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“Margrave Baumeister, you must admit you made quite an astounding career. It hasn’t been that long ago when I referred this mansion to you. Seriously, successful people are a totally different breed of people.”
“(Wend-kun, who’s this shady man?)”
“(He’s a real estate agent)”
“(Are we really going to be okay with this guy?)”
“(He does look pretty shady, but he’s the person who set us up with out mansion in the capital, so…he does look super fishy though…)”
“(Given that he does his work properly…I think his appearance is clearly working against him)”
“(Well, his appearance, speech and conduct…)”
After becoming a Margrave, it became necessary for me to possess a bigger residence in the capital. I acquired the mansion I was currently using during my time as appointed Baron and thus it was too small for my current station. Personally I didn’t really mind either way, but everyone was telling me so.
It’s true that the number of retainers and servants, permanently staying at the mansion, had increased, compared to the past. Above all, the biggest reason seemed to lie in avoiding to be looked down upon by nobles, who visited my mansion in the capital.
Roderich told me that the other nobles would mock me, saying stuff like 『Such a small mansion despite being a Margrave…』 or 『He’s probably poor as Margrave in name only, seeing how he can’t even arrange for a decent mansion…』.
It was bad for nobles…and especially high-ranking nobles to be treated with contempt. Accordingly I needed a mansion that fit my rank.
What a major pain in the ass.
With that said, I’ve come to the capital today to check out a new place. Roderich allowed me to take off from work for that reason…but then again, this is work as well…
Me thinking that I’d rather focus on developing the Savage Lands with my magic might be a sign of me still being unable to escape the mindset of a corporate slave.
Either way, currently I’m at my mansion in the capital, and when we’re speaking about looking at such properties, the name Rinnenheim immediately cropped up in my mind. After arranging a meeting with him, we joined up in front of my mansion.
He looked as shady as usual. At the moment, his son is running a real estate agency in Baulburg. Thanks to that I also learned that his flashy outfit and the glasses were part of the reason why he had risen to such success within one generation.
Even Amalie-san, who was seeing him for the first time today, felt that he was a shady guy, but that’s nothing unusual with this man.
“Elise-sama, allow me to congratulate you on your safe childbirth. Cardinal Hohenheim-sama has also requested from me to arrange for a suitable mansion for you and your family, yes.”
Apparently a fire has been lit under Cardinal Hohenheim, the great-grandfather of my heir Friedrich, after Friedrich’s birth.
“Erwin-sama, I hear you have had a successful life thus far as well. If you require a second residence or a secret refuge, please get back to me at any time.”
“Ahaha…as of now I don’t really think I need any of that…”
Erw warded off Rinnenheim’s sales pitch with an ambiguous smile. Because Elise and Amalie-san were right next to him.
I hear it often happens that chief retainers of high-ranking nobles prepare second residences in the capital or rent secret refuge as estates where they allow the women, whom they got close to, to live. When it came to being appointed to the capital, many of the retainers of high-ranking nobles desired the available spots.
Contrary to his appearance, Rinnenheim was a tight-lipped guy. Referring to such properties was part of his business and his close connection with the church also meant that he likely referred such properties to priests, too.
Though it was something we could never tell a serious girl like Elise.
“Margrave Baumeister-sama, you must be busy, so let us go and take a look at the potential candidates right away.”
“I don’t mind that, but is there anything actually available? I heard there’s a severe lack of free properties in the capital right now.”
It’s so bad that it even reached my ears as someone who has nothing to do with real estate. With the Helmut Kingdom developing rapidly at the moment, the lack of mansions keeps getting worse. Due to the economic growth coming with the development, there’s quite a few nobles who are trying to move to a bigger mansion after rising in rank.
“The Upper Noble District is already full and there’s plans to rework a part of the Lower Noble District to expand it, right? They say the number of low-ranking nobles is increasing and their mansions are going to be built anew in the section where the wealthy commoners are living.”
Since the nobles don’t work, if they don’t live near the palace, they’re naturally being pushed out after being unable to secure a mansion. However, this world’s public works level is lower than that of Earth, so you cannot expect for the shortage in mansions to be resolved anytime soon.
Baron Rembrandt, you ask?
He possesses a skill that allows him to relocate buildings, so if buildings suitable to serve as mansions of high-ranking nobles don’t exist, his ability is meaningless. As such, the problem won#t be resolved, unless many of such buildings are erected in the capital.
