Even the Mild-Mannered Minister Got Angry
Question: What happens when you get caught playing games with the real power behind a galactic Superpower?
Answer: If you don’t want your entire star system wiped out, you drop to your knees and slam your forehead into the floor.
When you think about how countless races and nations went extinct or collapsed simply because they couldn’t manage that simple answer…
“We are truly, deeply sorry, Your Grace Duke Arto!”
“Regarding this matter, we will provide immediate compensation and take full responsibility for the aftermath!”
The directors currently offering me a textbook-perfect forehead slam right in front of my eyes were, I had to admit, scoring full marks.
Especially since it wasn’t just any random directors from the Trade Coalition—it was all seven of the Supreme Directors themselves.
By the way, this sofa was ridiculously soft and fluffy.
“…”
“Furthermore, we will redouble our preparations so that Your Grace never has to endure such inconvenience again!”
The Supreme Directors just kept piling on more and more conditions all by themselves, even though I was sitting there with my mouth shut, not saying a word.
Well, they were the ones who started the little game in the first place, and now it was clear I’d seen through it from the very beginning…
“Is that really all?”
“Ugh…”
And once I made it plain that I’d deliberately played dumb and followed their act all the way to the end, they had nothing left to say.
Heh. Sweet.
Of course there were other reasons for their attitude, but…
“Do you seriously think our Minister is going to let you off with just those conditions?”
Cute.
Riel’s sharp retort, standing there all haughty in a perfectly tailored suit as if she were trying to look imposing, probably wasn’t one of those reasons.
Still, it was about time to wrap up the fun.
I shifted my posture and finally opened my mouth toward the directors in front of me.
“…Well, I did get a pretty entertaining show out of it. I’ll let this matter slide.”
“We are profoundly grateful for Your Grace’s immense magnanimity!”
Of course I wasn’t simply being a pushover and letting their little prank go.
“Then I’d like to move straight to the main topic. Let’s continue the discussion.”
“Yes, Your Grace!”
Because if I ended things here, it would just be a personal insult to me followed by some compensation…
“I wanted to have a thorough conversation about the outstanding debts left by the Predecessor Emperor of our great Holy Sevelian Empire.”
…But if I dragged it out just a little, the whole thing would swing back as a massive advantage for the Empire in its negotiations with the Trade Coalition.
Of course, I was no economics expert.
So every complicated practical negotiation and discussion that followed was pure white noise to me.
My role here was basically just to serve as a living totem so our staff could keep the upper hand against the Trade Coalition.
And something else drove that totem role home even harder…
The Price of Strategy
The price you paid for taking the Trade Coalition’s little game far too seriously is truly enormous.
Your reputation within the Trade Coalition has risen dramatically!
Wariness toward you within the Trade Coalition has risen dramatically!
Your very existence now forces members of the Trade Coalition to expend vast amounts of mental energy!
🎁 Reward: −10% transaction fees in all trade with the Trade Coalition; massive reduction in Influence consumption
🎁 Bonus for completing the trial: When the player personally oversees negotiations with the Trade Coalition, large additional rewards or further Influence and fee discounts become available
The event rewards were deliciously sweet.
And the extra reward only elevated my value as a genuine buff totem even higher.
Didn’t see that coming.
The practical negotiations with the Trade Coalition went smoother than a freshly paved highway.
After wrapping up all the minor side deals and finishing preparations to head back to sweet home, right when every last staffer was basking in pure joy, one fact suddenly flashed through my mind.
…We never actually dealt with the debt problem.
I hoped I was just imagining things, but no matter how hard I looked, it was the same.
Ah, crap. Screwed again.
Realizing we’d only handled a bunch of miscellaneous negotiations and left the Predecessor Emperor’s mountain of debt untouched, I was hit by a thoroughly bizarre feeling.
There’s no way this is another one of those merchants’ fishing schemes… right?
I still clung to a sliver of hope, but the status window drove a stake straight through my mental state.
The Ruthless World of Debt Collectors
You even became a buff totem, yet once again you and your staff have been thoroughly toyed with by the Trade Coalition’s slippery snakes.
If you fail to settle the Predecessor Emperor’s debt, you will suffer massive debuffs and pay a heavy price upon returning to the Empire.
Oh hell.
The status window’s thick red warning letters made the back of my neck tighten hard.
