How to Use the Lord’s Future Diary

Chapter 25

Rudick walked into the reception room with some jerky in hand, only to flinch when he saw Yuria.

This was the first time he had ever seen her in person, though he had heard about her before.

His face clearly showed his bewilderment at seeing someone who looked exactly like my former wife.

So even that shameless guy could get flustered, huh.

“What’s this supposed to be?”

“What do you mean, what? It’s jerky. Can’t you tell by looking?”

“Do you think I asked because I don’t know that?”

I wasn’t the only one feeling awkward.

After handing over the jerky in a rush, Rudick quickly left the reception room, leaving Yuria staring at his retreating back.

She then glanced at the jerky on the table and let out a sigh.

I had built up her expectations as if I were about to bring out something amazing, so when it turned out to be mere jerky, she looked utterly disappointed.

“Just try it before you say anything.”

“Hmph. Depending on how this tastes, my evaluation of you might drop a few levels, you know.”

“Good grief. You really have a sharp tongue, don’t you? Don’t tell me you can’t eat meat?”

I urged Yuria again, who still looked unconvinced.

With a pouty face, she carefully picked up a piece of jerky and put it in her mouth.

—Churai~ churai~

For some reason, Black Rabbit was excited, tap-dancing on the table right next to the Horned Rabbit jerky.

The sight was so ridiculous that I almost burst into laughter.

Damn rabbit.

I clenched my fist tightly to keep myself from laughing.

“…This is.”

“Well? How is it?”

“What is this? How can it taste like this?”

“Do you like it?”

“What is this? Where in the world did you…?”

Yuria’s expression shifted in real time.

Her face, which had been doubtful because it was so different from her expectations, gradually turned into one of astonishment.

As I thought, Horned Rabbit jerky worked even for a lady with refined tastes.

“I’ve had all kinds of meat in my life. But this…”

“It’s a bit different, isn’t it?”

“Yes. It’s definitely different. What kind of meat is this?”

“Horned Rabbit. It’s a magical beast native to the area around the territory. We succeeded in breeding it recently.”

“My goodness. You mean it’s livestock? Then that means it can be mass-produced?”

“Not just as jerky. If we can solve the transport problem, we can handle it as fresh meat too. Of course, it would have to be frozen, but it’ll still be good enough to eat. I’d say it’s even better than jerky that way—since the cooking methods become much more diverse.”

“Heavens.”

Hearing that Horned Rabbits were being raised on a large scale, Yuria was utterly shocked.

Being a merchant, she immediately recognized their commercial value.

But that reaction didn’t last long.

Her expression slowly darkened, as though something was bothering her.

“Is there a problem? We’re planning to set the price at a reasonable level.”

“There’s no problem with the product. No, the problem is that there’s too little wrong with it.”

“What do you mean?”

“If this enters the market, the entire meat industry will change.”

“Eh, surely not to that extent…”

That sounded a bit exaggerated.

Was it really so different from other meats?

In Johnson Territory, sure, meat was rare, but here?

Meat was abundant.

I thought pigs or cattle would be decent rivals to Horned Rabbits.

But in matters of trade, this woman was the expert, not me.

So if she said so, it was probably true.

Still, would that really be a problem?

The more popular it was, the more it would benefit Yuria, since she’d be the one handling it.

“If something like this gets distributed in bulk, the cartel won’t stay quiet. In fact, meat that doesn’t go through the cartel can’t even circulate in this region.”

“Cartel? Ah, I see.”

“There are several merchant groups running massive ranches. Actually, think of it like this: all the big ones run them. They monopolize the meat industry here. They’ve even got the lords in their pockets, so dealing with them from the outside is extremely difficult.”

“That’s troublesome. So what you’re saying is, if we try to sell this, problems will arise?”

“A few heads wouldn’t matter. But since you’ve built a whole ranch…”

“Right. If it were just a small amount, I wouldn’t have come to you like this.”

So, it was basically collusion between politics and commerce, a monopoly cartel.

People really did think the same everywhere.

‘But to be fair, I’d probably do the same.’

Wanting greater profit was human instinct.

And in trade, the surest way to maximize profit was through monopoly, collusion, and political connections.

From their perspective, they obviously wouldn’t want an ecological disruptor like the Horned Rabbit to throw the market into chaos.

If I were running a ranch and part of a cartel, I wouldn’t let a new competitor in either.

‘Wait a minute, isn’t the Level Merchant Group one of the biggest around here?’

Yet this woman was the one bringing this up now.

“Is the Level Merchant Group not part of that cartel? Maybe you don’t deal with meat?”

“…That’s not it.”

“Then what?”

“I don’t deal with it personally.”

“Ah, so it’s handled by the other side, then?”

No wonder she seemed so hesitant.

Meat wasn’t something Yuria herself could deal with.

If I traded Horned Rabbit with the Level Merchant Group, it wouldn’t go through her—it would pass to the other faction.

I didn’t know the internal workings of the Level Merchant Group, but judging from Yuria’s reluctance, she clearly wasn’t keen on seeing Horned Rabbit under their control.

“Don’t misunderstand. The same would happen no matter which group you went to. The merchant groups of Levelium are so intertwined that none of them will let a single one get ahead. Even the Level Merchant Group would struggle if the others united against it.”

