by Dojyomaru
In regards to this, Machiavelli said, “Fortune is a woman, and if you wish to keep her under it is necessary to beat and ill-use her,” a way of putting it that would upset any feminist who heard it. Setting aside his choice of words, in order to ensure that the roots of calamity didn’t remain, I had given the order to strike down twelve nobles here.
When she heard my explanation, Liscia slowly nodded. “I understand your reasoning, Souma. What will you do with the Houses of Saracen and Jabana, the ones you had leave?”
“Allow me to explain that,” Hakuya said, stepping forward. “The Houses of Saracen and Jabana had worked alongside the other twelve under their former heads, but that connection between them was broken with their deaths. The present head of the House of Saracen, Sir Piltory, is a fine young man who excels with both the pen and sword, while the head of House Jabana, Sir Owen, is a sober and honest hotblooded man. They can be counted on to serve His Majesty without duplicity. I believe you could see that from the way they acted while being led out of the great hall.”
“...So you showed some discretion about who was to be executed, then,” Liscia said.
“That is correct.” Hakuya nodded. “The ones executed were all up to something-or-another. Now we are investigating their mansions in the capital, collecting evidence of what that was for each of them. The punishment for the crime and the finding of evidence are in the wrong order, which is hardly praiseworthy, but I ask you to understand.”
With that said, Hakuya bowed his head.
He was probably trying to back me up. By telling her I hadn’t murdered twelve people on my suspicion alone, he was trying to keep it from doing anything strange to my relationship with Liscia.
Liscia seemed to understand that, too, so she didn’t press the issue any further. “Okay, I understand the twelve, but what if the other two had agreed with you, Souma? Would you have killed them, too?”
Hakuya shook his head. “In that event, the plan was for me to provoke them. Though, if they had attempted to curry favor with His Majesty like the other twelve houses, we would have had little use for them after this.”
“You’d thought it through that far...” Liscia looked at me, scandalized.
No, this sort of plan that involved reading the vagaries of people’s hearts is Hakuya’s department, I thought. I don’t have that nasty a personality... I think.
Seeing me avert my eyes, Liscia let out a sigh of resignation. “So, what happens to Carla and her father now?”
“...I’m getting to that.” I walked over to stand in front of the bound Castor. Having seen everything that had just unfolded, he looked dumbfounded. The blade he’d expected to fall on his own neck had fallen on another’s. It was little wonder he was so bewildered.
“Castor Vargas,” I said. “Because you refused to heed my ultimatum, you are guilty of treason.”
Castor bowed his head. “...I understand.”
Then he bowed his head even lower than before, grinding his forehead against the floor this time. “That’s why, I beg you. The crime is mine alone. So, please, spare just Carla.”
“You are not the one who decides that,” I said coldly. “This is your judgment. Your crime of treason is plain to see. ...However, as both Piltory and Owen said earlier, I will recognize your contribution to this country in the more than one hundred years you have protected it. I have already taken your post, your lands, your assets, and even your family name from you. Therefore, I will spare you your life, and that alone.”
I turned to Excel, who was silently watching to see how things developed.
“Castor will be left in your custody. However, he is forbidden from entering the former Duchy of Vargas, and also forbidden from contacting his son Carl, or the boy’s mother, Accela. Excel, your son-in-law is the one who did all this, so you must keep a proper watch on him.”
“Ah! ...Yes. It will be as you command.” There were tears forming in Excel’s eyes as she gave me a proper bow.
When she raised her face, I saw her mouth the words “Thank you,” to me. I showed no reaction, moving on to Carla.
Even though her father had been spared, Carla still wore a quiet expression.
“Carla,” I said, “you are guilty of the same crime. What’s more, you don’t have Castor’s distinguished record of having protected the country for one hundred years. I’m sad to say it, but I don’t see any way I could lessen your punishment.”
“...I understand,” she said quietly.
“W-Wait! Then kill me!” Castor exclaimed, grinding his face against the floor in desperation. “Carla turned her blade on you at my orders! So let my record be used for Carla...”
“Take him away.”
My attendants dragged him from the room. He kept screaming “I’ll take her place!” until he was out of the room, but I was under no obligation to listen to him.
Once things had quieted down, I continued. “You have clearly committed the crime of treason. However, if I let the mastermind, Castor, live, it would reflect poorly on me to kill his daughter. Therefore, I will spare your life, but you will live as a slave. Your owners will be the royal family—that is to say, Liscia and myself.”
The second most heavy punishment in this world was forced labor as a convict slave. There was no such thing as life imprisonment. Those who became convict slaves, unless they were granted an amnesty, would be forced to do endless hard labor in the coal mines. Though, in Carla’s case, because I had chosen to give ownership of her to the royal family, she would be spared the coal mines and kept in the royal house as a servant who had to be absolutely submissive.
“...Okay.” Carla accepted my order, nodding weakly.
Excel was about to say something, but she held it in. She must have decided it was better than her being killed, at least. Hakuya closed his eyes in silence, while Aisha was flustered by the atmosphere in the room. And finally, Liscia watched what I would do in silence, her expression unchanging.
