Chapter 283

The “Gary Beaufort Scandal,” involving Hailand’s prime minister, struck the entire world. It spread at once to Prozen, the Empire, and even the East, including Lobrus.

“So the esteemed prime minister accepts the Empire’s money and friendship openly, while keeping a mistress behind the scenes!”

Such words rang through the Common Hall.

“Above all, the Common Hall must not lightly overlook the fact that the woman is an Imperial citizen.”

Arthur Winston, meanwhile, slowly closed his eyes. He balked at the excessively cruel words being directed at Gary Beaufort.

“If the prime minister’s bedroom lacks proper security, can we be sure his drawers are safe? The prime minister has a duty to explain to the public who that woman was and what she said to him.”

Words that damaged Gary’s character, morality, and honor.

Words that were formally polite, yet utterly sharp.

“If the public elevates a person, that person must be all the more diligent in their conduct. Yet intoxicated by his own standing, the prime minister has behaved far too carelessly...”

Arthur clenched his teeth.

In the end, he could no longer endure such disgusting words.

“Enough of that nonsense!”

He had no speaking rights, but he struck the floor with his cane.

Thud!

The loud sound drew everyone’s attention. Arthur spoke from his seat rather than the podium.

“Is this the time to debate one person’s flaws for so long? Outside this Common Hall lurks something more terrifying, more important, and more urgent than one man’s bedroom, more urgent than any mere individual!”

Arthur spread out the documents and photographs he had brought.

“The Empire is enforcing an unprecedented law that confiscates the property of minority races.”

The Empire’s Bloodline Act. Camps. Families loaded into trucks. People left stranded on the streets of Bolska.

He held up the photographs one by one.

“Who can say we will not be next? Hailand also has many minority races. They are Hail people too!”

“...”

The ruling party legislators fell silent. Meanwhile, Leonard and the legislators of the Gray Apostles’ Society hardened their expressions. They exchanged glances, preparing for the right moment.

“To begin with, the effectiveness of the Genson Agreement is doubtful. Esteemed members, you must know that tensions have not ceased along the Bolska border. If you do not know, then you must learn now.”

The Empire had stationed troops in territory ceded by Bolska. It had even established supply lines and bases there.

In other words, armed Imperial forces had taken up positions along the Bolska border.

“Their intention is too obvious. Even now, Hailand must join hands with Prozen, Yursled, Bolska, and other nations!”

The atmosphere in the hall changed. Murmurs arose from the opposition benches, and several members of the ruling party lifted their heads.

“We must conclude a pact for collective defense!”

Thud!

The instant Arthur struck the desk with his fist.

“That’s right! That’s right!”

The shout began somewhere and filled the hall, spreading from back to front and front to back. Some sighed, saying things like, “That warmonger again...” The ministers in the front row sat with their arms crossed.

Meanwhile, Army Minister Leonard and Leonard’s comrades...

“...Let’s heat things up for about a week, then finish it.”

Quietly facing one another, they discussed a certain “scheme.”

...

The Prime Minister’s Office.

For an entire week, weary chants of “Gary must explain himself!” had echoed from outside the windows.

Gary Beaufort sat there with a stiff expression.

“Gary. You really don’t remember?”

“...”

He nodded.

That day, he had drunk quite a lot of wine at a dinner. He had been in a good mood.

“Did you know that person?”

“...”

He only nodded.

“Then someone may have drugged your drink. Isn’t that possible? You don’t suddenly become that drunk.”

Even so, Gary Beaufort said nothing.

“...Where is that woman now?”

Foreign Minister Damian was the only person in the cabinet with whom Gary could speak openly.

At Damian’s words, Gary quietly closed his eyes.

Damian read something in Gary’s expression.

“Could it be... you had feelings for her?”

Gary spoke after a long while.

“I was fond of her. I liked her.”

They had first met at a fundraising event and encountered each other a few more times at social gatherings. He had eaten with her and her husband, an Imperial merchant, once or twice. She knew the Empire’s life and inner workings well, so they had been able to talk.

That was all.

“Love... I’m old enough to know the difference.”

Damian lowered his gaze for a moment at Gary Beaufort’s words.

“Then reveal her schemes to the press and fight back instead...”

“Damian. Is that something a gentleman should say?”

Gary was gentle, cautious, dignified, and polite. Precisely because of that nature, he could not strike back against this kind of scandal.

As much as he considered his own pain and bewilderment, he also unnecessarily considered the woman’s feelings.

“...Steel yourself. Hailand’s future, the continent’s future, rests on you.”

If Gary stepped down, those who refused to accept conciliation and peace would continue provoking the Empire.

If Gary collapsed, no one would remain to stop them.

Knock, knock.

Then, somehow, an ominous knock sounded.

“Prime Minister.”

The secretary entered and handed him a newspaper.

[ Prime Minister’s Woman Found Dead by Suicide in Bedroom ]

“...”

Damian and Gary both read the headline.