“So they keep the benefits to themselves, but solo play is forbidden?”

“Well, that’s human nature.”

“Not wrong. So, if the Level Merchant Group handled this, the others wouldn’t just sit back?”

So in the end, Horned Rabbit meat was such a powerful weapon that it was actually hard to distribute?

That was a factor I hadn’t considered.

—This looks troublesome, doesn’t it?

‘It is. But I get it. It’s a weapon strong enough to shake up the entire meat industry, but not one worth staking the entire merchant group over.’

—Sounds complicated.

‘Well, that’s how the world works. What should we do?’

Since the cartel was linked to the lords, even direct trade with them would be difficult.

In this region, the merchant groups had unusually strong influence, and even the lords had to be mindful of them.

Maybe the best option was to split the supply and distribute it across all the big groups handling meat?

If no single side gained too much, everyone could profit.

‘Do I have to negotiate directly with the meat cartel? For just selling some meat, things sure got complicated.’

If I were a local, I’d push through negotiations and secure a trade route, but we were outsiders.

Once the trade was done, we had to leave.

We couldn’t spend days stuck dealing with this one issue. What a damn mess.

“I get the general situation. I’ll look into the rest myself.”

“Alright, then. Ah, and about that jerky—make sure to include some in our future trade. It suits my taste perfectly.”

“Is that so? I’ll keep it in mind.”

I only gained one thing here: the certainty that Horned Rabbit meat was a product far more marketable than I had expected.

To the point that even Yuria McBane personally requested a trade.

‘I’ll have to look around the market myself to get a clearer picture.’

First, I needed to hear directly from the merchants.

“Huh, so she’s really a different person? Wow, that’s amazing.”

“Enough of that, just come with me for a bit.”

“Where are we going now?”

“The market. I need to meet some merchants.”

“Did the trade not go well?”

“There’s a problem.”

“Hmm, then let’s go.”

Dragging along Rudick, who still couldn’t stop sighing in awe every time he thought about Yuria, I wandered around the marketplace.

She had been right.

Every shop in the area received its meat through a specific merchant group, and when I asked if they might be interested in buying some, every one of them shook their head.

They said that standing out would make it impossible to do business in this region.

It really did seem like the cartel had the entire market under its thumb.

‘The same must be true for nearby territories as well. With six such territories, no wonder there’s so much money involved. And the real profits for the merchant groups come from sending caravans to other lands, too.’

I walked around the area, turning over the problem in my head.

Frustrated, I stepped outside the castle for a while.

My feet carried me northward, until I ended up near a massive ranch.

In the distance, I could see pigs bustling inside the huge fenced enclosure.

“Pigs, huh. Well, in a place like this, raising pigs makes sense.”

“Aren’t pigs considered luxury stock?”

“More or less. Pigs eat almost the same things humans do, and they can only be raised for food. That’s why they’re so delicious.”

“Hmm, still, Horned Rabbits are the best.”

Talking about pigs, we arrived near the ranch.

And there, I spotted some familiar friends.

‘…That’s.’

—Master, Rabbit Tribe.

‘Exactly. Rabbit Tribe.’

It was the Rabbit Tribe.

I had heard that some had migrated out of the Forest of Illusions—apparently, those Rabbit

Tribe members had settled here.

But something about them seemed strange.

They didn’t feel quite like the Rabbit Tribe I knew.

“They don’t look very lively, do they?”

“You’re right. They feel completely different from our friends back in the territory…”

Normally, the Rabbit Tribe were incredibly energetic.

In Johnson Territory, they worked a staggering twelve hours a day without complaint.

They were the kind of folk who seemed born to work.

If I tried to limit their hours because they worked too much, they actually became uneasy instead.

The only thing I could really do for them was provide better food—so I made sure to serve plenty of Horned Rabbit, their favorite.

That only made them work harder, creating a vicious cycle.

That’s what the Rabbit Tribe were like—endless energy, like living batteries.

But here?

They looked utterly drained.

Ordinarily, nothing could put the Rabbit Tribe in such a state.

Just what had these humans done to them?

—They seem to be oppressed.

‘Oppressed?’

—Otherwise, the Rabbit Tribe would never look like this. This is a crisis.

‘Ugh, and what exactly am I supposed to do about it right now?’

I said that, but honestly, I felt uneasy as well.

It was true that I had become the guide of the Rabbit Tribe, and thanks to Black Rabbit’s efforts, running the Horned Rabbit ranch had gone much more smoothly.

On top of that, for some reason, even my Diary was influenced by Bestia.

The truth was, I owed them quite a lot.

‘Of course, for all that, the Diary never warned me about this.’

Did it know this was coming and simply not bother telling me?

Another mystery.

‘First, information.’

I needed to figure out what was going on.

So I asked around—who owned this pig ranch, and since when had the Rabbit Tribe been working there?

And I found something very interesting.

“So, that ranch is operated by the Level Merchant Group.”

A ranch very likely managed by the faction opposing Yuria.

Since Yuria didn’t handle livestock, it had to be them.

“Things are getting interesting.”

I hadn’t paid much attention since it wasn’t directly my problem, but it seemed I needed to learn more about how the Level Merchant Group operated.

What had begun as a trip to Levelium for Horned Rabbit distribution was now entering an entirely different phase.