There exists another method, but…
“Elise and the church have already handled most of the purifications for the cursed properties, no?”
Because the shortage in mansions was so grave, the church finally got off its butt. Having said that, the church called Elise in to purify a property, if they couldn’t handle it themselves.
Given that Elise’s mana capacity had risen after marrying me, they seemed to have relied on her quite a lot.
“With Cardinal Hohenheim-sama standing at the front of the priest corps, the church performed a major purification campaign in the Upper and Lower Noble Districts with Elise-sama helping out, so 『most of the properties were done』. I hear only a few extremely troublesome properties remain.”
“I had such a hunch.”
“Me too, Erw.”
In other words, the properties, which the church could purify alongside Elise, have been sold to new owners a good while ago. Now I only had the choice of obtaining a big mansion by purifying the problematic cases myself.
“Properties even Elise-san couldn’t purify…is this going to be alright?”
It’s only natural for Amalie-san to be worried. Those are all properties terrible enough that even Elise couldn’t purify. It’s logical for them to be regarded as more than dangerous.
“And that’s where you come in! If you, Margrave Baumeister-sama, and Elise-sama cooperate, you might be able to purify the cursed properties said to be part of Helmut Kingdom’s dark side, the client said.”
“Client? It’s not Cardinal Hohenheim?”
“Isn’t it my great-grandfather?”
“Well, no. Seeing how they’re dangerous enough to justify a sealing, the Kingdom#s government is currently possessing the ownership and accountability…”
Rinnenheim was unusually unclear towards the end of his reply to Elise and me.
“It’s scheduled for us to meet up with the client on-site, so let us be off then?”
“Is it okay, Wend?”
“We won’t undertake it, if it looks like the property cannot be purified.”
I’m not a man who will bet his own life over material possessions. And I’m definitely not willing to pay for a failure with my life.
“Client, you say…is it a very important person?”
“Yes. Otherwise we wouldn’t be allowed to enter properties belonging to the royal family after getting sealed away,” answered Rinnenheim to Amalie-sam while walking through the Upper Noble District.
After some time we arrived at an area located on the other side of the royal palace.
“I’ve never heard anything about this area here… Hmmmm…”
“Dear, the air here is stuffy and sinister.”
Performing a search with 『Detection』, I quickly felt a luxurious mansion with a clearly dangerous atmosphere. Even from a slightly distant place, similar presences could be felt in several locations.
Maybe because no humans have lived there for many years, the mansion’s walls and gate were overgrown with vines, making any visitor experience a gloomy atmosphere. And in front of that mansion…
“Yo, Wendelin. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Your Highness?”
For some reason His Highness stood together with very few attendants in front of the sealed mansion.
“Your Highness..why?”
“This is unexpected…”
“Rinnenheim, listen…”
“Erwin-sama, I didn’t anticipate this either. Margrave Hohenheim-samawould have been surprised as well. Usually, a noble in charge of this place would show up.”
Figures.
No matter how many sealed mansions you manage as chief executive, it’ll become impossible for the people to do their other jobs normally, if His Highness shows up every time.
“I just had some free time by chance. Besides, hearing that my friend Wendelin would be looking for a new mansion, I rushed here without even bringing a sword or shield with me.
“That’s…we’re extremely lucky…”
If possible, I want to leave him back here.
“(I’m innocent)”
Watching Rinnenheim insisting on his innocence while being unusually flustered, we exchanged looks, deciding to finish this job as quickly as possible.
＊ ＊ ＊
“This here is the first candidate. It’s the former mansion of Duke Brüver.”
“I heard the Duke Brüver family has already gone extinct…”
“As expected of you, Elise-sama. You’re very well-informed. However, although they have officially gone extinct after the sudden death of the family head, the real reason is something else. As a matter of fact, it seems like they were conspiring against the Kingdom while meeting with collaborators inside the mansion. Then again, it appears the Kingdom found out about their plot early on. The royal army then raided this place, where they had gathered, and killed all of them.”
“I ended up hearing about the Kingdom’s dark history, which I didn’t want to know…”
“True…”
Rinnenheim immediately returned to his usual mode. Since he wouldn’t be able to do his job while being flustered all the time, I’m sure it’s good like this.
He immediately explained the reason why this mansion turned into a cursed property, but to be honest, I’d have been better off to not know about it all.
“Rebels, eh…?”
