Chapter 30

Lily looked at Ayla, who was murmuring ‘I’m the one who got criticized and misunderstood so why on earth should I be the one uncomfortable?’, with a strange look.

“Stop it and go quickly. Ayla.”

“Lily… Would you like to go instead of me?”

Ayla smiled awkwardly and gently pushed the teacup she was holding.

Right away Lily said, ‘No.’, smiling, and left the dining room.

“You’re merciless.”

Ayla, who was looking pitifully at the place where Lily left, silently placed the teacup on the tray, as if she had given up.

***

Knock, knock, knock.

Ayla knocked lightly and turned the doorknob.

Standing in front of Theon’s office, she repeated her worries over and over again, but it was all in vain.

She even showed her thoroughness in organizing the storyline and how to make it sound the most natural, but the office was empty.

Ayla headed to the center desk to put down the tea she brought.

On the desk, there was a document that was different from the ones she had seen before.

Ayla’s gaze naturally turned to the document, and her expression changed seriously as soon as she saw its contents.

The title of the document read ‘Austerity Proposal’.

The meaning of this word was not very positive because, in the first place, the country has no money and there’s a lot of debt, and the purpose of an austerity finance was to raise taxes from the people and reduce the national expenses.

Simply put, the impressive Stellen Kingdom… Is just an empty shell of a country that could go bankrupt at any time.

Click.

Hearing the door, Ayla hurriedly took her eyes off the document and quickly pretended to dust off the desk with her hands.

“What are you doing?”

“Ah, t-that… The desk looked too dirty! Haha.”

It was really an excuse that didn’t make any sense, even if Ayla thought about it.

The maids in charge sweep and clean it daily, so it’s not dirty.

Contrary to his appearance, perhaps Theon was more careless than she thought, as he seemed to believe Ayla’s words straight away.

“Why don’t you move?”

“?”

“I think that’s my place.”

Theon lightly pushed her, who was hesitating, and sat down.

Ayla took the tea she had brought and handed it to Theon, and then stood behind him as naturally as possible.

‘I’m curious about the document…’

Ayla was preparing for a doctorate in national finances and accounting at Fencers, until Count Serdian’s alleged charges of evasion of treasury broke out.

Count Serdian, who early on discovered the talent his intelligent daughter had inherited from him, had the intention of establishing young Ayla as one of the next treasurers of the Stellen Kingdom.

Ayla also showed much interest in the accounting area.

Although that goal had been torn apart.

Theon picked up one of the piled documents.

Looking at its contents, it was a document related to food distribution.

Not surprisingly, this time too, it was cleverly incorrect.

It was now more difficult to find who was the person in charge and the part that was wrong, so, at this point, she suspected that it was intentional.

“360.”

Looking at the papers over Theon’s shoulder, a sum came out of Ayla’s mouth without her realizing it.

“…”

Theon turned his head silently and looked at Ayla.

“Ah… I’m sorry. Please, don’t mind it. Haha.”

Theon stared silently at Ayla’s awkward smile.

He shrugged his shoulders and soon picked up another document.

This time it was an annual financial report.

Looking over the document quickly with a side-glance, Ayla’s lips rose slightly.

‘It will be easier than I thought. I think we just need to reduce the national defense expenditure a little?’

Whether this damn country was crazy about war, the defense expenditures accounted for more than 50% of the national budget.

If the expenses here were reduced a little, there was no reason to proceed with the austerity plan.

Although cash will increase in a country that collects taxes due to austerity, in the long run, there is no way the treasurers won’t know that, no matter how you look at it, it’s no different than squeezing out the blood of commoners.

All right, but why?

From Ayla’s common sense, she couldn’t understand why he was trying to take such a risk.

It will be a national commotion at this rate, so why?