Published at 25th of March 2019 11:31 pm

Chapter 87 – Honeymoon IV

Translator: Isekai Shousetsu

We head for Nemes next.

Nemes is a Cretian colony of the city-state Therbae.

While the suzerain has quite the distance from the colony, it imposes vassalage.

Therbae performs governance with an organization consisting of one part aristocrats and one part wealthy citizens (wealthy merchants and farmers) called the senate at the center.

However, for important decisions such as war and the like, it seems the city decides through local referendum of residents who hold citizenship.

Nemes also follows its suzerain’s system of governance.

Well, the talks this time would only be about trade so there won’t be any need for a referendum.

The armed forces is split evenly into the army and the navy.

The country seems to have an elite unit called the Holy Corps comprising only of homosexuals. It is said to be an invincible and undefeated force.

In the Adernia Peninsula, homosexuals can’t obtain citizenship. However, Cretia seems to be an exception.

It seems that love of handsome youths is a Cretian taste or something……

It also seems such an inclination is quite strong in Therbae, or so I heard.

It’s an unimportant matter anyway.

Nemes is surrounded by both Gehenna and Lezzad. As such it has now border with any of the Adernian states.

Consequently, they have a lot of pure-blooded Cretians. However……this is quite the handicap compared to the two other Cretian colonies when it comes to trade.

However, compared to the other two colonies, does Nemes have a lower national power?

If you asked this, then the answer is not at all.

Rather, their military strength is much more stronger that of the mercenary-reliant Gehenna.

Now then, how did Nemes managed to obtain the power to resist Gehenna and Lezzad?

There are two reasons.

First is the Carnus Kingdom.

Nemes is conducting large scale trade with the Carnus Kingdom on the west. They procure rock salt from there.

Second is the iron ore mountain.

Nemes has a comparatively large-scale iron ore mountain. As such, they are exporting good quality iron.

As for me, I want that iron.

Even here in Nemes, we were received with a warm welcome. The reception wasn’t that much different from Lezzad’s.

What changed was the taste of the cooking. There are several things different.

Nemes cooking had a much more simpler taste.

By the way, Nemes’ deity is the “God of Love and Friendship.” It’s a male god.

I wonder if it’s only me who somehow felt an evil meaning behind it?

“Regarding the export of iron, if you place orders, we would process them into weapons and export them.”

“That would be great.”

I still can’t say that our blacksmiths are up to par.

The number of blacksmiths we obtained from the De Morgal Kingdom as compensation is also few.

Weapons are things that wear down after all plus we also constantly expend arrowheads.

Furthermore, it’s about time we get iron protectors.

At the very least, I want the standing army to be fortified with iron protectors and draw a clear distinction with other armies.

“Regarding the customs duties…”

“How about the same conditions as Lezzad? I think, given this opportunity, that all things should be judged with equality and impartiality.”

Or rather, nothing good would come out if we give Lezzad a monopoly where they’d do such things as buy cheaply and then sell expensively.

“We have one request. We want your country to give our country information regarding the East Tethys Sea and Povenia.”

I ask the same thing from Nemes.

This way, with information from several countries, we would be able to authenticate information.

“Now then, our country wishes friendship from you esteemed country.”

With a smile, I exchange handshakes with Nemes’ Chief of Parliament.

With this we get bound to a treaty of friendship with Nemes.

Next after Nemes is Gehenna.

For the time being, we plan to end the honeymoon with the trip to here.

Now then, this country called Gehenna……is a bit special.

It was a colony of the Cretian city-state called Alto.

Now, it has achieved a substancial amount of independence.

Alto is a state managed through direct democracy. It’s an up and coming democracy.

However, the disparity in wealth is huge.

The new state of Gehenna inherited that system of government but……twenty-years ago, a change in government had occurred.

A politician by the name of Abraham spearheaded a group of unlanded citizens, tenant farmers, debt slaves, and the like and announced a coup d’etat.

Thus, Gehenna fell into the control of Abraham.

Alto, in accordance with the requests of the expelled politicians, in order to pursue Abraham, waged war to Gehenna.

However, the soldiers under the Abraham’s command provided stiff resistance and the war degenerated into a stalemate.

Things ended up this way because of the behind the scenes aid provided by Lezzad and Therbae.

