Our Expo Is Open for Business as Usual - 5

We managed to close out the final day of booth operations with a complete sell-out. For a club founded only this year, it was nothing short of a dazzling, legendary achievement. Every time my eyes met Luise’s, she beamed so brightly that she must have been genuinely overjoyed. If I’d known she would be this happy, maybe I should have bought something every single day.

“Thank you for granting my personal request.”

“Considering how hard you work, Inspector, something like this is the least I can do.”

“Even so, you must take the money. When a civil servant fails to settle financial dealings with a civilian properly, it creates complications.”

“Haha. Is that so?”

I met the Vice Principal in front of the inspectors’ quarters to pick up the cookies and, after considerable insistence, finally forced the payment into the hands of the man who kept refusing. After all, I had imposed on him with a private request, and I had also made him spend money against his will.

He seemed to take it as a joke, but if a public official truly muddles money matters with civilians, I am the one who ends up in trouble. Getting hauled in and locked up by the Ministry of Justice is hardly pleasant. Those people are the sort I would rather not meet either.

“You seem to care a great deal for the club members, Inspector.”

“I’m glad it looks that way.”

I answered the smiling Vice Principal with a smile of my own. At least in his eyes I appeared to be a decent faculty advisor. After all the trouble I had gone through, it was satisfying to see that a proper image had finally taken hold.

I watched his retreating figure until it vanished from sight, then checked the size of the cookie pouch in my hand.

The quantity is definitely modest.

Thankfully it was nowhere near the mass-production levels I had endured in the club room. On the last day Luise had assumed most of it would go to waste and baked only a little, which was a relief. The amount was just right for a solitary meal.

Besides, tomorrow held no schedule beyond the ranking announcement in the auditorium and the evening banquet. The announcement was set for noon, so I could eat at a leisurely pace. No need to rush out first thing in the morning.

First place was obviously going to the Baking Club anyway, so there was no real need to attend in person—yet as their advisor I still had to show my face. A nuisance, but what could I do? Once you are handed a name card, you have to act the part that matches it.

I had never set foot inside the Academy auditorium before. At most I had glimpsed its exterior while wandering the grounds. With no reason to enter, I had never seen the interior, but from the outside it was already an imposing structure.

It’s huge.

The interior proved equally grand. A vast first floor, with a second floor overlooking it—once the seats filled, you could easily mistake the place for a concert hall.

“The first floor will be crowded. Would you prefer the second floor?”

“I appreciate the consideration.”

While I surveyed the still-quiet auditorium, the Vice Principal beside me casually suggested the upper level. I agreed that sounded better. Every student and staff member would pack the first floor; squeezing in among them would be awkward for everyone. Watching from above was far more comfortable.

Once I actually climbed up, the stage did not feel all that distant. I would be able to see Luise receive her award clearly enough.

If I clap from here, it should still reach the stage.

Satisfaction made me nod to myself. Having secured a good spot, I waited quietly while students began filtering onto the first floor one by one. There was still time before noon, yet they were already so diligent. Not that I, the earliest arrival, had any right to comment.

The first floor filled with people in no time; the second held only a handful of faculty and the Student Council. Even with so few of us, the distance made things awkward—imagine how much worse it would have been downstairs. Instead of the current bustle we would have had only an uncomfortable silence.

Not here.

Seeing Student Council members scattered around the second floor, I naturally looked for Margeta, but she was nowhere in sight. The president was missing as well, so the two of them were probably handling the awards.

Presenting side by side with a ducal lady… I worried a little for the president’s mental health. Still, Student Council life must have built up some resistance by now. As a future civil servant, he would endure that much, I trusted.

Noon arrived and the ranking announcement began. Contrary to my expectations, Margeta and the president were not presenting together; the president and the principal took the roles of host and presenter respectively. Where was Margeta? Did she have some sudden errand?

Then those people shouldn’t be up here either.

Aside from the president on stage and the absent Margeta, the entire Student Council was on the second floor. If Margeta had work that required her to stay behind alone, someone among them would have volunteered instead. Of course it was internal Student Council business and none of my concern as an outsider. I had something else to worry about.

Approaching footsteps drew my gaze. A brown-haired girl student was walking toward me. Not Student Council, and not any of Luise’s friends I had glimpsed on my first day of assignment. A complete stranger I did not recognize.

When I turned my eyes on her she merely smiled and kept walking without pause.

“Hello. Have you been well?”

She stopped in front of me and offered a polite little bow, yet I still had no idea who she was. Being recognized one-sidedly was awkward enough.

