Yobik had faithfully carried out the role of mediator between Alexei I and the Yeon residents. He helped the Yeon tribesmen who came to the Duchy of Azure settle in properly, regularly gathered and conveyed the Yeon tribe’s demands or inconveniences, and had them corrected so grievances would not pile up. When disputes arose between Yeon tribesmen and imperial people, he mediated them and helped ensure that proper judgments were made.
The fact that no Yeon riots had occurred under Alexei I owed much to his efforts.
And yet Marquis Sigrid had persecuted Yobik, who had played the role of mediator, calling him the leader of the Yeon tribe, then seized him as an example and retaliated against him.
Yobik had worked hard for peace between the Empire and the Yeon tribe, only to be brutally tortured instead. It made no sense.
So the relationship between imperial people and the Yeon tribe could only worsen, and their conflict could only grow.
‘If I hadn’t died, Yobik wouldn’t have ended up like this.’
Aslaf had no lingering regrets about his previous life. Since he had reincarnated, he believed he simply had to live his current life to the fullest.
Even so, his heart ached whenever he thought of the subordinates and soldiers who had died in the war. Every time he met someone like Ethan, who had been executed while trying to avenge Alexei I; someone like Yobik, who had not even gone to war but had been dragged away and tortured for the crime of helping Alexei I; or someone like Jacques, whose livelihood had been threatened by a ban on trade simply because he had been close to Alexei I, his resolve to set this twisted situation right grew firmer.
Moreover, Sigrid and Georg had impoverished even the lives of imperial residents and foreign races who had nothing to do with Alexei I, and intensified conflict between them.
‘Georg. Sigrid. Did you attack me just so you could turn the world into this mess?’
He had expected that people would find it difficult to live if they were ruled by the cruel Marquis Georg and the violent Count Sigrid.
However, the lives of the people he witnessed after reincarnating were far more miserable than Alexei I had expected.
“Are you all right, young master?”
When Aslaf said nothing, Iwan noticed the change in his emotions and asked.
“Yes. I’m fine.”
Aslaf regained his composure and nodded.
‘I will not let those bastards get away with this.’
The more he saw the Duchy of Azure from his previous life and its current state, the more certain he became that Georg and Sigrid were roots of evil that had to be removed. Their atrocities were not matters of the past, but still ongoing in the present, and they had only grown more vicious.
“Forgive me, my lord. I know nothing.”
When Yobik realized that Aslaf was looking at his hand, he thought Aslaf was staring because his hand was hideous and hid it inside his clothes. As his small body curled up like a ball, he looked as tiny as a child. Remembering Yobik from seventeen years ago, when he had stood proudly as the representative of the Yeon tribe like a small giant, made Aslaf’s heart ache.
If Yobik did not open his mouth, Aslaf would not be able to hear about the circumstances from seventeen years ago. But the person who knew that incident best was him, so he had to make him talk.
“Yobik. I am not a bad person. I do not intend to harm you or the Yeon tribe.”
Aslaf raised his right hand, tapped the left side of his chest where his heart was, and spoke.
“May the blessing of water be with you.”
That was the greeting exchanged among the Yeon tribe. It was a blessing unique to the Yeon tribe, who lived in regions where water was scarce.
When Yobik heard those words, he turned his head, widened his eyes, and looked at Aslaf. If a person of noble imperial status even knew the Yeon tribe’s unique greeting, then he was surely someone who had a great deal of interest in the Yeon tribe and was friendly toward them.
To soften Yobik’s wariness, Aslaf spoke to him in a gentle voice.
“If the Yeon tribe and imperial people must live together, wouldn’t it be better to live in harmony without fighting?”
Yobik stole a sidelong glance at him, as though trying to discern Aslaf’s intentions.
“What’s good for you is good for me, so let us all live well together.”
At that, Yobik raised his eyebrows and asked, as though testing Aslaf.
“Do you know who said those words?”
What’s good for you is good for me, so let us all live well together.