“I will give you further directions later, but, for now, I have an order to give you,” I said.
“...As you wish.”
I walked over to Carla, who was hanging her head, crouched down and whispered a certain order, quietly, so that only she could hear. Carla’s eyes went wide.
◇ ◇ ◇
When Souma quietly whispered the order, I doubted my own ears.
“If it comes to it, kill me.”
When he saw my eyes widen in surprise, Souma needed to me with a serious look on his face. “Not now, of course. If I become a tyrant, I want you to be the one to stop me. With your martial ability, you could kill me easily, right?”
Kill him if he becomes a tyrant...?! Why would he suddenly say that to me?!
I kept my voice low, asking him, “Why would you say that? And why to me, of all people?!”
“Because Liscia and the others might not be able to,” Souma whispered, a troubled smile on his face. “At some point, I found myself surrounded by many people I care about. Just recently, I got engaged to another person on top of Liscia. It’s Aisha, over there.”
He got engaged to that dark elf without me hearing about it? I thought, stunned. Has Liscia accepted it? Well, knowing her personality, she’s probably being pragmatic about it...
“Well... Congratulations?” I whispered.
“Thanks,” he whispered back. “So you see, I have more and more people I care about. In itself, that’s a good thing, but when I think of what would happen if, someday, I grew drunk on power and become a tyrant... it starts to scare me. If that came to pass, I worry whether Liscia and the others could stop me like they should, you know?”
“Liscia would stop you,” I whispered. “You know her straight-laced personality.”
“Would she?” he retorted, still whispering. “Sure, if I started indulging in too much debauchery, or started massacring the townspeople, she’d admonish me for it, but what about if I had a good justification, like I did this time? Individual purges aren’t that mu
ch of a problem on their own. But when they happen repeatedly, eventually you reach a point of no return. When it comes to that, will Liscia and the others be able to abandon me?”
That’s... No, probably not, I realized.
“It’s not my place to say it, but... Liscia is head over heels in love with you,” I whispered. “If you fall into hell, I’m sure she’ll be right there beside you.”
Liscia was too serious and too devoted a girl. Probably, no matter what happened, she would follow Souma loyally to the bitter end.
Souma nodded. “I know, right? Aisha’s sort of the same way. Do you think Juna would do it, maybe? Anyway, there are a lot of people who would try to suffer alongside me. I don’t want that. If there were a revolution in response to my tyrannical rule, it wouldn’t just be me who got executed, it would be Liscia and the rest, too. I don’t want Liscia and the others to turn out like Marie Antoinette.”
Marie... who?
While I still had a question mark hovering over my head, Souma whispered with a serious look, “That’s why, Carla, before those I care about can suffer with me, I want you to take on the role of putting an end to me.”
“...I’m a slave now,” I whispered. “If I kill my master, the collar will kill me, you know?”
“Yeah,” he whispered back. “So, please, only do it if you’re prepared to die, too. And, if I manage to hand the crown on to the next generation, I will set you free.”
This man... he says the most incredible things as if they were nothing. I was stunned.
Souma had told me, if he became a tyrant, to become the blade that struck him down. Then, having killed him, to die myself. By keeping me at his side as his slave, he was hoping to use me as a personal deterrent against his becoming a tyrant.
“You really... don’t show any mercy,” I whispered.
“I only hold back for those I care about,” he whispered back.
“I meant towards yourself,” I whispered. “Though I suppose the meaning still got through.”
I had thought the same thing in the battle with Amidonia, but this man treated himself far too poorly. If he didn’t take better care of himself, he was going to cause no end of worry for those around him.
Liscia, you’ve fallen for a real troublesome guy... I thought to myself.
That was right. In order to keep my best friend’s love life from a sad future, I decided to act as his deterrent.
Sitting up straight, I bowed deeply. “I have received your order. Until the day comes that I must act on it, I will work my hardest for you, praying that that day never comes.”
Souma nodded in satisfaction at my response. “At this moment, we have no work meant exclusively for a slave. For now, you will join the maid force... But... Well... Uh, get the details from the head maid yourself.”
When he gave me that order, he sounded a bit hesitant towards the end. I wondered what was up, so I followed Souma’s gaze to see a beautiful maid who seemed to be around twenty years old smiling happily.
When I wondered what it was about her, I realized Liscia was looking in my direction, an expression of utter pity on her face.
...Huh?
◇ ◇ ◇
With the trial of Castor and my friend Carla over, Souma, Aisha, and I were returning to the governmental affairs office when suddenly, Souma stumbled in front of us.
“Souma!” I cried.
“Sire!” Aisha shouted.
When Aisha and I tried to support him, Souma put a hand on the wall. “I’m fine. Just stumbled a bit,” he said, motioning for us to stop with his free hand.
“But...” I said.
“It’s all right,” he said. “...I’d like to be alone for just a little while,”
Then he went into the governmental affairs office by himself.
