NOVEL NEXT Chapter 190: Something is amiss
The evening’s event concluded with Ren Xiyang successfully avoiding any dancing.
On Saturday morning, Ren Xiyang said farewell to Rian and went to the Rosewood fief. Solicitor Carmine, Master Otto Silvercharm, and Aaron were waiting for him. Seeing their expressions, Ren Xiyang ushered them to his office.
“As you know, the census is being conducted alongside the tax collection,” Otto said. “The census team have been compiling the data as it comes in and have calculated some initial statistics. Although the census hasn’t been completed yet, Remi from the team noticed a problem that we hadn’t picked up before.”
Otto passed over a few sheets of paper with two columns: one for the various fiefs around the kingdom and beyond, and another with the number of people who had come from that fief.
“As you know, the census asks about place of birth. However, there are very few people from these fiefs…” Aaron pointed out particular fiefs that were located far away from the Rosewood fief.
“Given the mass migrations to the Rosewood fief over the last few years, this is an anomaly,” Solicitor Carmine said. “Even if we account for the distance and travel time, and assume that many travellers stopped in other fiefs before reaching the Rosewood fief, we believe there should be greater numbers.”
Ren Xiyang frowned. “You’re suggesting that they’re being stopped from leaving their home fief.”
“They could also be waylaid or intercepted by bandits along the way,” Solicitor Carmine said.
“Either way, it’s concerning,” Ren Xiyang said. “Alright, I’ll speak with Prince Rian right away.”
After Solicitor Carmine, Master Otto Silvercharm, and Aaron left, Ren Xiyang took out his communication mirror and called Rian.
After a few minutes, Rian accepted the call.
“Earl Rosewood, how may I help you?” he asked.
In the background, Ren Xiyang could see the Imperial Palace grounds, people walking around measuring distances and discussing, and a few artists painting.
“This is a little urgent, and may require secrecy,” Ren Xiyang said.
“Give me a few more minutes then,” Rian said.
A few minutes later, Rian was in a private room. “What happened?”
Ren Xiyang explained, and Rian’s expression became increasingly serious. He asked for the list of suspicious fiefs, which Ren Xiyang read out loud.
“I’ll have them investigated immediately.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m always here to help,” Rian said with a faint smile. “See you later, dear.”
“Bye bye.”
After Ren Xiyang’s face disappeared from Rian’s mirror, Rian put away the mirror and walked swiftly back to his quarters.
His Imperial Guards followed behind him, a little apprehensive. They could feel that something was amiss.
Rian entered his quarters and left his Imperial Guards outside. He contacted several shadow agents, including two via mirror-call. Each of them was assigned to a fief to investigate. If they found any information—rumours included—they were to contact him.
After he finished assigning work, Rian sat in silence, alone in his study, and frowned.
Not matter how hard he thought, he couldn’t remember anything like this happening in his previous life. But then again, no one had created such an attractive fief as Ren Xiyang.
Their actions had changed the course of the world in more ways than expected.
And there were other undesirable people aside from King Augustus who needed to be dealt with.
Although Ren Xiyang had handed the issue over to Rian, the matter still weighed on his mind.
He remembered something that Solicitor Carmine had said a few weeks ago: that they needed to increase the range of their actions beyond the Rosewood fief.
He suddenly wondered how Rian felt. Rian had responsibility over the entire kingdom. Did it not feel too large and unmanageable? Or rather, at such a size, efficiency was impossible and that made Ren Xiyang quite uncomfortable.
Ren Xiyang had scheduled other work, but this was too pressing. He spent an hour brainstorming everything he could think of in order to expand the range of the Rosewood Group’s influence and impact. The top item of the list was to spend more time brainstorming a list and to get others to brainstorm their own lists. Other items included setting up a task force—a task force per fief? Per region? They also needed to contact other fiefs and establish ties beyond trading. The way they worked with the Cordovan fief could be used as an example: Rosewood citizens provided support for the local citizens to actually do the work. Perhaps they could set up ‘embassies’ in other fiefs…
Time, money, resources, people. Even if Ren Xiyang had started this earlier, they wouldn’t have stretched so far as the suspicious fiefs.
Ren Xiyang handed over the list of Aaron to expand upon and met with Kel and Maria next.
“I haven’t done anything since Thursday,” Ren Xiyang admitted.
Maria grinned. “My Lord, we didn’t expect you to do anything.”
“I’ve gone through the draft content and have made some suggested changes for readability,” Kel said.
