novelraw Chapter 9
Chapter 9
Chapter 9
Killing Corrupt Officials.
When they heard of this project, all the nobles who could reasonably be called Corrupt Officials trembled in fear.
But surprisingly, there were accomplices who felt relieved instead.
“If he is talking about Corrupt Officials, does that not mean he is only going to purge the officials?”
“That is right.”
“They should have at least spread the wealth around to us and others if they were going to gorge themselves that much.”
“Exactly.”
“They got greedy among themselves and destroyed themselves.”
Those people were the commoners who had taken part in the embezzlement.
Far from imagining that they themselves might become entangled in the project, they felt completely at ease.
They had heard that Prince Noel was wreaking havoc on the nobles, but they had not heard that he was touching commoners.
“Hey. They say Prince Noel even threw Schmitz into prison.”
“What? Schmitz? Mark Schmitz?”
What shattered that complacency was this very audit of the physical assets.
“Why him all of a sudden? Did they catch him trying to take something out of the warehouse?”
“I do not know the details either. But they say Prince Noel personally dragged him off with the guards and locked him up.”
“What is wrong with that prince, seriously?”
“Why did he suddenly have to go insane?”
From their point of view, this was a development they had never imagined.
Fine, let us say that the prince who used to be soft enough to be taken for a fool had started going after nobles.
But how far exactly was he planning to take this chaos?
“Ah. I really want to stop doing audit work now.”
Meanwhile, Prince Noel himself wanted to take his hands off audit work already.
How many days had he been pouring into the practical side of it by now?
Even so, it was almost unbelievable that the workload had not diminished.
Still, it was a tremendous relief that the Queen had joined him as an ally and eased some of the burden of the economic side of things.
“Mother, once we started digging into the physical assets, the shady ones just kept coming out one after another.”
“Yes. But in the process, you must investigate carefully so that no innocent person is wronged.”
“Yes, I know.”
The large-scale audit that had begun with the chief warehouse overseer.
Because the scale itself was so vast, all kinds of people were being summoned to the palace—from those who had actively chosen to become accomplices by accepting bribes, to those who had been unjustly exploited for their labor by nobles.
“Um, Your Highness.”
“Yes.”
“I heard my mother was taken at this time.”
Naturally, several experts from the mining region who had helped verify the physical assets were taken in as well.
“I-I really think she was taken unfairly.”
Even if the criminal charges against them had not yet been confirmed, they still had to be investigated.
“Is there a high probability that your mother is an accomplice in embezzlement?”
“No! She was truly dragged away by force and paid almost nothing for over a month! And, and...”
Because of that, many people, Gilbert included, were shaken emotionally.
They had resolved to help Prince Noel for the sake of the nation, but they were frightened that they might instead be making the people around them miserable with their own hands.
“Then she will only undergo a simple investigation and be released.”
But Prince Noel had taken that possibility into account from the very beginning of the project.
This was a thoroughly stratified society.
Naturally, there would be many cases where people merely had their abilities exploited unfairly.
Especially if they wished to avoid charges such as insulting the nobility.
“During this audit, not a single person is going to prison unfairly.”
Rather than wrongfully punishing one person out of a hundred, he would rather let ten ambiguous offenders go free.
That was Prince Noel’s goal for this round.
“As for the next audit, who knows?”
The first audit in a country where corruption had run rampant for so long?
Of course it was bound to have its own peculiarities.
Because he understood that, Prince Noel had never intended to sweep everyone up in a single audit.
Though those being audited were stunned, simply because it was a situation they had not seen in far too long.
“Thank you!”
“What are you thanking me for? There is nothing to thank me for.”
Of course, this was not a choice made for perfectly pure and beautiful reasons.
There were countless calculations beneath it—labor shortages, the cost of maintaining the prison system, and so on.
“It is not as though we have enough money to run the prisons on a scale large enough to lock up half the population.”
But there was no way anyone else could see through those calculations.
What stood before them was simply a prince doing his utmost on the front lines for the sake of the country.
“His Highness is muttering to himself again because he is embarrassed.”
“No wonder people used to say he was kind enough to be a fool.”
No matter how much Prince Noel grumbled without minding those around him, no one took it at face value.
If anything, they merely took it for humility.
“His Highness' nature really has not changed at all.”
“They say he did not go mad. He just became wise, and the people with guilty consciences started calling him a lunatic.”
“It is a relief that he has become firm and wise.”
“He is no longer a fool now. He has become a sage king.”
And so, Killing Corrupt Officials did not end with merely filling the state treasury.
It became the spark that reignited a tiny ember of patriotism in the hearts of the people.
“It does seem that people have started paying their taxes properly.”
“Have they?”
“I think it is because they have begun to believe that their taxes will no longer be diverted to Corrupt Officials or vanish into other corners. Well done.”
“The effect came faster than I expected.”
For the time being, the Queen and I conducted a full-scale review of the state treasury under the guise of Tea Time.
I had suggested that it might be better to arrange formal meetings openly, but she said she still felt awkward about stepping fully to the forefront.
“Yeramerian might truly have fallen into serious trouble before the year was out. The timing was very good.”
“I know. At this rate, we may even be able to clear the debts owed to the countries that absolutely have to be repaid quickly.”
Killing Corrupt Officials had really, truly become a far bigger project than I had ever imagined.
The physical assets recovered were, of course, on an insane scale.
Even taking inflation into account, the total amount recovered from accumulated embezzlement was nearly equal to Yeramerian’s entire annual budget.