Gary’s body swayed sharply. He staggered and caught the corner of the desk. The newspaper slipped from his hand and fell to the floor. Damian watched the color drain from Gary’s face.

“...Gary.”

Whether this scandal was true or false, fabricated or planned, all the people of the continent were humiliating Gary.

Even Gary himself seemed unable to believe in himself anymore. He would not be able to bear the position of prime minister intact.

But Damian’s fear lay in what came next.

* * *

A pale haze settled over Hailand’s capital. It was some phenomenon called smog.

“Can’t see anything... What’s wrong with this country?”

At this level, wasn’t smog a natural disaster?

“...Tch.”

Walking through the fog-covered streets, I barely found the Daily Clarion.

I entered the media company I had bought.

Clatter. Clatter-clatter.

The sounds of typewriters and thick cigarette smoke. Typing was in full swing.

“No, seriously. Why did it have to be an Imperial woman?”

“What... She blew him, and he probably started thinking he was some kind of king.”

“Shouldn’t they start by investigating his accounts...?”

“They say Gary Beaufort’s affair is being broadcast over Imperial radio now. What kind of national disgrace is this?”

An Imperial woman.

At this particular time.

An affair.

If this scandal was Izenheim’s doing, what was the reason?

If Gary resigned according to their intentions, war might come a little sooner.

Would that be good for us, or bad?

Of course, considering national strength, no single country could stand against the Empire.

But the East, led by Lobrus and united among more than a dozen countries, could certainly resist. If the West and East joined together, they would surpass the Empire.

In the end, population was limited.

Wars were fought by people. Whether tanks, cavalry, or knights, it was infantry that ultimately planted flags in enemy territory.

Was that what Izenheim was aiming for?

I still didn’t know.

But one thing I knew for certain was that Izenheim didn’t know either.

They, too, merely predicted and anticipated.

They imitated humans, so even their judgment was no more than human judgment.

In other words, they were not divine beings. They made wrong judgments and held wrong ideas. The entire species was merely focused on a single goal: humanity’s destruction.

Therefore, they were parasites that had seeped into our continent, nothing more than tumors that had to be torn apart and killed.

“Hey! Who are you?!”

Then some bastard suddenly called out to me.

“...”

I glanced sideways at the name on my employee badge.

“Thomas Hale.”

“Are you new? What are you doing coming in here? Go dig something up already, damn it!”

“Uh... yes.”

I was thrown out of my own company.

“...What was that bastard’s name again?”

Should I fire him? I was grumbling to myself while breathing in the smell of smog.

“Sir.”

Hanna emerged from the fog.

“I found the woman connected to the Gary Beaufort case.”

“Where is she?”

I asked as I walked toward her.

“...She apparently killed herself.”

I stopped walking.

Hanna brushed a hand through her hair as though at a loss.

“It turns out she was listed in Georgen’s list of Imperial citizens abroad. She had strong anti-Empire leanings.”

“Lead me there.”

“Yes.”

We soon arrived at an affluent neighborhood in Hailand.

But police had already set up a heavy cordon in front of the mansion.

“Can’t we get inside somehow?”

“This way. I slipped them some money in advance.”

Hanna had become very capable at some point. It struck me anew.

“It feels like only yesterday that you were eating cabbage as emergency rations.”

“...That was years ago, not yesterday.”

We went around to the back door.

The constable turned his back and pretended not to see us.

We climbed a narrow servants’ staircase to the second floor. The scent of perfume still lingered in the corridor, and through the crack of a half-open bedroom door, the body was visible.

A woman preserved as she hung by the neck.

A folded sheet of paper sat on the bedside table beside a glass.

A suicide note.

“...”

Thump.

From the moment I stepped inside, my heart began to pound. Izenheim’s magical power lingered throughout the room, but the woman who had supposedly taken her own life produced no reaction at all.

Had she been made to commit suicide?

“It would be easier if the Yaken were here.”

Hanna scratched the back of her neck.

“I’m more accurate than the Yaken.”

I picked up the suicide note.

[ I loved him alone. ]

[ Because it was a love that belonged only to me, I will let him go at last. I hope I will not become his burden... ]

[ This is my sin, so please do not hate him. ]

[ I will take responsibility. ]

A page of sentences.

They intended to destroy Gary completely.

What would happen to a prime minister caught in such a vicious trap, so full of malice?

They said the higher one rose, the more it hurt when one fell.

Did Gary have the strength to withstand such pain?

...He would not.

Gary Beaufort had also ended his life by suicide before my regression.

He had taken responsibility for being wrong with his own life.

“It’s complicated.”

Even if things went as badly as possible, I would only have to deal with Arthur Winston a few months earlier.

Arthur was certainly no easy opponent, but I was confident I would win.

But...

“Hanna.”

“Yes?”

I suddenly asked her.

“If a man were born as the eldest son of an excellent noble family, raised with dignity while following nothing but the elite path, and became entangled in a scandal like this.”

