The Emperor Doesn't Know Labor Law - 2
The Emperor issued a dismissal order.
Calling it a "dismissal order" made it sound grand, but all it really meant was that the dukes who had been stuck at the Emperor's side, suffering alongside him, were free to go home. They would have to return to the Imperial Palace once the accession banquet began, of course—but even a short rest was better than none.
I, however, was not included in that dismissal order.
"You already have a substitute at the Academy, don't you? Remain in the Imperial Capital until the banquet is over."
I had been ready to protest that vicious declaration—he was sending everyone else away and keeping me chained—when the words that followed crushed any resistance I had left.
"While you're at it, why not check whether the founding of the Inspectorate Ministry is progressing smoothly? You had no choice while you were at the Academy, but since you happen to be in the capital..."
"...Yes, Your Majesty. I shall do so."
It was infuriating, and yet the pretext was perfect. As long as I wore the label of founding committee chairman and minister-designate of the Inspectorate Ministry, defying that order would be no different from flatly rejecting the Retired Emperor's final personnel directive.
So I headed for the Ministry of Finance building in silence. A minister-designate who ignored orders the moment a new Emperor took the throne would have hell to pay later.
Damn it.
It left a bitter taste. Everyone I met called me the Minister of the Inspectorate Ministry, and for a moment even I got confused—but the organization itself did not yet exist. Officially, we were still split into the Audit Department under the Ministry of Finance, the Information Department under the Ministry of Special Affairs, and so on. We were merely in the preparatory stage of integrating those offices.
As the Emperor had said, I had been at the Academy, so the deputy chief and the head of Information had been handling the founding preparations. I never imagined this year's abdication ceremony would explode and drag me up to the capital.
Might as well get everything done while I'm here.
I set foot in the Audit Department, still housed within the Ministry of Finance building, and let out a sigh. Since things had come to this, I would clear every matter that needed my approval before I left.
The organizational structure of the Inspectorate Ministry, for instance. Who to appoint as department heads and other senior officers—just thinking about it casually, there was quite a lot.
First things first: the Second Section Chief becomes deputy chief at minimum.
Whatever department he ends up in, he gets the deputy chief seat. Higher would be even better.
That was a promise I had staked my resignation letter on.
When a person's suffering reaches its peak, people say they feel like they're going to die. Crushing workload, endless overtime, a bed so distant it has faded from memory—there are many reasons death might flicker before one's eyes.
But that was a misconception. When a person is truly in agony, a different phrase comes out.
Save me...
Words pleading for survival. The gut-deep sense that you might actually die forces out a desperate death rattle.
My hand, clenched around a pen, trembled violently as it fluttered over the documents. The letters written on the pages danced as extravagantly as young ladies at their debutante ball.
I was finished. Both my hand and my eyes were slowly losing their minds.
Siri?
I glanced over at Siri without thinking, but she was no better off. No—it wasn't just Siri. A fair number of my peers and seniors were showing the same symptoms.
I closed my eyes against that wretched sight. I, Demian Corner, had prided myself on living happy days ever since entering the Audit Department through Chief Crassius's grace—but lately the word "happy" had started to waver.
It was paradise, I was sure of it.
Since becoming a new official in the Audit Department at the start of the year, I had been living a hard but rewarding life. Belonging to the most powerful of all powerful departments meant the workload was naturally high, but it was something I could handle and had braced myself for.
Moreover, contrary to its stiff and gloomy public image, the atmosphere inside the Audit Department was decent enough. The senior officials would even soothe the newly arrived rookies and teach them with genuine care.
But the sudden founding of the Inspectorate Ministry had been more than enough to turn the Audit Department upside down.
It's hell.
A single brief order had transformed paradise into hell in an instant.
Existing Audit Department work, assessing the status of every department and unit to be absorbed into the new Inspectorate Ministry, the process of harmoniously integrating multiple offices—work of insane difficulty and volume had all piled onto the Audit Department. Neither the seasoned seniors nor the passionate newcomers could handle it.
How else could you explain that not only the deputy chief's office, which handled administration, but every warm body in every section who could so much as look at a document had been pressed into service?
Good heavens.
I cracked my eyes open and looked toward the deputy chief—and felt pure wonder. Even with most of the people in the deputy chief's office dying on their feet, the deputy chief himself was processing documents at high speed without the slightest tremor.
He even casually took documents from other officials. I felt wonder and mercy at the same time.
"The Audit Department doesn't run without the deputy chief. You can tell just by looking—even with the Chief away on long-term assignment, there's not a peep of trouble."
A senior's words from a few months ago floated up unbidden.
"On top of that, the deputy chief has plenty of field experience, so the other sections are cooperative with his office. There's a reason they call the deputy chief's office Section Zero."
At the time, pride at belonging to the deputy chief's office had made me think those words were a little exaggerated. Looking back now, they hadn't been exaggeration—they had been humility.
It was true. The Audit Department really would have collapsed without the deputy chief. With a titan like the Chief holding the line, the shell of the Audit Department could stay intact—but the inside would have been screaming.
...
What happens when the deputy chief leaves?
Genuine fear gripped me. The current Audit Department would remain under the newly formed Inspectorate Ministry, but the deputy chief himself was reportedly going to follow the Chief and become the minister's secretary. Then the deputy chief's office—an Audit Department that had lost both its chief and its deputy—what would become of it?
Would we have to grind ourselves down handling work like this without the deputy chief—
"Have there always been this many people in the deputy chief's office?"
Suddenly the door to the deputy chief's office opened, and a familiar voice rang out. Every official in the room turned toward the door as one.