“And I’ve been planning out what we need to do to deploy them,” Maria followed up. She pulled out a large sheet of paper with a flow chart: create task force, booklet design, finalise content, printing (size, colours, paper type), distribution (Rosewood fief, beyond the Rosewood fief) and so forth.
“—These booklets are really interesting, I learned a lot from them, and I believe that other people will also be very interested in reading them,” Maria said. “That was the same for you too, Kel?”
Kel nodded. “Yes.”
Maria turned back to Ren Xiyang. “For this, I have some possible candidates in mind for the task force, and a candidate in mind for the person to lead it. Her name is Vanya Bauer, and she’s been working for the Rosewood Group for the last two years making protective clothing, and she recently got married to her wife.”
“Please go ahead and form the group,” Ren Xiyang said.
Maria had another large sheet of paper where she had mapped out which Rosewood Group divisions to contact, which people, and which external people to be contacted. The detail that Maria had put into it gave Ren Xiyang confidence that she could manage this well.
“—To add,” Ren Xiyang remembered, “If Lady Cassiopeia Schauss has distribution channels for the booklets, then we’ll employ those first.”
“Understood,” Maria said. “Please rest assured, my Lord, and leave everything to us!” She was very happy to help lay the path for Earl Rosewood’s future life. “I heard from Kel that you’ll be meeting Cassiopeia in a few days. May I join that meeting?”
“You may,” Ren Xiyang said.
“Thank you,” Maria said.
With no further news from Rian, Ren Xiyang shifted focus to winter preparations. The days had become colder, and many trees had lost their leaves. He inspected the public housing area, and then spent the next day visiting Baltasar in the Cordovan fief and the nobles in the other bordering fiefs, to confirm their winter anti-bandit plans. Ren Xiyang also asked the nobles to contact their neighbouring fiefs.
Within the Rosewood fief, he met with the anti-bandit task force.
Over the last few years, the roads and connectivity in the Rosewood fief had massively improved, and the population had doubled. There were now more roadside stalls, inns and resting spots, and more people on the roads, which made them safer. But there were still many places that had little to no people, so bandits were still a risk. However, unlike previous years, Ren Xiyang couldn’t spend so much time randomly patrolling; it was up to the guards to take up more work and responsibility.
Ren Xiyang returned to the Capital on Monday, as usual. Still no update.
“If there’s an issue, the agents must be careful,” Rian said.
“I know.” Ren Xiyang told Rian about Maria’s plans for the LGBT+ booklets and associated task force.
Rian nodded in approval. “Maria is great, she’s a hard worker and efficient. You should leave more tasks to her—”
“—And thus spend more time with you?”
Rian’s lips curled. “You read my mind, Yangyang!”
“How do you manage everything?”
“You were the one who kept reminding me to delegate,” Rian said, wrapping an arm around Ren Xiyang. “However, not everyone is suited to manage entire kingdoms. That’s why you have me.”
Delegation? But even delegation requires work… Ren Xiyang mused to himself. He rejected Rian’s attempt to connect telepathically.
“Ren Xiyang…” Rian poked him with his telepathy link again.
“I need to think a bit more, and I can’t do it with your thoughts,” Ren Xiyang said.
Seeing that Ren Xiyang was serious, Rian became serious. “I’ve been preparing to manage the kingdom since I was old enough to speak,” he said. “As a prince, I also already have many connections by default and many talented people whom I can delegate tasks and projects to. Your management style and resources, versus my management style and resouces, they have their advantages and disadvantages. That’s why we complement each other.”
Ren Xiyang’s lips curled up slightly. “You love me because I can work for you?”
Rian responded by kissing Ren Xiyang deeply, and that concluded the serious work for that night.
On Tuesday afternoon, Ren Xiyang had a meeting with both Cassiopeia Schauss and her father.
Ren Xiyang met with Cassiopeia first. He introduced her to Maria and gave his and Rian’s feedback on her trans information booklets, before letting Cassiopeia and Maria continue the rest of the meeting in Maria’s office.
Then, Ren Xiyang went down to the sitting room where Duke Schauss was waiting.
A staff member had already prepared tea and snacks, but Duke Schauss hadn’t touched them.
Ren Xiyang sat down opposite. “Tea?” he asked.
“No, thank you,” Duke Schauss said.
Ren Xiyang poured himself a small cup. “What did you want to talk about?”
Duke Schauss knew that Earl Rosewood would never answer a question such as ‘what happened during that fateful meeting a few years ago?’ so instead, he led with: “You’re meeting more frequently with Cassiopeia.”