Hanna looked at me too.

“And because of him, the woman left behind a suicide note like this and killed herself. What choice do you think such a man would make?”

Hanna seemed to have words rolling around in her mouth, but she did not say them.

“...I don’t want to leave it that way. Izenheim’s scheme is too obvious.”

Interfering with anything Izenheim did was one of my strategies.

“Yes.”

Even if I could not save Gary Beaufort the “prime minister.”

Gary Beaufort the “person” might someday be useful to the Empire.

In the future after the Empire’s victory, as the only person with whom the Empire had been able to “communicate.”

“Then how should we proceed?”

Hanna asked.

“I’ll write a letter.”

A mere letter.

Only a single sheet of paper.

Yet some letters completely destroy a nation, while others save a person from collapse.

“You only need to deliver it. Directly to him...”

* * *

A villa far from Hailand’s noisy capital.

It was a small residence where Gary’s father had once stayed when he needed time to think.

Gary was packing there.

He had decided to take a trip for a while.

He had told no one.

It was a strange feeling.

He thought of his wife, son, daughter, and family, but this time, more than that... it would be a decision for his convictions.

Gary believed that peace and conciliation were certainly not the wrong path.

But no matter how right a message was, the messenger’s flaws killed the message.

It would be better for him alone to become an immoral man, and for the next generation to succeed him.

Whatever had happened that day, I became this way anyway.

The entire continent had made him into such a person.

Every newspaper and radio broadcast, every cartoon and joke in every bar, had jabbed at his alleged shameful secrets and inflated nonexistent lies into facts.

“...Why did you die?”

Gary bore some resentment toward the woman who had committed suicide.

She could have said it wasn’t true if it wasn’t true. She could have spoken according to what was right.

At the very least, she could have put everything on him and run away.

Click.

Gary stuffed clothes into his bags.

The papers were already prepared, and Damian would take over as his successor.

“...”

Bitterness lingered in his mouth.

Was his choice easier than endlessly fighting to claim his innocence, or was it harder?

Gary did not know.

But it was only painful.

More than the pressure of facing the enormous entity called the Empire, these mockeries that damaged his soul as a person were simply... more painful.

Click.

Just as Gary closed his suitcase.

Knock, knock.

“...?”

A sudden knock came at the villa door.

Knock, knock.

“...What?”

Knock, knock.

“Who is it?”

“Letter. I have.”

Awkward Hail language came from outside. A voice trying hard to speak Hail.

“Letter. I have.”

“Leave it there.”

“I have a letter.”

A foreign worker, perhaps. Gary smiled bitterly and opened the door. Before him stood a woman in a hat.

“...You could have just left it.”

“Directly to person. Must deliver.”

She handed him the letter, then immediately turned and left.

Gary Beaufort looked over the envelope front and back.

[ To Prime Minister Gary Beaufort ]

Elegant handwriting in Hail language.

As he examined it, a question occurred to him too late.

“Deliver directly to me...”

How did she know he was here?

Tilting his head, Gary opened the envelope.

[ Greetings, Prime Minister Gary Beaufort. I am Maximilian Ebenholtz of the Empire. ]

The letter began that way.

“!”

At the name Maximilian, Gary’s eyes widened. His chest lurched as though his heart had been stabbed with a knife. Veins stood out on the back of his hand.

Had he gone to the trouble of sending such a letter to point out Gary’s stain and fault as well?

...That concern vanished with the very next sentence.

[ I learned of this matter through the newspapers. I thought for a long time about what I should say. ]

[ Prime Minister, I remember you. I remember the respect and consideration in every word you used, every movement and gesture you made, and how you would gently set down a glass while considering the other person. ]

Gary Beaufort’s fingertips trembled.

Without realizing it, he bit his lip.

[ A person whose nature is kind, polite, and warm. ]

[ I write this letter to tell you that I know every sharp and filthy word now stirring up this continent is greatly at odds with your true nature. To tell you that someone who believes in you exists across the sea from Hailand... ]

An Imperial knight believed in him, while everyone in his homeland insulted him.

[ Prime Minister, I enjoy gardening. During winter, there is nothing to tend, and I often look at dry branches from the window. Strangely, that is the most peaceful time of the year. I have wondered whether you might need such a time at least once as well. ]

[ If you agree with me, it may be very welcome news for me. We will be able to have a more comfortable and deeper conversation... ]

Gary Beaufort pressed his fingertips firmly against the words.

[ ...Mr. Gary Beaufort. It was never a lie when I said we could understand one another. ]

[ Therefore, someday, I would like to share another kind of meal with you at Lilac Vita. At that time, I hope there will be no documents or written pledges, only good wine and food. ]

Such a warm letter, written by the racist and most dangerous imperialist whom not only Hailand, but the entire continent, feared most.

[ If such a day comes, I think it may be quite a good day. ]

[ Don’t you think so too? ]

Gary Beaufort read it again and again.