Chapter 14: Presentation

A fireplace made of red bricks protruded from the wall, and above it was a decorative plate. A painting of a knight running through the winter plains was placed on the smooth stone wall. A bronze chandelier hung from the ceiling, and the rectangular table placed near the fireplace was made of bulky wood.

There were two mansions, with the royal palace located between them. And now, I found myself in the mansion on the west, Archduchess Berthold’s official residence.

I was led to a small room on the second floor. Alfina and I sat on the same side of the table and waited for the mansion’s owner to arrive.

The two of us were wearing our uniforms. We came here directly from the Academy. Fancy clothing suitable for a visit to an archduchess’s residence isn’t something which can be prepared in just one or two days. All the more so for me, since I had no plans of ever coming here again.

My underclassman was wearing a maid’s outfit and poured us some tea. It’s like I was a guest or something, though she glared at me coldly in a way that Alfina couldn’t see before leaving the room. It had enough punch to it that it made me hesitate to drink the tea she put before me, just for an instant. I didn’t really feel like a guest anymore. Well, not that I intended to be one, either.

I took a look at Alfina sitting beside me. Unlike me, she appeared to be more relaxed than usual. To her, this house is literally home. Apparently, the room across from the one four rooms down is her private room. How many rooms do they have in this mansion, anyway?

It made me want to know just how high-class the leaves in this tea, and all the ornaments in the room, are. I couldn’t tell whether they were welcoming me, at least for decorum’s sake, or telling me “this sort of shabby room is more than enough for the likes of you.”

It looked high-class enough from my perspective, but this sort of luxurious space is quite foreign to a commoner from a farming village. Even if you doubled the value of everything in the room, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. I couldn’t sense any sort of idiosyncrasies from the furniture and such, either. The unaffected and sincere atmosphere didn’t show any of the ruling lady’s tastes. In any case, I didn’t know what her motive was.

“Does it not suit your tastes? Shia prides herself on the tea she brews, so she insisted on doing so today.” My classmate placed the cup at her lips back down on the table and cocked her head.

Her elegance was on a different level from mine. Each and every one of her gestures felt natural within this room. Right, I get it now, this room is high-class. Actually, that girl really did volunteer to make this tea? Isn’t having a student of the Academy do so in spite of all the maids they must have at this mansion kind of poor taste?

“I don’t know how to behave myself in front of a grand noble. I’m nervous that I’ll end up doing something impolite.” Even though I thought that saying this to a princess was weird, I forced myself to stretch my hand towards the teacup.

However, I came to a stop before touching it upon realizing that it wasn’t sugar next to my saucer, but honey. That light tint is something that I’m greatly familiar with. I really am being welcomed here...

There’s no doubting that this archduchess is a troublesome opponent. She was far beyond prepared, and summoned me without giving me the time to prepare myself. It’s far too immature an act against some harmless commoner, isn’t it?

“There’s no need to be so nervous, Ricardo. You’re a guest here, and my aunt is quite kind.”

It must indeed be true if you claim it to be so, to you, at the very least, Your Highness.

...Crap, even the speech in my head is getting all stiff.

“Well, considering what we’ll be talking about...” I put the documents I had prepared for the presentation on the table.

“That’s certainly true. I may not be all that reliable, but I will assist you the best I can.” Alfina placed her hand atop mine, as if to comfort me.

Resorting to physical contact is cheating. She seemed even more open-minded than usual here in her home, and I felt my stiffened mind calming down... The feeling of warmth returning to my chilled fingertips is nice. And just at that moment...

“I regret that I kept you waiting.”

The door suddenly opened, and Alfina let go of my hand in a fluster. A lady entered the room, accompanied by an elderly maid and butler. Her blonde hair was tied up in a spiral and hung down over her shoulder. She held out her hand to stop us from standing up, and with rapid strides, she sat down in front of us, with the fireplace to her back.

The lady in a dress received a fan from her maid and then faced us, or more specifically, me. We just barely averted the atmosphere in the room turning to that of an impending sentence of an execution during the French Revolution.