“I had hoped to see you at the café, but here we meet instead.”

Ah.

At those words I exhaled a quiet sigh and held out my hand. The girl took it in a handshake; a rough scrap of paper pressed naturally into my palm.

The Intelligence Deputy again. Even if she had been stationed at the Academy for contingencies, I had assumed she would have withdrawn with the First Division Chief and the Mukgwangdae.

“You’re still here?”

“I returned a few days ago. Something came up that I had to deliver in person, so what choice did I have?”

I swallowed the blank scrap of paper and asked. The Intelligence Deputy shrugged lightly, yet every movement carried thick exhaustion. Translated, it meant: “I came all the way back because the matter was too important to send by communication crystal.”

Both the deputy who had returned to the Academy to deliver such vital news, and I who had to receive news so vital that only she could deliver it, were thoroughly miserable.

“The body disposal is finished. We thought they were unclaimed corpses, but fortunately we located the bereaved families as well.”

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

“Good news. Many of them?”

“About three? Fewer than expected.”

I nodded silently at her words.

Three traitor houses.

“Bereaved families.” The term was a euphemism for the houses connected to the Third Glory—houses that now felt more familiar under the label of corpses. Fully three noble houses had contacted that rebel group.

As the deputy said, it was few for a group that had grandly spouted about restoring Apels, yet the Third Glory had been a shoddy organization barely fit for a tutorial. Three was already quite a number.

“Was the conversation too dull? Let’s watch the rest of the awards.”

“Let’s.”

We both turned our eyes toward the first floor at the same moment. The Intelligence Deputy drew a small scroll from her robes and tore it swiftly; a faint membrane enveloped us and vanished.

“For five minutes no one outside will hear our voices.”

“And our appearance?”

“We remain visible, so I’ll keep it informal.”

She cleared her throat and spoke in a grave voice utterly at odds with her disguised student face.

“Karl Crassius, Chief of the Audit Department—receive the solemn Imperial Decree.”

I inclined my head slightly before the Imperial Decree. Ordinarily one should kneel and bow deeply, but the abbreviated form made this acceptable.

Once I lowered my head, the Intelligence Deputy—now the Emperor’s noble proxy—continued.

“I shall receive the solemn Imperial Decree.”

That was all. In a mere handful of words the fates of three noble houses had been decided.

Only then did the Intelligence Deputy drop the formal tone, wipe the cold sweat from her brow, and exhale a long breath.

“Isn’t it rather harsh to have a deputy deliver an Imperial Decree?”

“What choice is there? It shows how strongly His Majesty desires this.”

A solemn Imperial Decree could not be delivered by just anyone, and an abbreviated form even less so. At minimum it required a minister-level official. Yet the Intelligence Deputy—not even a department chief, merely a deputy—had delivered it in abbreviated form. Inside she must have wanted to weep.

But what could be done? The Emperor apparently found even the time to dispatch a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠minister-level figure to the Academy too precious to spare.

The moment he heard the word “Apels,” he must have lost his temper.

A restorationist army of a nation that fell three hundred years ago rising again in his own reign? Even hurling the imperial seal in rage would have been understandable. And to learn that noble houses had contacted that damned restorationist army—he must truly want them dead.

“I’ve already passed the information to the Audit Department’s deputy chief as well, but we still don’t know how deeply those three houses were involved. They might have conducted simple transactions without knowing it was an Apels restoration group, or they might have actively joined the treason.”

“Does it matter?”

I answered curtly. After a brief silence the deputy shrugged again.

“It doesn’t, really.”

Right. It did not matter. Whether simple trade or active participation, their entanglement in treason was undeniable. The fact that they had contacted the Third Glory remained unchanged.

“The bastard who climbed the ranks on his comrades’ blood money.”

Old memories surfaced; I closed my eyes quietly. That bastard had left too easily. Yet those who had helped him still remained.

When I opened my eyes the Intelligence Deputy had already vanished, and the awards ceremony was drawing to a close. Luise stood before the principal receiving her trophy. As congratulatory applause poured down she lifted it high, looking thoroughly delighted.

She glanced around, somehow spotted me on the second floor, and broke into a wide smile. I answered with a smile of my own. Congratulations, Luise.

I’m glad.

Glad that Luise had made unforgettable memories.

Truly glad.

That the ones who deserved to die still remained.

With a heart full of satisfaction I began to clap.

Today the communication crystal in my breast pocket felt especially heavy.