A luxury passenger liner bound from the Empire for Deber.
With the sea rolling all around, the land of Deber was visible far off.
Marquis Gebel's wife, who had been watching that sight through the window, could not contain herself and hurled a glass.
CRASH!
"What was that, what did you say!"
The marquess' shrill voice was even more unpleasant to hear than the sound of breaking glass.
"Say it again. Where is the Ninth Prince staying!"
"He is on a long-term stay at the very hotel we intended to lodge you in, milady."
It was what the hotel had conveyed most cautiously when rooms were requested in House Gebel's name.
A natural measure. Whoever the manager was, he would want to prevent the worst case of the two coming face to face in the hotel.
"How!"
At the excessively high pitch, one of the maids flinched. She was a gray-haired maid newly brought in after the young maidservant called Daien had disappeared.
In the moment she faltered, unaccustomed to the situation, a flying glass struck her in the face.
CRASH!
"Kyaah!"
The maidservant collapsed with a deep cut on her face, but no one paid her any mind.
To be precise, no one was permitted to.
Sparing her so much as a glance would leave one sharing in the tantrum.
"Explain in detail! How is the Ninth Prince lodging at the finest hotel in Deber!"
The further the butler's explanation went, the more her thin, hissing breaths quickened.
In the end the marquess exploded once more the instant she heard the Ninth Prince's present situation.
"So! The bastard who ought to be worrying about his next meal is eating well and living well, patting his full belly!"
Marquis Gebel was still unconscious.
And yet the Ninth Prince, contrary to expectation, was suffering no hardship whatsoever.
She could never sit idle for that.
'Zion Riobelt. I shall become the sharpest blade to cut your throat.'
The journey had been undertaken to see his pathetic state with her own eyes and soothe her grudge.
Since it had come to this, working the grudge out with her own hands would be quite the thrill as well.
Venomous hatred burned in the marquess' eyes.
***
"Director Lumio. Is the exterior not crude? You must consider that the customers we are targeting are the wealthiest twenty percent."
"I told you it must have an appearance that makes people with money want to keep one in the house. To put it in the new terminology, it means we need design. Do you understand?"
"This looks like nothing but two white metal boxes stacked on top of each other. Our 'refrigerator' is an expensive magitech device. Having bought it after some resolve, the owner must be able to put it somewhere visible, invite acquaintances over, throw the door open for all to see, pull out ice, and pass around cold beer."
Zion lay on the sofa with his arm as a pillow, counting how many patterns there were on the ceiling.
Ah. This is comfortable.
"Director Lumio! Design! I am saying we need design!"
Lumio floundered as he answered Winter's demand.
"But, Aide Winter. My aesthetic sense is a total loss."
Winter strode over and opened the drawer of Zion's desk.
"Here. Take it. Good grief. To think you still had not hired a designer."
Winter handed over a wad of banknotes as though granting a favor, and it was not even his money.
Even so, Zion did not say a word.
'Ah. This is comfortable.'
The business was rolling along nicely on its own even while he stayed still, so was there any need to butt in?
Money management was being done by Winter anyway, so there was no meaning in watching a few coins increase and disappear.
That is, unless he meant to examine and manage each thing himself.
'If it came to that, I would rather quit business altogether and earn money as a bank robber.'
Ugh, how could anyone do that work himself?
Entrusting all of it while occasionally startling them with magic and giving them a scare to keep the tension up was exactly right.
"Your Highness."
Having finished his scolding and sent Lumio off, Winter began his report.
"The Refrigerator 14 that Director Lumio completed this time is of quite decent quality. It seems we should start looking for sales routes."
For reference, the number appended to the end was the prototype's version.
That vicious bastard Winter. Barely a month and a half had passed and it was already the fourteenth.
Well done.
"Selling already? You were just tearing into him a moment ago."
Winter answered without concern.
"The result was satisfactory, but a man like Director Lumio has to be badgered continuously. He is the type who is suitably naive while suitably clever at research and full of drive, so if you badger him, something keeps coming out."
Hm. It was not a wrong statement, but.
Something about it made him feel strange.
"He has ambition, but not excessively large ambition, and he does as he is told. A gearhead like Director Lumio is best when ground down. That is how a business flourishes."
"Gearhead?"
"It is a word used at the university. It refers to the kids who studied magitech engineering."
A moment from the past suddenly crossed his mind.
"Your Highness the Crown Prince. Please make me this. An hour should be enough, right?"
"What? When there are no materials?"
"Oh come on, you can do it. You are the greatest genius in Deber's history, after all."
He realized why he had felt strange.
"Winter. I forbid the use of the expression gearhead."
"Pardon? Why so suddenly?"
"Forbidden is forbidden."
At any rate, to begin the refrigerator business in earnest there was a great deal to do.
"Director Lumio will have no money, so the factory expansion and hiring will have to be done with mine."
"For the first round it cannot be helped. Still, Director Lumio has agreed to take it on after the dividends, so seen over the long term it is not a loss."
They had fleeced Dechion and Reijo and earned a fortune, but a considerable portion of the spare funds would have to be invested in Blen Industries.
Creina, the one remaining partner, was not being pressed for investment funds at all.
"So in effect the entire cost of the business comes out of my pocket."
"You took 76 percent of the shares, so you do have to put in that much."
"Did anyone say otherwise?"
He pulled a bundle of checks out of the drawer Winter had opened a moment ago.
"How much?"
"Here you are."
He read the settlement statement and approval documents Winter held out, then wrote in the amount.
Then he wrote one more check.
"One million Luon. Your share, Winter. It is a bonus."
"You are finally giving it to me?"
Winter whistled, then caught himself and quietly checked Zion's expression.
