Did You Say My Kid Got Hurt? (1)
The tail end of summer.
Aiden woke up at the crack of dawn, just as he always did. However, unlike his usual routine—where he would wash up, eat a simple piece of fruit, and head straight to his office—today he stepped out toward the grounds of the Lord's Castle.
'My stamina is failing me. This won't do.'
The agony of having to drag himself away from his desk because his eyelids kept drooping, despite the mountain of paperwork still waiting for him, had become an increasingly frequent occurrence lately. This was a matter of pride. To have to stop working because his physical strength couldn't keep up? For Aiden, whose life’s joy and ultimate goal was work, this was unacceptable.
"Hoo, hoo."
He began to stretch, watching the sky slowly brighten. You could never overdo the stretching before a workout. If he skipped it out of laziness and ended up getting injured, his adjutants—who had become pathologically overprotective lately—would surely block him from even leaving his room to go to work. Kalisa might be reasoned with, but there was no hope if Jamie, who was twice his size, decided to stand guard in front of his office door.
'I can't just waste my life lying in bed.'
So, he had no choice but to stretch until he broke a sweat. 'My shoes... well, they'll have to do.' Even without the New Balance running shoes or the Runday app from his past life, he had no doubt that if he just ran until his breath hitched and his mouth went dry, his stamina would return in no time.
Cock-a-doodle-doo!
Not long after he started his run, intending to circle the village near the castle, a rooster crowed, as if awakened by the sound of his footsteps. Quack, quack-quack! A duck joined in, followed by a "Maaa-aa," which could have been a goat or a sheep. It was a regular petting zoo.
Recently, it felt as if the North had launched a "One Household, One Livestock" campaign; everyone had started raising animals. The children were excited, busily cutting grass to make hay, and the adults couldn't stop smiling as they watched their animals grow plump and healthy.
"In, in, out, out!"
How much further had he run? The sun was now fully up. Smoke was rising from the chimneys of every house, and soon, the savory scent of cooking wafted through the alleys. It was a picturesque, pastoral scene—the very landscape the Northern people had longed for.
"Hup!"
Regardless, rather than being moved by the transformed village, Aiden just swallowed the saliva pooling in his mouth and kept his feet moving. He wasn't the type to be easily touched or sentimental, so even looking at the morning of the North he had built, his only thought was, 'Should I have a sandwich for breakfast too, instead of just fruit?'
If Jamie had heard that, he would have nagged him about eating sandwiches every single day, asking if he really needed to have one for breakfast, too. Honestly, what was with his obsession with hating sandwiches?
"Going already, dear?"
"I can go on my own. I'll be back after I draw some blood."
A diligent head of a household was heading to the fields with a pickaxe in hand. Aiden recognized his face as he passed by. 'I think he was the farmer growing herbs in the pilot complex.' He had been the first applicant, so Aiden had met him personally to ask if he needed anything.
"Huh? Oh! Lord—no, Administrative Officer!"
"Good morning!"
The farmer, realizing it was Aiden panting as he ran past, was so startled he bent at the waist. He had wondered who was running around at the crack of dawn, but to think it was the Lord himself. '...But why is he running around in the morning?' It didn't look like he had any urgent business. For an ordinary farmer in this fantasy world, morning jogging was a difficult concept to grasp.
Regardless, Aiden’s run continued.
'The patrolling soldiers seem to have solid discipline. But their uniforms look a bit hot; I should do something about that.'
'Has the stream risen? The bridge looks dangerous. I should look into repair work.'
'There are quite a few buildings going up, aren't there? Hmm, but if they keep piling materials on the road like that, it'll be hard for carts to pass.'
Things he hadn't noticed when touring the village with his adjutants were now coming into view. 'Is this why the kings of old used to disguise themselves and walk through the markets?' Indeed, a public official should never leave the field. 'I suppose I should continue morning exercise from now on...'
Clunk.
"Ugh!"
This is why it’s dangerous to let your mind wander while exercising. Aiden, having tripped over a tree root that was blatantly asserting its presence in the middle of the path, flew about two meters before face-planting into the dirt. He lay there spread-eagled, sniffing his nose, and thought: 'I think my leg is broken. No phone, no emergency services... this is a disaster.'
The Lord's Castle has been turned upside down.
It was only natural, as the Administrative Officer, whom no one even knew had left, had been brought back in the cart of a terrified resident. Knights and soldiers had come bursting out of the training grounds in shock, and the officials and workers were trembling, their faces drained of all color.
"I-I found him collapsed at the edge of the village... He said his leg won't move...!" the young resident, barely more than a youth, stammered.
"An attack!"
"Who would dare touch our Lord? Why?"
"Grr. We must find the culprit immediately and hang them from the castle walls!"
"...Please, everyone, stop it..."
Aiden, who had only broken his leg and hadn't lost his mind, looked at the murderous intent radiating from the soldiers' eyes and thought he might have been better off just passing out. It was embarrassing enough that he’d broken his leg after falling while doing unprompted morning exercise to build stamina, but to have them make such a fuss—like the male leads in a morning drama seeing the heroine bullied by an extra villain—was even more agonizing.
"I just tripped while trying to look around the village for exercise, so please, everyone, go back to your posts."
"But...!"
