, then tilted my head.
“We’re both in difficult situations, so why exactly should I help you?”
There was a reason I was bothering to engage instead of simply throwing her out.
I couldn’t figure out why she had come here so suddenly.
You come straight for Erenta like this? Something’s off.
Sure enough, the moment I showed even a hint of having the upper hand, Dalia folded.
She puffed up proudly and announced,
“Baron Forman is staying at our estate right now.”
That was unexpected.
“…You mean Baron Forman of the west?”
“Yes. He came to visit an acquaintance, but got stranded because of the warp gates. He’s quite elderly and can’t risk using unstable warps, so he’s apparently very flustered right now.”
That was news to me.
The western territories should have been overwhelmingly busy dealing with their own monster wave.
And Baron Forman was one of Duke Nozen’s information assets—an old retainer, even if retired.
So why was he here?
And… Baron Forman is Leopold Nozen’s maternal grandfather.
In other words, he was related by marriage to the Duke of Nozen’s family.
The difference in status between the families was considerable, and there was even a lord–vassal relationship, but Leopold’s parents had been an unusually rare case among nobles: a love match.
Both of them had died during the monster wave ten years ago.
Which meant Leopold had been orphaned at the age of four.
Leopold Nozen…
Without meaning to, I pictured a tall boy with jet-black hair and golden eyes.
Since I know the future, I don’t have to worry about whether Leopold survives.
He would come back from this monster wave alive and well.
At least that was a relief.
I swallowed a sigh, recalling the bouquet of flowers that had arrived on the day my engagement was annulled.
It had been sent anonymously, but I could guess who it was from.
I’d thought we wouldn’t have any further entanglements, yet here his maternal grandfather was, in the central region.
Dalia lifted her chin and continued.
“This is our chance to become vassals of Duke Nozen. If we show him how well we overcome this crisis.”
Oh, Uncle… your ambitions are impressive…
Now I understood why Dalia had been sent to me.
Baron Harwin was too busy flattering Baron Forman to spare the time himself.
“We’ll overcome this crisis wisely, Brisa. Right under the gaze of Duke Nozen.”
Dalia spoke proudly, as though the Harwin family were already vassals of the Duke of Nozen.
“It’s an incredible—truly incredible—stroke of luck. To have our excellence reported to the ducal house at every turn.”
“Have you considered that your shortcomings might be reported at every turn instead?”
“That won’t happen. You know horse prices are skyrocketing because of the warp issues, right?”
Baron Harwin was a man with military achievements. In other words, unlike us, he’d had a knight order from the start.
And the barony he’d been granted was originally a place where horses were raised on a small scale.
“We’re planning to sell horses and trade them for dairy cows. That way we’ll get milk and be able to make butter and cheese. It might help you if you take notes—”
Dalia smiled darkly at me, then added with theatrical flair,
“Oh, right. You don’t have horses, do you? Since you don’t have a knight order.”
Apparently, she didn’t yet know that Alphius’s knight order had been established.
I didn’t bother correcting her.
“Anyway, that’s what I’m saying. You and we are on completely different levels now.”
Dalia arched an eyebrow.
“So I’m giving you this opportunity first. You’re barely scraping by, aren’t you? So hand over Erenta. I’ll pay a fair price. We’re blood relatives and neighbors, after all.”
“Yes. Blood relatives and neighbors.”
I nodded, then replied calmly.
“If you end up barely scraping by too, hand over Jejel Street. I’ll pay a fair price. It was originally ours anyway.”
“Originally yours?”
Dalia echoed coldly.
She’d already realized the negotiation had failed, but the word originally seemed to push her over the edge.
She glared at me.
“Your father took everything from my father just because he was born the eldest son.”
“So that’s how people phrase ‘following the Empire’s inheritance law’ these days.”
“Shut up. Arrogant people with no real ability always fall in the end—like bugs crushed underfoot.”
“Really? Then the fall of Harwin should be quite a sight. I’ll be sure to come watch.”
At that, Dalia sprang to her feet.
“You’re arrogant to the very end, Brisa.”
Her sky-blue eyes burned into me.
“And you’re rude to the very end, Dalia.”
Still seated, I shrugged.
“I noticed earlier—your tea sloshed quite a bit when you lifted the cup. You should practice more. Especially in front of Baron Forman.”
At my remark, Dalia sucked in a sharp breath.
The maids seized the moment, clearing their throats with little coughs as they struggled not to laugh. By their standards, not being able to hold a teacup properly was the greatest insult in this entire exchange.
A brief silence fell.
“I too…”
After the pause, Dalia glared at me again.
“If I’d had a mother who was a princess, I’d hold a teacup far better too. Don’t act so superior. Baron Forman decided to stay at Harwin, not Sears.”
“The ‘For’ sound should be drawn out a bit longer. Western proper nouns are pronounced closer to the ancient tongue.”
“Stop showing off! If I’d gone to the capital academy, I’d know that too!”
“Ah.”
At last, everything fell into place.
Goodness—sometimes even the maids were right. Their judgment had been spot on.
“You must have been jealous of me, Dalia. That’s why you resented me.”
Dalia shot me one last glare, then spun on her heel and stormed out of the drawing room. She would no doubt run straight to her parents at the Harwin estate and throw a tantrum.
I let out a deep, weary sigh.
Why envy something like this? What was so important about holding a teacup without spilling?
I didn’t need a mother who was a former princess.
I didn’t need the capital academy either.
What I needed was…
Parents I could go back to and say, “This is what happened.”
Adults who could recognize danger and somehow find out why the warp gates weren’t working.
Why did everyone act as if I’d been born with everything?
When they themselves had always possessed the one thing I’d desperately wanted.