Eventually, Abraham’s diplomacy paid off and a united Claris-Therbae-Rehm army descended upon a shorthanded Alto army.

In the Cretia of that era, because the Southern Alliance headed by Alto had become strong, the East-West-North Union had united to defeat Alto.

Thus, the Alto army was forced to retreat from Gehenna who consequently achieved complete independence.

Presently, Gehenna is under the dictatorship of Abraham.

Now then, there are two rumors surrounding this Abraham, one extremely bad rumor and one extremely good.

The extremely bad rumor is that he had everyone in the opposition thoroughly killed or otherwise vanished from the country. At any rate, the majority of the country, that of poor people, is on Abraham’s side. There’s no way they’d oppose him.

The good rumor is that he’s striving for the development of industry and the redistribution of wealth.

If the wealthy farmers and merchants were not to oppose Abraham, then their properties will, to a certain extent, not be seized and neither will they be killed.

He redistributed the seized land from the opposition to the poor farmers to try and resuscitate landed agriculture.

He also incorporated the propertyless citizens into a standing army as a countermeasure against unemployment.

He then went for rationing wheat in order to stave away starvation for those who nevertheless couldn’t be absorbed into the army.

And then, his greatest achievement, which is the development of a gold mine within his territory.

Gehenna had a small-scale gold mine. However, due to lack of technological level, manpower, and capital, it hadn’t managed to begin mining gold.

So to develop the gold mine, he took a step further and invited miners from Persis and Povenia to conduct large scale mining. He used the money he seized from the opposition as capital.

They also seem to be conducting trade with the Lupus tribe.

But then again, these are rumors so it don’t know their true meanings. The Lupus tribe is a closed nation so their true conditions are unknown.

However, Gehenna and the Lupus tribe, having no mountain range between them, directly border each other. As such, it wouldn’t be strange even if there’s trade between them.

While it also wouldn’t be strange if, at the same time, war has happened between them but………I wonder about that.

“You are the Rosyth Kingdom’s new king, yes? I am Gehenna’s first citizen, Abraham.”

Abraham declares such.

Up until now, the MP’s of the previous two Cretian city-states gave off a subordinate impression, but this person is different.

Is this the difference between a parliament member whose power is shared with several other people and a tyrant who controls the national power by himself?

This is mostly the same as a king.

“Your Excellency, Lord Abraham, I am most happy to be able to meet you.”

The two of us exchange hand shakes.

That said, this old man, I feel like I’ve seen him somewhere, huh…

What is this amazing feeling of déjà vu…

Is it just me?

Suddenly, I recognize this uncomfortable feeling. The old man’s not looking at me.

No, it’s not like I want to be looked at by the old man. I’m not a Cretian, after all.

However, normally, wouldn’t you not look away when doing handshakes?

Even after the handshake ended, Abraham’s line of sight was a little bit off my direction. The target of this line of sight was…Tetra.

Why in the hell is this old man looking at Tetra intermittently?

What’s going on?

However, once Abraham notices that I’ve noticed his looking away, he shows a shining smile and suggests the following to me.

“By all means, this is the point where one would want to go sightseeing but……you’ve probably been accompanied around to exhaustion by Lezzad and Nemes, yes? It’s probably around time you got tired of it, yes?  As such, for me, I would like to immediately move to diplomatic negotiations. Tomorrow morning, I would like to begin as early as possible.

Quite the fast development, huh.

However, I’ve thoroughly examined Cretian technology.

“I accept.”

As such, it’s been decided that talks were to be held early in the morning.

“Hey, Tetra. Why were you and the old man staring at each other? Did you fall in love?”

Julia asks Tetra in jest.

Surely, that’s impossible……is what I want to believe.

Although you can’t say that I’m a beautiful young man, I’m inclined to believed I’m more or less on the right direction.

My body is trained after all. Plus, I’m resourceful.

If you consider the Average Adernian, I’m on the taller side.

Nevertheless, while he might be quite the dandy, to suddenly lost to an old man that looks around 50 years old……

Before being sad, I’d be mortified.

“Don’t mess around. I’m not in love with an old man like that.”

Tetra whacks Julia with her staff as she makes a slightly mad expression.

Well, that’ll happen if you ask her such a question in front of me……

“I love you after all.”

