Chapter 192 : An Unexpected Assignment
Chapter 192: An Unexpected Assignment
I arrived at Haken Castle.
The first thing I saw was the Dog Tribe warriors and human knights guarding the castle gate.
“They're Sir Petrok's knights.”
“Ah, Sir Patrick, the ‘Stormbringer,’ stayed behind, didn't he?”
It was only Sir Durek who had been an oddball. Masters were originally neutral and supported no one.
Their attitude was basically that no matter who became the lord, they would only serve the Lord of Haken.
Even when chaos suddenly erupted and Gios overturned the territory, they had probably remained on standby.
There had been no way to know how things would turn out. They couldn't move so easily.
However, once Irene returned to Haken and conveyed the will of the Lord of Haken, they must have started moving alongside her.
Seeing that the ones guarding the castle gate were Dog Tribe warriors and Petrok's knights, it seemed the situation inside had already been brought under control.
“But why is the gate in this condition?”
“W-Well, Sir Irene...”
“Ah... I see.”
The shattered castle gate was certainly striking.
So I asked one of the Dog Tribe warriors, and apparently Irene had smashed the gate apart the moment she arrived.
The knights guarding the gate at the time had been on Gios's side, and when they barricaded themselves behind it, she blew the gate apart as an example.
–She's quite the fiery female.
'Well, she is a user of Fire-Attribute Aura.'
She normally wasn't like that, but when she decided to go all out, she really did it spectacularly.
Still, wasn't that fine?
The faster a civil war was suppressed, the better.
That was the very reason I'd assigned several hundred Dog Tribe warriors to her in the first place.
“Hah, that Irene... Only someone like you could handle her. If it had been anyone else, they wouldn't have stood a chance.”
“Yes, well.”
The Lord of Haken clicked his tongue, bewildered by Irene's aggressive actions.
Rather than criticizing her, he looked embarrassed.
In particular, he seemed awkward facing me, and the feeling was rather strange.
'Honestly, isn't that one of Irene's strengths? That's exactly why I can entrust the territory to her whenever I'm away.'
Since it was true that Irene was no ordinary person, I simply smiled and let it pass.
“It doesn't feel chaotic at all. It's much more organized than I expected. The people don't seem unsettled either.”
“If Gios was the one who acted, he would have handled everything swiftly and silently. That's always been the kind of child he was.”
“Is that so?”
“The residents wouldn't even have had the chance to panic. And if Irene and Sir Petrok immediately secured the territory afterward, then this quietness isn't difficult to understand. However...”
“Yes?”
“No... Never mind. Let's head to the inner castle first.”
The Lord of Haken stopped himself midway through speaking.
It felt as though something was bothering him.
And what he had been trying to say became clear after meeting Irene, who was waiting inside the inner castle.
“Second Brother gave Eldest Brother sleeping medicine. The rest of the family has been confined somewhere quiet.”
“So he didn't lay a hand on the family.”
“No. I told you before. He would never do something like that.”
“Huh...”
“He had planned to quietly evacuate them elsewhere before Sir Durek returned.”
“Well, maybe Gios would have done otherwise, but Durek would never have left the Lord of Haken's remaining family alone.”
So that was really what had happened?
That was rather surprising in its own way.
I was momentarily speechless at the miraculous victory(?) brought about by the Lord of Haken's family-oriented nature.
Then another possibility suddenly crossed my mind.
Could it be that Gios had been a soft-hearted man from the very beginning?
However, Irene's next words completely shattered that assumption.
“About two hundred people were executed overnight.”
“What? That many? Just what in the world did they...?”
“Political enemies.”
“Political enemies?”
“Yes. More precisely, they were Durek's political enemies, but it's a little complicated.”
Two hundred people in a single night.
They framed their political opponents for conspiring with the Imperial Army to assassinate the Lord of Haken and arrested them.
Dozens were personally arrested and executed on the spot, and when those who died during the process were included, the total reached around that number.
Wasn't that practically proof that he had been preparing for this all along?
For someone supposedly caught in a sudden rebellion, his actions were unbelievably radical.
Of course, Sir Durek's influence must have played a part in the decision, but the one who actually carried it out had undoubtedly been Gios.
“I think Second Brother had always intended to do it.”
“To do what?”
“To get rid of the parasites feeding on the territory. He used to describe them that way quite often.”
“Really?”
“They were political enemies, but in the end, they were Father's closest aides.”
“His closest aides... That makes sense.”
“To be honest, they had their own problems too.”
The Lord of Haken's closest aides.
They were the established elite who had helped build Haken alongside him.
Back when Haken wasn't yet a great territory, everyone had worked together to manage it.
At that time, they had all been young and incredibly ambitious.
However, as time passed and Haken firmly established itself as the dominant territory in the region, they gradually began pursuing their own interests.
At first it hadn't been too serious, but eventually some of them had gone far beyond acceptable limits.
“But you know Father's personality, don't you?”
Just from the way he treated his family, it was obvious that the Lord of Haken was exceptionally devoted to those he considered his own.
He treated his close aides just as generously, and naturally, more and more of them took advantage of that kindness.
To begin with, wasn't Sir Durek—the very leader of the rebellion—also one of the Lord of Haken's trusted aides?
From Gios's perspective, as someone aiming for the position of lord, this had been something he absolutely couldn't stand.
“So he took this opportunity to clean house?”
“That's what Second Brother said. No matter who became the lord, this was something that had to be dealt with eventually. But Father and Eldest Brother would never be able to do it.”
“Ah... That's true.”
The Lord of Haken's eldest son, Ulrison Haken, was almost an exact copy of his father.
