The next morning after the messenger from my father came, the commanders gathered at the headquarters. We have breakfast with the Duke while giving our own report to the duke.

“There was a battle near the capital. Apparently, our kingdom’s army was victorious. I will share the details while we are eating.”

Duke, can you stop dropping that kind of bomb!? Look what you’ve done! Everyone is so surprised that they are leaning forward like that!

Well, we can’t be surprised for long. The duke immediately asked for the regular reports, so Viscount Kauffeldt gave his report on the situation around the camp. Perhaps being really curious about the duke ‘bomb’ everyone seems to be more high-spirited than ever. Well, obviously this will happen.

By the way, my report is about the demand of refugees. Not all of them though. Since If I listened to all demands both my mind and the army’s goods stock won’t be able to handle it.

Some people told me their demands with expressions that seemed to say ‘You will definitely listen to my words, right?’ They might feel that they told their demand in a one-on-one conversation with me but for me, I was forced to listen to the demand of several people.

Well, no matter how earnestly they told me what they wanted, the arm didn’t have any capacity to grant all their wishes. Talking to the refugees about their demands made me feel about how humans are creatures that think that they themselves were the most special.

After everyone finished giving their report, breakfast finally was brought in. Today’s breakfast is the usual something similar to bread that was created by baked wheat, and somewhat salty soup. We also have cheese here. As for the drink, it’s diluted vinegar.

Every one of these foods is made with the intention to preserve them for a long time. The soup is salty because there’s pickled dried meat in it, and the vinegar will take a longer time to spoil compared to water. Well, normal alcohol will also take a longer time to spoil compared to water but we can’t have the commanders drunk.

Sometimes, the breakfast will also include dried fruits but today there’s no dried fruit. Well, we will reach the capital in a few days so that’s not a problem.

“After being victorious, did His Highness lead his army to retake the Veritza Fortress?”

“He did.”

After listening to the duke’s explanation, Baron Kretschmer asked a question to confirm the situation. The Baron seems to regret the fact that he was unable to participate in the battle. Well, I guess he really is a military man.

I’m also surprised when I heard that after His Highness exterminated the enemy, he went to attack the Veritza Fortress. But I understand his reasoning. Especially from the military standpoint.

If it is to protect the capital, both the military faction and the civil faction have no other choice but to lend their soldiers, but to retake the fortress? That’s a different matter. If His Highness chooses to disband the army after succeeding in the battle to protect the capital, then create another new army to retake the fortress later on, then there will be some people who disagree with creating an army to retake the fortress. The mission to retake the fortress will become more of a political problem, rather than a military one

But currently, the army has just achieved a great victory and due to His Highness’s extermination order, the number of enemy forces has decreased significantly. The kingdom army’s morale is also sky high due to the victory. Compared to that, the enemy’s number and morale are at rock bottom. I understand that currently is the best time to try to retake the fortress.

Still, His Highness sure is going all out… while I’m thinking like that, the Duke shoots me a strange look. Why?

“Right. I heard it was Mazell-kun that killed the enemy’s commander.”

I almost sprayed my soup. Looking at me like that, the duke’s eyes are laughing. Ah, he’s doing it on purpose.

“Ah, that hero?”

“Just like last time, he got another great achievement.”

While hearing the conversation between Count Engelbert and Viscount Kauffeldt, I became more curious about another matter.

According to the Duke, the battle happened 3 days after the merchant corps returned from the capital. I only got the information about the merchant corps’ safe return last night, but the Duke got the information about the battle just 1 day after the battle was finished. It might be because the information about the battle is higher in priority compared to my information about the merchant corps, still, both pieces of information took time to reach us. In the future, this kind of time lag between the incident and the information might also happen.

Plus in the future when the influence of the demon army has strengthened, it might be even more dangerous for the messenger to use the highway to relay information since unlike the capital and the palace, the highway didn’t have any anti-demon barrier. It might come to the point where it becomes dangerous for even a knight to use the highway.

Killing the enemy’s messenger to disrupt their flow of information is something that often happens even in battles between humans. In the battle against the demon army, this can be done semi-automatically as the demons will just attack all humans, including the messenger, on sight. If we didn’t have any way to maintain the flow of information, wouldn’t we lose the momentum of the battle against the demon?

Since the reason Triot didn’t make an appearance in the game is that it was destroyed by the devils, it might be safe to assume that other towns and countries that didn’t appear in the game were also destroyed. If this is true, then information becomes more and more important.

