Chapter 69
Chapter 69
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 69
Chapter Title: Blonde Tanned Dragon Brat
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80 years. That's a very long time. Or not.
For a single person, 80 years is a span so long it's hard to fill even living a full lifetime to the end, but after experiencing multiple lives, 80 years doesn't feel like such a long time anymore.
So.
Experiencing 20 years four times makes 80 years, and five times makes 100.
Perhaps this is the greatest gap between the princess and me.
The princess reads the thoughts that flash through a person's mind in this 'instant'.
I read the lifetime one person has lived continuously.
No matter how many instants you stack, it's still just instants, but lifetimes, when pieced together, become more solid.
Thus.
To me, a person has value in themselves.
To the princess, only a 'valuable person' has value.
I believe people should respect each other as people.
The princess believes 'better people' should decide the fates of 'lesser people'.
What is more right? I don't know.
But.
The fact that we can understand each other's thoughts.
Means we can find a compromise.
At least, it means we can try to respect each other.
That's why they call this a 'blessing', isn't it.
"Child. The day you were born......"
I thought of the princess's 80 years.
"......your fate was decided."
.
.
.
The princess, Yule, was born wise.
No. Not just her, but all imperial royals who inherit dragon blood are born wise.
And.
Proportionally greedy.
Wisdom doesn't necessarily guarantee prudence, does it?
The ancestors of the imperial family were wise but greedy dragons,
and their blood was so thick that,
even after repeated interbreeding with humans over generations, it never diluted and continued unbroken.
"......Father. Why did we entrust the nation's management to the council? Those people just bicker and fight all the time. Corruption is rampant, they're dim-witted, and they make decisions harmful to the empire for their own interests. The imperial family has veto power, but aside from matters related to the imperial family, I've never seen you exercise it."
And so, the princess, so wise and so greedy,
could not understand the even wiser emperor's decision.
What's the reason to entrust the great empire to foolish, short-lived humans?
No matter if it's the emperor's possession,
if left to humans like this, they'll eventually think the empire is theirs.
No.
Not just humans,
the future imperial family will come to see the empire as belonging to humans too.
Forgetting their own rights,
they'll fall to being mere 'occupants of the seat'.
Strange.
I couldn't understand it.
And.
To this immature question from such a princess,
the emperor smiled gently and stroked her head.
"It's to become lazy, my child."
"Pardon?"
"Our world is too slow, and our lives too long. We spend too many years in the form of childhood, immaturely, and thus realize truly important things too late and make mistakes."
"Truly important things......?"
"For example...... love."
"Love?"
"Yes. Someday, Yule, you'll realize that love is different from possessiveness. So that you won't regret it when you become an adult, we live lazily. The slower we move, the fewer mistakes we make."
"......I don't quite get it."
"It's fine if you don't understand yet. We can't understand everything. Even living a full 500 years, there'll be much we don't know. That's why there are customs. So we can manage this world without mistakes, even if we don't know well."
"......Yes."
"Don't live too diligently. Just...... try to become lazy. This is for your sake."
The princess didn't think much of this exchange at the time. Not because she was foolish, but because she was wise.
She still wasn't prudent,
and so due to her wisdom and greed, she made the mistake of living too diligently.
Thus, it took her 20 years to grasp the meaning of this conversation.
The age humans call young adulthood.
By imperial standards, just past infancy.
The dragon that sought to grasp everything
realized there was nothing left to grasp.
"What is this?"
"Pardon?"
"Didn't I say to bring special food today since it's a special day? Yet why is it the same as what I ate 2 years ago?"
"......Forgive me. But finding new recipes is no longer possible."
The princess had indulged too deeply in gourmet food for 20 years.
She had different dishes for every meal of the day to taste new flavors,
and as a result, she tasted every delicious food in the world.
She felt no novelty from any food anymore, and new dishes without tradition were just crude.
The princess lost her passion for fine dining.
"This is the gem called Dragon's Tear coming up at the auction."
"Not tears, but yawns it brings."
It was the same after that.
Whatever she did, whatever interest she took, no matter how enjoyable the hobby,
most didn't last 10 years.
"Pardon?"
"A joke. Just...... nothing special. The palace must have dozens like this."
She could obtain anything.
Not just objects.
Any skill she learned, she mastered easily; any knowledge, she absorbed easily; even handling people was too easy with her 'blessing'.
Only then did the princess understand the emperor's words about 'to become lazy'.
Dragons as a race
were not inherently lazy by birth.
Dragons as a race
were forced to become lazy by their birth.
Otherwise, the world would be too boring.
"......Better to rummage through Father's treasury."
"Y-Your Highness, that's......"
"A joke. Even I wouldn't do that."
"Haha......"
She obtained everything she wanted.
Yet why was the world so boring and meaningless?
"......You know, you've had a child recently."
"Ah, yes. The baby is babbling so cutely...... Thankfully, it takes after my wife, not me. I finally get what they mean by just looking at your child makes you happy. You know how they say parents feel full just watching their child eat? I thought it was a metaphor, but my stomach really fills up. Haha."
And why were
those poor, lowly people with nothing in their hands
so happy?
I couldn't understand.
As a princess who fully heard their hearts through her blessing,
I understood even less.
Without reason or possessions, where did such happiness come from?
"Looking at that child makes you that happy?"
"Yes. It does."
"......Hmm. How much to sell it for?"
"......Pardon?"
"Yes. If I give you this gem, will you sell the child? Or if I grant you a title and manor, will you give the child to me?"
"Haha. Another joke......"
"Does it sound like a joke? I'm serious."
This ear-piercing,
noisy emotion called happiness,
I want it.
Not just hearing it from the side,
but to feel that emotion directly in my soul.
"......I'll pretend I didn't hear that."
"Not enough?"
"Your Highness."
"......"
"If you want my head, take it. But I cannot give you my child."
"Then give me that."
"......Pardon?"
"Your head."
"What do you......"
"You've committed plenty of corruption inspecting goods supplied to the imperial family. If no bribe, you nitpick and strangle merchants; sometimes buying inferior goods at inflated prices in the imperial name and taking the difference back from merchants."
"Y-Your Highness, that's not......"
"Don't bother with excuses. Did you think I didn't know? I just let it slide as minor."
There is truly something I want.
And she has the power to obtain what she wants.
I want it.
I will have it.
"Well, does what you said earlier still hold?"
"Y-Your Highness......"
"I'll ask again. Your child that makes you so happy, how much to sell it for? The gem, title, and manor I mentioned are still on offer. And I'll add your life too. Is the scale balanced now?"
"So, that's......"
The princess looked at the man before her.
The man's thoughts wavered.
Her mind-reading ability played all sorts of dissonant notes that wouldn't harmonize.
And.
When the tangled thoughts slowly coalesced into one,
and finally revealed their shape.
"I-I'll sell......"
The princess realized.
"No need now."
"Pardon?"
"The emotion you think of when imagining that child is different from before. You no longer feel happy even picturing the child smiling."
That truly 'making one feel happy'
comes from others' possessions.
What others own is what truly has value.
I want it.
That day, a strange desire was born in the princess's heart.