He too had been born a knight by nature, someone far more accustomed to fighting enemies outside than enemies within.
Even if he became the lord, he wasn't the kind of person who could ruthlessly purge the old retainers left behind by the previous generation.
To begin with, most members of the Haken family had personalities like that.
'Come to think of it, Irene is also someone with a great deal of affection for others. Just look at how actively she supported the Crimson Comet, or how she insisted on bringing everyone who followed her during the migration.'
–The fact that snake-eyed male could carry out such a purge proves he wasn't born from that old male.
Unlike the rest of the Haken family, Gios—who wasn't the Lord of Haken's biological son—possessed the heart of a snake, capable of eliminating even the senior elders without hesitation.
In fact, one of the reasons he had wanted to become the lord despite being the second son was because he wanted to clean out all of that.
Thinking about it now, Gios really wasn't an ordinary man either.
“You've come.”
While I had been receiving the full story from Irene, the Lord of Haken had spent some time alone with Gios.
Now he called me over again.
His face looked as though it had aged ten years in just the past few days.
Well, considering everything that had happened, it would have been stranger if he looked perfectly fine.
'But why did he call me?'
Unable to understand his reason, I listened as the Lord of Haken began speaking.
Surprisingly, rather than expressing anger or resentment over being deceived, most of what he said was sympathy for Gios.
“A child doesn't get to choose his parents, does he?”
“Well... That's true.”
On that point, I agreed with him.
Right up until just before the rebellion, Gios hadn't even known who his biological father was.
It wasn't as though he'd chosen to be born that way.
Still... Why was he telling me all this?
“So... I'd like to exile the boy from this territory.”
“...I see.”
Exile.
After everything that had happened, there was no way Gios could remain here.
The real issue was whether to execute him or not, but it seemed the Lord of Haken had decided there was no need to go that far.
Perhaps Gios had earned considerable goodwill by keeping the rest of the family safely imprisoned instead of harming them.
According to Irene, the moment he heard that Sir Durek was dead and the Lord of Haken had survived, he surrendered immediately.
When someone reacted like that, it actually became much harder to execute them.
And above all else, the Lord of Haken had raised him as his son for decades.
Some people might have become even angrier because of that.
But the Lord of Haken had always been soft-hearted in matters like these.
'Well, that's understandable. Everyone thinks differently.'
In that situation, I could understand why the Lord of Haken wanted to spare him and simply exile him.
'But why are you telling me this?'
–Hmm, I smell something.
'What smell?'
–The smell of dumping work on someone else.
'Dumping work? Don't tell me...'
Wait.
Was this really going where I thought it was?
Was he seriously about to dump Gios onto me?
“So... Would it be possible for Johnson Territory to take Gios in?”
“Ah.”
'It's actually happening.'
–But isn't that the only option?
Unfortunately, it really was.
Relations with the other great territories weren't exactly good, and now even the neutral city of Saint had fallen into chaos.
That left only one place.
Johnson Territory was incredibly remote and barely interacted with other territories.
Most trade was conducted elsewhere, so even outsiders rarely visited.
With Irene already living in our territory, it was practically the perfect place to entrust Gios.
As I'd said before, Irene cared deeply about people.
Even if they weren't related by blood, she couldn't coldly abandon someone she'd thought of as her older brother for over twenty years.
“Second Young Lord won't be coming alone, will he?”
“Well... No. That person will be coming too. Along with Gios's family, several officials who served him, and their families as well.”
“That's quite a lot of people.”
“It certainly is. I... truly feel sorry about this.”
Not just Gios, but even his biological mother—the Second Wife—and the rest would be coming together.
In that case, there really was nowhere else besides Johnson Territory.
Ours was the only territory that could take them in without causing problems.
'This is pretty absurd.'
It was certainly astonishing that after I'd saved his life, the Lord of Haken immediately tried to dump this responsibility on me.
But was it actually a bad thing for me?
Not really.
He was giving me Gios, along with several capable officials who had worked in Haken.
The one thing our territory needed most was exactly that kind of administrative talent.
'Johnson Territory. A barbaric land where there isn't a single person who knows how to use their brain.'
–I suppose I should feel a little guilty about that too.
'You should. The Beastmen are part of the problem as well. At least the Fox Tribe is somewhat better, but they aren't particularly interested in handling administrative work either.'
Our territory hadn't truly begun functioning properly until Irene arrived.
After Venice and Nilson followed Irene to our territory and began serving as Legal Officer and Treasurer, we finally had something resembling normal administration.
But that only lasted for a while.
As more and more Beastmen poured into the territory, my workload exploded.
That was why I'd spent the entire winter shut inside the lord's castle.
However, if professional administrators like Gios and his supporters joined us, the number of capable workers in the territory would multiply several times over.
'The question is whether these people can be trusted.'
But what exactly were they supposed to do?
They were bringing not only Gios but also his biological mother and the rest of their families.
Our territory was simply too barbaric for a handful of administrators to stir up much trouble.
Most of the population consisted of Beastmen anyway.
At worst, maybe they'd embezzle some funds.
If there was anything to embezzle, then they could try their luck.
If they ended up getting their heads smashed in, that certainly wouldn't be my fault.
–Still, will they really be willing to work for the territory under these circumstances?
'I don't think that's something we need to worry about.'
Once they came in, leaving again would be difficult.
If they wanted to survive, they'd have no choice but to work.
Officials whose only real skill was pushing pens couldn't possibly make a living without the territory's support.
Besides, people like them usually became uncomfortable when they had nothing to do.
Johnson Territory, which still lacked even the most basic administrative system, would probably smell like an irresistible challenge to them.
Still, common courtesy demanded that I ask Gios first.