Ren Xiyang nodded. “It seems that I am.”
Duke Schauss gave him a look. “May I observe one of those meetings?”
“I’ll ask Cassiopeia later,” Ren Xiyang said.
Duke Schauss’s lips thinned. He had asked Cassiopeia and she had sternly told him no. “And what have you been meeting about?”
“Healing methods discussion,” Ren Xiyang said. “Has Cassiopeia told you anything?”
“She asked me to teach her direct magic healing. However, she’s still young. Direct magic healing is inherently risky.” Duke Schauss also knew that Cassiopeia had spoken to her friends about the new healing technique she learned from Earl Rosewood.
“It may be risky, but it plays best to Cassiopeia’s strengths,” Ren Xiyang said. “She has a strong intuitive understanding of what is wrong and what is right in the human body, and direct magic healing will allow her to heal complex diseases without known spells and pioneer new healing techniques.”
Duke Schauss’s expression became a little better, before it became stern again. From his perspective, Earl Rosewood was becoming a young man, and Cassiopeia was his young daughter…! What purpose did Earl Rosewood have, praising Cassiopeia like that? But this wasn’t something he could ask Earl Rosewood directly. He needed to observe him more.
“While that may be true, it is still important that Cassiopeia learns the established healing theory and practice,” Duke Schauss said.
“I can’t offer any guidance there,” Ren Xiyang said.
“And why does she need the book printing services and distribution channels?” Duke Schauss asked.
“It’s a small project to print small information booklets and distribute them,” Ren Xiyang said.
“As part of educating the commoners, as one of the Royal Healers’ Association missions?”
Since it was technically correct, Ren Xiyang nodded.
Duke Schauss didn’t push further. There were no more questions regarding Cassiopeia and Earl Rosewood’s intentions that he wanted to ask right now. Since Cassiopeia was still in her meeting, Duke Schauss changed the subject to other matters of the Royal Healers’ Association instead.
Eventually, Maria and Cassiopeia came downstairs.
Duke Schauss stood up. “Finished, Cassiopeia?”
Cassiopeia nodded. “Yes. Ayden, can Maria and I meet online—I mean, via mirror-call—in a week or two? I don’t think I’ll be back in the Capital until around the next social event.”
“Go ahead,” Ren Xiyang said.
“Yay.” Cassiopeia said goodbye to Maria and Ren Xiyang and left with her father.
Ren Xiyang turned to Maria. “How was it?”
“Good. Cassiopeia has agreed to leave the printing and distribution to us. Don’t worry, my Lord,” Maria said.
“Okay,” Ren Xiyang said. “I’ll leave it to you. If I can provide any assistance—”
“Then I’ll ask you,” Maria said firmly.
“Thank you.” Ren Xiyang suddenly realised that this meant he wouldn’t do any work at all regarding the LGBT+ information booklets. “Did Prince Rian say anything to you?”
Maria blinked. “Yes, he entrusted the work to me. I won’t let you down, my Lord.”
Ren Xiyang felt a sense of helpless exasperation and love towards Rian. Sneaky, sneaky Rian!
Upon returning to the academy, Ren Xiyang said to Rian, “Fine, I concede. I’ll focus on other work instead.”
Rian’s lips curled up. “Are you saying that I’m right?”
“You didn’t want me to do any more work on those booklets, and you’ve succeeded,” Ren Xiyang said.
“Can I really stop you if you want to?” Rian countered.
Ren Xiyang pretended to think for a moment. “Surely you could…No, you’re right, you still can’t defeat me in a full-scale duel.”
“How about we duel right now and whoever loses gets to choose what we do tonight?” Rian said.
Ren Xiyang gave him a pointed look. “I’m going to do some work now.” Kel had successfully scheduled a meeting with Anya Rose for him next week, and he wanted to prepare some research to show her.
“What is it? Can I do it for you?” Rian slung an arm over Ren Xiyang’s shoulder.
“It’s plant and mushroom research. Florence can help me but you can’t.”
Rian pouted and bit Ren Xiyang’s ear in grievance.
Ren Xiyang patted the head of his big loveable Rian and walked over to his desk, dragging Rian along with him.
A few nights later, the first of the agents sent a message back to Rian, and Ren Xiyang and Rian cleared their schedules for a more urgent problem.
Kiss between Rian and Ren Xiyang, by mii-ruku! Made Ren Xiyang blush~
And thank you to Mero for the name “Remi”, and KeKe for the name “Vanya”!
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