Let’s Just Give It A Try First! (2)

Spring always started with a sense of freshness.

“Aaah, warm sunshine… cozy breeze~”

At my words, Beni, who was standing beside me, laughed and spoke.

“Magic tools really are nice, aren’t they.”

Beni broke my little moment of appreciation, and it was certainly thanks to the temperature-control magic tool installed in the lord’s castle. The Month of the Demon God had passed, and we were just about to reach a full month after that.

In other words, it was not actually spring.

Even so, when I stood on the balcony of the lord’s castle and looked down at the slaves and Beastkin working up a good sweat in this cold, my heart warmed just watching them.

“I wonder if the chairman of a big corporation feels like this.”

“A big corporation?”

“No, forget it. Anyway, Beni, are you assigned to me today?”

Until yesterday, Alena had been in charge of attending me. Because she had practically claimed my bedroom as if it were her own room, the days had been getting warmer and warmer in a very different sense. Knowing those circumstances, Beni blushed slightly and nodded.

“One of us three—Seria, Ariana, or me—was going to be picked, and I drew the short stick!”

I thought teaching them how to draw lots had been a mistake. Recently, they had been using lotteries to decide position assignments.

I wondered if I was lucky.

Or was it unlucky instead?

There were even rumors that, because Alena had been assigned to me for two weeks straight, she had been acting like the mistress among the maids, so I had already warned her. But there was no law saying Beni wouldn’t do the same this time, so I said a word.

“How about we just rotate in order next time? You need to study Pharmacy too, Beni.”

“But… I really don’t want to give up this job!”

Beni pouted and whined. I patted her on the head once, then went back to gazing out over the terrace while slowly sipping my coffee.

A few days earlier, a letter from the Dust of Sands Trading Company had arrived in advance.

It explained that, because the shipment being moved this time was large, we would need to expand our facilities ahead of time, and it came with something I had long been waiting for—“cacao,” enclosed with it. Thanks to that, I had to move up and prepare several different plans.

The letter was also the reason I had been able to immediately drop the work I had been focusing on up to recently—decorating the pyramid and building the internal bunker.

‘Cacao, huh… How did you make chocolate again…?’

I was sure that if I could just manage to produce it, it would become a food that would spark a revolution in the Empire even bigger than invigorating tonics, and on top of that, the list of things I wanted to try—cocoa, bread with chocolate, cookies with chocolate—just kept piling up like a mountain.

And the reason I kept staring out the window like this was that today was the day the carriages were supposed to arrive.

Just then, I saw Matilda, who had come to the lord’s castle for the morning report, step into the room.

“Is Matilda doing the regular report today?”

“Ah, Linda is currently out welcoming the Dust of Sands Trading Company. She said she would go ahead to the Third Rest Stop and wait there.”

“She went all the way out there?”

“There were issues with the rest stop itself, complaints, and several problems piled up. She left at dawn, planning to take care of those while she was at it.”

“You two are working so hard. I should give you both a bonus. If I paid you performance pay, how much would you want?”

“…I don’t think we’ve accomplished anything worthy of that yet, so I’ve never really thought about it.”

“For me to be this free and still hear that you haven’t done anything—now that’s taking modesty too far. Don’t you think so, Beni?”

“That’s right. Thanks to those two, my lord has been putting on healthy weight by the day and regaining his strength. We’re the ones who ought to be grateful.”

“If you think of it that way, I can only be thankful.”

Matilda blushed as if embarrassed. But that was the end of the private chat; she soon fixed her expression, handed me the report, and started speaking.

The report mainly covered regular trade with merchants and the scale of those deals, as well as requests to replenish scarce medicinal ingredients and to grant authority to issue orders to parts of the Beastkin population.

Linda and Matilda were frugal and efficient in how they handled people. Everyone except me was essentially being moved this way and that by their hands, that was how competently they were handling the work.

“Mm, I’m thinking of approving everything for now, but… is this one really necessary?”

Matilda said it was, and went on to explain why.

“At present, our domain lacks anyone who can properly be called soldiers. No, it would be more accurate to say we have none. Certainly, if it came to defending the domain, all the Beastkin would undoubtedly rise up to protect you, my lord, but they all lack equipment and would be forced to fight barehanded. I know Beastkin are strong with just their bodies, but if an organized regular army came at us in formation, the resulting damage would be impossible to ignore.”

“So basically, you’re saying we should take this opportunity to buy a large quantity of gear for the Beastkin to use, right?”

“That’s right. The public funds—the money that can be called the treasury of the Ingrad Domain—currently amount to about four hundred thousand in large-denomination coins. Excluding your personal fortune, my lord, that is the level of our public funds. If we use that to stock equipment for the Beastkin, it will be enough to arm twenty thousand people. It is a huge sum.”

“How many private soldiers is a Viscount allowed to keep again?”

“A maximum of twenty thousand.”

So she had already completed the relevant research beforehand. And since there was nothing in particular I needed to spend money on right now, I asked Matilda another question.

“If we buy that much equipment at once, it’ll inevitably affect the market price of ore and such, and in the end we probably won’t be able to secure all the stock we need and will just burn through our budget. How are you planning to solve that?”

“It is written on the next page of the report, but I will explain. First, I plan to make a request to the Dust of Sands Trading Company that is arriving this time. They are not just a ‘trading house’ dealing in spices, woolen carpets, and intercontinental trade—they also handle items that fall under military supplies, such as iron ore; they are a grand merchant company, an influential organization.”

“They’ll also find it a burden to handle that much volume all at once. How are you planning to deal with that?”

I asked while flipping through the report, reading the methods written there. As I was taking in the detailed contents one by one, Matilda waited, giving me enough time to read thoroughly, and then opened her mouth.