Tetra says to me as she embraces me.

I lift her up and give her a kiss. She’s very light since she’s a step smaller amongst the smaller Adernians.

“So, what’s up with the gaze?”

“………It’s just that I felt like I’ve seen him somewhere before. I felt something very familiar.”

“I felt the same.”

That old man, we’ve indeed seen you from somewhere huh. Although I can’t point out where and when.

“Did Almis also feel fate between the two of you?”

“No way. I don’t have homosexual tendencies.”

Even if I did, I won’t be chosing that old man. I’d be choosing a tomgirl or a fine trap.

He’s an old man whose head is turning to desert, you know? There’s no way in hell I’d choose him even if he’s the last person on the world.

“Hey, have you ever seen him?”

“Hmm, I can’t really say……Am I, am I possibly slow?”

Well, maybe. There are several areas where you’re kind of slow.

Because she relies on sorcerous sixth sense, this girl’s powers of observation, such as of sight and of hearing, are quite low.

She’s always looking for something in her chaotic room.

Well, the sixth sense is amazing anyhow. Even if I blindfolded her, she’d immediately find out my location.  I couldn’t achieve blindfold play.

In contrast, Tetra’s observational abilities are extremely outstanding. In exchange, she fails to notice her gait and often stumbles in the process.

With regards to play, Tetra’s reactions are definitely more enjoyable.

“Things that can’t be understood can’t be understood. It can’t be helped. It appears that Lord Abraham himself has become curious regarding Tetra after all. If the opportunity comes, we’ll try and ask him.”

With this, we welcome the day of the talks.

“I understand what your honorable country wants of our country. You want human resources that are capable of reading and writing Cretian as well as performing arithmetic. You also want field supervisors for road and flood control maintenance, as well as mining supervisors, yes?”

“We appreciate the effort in advancing the talks quickly.”

“We’ll immediately recruit them for you. Your country should have a lot of people that want to make a name for themselves. At any rate, Gehenna is small. However, your country’s rise is in ascendance.”

A part of a country’s ambitious youth should have an inclination to want out the country - just like Ismere.

In order to advance in one’s own country, the youth themselves also need to wait to mature because there exists mature workers ahead of them.

If that’s the case, because of that established path, there are a lot of youths who can have peace of mind. However, amongst them, there also exists impatient youths.

Since there aren’t any mature workers in the Rosyth Kingdom, workers are placed in a high position from the start.

Furthermore, the rapid enlargement of our Rosyth Kingdom’s national power is also huge.

The new king is also young and proactive……that a lot of people think that, when it comes down to it, he’d be the winning horse.

“We’ll be making customs duties zero.”

“I’m thankful for that.”

The talks are quick, huh.

They aren’t making any difficulties so it’s going smoothly.

They’re not even troubled one bit by anything.

Perhaps maybe they already foresaw the pacts that I had signed with other countries.

“Will you be requesting information regarding foreign countries?”

“Yes. Information is important.  As the Cretian maxim said, “Wisdom is worth more than gold.”

They agreed with an immediate reply.

Things are going exceedingly easy.

“By the way, Gehenna directly borders the Lupus tribe so…do you perhaps maybe conduct trade with them?”

“Trade? Haha, there’s no way you could do that with those lot.”

According to Abraham, rather than trade, they were subjected to harsh plunder by the Lupus tribe.

Because the damage they sustain from getting plundered is larger than the money they’d profit from trade, Abraham decided to construct a defensive line along the border to stop their raids and such.

Negotiations are impossible, huh. Well, those lot didn’t send even a single person for my enthronement.

They’re probably just that kind of people.

“By the way, would it be possible to ask you a question?”

“What would that be?”

“I heard that one of your wives is a half-Cretian. ……I would like you to tell me her esteemed mother’s name.“

The name of Tetra’s mother?

What was it? I can’t remember huh.

It seems Tetra herself doesn’t remember that much so it’s only natural that I myself had never met her.

Tetra doesn’t talk about her family that much so I don’t know much.

“I apologize. Tetra’s mother was killed when she was young so……we never talked that much about her. Shall I call for Tetra?”

I remember talking about her a long time ago.

We’ll probably get the answer if we ask Tetra.

“She has died, huh……Please, without fail, I want to confirm her name.”

Note 1↑:

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