Those words were a slogan Alexei I had often used while assimilating the Yeon tribe living in the Empire into the Empire, and helping imperial people and the Yeon tribe live in harmony. After Alexei I died, no one would have said such things anymore, but Yobik had heard them until his ears were calloused, and he himself had gone around saying that slogan to the Yeon tribe, so there was no way he could ever forget it.
“I heard Alexei I said them. He died before I was born, but I agree with his thinking.”
At Aslaf’s words, Yobik looked around. He was checking whether anyone was eavesdropping on them. If someone heard him praising Alexei I, who was rumored to be a traitor to the Empire, and reported him, he might be dragged away by Marquis Sigrid.
Perhaps Yobik had come to trust Aslaf, who knew both the Yeon tribe’s greeting and Alexei I’s slogan of harmony, because he opened the tent flap.
“Please come inside.”
Yobik brought Aslaf into the tent. Then he served hot water with not even a tea leaf in it. Since the Yeon tribe had difficulty finding work and many residents were starving, they would have nothing to eat, and naturally, there was no way they would have tea.
“I apologize that I have nothing to serve you.”
“Not at all. It is fine.”
Aslaf sat on the floor covered with sheepskin and asked him what he wanted to know.
“A Yeon riot broke out in the final year of Alexei I’s life, did it not? Do you know why such a thing happened then? I heard the Yeon tribe had a good relationship with Alexei I. Was there some grievance that Alexei I did not know about?”
The Empire’s ranch owners often worked Yeon tribesmen hard, then drove them out without even paying delayed wages. When there were signs that a riot might occur due to such grievances, Yobik would inform Alexei I of the matter, and Alexei I would pressure the ranch owner into paying the overdue wages and resolve the issue.
“If something like that had happened, there is no way I, the village chief, would not have known.”
Yobik sighed with a regretful expression and recalled the past.
“The incident happened suddenly. One Yeon tribesman disappeared from the village, and a few days later, he was found murdered outside the castle. But then a rumor spread that he had been murdered and abandoned by imperial people, and public sentiment turned ugly.”
“Why did they believe imperial people had killed him?”
“That is precisely what was strange. When you examined what they called evidence, none of it made sense. At first, the rumor was that he had been killed because he refused to enlist. Then, when it was revealed that he was someone who had been dismissed from the unit after talking back to an officer, the next rumor was that an imperial person had teased his younger sister, and when he protested, they beat him to death. Then, when it became known that he had no sisters, the rumor changed again, this time saying they had simply killed him for no reason.”
He said the Yeon tribe did not feel so negatively toward the Duchy of Azure that they would believe such absurd claims, so at first, everyone thought there was no way it could be true and did not believe it.
But then another Yeon tribesman disappeared. This time, however, there was a witness. People dressed in imperial soldier uniforms dragged him away, and a few days later, he was likewise found murdered outside the castle.
“This time, everyone believed imperial soldiers had murdered a Yeon tribesman. Before anyone could stop it, someone set fire to the shopping district and began looting. The soldiers beat and dragged away those who took part, and other Yeon tribesmen, thinking they might be killed by the soldiers as well, grew excited and joined the riot.”
Now that he thought about it, Aslaf remembered receiving a report about the Yeon murder cases at the time.
Back then, Alexei I had been busy preparing to set out in order to face the advancing enemy army. He had received a report that a Yeon murder case had occurred, but in densely populated cities, violence and murder cases occurred from time to time, so he had left it to the security captain and had not paid much attention to it.
But unlike an ordinary murder case, it had spread into a riot that set fire to the city center, and because he had to set out in haste, he never learned what happened afterward.
“Soldiers stormed into Yeon village and arrested the leaders of the riot. I told Cavalry Captain Churin the rumors about the recent Yeon murder cases, and informed him that imperial soldiers had dragged the man away. But Captain Churin said imperial soldiers had never arrested any Yeon tribesmen. He said there seemed to be some kind of misunderstanding.”
