Chapter 235: Things turned complicated

Inside the grand room, the emperor was massaging his temple. There was a noticeable black circle under his eyes. It was evident that he didn't have a good sleep in the past few nights.

Lately, there have been some crises occurring everywhere in the empire.

He secretly sighed and glanced at the anxious faces of the people in front of him. 

'The minister of trade, Gerum Bellum, and the minister of public affairs, Harud Delkulum,' thought the emperor as he was recalling their names.

These two ministers came earlier than the sunrise. Well, aside from the minister of public affairs, who barged in the room without prior notification, the minister of trade was intentionally summoned by him.

"Your majesty, if this keeps on going, I'm afraid it will cause a far more serious problem in the coming days! Not only the citizens will get affected by it, but might as well cause a heavy blow to the Imperial family!" One of the ministers, Harud Delkulum, expressed his worry.

The emperor's hand stopped moving and slowly rested it on the desk in front of him. He expelled a sigh before opening his mouth.

"I've already sent some people to investigate. We can't do anything about those problems until the reports from those agents come up. For the time being, all we can do is wait." The emperor responded, trying to sound as calm as possible.

The deterioration of medicine supply is undoubtedly a very concerning matter. But, the emperor could not act without a better grasp of the situation.

Regardless of what would happen, he could not make a haste response without thorough thinking. Mostly, because he felt it was suspicious.

"But your majesty, if the report comes too late, the damage the crisis will cause might become irredeemable at some point. If that is going to happen, the citizen's dissatisfaction will cause an alarming outcry and perhaps crumble the empire."

After all, the citizens are what made the country a country.

The minister must be worried that the problem would result in revolt against the imperial family, which is not impossible to happen. The emperor knew it. He furrowed. He understood very well. While creasing his brows, the emperor replied, "I know. That's why I also summoned the minister of trade."

"Yes. His majesty was right, Minister Harud Delkulum," just then, they heard the minister of trade speak.

The minister of public affairs fell silent and glanced at the person beside him.

"I see. So the minister of trade was summoned by his majesty."

"That's right," said the minister of trade in affirmative.

After saying it, he took something underneath his sleeve and handed it to the emperor. It was a piece of paper, rolled and tied with a white ribbon.

The emperor untied and opened the letter. After a couple of seconds of reading it, there was already a noticeable vexation on his expression.

"I never thought it was far more critical than I imagined…" the emperor said dejectedly while narrowing his eyes.

"Yes, your majesty. Not just the supplies for medicine concocting that had stopped coming, but also food and other supplies from the other cities. One of them is the Rothsport town. Seafood from that region is undoubtedly the highest quality. However, these past few days, they stopped shipping supplies."

"Wha--!" Minister Harud Delkulum exclaimed upon hearing it.

Even the emperor was wearing the same expression as the minister. "Have they sent an envoy?" Yet, he managed to sound calm when he asked.

"Sorry, your majesty, I have yet to check yesterday and the other day's report…"

"Bastard, what are you lazing about?!" Along with his outburst, the emperor slapped the armchair of his golden chair. The sound from the impact reverberated in that room.

"Hieee!" Minister Gerum Bellum shrieked from the emperor's sudden outburst. "S-sorry, your majesty. I-It wasn't because I'm lazy to do my job, but because the current crisis hinders the delivery of reports from all sectors of the trade union," he stammeringly explained.

There was a couple of seconds of silence before the emperor expelled another sigh from his mouth.

"This is undoubtedly bad. Things turned complicated," said the emperor as he sank back to his chair.

The two ministers agreed to the emperor.



After coming inside the academy's gate, Eman gathered many glances from the other students around.

"How come that beauty is with him?!"

A student who failed to hide his jealousy asked in a shout. Alas, the people around, who were initially unaware of it, had now noticed it too.

Sol was quite famous in the Academy, though Eman was unaware of it.

She was, after all, frequent in the Oval Arena. With her exquisite features, her image bore deep in the minds of many male students who come to watch duels in that place.

However, up until this point, they never saw her around with male students. Some tried to talk to her, most of them were from noble families, yet none of them got the chance to get her favor.

Many noble ladies were jealous of her. Not only because of her closeness with the princess but also for captivating most of the male students in the Academy. So they were trying to humiliate her by defeating her in a duel, though the result was completely the opposite of what they expected.

Back to Eman,

Although the students around them were glaring daggers at him, none of them tried to approach and showed an open hostility at him. Otherwise, they would be the next victim of him. After witnessing his performance against the Red Drake Clan, they were now hesitating to antagonize him. That's why most of them were crying in envy as the female of their dreams was walking side by side with him!

They could not show any open hostility towards him as it was risky, but it was different when it comes to their minds. They wanted to beat him up!

Yet, whenever Eman glanced at them, they averted their eyes away from him, as though they were not looking at him in the first place. 

"Brother?"

Eina called out.

"Fufu, it's nothing. Let's go."

Before Eman and the others could arrive in the Merciless Clan, he met Instructor Stuwart in the hallway, who instructed him to come to the faculty room later.

He nodded in response.