Grand Opening of the Hot Springs, Part 2
The night before the official opening, with only two days left to go, I stood in the first-floor lobby of Seolhwa Great Hot Springs and kept the staff in line with my hands clasped behind my back.
"What did I tell you to do when guests come in?"
"Greet them with a bright smile and hand over the locker key and bathing clothes quickly!!"
"What’s the water temperature in the hot baths?"
"We keep it at a steady 40 degrees Celsius and skim off any floating debris with a net every hour!!"
"Good. Then one last question for the head of the sesinsa team. What do you do when a guest lies down on the scrubbing bed?"
"With our souls poured into it, we strip away years of dead skin until the guest’s skin turns bright red, pulling it out like noodle strands!!"
"Perfect."
I nodded in satisfaction.
Every single one of these employees had been hired personally by me, after interviews with the residents we’d cleared out of Slums Districts 3 and 4.
From the maintenance crew led by the construction foreman, to the counter staff, the snack bar, and even the sesinsa, the very flower of any bathhouse.
To be honest, I had been a little worried. Since they’d all come from the slums, I’d wondered whether some of them might turn out to be as unruly as a gang of thieves.
But maybe it was because Giselle had already kept territorial management so brutally tight, or maybe it was because I’d given cold and hungry people warm jobs and food, but their discipline was razor-sharp.
They all called me their benefactor, absorbing every instruction like sponges and working with genuine enthusiasm.
"All right. Tomorrow’s the final inspection, so get some good rest and come in early!"
"Yes, Manager!!"
For some reason, being called Manager instead of prince made me weirdly pumped.
And then, the next day.
For the soft opening, that is, the final inspection, I invited a very special group of guests.
"Waaahhh!! It’s water!!"
"Hey, catch this!!"
The orphanage children, along with the little brats from around the territory.
I’d used the excuse of repairing the orphanage’s outer wall to keep the children here for the day while the work was being done.
"Oh my, Your Highness. Not only did you take care of the orphanage wall repairs, you’ve also let our children stay in such a splendid facility for free… I don’t even know how to thank you."
The orphanage director clasped both my hands and kept bowing again and again.
As usual, I waved a hand.
"Ah, it’s nothing. A run-down orphanage next to a flashy hot spring would ruin the whole vibe. Forget it and just play with the kids."
As the old director wiped away tears of emotion and retreated, Chloe, who was sucking on a banana milk beside me, spoke up.
"Your Highness. Why did you bring those kids here? It’s not really because of the orphanage repairs, is it?"
"It is, though?"
"What are you saying? Hurry up and tell me!"
"Heh. Kiddo, don’t you know?"
"Huh?"
"Rumors are always spread fastest by the kids in the neighborhood."
I grinned and added, "If they come here, soak themselves in the hot water, crack open some roasted eggs, and have fun all day, then tomorrow they’ll run straight out and tell their moms, dads, and everyone else, 'That place is seriously amazing!' That’s the best kind of marketing."
At my words, Chloe snorted in disbelief.
"Yeah, yeah. Sure. Our prince really is a ruthless businessman."
"No, I’m serious. It really is for marketing."
"Who said it wasn’t?"
It was the truth.
Just as I was grumbling to myself, a group of children in matching bathing clothes came rushing over to Chloe.
"Chloe! Come on, hurry! We’re betting on who can last longer in the Bulgama Room!"
"Yeah! I’m not losing this time!"
The kids tugged on Chloe’s arms.
"Huh? Hey, I really hate heat…"
Chloe hesitated, glancing at me for approval.
I gave her a light shove between the shoulder blades.
"Go have fun. Don’t stick to my side like some old man. And make sure you get a proper scrubbing later."
"...Well, I guess I can’t help it."
Chloe laughed and ran off into the steamy bathhouse with the other kids.
I watched them from outside the hot room, where they pinched their noses and tried to hold their breath while giggling like mad, and took a leisurely sip of banana milk.
That had all happened yesterday.
And now, back to the present.
The first day of the official opening.
"Each person gets two towels! Don’t run—please enter one at a time!"
The lobby of Seolhwa Great Hot Springs was packed wall to wall with people.
My prediction had been dead on.
The North was vast, but because of the bitter cold and the magical beasts, the places where people actually lived were clustered tightly around the castle walls.
That made the bathhouse extremely accessible, and with the kids’ wildfire gossip from yesterday added on top of that, a line had stretched all the way outside the building on opening day.
The admission fee was only the price of a single loaf of bread.
The reaction from the northern territory’s residents was explosive.
"Good heavens, we can use water this hot as much as we want for this price?"
