Chapter 19
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 19
Chapter Title: Unyielding People (2)
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"Cough, cough!"
He tried to hold it back somehow, but in the end, the cough burst out.
Carton's body shook violently as he dropped the crystal orb to the floor.
"Mi, Minister!"
The startled secretary hurriedly rushed over with a handkerchief and water.
"I'm fine. Just something caught in my throat."
But the coughing wouldn't stop.
Perhaps because it had been so long since he'd lost his temper beyond his limits, even after downing the water in one gulp, his body shook repeatedly amid ragged breaths.
"Damn it, cough! The doctor's gonna chew me out again."
"Medicine...! Where's the medicine?"
The frantic secretary flailed about, hastily scanning the surroundings in search of the medicine.
At that moment, a long, slender hand appeared from behind her and placed a small vial on the desk.
"Swallow this. Your breathing should ease up for a while."
A calm voice utterly out of place in the situation.
"What's this, cough! Another one?"
"Snail extract ground with herbs. In my homeland, we use it for sore throats."
Carton seized the vial without hesitation and dumped its contents straight into his mouth.
And sure enough, the coughing stopped on the spot.
"Whew, guess getting old means I can't even get mad anymore."
As he finally caught his breath, the owner of those long fingers spoke up.
"Looks like I'm the only one around to look after you, old man."
"You're the only one who shows up without warning at the perfect damn timing with medicine, Director of Immigration Control."
With that reply, Carton looked up at the tall woman.
Immigration Control Director Haillin Metaharasin.
She picked up the crystal orb as she answered, her exotic features owing to her western desert origins.
"Thanks to you, I got a fine show out of it, so no complaints here."
The "fine show" she referred to was none other than Carton erupting in fury.
How many years had it been since he'd boiled over like this?
He'd kept his emotions in check for quite some time, heeding his doctor's warnings about his health, but this time, he simply couldn't hold back.
"If you knew you'd blow up like that, why not do it at the cabinet meeting too?"
Carton shot her a look of utter disbelief.
"That's rich coming from you."
Who was it that had ranted for a solid two hours straight to the Inspection Department Head and the Queen?
- The Central Officer racked up brilliant achievements over five long years at the southern border. How can you take a public servant's head so lightly over one damn letter!
- Sure, the standard punishment for immigration officers is execution, but those precedents are all graft and corruption cases. And we're talking summary execution without even hearing testimony? That's downright unjust!
Recalling that moment, Carton unwittingly let out a sigh.
"At least we dodged the worst of it."
The Queen's stance at the cabinet meeting had crossed from mere stubbornness into outright recklessness.
[Central Officer Nathan Kell insulted the Pope and the Holy Church. This constitutes a grave diplomatic breach, warranting the Central Officer's execution.]
What utter nonsense.
And their so-called evidence? A protest letter from the Holy Church.
It claimed the Central Officer had deemed the pilgrimage group's true intent as war, resulting in an "unreasonable entry denial based on personal judgment rather than regulations"—a claim so outlandish it defied belief.
Carton wasn't one to be easily rattled by that.
Pope's seal or no, it was unprecedented for the Church to dictate how a kingdom handled its own officials.
'Not to mention, the Pope knowing about the pilgrimage business this fast is suspicious.'
Even with the Saintess in the mix, the timeline for word of the insult to travel from the southern branch back to the Church and return here as a letter was suspiciously swift.
Fortunately, the other vassals harbored similar doubts.
Principled arguments, unyielding resolve, and staunch opposition from the heads of the Foreign Affairs Ministry's other departments had ultimately quashed the Queen's proposal.
Not a full rejection, though—it was settled that he would be summoned to the palace later for trial.
A few vassals, spearheaded by the Inspection Department Head and the Finance Minister, had backed the Queen.
"Those wretched fools. Sucking up to the Queen."
Carton spat the words like venom. He continued,
"At least none of my subordinates are in bed with her. Small mercies."
Put another way, those outside his chain of command included her allies.
Carton muttered with a sigh.
"How the hell did the country end up like this..."
The Crossroad Kingdom he remembered was nothing like this.
It wasn't so fractured, so easily swayed by outside forces.
Just over a decade ago, it even had a dashing nickname.
