FFF-Tier System, SSS-Rank Wife

For the second night in a row, I missed the comfort of sleeping with Selia.

In theory, I could ask the men to build two sheds instead of one so that I could get some private time with her…

But I wasn't going to do something so tragically bad for the morale after doing my best to build it up.

And so, my time of struggle continued after the second night and into the third day.

Just like it was with the building of the shed, now that everyone knew what had to be done, the whole process went a lot smoother.

There was no need to gather the tools — already aware they would be leaving the very next morning, everyone made sure to keep them all stacked in one secure place after finishing the last night's job.

The supplies?

All packed and ready, save for the provisions and fuel used to get everyone a solid breakfast.

The night's watch?

They got to eat before everyone else, now using the breakfast time and the following half an hour of added rest — a notion I forced through by basing it on my memories and experiences of Earth's research — to get some of the sleep they missed during the night.

Thanks to those improvements to everyone's efficiency, we managed to set out for the road a lot faster than the day before.

In fact, merely judging by the angle at which the sun shone right into my face, we actually managed to save quite a lot of time…

Which only made me doubt whether or not the spacing between each of the resting points was correct.

"There's no need to think about it so hard," Selia commented once she heard about my worries.

With it being still early in the morning, we had yet to exhaust ourselves to the point where we would only think about putting one foot in front of the other, leaving us with enough energy to spare on some small chat.

"Assuming everything works exactly the way you expect it to, it won't be long before hand-drawn carriages will get replaced with horse-drawn ones," she pointed out before turning her eyes toward the surface of the road and grinning lightly, "and once the town's government realizes this new opportunity, I wouldn't put it beyond them to invest into rebuilding this road."

That statement made my eyebrows move up.

Back on Earth, there were nearly five thousand years of experiences that became the reason why politicians were often at the very bottom of the jobs when ranked by who people trusted the most.

In a modern world full of excess that only led to more struggle and socio-economic imbalance, they were often seen as the ones who were both responsible for the faults of a country and often stood to directly profit from them.

That's why, when I heard Selia mention how a government would do something that would actually help the people within its influence, I nearly took it as a joke.

Only when looking at her face and failing to spot even a single clue that she might be joking, I realized she was actually serious.

"Do you mean to say the governments here do their job properly?" I asked, raising my eyebrow to express my considerable doubt.

"Wait, that wasn't the case back… where you came from?" Selia replied, shocked… but not to the point where she would randomly speak out about my place of origin or how, in fact, I was from another world.

"Let's just say they gave us every reason imaginable to hate… No, not hate, despise them."

There was no lie or overexaggeration in my words.

I saw how the poorly written legislation killed the business one of my friends spent years building, fighting against the bureaucrats, holding up entire avalanches of paperology…

It was one big mess, all because rather than making the tax code simple, a list that anyone could understand, the politicians continued to make it messier and messier with every chance they got, all for the sake of concealing whatever small bits they smuggled into the new changes to please whoever left them with the most expensive gift.

Sadly, for people in those social circles, with that level of power and this kind of money, those things no longer qualified as bribing, but were reworded as lobbying, suddenly legalizing the whole procedure of the rich using their wealth to effectively buy themselves whatever laws and tax cuts they really wanted, all at the cost of an average person who ended up getting the bill for all of it.

"Wait, are you seriously trying to tell me you guys just… allowed people like that to govern?" Selia looked at me with her eyes wide open, her step nearly faltering.

This wasn't just a surprise that I saw flaring in her eyes.

It was pure, unbridled, and unadulterated shock!

"There was nothing an average person could do against them," I shook my head. "There were some instances in the past where people like that would get dragged to the streets, ripped apart and then…" I closed my eyes as I decided to omit the most grotesque part of that legendary revolt of people who literally ended up shitting out their politicians a few days after the political uprising.

"But not in your times, was it?" Selia came with a perfect counter, right after my voice lingered out in the air.

"Yes. In the present, they were pretty much untouchable. Not because it was impossible to hurt them…"

I shook my head.

How was I to even begin to explain the complexity of it all?

How the social dynamics changed, leading to putting life itself on a pedestal, even if at the cost of all the morals that managed to regulate society well for thousands of years. How the emergence of the media made it easy for a politician to demonize anyone they didn't agree with, how society grew so complex one couldn't just exist in it without adhering to an endless set of rules…

Sure, even in all of those circumstances, there were things that one could do to punish the unruly politicians…

But who would be willing to give up everything in a world where responsibility for even the worst of the things would get diluted over the whole crowd of politicians, law enforcement, parliamentarians, and simple officials?

Who was at fault, when a good law ended up serving a bad cause? Who could judge it if a bad law ended up helping to bring a huge criminal group to prison?

Who was responsible for it all? Who had the ability to judge not only for themselves but everyone else in the country?

A normal person would ask themselves those questions. Then, they would question whether whatever they felt about a politician was what they actually felt or what the media fabricated and made them feel about that politician instead.

"How do your guys solve it here?" I asked, my mood already soured from just thinking about how far the politicians of my old world entrenched themselves within the position of power, continuing to rule through the popular vote even when the majority of the country had enough of them for far too long.

"It's simple," Selia shrugged her shoulders. "The town's governor isn't elected or appointed," she started her explanation with a statement that, when taken by its own, made absolutely no sense.

Unless that role was hereditary to begin with.

"They are picked at random instead," Selia shrugged her shoulders for the second time. "Then, whoever gets the lucky vote, they are given the right and the obligation to pick out the right people to lead the city towards greater prosperity in the future."

For a moment, I could see pride in Selia's eyes, as if this kind of political system was something of a founding element of a national spirit of this town, a shared source of pride they wouldn't let anyone insult.

"Excuse me…" off from the side, one of the genuinely middle-rank adventurers approached with a look of anxiety mixing with curiosity in his eyes. "But isn't the selection supposedly guided by Jahel's hand?"

Once again, I saw the same kind of pride flash in the man's eyes as soon as the topic of electing their governing body came up.

"Rather than random, I believe it's a blessed system when it's Jahel himself who decides on the person most fitting of organizing the policies in town!"

Selia raised one of her eyebrows but otherwise kept a perfectly neutral face.

Still, through our bond, I could feel the tinge of anger bursting forth in her heart as she heard the man's question.

"It was never confirmed nor divined by the church for this selection to be Jahel's miracle," she stated bluntly and right in the man's face. "And don't forget," she raised her hand only to bend down all of her fingers but one that she then used to nuh-uh the man. "In this world, it's on us to do things. That's why Jahel's miracles are a true rarity, not something people can receive every few years. As for whether or not this system is good?"

Selia shook her head, her face now melting into one of sympathy, thoughtfulness, and deep consideration.

"It will be up to Jahel to reveal the answer to us once the time has come for us to meet him," Selia then added, only to lower her head in what could be seen as a slight, respectful bow.

Then, as she raised her head back up, I could see fire in her eyes.

"Up until that day, however," Selia leaned her head off to the side as she shot the adventurer an intense glare, "it is on us to keep on struggling, to keep on working hard. Otherwise, hoping for constant miracles would be no different from blasphemy!"