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Chapter 644

Magi Craft Meister 644

18 King Klein’s Treatment Arc

19-31 Flowers By The Window

The one who had followed Elsa to the balcony was the Minister of Industry, Derait Domus Hanks.

“Why are you here?”, Elsa asked while wiping her face.

“Well, my office is next to this balcony. I heard someone running down the corridor, so I went out to take a look and then I found you.”

People normally don’t run down these corridors, so he must have thought that something urgent had happened, which is why he came out of his office to take a look.

“…This is very embarrassing.”

Elsa looks down as her face goes red. Derait seemed to be taken a bit off guard by this, but still spoke to her in a calm voice.

“It’s already getting dark, and the wind is cold here. I’m sure you are in the middle of some kind of complicated situation, but for the time being, would you like to come to my office?”

Having calmed down a little, Elsa took Derait up on his offer and followed him to the Minister of Industry’s office. Edgar remained outside so that he could tell Jin in case he came looking for her.

There was a stylish table set by the window. Derait offered Elsa a chair.

“I was just about to finish my work. Please have a seat.”

“…Thanks.”

Elsa sat on a chair by the window. The window was right next to the balcony. Elsa felt ashamed about Derait having seen her like that, but was relieved to see that that crate was on the way, so at least he hadn’t been able to see her when she was in the balcony from here.

“Well, let’s make some tea. …Don’t worry, it’s not poisoned.”

Derait brought up the topic of poison, probably in an attempt to make Elsa smile, since she still had a grave look on her face.

“…Have a look, these guys are my assistants.”

“…Ah.”

Minister of Industry Derait’s assistants were two Golems. One of them – the one who was about to brew tea – had the physique of an adult man. It seems like an all-purpose Golem.

The other Golem is two meters tall, and was probably built for heavy work. This one was standing in the back of the room.

“The one in the back is Gren, and he helps me with heavy work such as carrying luggage, and this one is Lecker, who takes care of everyday tasks.”

“I see…”

Elsa was looking in the direction of Lecker without really paying too much attention to it, but was still impressed to notice that the Golem’s movements were quite sophisticated. It was a very well-made Golem.

“Here you go.”

She was served a rose-scented herbal tea, sweet with a hint of sourness.

Elsa takes a sip and exhales. Derait did the sale, and smiled.

“Well, are you feeling a bit better?”

“…Yes, thank you very much.”

“That’s good to hear. I’m indebted to you for saving my life. So it makes me happy to be able to give back to you even a fraction of it.”

After taking another sip of herbal tea, Derait opened his mouth again.

“…Opportunities like these seem to be rare, so would you mind indulging me in a bit of conversation?”

“Eh, sure.”

In a polite tone, Elsa replied semi-reflexively.

“…This country is already in shambles…”

Derait changed into a heavy tone.

“…The king fell sick, the nobles put their own interests first, and even the weather gave up on us.”

“…”

“You are from the Shouro Empire. So I would like to hear your frank opinion. Do you think this country has a future?”

It was a very heavy question for Elsa.

But, regardless of how she was two years ago, now that she’s been able to travel with Reinhardt, seen different countries, and accumulated more experiences together with Jin, it’s a question she can answer.

“I think it does.”

The answer seemed to take Derait by surprise, as if he was expecting something different, and his eyes widened in surprise for a moment. He soon becomes calm, however.

“Oh, why do you think so?”

Elsa answered while carefully choosing her words.

“Countries are people. In the Klein Kingdom, there may be some people in their ruling class who are no good. But there are also people who are trying to rebuild the country. And they’re working very hard to that end. This country will not die yet. That’s what I think.”

“…”

Derait closed his eyes while listening to Elsa’s words.

The unexpected question and conversation had managed to cool Elsa’s head off. She feels that Derait believes the future of this country to be bleak.

In her mind, she started going over the various events that had taken place, and connecting them. Although it was still incomplete, the mysterious puzzle was assembled.

The Minister of Industry’s poisoning, a weak poison, the king’s illness, the problems with the kingdom’s food provisions, the successor…

Some pieces were still missing, so the whole picture was still not visible.

As her mind worked, Elsa’s eyes looked around the room unconsciously. Suddenly, her gaze stopped by the window.

A simple vase was sitting by the window. The plant in the vase had several purple flowers that looked like long and narrow helmets. However, they had no leaves.

“Aconita?”

Hearing those words, Derait opened his eyes wide. His eyes were slightly bloodshot.

“Miss Elsa, do you know this flower? But it doesn’t grow here… No, I don’t think it even grows in the Shouro Empire, either.”

“… Yes. I know a little about medicines and poisonous plants.”

Elsa slowly looked back from the vase as she continued.

“…The poison that you ingested the other day was probably from the leaves of this plant, Mr. Derait…”

“…”

“Mr. Derait, why aren’t there any leaves on this flower?”

She accidentally said too much in an attempt to derive an important piece of information.

As soon as he heard those words, Derait’s expression changed.

“…I see, so you know that much..”

“Huh?”

＊＊＊

Jin had gone looking for Elsa, who had run out of the room.

When he asked the knight in the hallway, he told him that she seemed to have run through the hallway and headed towards the stairs.