“If we had arrested them all without mercy, the state treasury would have overflowed.”
“But there would also have been many innocent people among them. The history behind all this is simply too long.”
Hearing the Queen’s bitter voice, I nodded.
That was right.
Even among the many victims who had helped with the audit, plenty would have had to be dragged in as well.
In a situation that extreme, a revolution might even break out out of nowhere.
No, absolutely not.
“You really worked hard, Mother.”
“It is nothing. You must have plenty of other things to do next as well.”
The Queen encouraged me in a gentle voice.
But the content spoken in that gentle voice sounded a little strange.
“The next things to do?”
“Yes.”
“Do I have something else I need to do right away besides the work I am doing now?”
At my question, the Queen looked slightly flustered again.
“Oh my. Are you not going to work anymore?”
What was that supposed to mean?
“I am. I was working right up until just now.”
“Not this sort of thing. You were not planning to spend all your time as prince only doing audit work, were you?”
“No.”
“Then there is the next step as well, is there not?”
The Queen’s eyes were full of question marks.
Oh.
Mother was harsher than I thought.
“Mother. I have truly been working day and night.”
“Yes. For Yeramerian.”
Looking at those utterly innocent eyes, I burst out laughing.
Your Majesty.
I understand what you mean, but this is a little too much.
“Mother. I am a person too, you know?”
“Hm?”
“I have not slept more than four hours even once recently. I have done nothing but work the entire time.”
“Ah, oh my!”
Only then did the Queen realize what she herself had said, and her face turned bright red.
But the Queen, who had been exhilarated by finally working in her own field again after so long, and I, who had come crashing into this world after literally working myself to death, were in rather different situations.
“I will take it easy for a few days. My head will work properly again after that.”
“Yes, yes. I am sorry.”
“It is all right. I can still handle the Budget Proposal Reorganization we agreed to discuss tomorrow.”
“Ah, yes. I should be going, then. Get some rest!”
Flustered, the Queen hurried away.
I looked around the office, which had suddenly grown quiet, then turned my gaze out the window.
“But what do princes even do when they rest?”
That was what made it awkward.
Rest was something people who had actually rested before knew how to do.
All I could do was wonder what I was supposed to do with myself.
If I thought about trying to spend some money, I immediately started considering the sort of consumption that might raise Yeramerian’s GDP, and the state treasury was not exactly overflowing, so there were limits there too.
“There is no way they have online games here. What do people in this era even do for fun?”
Throw a party?
No.
Politically and economically, that was not a good choice.
I did not even know how one held a party in this era.
If anything, it might just become more troublesome.
“Then should I go out for a while?”
I had heard plenty of stories about kings and princes from all over the world disguising themselves and going out among the people to learn how they lived.
In history books, anyway.
“That does not sound bad. It has a bit of thrill to it.”
This was an era without anything like a proper camera.
For such a sudden thought, it did not seem like a bad plan at all.
“You there outside. Come in for a moment!”
I raised my voice toward the door, and immediately one startled attendant flung it open and rushed inside.
“You called for me!”
Of all people, it had to be the one among my attendants who had been scolded the most.
Still, he was the sort who had often been reprimanded for not knowing when to hold his tongue, so at least I could expect an honest answer from him.
“Do the common people know what I look like?”
At the sudden question, the attendant flicked a glance toward the guards outside.
They too seemed utterly unprepared for such a question, as though all they could do was roll their eyes around in confusion.
“Most of the nobles probably do. They must have attended the parties Your Highness hosted several times.”
“Not them.”
“Not them?”
For a moment, the attendant fell deep into thought.
It looked as though he was trying to figure out what I really meant by the question.
“Just answer what I ask. Do not drag it out.”
“Ah. I-I do not think so.”
“Even though I am a prince?”
“Your Highness has always tended to dislike showing your face publicly.”
“I did?”
At the attendant’s answer, I looked at my face in the mirror in the corner of the office.
Why?
“Am I not fairly handsome?”
“Pardon?”
“Am I not?”
“Y-you are, in fact. Even princesses from overseas once hoped for marriage talks with Your Highness.”
“Right?”
Then why had I let a face like this go to waste?
As far as I knew, being handsome generally had a positive effect on public opinion.
“All right. You can go.”
“Yes, sir!”
In any case, I had gotten my first answer.
Ordinary people would not recognize me.
If that was the case, I could move around without having to disguise myself too heavily.
If a noble showed up, the area would probably stir immediately, so I would just need to be careful at those times.
“Now where was the wardrobe room~ the dressing room~”
With a tune on my lips at the thought of finally having a break after so long, I stepped out of the office.
The attendants looked at me sidelong as though I were being strange, but that was none of my concern.
Right now, what mattered more was finding out how commoners spent their time.
“It would be nice if I overheard some interesting gossip too.”
Dressed in suitably shabby clothes and with my face roughly concealed, I stepped out through the palace gate.
After waving to the guards, I quietly looked around the forest path outside.
According to the map, if I kept walking straight from here, I would reach a different district near the palace.
“Hmm. A capital district within walking distance of the palace.”
If this were Korea, would it feel like wandering around Yeouido?
Then rather than seeing how ordinary commoners lived, this would probably feel more like walking through an affluent district.
Half of me felt a little disappointed, and the other half was curious to see what sort of amusements an affluent district had.
With those thoughts in mind, I set out.
“What is this?”
But the moment the sight of that affluent district entered my eyes, the lightness in my steps slowly began to fade again.
Ah.
Of course.
A day of simply relaxing never really exists.