"Oh, my aching bones… This warm room here, isn’t it seriously addictive? It feels like all the cold I’ve carried my whole life is melting right out of me."
"Darling! They’re selling something called banana milk at the snack bar, and the children won’t stop begging for one. Let’s try a bottle too!"
Coins were pouring into the cash box at the counter like a waterfall.
I leaned on the railing and looked down at the territory residents rolling around on the bathhouse floor, blissfully happy.
"Not bad. This is how people ought to live."
Just as I was smiling in satisfaction, one of the counter staff in uniform came hurrying up the stairs.
"Manager!! We’ve got trouble!"
"What, did we run out of towels?"
"It ain’t that—four noblemen in top-of-the-line suits suddenly showed up at the entrance, and everyone got so flustered they don’t know what to do!"
"Ah."
I pressed a hand to my forehead.
No wonder the air by the entrance had felt so tense.
"Got it. I’ll go."
I quickened my steps and headed back down to the first-floor lobby.
Sure enough, Baron Killian and three other nobles in the finest tailored suits stood there in utter shock among the territory residents wearing rough yellow-brown bathing clothes.
"W-what in the world is this…?"
"Where are the bunny-girl dancers, and why are commoners wearing strange towels and lying around?!?"
"Hey!"
I strode over and barked at them, and all four jumped and turned to look at me.
"Y-Your Highness!! W-what is the meaning of this! We were clearly told you were building a VIP casino resort, so why is this place full of peasants…!"
"Then why are you idiots the ones who came in here and started screaming?"
I cut him off, frowning hard.
"Huh?"
"Just follow me!"
Dragging the confused fools along behind me, I led them up to the third floor.
The third-floor V.I.P. level.
The moment I opened the door, an ultra-luxurious private space appeared, plastered in high-end marble and gold ornaments, utterly on another level from the floors below.
It was a scale you’d be lucky to find in even the villa of a high noble.
"Oooh…!"
Once again, the four of them went wide-eyed.
"All right, strip down. Since my investors are here, I’m treating you all to the full VIP course."
I half-forced the lot of them into the finest private bath.
The natural sulfur hot spring water, hot enough to make steam, shimmered in the wide marble tub.
Beside the bath, premium champagne and fruit had been laid out.
"Oooohhh… it’s hot… no, wait, it’s refreshing!"
Baron Killian sank into the tub and let out a very middle-aged groan.
"This natural hot spring is seriously incredible, isn’t it?! I feel like every last bone of fatigue is being washed out of me!"
"Exactly! The water’s so smooth, I never imagined I’d live to experience this kind of luxury…"
Baron Rowen, who had been enjoying the spring water to the fullest, suddenly came to his senses and shook his head.
"N-no, wait! Your Highness! What about the casino resort? At this rate, how are we supposed to recover the principal we invested…!"
"Hey, you done? If bath’s over, next!"
Before he could finish, I clapped my hands and swung the door open again.
"Come on, out you go! The course is nowhere near over!"
"W-what? W-wait a moment…!"
I shoved them into the dry sauna next, then had them lie face-down on massage beds.
"Aaaagh! That hurts! Your Highness, it hurts!!"
The sesinsa I’d personally trained buckled green towels over their hands and began scrubbing the nobles’ backs with ruthless vigor.
They had spent their whole lives only ever being gently washed by other people, so the agony of having their skin abraded by rough scrubbing cloths made them scream.
"S-save us! It feels like my whole back is being peeled off!!"
"Stay still! It always hurts at first!"
After about a minute of that:
"Oh…? This scrubbing thing… at first I thought it was just tearing my skin apart."
Baron Killian murmured with his eyes closed.
"But the more I get it done, the more refreshing and clean it feels? My body feels like it’s floating."
"Indeed. I had no idea so much dead skin had been on my back… Ahem, this is an excellent technique."
While they grinned stupidly and surrendered themselves to the sesinsa’s hands, Baron Killian suddenly came to his senses again and shot upright.
"No! Forget refreshing—it’s refreshing! Your Highness, what happened to the casino…!"
"Ah, done with the scrubbing? Then get dressed and come out! Time for snacks!"
Again I cleanly cut him off mid-sentence and herded them into the lounge, where banana milk and roasted eggs had been laid out.
Two hours later.
The four nobles stepped out through the front gate of Seolhwa Great Hot Springs.
Their faces were glossy and smooth like peeled eggs, polished by the hot spring and scrubbing, and each of them carried a bottle of banana milk in both hands.
Their bodies felt so light they could’ve floated away, and their bellies were satisfyingly full of roasted eggs.