“It’s something from fifty years ago. Since it has stood here for many years after the ceasefire with the Empire, people earnestly looked for evidence to prove that those people were plotting a rebellion, but in the end they didn’t find anything.
“No matter the reason, they wouldn’t be able to announce the real reasons anyway…”
After listening to His highness’s explanation, Erw clearly looked as if he didn’t want to know any of this. Obviously, we felt the same way.
Planning a rebellion after accepting the Empire’s invitation, huh?
People depending on illegal drugs would try to start a reckless rebellion after losing their normal judgment. If anything, they must have hesitated to make the official announcement.
“Do you believe that the evil spirits of those, who were arrested by the royal army, are gathering in the mansion, trying to scheme a rebellion against the Kingdom?”
“Back then more than a hundred were killed, I heard. It must have been a very gruesome battlefield.”
“Your Highness, do you wish to keep the mansion’s interior design as it is?”
If everything goes as Amalie-san has been predicting, it will become much harder to enter the mansion’s audience hall.
Mmh, everyone should have a similar opinion.
“Since it’s officially a sudden death, they cannot afford to not hold a funeral. It doesn’t mean that dead bodies are still left inside the mansion.”
“That’s good to hear,” I felt relieved for the time being when His Highness announced this.
But…
“However…”
“What is it?”
“The royal army swarmed into the mansion when they found out about the conspiracy, turning the great hall into a crimson mess full of ghastly slaughter. No matter how often attendants tried to clean it away, blood was still sticking to the floor and walls. But, it should be fine with a proper purification.”
“(Hey, Wend, wouldn’t it be better to decline this job?)”
Erw, if I could do that, I’d have done so long ago. Besides, once the purification finishes, the blood stains on the walls and floor should disappear. Let’s finish our job here as soon as possible.
“(Wend-kun, are you going to use the purified mansion? I don’t mind either way, but…)”
“(There are many other houses after all)”
I asserted to Amalie-san that we should go to the other candidates.
“(But, it’s not just this mansion with such a background…)”
“(…)”
Let’s think about that later. In the worst case, I just need to build the mansion back up with the power of my money.
＊ ＊ ＊
“I sHaLL oBTaIn tHe hElMUt KiNgDOm! tHe tIMe iS riPE! tHIs dRuG iS gOInG to wORK….”
“I wiLL bECoMe a mInIsTEr! Uhehehehe…”
“i’M tHe fUTurE prIMe MiNisTER! sO nICe───!”
The mansion has been strictly sealed off, but it seemed like the evil spirits appeared only in the big hall. Then again, if you didn’t go through that hall, you wouldn’t be able to climb to the second floor further in, so it didn’t change the fact that the mansion remained unusable as long as you didn’t purify it properly.
Still, the spirits’ conversation…umm…those have been sealed away.
“A conspiracy? This?”
“Erwin, they have always been conspiring in this hall ever since becoming evil spirits. But, their conspiracies are all over the place. They’re doing it while taking something. Anyway, you don’t have to worry about it.”
“””””Okay…”””””
Seeing how His Highness said that we don’t need to mind it, they must simply be high by nature…yep, I’m sure that must be it.
“They’re just shouting out their own desires.”
“Indeed.”
The evil spirits haunting the great hall only were Duke Brüver and those under him, whose sanity could be doubted. It’s probably true that they’ve become addicted to an illegal drug.
“After becoming drug addicts, they were subjugated as they plotted their little rebellion while being completely delusional. People with weak wills and minds will always appear in fixed numbers, even among those of high status.”
Were they crushed by the pressure?
Given that ducal families would only become a hindrance for the rule of the royal family, they won’t be given land and many of them are basically treated like useless baggage. Maybe the stress induced by that state broke their mental stability.
“I must be careful too.”
“Wend, I think you’ll be okay.”
“No, you never know. If Roderich doesn’t lower my workload and increase my days off, I might become sick as well one day.”
Because I’m not used to being a noble as a former commoner, I must be more careful than anyone else.
“You’re doing pretty much whatever you want, so I believe you’ll be just fine…”
“We and Amalie-san are here so that this doesn’t happen, after all.”
So my mental balance won’t be broken because Erw, Elise, and Amalie-san are here for me?
“Besides, am I not with you as well?”
“That’s…right…”
And for some reason, His Highness did a mysterious appeal for himself as well here.
No, umm…as a former commoner, I don’t want to have to do much with the people of the Kingdom’s upper echelon such as the crown prince…
“Margrave Baumeister-sama, Elise-sama, what do you think?”
