CH 87

Tea Party and Lorschel (1)

“A bunch of mysterious beasts?”

Kergel narrowed his brow while reading the thick report before he finally raised his head. Heinez replied with a nod to Kergel’s sudden gaze.

“Yes, Your Majesty. It is certain to say that it is a sign of a beast, but it is still impossible to judge the specific kind of species. There is no indication of what animal it truly is.”

“However, what’s really clear is the fact that the trail belongs to the beast.”

“That’s right.”

Heinez nodded again as he agreed with Kergel. Kergel looked through the report once again and squinted.

The report was sent by the head of the frontier near the Samalta Mountains. He had been sending regular reports for every two months and as a matter of fact, there was never really anything special that should be paying much attention to.

Since the Samalta Mountains were notoriously rugged, there was no reason to worry about any outside intrusion and even if that were to happen, the forces of change alone would be enough to prevent it entirely.

Seroif was, by no means, a weak Empire at all.

“Well…”

But why though? Kergel could hardly take his eyes off the report. It was itching his nerves, although it was simply a report of the presence of a herd of beasts.

Even the person who was responsible for the change had added just a minor addition to the end of the report……

Kergel tapped his hand on the desk and narrowed his forehead repeatedly. The Chancellor looked puzzled before he stopped pouring tea into the cup that was just in front of him. Heinez opened his mouth again with an expression that was rather similar to that of Kergel’s.

“What’s the matter, Your Majesty? What seems to be bothering you?”

“Well. It still doesn’t seem like there’s anything particularly good about it, though. Oh, thank you.”

Kergel replied to Heinez’s words as he gave his thanks to the Chief of staff before he took the teacup in one hand and clutched onto the report with the other. His golden gaze became sharp as if he was truly going to pierce the report whole.

Heinez’s expression began to harden as he was looking at the figure. When he saw that Kergel had responded so sensitively, he thought it was no longer a matter to be overlooked lightly.

“You don’t have to do that, Heinez. Loosen your expression.”

Kergel smiled and waved his hand when he saw that Heinez, his loyal servant and also his friend, was donning on a firm expression.

Then, he put down the report and took a sip of his tea before saying nothing as if he was now thinking about something instead. Both Heinez and the Chief of Staff waited silently, not having even dared to breathe, which could disturb Kergel’s silence.

Until their Lord had finally organized his own thoughts and opened his mouth once more.

After a while, Kergel frowned as he drank tea yet again. It was because the tea had cooled down a lot more than he had thought.

As he noticed it, the steward tried to prepare the tea once again. But Kergel just motioned to dissuade him before placing the cup down and spoke.

“Is there any damage that got reported?”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“It’s just that only traces were found left……”

Kergel smirked as he tapped on the desk. He thought that he was rather overreacting for nothing.

“That’s enough. I’ve made you pay some attention to it too. No one has been harmed anyway. You should also stop worrying about it.”

Kergel shook his head and said to Heinez. However, Heinez did not let it go that easily.

“But your feelings have rarely been wrong at all.”

Heinez’s rebuttal was well worth listening to as well. Therefore, the Chief of Staff nodded in agreement with him.

Perhaps since he had inherited the blood of the wolves, Kergel could instinctively grasp onto the dangers more acutely than others.

Other than that, he could notice ‘traps’ and ‘tricks’ very quickly too.

Thanks to this, he was aware and became able to prevent such incidents and accidents in advance.

That was why they could never take this little thing light right now. Kergel nodded as if he understood Heinez’s mind and  proceeded to say.

“Let him watch over for now. See if there’s another trace of that. Then, tell them to report any changes—even if they are just trivial.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“And that’d be enough for now. Nothing has really happened right now anyway.”

Kergel soon gave Heinez a simple command. And as soon as he was about to pick up another report to review, the door to the office opened. Bert eventually entered with a mountain of documents in his arms.

“There seems to be a lot of documents to review today.”

Kergel unconsciously let out a sigh when he saw it and began to mutter in a complaining tone. Then, Bert laid the pile of papers down on his desk before he pretended to wipe his sweat off and grinned.

“I don’t know. I think it’s just the same as usual.”

“No, there’s definitely a lot.”

“Hmm… I still don’t think so. Do you feel that way because your butt is already moving away?”

Bert replied back to Kergel’s words and made a mischievous face in return. Heinez understood what Bert had meant as his lips twitched. The same was clearly true for the Chief of Staff as well.

Kergel coughed at those embarrassing looks on their faces that was asking the boss as if he thought of it as “accidentally”, “just suddenly” or even “unexpectedly”.

“Well, how’s the tea party going?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. I understand that everything is going well without any problems.”

After holding back his laughter, the Chief of Staff replied politely while bowing down.

Surely their Emperor had been ‘unusually’ unable to concentrate on his duties in spring. And not a single person here wasn’t aware that the real cause had been the ‘tea party’ that just came out of his own mouth.

However, it was only natural for them to laugh because he was acting like nothing happened and as if he had never thought about the ‘tea party’ at all.