A simple solution like making a signal fire can’t be used to fix the problem in information flow. I mean if a signal fire is used outside of a town, then the wandering demons might attack it. That means the kingdom needs to have soldiers guard the signal fire to keep it safe. But that would be a waste of our soldiers. The problem with using signal fire is that in the war with demons we don’t know when demons will attack us.

Even if that item existed in the game, there’s no money to buy it. Or rather, that item isn’t sold out in the game but realistically speaking that kind of useful item might be sold out in reality. I don’t know.

I didn’t notice the Duke’s gaze on me while I was lost in my thoughts. I feel like I need to fix my habit of being lost in my thoughts.

♦

In the end, it took us a few days after that breakfast with the Duke to arrive at the capital. When we arrived at the capital, we headed the refugees to another person that’s in charge of helping the refugees in the capital, and the job was finished. At least, for now.

Thinking about the mountain of jobs that the person needs to complete after being put in charge of the refugees in the capital does make me feel sympathy, but I don’t have the authority to do anything about it and I also don’t want to invite trouble to myself by helping.

I mean I’m still swamped with my own work. I need to give the payment to the scouts and adventurers that I hired, need to make a list of goods used on our journey, and need to make a chart based on the appearance rates of demons on our journey. Part of my job is helped by Father and Father’s butler, Norbert.

By the way, since I went on the refugees’ mission on behalf of my father, I used the office next to my father’s office in the palace to finish my work. Since I’m working in the palace, I’m wearing formal attire. The office I’m currently using is originally meant for my father’s aide. Though technically as a vice-count, I am father’s aide.

If it’s work regarding the county then I can do it in the mansion, but since this time it’s military work given to me by the royal family, I need to finish it in the palace. Since I included The money used to hire the adventurers and the mercenaries in the budget plan I gave to the kingdom, it will be paid by the kingdom, so it’s considered a government expenditure. But the additional reward for the adventurers will be paid privately.

The most troublesome thing about this is to get the balance between the expenditure and the money the kingdom gave us. It’s going to be a problem if later on, people said I took some money for myself.

As I’m groaning while keeping my feather pen running, I received a message from my father’s secretary that my father called me. The secretary looks old, but I guess since he’s the secretary of the Minister of Ceremonies he needs to be an experienced person. I probably still have a lot of mistakes in the budget report but I just went to Father’s office next door first.

I entered the office after giving a bow. As I’m technically Father’s aide right now, I need to keep my manner as a noble. Father looked at me with a bitter smile and said, “I want you to command some people again tomorrow.”

“Father, you do know I’m still a student, right?”

I tried to refuse this sudden job, but I’m pretty sure it’s useless. That’s the downside of having peerage. When nothing is happening, nobles with peerage can receive money without doing anything but once an incident happens, we will be really busy since the kingdom will use our ability to the limit.

Still, judging by Father’s expression, I don’t think it’s a big incident this time.

“I understand your meaning, but this time you will be able to watch a quite interesting thing from a special seat up front.”

“Special seats?”

“We succeeded in retaking the Veritza Fortress.”

Woah, as expected of His Highness.

“I heard it was Mazell-kun that defeated the enemy’s general, Dreax.”

“Whoah…”

This time I let out the voice. But now that I think about it, I don’t know if the fact that it was Mazell that defeated Dreax, the big boss of the Veritza Fortress, is a coincidence or the game’s correction.

“His Majesty said that we need someone to control the citizens’ excitement in the triumphant return of our army.”

“So my job is to prevent an accident from occurring when the army returns. I understand.”

Neither I nor my father knows that at this time, the citizens are already excited when they heard the news of the army’s triumphant return. This is all the fault of the messenger. I know that you’re excited about the fact that we won, but can’t you keep your mouth shut!!??

“The person in charge for tomorrow is COunt Engelbert, so listen to the Count’s order. I will prepare what you need.”

“Understood.”

I bowed. Thus, I’ve accepted the royal decree via my father. I need to increase my speed in finishing the documents.

Well, since it’s my friend Mazell’s return even without this job I will welcome him. Since It will be hard to publicly welcome him tomorrow, I want to finish these documents as quickly as possible to meet him after the return ceremony.

♦

T/N: What happened after this, you can read it in the first chapter. Also we will be editing the old chapters from now.

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