But their expressions were terribly sour.
"...Don’t you think something has gone seriously wrong here?"
Baron Rowen said, lowering the banana milk bottle he’d been sucking on.
"Indeed. We clearly invested because we expected a gigantic V.I.P. casino resort."
In the end, all they had experienced was soaking in a bathhouse full of commoners, getting scrubbed down, and coming back out.
"Was this some kind of complete scam by Your Highness?"
"You mean our blood money went into nothing more than heating bathwater for those damn peasants?!"
The nobles complained bitterly only after the fact, simmering with outrage.
Baron Killian looked at the waiting line stretching out in front of the building and let out a long sigh.
"Haaah… no matter how I look at it, this can’t be right. Didn’t they say the admission fee was only the price of one loaf of bread? No matter how many of those commoners cram in there, it’ll take a hundred years to recover what we put in."
"Then shouldn’t we go demand answers from Your Highness right now?"
"Are you insane? He’s the one holding our leash. And he’s the Empire’s Eighth Prince, isn’t he? If we make a scene, our heads might be hanging from the Grand Ducal Castle gate by tomorrow morning."
At those chilling words, all four of them fell silent at once.
That was the thing. Even if they’d been cheated, or whatever else, they didn’t have the courage to openly defy that mad prince.
"...Still, he is the Eighth Prince. Maybe he has some deeper plan after all," Baron Rowen muttered, desperately denying reality.
"For now, let’s trust him a little longer and wait. Who knows? Maybe a real gambling den for nobles will open underground later…."
"Haa, let’s pray that’s true. My thoroughbred horse… my southern villa… sob."
Unlike their refreshed bodies, their hearts had become heavier than lead.
In the end, the four nobles climbed into their carriage, looking back again and again with miserable faces, muttering, "This really doesn’t seem right…"
And as I looked down at that scene from the second-floor window, I wore an apologetic expression.
"Sorry, but I can’t help it, guys."
With this, the territory residents would always have a place to warm their frozen bodies, and their overall cleanliness would improve dramatically, drastically reducing both disease and deaths from the cold.
But I knew very well that the hot springs’ real profitability wasn’t going to be as amazing as those idiots expected.
Even with high turnover, the admission fee was so cheap that it wouldn’t leave much profit.
As for the glittering VIP facilities I’d built on the third and fourth floors, those were really just for show, to keep the imperial family off my back.
Of course, those sections would make money in their own way.
But I didn’t expect the high-end baths to turn over quickly at all.
Outside of the North, all the nobles of the Empire were already tiptoeing around the imperial court and reluctant to tie themselves to the North. No matter how good the water was or how clean the air felt, there would be almost no nobles crazy enough to travel all the way up here just to take a bath.
"Still, if it makes a profit, I’ll send it over on time, so don’t worry. I’m not some evil boss."
And a hundred years?
"Nah, not that long. I’ll probably recover the principal in, what, eighty years?"
As I smugly entertained that shameless thought and chuckled to myself,
tug tug.
"Your Highness."
Chloe, her cheeks bulging with roasted egg as she chewed, pulled on my collar.
"Viola came by."
"She did?"
I took Chloe with me and went back down toward the first-floor lobby.
There, in simple everyday clothes and holding a towel, stood Viola.
"You came? Want me to take you up to the V.I.P. floor?"
At my question, Viola waved a hand.
"It’s fine, Your Highness. I’m just here as a regular neighborhood customer today, so I’ll use the public baths on the first floor. I wanted to soak in some hot water and really loosen up."
She said that, then smiled brightly at Chloe, who was glued to my side.
"Chloe, want to come wash with your sister? I’ll buy you a banana milk once we’re in."
"Really?"
Chloe shot me a glance.
At first this girl had gripped my arm hard and called Viola a dangerous old lady just from seeing her face, but after Viola gradually won her over with food, these days she followed her around just as happily, calling her “sister” this and “sister” that.
"Go ahead. It’s not like you’ve got anything else to do."
"Okay!"
Chloe trotted over and stood beside Viola.
"Then, Your Highness, we’ll go wash up and be back~"
"Sure."
Just as Viola was about to take Chloe’s hand and head for the women’s bath entrance,
"Oh, right."
As if something had just occurred to her, Viola stopped and turned back.
Her face wore its usual playful smile.
But the words that came out of her mouth were anything but light.
"I heard First Prince is coming this way to the North?"
"...What?"
What?
Viola grinned, clearly enjoying my stunned reaction, then left me standing there dumbly and disappeared into the women’s bath with Chloe, humming softly as they went.