The Matter of Correctional Facility Maintenance (1)
“Hey, sir!”
As Aiden rose from his seat with a sense of relief after the trial, a few residents cautiously approached him.
“Did you call for me?”
“Oh, goodness, Administrative Officer! Please, speak comfortably!”
Aiden usually spoke in casual, informal language to his subordinates, but because of his past trauma from being relentlessly grilled during a “Civil Service for the People” campaign, he still habitually used formal, polite language when dealing with residents.
“Haha. But what brings you here? Is there something you’re curious about?”
Aiden, still unable to get comfortable using informal speech with petitioners, brushed it off with a rough laugh and asked for their business.
“Well, if we catch the bad guys, do we get a reward like the one you just mentioned?”
“Ah.”
Gulp.
The expressions of the residents waiting for Aiden’s answer looked exactly like children waiting for a gift box filled with snacks.
“Not every criminal qualifies, but I have recently revised the regulations for reward payments.”
“Revised reward regulations, you say…?”
“Originally, I planned to make them available for all residents to see once the Administrative Welfare Center opens next month. But if you are curious right now, go to the first floor of the Lord’s Castle.”
“If we go to the first floor of the Lord’s Castle, can we check when that reward money comes out?”
“If you look for the Civil Dispute Department, they will guide you immediately.”
“Thank you, thank you, sir!”
Upon hearing Aiden’s words, the residents—young and old, men and women alike—began to make their way toward the Lord’s Castle.
‘It seems the residents are starting to take an interest in the law.’
It was a bit strange that residents in the North, where most were illiterate, were showing interest in the law, but Aiden dismissed it, thinking that whatever was good for the territory was fine.
It was a mistake born from his lack of precise knowledge regarding the temperament of the Northerners.
“Administrative Officer!”
A few days later.
Jamie came running in, looking pale.
“What is it this time?”
It had been quiet for a few days, so it seemed something had blown up again.
“Well, I think you need to come outside right now.”
“Why?”
“It’s faster if you see it with your own eyes!”
“What on earth… Huh?”
Aiden, who stepped outside, doubted his own eyes.
“…Did a war break out in the North behind my back or something?”
Aiden rubbed his eyes, wondering if it was a dream, but the situation in the courtyard of the Lord’s Castle did not change.
A person dragged in with a gag in their mouth and their eyes covered.
A person tied up with ropes and dumped unceremoniously over a donkey.
Even a person lying spread-eagled on the bare ground, unconscious, without any restraints at all.
“…What is this?”
The state of them looked exactly like a bandit group that had looted civilians and taken them as slaves, but since they wouldn’t have come to the Lord’s Castle of their own volition, he decided to ask out of courtesy.
What on earth is this?
Where did you go and what kind of trouble did you cause?
“Hehe.”
“Heh heh.”
However, the people who had captured the slaves—no, the civilians—at their own discretion were all just letting out sneaky laughs.
“They are criminals.”
Kalisa, who had been briefed on the situation in advance, sighed deeply and answered in his stead.
“Criminals?”
“Yes. The residents caught those who committed crimes that fit the reward payment regulations themselves.”
“……?”
So, you’re saying all of this happened because of the reward money?
Aiden’s head began to throb. Of course, paying rewards or bounties was meant to induce voluntary participation in maintaining order, but he hadn’t expected the residents to be this proactive.
“The one dragged in with a gag is an arsonist.”
“An arsonist?”
“They discovered him hiding after he set fire to his neighbor’s house because he didn’t want to pay back money he’d borrowed, so they caught him.”
“This is insane. Then is the one hanging on that donkey a similar case?”
“He’s a fraud who moved from village to village, sucking up all his neighbors’ property. He posed as a fortune teller, and he even used poison to harm people to make them believe his words.”
“Damn it. Then what about the last one?”
As Aiden frowned at the man lying spread-eagled and still unconscious, Jamie answered this time.
“He’s a guy who grew prohibited crops.”
“Prohibited crops?”
“It’s a mushroom that makes you feel good, causes hallucinations, and is highly addictive…”
That’s a drug.
“You damn bastard! Trying to destroy our neighborhood!”
Aiden slapped the forehead of the unconscious man without realizing it.
He regretted it immediately.
He thought that he must be slowly assimilating into the people of the North.
“But the residents caught all these criminals themselves?”
“Yes.”
“Not just helping with the arrest—.”
“They literally caught them.”
“…….”
“Hehe. Isn’t it amazing? The spirit of our Northerners is so—.”
Jamie was excited and rambling on, while Aiden and Kalisa, who were outsiders, had to look at each other and contemplate what exactly was wrong with this neighborhood and where it started.
‘No, does this make sense?’
Putting up a wanted poster with a criminal’s montage in front of a police station is meant to encourage reports from residents; it doesn’t mean they should beat the criminal up themselves and drag them to the courthouse.
“Administrative Officer.”
“…Yes.”
The middle-aged man who had caught the guy growing hallucinogenic mushrooms asked quietly.
“Do we get the reward money right away? I’m thinking of buying a few sheep if I get it.”
These people.
They are truly treating criminals like walking bonuses.
…Anyway, the farm income of the North was steadily rising.
“It’s not just these three who thought of catching criminals to get the reward money.”
“Yes. It seems the story that the Bramwood village militia leader caught Jenkin and received a large reward is spreading through the grapevine. In every village that hears the story, people are starting to go out on criminal hunts at night after finishing their work during the day.”
“Please, don’t use words like ‘hunting’ when it comes to catching people.”