“I think it should be alright if we purify this place together.”
“I also believe that it will be fine.”
We decided to start the purification at once to not waste any time.
“However, we can only see a big number of wraiths here…”
I don’t understand why Elise wasn’t enough to purify those by herself. If she got help from the church, it should have been easy for her…
“Dear, the wraiths of Duke Brüver and his subordinates keep respawning for some reason. So I couldn’t purify them.”
Even Elise doesn’t understand it?
“I wonder how that works?”
“There have been various opinions among the church members, but so far we haven’t found out the reason. It’s quite difficult to purify more than a hundred wraiths all at once without any time difference.”
“Without you here, the amount of mana won’t be enough, Margrave Baumeister-sama,” Rinnenheim added to Elise’s explanation.
“The amount of mana, huh…? How about purifying them while supplying the missing mana with magic crystals?”
“If you use that method, inconsistencies in the purification will pop up, so it won’t work well.”
When erasing more than a hundred wraiths at once by using 『Holy Light』, inconsistencies in the distribution of the released mana, which would be provided by the magic crystals, will naturally appear, causing a delay in the extinction of the wraiths.
Normally it won’t matter when purifying a swarm of wraiths, but in the case of Duke Brüver and his friends, it’ll lead to a failure of the purification, I suppose.
“Accurately purifying more than a hundred of them at the same time…”
“Dear, let us make sure to match our timing perfectly.”
“We also need to the minutely set the effective range of the 『Holy Light』 and activate the spell uniformly. The slightest disturbance will result in a failure.”
“Yes.”
If there’s even one wraith, who survives the 『Holy Light』 because it’s too weak, all the other wraiths, who should have vanished, will respawn from that one spirit.
With things like this, even Cardinal Hohenheim found it impossible to make Elise exorcise them. The hurdle of the mana amount and ability would be way too high for her alone.
“Accordingly, please show us your love by working together with Elise-sama, Margrave Baumeister-sama.”
That blasted Rinnenheim…now he sure is good at sweet-talking others…
“Wendelin, your mana capacity is still continuing to grow. It might have been impossible a few years ago, but now it should be well within the range of your abilities.”
“(I don’t understand why His Highness is so sure about this)”
“(Yeah. Me neither…)”
Did he get the information about my mana capacity still growing from Doushi?
I ended up reflexively agreeing with Erw, but if it fails after actually trying it, even His Highness will likely give up on the idea.
Elise and grabbed each other hand and released a 『Holy Light』 that engulfed the entirety of the great hall, at once pumping a huge amount of mana into the spell.
“mY bODy…mY tHrONe! giVE mE MOre dRuGS!”
“I wANTeD tO beCOmE a mInIStEr───! tHe dRuG tOoO───!”
“i wOn’T gIVe up! PrIMe mInIsTEr───! GiVE mE mORe dRUgs───!”
It seems like it went well.At once all the wraiths vanished thanks to the 『Holy Light』 released by Elise and me. As soon as they were all completely gone, silence fell upon the great hall.
They were wailing about getting more drugs, but this has nothing to do with it.
“Wend, is it over?”
“I don’t get any responses from 『Detection』, so it’s fine. Elise.”
“Yes.”
Just for caution’s sake, the two of us wrapped up the whole mansion with 『Holy Light』 to make sure that not a single wraith escaped the purification.
“This should wrap it up.”
“As expected, it was an outstanding performance. You’re wonderful as a couple.”
“Thank you.”
Elise honestly praised Rinneheim, but I didn’t show any openings. After all, he didn’t mention a single time that this would be the only flawed property.
“Leaving aside its history, it’s a nice mansion. Since it used to belong to a ducal family, I doubt there’s any problem with its size either.”
Amalie-san’s official status is that of a head maid, so does she also want to study knowledge in that direction? I mean, I don’t have a clue whether this place is suited for the Margrave Baumeister House.
“Above all, it’s close to the royal palace. Wendelin, you’re a key figure of the Kingdom, so it’s best for your mansion to be as close to the palace as possible. After all, we’re relatives now.”
“”””……””””
Why is he stressing that part…?
“If that’s the case, a mansion closer to the palace would be alright as well. As a matter of fact, I do have a property in mind. Though it requires purification.”
