The Isolated Marchioness Just Wants to Make a Living
Chapter 5
“Which is why you people need to pay off this debt right now!”
The atmosphere in the drawing room was a complete disaster.
“If you can’t hand over the land, then give me your corpse instead!”
The one dealing with the guildmaster was Alpheus’s adjutant, Rancy.
First, he issued a stern warning to stop yelling.
“Even if I did, you wouldn’t get a decent price for my corpse. My eardrums just went bad, you see…”
Truth be told, Rancy was far too polite in his speech. His temperament was entirely unsuited for this sort of shouting match.
Back when Alpheus led the mercenary company, Rancy had handled all administrative and financial matters. Naturally, the administration and household management of the marquisate had fallen to him as well.
The problem was that this was only his third day on the job.
There hadn’t even been a butler to hand over the duties.
“The repayment date written on this contract has long since passed! If you can’t pay right this instant, I’m taking the land in the Erenta Region listed here as collateral!”
There was no logical counter to the guildmaster’s words. It was an undeniable fact that the due date had passed.
“Why are you acting like this, honestly?! That’s just a contract on paper—you’ve always received the payment in winter!”
The Head Maid stepped forward and shouted.
Hearing the words ‘just a contract on paper’ made Rancy furious. He turned on the Head Maid and fiercely demanded if she had any idea how ridiculous that sounded.
“Then did we write this contract just to practice our signatures?!”
Only after the words left his mouth did he realize the Head Maid was on his side. Over the past three days, he had come to regard her as merely ‘the opposing faction that spouts nonsense.’
Because she had spouted nonsense again, he had reflexively assumed she was on the enemy’s side.
Fortunately, Rancy’s indignant retort proved entirely ineffective, as always. It was instantly drowned out by the Head Maid’s screech.
“It was like that last year, two years ago, and three years ago, wasn’t it?! We signed the exact same contract every year, so it’s only right we follow precedent!”
Rancy fought with everything he had to refrain from pointing out the logical fallacy.
The other side, however, showed no such restraint.
“That was us doing you a favor all this time! The situation has changed, I tell you! With the Western Monster Wave, we’re at our wit’s end too!”
Agonized, Rancy came to a firm conclusion: discovering their lord had a secret birthright was not something to celebrate.
‘If I’d known it would turn out like this, we should’ve kept it a secret forever.’
Though the Marquisate of Sears was a founding family of the Empire, it had grown poorer by the day, culminating in the present disaster.
Three days ago, after the funeral of Marquis Sears. Before the coffin was even in the ground, the creditors had come knocking.
“Beron belongs to us now. Here is the loan document where Marquis Sears put up the Beron territory as collateral.”
“Wh-what did you say?”
“Take a look at this as well. As you can see in this contract, the marquis staked the Jezel commercial district as a penalty for breach of contract.”
Just like that, plots of land across the Sears territory were signed away in droves.
All because the contracts contained the clause: ‘Should either party pass away, the contract shall be terminated due to reasons attributable to the deceased.’
On top of that, the late Marchioness Sears had racked up a massive debt with the Central Bank.
Her spending habits had always been extravagant, but two years ago, she had taken out another colossal loan to send Brisa to the Capital Academy.
“This debt isn’t a personal contract; it passes down to the children. The interest is monstrous, so it’d be best to pay it off right away.”
“Can’t I cover it all with my personal funds for now?”
“You could, but it’ll clean you out entirely.”
“So it just means I’ll be back to having nothing. It’s fine. I’m still young.”
In any case, Alpheus had amassed a fair amount of wealth during his years as a capable mercenary.
Yet just as Rancy had warned, after clearing that debt, barely any liquid funds remained.
“We’ve put out the immediate fire, but the financial crisis remains, doesn’t it?”
“It’s no ordinary crisis. If we want to feed our knights, every second counts. You’d better head to the Imperial Palace at once and bring back whatever you can.”
Originally, Alpheus had fought in the northern civil war as a mercenary.
Along the way, he became comrades-in-arms with the 2nd Prince, brought an end to the civil war together, and even earned the title of ‘War Hero.’
Recognizing Alpheus’s meritorious service, the 2nd Prince intended to petition the Emperor for a barony on his behalf. They had been traveling together to the capital for that very reason.