This is the Archduchess of Berthold, Euphylia; Alfina’s guardian and aunt. I’ve heard she’s in her late thirties, but she doesn’t look to be any older than her mid-twenties.

“I thank you for coming here. First, I must offer my gratitude for taking care of my niece the other day.”

“Nothing of the sort, Your Grace. Being appointed to serve as Her Highness’s guide was far too great an honor for me.”

You’re the one who forced it on me. I managed to return her home by curfew too, so I have nothing to feel guilty about. Her eyes didn’t seem to imply that she was smiling at all, and I barked back at her in my mind. I think I’m doing pretty good for not voicing my sour grapes yet.

“Mm, my niece is a little too sheltered, you see, and I’ve been quite worried about that. I thought it would do her well to experience a little flirting.” The archduchess half-opened her fan and hid her mouth.

“Wha—?!” I was stretching my hand out towards my teacup and nearly ended up knocking it over.

“A-Auntie?!” Alfina also covered her mouth in a panic and put down her cup.

“Hm? Was that not the case? For that quiet Alfina to have a tryst while leaving me uninformed... My, how you’ve grown.”

“Your Grace. There are limits to such jests, are there not? I already have my hands full with my work and the organization of these documents I’ve brought for what I’ll be explaining today. I’ve been receiving help from Her Highness with these all this time.”

“So, how was the trip both ways in the carriage? You two were alone in there all that time, weren’t you?” Meaning, the other two carriages really were both escorts and surveillance. This much I already expected.

“I am fully aware that I am privileged just to be a classmate to Her Highness the Princess.”

Seems she’s thinking of me as an older brother anyway. Well, regardless of Alfina’s intent, the problem the archduchess is facing is probably what my intent is.

“Hmmm. In that eccentric’s letter of recommendation, he wrote that you’re a brazen youngster who places not an ounce of worth in social status, you know?”

That old fart. Is this supposed to be a perfect letter of recommendation? I don’t appreciate you putting my life on the line because you think it’s funny, dammit.

“Besides, Alfina herself is surely delighted to not be treated as a princess, aren’t you now?”

“Th-That’s because... I’m thankful to Ricardo for properly listening to my story without worrying about my status...” Alfina’s cheeks turned red. This was bad. The people around me were all joining forces to testify against my true nature.

“I was approached by Her Highness for my knowledge regarding the disaster in her attempt to fulfill her duty as the Oracle Princess. Director Fulsig and I just happened to possess the relevant knowledge. That’s all.”

“Hmm, and the reason you divulged this knowledge for no compensation?”

“The disaster that I’m about to explain to you, Your Grace, is to befall a region of great importance to our company. For a small company like ours which could be blown away by the wind, losing a single business partner could affect our very existence.”

I opened the lid on the jar of honey, scooped up a full spoon, and mixed it into my cup. I never planned to pretend it was out of any sort of loyalty to the princess, nor out of friendship for a classmate. Thinking of the difference of what we were responsible for between myself and this woman, there’s no way she would trust me if I did. I would never trust someone like that, at least.

“So you say it is purely for your own interests?”

“Yes. And just this once, I do believe that my interests are in line with yours, Your Grace. As well as quite a few others.” I emphasized my own interests, as well as the interests of the lady of Berthold. This is the one point I’m capable of boldly advocating. Not because it’s just, but simply because it’s true.

“You’ve grown bold.”

“I am naught but a simple student. I can’t run counter to what my teacher said in the letter of recommendation.” I shifted the responsibility over to my referrer.

“Very well, let’s move on to the main topic. This is about the danger that encroaches upon my territory, correct? Alfina’s prophecy. A disaster will actually break out from the west. I understand that this is your claim, but a monster flood is truly difficult to consider.”

Euphylia corrected her posture. The mask of an aunt teasing her niece had vanished. Well, I guess that’s how it goes. The possibility of me being a danger to her niece is perhaps the greatest scale to measure whether or not the upcoming topic can be trusted.

“Then I will begin by explaining the details of how we arrived at such a conclusion. I leave the decision of what is to be done after that to you, Your Grace.”

“Naturally, I intend to do just that. A crisis to my land, and ultimately the Kingdom, cannot possibly be left to the words of a single youngster.”