“Oh, what a surprise…”
Rinnenheim had been quite shaken by His Highness’s sudden participation in our housing tour, but he immediately went back to normal, pushing the troublesome purifications on Elise and I.
Why are we not refusing him, you ask? Is that obviously because His Highness is right next to us?
＊ ＊ ＊
“The other cases only had strong grudges going for them. That’s great since they returned to being simple residences once we purified them with a powerful 『Holy Light』.”
“True. For us two to be able to purify such strong wraiths, if we do it together, was quite unexpected.”
“That’s nice and all, but Amalie-san and I…”
“The Kingdom’s darkness is now gone.”
“Erwin-sama, Amalie-sama, just now the Kingdom’s darkness disappeared.”
“(Wend, this person has great personality after all, doesn’t he?)”
And just like that we finished the purification of all the flawed properties managed by the Kingdom’s government after the church gave up on them.
Elise and I have used up most of our mana, even going as far as using many of the magic crystals in my magic bag.
Tonight we have to stay over at the capital.
“Wendelin, Elise, feel free to stay at the palace. You purified all of the Kingdom’s flawed properties. So, it’s only natural to offer you at least that much hospitality.”
“”……””
Staying at the royal palace, huh…? It makes me nervous, but it’s not like I can simply turn down His Highness’s invitation either.
“It’s also necessary for us to decide on which residence to pick.”
“Oh, right!”
We came here to look for a new mansion. I guess we’re going to choose one of the places we purified earlier.
“(Choosing from those properties, eh…?)”
“(The owner of the first was killed by the royal army after becoming a drug addict and trying to start a rebellion. The next one turned into a slaughterer who killed all the people in the mansion, be it retainers or family, after suddenly experiencing a change in his mental state. The next one abducted children, locked them up in the basement, and tortured them there, but then suddenly died after the Kingdom found out about it. No matter how you look at it, not a single residence has a decent track record. Personally I’d prefer to not live there).”
“(I’d hate it as well, but…)”
I could only agree with Erw, who didn’t want to live in a place where such atrocities happened in the past.
“Freely choose whatever residence you prefer.”
And then there’s His Highness Wald who hasn’t noticed any of it.
We can receive one of the big mansions for free as payment for the purifications, but the past of all of them is just too terrible.
Having said that, we cannot afford to turn this offer down. That’s also the reason why Elise and Amalie-san don’t look overly happy either.
“(Elise, we can’t trade or resale the residence after getting it, can we?)”
“(That’s impossible)”
Figures…
It’d be a complete affront to His Highness.
“(Wend-kun, I feel like I can understand why His Highness has no friends…)”
“(Hahaha…)”
He’s probably a master at fruitlessly pushing his good intentions on others. Anyway, I have to somehow dodge this bullet.
Just when I entered the royal palace while thinking so, several elderly nobles awaited us. Going by their appearances, they seem to be high-ranking nobles beyond the rank of Marquis.
“Duke Dorant, do you have any business with me?”
“Duke Dorant?”
This person is a duke? Certainly, now that he mentioned it, I guess I can feel such an air from him.
“(Duke Dorant is royalty, but when it comes to ducal families, his is relatively new. Having said that, it’s still a story from forty years ago…)”
“(Hoh, I see. He must have achieved something great then)”
Otherwise, he wouldn’t become a duke so easily, regardless of him being royalty or not. Also, for something from forty years ago to be treated as new…
“(No, we always have an excess of royals. Since we had no other choice, we simply made a new ducal family)”
Given that there are many leftover royals, the number of ducal families was growing, Rinnenheim told me. But it’s quite a blunt way of dealing with royals.
“(The Duke Brüver family was discontinued just then, so it fit)”
So they established the Duke Dorant family in Duke Brüver’s stead, huh?
“The former estate of Duke Brüver is suitable for me, Duke Dorant. Margrave Baumeister, withdraw from buying it!”
“Right! It’s plainly rude for the likes of a Margrave to live in a duke’s estate!”
“””Right, right!”””
Further high-ranking nobles, who all wanted the mansion we purified for themselves, pressed me to give up on it.
“Are you saying that you will steal the sealed property, which you didn’t even purify yourself, from Margrave Baumeister while using your peerage and family background as shield?”
He probably didn’t see such things happen often. His Highness became quite angry at Duke Dorant and the other nobles.
“Your highness, it’s certainly a great achievement for Margrave Baumeister to have purified the sealed properties, but him living there is another matter altogether.”
