Chapter 11
It would take a long time for him to come near so I let Tofu fetch him. Only then did he rushed towards me when Tofu was about to drag him by his pants.
The once immaculately groomed chamberlain was standing in front of Elle, looking disheveled with a smudge of blood on his nose. That’s only what you earned from threatening and cursing me but if it was the Emperor or Empress you’re throwing those threats at, it would be ‘the Guillotine’ for you.
No one spoke a word as Elle stared at her cup where soon the steam was rising. A moment later Elle began to speak.
“Who is responsible for managing the budget of the Second Prince’s Palace?”
“It’s me.”
“Hand it over.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Why do you seemed surprised? Isn’t it obvious since I’m the Mistress of this palace?”
In the beginning, budget management was a matter that needed the approval of the Second Prince.
However, the Second Prince was said to be a monster and could only be a human at night. Given that he couldn’t engage in his palace’s affairs during the day and hasn’t even tried to manage it at night, the chamberlain wielded his authority without constraint.
If I haven’t come here, I wouldn’t know these things happen right under my nose. I could only regret not coming here sooner.
“Hah, but Your Highness, aren’t you just a pampered child?”
“… ??”
“Can you even calculate the figures?”
“……”
“Furthermore, Your Highness thinks it’s easy to manage this palace when you’ve only lived in luxury your whole life!”
When Elle didn’t say anything, Coffari’s nose went up, basking in his little victory. But he didn’t know that he was speaking to a new Elle who was a talented person that graduated from college and had been given preferential treatment at a good company.
I only went silent because I was so dumbfounded by his arrogance and insolence. On top of that, he threw in an absurd question of whether I could calculate the numbers?
“… Don’t the women of this Empire learn calculations?”
“No?”
“You don’t even know? Are you stupid?”
“Don’t worry, I’ve learned that much since I was a baby in the kingdom.” Elle waved her hand, dismissing the topic.
I just wanted to avoid revealing myself more since I don’t know when the Sahad Kingdom starts teaching calculations. I don’t even know the customs of that damn country.
However, I learned that since it is a barren and a difficult place to live, everyone develops their physical strength and learns swordsmanship from an early age. So they could raid and plunder.
The nobles were no exceptions. Rather, the nation’s economy would fall off a cliff unless they could loot the neighboring countries. They even set up a separate warehouse for looting inside the royal palace. That’s how mighty that country was.
The biggest victims of the looting were the Rennes Empire’s borders and the Principality of Phipps in the east.
This is a fictional world, and Elle knows the future. This country had the title of an “Empire,” but it was actually a sinking ship.
Dejelion Sahad, the present king of the Sahad Kingdom, was a very ambitious king, and as luck would have it, this Empire’s First Prince was a complete idiot and a trash.
I don’t know what my husband, the Second Prince was like but I wished the Emperor should reign on for many years and would not hand over the empire to that trashy First Prince.
This place would become a bloodbath in just a few years, but such a future really didn’t matter. Elle doesn’t care what happens to this empire as long as Lari and Tofu are safe. Despite knowing what will happen, she still hadn’t had thought of returning to the kingdom.
I wonder if I could make a living here somehow.
“Well, then I’ll have to test it out!” Coffari declared.
But right now, I think the first thing to do is to get rid of this cocky nose fly.
This stupid nose fly.
I came here to where he was working because he said he would like to test my skills, but this place was more splendid than the palace I was living in. It was so bright walking along the corridors and there were many fancy decorations everywhere.
The servants and maids were more polite to the nose fly than they were to me. And then the nose fly was clearly absorbing their respects with his chin raised.
Again, I was dumbfounded, but I had to put up with it for now.
“If I know how to draw up the accounts, will you hand over the management rights?” I said after sitting in his mahogany desk that wouldn’t pale to the desk of the emperor.
“Yes, I’ll pass it to Your Highness.”
Coffari spoke haughtily as if he doesn’t believe she have the skills to do it. Elle ignored his disgustingly smug face and began compiling the list of budgets used in the new books he had brought over.
It would have been more convenient if I had a calculator, but I don’t think I need it. As I looked through these books, there was nothing complicated about the computations written in here. Even elementary school students could solve these mathematical problems.
Elle was writing down the book without a hitch, and Coffari, who was watching behind her, was fading fast.
“Oh, no, how, how?!”
I still have to double-check the book I’ve written, but the nose fly suddenly took them away. There shouldn’t be anything wrong.
On the contrary, Coffari was shocked because it seemed cleaner than it was when he did it. What’s more, was it possible to quickly sort this out in a blink of an eye?
His astonishment wasn’t unreasonable because the books were almost seemed to be calculated in mental arithmetic. Those who have been able to perform arithmetic in this way were usually prepared to become wizards.
“……I can’t believe this.”
He still didn’t wipe the blood on his nose that he got from Elle earlier so when he was gaping his mouth with a nosebleed, it looked pretty disgusting to Elle.
“So, when can I check the previous accounts and ledgers?”
I didn’t want to see it anymore, so I interrupted him. However, the nose fly was fidgeting, gripping the edges of the book while making excuses.
“Your Highness may be good at organizing these accounts, but I don’t believe that Your Highness won’t waste the budget!”
“……”
“…… As expected, I’m the only one deserving of managing this palace!”
Even though he should be grateful that he was able to keep his position up to this point but the nose fly remained an ingrate and rude. Lari’s expression began to twist as she dangerously raised her fist, but the one who beat her to it was Tofu, who was snarling for quite a while now.
I thought of breaking his nose, but it was as if Tofu read my mind and suddenly rushed up to him and bit his nose the moment I thought of it.
“Oh, my God. My baby did a good job!”
Elle clapped her hands while admiring Tofu’s little heroic feat.