"You do not want it?"
"I shall receive it with gratitude."
Folding the check neatly and tucking it into his coat, Winter continued.
"The takeover procedures for the farms seized from Reijo are complete. I will put them on the market immediately. The next matter to report is......."
"Wait. Let us just hold on to the farms."
"Pardon?"
Winter flinched for an instant.
Something felt off.
"Hey. Hand over the document you are looking at."
"Your Highness? Looking at it will only make you dizzy, and you will not be able to make it out."
"Hsss. It is a prince's order."
"......Here you are."
The first phrase visible was "unless we intend to run a rice business, selling is correct."
And on the listing...... so this is why he flinched.
"You slipped the Teraguard farm in there on the sly, didn't you?"
A protest followed.
"The Teraguard farm costs far too much to maintain. That mess hall of theirs cooks with better ingredients than I eat."
It was a thought that kept coming to him lately: the reason the Ring of the Guide had first responded to Winter back in the back alleys was probably his knack for earning money and saving it.
Even now it was so.
"It is my money, so why do you begrudge it?"
"It is money I earned. And do we not have to save to live well?"
"I live well spending freely."
"I save so that Your Highness can spend freely."
"Have I been treating you too easily lately? Where has the Winter Flowering of two months ago gone, the one who said he would work hard at playing the dog?"
"He disappeared after I proved my ability and gained the certainty that I would not be discarded."
"......."
This time Zion fell silent.
Ah. He is right, but that overflowing confidence is an eyesore.
"Get ready. We are going to Creina's."
Winter's face crumpled all at once.
"You are going to buy a pile of useless things again. We have no money, Your Highness."
"If we have none, go and earn it, right arm."
"I was in the wrong. How about restraining yourself today? Ah, instead, how about buying Brown securities?"
Winter had been opposed to purchasing Brown securities all this time.
When he came at him with the question of what he meant to do buying a military supplier when there was not even a sign of war, there had been nothing to say.
At a time like this, bending him once and buying the securities could do no harm.
'They may be securities that will be worth dirt without a war, but the Third Prince is certain to make the clouds of war gather over Deber.'
According to the Guide of the Fork, Brown Defense would surge without fail in the near future.
Because whether or not Zion himself blocked the Third Prince's conspiracy, war clouds were bound to gather.
"Then buy another 0.1 percent. It will all come back later as, eh? As a tremendous investment success, so buy with confidence."
"You said you know nothing to be confident about. Just give me the money."
He opened the drawer once more.
Brown Defense at 0.1 percent would take a considerable portion of the money he had......
"Huh?"
The checks had run out before he knew it.
Never mind 0.1 percent, it looked as though even 0.01 percent would barely be affordable.
When he raised his head, Winter was wearing a triumphant smile.
"Your Highness. You must give me money if I am to carry out your command. And if you are to enter society soon, you will have to purchase a mansion, and there are a great many other places for money to go."
He had been had. It seemed this had been the plan from the start.
"Wait, where did all that money go?"
"You spent it all, bit by bit. Because over the past month you went to the Madame de Gallery, no less than, once a week, or more."
'...I went that often?'
More to the point, look at the way he puts accents on the words.
All of it was funding for the liberation of your homeland.
It was not as though he had intended to indulge for his own sake...... though he had thought of that plenty as well.
"So how much money is left?"
Winter silently thrust out a single table.
...Wow. I did spend a lot. Winter had reason to complain.
One thought suddenly came to him.
"Winter, my boy."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Would you like to return your bonus?"
"I would not."
"Right?"
A sigh came out at the thought that he was once again in a position of having to rack his brain to earn money.
He had clearly beaten Dechion and Reijo down and been showered with money, so why already?
DING-DONG DING-DONG DING-DONG DING-DONG DING-DONG DING-DONG!
The bell rang noisily. His face wrinkled.
"Who rings a bell with such a lack of breeding?"
Press it once and Winter would go and open the door soon enough.
"Your Highness. There is some middle-aged woman here. Do you happen to have an appointment?"
"An appointment? A middle-aged woman? I have no idea."
The only middle-aged woman he knew was Creina, and going by appearance alone the expression middle-aged was a stretch for her. It was not as though Winter did not know her, either.
"Open it for now."
"Yes."
It was the moment Winter opened the door.
"Madam! This is the residence of His Highness the Ninth Prince, Zion Riobelt!"
"Do you think I came here without knowing? Be silent."
The middle-aged woman strode over and stood before him.
She is thoroughly angry, isn't she?
Who is this?
"A subject of the Empire greets a member of the great Divine Race."
A salutation accompanied by a savage smile.
"You say I may withdraw the courtesy? Thank you, Your Highness."
What is she doing as she pleases?
"You dare commit such an act and still enjoy your leisure so freely. I could not bear to watch, so I came here myself. Do not worry, today I will end it with a warning alone. I shall do my utmost to make your life in Deber all the more entertaining from now on, ho ho ho ho."
He stared blankly for a moment, then opened his mouth.
"Let me ask one thing."
No matter how he searched his memory, he did not know.
"Who are you?"
"......You do not know me?"
"Right. Are you a celebrity of the sort this prince ought to know?"
The middle-aged woman began to tremble violently.
"Ninth Prince! Just how far do you intend to insult our House Gebel!"
What? She is Gebel's wife?
"...I cannot believe it. Truly? He climbed all the way to marquis, so why did he marry someone as ugly as you?"
A convulsive shriek burst out.
"Ninth Priiince!"
With her mouth gaping open, she looked truly ugly.
He coveted power so greatly, and for his marriage.......
Looking at it sometimes, there seems to be nothing as futile as power.