“They gave up being human first, so what’s wrong with treating them like beasts?”
“Oh, boy.”
Aiden agreed with Jamie’s words as well. Still, since a public official has things they can say and things they shouldn’t, he substituted his response with a sigh.
“But is our correctional facility okay?”
“The dungeon?”
“Yes.”
Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen the dungeon in person even once since he took office.
‘Well, the trial for Jenkin was the first one, so I guess that’s natural?’
It hadn’t been long since he realized that the Administrative Officer, acting as the Lord’s deputy, was also in charge of trials.
Actually, the North is a place where people live, so why wouldn’t there be criminals and trials? After Jenkin’s verdict, he found out that minor matters were handled by the village councils. However, serious matters that were too heavy for the council to handle would come to the Lord’s Castle, but there hadn’t been any serious trials like that until now.
- Originally, big things don’t happen around the time spring begins.
According to Jamie, the time he took office was usually a busy time for everyone preparing for farming, so it passed without any major incidents.
Anyway,
“If the residents keep bringing in criminals like this, I think we’ll need to maintain the dungeon. What do you think?”
“Do we really need to maintain a place for guys who committed crimes and got dragged in?”
“I agree with Jamie on that.”
For the first time in a while, Jamie and Kalisa’s opinions were in agreement. Both of them looked indifferent. They had the expression that if there was money to spend on maintaining a prison, they’d rather make a few more pickaxes and sickles to distribute for free.
“Maintaining a correctional facility doesn’t necessarily mean we’re making it comfortable.”
“Oh, that wasn’t it?”
Aiden sighed deeply and added an explanation.
“No matter how I look at it, the number of guys getting locked up is going to increase, so I’m saying we should think of a way to manage them more efficiently.”
“Ah!”
“So that’s what it is.”
Aiden didn’t intend to graft 21st-century human rights sensitivity onto the romantic North, but he couldn’t give up on efficiency either.
“Let’s go out for an inspection first.”
It seems the time has come to find out what the prison in this neighborhood looks like and how the criminals are being managed, even if it is a bit late.
Creak.
The sound of rusty iron bars echoed through the dungeon.
‘…Not really, strictly speaking, it’s a semi-basement?’
It was a bit of an ambiguous first impression of a prison.
‘Well. If it were completely underground, they would have had to light candles even during the day, so that would have been a loss.’
Would it even be feasible in the Northern household economy to hand out precious candles to criminals? So, the structure was acceptable for now.
‘Consumable costs add up to millions if you save them.’
Ding, ding, ding.
“It seems to be mealtime.”
It was lunchtime. In fact, it was the part he was most curious about.
“Tell them to do as they usually do, since I want to see how it is normally.”
Of course, it’s impossible for things to be exactly the same when the head of the institution shows up, but there’s a difference between saying this and not saying it. Since he had visited suddenly, the criminals didn’t know about the inspection, so perhaps he could see things more in their raw state.
Rumble, rumble.
He heard the sound of a cart passing over the bumpy stone floor.
“It’s mealtime! Everyone sit straight!”
“I heard the Lord’s Castle’s situation is pretty good lately? It would be nice to have a bowl of hot soup!”
“Is the wheat bread I asked for not here yet? I ordered cheese and ham too!”
“Tsk! This damn rock-like rye bread again today.”
The guard, who had bowed to Aiden, cleared his throat and shouted, and a ruckus broke out from the prisoners.
“What the…”
He wondered if it was the same in every world that criminals receiving punishment would complain about side dishes, but then,
“Ordered cheese and ham? What kind of nonsense is this?”
By any chance, does this place have something like private food delivery?
Aiden’s brow furrowed tightly. The guard, who had been watching him, approached while stuttering.
“Administrative Officer. May I explain?”
“Of course.”
“I know it must look strange. But it’s difficult to ban private food.”
“Why?”
“Private food is expensive.”
Aiden wondered if the guard was stating the obvious, but then,
‘Ah, is it not? Isn’t private food usually expensive?’
He reached that thought. Come to think of it, he remembered seeing a price list for private food on an internet community in his past life. He couldn’t remember the exact year, but he remembered being quite shocked because the price list for private food was cheaper than he thought.
‘Cup noodles were 1,000 won, sausages were 1,500 won, I think it was about that much.’
In the midst of that, he was shocked to see that coffee was divided into milk coffee, sugar coffee, and sugar-free coffee. He thought it was better than the breakroom of a low-level civil servant.
Anyway.
“If private food is expensive, does that mean you are doing business with the criminals in prison?”
“Partly true and partly false.”
The guard, perhaps thinking that Aiden was not as authoritarian as he thought, finished his explanation with a much more relaxed face.
“It is a presumptuous thing to say, but where would there be enough tax money to spend even on criminals?”
“That’s true.”
“But we can’t let the criminals starve to death, so we provide private food at a high price to criminals who have economic power, and with the remaining money…”
“…Sigh.”
The guard mumbled the rest of his words, but even without hearing them, it was clear how the situation had turned out. This is why local governments without money have no choice but to be sorrowful.
‘To think it had reached a point where the guards had to sell private food because there was no money to feed the criminals.’
But, wait.
Isn’t something a bit strange?
“But, prisoners.”
“Yes, Administrative Officer.”
“Don’t they do forced labor?”
Didn’t he also pass a sentence on Jenkin? 10 years of forced labor. Forced labor essentially means the government swallows the prisoners’ labor, so why is there no income when there are people working?