Jin went towards those stairs as well. For a moment, he was unsure of whether Elsa had gone up or down, but soon realized that he didn’t have much time to make up his mind.

Even though she had rushed out of the room, the Covert Units Chestnut and Plum were still protecting her while hiding their presence with the Invisible spell. And Edgar was with her as well.

For that reason, Jin could find out which direction Elsa had taken by just looking it up via Laojun.

But the reason why he didn’t do that from the beginning was because he didn’t want to rely on Reiko and the others, and instead wanted to find her himself, but there were limits to that within this royal palace.

“Reiko, please ask Laojun where Elsa has gone.”

“…Understood.”

With a slightly dissatisfied look on her face, Reiko contacted Laojun. The answer came soon.

“…It seems that she’s in the office of Industry Minister Derait, on the upper floor.”

“What is she doing in a place like that…?”

Then came Princess Lieschen.

“Any luck, Jin? I realized it would be hard for you to search for Elsa in this castle all by yourself, so I chased after you to help you… you haven’t found her yet, have you?”

“Liese… No, not yet, but she seems to be in the office of Minister of Industry Derait.”

“In Derait’s office? I see. Let’s go.”

With the princess leading the way, Jin began going up the stairs.

“…Come to think of it, I just remembered that Derait is also from the Celuroa Kingdom… I heard that he was married into the Hanks family a long time ago. His wife passed away a few years ago, and he hasn’t remarried since.”

Hearing that, Jin suddenly remembered the words that Industry Minister Derait had let slip without any context.

(Come to think of it, he called Elena an Automata… Has he seen her before?)

He didn’t think that the fact that she was an Automata would come out of Elena’s own mouth. And he also had his doubts about Minister of Industry Derait being knowledgeable in the matter enough to see that Elena was an Automata.

This means that he had seen Elena in the past. Jin had a bad feeling about that.

“The 2nd floor is where we were until recently, and the 3rd floor is where the offices of each of the ministers are.”

At that time, Reiko interrupted their conversation.

“Father, Elsa is in danger.”

＊＊＊

“You are brilliant. Very much so. If possible, I’d like to persuade you to come with me.”

“W-what are you talking about?”

Derait stands up and stands in front of the door, cutting off Elsa’s escape route.

“You’ve realized, haven’t you? You know that that poisoning incident was all a ruse.”

“…I know that the poison from Aconita leaves isn’t lethal.”

“Yes, if everyone in that place had fallen to poison, your credibility would have dropped like a rock.be lost. Then you wouldn’t have been allowed to treat the king. That’s what I thought… But I never imagined you would know about Aconita.”

“You mean you were the one who brought that poisoned tea caddy?”

“…I know. If I take you with me as a gift, it’ll make up for me not being able to complete my instructions.”

“Huh? Instructions?”

Disgusted, Elsa got up from her chair. Edgar was out the door.

“This country won’t last long. Just like the neighboring Franz Kingdom.

In that case, it would be better for it to be absorbed by the Celuroa Kingdom, and leave its rule to it.”

The eyes of Derait, whose tone had changed completely, seemed to be filled with madness.

“…I don’t think so. If the government of the Celuroa Kingdom occupies the Klein Kingdom, they’ll just treat it and its people like they’re of a lower position than its own.”

Elsa has seen many countries. Recently, she’s had a bitter experience when she personally faced her selfish older brother and younger sister in the Celuroa Kingdom. And she’s also heard stories from Stearleana and Vivian.

No matter how she looked at it, she didn’t think there would be fair governance under Celuroan rule.

“… Hmph, I don’t care about the common people. The important thing is whether or not we… I can get a better position than I am now…. Lecker, don’t let that girl escape.”

The Golem Lecker approached Elsa as instructed by Derait. Elsa immediately put the table between them as a means to shield herself.

“Hmph, it’s useless. You won’t cooperate nicely, will you? I don’t want to have to get rough. It might have been all an act, but I still owe you for ridding me of that poison.”

“…Do you think you can escape safely by taking me as a hostage? If I make a loud noise, someone will come running.”

“Haha, I wonder if I can just stall for time. …Gren!”

With that one word, the Golem standing in the back also started to move.

“I have another one just like him outside in the corridor. Who’s going to be able to come here?”

“Even so, there’s no way you can escape.”

“Haha, don’t you think you’re forgetting about something? …What if I told you that I have a hot air balloon too?”

“No way…”

“The technology of the Celuroa Kingdom is wonderful. In exchange for 300 tons of wheat, they gave me one hot air balloon and five Golems.”

“…You smuggled precious food out of the country? …You’re the worst. Selling your own country like that…”

“You young ones don’t seem to understand how attractive power can be. I don’t suppose you can even begin to see how wonderful it is to be able to run a country the way you want. Besides, my homeland is… the Celuroa Kingdom.”

“…I don’t even want to understand. Things like power are just a bother.”

Dyed with Jin’s way of thinking, Elsa’s words meet Derait’s lust for power as if they were a sword, cutting it down and throwing it away.

“A bother, you say? Well, you’re a woman after all. You can’t understand the joy of ruling over others.”

“I’m a man, and yet I can’t understand that joy either.”

“What?!”

“Brother Jin!”

The door to the room had been forcibly opened from the outside, and Jin was standing there.

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