Reset Life – Chapter 72

Chapter 72: I’m…… A First-Timer (2)

It was the first case I had ever been involved in, out of all the things my father handled. I don’t know if it was that enjoyable, but I remember the entire development, the inside story, and even the culprit.

Besides, it was a rather unique case.

The gist of it is this: someone had embezzled military supplies from the Dolen Mountain Patrol. It’s a common embezzlement case you can see anywhere, but the noteworthy point lies in the clever method used to conceal the perpetrator.

As it turned out later, the amount was also enormous. It must have been a considerable sum, considering even the City Council’s Finance Department was shocked.

Well, since I know everything, it’s just boring. There’s no need to investigate here and there; I just need to piece together a few clues.

Why did I come all the way here when I could finish it with just a single letter?

This time, following my father’s orders, I have to pretend to struggle, according to his wishes.

“Being popular is tough. Damn, at this rate, the problem will be when I finally return to Nek and my confinement is lifted.”

My popularity has skyrocketed.

This is the biggest reason why I have to handle this matter with a serious expression.

If I’m not careful, there’s a chance my father and brother might think I’m aiming for the position of Duke. Or public opinion might shift to favor me as the more suitable Duke.

The latter is a rather presumptuous thought, but if I continue to gain popularity like this, it might actually happen. My explosive popularity will turn into a bomb.

I had to hold the Grand Ball to solidify the bubble, but now I have to wait for the remaining bubbles to disappear. Is this what people mean when they say life is unpredictable?

I relaxed my posture a bit more.

How much should I pretend to struggle to make it seem like I’m sufficiently discouraged?

How can I flatten Baron Hiltenpens’s condescending nose?

At times like this, I truly miss the presence of cigarettes. If I had just one, I could organize my thoughts relatively quickly…… Ah, forget it. I don’t need to appear like a delinquent youth.

It was while I was racking my brain for a while.

Knock, knock.

“Sir Arisein, the documents have arrived.”

“Send them in.”

I straightened my posture again. Right now, I need to confirm whether my memory aligns with the actual details of the case.

“Hahaha! So that’s why the 3rd Patrol Captain was so angry?”

“Indeed. People have different tastes, Baron. Hahahaha!”

Dinner time.

I feel like I could write a brief thesis on how much anger a person can endure.

Naturally, the Baron’s entire family was present at the dinner. However, the attendance rate of the City Council members was less than half, and the Baron kept bringing up topics I couldn’t participate in.

For instance, he kept talking about the situation within Orknesia or the current state of the Dolen Mountains, topics that were a continent away from news about the Imperial Capital Nek.

“Speaking of which, these days in the Ado region……”

“The winter monsters in the Dolen Mountains have increased significantly……”

Hey, listen here. So you’re saying I shouldn’t even think about joining the conversation?

This is a grave insult.

According to noble etiquette, when you invite someone, you should highlight them as the center of the conversation and acquire the necessary knowledge beforehand to understand unfamiliar topics.

However, I’m being treated like a nobody at this dinner party, someone who was invited only in name and out of obligation.

It’s a nasty treatment, as I can’t even get angry and advertise myself as petty.

I silently maintained my position, cutting and eating the roast beef moderately.

It’s better to remain silent at times like this.

They have no intention of treating me properly anyway, so there’s no need for me to step up and try to improve the relationship. I’ll just do what I was originally supposed to do and leave…… But my insides are bubbling like a gratin placed in an oven.

Actually, if I wanted to, I could overturn Baron Hiltenpens or even the highest authority in the Ado region.

Since Orknesia was under our family’s jurisdiction, I heard a lot of stories, even if I didn’t want to, before I died. Among them were quite a few stories that were fatal to the owner of this place.

Well, my father will take care of that later, so I don’t want to touch it now.

I have no intention of causing friction with a vassal after coming all the way here.

So don’t provoke me.

I’ve had a lot going on lately, so I just want to live quietly.

Time passed slowly, and the dinner proceeded in a reasonably good atmosphere. It was a good atmosphere, except for the fact that they ignored me. The food was decent too.

What melted my heart was the freshly baked almond muffin. The warm and fluffy texture of the bread, combined with the savory aroma of almonds, made it quite a delicious dessert.

When I decided to enjoy the food until the end of the dinner with the accompanying coffee, Baron Hiltenpens suddenly turned the topic to me.

“Ah! Come to think of it, Sir Arisein, I heard that if you don’t know you in the Imperial Capital these days, you’re said to have come from across the Sair River. Is that true?”

Oh my. They’re having fun. I don’t even have the energy to ask why they’re only asking this now.

“Well. What have you heard?”