When they investigated mainly the witnesses who had seen imperial soldiers dragging away the Yeon tribesmen, not a single person knew the soldiers’ faces. Many Yeon tribesmen had served as mercenaries, so they usually knew someone through another person, but no one knew those soldiers.
“Are you saying they were not imperial soldiers?”
“Captain Churin said that seemed to be the case. There was no record of him having been imprisoned in the jail, and there were no such soldiers in the Duchy of Azure’s army.”
It seemed someone had pretended to be imperial soldiers, kidnapped and murdered Yeon tribesmen, and incited the riot.
“The soldiers who dragged away the murdered man were Yeon tribesmen, but no one knew them. They were faces none of us had seen before.”
The people who had murdered Yeon tribesmen and instigated the riot had also been Yeon tribesmen.
And not even Yobik, the chief of the Yeon village, knew them. It was difficult to understand.
“Later, I found out through the Yeon tribe in the Duchy of Gironde that their leader was a Yeon tribesman named Yatsuki, a man who had been in Marquis Sigrid’s army.”
When Aslaf heard those words, the puzzle pieces fell into place. Marquis Sigrid had infiltrated the Duchy of Azure with a Yeon soldier from his own unit and had instigated the riot. The reason he had been wearing an imperial uniform must have been because he belonged to Marquis Sigrid’s army.
“So Marquis Sigrid had a Yeon soldier from his own unit kidnap and murder Yeon tribesmen, then instigate a riot?”
“That is correct. According to those who suffered damage in the riot, it was also that man’s group who first set fire to shops and began looting.”
Aslaf had thought the Yeon riot had occurred simply because of misunderstanding or distrust, but behind it was a conspiracy that seemed to have been planned over a long period.
It was a meticulously designed scheme by Marquis Sigrid to divide Alexei I’s forces.
After opening his mouth, Yobik once again nodded fearfully and hunched his neck.
“Please do not say you heard this from me.”
Marquis Sigrid still ruled this place. If Yobik let his tongue slip, it would be difficult for him to keep his life.
“What happened to Yatsuki, who led the riot?”
“According to rumors, he returned to Marquis Sigrid’s army, then after the war ended, he took the reward money he received and went back to the Yeon tribe in the desert.”
He had murdered civilians unrelated to the war, caused a riot, and received reward money. It was obvious that he had followed Marquis Sigrid’s orders.
Since Yatsuki had returned to the Yeon tribe, finding him was no different from looking for a needle in a sandy beach. Given the nature of the Yeon tribe, who kept moving, it was hard to know where in the vast desert he might be wandering.
“Thank you for telling me.”
Aslaf handed Yobik the fox-fur clothes he had been wearing and the gold coins he had gathered there.
Yobik did not know what to do when an unfamiliar noble came and showed him kindness.
“Why would you give this to me....”
“I received tea from you, so I should return the favor.”
“I could only give you water....”
“You opened your heart to someone you had never seen before and told me something difficult, did you not? It was a great help.”
Thinking of all the suffering Yobik had endured, Aslaf wanted to give him an even greater gift.
“Now that I know why the Yeon tribe started the riot, I will find Yatsuki and make him pay for his crimes.”
At Aslaf’s resolute words, Yobik blinked as though doubting his own ears.
“I am grateful for your words, but why would you step forward for the Yeon tribe’s affairs from long ago, my lord?”
“If the Empire is to regain peace, the war with the Yeon tribe must end, and for that to happen, the misunderstandings and conflicts between the Empire and the Yeon tribe must be resolved.”
“If that happens, I could ask for nothing more. It has truly been a long time since I met an imperial person who is kind to the Yeon tribe. I am relieved that there is someone like you, my lord, who understands the Yeon tribe. Thank you very much.”
Yobik said that even warm words alone gave him strength, and smiled at Aslaf with a trace of hope.
Seeing Yobik’s bright expression for the first time made Aslaf feel considerably lighter as well.