Chapter 398

Alone

Mia took Chloe into her room by the hand. Inside, they found Anne still cleaning, with a dust cloth in one hand.

“Anne, I’m sorry to interrupt your cleaning, but Chloe and I are having a tea party right now. You can stop for a while.”

“Oh, okay, milady. After that, I’ll go make the tea—”

“No, don’t. Bel is off to get it from the restaurant as we speak—”

“Mia-neesama, I’m back!” Bel came back right on time. She held a tray with five cups on it. The cups gave off a sweet smell of hot chocolate.”

“Oh, Bel, I told you tea was fine... Also, how many cups are these? Only you, me, and Chloe are here. Why do we have extras? Did you get some for Anne and Lynsha?”

Anne was in the room, but Lynsha wasn’t there. Mia cocked her head when she saw how many cups there were. Bel grinned.

“Of course, the extra one is for me to fill up!” Bel said this without any shame.Explore new novels on novelbin(.)com

“Bel...” Mia waited for Bel to put the tray down on the table before pinching the girl’s upper arm. One of the side effects of F.A.T. was that the skin between the shoulder and elbow was loose.

“Whoa, what?” Her jaw dropped. There wasn’t any jigglyness! She tried her own arm quickly. It moved around more than Bel’s. What a shame! She tried again on Bel because she couldn’t believe the world could be so unfair. To her great disappointment, it only confirmed what she had already found.

“U-Um... Mia-neesama? What are you doing?”

“Huh? Oh, nothing, I guess. Don’t mind me. Bel, what are you doing? Are you...working out? When I’m not paying attention?”

“Huh? I’m practicing the dance moves you showed me. Is that enough?”

Eeeeek! No, no, no, no! This is wrong!

On her back, a thin layer of cold sweat formed. She drank a big mouthful of hot chocolate and let out a breath. It helped her relax. After that, she gave Chloe a serious look.

“Please tell me what’s going on. What’s going on?”

Chloe looked at her for a second before nodding.

“Another company is actually coming after us. In terms of business, I mean.”

She then started telling her story. Someone went on a full-scale attack against Forkroad & Co., going after all the businesses that did business with them. This person was Shalloak Cornrogue, a rich merchant. As an aggressively hostile rival, he had used his business power to destroy every single trade channel that the Forkroads ran. In response, Marco worked day and night to try to find a way out of this terrible position, but he eventually collapsed because he was too tired.

“U-Unforgivable.” Mia said, “How dare he pick a fight with Chloe’s dad!” through clenched teeth.

The nerve of this thug of a shopkeeper made her visibly shake with anger. Forkroad & Co. was very important to the empire’s ability to get through the famine. In fact, after Mia’s big promise at the entrance ceremony, their part became even more important. She couldn’t let the Forkroads run out of wheat, because the wheat stocks were looking dangerously low now that demand had gone up.

This famine is already a code-G situation, merciful moons. Right now, the last thing I need is more trouble. Who is this jerk who wants to fight me?

Yes, you’re right... At this moment, attacking Forkroad & Co. was the same as attacking Mia herself. Code-G, which meant “guillotine,” was no joke. She wasn’t going to sit down and take this.

“Thank you, Chloe,” she said, giving her a nod of approval. “And good for you. I’m glad you told me about this, because I’m the right person to talk to about it. I’ll deal with it.”

“Princess Mia...”

“Let’s see... First, I need to talk to Ludwig. I don’t know much about merchants, but I think he comes from a family of traders.” Mia said to herself, “He should have some good ideas about how to handle this.”

Then, she showed an evil smil.

“Oh, ho, ho! Whoever this guy is, he’ll be sorry he picked a fight with me!”