And I couldn’t even dump this problem on the staff uncles…
Artraia… at the very least you should’ve put people who know about the debt repayment on the team.
Maybe she’d assembled the personnel in a much bigger hurry than I’d thought.
The staffers’ faces were glowing with the satisfaction of a job well done. Not a single one of them showed even a hint of fear over the unpaid debt.
…Actually, thinking about it, that was the obvious call.
Telling the staff that the Predecessor Emperor had racked up debt with the Trade Coalition—and that it was casino gambling debt, no less?
No matter how tightly you controlled the information, it would still explode across the entire Empire in an instant.
They must have judged that the current Empress Artraia and the entire Imperial family could end up humiliated.
The moment I realized this could go beyond insulting the Imperial family and actually shake the foundations of the Empire itself, a chill ran down my spine.
This wasn’t some joke I could just laugh off.
And Riel seemed to feel the same way.
She quietly sidled up and sent a super-low-frequency telepathic whisper to prevent eavesdropping.
“Minister, so what are you going to do about the Predecessor Emperor’s debt?”
“…”
Riel, I don’t even know how to use super-low-frequency telepathy. What am I supposed to do when you just start blasting it at me?
So after various maneuvers, I sent the staff back to the ship first.
“Is there still something left to discuss, Your Grace?”
“…”
Looking at the bewildered expression on the Supreme Director’s face, I let out a long sigh and spoke.
“I can’t exactly have a sensitive conversation with those friends present, can I?”
“…Ah.”
The Supreme Director paused for a moment at my words, then nodded in understanding and dismissed the other directors standing nearby.
A short while later:
“Then shall we move straight into the… ‘main topic’?”
I gave a slight nod in reply.
“We’ve already spent quite a bit of time. The sooner, the better.”
Inside the central command center of Helvetia Edelweiss.
“He’s even sharper than the rumors said.”
“I know, right? We can’t let our guard down for a second.”
The place deliberately kept a dim, stylish interior unlike everywhere else. Inside it, the remaining Supreme Directors—everyone except the one currently facing Arto—were frantically responding to Arto’s “offensive.”
“During the practical talks he deliberately dragged things out with completely useless side negotiations, and the moment we hit the main topic he dumped the blame on us.”
In reality Arto himself hadn’t been thinking about anything at all.
He’d even hit pause mid-meeting and taken a nice little nap…
But to people who never imagined such a thing was possible, it simply looked like Arto was personally confirming every rumor about himself.
And the screen in front of them kept adding hard evidence to that suspicion.
—“For those reasons, we request repayment of the interest that has accumulated over the years.”
—“Hahaha… even so, regarding this matter we are simply collecting our rightful due…”
Every time Arto opened his mouth, they tried to mess with him by delivering highly intelligent, board-supported, labyrinthine replies…
—“…and so we kindly ask for your understanding on that point.”
—“That doesn’t seem right… and you can stop casually changing the subject now.”
—“Haha, whatever do you mean…?”
—“According to Article 320 of the Galactic Federation Legal Code…”
“How the hell is he giving instantaneous answers to every single thing the entire board—plus AIs—comes up with?!”
“The rumor that the Minister is the greatest genius of the century is actually true!”
Every single time, Arto fired back with zero delay—immediate, perfect responses.
That display of “competence” was enough to make the meritocracy-obsessed directors of the Trade Coalition fall under a strange kind of charm.
“Ohh… to think we dared to test someone like him.”
“It seems we were the ones in the wrong.”
“Even so, we absolutely must collect the Predecessor Emperor of Seveli’s debt.”
A few of them still clung to reason and tried to drag the conversation back to the original goal…
“Gaaaaah!!!!”
“This is exactly the rational incarnation we’ve dreamed of!”
“Oh for fuck’s sake…”
In the face of the fanatics seized by that mysterious allure, reason was nothing more than a fragile candle flame.
In the end, the very people who had been facing Arto as the embodiment of reason and professional loan sharks were reborn as his brand-new alien connections.
And at the exact same time.
“Ah, is that so? Understood… then let’s do it that way.”
The Supreme Director I’d been talking with suddenly asked for a moment because of an urgent call, so I said okay…
“Your Grace, we have decided to renounce all claim to the interest on the debts incurred by the Predecessor Emperor of the Sevelian Empire.”
“…Uh, okay.”
It was so abrupt and so smoothly resolved that I couldn’t hide my bewilderment.
What the hell.