Even the deputy chief, who had been looking only at his documents, reacted to that voice and shot to his feet.
"Chief?"
"Sorry for dropping in without warning."
The Chief had arrived.
The dying officials immediately straightened their spines the moment he appeared and began reading their documents with deadly serious expressions.
Of course, everyone knew it was pure performance. They were already at their physical and mental limits—this was nothing more than the instinctive refusal to look limp in front of the highest authority present.
"Looks like I'll be able to come into the office for a while. His Majesty ordered me to remain in the Imperial Capital until the banquet is over."
In the midst of that tear-jerking scene, the Chief was calmly conversing with the deputy chief.
Come into the office?
Unfortunately, the content of that conversation was anything but calm.
The Chief reporting to the Audit Department was only natural. But from the moment the founding of the Inspectorate Ministry had been decided until now, the deputy chief had been leading the founding work. If the Chief stepped in now and took the lead according to his own preferences, everything we had done so far could turn to foam—or chaos could erupt.
And in terms of authority, as founding committee chairman of the Inspectorate Ministry, the Chief's opinion rightly took absolute priority.
...What do we do?
My hand began to tremble again. If everything we had done so far turned out to be garbage, I might actually go insa—
"Any bottlenecks?"
"Fortunately, nothing so far, sir."
"Then keep going as you are. Better you handle it than me sticking my hands in."
—ne...?
What?
Watching the Chief clap the deputy chief on the shoulder, my mind went blank for a moment.
Could you really just breeze past the founding of a ministry-level administrative body with "You're better at this than I am"? Even I, still new to bureaucratic life, could guess how much authority would come with intervening in this project. Hardship would come in proportion, of course—but plenty of people would still chase that authority.
How to balance the stakes of each department being merged, for example. Whom to fill the suddenly expanded roster with. Just the things that sprang to mind offhand were already that substantial.
And he's giving that up?
It was hard to understand. From the position of people grinding body and soul into the work, it was something to be truly grateful for—but from the Chief's position, it was authority he could claim just by working us a little harder, wasn't it?
"Ah—anything that needs my approval?"
"Only the matters that absolutely require the Chief's decision remain. The composition of subordinate departments and senior officers falls under the chairman's authority, so I cannot determine those myself."
"Perfect."
Even amid the confusion, the Chief continued the conversation with perfect calm. Then he picked up a scrap of scrap paper from the deputy chief's desk and began writing something.
"Make only three departments. The current Audit Department becomes the Enforcement Department. The Information Department stays as is. The units under the Ministry of Special Affairs get consolidated into a Special Operations Department."
"Yes, sir. Understood."
"Move every information-related section that was under the Audit Department over to Information. That way the next department head will have an easier time working."
The deputy chief nodded at the order to turn the current Audit Department thoroughly into an action unit.
It was true—if the Audit Department, no, the Enforcement Department became a force focused solely on combat power, the administrative burden would drop sharply. Of the current Audit Department's work, Section One handling interrogations and Section Two handling intelligence held no small share.
"Everyone in the deputy chief's office transfers to the minister's office. That all right?"
"It would be an honor."
I almost cheered at those last words.
He didn't touch his subordinates' work. He trusted them absolutely. And he assigned them exactly where they wanted to go.
A true superior...!
I felt like I might cry. The Chief was truly a merciful and gracious boss.
I jotted the rough organizational draft on the scrap paper and handed it to the deputy chief. The Ministry of Finance itself, minus the Audit Department, consisted of four departments—so three departments in a newborn ministry would look more than sufficient to outside eyes.
I can make the Second Section Chief the deputy of Information.
Satisfying. With an Information Department in place, it was the perfect slot to jam the Second Section Chief into.
There was already an incumbent deputy of Information, of course, but I had heard he would not be joining the Inspectorate Ministry—he was staying with the new Intelligence Department the Ministry of Special Affairs was creating. A bit of a shame, but the trade-off was that I could promote the Second Section Chief, so I could live with it.
Just imagining the Second Section Chief's face lighting up at the surprise promotion made me feel warm inside. How many bosses like me were there in the world?
Have to promote the others too.
Roughly: Third Section Chief becomes head of Enforcement, Fifth Section Chief becomes deputy of Enforcement, and Penelia becomes head of Special Operations.
Perfect.
At this rate, it was as if the heavens themselves had prepared the seats just so I could promote the kids.
Erzebet was the one sticky point—there wasn't an obvious seat to bump her into—but fortunately it wasn't urgent, so I could set it aside for now. A decent post would turn up eventually.
Hm?
Only after satisfaction had thoroughly filled my chest did the pitiful state of the deputy chief's office finally register.
When I first walked in I had assumed they were just working normally, but looking again, it was a zombie den and nothing else. The atmosphere had been the same when I first became Audit Department Chief. Work pouring in like mad while manpower stayed capped—those days.
"You've all been working hard."
"Not at all, sir! We're only doing what we're supposed to do!"
The moment I tossed out the casual remark, the official sitting closest to the deputy chief barked the reply like a spinal reflex.
Seeing that made me feel even more pity. A wretched life that has to smile on the outside even while dying on the inside. No different from me.
"Hand out a few large silver coins each. I'll cover it out of my own pocket—don't worry about the budget."
I murmured it to the deputy chief, and the zombies' complexions brightened a little.
Sorry. I know perfectly well that what you desperately need isn't money—it's rest.
I can't give you that either...
I'm being worked over by the Emperor myself, so I can't go handing out vacations to other people. If I could, I'd have taken one first.
So I'm sorry. Take the money and keep working hard.