Bang!
"Administrative Officer! Which bastard dared to—! Adjutant Jamie, I will catch the guy and smash his head in with one blow...!"
"Get out!"
Aiden thought: 'I really am better suited for the position of worrying about others, not being the one worried about. This is so embarrassing it’s giving me hives.' Once he had chased everyone, including Jamie, out, silence finally returned to the bedroom.
'I have so much work to process today.' He resolved to have the bone-setter finish the treatment quickly and then request that his paperwork be brought to the bedroom. Still, he was lucky. If he had broken his arm, it would have been truly inconvenient. 'If my arm were broken, I'd have to find a scribe, I'd have to dictate everything... how annoying.' The option of not working was never on the table.
Knock, knock.
"The bone-setter is here, Administrative Officer. I’m coming in."
"Yes."
Unlike Jamie, who had been running around like a knight on the battlefield, shouting about smashing the heads of non-existent culprits, Kalisa had sought out the bone-setter from the barracks the moment she received the report. It was good to have at least one rational adjutant.
"Fortunately, it isn't broken, but it seems to have a slight fracture," the bone-setter diagnosed after poking, examining, and tapping the leg. "Still, moving around immediately is out of the question, so it would be best to live in bed for a while. I will apply a splint today, and I'll have a decoction to ease the pain brought to you at every meal."
Aiden had been worried about what kind of quack might show up when he heard they were calling a bone-setter instead of a healer or pharmacist, but fortunately, the man seemed quite experienced. 'Well, I suppose since our barracks training is so brutal, he might actually have more experience with this than internal injuries.'
He really needed to overhaul the medical side of things, too. Simply bringing in medical personnel wouldn't revive the regional medical system. To make the system work, policies to support the supply of personnel were necessary. And those policies had to account for administrative welfare, and for medical administration to be properly executed, securing funding was essential. It didn't end there. He had to reach a consensus considering social and cultural contexts, establish a legal foundation, and...
"Administrative Officer. Please, don't think about work right now and focus on your recovery."
"Ah. Is it that obvious?"
"Yes. Very."
He must have been frowning without realizing it. If Kalisa hadn't interrupted him, he would have spent the entire time with the bone-setter lost in a chain of work-related thoughts.
"I will process the medical fees, including the travel expenses, immediately."
"Medical fees? That is out of the question, Administrative Officer! I belong to the barracks, so please don't say such things!"
"But I am not part of the barracks..."
"The Administrative Officer becomes the supreme commander of the barracks in an emergency, so it is not a problem to consider you part of the barracks."
"Ah, does it work that way?"
"Yes."
The bone-setter bowed in surprise at Aiden's unexpected talk of medical fees, and Kalisa explained his position once more with a look that said, 'This man is doing it again.'
'He’s so flexible when working, but he’s so stubborn about things like this.' At first, she thought he was teasing his subordinates on purpose. What kind of Lord’s deputy in this world would distinguish so precisely between "mine" and "yours" according to the manual? Having seen only people who thought every blade of grass and every pebble born and raised in the Lord’s Castle—no, in the North—belonged to them for years, it was, well, somewhat refreshing. '...Maybe it’s even better this way.' Kalisa felt a sprout of respect for her otherwise awkward superior.
Knock, knock.
"Is someone else coming?"
"I wonder."
When he opened the door, Jamie, who had been cursed out and chased away just a moment ago, was standing there with a proud expression.
"Administrative Officer!"
"Why are you back?"
"I personally prepared breakfast for you. Please, have some."
"I'm not eating."
"If your leg is broken, you have to take medicine, don't you? You need a full stomach before taking medicine."
"It’s not broken. Just a fracture."
"Still, you have to take the medicine."
Aiden had a premonition. That guy... he wouldn't leave the bedroom on his own feet until Aiden ate everything he’d brought, whatever it was.
"Sigh."
He was about to have an unplanned feast from the morning. 'A single piece of fruit would have been enough.' He prayed that whatever he brought was simple, or at least small in portion.
"Hehe."
But seeing that smile, he instinctively felt that both hopes were already dashed. The greasy, protein-rich scent wafted out from the lunchbox, which Jamie had covered with a lid to keep it warm. And the size of the container was massive.
"Ta-da!"
"..."
'Ta-da, my foot,' he thought.
"...Are you really expecting me to eat all this?"
"It’s exactly what you need right now, Administrative Officer. All you ever eat is the thin ham inside your sandwiches, which is why your bones fracture just from a little fall. If you had eaten plenty of meat in advance, this wouldn't have happened, right?"
"It’s not because my bones are weak, it’s just that the direction I fell was—"
"Now, now. You need to eat well for your bones to knit together quickly. I thought about frying it for better digestion, but I just boiled it instead."
The lunchbox was packed three layers deep with various boiled meats.
Knock, knock.
"I’m coming in."
Aiden was having a staring contest with Jamie’s lunchbox, feeling overwhelmed, when someone else arrived. "Chef?" It was Brikal, the chef, carrying a large hotpot that looked like it could feed four people.
"...Chicken?"
"It is duck."
Aiden pondered seriously. 'Did I do something wrong?' Why was a sick man being subjected to food torture? He hadn't even taken a single bite, yet he already felt full.