“Indeed. We’re people hailing from glorious families with proper peerage. Living in a mansion befitting that status is just reasonable!”
“The purified mansion is near the palace. If you let Margrave Baumeister, a newcomer, live there, the other nobles will also complain about it.”
All of the purified mansions are located in good places. Duke Dorant and the others likely want to show off their influence by living there. Though it’s probably best if I don’t deliberately ask whether they really possess such an influence.
“Then it’d have been fine if you had purified one yourself.”
“Of course, we sent requests to the church and famous holy magicians.”
“But, we were turned down for the reason of them lacking the power to do so.”
Since Elise and the holy magicians of name in the church couldn’t do it, I think it’s only natural that it’d be impossible for unaffiliated holy magicians. Still, wanting to live in mansions with difficult backgrounds for such a reason…
I think they’re a bit crazy. At least, we can’t fully understand the thought process
“(Do they want to live in those formerly flawed properties so much? I can’t really get my head around it as eighth son of a poor knight)”
“(Dear, That is the way how major nobles with a long history usually think. I cannot comprehend it either though…)”
“(Don’t they feel disgusted about the prospect of living in a bloody mansion where many people died?)”
“(I’d absolutely hate it!)”
We whispered amongst ourselves behind His Highness who was arguing with the nobles. It wasn’t me who was struggling to understand the nobles. Elise and the others also had problems with that thinking.
“(They believe they inherited the Duke Brüver family, despite having a different family name in Duke Dorant. I think they want the mansion of Duke Brüver as evidence since it wasn’t an official inheritance. They’re treating it like a stronghold or hometown. Well, I cannot understand the thinking either…)”
As expected of Rinnenheim. Even he cannot comprehend Duke Dorant and his group.
I suppose they want that mansion, which is the origin of the family, exactly because they aren’t blood relatives. The other elderly nobles…I really don’t get their circumstances, but it seems they want to get back the mansion purified by Elise and I, claiming it belonged to their ancestors. But, is that really true?
“Anyway! The right to that estate belongs to Margrave Baumeister and Elise, who purified it!”
“Does that mean we won’t be able to get back the mansion of our ancestors?”
“No way!”
“I’ll pay whatever price you name!”
Even if we choose a mansion, we won’t get anywhere like this. In the end, one of them will be unable to recover the mansion of their ancestors, even if only self-alleged.
“(Wend, what should we do?)
“(Hmm, let’s see… Ah! I’ve got a good idea!) Umm…how about handling it like this?”
I made a certain offer to Duke Dorant and the other nobles.
“One of you will give me your estate instead.”
“Ooohh! That’s possible as well!”
“The mansion will be free, once we move, anyway.”
“Exchanging mansions is a good idea.”
It looked like Duke Dorant and the others agreed with this as well. Since they were marquis and dukes, they’re living in mansions with a size suitable for me. Since those places aren’t flawed or anything, we can move there without a worry.
“(We just need to get the best mansion from among the ones they own)”
Their mansions, as well as my current mansion, should be bought by other nobles after they move. Maybe the lack of mansions in the capital will be alleviated a bit with this?
“Then let us do it like that.”
“Man, Margrave Baumeister, you’re still young, but your modest personality is truly outstanding.”
“Quite so. Thanks to that, we will be able to return to the mansion of our ancestors.”
“It’s truly wonderful.”
To be precise, only Duke Dorant is different, but them being happy is the most important part. We don’t want to live in a formerly flawed property, so it’s a genuine win-win situation for both sides.
“Your Highness, it’s great that Duke Dorant and his friends agreed, isn’t it? (Phew, that was a close call)”
The trouble with those annoying nobles was resolved by me yielding. And just like that, I succeeded in obtaining a decent, huge mansion while making His Highness indebted to me. His Highness shouldn’t be able to complain about this outcome either.
“Wendelin, you were a big help. They become a big problem whenever they’re stubborn like this. But, even though you finally found a nice mansion…”
I totally hated the part about it being a formerly flawed property. Rather, I feel grateful to Duke Dorant and his friends.
“We can choose the mansion tomorrow. The other side accepted our conditions, so it’ll be fine to simply select the best mansion they have.”
“Thank you.”
And then, on the next day, I decided to take Duke Dorant’s mansion as it was the biggest and prettiest among their mansions. Duke Dorant would apparently move to the mansion with the bloodstained big hall. Since he himself said that he was fine with that, I didn’t try to stop him, but I might be unable to ever learn how to understand the thinking of high-ranking nobles.