The archduchess squinted her eyes and her gaze grew sharper. I suppose this was the intimidating air of a sovereign. The atmosphere of those who carry the burden of the lives of thousands upon thousands in their everyday routine. And this fact was felt by me, who had never once, even in the other world, sat face to face with such a person before.

It’s finally time for the main stage. But a negotiation is exactly what I want. That’s because I hold the important information that she requires, and she possesses what I need. Regardless of the gap in our social status, our current relationship can be simplified to the fate of the nation, and the lives of the people. In other words, what’s about to begin here is a business negotiation. That’s just perfect for a merchant. And as I forcefully deceived myself into believing that, I opened the map I’d brought along with me.

“First, we began with constraining the potential regions where the disaster that Princess Alfina was shown by the crystal could occur, by analyzing the geography and customs of the land based on the image she saw. In conclusion, we assessed that it will occur on the western border of the Kingdom, in Reylia village. This fact has been confirmed by Princess Alfina herself upon her visit to the village.”

I emphasized Alfina’s role in this and its point as our primary piece of information. The archduchess looked at her niece, and Alfina nodded back firmly. After confirming that the archduchess’s gaze was once more on me, I continued my explanation.

I went on with how we narrowed down the list of potential disasters, our hypothesis of a monster flood, our discussion with the specialist Fulsig, and the experiment we ran to verify it. I brought attention to each logical step as a single point, and interposed the basis for what we did and our conclusion between each one.

A sandwich of information. It makes it easy to digest in a short time. The more capable the person, the more they will harbor distrust when there is too much of a gap between the basis and the conclusion.

I stopped at each spare moment to observe her reaction. The archduchess had her fan covering her mouth, making her expression unreadable. About the only visible reaction was her brow raising ever so slightly at the graphs of precipitation and crop yields that Mia put together.

“And finally, these are the records of mana fluctuations taken using annual tree rings during the monster floods in the east. And these...” I pulled out the most important document. “...are the records of mana fluctuations in the west over the past few years taken using the same method.”

I lined up the two graphs Mia made and paused right there. I’ll leave the conclusion to her. If this was a competition between merchandise—in other words, if the person before me were the guest and judge—I couldn’t be the one to make the conclusion. That wasn’t where we were going with this, though. This wasn’t a matter of selecting one of multiple goods. This was an exclusive item that only we could provide. Meaning there were only two choices: to buy it, or not to buy it.

Euphylia put down her fan and looked at the documents I laid before her. Silence filled the room.

“Auntie, Ricardo can be trus—”

“What’s your opinion of prophecies?” The archduchess once more picked up her fan and held back her niece. An unexpected question. “Putting it bluntly, do you believe in that which we call prophecies?”

“Auntie, I really did see...”

“No, I don’t believe in them.”

“...Ricardo?!”

I dared to say it. This wasn’t a lie. Even after confirming this much, I still couldn’t imagine the mechanism to make it possible to predict the future. That was exactly why I put all my strength into changing the prophecy into a forecast.

“I see. Honestly speaking, at least the last three Oracle Princesses were unable to see anything from the crystal. The prophecies, you see, were simply created similarly to what you did here, by observing the rainfall. We have records of the volume of water in the rivers of every region, after all. There are two regions where we receive such reports in my territory as well. Of course, our methods were not as strict as your analysis, though.”

Euphylia looked at the line graph displaying the precipitation and crop yields, then to the scatter plot which showed its normal distribution.

“Incidentally, our original plan for the prophecy was to announce the same yield as last year across the nation, including the west.”

“But Auntie, in the years where a monster flood was to occur in the east, wouldn’t the prophecy be wrong?”

“There are some differences from the calculations you’ve just shown me, but they aren’t all that big. Who are you saying will complain if the harvest is just a little more bountiful?”

It was clear as day that she was treating the prophecies as a farce, even in front of Alfina. The fact that there was a trick behind it is actually quite admirable, to me at least.