The Little Beast.
A nation sitting at the world's crossroads, a strategic chokepoint, inevitably draws predators.
Great powers, militant sects, spies, lobbyists.
They'd plagued the kingdom since its founding, never once vanishing.
Attempts to bring it under their sway were constant.
Yet it had always guarded its land, its people, its sovereignty—
thanks to leaders who desperately fended off every external pressure and meddling.
The little beast of a small nation.
"It wasn't like this when King Rio Castor held the reins."
Master of every road to the world.
Rio Castor.
Back when Carton was still head of the Intelligence Department, not Foreign Affairs Minister, he'd witnessed the King's true colors firsthand.
Fifteen years prior, after the Holy Church's grand holy war in the south ended in defeat, their routed remnants fled north—using it as an excuse to demand the borders be opened.
[Honor the agreement. We shall lend you passage. For peaceful ends, any man or thing has our leave.]
[But should your blades insist on crossing our borders. Should your vaunted might trample the pact my forebears and I have upheld across generations!]
[Not one grain of rice, not one cart, not one span of road shall remain upon this soil.]
[Yes, we are weaklings next to you. But our blades suffice to shatter ourselves!]
[Choose! Breach the pact and ford the ruined gorge, or slink back to your own lands!]
A bloodcurdling ultimatum: to smash the crossroads of the world and seal them shut.
The Holy Church had no choice but to abandon their remnants and husband their southern forces.
Now that little beast of a nation looked frailer than a rabbit in the fields.
"No compromises, no bowing back then. So why's the Queen playing herald for the Church now?"
Lost in wistful memory, Carton clicked his tongue.
Haillin plopped down into a chair and replied.
"How? Bit by bit, ever since His Majesty turned into... that."
She thumped her chest twice with a clenched fist—a mourning gesture unique to desert folk.
"They call it unfilial ruin. A father burying his son."
The Minister fell silent for a moment before murmuring,
"A tragedy."
"A tragedy."
No need to elaborate.
No one could have foreseen it.
And on the day of the prince's funeral, King Castor's own steel and fire were laid to rest alongside him.
- Do as the Queen wishes...
All that remained was a hollow shell stripped of soul, and the woman who gripped true power in the guise of consoling it.
How long had he secluded himself now? He could scarcely recall.
"If only there'd been another son to name crown prince and curb the Queen's overreach, but there's just the one daughter."
Haillin said with regret.
"And even she was crushed under the Queen's heel from childhood."
In a realm where the king abandoned governance to cling to the shadow of his dead son, becoming prey was inevitable.
As a result, the Crossroad Kingdom grew ever less deserving of its neutral banner.
Just like the present crisis.
"Anyone not cozying up to the Queen here would be the weird ones."
Carton let out a hollow chuckle.
"Like you and me?"
"Exactly. Unless His Majesty rises again, the kingdom will keep getting tossed around like this."
Haillin's expression turned grave.
"Dark times are upon us. I can feel it."
A heavy pall settled over the room.
"...That really rubs me the wrong way."
"Golden ages beget dark ones—what can you do? In times like these, we've got just one job."
She toyed with the crystal orb on the desk.
"Delay the darkness as long as we can. And pray that when our time's up, the next generation brings back the gold."
Gazing at the orb, Carton grasped whom she meant by "next generation."
He voiced the question he'd held back earlier.
"...You sure about this?"
"About what?"
"You could've said something to the guy earlier. 'Hang in there' or 'we've got eyes on you'."
Haillin's laughter rang through the room.
"What, spout some cringe like that? The kid'll manage. That's what I believe."
"Optimistic, considering how unreasonably everything's spiraling."
"Chaos is precisely when order and principle shine brightest. Think about it—even the Queen throwing her tantrum at the cabinet meeting, you defied her."
She had a point.
No matter how the world turned upside down, went mad.
Some things couldn't be toppled so easily.
"And folks like us? We've got a duty to safeguard that order and principle. A duty to shield those who uphold it."
The Minister nodded.
"Like King Rio Castor of old."
The Director picked up the thread.
"And like the Central Officer."
Even in this turbulent age, there remained those who refused to bend to the world.
And now, the time had come to protect them.