A Fiery Start to the Year - 1
Just before heading back to the Imperial Capital to return to ordinary life, I looked at Erich, who had come out to see me off. I had received more gifts this birthday than ever before, yet the only one that lingered in my memory was the Laku-Laku from Erich—a rather melancholy birthday, all told.
And so I made a vow. I would take charge of Erich’s future myself and set him firmly on the path of a civil servant. Have some other dream? Abandon it starting today. You’re a civil servant, pure and simple. Administration, legislation, judiciary—even the military or the knightly orders if it came to that. As long as you were a member of House Crassius, of course you had to serve the Imperial Family and the Empire.
But the administrative and legislative sides already had members of House Crassius holding the fort. Having family members lined up side by side in key administrative and legislative posts would look a little too pointed.
The military would be about right.
So the military was the best option. I could even put in a good word with the Duke of Victory, and Erich had a strong martial streak anyway.
I would definitely send Erich into the military and give him a Laku-Laku as an enlistment gift. Or wait—if it was the military, a one-man tent might suit him better than a Laku-Laku. A tent that unfolded automatically at the push of a single button. Wasn’t that every soldier’s ideal?
“Hyung?”
I patted Erich’s shoulder with the thought that I might as well give him both if it came to it, and he looked up at me with a face that clearly had no idea what I was talking about.
“Thanks for the gift.”
I answered him with a deep smile. I really was grateful. A gift I would never forget for the rest of my life. No matter what happened, I would never forget this gift.
And our mother, moved by the brotherly affection on display, left the slightly haggard-looking family head behind and came over to us.
“I take it you liked what Erich gave you.”
“Yes. I received something truly useful.”
I hated to admit it, but it really was a useful item. Perfect for installing in the clubroom that was basically my private hideout.
That was why it was an unforgettable gift. Every time I looked at that Laku-Laku, every time I lay my body down on it, I would be reminded of Erich’s goodwill. Was this roughly what they meant by enduring hardships to prepare for revenge?
...Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.
In the middle of it all I felt intense stares boring into me. Mentioning only Erich’s gift among the many I had received must have done it—six pairs of eyes filled with quiet jealousy and disappointment were fixed on my back.
I would clear up the misunderstanding once we got back to the manor. What I had just done wasn’t a thank-you; it was the brand of a man planning to hijack his little brother’s future. The jealousy would vanish soon enough after that.
Sure enough, the moment we arrived at the manor and I explained about Erich’s gift, the 1st Division Chief burst out laughing right there on the spot, snickering and snorting.
Fuck.
Honest laughter was fine, but couldn’t she at least pretend to hold it in like everyone else? It kind of hurt.
I had only requested leave for the day of my birthday itself, so today I had to show up for work right on the dot. It felt a bit like heading into a Monday after a blazing weekend, but what could I do? I needed to retire soon so I could live a life of Saturday-Saturday-Saturday-Saturday-Saturday-Saturday-Sunday instead of Monday-Monday-Monday-Monday-Monday-Saturday-Sunday.
“Director.”
“Yeah. Anything happen while I was gone?”
“Nothing except that His Excellency the Minister was looking for you.”
The moment I returned to the Audit Department with the 1st Division Chief, the Deputy Director delivered that chilling piece of news, but this time I could take it in stride. Getting summoned by the Minister at this time of year was only natural.
My birthday fell roughly at the end of January. Meaning that after the New Year’s Audience finished, a few weeks of work would bring my birthday around, and once the birthday was over we would be right on the doorstep of February. It sounded like I was making a grand statement out of the obvious, but that subtle interval of time was important.
“Everyone’s rushing around, I see.”
“If you’re late, the budget flies away. Of course they’re in a hurry.”
It was such a perfectly correct observation that I nodded. If you moved too leisurely and got outpaced by other departments, you would be left kicking an empty can.
February was only a few days away now. And that February was the period when every civil servant in the Empire collectively turned into a berserker.
With money on the line, of course they all go crazy.
At year’s end the Ministry of Finance drafted the budget and unilaterally sent it out to every department. Once that regular budget was issued, it almost never changed except for truly extraordinary reasons. Plenty of departments still bothered the Minister trying to create those extraordinary reasons, but generally speaking that was how it worked.
And for the departments that had received their budgets unilaterally, there was only one chance left to strike it rich. The season of dreams and opportunity when you could snatch additional funding beyond the regular budget—the supplemental budget allocation period.
It wasn’t anything grandiose. Departments that simply said “We can’t live on this!” showed up at the Ministry of Finance with their supporting materials, and the Minister either accepted or rejected them. That was all.
It’s fucking grandiose.
It wasn’t just grandiose. It was a period so fucking grandiose that an entire department’s livelihood for the year hung on it.
Civil servants who finished the New Year’s Audience immediately returned to their departments, checked the regular budget lists, scraped together every scrap of justification they could find for getting more money, and burned through January. The point when they finished writing those soul-scorching “please give us more money” reports was roughly the end of January.
But civil servants whose eyes had gone bloodshot for cash were never going to wait quietly until February. Starting at the end of January they visited the Ministry of Finance in advance and bowed their heads to the Minister. That was roughly right after my birthday ended.
If only I’d been born a week later.
Yes—my birthday was basically a rest period to prepare for this season. Enjoy your leave because it’s your birthday, then get back to work already: a delicately timed interval that felt almost ordained by heaven itself.
Of course, if I had been born a week later there was a high chance even the leave itself would have been rejected.
If he’s calling even me in for help, you can imagine how bad it is.