Of course, asking the person involved in the rumor if it’s true is the most idiotic thing you can do. However, since Baron Hiltenpens’s intentions were obvious, I simply returned the question.

“I heard that if you hadn’t been part of the goodwill mission to Azot, the mission would have failed several times over. Moreover, I heard that Princess Mideijel of the Azot Royal Family proposed to you.”

“The success of the goodwill mission with Azot is due to the members of the delegation doing their respective roles well. The rumor about Princess Mideijel is quite burdensome for me as well. We simply agreed to be comfortable friends.”

“Is that so? Ah, I also heard that you recently caught a serial killer who appeared in the Imperial Capital. I heard that the serial killer was a demon……”

“It was a demon. A type of demon called an Inquisitor. Fortunately, only a part of it appeared, so I was able to defeat it somehow with the people who were with me.”

“Ah! That’s truly amazing!”

“You flatter me. I was just lucky.”

When someone praises me for no reason, it’s highly likely a trap.

I expressed appropriate humility.

I don’t know what’s inside the trap, but there’s no need to stick my head in to find out.

“Hahaha! You’re quite humble. Judging by the rumors I heard before you arrived, I expected a valiant and wise swordsman and sage to grace us with his presence. Hahaha!”

I chuckled softly and said nothing. Denying it here would be truly self-deprecating, and affirming it would make me seem like an arrogant youngster.

They seemed to want to say something more, but I got up before they could open their mouths.

“Well then, I’ll take my leave. The sooner I handle the task given to me, the sooner you all will be at ease.”

I wiped my mouth with a napkin and rose from my seat. It’s best to naturally excuse myself before they throw the rest of the traps they’ve prepared.

Baron Hiltenpens and the others made a show of trying to hold me back for a while longer, but since there was no real reason, I was able to gracefully slip away.

Phew, the food was delicious, but if it’s like this every day, I think I’ll get indigestion.

January 16th, 373rd Year of the Imperial Calendar.

I’ve reviewed it more than five times in two days, but the contents of the documents haven’t changed. I guess documents that change every time you look at them don’t exist in this world?

“Huh, this is strange.”

I’m in a predicament.

Clearly, as I remember, this case was about the culprit secretly disposing of the reserve military supplies that were generated each month.

Military supplies are managed quite strictly, but since the number of personnel using them is limited, there tends to be a surplus of reserves. Even though the Imperial Army’s budget allocation is tight, there are still leftovers.

The culprit quite meticulously prepared fakes to replace the reserves over time and swapped them out. Then, after some time had passed, they wrote documents stating that the reserves had been discarded because they had become unusable for some reason.

Since it went through quite a few stages in between, it’s quite difficult to track down the culprit. Moreover, the actual culprit is someone completely unrelated to the military.

That’s for sure…… but strangely, it’s a bit different now.

The figures in the documents that I vaguely remember are subtly different. Even some of the people are different.

Furthermore, the fatal thing is that the culprit’s name, as I remember it, doesn’t even exist among the people managing this territory!

Huh, what should I call this?

I scratched my head and put the documents down. This is no different from a completely unknown case, isn’t it?

Now I have to start everything from scratch. With uncooperative people, no less.

Father. I didn’t mean to, but it seems I’ll have to rack my brains as you wished. You must be pleased. Hehehe.

“Ugh, this is just great.”

I undid two buttons of my shirt and took a deep breath. As I glanced out the window, white snow was falling from the white sky and settling on the gray city.

It’s a city like Aila’s hair. No, actually, Aila’s hair is better. Her hair was a shimmering silver-like gray.

Thinking about Aila naturally led me to think about Levidian. Then, the space between my eyebrows narrowed. Similarly, my chest felt tight.

Sigh, why did she do that?

No matter how much I thought about it after that day, I couldn’t see her intentions. Aila seemed to be trying to make things work, but what solution could there be when I’m here now?

Seeing how problems only pile up with the arrival of winter, perhaps problems are related to snow. They’re similar in that they both melt away eventually and leave behind a muddy trace.

The difference is that snow is pleasing to the eye, both when it falls and when it accumulates. Problems, on the other hand, aren’t pleasant to see pile up at all.

“I don’t know. I’ll have to do what I can.”

I rested my elbows on the desk and propped my chin on my hand. In that awkward posture, I was casually looking over the documents and erasing them from my mind when……

「Hey, Risel, are you well?」

A voice echoed in my head. It’s Brother Lime.

I chuckled and leaned back in my chair, gripping the necklace. Then, I closed my eyes and spoke into my mind.

