Hearts of Beasts
After the event that could be written as the prince’s “Eastern Governor Inauguration Ceremony” but was better read as the “Eastern Love War” came to an end, both the prince and Adler fell into deep thought. They had agreed to respect Mariel’s decision. It was the product of their love for her and their desire not to earn her hatred.
The problem was that while both were used to being loved one-sidedly, this was their first time having to give love one-sidedly. It felt like they had become the pursuer instead of the pursued for the first time in their lives, and they agonized over it. How could they capture Mariel’s heart without earning her resentment?
They both arrived at a similar choice. And that was…
“Mariel did like tulips, didn’t she?”
“I must present her with tulips even more beautiful than that knightly upstart.”
It was an all-out gift offensive.
The prince moved first. He sent the twenty thousand red tulips he had purchased straight to the garden of Mariel’s villa.
“Th-this…!?”
“A gift from His Highness the Prince.”
In a single night, the villa’s modest garden had transformed into a sea of crimson tulips. Seeing the sight, a strange mix of emotions swirled through Mariel’s heart.
“Aah… I-I’m happy. Lord Luca, I’m so very happy, but…”
It felt wonderful that he was thinking of her and creating a beautiful field of red tulips just for her sake. But…
“Doing it to this extent is… a bit much.”
Sending twenty thousand tulips and turning the entire garden into a red tulip field… Mariel recalled the prince’s flood of letters back in the capital and began to feel slightly overwhelmed.
And the gift offensive was far from over. Not long after, Adler’s present arrived for Mariel.
“Lord Adler… what is this?”
“This is the tricolor tulip said to have bloomed only once in the entire East, Lady Mariel.”
It was a rare tulip possessing white, yellow, and pink petals all at once. The flower practically screamed “I’m expensive” with its entire being, leaving Mariel both delighted and flustered.
“Th-thank you, Lord Adler. To give something so rare for my sake…”
“For you, Mariel, I would even retrieve a magic crystal from the demon realm itself.”
“Lord Adler…”
Adler’s eyes blazed as if he were ready to sprint toward the demon realm at any moment. In that gaze, Mariel sensed the same intensity she had seen in the prince, and little by little, unease began to take root inside her.
Meanwhile, the Eastern Branch of the Lorend Guild was waging its own war.
“You wish to secure four thousand tulips in advance?”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible. All tulips are now sold exclusively through auction.”
“Even if I offer eight times the price, what cannot be done cannot be done!”
In my previous life I had been stuck in the military during the coin craze and never witnessed it firsthand. But watching the tulip mania unfolding before my eyes, I could more or less imagine what it must have been like.
The original purpose of a token of love had vanished. Now people were simply buying in bulk to earn even greater profits. Commoners, wealthy merchants, and nobles alike all came carrying sacks of money, desperate to purchase tulips. The price rose with every sunrise.
“Elina…”
“Yes, young master.”
“What is the current price of tulips?”
“…The cheapest variety is now 5,500 zenons.”
Since I had first sold them at 500 zenons, the price had skyrocketed elevenfold. What was even more terrifying was that the atmosphere suggested it still had further to climb.
I called out to Chloe, the chief secretary who was darting about in a frenzy.
“Chloe.”
“Yes! Young master!”
The orange-haired chief secretary with glasses and an adorably earnest face came running. I asked her how much profit we had made from the tulips so far.
“How much have we earned from the tulips up until now?”
“Um… yes, just a moment, please.”
At my question, Chloe closed her eyes and dove into mental arithmetic. As the Eastern Branch’s greatest mind, she had memorized every single sale and was capable of performing instant calculations like this.
After keeping her eyes shut for roughly five seconds, she opened them and spoke.
“As of today, we have recorded sales of 67.3 billion zenons. Net profit stands at 32 billion zenons, and the total asset value—including land—is estimated at 210 billion zenons.”
I couldn’t close my mouth. Whoa… had I really made that much money? A venture I had begun by investing 5 billion zenons of my own money had somehow ballooned to a value of 210 billion zenons. The reason 210 billion zenons meant so much to me was that this had been a business started entirely with my personal reserves.
While previous ventures had used the Lorend Guild’s capital, this horticulture project was a pure 100-percent personal business launched with my own 5 billion zenons. A miracle had occurred: 5 billion had turned into 210 billion.
It was a moment that should have filled me with joy, yet instead of happiness, what I felt was… fear.
“Congratulations on the massive success, young master.”
“Mm… thank you, Elina.”
“…Your complexion doesn’t look good. Are you not pleased?”
“I am pleased, but… it’s starting to scare me.”
“Scare you? What do you mean, young master?”
“…The hearts of beasts.”
What I feared were the beast-hearted speculators who would lose their minds and swarm into this insane tulip market. And that worry soon became reality.
The Eastern Auction House, the largest auction venue in the East for all kinds of crops, medicinal herbs, and horticultural goods. The farmers and noble plantation owners watching the auction there felt their stomachs twist with envy.
“Five thousand five hundred for the tulips! Any higher bids?”
“Five thousand seven hundred!”
“Five thousand seven hundred! Any further bids?”