＊ ＊ ＊
“That is a fine mansion.”
“It looks like it will be alright to rush ahead even further with the future Baumeister House.”
“Puhaaaa! A move-in party is truly the best!”
“Doushi, how dare you only drink the expensive wine! I’ve been telling you to leave some of it for me as well.”
Since we safely moved to the former mansion of Duke Dorant, I invited Margrave Breithilde, Cardinal Hohenheim, Burkhart-san, Doushi, and others to a move-in part in the garden of our new place. Since it’d be too much hassle to make the party too big, I deliberately planned for it to take place on the same day as Duke Dorant’s move-in party, and thus lowered the number of participating big-shots artificially.
Some people might consider that to be rude, but if they participated in every celebration of this sort, any high-ranking noble would collapse from exhaustion, so nobles deliberately scheduled their parties in such a manner, Roderich told me.
The majority of the nobles made an appearance at Duke Dorant’s party.
“Son-in-law, it seems like you yielded the mansion to Duke Dorant. Sorry for that,” Cardinal Hohenheim apologized to me.
“Personally I prefer this mansion though…”
Since Duke Dorant is a royal, Cardinal Hohenheim must probably take his wishes into consideration.
“Any normal person would dislike the idea of living in such a flawed property. But, Duke Dorant was given a new peerage. The discontinued Brüver family used to be a famous family with more than a thousand years of history. Him wanting their main estate is based on his thinking as a noble, I suspect.”
“Does he want to share some of their luck?”
“In such a place?”
“The scandals of the Brüver family have not been made public! Hence he should have wanted to obtain that mansion even more!”
It was the same for the other high-ranking nobles too. I guess a mansion close to the palace has more value than feeling bad over living in a formerly flawed property.
“This mansion here is nice since it’s slightly away from the palace. Us landed nobility want to be as far away from the palace as possible.”
When it comes to landed, and moreover, high-ranking nobles, they’re actually like kings of small countries. Margrave Breithilde dislikes the Kingdom meddling with him in various ways.
“Keeping a reasonable distance is the best, huh?”
“Though it’s hard to find the proper distance.”
“Wendelin-sama, the cheese has melted.”
“Hoh, a new dish?”
“It’s cheese fondue.”
Oil fondue using the oil of animals and monsters already exists in this world. The other day, I presented a chocolate fountain to Crown Prince Wald that used the same principle. All that was left was to create cheese fondue.
Placing a pot on the portable magic stove, which we had set up on a table, we heated it to melt the cheese produced on our local farms. Philine, who had been watching the state of the pot, informed Margrave Breithilde and me about the cooking being done.
“Just like this, you stab bread, cooked vegetables, and meat on a skewer, dip it in the cheese, and eat it. It tastes great.”
“This is a great dish. I will have our cook make it as well.”
“This goes well with wine.”
“Yes! Indeed!”
“Burkhart and Doushi, you guys really never change, do you?”
Everyone enjoyed the cheese fondue, but I feel like I’ve forgotten something again…
No…Roderich didn’t tell me anything either, so it must be my imagination. Either way, I’m too busy for my own liking.
＊ ＊ ＊
“Hahahaha! After forty years, I, Duke Dorant, have finally returned to a mansion suitable for my station. Today we’re celebrating this, so please enjoy the drinks and food to the fullest. Your Highness, you too.”
“I shall do so.”
Today Margrave Baumeister is holding a move-in party as well, but due to my standing, I had no choice but to attend Duke Dorant’s party. Since the other party is a duke, I have to be considerate of him. Moreover, we’re also related.
And sure, he’s serving dishes and drinks while giving all he has, but…
“(I wanted to go to Wendelin’s party… But, he has moved to a mansion which is closer to the palace than the previous one. That means…)”
Maybe he’ll invite me to a private home party, which he’ll hold in secret, instead?
“(Right! After all, I’m related to Wendelin now. If it’s the former mansion of Duke Dorant, I can hurry over there at any moment. I’m looking forward to the parties to come!)”
“Your Highness, it is a delight to see that you seem to be enjoying yourself.”
“(When is Wendelin going to invite me to one of his home parties? It might take some time since he moved in just now)”
I don’t know when I’ll be invited to Wendelin’s home party. So let’s quickly wrap up my work tomorrow so that I’m ready at any time.
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