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Volume 3 Behind the Scenes 2.4

Translator: Reflet
Editor: Weasalopes

「Marriage of convenience～」

「Fake couple～」

「Separate rooms～」

「Insurance murder～」

「Dispose of body～」

「Not really sure what you mean by insurance, but remember this is a serious topic. Do not say such things so lightly.」

　The king sharply rebuked the octogals and their dangerous game of association before declaring all out-of-country options as negative. He didn’t even have to ask Aearis to know that all of these people brought nothing good.

「What about Julius-chan～？」

「They’d look good～、look good together～」

「Handsome couple～」

「Julius, eh……」

「That is an option, but……」

　Julius, Layotte’s right-hand man in the military. He had enough power to defeat a wyvern by himself and was firmly dedicated to the kingdom of Farlane to the core. In addition to his age, his personality was already more suitable than anyone else, but…

「The status of the Felnock house is…」

「Low？ Is it low？」

「Not quite low. But in order to marry Older Sister, a bit low.」

「He can’t rise up？　Rise up？」

「……If he had another achievement, he would make it right to that position……」

　Ordinarily, they would have raised the Felnock house from earl to marquis status for helping out after Katarina’s rebellion. But Julius’s father, the current head of the Felnock house, refused the award, firmly believing it to be the equivalent of a looter taking advantage of a crisis. After a bit of a scuffle, the royal family managed to force some land on them temporarily, ending the discussion.

「We could always just have Julius’s younger brother take over the Felnock house and make Julius the first generation earl……」

「Auros? Not bad, but he is a bit average compared to his brother. Regardless of what he thinks about Julius, I do not think that his father would agree that the younger brother is more suitable. Because that would mean his brilliant older son getting taken away from him.」

　There apparently wasn’t any clean way to resolve this. They couldn’t just ignore the traditions or customs of an old country.

「Elen-chan, hard time？」

「It is quite the difficult situation. Well, at worst, we may have to use our authority to persuade Count Felnock.」

　The king decided that if they couldn’t find a more suitable partner, then even he would resort to the iron fist. Sure, you might argue he could have done that from the beginning, but after already resorting to the iron fist in order to resolve Katarina’s rebellion, he didn’t want to risk anything over this.

　In actuality, the only issue here was power balance, so without a political say in this, there was no real problem with letting Elena free to be with a commoner. There really wouldn’t be, but it was difficult to prove that such a person was alright, and the Farlane royalty had hardly ever had any connections with suitable commoner men. Also, the amount of time and effort spent to persuade the nobles of such marriages were even more strenuous than with royalty and nobles outside the kingdom, so there were really no options at this point.

　Some exceptions like Tatsuya or Hiroshi were technically there, but it would be rather ungrateful of them to force Elena on Tatsuya, who already had a wife, or Hiroshi, who had gynophobia. Plus Aearis was doing her best every day to make Hiroshi notice her. So neither of these choices would work either.

「What about Lay’s bride～？」

　The octogals seemed to recognize that Elena’s suitor had been decided, turning to look at Layotte. He snorted and told them exactly what he thought.

「I do not care who is my bride, as long as they know their place and say nothing regarding my politics. Ideally, I would love to have women like Haruna or Makoto. It is pointless to seek very much from the daughters of royalty or nobility. As long as they do not interfere in politics, I would not even care if they were to go off and find another man and get pregnant.」

「Layotte, that is a bit too upfront to say.」

「Father, if you can look at a partner of marriageable age and still deny what I said, how about you bring along such a woman？」

「……」

　It would seem that Elena wasn’t the only one dealing with marriage troubles. As they looked at the two royals puzzledly, the octogals decided to go ahead and pour some more tea and drink it.

　Elena’s requirements were the same as Layotte’s. Besides, the founding king had picked up his queen from the slums, and the most recent fifth generation queen hailed from a street of craftsmen. It wasn’t like the bride even had to be human. One famous instance of this was the eighth-generation queen, who was an elf. No country could even complain about Farlane, the kingdom of food exports making a move. Besides, there was also the added bonus of strengthening ties with other countries, as marriages of convenience usually went, so even if the other country grumbled about it the first two years, they wouldn’t say much more.

　In the end, whether it was Layotte or Elena, the king was focusing on royalty and nobles simply because he had relatively few commoner connections and couldn’t find “the one”. For various reasons, he had no choice but to exempt Hiroshi, then proceeded to lose the will to search for commoners or other races because of all the hassle. Which only left royalty or nobility for marriages of convenience.

「……Well, if we disregard the age gap, there might be a promising aristocratic lady come five years. I would like to have a princess for you by the time you turn twenty if possible……」

「I’d rather wait than compromise with a sucky woman. Because the day they bring in a reject aristocrat from some random country that they don’t know how to handle is the day that this country will be a laughingstock to the neighboring countries.」

「Sheesh, you are quite the hardcore misogynist……」

「It isn’t that I hate all of them. They just more often than not happen to come from families of power.」

　Finding the treasured rice crackers while the king and Layotte continued their conversation, the octogals attempted to reach in and grab some when Layotte casually blocked them from doing so. The octogals truly did as they pleased even though they were the ones to ask about Layotte’s bride in the first place.

「We’re gonna go play elsewhere now～」

「Alright. As per usual, you don’t tell anyone about what you heard here.」

「We know～」

「Secret secret～」

「Leave it to the secret ○kid～」

　The octogals undertook the request with a rather dubious attitude before abruptly disappearing. These odd creatures still seemed to have a sense of loyalty and had never once revealed anything that the king and Layotte had said to keep a secret. And they knew this too, since they had tried asking the octogals about the secrets of other nobles and the octogals kept their mouths sealed shut.

「As per usual, they just said what they wanted and left with the last word.」

「Father, what in the world do you expect from those things？」

「Because sometimes they say…sharp things?」

　And as they continued their leisurely conversation, they could hear Rayna’s angry voice from the training grounds. Considering how far away the castle was from the training grounds, someone must have done something considerably bad to anger her. 

「It’s peaceful here.」

「That it is, that it is.」

　It was another peaceful day in Wulls.