「It’s been a while. How are you?」

「So-so. Ah, I’m going to be a father around summer next year.」

「Oh, that’s great news. Congratulations. I’ll send you a gift later to celebrate.」

「Your thoughts are enough.」

It’s a trivial matter, but history is changing here as well. Until I died, Brother Lime didn’t have any children. That’s why I told him to be sure to use contraception.

「So, what’s up? Surely that’s not all you wanted to say?」

「Of course not. I’ve been observing the recent events, and things seem quite unusual. Has anything changed over there? Ah, never mind. I heard the Imperial Capital has already changed drastically. They say demons appeared, but instead of panicking, people are singing? Thanks to the Knight of Light who saved the Imperial Capital by defeating the demons.」

「Shut up. Thanks to that, I’m having a headache right now. I’ve been quite bothered by the priests, and I got scolded a lot at home. Haven’t you heard the story yet? I’m temporarily demoted.」

「I heard. Still, that’s good. I think that’s a small price to pay, considering what you’ve gained.」

「A small price? What do you mean?」

I tilted my head. What’s good about it?

「You and I both died and came back to life, walking the present, even if the timing is different. And we’re changing things we originally knew to our liking. As a result, things we didn’t know pop up unexpectedly.」

「We’ve talked about that several times already, haven’t we? You said you were only changing things little by little because you were worried about that.」

「Yes. That’s right. But thinking about it, no matter how much we try to improve the situation, there’s always a feedback of misfortune.」

「Feedback of misfortune?」

I straightened my posture and focused on Brother Lime’s words.

According to Brother Lime, happiness and misfortune are scattered throughout the world, and their proportions are equal. As if when someone is happy, someone else becomes unhappy.

I know that much.

Since happiness and misfortune cannot exist without each other, if I’m happy, someone will be unhappy.

But both you and I can avoid misfortune as much as possible.

By knowing in advance what kind of misfortune might occur and removing or changing the cause.

However, this is a life that shouldn’t exist in the first place.

Just as uphill and downhill can never exist separately, neither can happiness and misfortune exist alone.

「The misfortune we’ve removed or avoided will return someday. I call that the feedback of misfortune. The misfortune that was supposed to come couldn’t because we blocked it, and then it explodes all at once at some point. I heard you had quite a hard time?」

「Ah. That’s right. Even now. So you’re saying this is what you’re talking about?」

「Yes. So a demotion is a small price to pay. Honestly, considering what you’ve gained, a misfortune significant enough to kill someone around you could have accumulated.」

「I suppose you could think of it that way. Instead, I’m now in danger of dying.」

「Hmm, it seems something else has happened?」

I mentally sighed and rambled on about my current situation.

Since I couldn’t tell anyone around me, I ended up venting my frustrations to Brother Lime, who happened to contact me.

Brother Lime spoke as if he was intrigued.

「Huh, this is quite a coincidence.」

「Coincidence? What kind?」

「Actually, there’s a case here that I experienced before that has changed subtly. The timing is off as well. It caused me quite a headache. Moreover, it might be related to that, but……」

Brother Lime paused for a moment before speaking. And I was surprised, my jaw dropping.

「I-Is that true?」

「Yes. There’s been no sign of the Black New Moon’s preliminary movements. Around this time, there should be some movement at the Small Forest Shrine or something unusual in the southwestern part of the continent, but there’s nothing. I sent someone to Yorchensia just in case, but they found no trace.」

Yorchensia is one of the ancient ruins, the origin of the Black New Moon, or Mangya. Around this time, the members of Mangya should be gathered there…… but there’s nothing?

「Are you sure you’re not lying?」

「I expected that, but it hurts to hear it directly. I wish you would have more trust in your partner.」

「It’s true. What in the world is going on? Ah! Could it be that the master of Mangya is perhaps……」

「It’s possible. Or it might be something that happened because we’re changing history.」

「It won’t just be us.」

A silent feeling of agreement arose in my mind. I knew something like this would happen someday, but it feels strange now that it’s actually happening.

「So, for the time being, I’m going to do nothing and observe the situation. I hope you do the same. Ah, you’re probably already thinking the same thing, aren’t you?」

「That’s the right answer. Once this is over, I’m thinking of maintaining the status quo and observing the situation. If we continue like this, something we can’t handle might happen.」

Honestly, the Inquisitor was really hard to handle. Even if it was Artshever’s doing, it was too much for something that could happen when you wake up one day.

I don’t know what kind of damage Artshever suffered, but since he said he’ll lie low for a while, I should get some rest too.

「So I postponed the Imperial goodwill mission scheduled for this year to the year after next. I need to observe the situation this year. For now, childbirth is the excuse.」

「Oh, that’s a bit of a shame.」

Brother Lime spoke lightly, as if he had just changed the menu for dinner the next day, but it’s not that light of a matter.

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