From the glimpse I got of his face in profile, he looked pale and unwell. Left on our own out in the hallway, I struck up a conversation with Aisha, who had likewise been left behind and was standing there in a daze.
“He was his usual self just a moment ago,” I said. “What do you think happened to him all of a sudden?”
“I am not entirely sure myself,” said Aisha. “However...”
“However?”
“He looked like a soldier returning from his first battle,” she said, looking troubled. “Like one... who had just killed for the first time.”
“You mean he’s feeling bad over how he killed the twelve nobles?” I asked.
But Souma had done that because he’d believed it to be necessary, hadn’t he? If so, he had nothing to regret. Besides, Souma had experienced his first battle in the war with the Principality of Amidonia. He’d struck down Prince Gaius VIII of Amidonia, and he’d had the corrupt nobles executed after that. This wasn’t a first for him.
When I pointed that out, Aisha shook her head. “This is mere speculation on my part, but the time with Gaius was a case of ‘kill or be killed.’ The corrupt nobles had clearly manifested their intention to rebel against him. However, in the case of those twelve nobles, they were not immediately attempting to harm His Majesty. Even if he knows it would be harmful to leave them alive, he questions whether or not it was the right decision to kill them. In his heart, perhaps he can’t quite come to terms with it.”
Aisha looked worriedly at the door to the governmental affairs office.
He can’t come to terms with it... huh.
...Yeah. I thought Aisha’s interpretation of it was correct. I’d heard Souma had come from a peaceful world. There hadn’t been a war there in some time.
Because he had come from a world like that, Souma absolutely hated to have people die. But he wasn’t so unduly optimistic that he thought everything could be taken care of without sacrifices. That was why the policies Souma took were always focused around minimizing the sacrifice while maximizing the reward.
It was a natural frame of mind for the ruler of a nation. However, in Souma’s own heart, he wasn’t so insensitive that he could accept even those minimized sacrifices.
“Hey, Aisha,” I said. “What do you do to support a soldier like that?”
“Well... I have never been a part of the military, so I am no expert on these things... but I often hear it is best to make them forget about it.”
“Make them forget about it?” I repeated.
“I hear that their superior officers and the older soldiers will invite them out for wine and women to help them vent,” Aisha said. “It is the sort of thing that only time can heal, so they keep them from thinking about it too deeply and breaking down.”
Wine, or the other thing... huh, I thought to myself. In that case...
◇ ◇ ◇
The trial had begun at noon. Now it was most definitely night time.
I lay alone in my bed, the governmental affairs office completely dark with all of the lights turned off.
There was a lot of work for me to do. But, just for today, I had asked Hakuya to let me shirk my duties. I just didn’t have the will to do anything. Hakuya understood that. I wished I could just go to sleep. But, contrary to that hope, I was wide awake.
If I used my head just a little, that might help, so I decided to think through whether the execution was justified or not.
I thought that executing the twelve nobles had been correct, examining it in the long term. If I’d left them alive, and if anyone had been hurt by the seed of calamity they would sow, I was sure I would have regretted that. But, well, now I was desperately holding my chest, trying not to regret that I had killed them.
“All cruelties should be carried out in one stroke.”
“A prince need not concern himself over a reputation of cruelty.”
“In order to avoid destruction, it is better to choose to fight.”
“When the time of your demise comes, it is too late for regrets.”
I went over Machiavelli’s ideas over and over again in my head. But all I was doing was looking for an excuse.
If I was going
to regret something, I preferred to it be that I had chosen a path that didn’t hurt those I cared most for. I thought I had convinced myself of that before making the decision, and I resented my own heart for still wavering despite that.
While I was pondering, the door suddenly opened. I moved just my head to check, and Liscia and Aisha were standing there.
In rather provocative attire.
“Huh?!” I reacted in shock.
They were both wearing what looked like thin bathrobes that only went down to a little above the knee.
Maybe they weren’t wearing anything underneath the robes, because the cleavage that poked out from where the collar met, as well as the bare thighs that stuck out from beneath, were captivating. In the light that came in from the hallway beyond the open door, their silhouettes were accentuated in a provocative way. It made Aisha’s height and her shapely figure stand out all the more, while Liscia’s well-balanced body was beautiful, too.
It was a little too much for me to take in all at once, and I stared for a while, entranced.
...Honestly, if I hadn’t been feeling so down at the time, all reason would have likely gone out the window in an instant. However, in my current state of mind, it all seemed more like a bad joke.
“...What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded.
My tone was so scary that I startled myself. No, that wasn’t what I ought to have been saying, and I knew it. It was like I was taking my frustration out on them.
I kept my tone as calm as I could manage and corrected myself. “I believe I asked you two to give me some time to myself.”
“We can’t leave you alone when you’re like that, now can we?” Liscia paid my objections no heed as she came over and sat down on the edge of the bed where I was lying down.
Aisha also said “P-Pardon my intrusion,” and came around to the opposite side from Liscia before politely taking a seat.
Whether I turned my head left or right, there was a beautiful girl’s bottom. I could only cover my eyes with one arm, looking straight up. “What is this...? What do you two want...?”