In a period when essentially every department in the Empire came calling, he desperately needed an extra pair of hands. From the Minister’s perspective, the Director of the Audit Department must have looked like extremely attractive labor.
Thinking about it again made me angry. A man who was supposed to be in the military was stuck in the Ministry of Finance, suffering every kind of hardship imaginable.
That bastard.
As always, half the suffering in my life was the Crown Prince’s fault.
This was annoying. I wanted to throw the supplemental budget and everything else out the window. If they needed money, I just wanted to shove a few platinum coins into their hands and send them packing.
But I had to endure. Handle budget matters carelessly and the repercussions would come back multiplied dozens or hundreds of times. I couldn’t throw away the future just to make the present comfortable.
“Your Excellency, we humbly ask for your favorable consideration.”
“I will review it as positively as possible.”
And so I mechanically repeated the same words and sent the bureaucrat from the Ministry of Justice on his way.
Damn it.
The moment I confirmed the man had left, I pressed my fingers to my brow. I never expected even the Ministry of Justice to show up. That was a department that was usually more than satisfied with its regular budget.
“We plan to process the death-row inmates on a large scale and renovate the prisons.”
Who could have predicted they would come with a reason like that? Mass execution of death-row inmates and prison renovations—how was an outsider like me supposed to know about that?
Processing the death-row inmates.
My head throbbed. Unlike the traitors who had been executed immediately upon receiving their death sentences, these were the death-row inmates left rotting in the corners of the prisons. Declaring that they would process all of them at once was no ordinary statement.
Ordinarily, to avoid the charge that a reign had been stained with blood, executions were delayed as long as possible or staggered out. Yet His Majesty intended to proceed with the executions while accepting that unpleasant reputation. The reason was obvious.
This is preparation for the abdication too, isn’t it.
For the sake of the Crown Prince’s path ahead, once he received the throne. So that His Highness would not begin his reign already stained with the infamy of having killed people from day one.
The abdication I had been hoping would at least wait until I was no longer in office was growing more and more visible. Just my luck. I was far too old to want to spend three days slamming my head into the floor.
— Knock knock
At the sound of knocking that reached me in the middle of all this, I frowned. After the Ministry of Justice it was definitely supposed to be the military, and that guy himself was going to—
“Your Excellency, it’s me. I heard you were looking for me.”
Ah.
“Come in.”
I opened my mouth, feeling a complicated mix of relief and irritation. The brat was confusing people on purpose.
Still, after taking a surprise attack from the Ministry of Justice, it was a relief I didn’t have to deal with that guy right afterward. Better this one than that one.
“You look like you’ve been through a lot. Seems like you’ve aged a good ten years already.”
Or maybe they were both about the same.
I waved a hand at the guy who started spouting nonsense the moment he walked in. Shut up and sit down already.
“How many have come through?”
“Ministry of Relief, Ministry of Maritime Affairs, Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Justice.”
“Oh.”
What do you mean, “oh.” This bastard was reacting like it was someone else’s problem.
“Next is the military’s Deputy—”
Before I could even finish the sentence, the door burst open.
Thick-skinned bastard.
The audacity to fling open the door of a minister—and not just any minister, but the Minister of Finance, second in the ministerial hierarchy—without permission. I had a pretty good idea whose work this was, so I let out a sigh.
There existed in this world a refined and courteous culture called knocking, yet that half-barbarian still hadn’t learned it. I was almost embarrassed to call him an acquaintance out in public.
“I’m here. I’m not late, am I?”
Actually, rather than being late, I had been hoping she simply wouldn’t come at all.
The door opened without the slightest warning. What? I hadn’t even heard a knock.
It was such an unexpected situation that for a second I even wondered if the Crown Prince had arrived. Even the Minister of Palace Affairs, who outranked the Finance Minister, wouldn’t barge in like this. Just who would pull something this bold?
Ah.
And the moment I saw the face, I understood. Yeah, if it was that person, it made sense.
“I’m here. I’m not late, am I?”
“You’re right on time.”
At the Minister’s curt reply the woman snickered, then spotted me and waved vigorously.
“Oh, the little guy’s here too. How’ve you been?”
“Fine, more or less.”
At that answer the woman—the Commander of the Central Front Army—sat down beside me, casually threw an arm around my shoulders, and laughed.
“Man, first time in a year. You’ve grown a lot in the meantime. Must be a growth spurt, huh?”
“What’s a growth spurt for a guy who’s already past twenty.”
Despite the Minister’s perfectly reasonable point, the Central Front Army Commander just kept laughing. The way she thumped my shoulder made it clear she really was treating me like a kid, but unfortunately, from her perspective I really was a kid. She was on the same level as the Minister, so of course a subordinate like me looked like a greenhorn.
Compared to her I fell short in age, career, everything. Even the achievement of having killed Kagan didn’t mean much.
The reason the team leaders of Audit Department Division 4 had even been able to attempt the subjugation of Kagan was that Kagan had already been seriously wounded in a battle where this woman had fought alongside the Minister.
“Come to think of it, I heard you’re getting married soon. Congratulations! How many kids are you planning on having?”
“I was thinking I’d take it slow…”
“Really? Well, three kids per wife should be plenty!”
I quietly closed my eyes at the birth of FC Crassius. The Minister was an eccentric, but this woman was every bit as eccentric herself.
Actually, anyone capable of seriously wounding Kagan probably wasn’t normal to begin with—but they were all so uniformly insane in their own ways that I felt like I was going to go insane myself.