“Six thousand!”
“Six thousand has been bid!”
Watching the tulip prices climb to unimaginable heights, their own crops suddenly looked like garbage. The neighbor’s tulips doubled in price in a single day—what the hell have you been doing?!
Many farmers and nobles who witnessed the absurd tulip prices made the same decision.
“Plow the fields under!”
“We’re growing tulips starting today too!”
Countless farmers began ripping up their rice paddies and fields to plant tulips instead. The plant-growth magic that forced flowers to bloom sold like wildfire. Mages from the Green Magic Tower wandered the plantations without rest, casting spell after spell.
“Senior brother… I think I’m going to die.”
“I feel like I’m dying too…”
The Green Magic Tower mages chugged mana potions as they moved from field to field. And so the farmlands of the East gradually filled with nothing but tulips. The wheat and potatoes that filled people’s bellies, the medicinal herbs that cured their illnesses—all of them vanished, replaced by tulips that offered only beauty.
"Chloris."
⟨ Plant Growth Magic ⟩
Vwoong—
Elina and I watched yet another instance of the plant-growth spell. For the record, it wasn’t cast on my own flowerbed. It was cast on a neighboring field that had once grown wheat and corn. The green magic kept activating nonstop across the surrounding fields.
“……”
“It appears they intend to grow tulips there as well, young master.”
“Seems that way…”
Lately I had been seeing that green magic almost every day. No, it wasn’t just often—I couldn’t remember the last time I hadn’t seen it. In the empire’s breadbasket, the Eastern Region, rice paddies and crop fields were disappearing, replaced by flower fields. Hmm… it might be time to pull out.
My crisis-detection sensor was flashing bright red, screaming a warning.
Just then, a servant came running and whispered something to Elina. After listening, she hurried over to me.
“Young master.”
“What is it, Elina?”
“Count Furkus has sent word that he wishes to meet with you.”
“Count Furkus…? All right. Tell him I’ll meet him.”
“Understood.”
I had been wanting to see him anyway, so when he reached out first I immediately set the appointment. The next day I visited the count’s mansion.
Count Furkus, whom I met in his study, looked far worse than when I had first encountered him. His cheeks were sunken, and his fingernails had been chewed so savagely they were bloody and ragged.
“Ohohoho… welcome, Sir Kyle.”
“Have you been well, Count Furkus?”
“Ohohoho… I’m afraid I have not.”
As soon as I sat down, the count opened his mouth.
“Let me speak plainly… I wish to buy back my mother’s land.”
“The land, you say?”
This man really dives straight into the main topic without even offering a cup of tea?
“Yes. The land I sold to you, Sir Kyle… I must have it returned.”
“So suddenly?”
“Yes… ever since I sold the land, my deceased mother has been appearing in my dreams. She keeps telling me I must reclaim it. Ohohoho…”
The count laughed in a gloomy manner, as if he truly had been suffering nightmares. It seemed the explosive success of my tulips had left him so sick with envy that he had lost this much weight. There were always people like this—those so consumed by jealousy over someone else’s jackpot that they burned themselves alive. The count was exactly that kind of person.
“However, Count, that land is…”
“Shall I tell you an old story?”
An old story all of a sudden? I listened quietly.
“I once had a noble friend named Alfred… He used the medicinal herbs researched on my land to create a hugely successful potion guild.”
The count lit a cigarette in the study. He exhaled the smoke with a sigh, as though reminiscing about the past.
“But that friend… refused my request to share even a small portion of the profits. And what do you think happened?”
He looked at me. From the greedy expression on his face, it was clear the story did not have a pleasant ending.
“Unfortunately, his guild caught fire. Unfortunately, the banks he dealt with refused to extend his loans. And unfortunately, my friend ended his unhappy life by suicide.”
“Are you threatening me right now?”
“If it sounded like a threat, I apologize, Sir Kyle… After all, you have the Lorend Guild behind you, so the outcome might be slightly different. Even so, you will not escape considerable damage.”
I understood what the count was implying. He would reclaim the land no matter what. If I refused his proposal, the Lorend Guild would not escape heavy losses either.
“Wouldn’t it be wise to hand over the land at this point and reach an amicable agreement, Sir Kyle?”
Of course, the count’s words had crossed the line. No matter how much lower my title was than his, our transaction had been a legitimate, notarized deal. To come at me with raw power over a perfectly legal agreement… Strangely, I didn’t feel angry at all!
Ah, perfect! I had been looking for the right moment to pull out, and here he was kindly creating the perfect opportunity! I almost wanted to thank him. But the world of commerce was cold and ruthless. I decided to squeeze one last morsel out of the count.
“Very well. I will return the land.”
“Ohoho! Excellent! I knew you would be reasonable, Sir Kyle.”
“However!… I cannot simply hand it over for free.”
At the words “not for free,” the count’s expression froze.
“Yes, of course… What do you desire?”
I spoke the very thing I had been aiming for since the moment I first arrived in the East.
“Let us exchange it for your farm, Count.”
“My farm, you say?”
My ultimate goal. It had been Count Furkus’s farm all along.