Right then, however, it was revealed that Alpheus was the hidden son of Marquis Sears. Thus, after hurriedly attending the funeral, he had inherited the marquisate.
“What? I had a twelve-year-old younger sister? Then has the poor child become an absolute orphan? I must claim the title without delay and protect her under my wing like a mother hen.”
That sentiment, too, was quickly proven to stem from a commoner’s worldview.
The estate’s existing servants had already branded him as ‘the commoner’s son who stole Lady Brisa’s marquisate.’
Before he could even feel the full weight of that disdain, Alpheus set out for the capital.
“Now that I don’t need a title, I can simply ask for monetary compensation instead. The 2nd Prince would never be stingy toward a comrade who shared life and death on the battlefield.”
“Then get going right away. The sooner you beg, the better.”
And so, that very night, Alpheus led his elite unit toward the warp gate.
Of course, right up until his departure, he worried endlessly about his newfound little sister.
“Is there really no other way? Brisa lost her father only today. I don’t know if it’s right to leave her all alone like this.”
“There is the option of having our knight order change professions to bandits and grandly rob the Central Bank. You just gave them a massive sum, my lord, so their vault ought to be quite plump tonight.”
“I shall return swiftly.”
Having sent Alpheus off, Rancy remained at the estate and began combing through the documents.
‘Only two pieces of land remain.’
The previous Marquis Sears had clung to only two territories until the very end.
‘The Olive Plains, where the founding Marquis Sears personally planted olive trees… and the riverside Erenta Region, where they catch Marang fish.’
The olives yielded hardly any profit. The quality of the harvested fruit was mediocre at best.
Only the Marang fish brought in decent money.
From the look of things, the estate had been procuring grain on credit from western grain merchants from spring through winter, then settling the tab with Marang fish in early winter.
‘No, but why on earth did they write the contract like this?!’
Rancy felt like crying.
‘They should’ve written that payment was due in early winter from the start! Why write immediate payment?!’
The guildmaster spoke with an air of immense generosity.
“Fine. You seem to feel wronged… so let us do this. The grain bill from last winter, plus the cost of the next month’s grain… We can call it even if you hand over five years of fishing rights in Erenta.”
Darkness seemed to close in before Rancy’s eyes.
Now that the war was over, their valiant knight order had no way to earn money. To make matters worse, their food stores were running low. There was a reason he had rushed Alpheus off to secure funds.
‘If we agree to this, the estate won’t have a single meaningful source of income for five whole years…’
It was at that moment.
A young girl with flowing platinum-blonde hair stepped into the drawing room with confident strides.
“Speak with me from now on.”
It was Brisa, her expression cool and composed. By Rancy’s standards, she was ‘the spiritual leader of the nonsense-spouting maids.’
While Rancy stood frozen in surprise, the maid flanking Brisa delivered a sharp kick to his foot.
“Gah!”
When he glared in protest, the maid merely jerked her chin. It was an unmistakable command to move.
H-how dare… a maid… treat the marquis’s adjutant… like this…!
Refusing to tolerate such an unprovoked kick, Rancy protested fiercely.
“Are you a footvolley player or something?!”
At that, the maid glared right back and began rolling her ankle in earnest, warming up for another strike.
In the end, Rancy stumbled to his feet and vacated the seat opposite the merchant.
Brisa seated herself with graceful poise.
“My word,” the maid murmured under her breath.
“She walked all the way to the back garden, yet there isn’t a single wrinkle in her skirt… Simply marvelous, our young lady.”
Just as he thought.
Rancy was reminded once again that his assessment of the estate’s maids was spot-on.
‘It’s as if they were born with a free built-in feature where opening their mouths only produces utter nonsense…’
And Brisa was the very leader they praised in endless, repetitive chorus.
Naturally, her sudden appearance in the middle of this crisis was hardly a welcome sight.
Yet Brisa simply looked at the guildmaster with composure and asked,
“I would like to know the current market price of timber.”
…Why timber, all of a sudden?
“With the Monster Wave, the forests in the West must have suffered immense damage, have they not?”
There aren’t even any forests in this marquisate, though?