“As you can see, the Dust of Sands Trading Company has quite a few subordinate branches they can link with. By using those, our plan is not to import materials from within the Empire but to place orders to purchase fixed amounts of iron ore and the like from beyond the continent, or from other countries. The transport costs will be a bit of a burden, but I believe that much falls within an acceptable range. And when we sounded out the craftsmen, they said that if Your Lordship would construct facilities of a certain minimum scale, they would be able to produce around five hundred sets a day. That’s what we were able to agree on.”

I thought she was a truly fascinating woman. She had studied economics and, driven by curiosity, had reached out into areas beyond that, and the level of her grasp was impressive.

It even made me wonder if Matilda might be smarter than Linda.

‘Matilda has the edge in meticulousness and attention to detail, while Linda is ahead when it comes to flashes of inspiration… maybe?’

They were two delightful geniuses. So I picked up the pen set on the table, signed my approval, and handed the report back to Matilda. She hesitated and glanced at the table.

Only then did I realize she was hoping for something, so I spoke.

“Want to have a cup of coffee before you go?”

“I’d be happy to!”

It struck me again that both Linda and Matilda treated me, their lord, with very little stiffness.

Later that afternoon, I finally saw Linda and the Dust of Sands Trading Company entering the lord’s official residence, and I couldn’t help being taken aback by the fact that they were more numerous than the advance notice had said.

“Why is there so much…?”

Beni seemed equally at a loss for words. She had stopped the work I had assigned her and was staring at the same scene with a dazed expression.

“Well, I should at least go and see, right?”

“Uh… please, have a good trip!”

Saying I understood, I asked her to clean up the workshop and headed outside. Once again, the one who had come as the face of the caravan was Idlen.

It was a welcome face, and today, unlike last time, her outfit was quite splendid. Meeting her, I spoke.

“I almost thought a flower had walked in just now and was shocked, you know?”

“Oh my, I didn’t know you were capable of compliments like that.”

“Sorry if it sounded cheesy. So, are you serving as the representative again this time?”

“In fact, I’m not the representative. There is someone I’d like to introduce you to. He has trouble moving around, so I hope you’ll be understanding.”

“Of course.”

Idlen walked ahead and I followed behind, and the merchants I had seen last time were all trailing along as well. Or perhaps they were people who assisted Idlen.

When we arrived in front of a large, luxurious carriage, its door opened, and I saw an old man slowly descend with the help of several people.

At a glance, he looked easily eighty or ninety years old. Once his feet touched the ground, he bowed his head to me.

“It is an honor to meet you for the first time. I am Amode Tichel, head of the Dust of Sands Trading Company and this child’s grandfather. I have committed the discourtesy of making the Lord of Ingrad come out to receive me.”

The word “head” there—the master of a trading company—surprised me a little. Considering the influence the Dust of Sands Trading Company had across the continent, if he was the head, that meant he was the owner of that enormous trading house.

“If anything, I’m the one who should apologize for making you come all the way to such a humble place. Is your knee in bad shape, by the way?”

“You noticed right away. Yes, it seems that after walking this world for so long, my body is slowly starting to break down.”

I tried to recall what medicine was good for knees. Thinking about that for a moment, I decided I should brew some medicine for this grandfather and granddaughter pair when they left, and for the time being, I guided them to the VIP room in the nearby lord’s residence.

Then, looking at Linda, who was stuck to my side and had practically turned into a block of ice, I spoke.

“Where did all that ambition go, for you to be frozen like this?”

“…I never imagined I’d have to deal with the head of the company directly… uuuuh.”

Linda looked so tense that if I teased her any further she might faint. It made me wonder if that old man was really that incredible a figure.

Well, I figured I’d know once I actually dealt with him, so we moved together to the VIP room. Once we were all seated, Idlen and the attendant merchants stood behind Amode, and behind me stood Linda, Matilda—who had somehow arrived at some point—and Demina, just the three of them.

As a strange tension flowed through the room, I was the first to speak.

“You must have had a hard time coming such a long way, so how about we warm you up a bit before we begin?”

“Do you have something good in mind?”

“Starting with alcohol would be too much, so I was thinking you might like to try a cup of ‘tea’ produced in our domain first.”

“Hooh… tea, you say?”

Amode’s expression took on a curious look, so I gave Matilda a quick signal with my eyes. She swiftly left the VIP room, and I heard her ordering coffee from the maids.

Amode heard it as well, but he neither asked about it nor showed any particular reaction. He seemed like a man who kept his mouth shut unless he needed to speak.

Then, in the awkward silence that settled over the VIP room, it was unexpectedly Idlen who broke it.

“I’m sorry, my lord. My grandfather isn’t normally like this, but if something concerns me, he sometimes ends up being a little rude…”

I was wondering what on earth she meant by that when Amode suddenly asked me a question.

“She may be my granddaughter, but isn’t she truly beautiful?”

“Well, it’s certainly true that she has remarkable looks. On top of that, she’s bright as a merchant and seems to be very clever, so I’d say she’s an impressive woman.”

I started by complimenting her as I honestly saw her, and Amode curled his lips in a faint smile and asked me another question.

“I’ve heard that the Viscount of Ingrad is quite an extraordinary man as well. They say it would be no exaggeration to claim that every current sweeping trend in the world begins here in Ingrad, but seeing you in person… I’m not so sure.”

Was he trying to put me down?

That thought crossed my mind for a moment, but the one who flared up at her grandfather’s words was not me—it was Idlen.

“Grandfather, what are you saying! Why are you doing this to me!”

Honestly, I wanted to ask the same thing. What had happened between them for him to be looking at me like I was some man about to steal away his granddaughter…

It was an uncomfortable situation, with a gaze I could hardly fail to notice bearing down on me.