“This is not that manner of farce, by the way. Just as I explained, this is a pure forecast. In other words, this isn’t about whether or not the disaster in the prophecy will occur. This is a forecast of whether a monster flood will occur in the west. This is what I’d like you to make a decision on, Your Grace.”

After coming this far, I did in fact have no choice but to believe that the image of the future that Alfina was shown by the crystal did in fact exist. That was the source of an entirely different problem, but that could be set to the side for now. As the guardian of this adopted girl of the royal family who had been placed in such a precarious position, it was surely something this woman before me had given much more thought.

“‘Omens of a monster flood from the western mountain range have been shown. Decide on how you will deal with this, as the representative of the feudal lords of the west.’ That’s what you want to say, right? I see, you truly are a brazen youngster,” the Archduchess said, as she tapped the grip of her fan with her finger. “What are the expected casualties?”

“We made our calculations based on the monster floods in the east that were not suppressed before they began. In the case of a small-scale monster flood in the east, there are examples of grausams encroaching from the Loewer Wald over here... to about here. Over ten villages fell prey to these attacks. Even if we assume that a flood of the same scale will occur, villages that exist within this same range to the west surpass 25 in count. There’s never been precedence for a monster flood there, after all. Also, in the case of a larger flood, I cannot deny the possibility of it reaching all the way to Berthold. Setting aside Berthold itself, protected by its walls as it is, the surrounding villages surely won’t get by unscathed.”

The important point in negotiations with a large organization is to emphasize the interests of the negotiator. That’s because their interests are not necessarily the same as those of the organization as a whole. A negotiator is simply but a representative of a single part of the organization, even if they’re at the very top. This also works in the extreme case of dealing with a completely impartial eccentric. Such negotiators would surely extrapolate the interests of everyone all on their own.

“It would be no exaggeration to claim that it will affect the entire region. Without the food in the surrounding area, Berthold won’t survive either.”

In this world, the transport of goods took a lot of time and labor. It was different from Japan, where food can be imported from across the ocean. With just a little too much distance, even if there was an abundant harvest elsewhere, a city could easily starve out before anything could be done.

The reason the Kingdom didn’t have many records of starvation isn’t just because there were many fields, but because of the stability. As for the reason why agricultural trade with the Empire was managed by the state, that was because it had to be handled on a national scale, taking every region into consideration. My belief on this, though, was that merchants exist precisely for the point in time where such stability is lost.

But still, how did I end up getting directly involved in all this...?

“Then, my next question...” The archduchess placed her fan on the table, and began asking about the necessary scale of the knights to dispatch, the types of monsters that would appear, and other such questions. I answered each one using what I’d heard from Fulsig beforehand as a basis. There were, of course, multiple points that I wasn’t certain of.

“And that’s all the information I possess.” I delivered the general framework of all the information I brought with me, and the presentation came to an end.

“...Hmm.” The archduchess once more picked up the fan she put down on the table. Two gulps could be heard resounding in the air. “Very well. I shall take charge of this conclusion. Of course, I’ll have the Kingdom cooperate and take action as well.”

“Thank you so much, Auntie!”

“Thank you very much, Your Grace.”

Alfina raised her voice in joy, and I honestly bowed my head. It truly was a relief. Now I just need to go home...

“My nerves ran cold when you went wild during the Spring Festival, but you’ve really hung in there, Alfina. Not lending you my ear was truly ignorant of me.” The aunt spread open her fan and praised her niece. Mhm, she really did hang in there.

“That’s not really... This is all due to Ricardo’s guidance.” My self-preservation alarm started clanging over my classmate’s overestimation of me.

“Nothing of the sort. You were the one to disregard your position and attempt to fulfill your duty, Princess Alfina. And the theory to predict a monster flood is the result of the long years of research that the dire—”

“Oh yes, that’s our remaining problem.” The sound of a closing fan cut me off. “I understand full well what you’ve said to me. However, just how did a fifteen or sixteen-year-old commoner come up with this? That’s what I’m completely unable to understand.” The grand noble put the tip of her fan against her temple and shook her head.

Well... I guess that’s about right. That’s an inevitable problem. I mean, it’s the kind of problem that comes with being able to make a presentation that can move an archduchess.