WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ SSS-Class Revival Hunter ◈

Chapter 218: Golden Rule (2)

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2.

We entered the main council chamber.

Step. Whenever Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong stepped forward, dozens of nobles followed behind her with steps of their own. No one spoke as their footsteps crossed.

Like elite soldiers facing their final battle.

"......."

The moment we entered the council chamber, I felt suffocated.

The nobles from other factions who had already arrived all turned to look at us simultaneously.

Some looked with anger boiling in their eyes.

Some stared with jealousy tainting their gaze.

Others looked up, soaked in admiration and longing.

If there were a hundred emotions in the world, a hundred gazes were directed at Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong.

"Good day, everyone. It seems the meeting will resume soon."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong smiled leisurely.

"I've come with the members of my faction. Is it too late?"

Silence.

No one could respond.

However, it seemed like Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong never expected a reply in the first place. Smiling cheerfully, she found her place.

"What are you doing, advisor?"

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong looked back at me as she moved.

"Yes?"

"Your place is right next to me. Hurry up and follow. You're not thinking of leaving my side cold, are you?"

Ah.

'She's considering that my memory is somewhat vague.'

I bowed my head and quietly followed Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong.

As I approached my assigned seat, the scenery of the council chamber began to come into focus.

It was quite different from the [council] I usually knew.

Firstly, it wasn’t semi-circular but a complete circle, resembling the Colosseum. A throne was firmly placed in the center, surrounded by the seats of the noble council members.

But the most peculiar part was something else.

‘…Water?’

Yes. There was flowing water.

A canal was installed beneath the seats. If you sat down, you had to immerse your feet in the water. The canal spread like a spider web through the council, flowing down and eventually connecting to a drain at the throne.

"Amniotic fluid. Heave-ho."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong took off her leather boots and sat down. Looking around, I saw the other nobles taking off their shoes as if this were second nature.

"Amniotic fluid?"

"Yes. Amniotic fluid. There’s a giant lake beneath the capital. Water is drawn from that lake and channeled throughout the city, with the first place it reaches being here, the main council chamber of the Platinum Tower."

I followed suit, taking off my shoes.

"What's the significance?"

"It has several meanings and uses. We make laws in the council, and laws create the kingdom. The kingdom is born right here. [Always remember that we are birthing the kingdom]. That's why it's called amniotic fluid."

I removed my socks and dipped my feet into the canal.

Splash, the warm water seeped between my toes.

"It's warm..."

"Yes, it's winter now. It's cool in the summer. It also serves to regulate the temperature of this vast meeting hall."

"That's amazing."

"Not just the temperature, the color of the water changes depending on the seriousness of the agenda. For example, if the council decides to subjugate a Dragon Country, the amniotic fluid turns red like blood. The canals throughout the capital also turn red. It informs the citizens that a critical situation has arisen."

"Wow."

"In short, the citizens use water that has been touched by the toes of nobles in their daily lives. For some select few nobles and citizens, this fact provides a fetishistic satisfaction. It's quite practical in many ways."

No. That's a bit...

Seeing my disgusted expression, Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong chuckled.

"Kim Gong-Ja, you don't seem like Gu Won-Ha, the advisor, right now."

"Yes?"

"My advisor would never make such a face. It would be fun if your identity gets exposed, but we have a meeting to attend to. I'd appreciate it if you're careful not to let others notice."

Hmm.

"What does Gu Won-Ha's way of speaking sound like?"

"Oh? Don’t you remember?"

"Yes, it's a bit fuzzy. The amniotic fluid also feels like I'm seeing it for the first time."

"Hmm."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong smiled with her eyes.

"Well, it's simple. Generally, speak courteously. Mostly expressionless. With a tone of indifference to worldly affairs, while using slightly formal language.”

I furrowed my brow.

"…Do I speak like this?"

"Good. A bit lacking, though."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong rested her chin on her hand and looked at me.

"Just a bit more expressionless would be perfect. My advisor really doesn't attach any value to the world."

"Not valuing the world…"

"Yes. Whether it's people, the populace, or the kingdom, nothing is of value. Only her daughter and I hold weight in the advisor's heart. Everything else is just meaningless noise."

"......."

Suddenly, I recalled the information magic marked by the original owner of this body.

She had written this about Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong:

+

My master.

My heart.

My blood.

My everything in this world.

+

Thump.

Recalling that note made my heart strangely ache.

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong watched me with an interested look.

"Your expression acting is excellent. Have you had any training in acting?"

"……Yes. I had opportunities to immerse myself in theater while climbing the tower."

"You are unexpectedly versatile, Kim Gong-Ja. Right now, you look very much like Advisor Gu Won-Ha."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong's eye-smile deepened.

"From now on, may I continue to call you [advisor] instead of Mr. Kim Gong-Ja?"

Why?

My heart throbbed again.

"......"

Just making eye contact with Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong made my chest feel tight. Like when I had first been possessed in this trauma world, my mind was clouded with fog.

Fortunately, a voice that brought my attention back just before I was completely enveloped in fog emerged.

"The King has arrived!"

The meeting resumed.

3.

As soon as the meeting started, the nobles from other factions launched an all-out attack on Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong.

The first to open fire was Count Ah Ru-Ho, who had been waiting for an opening ever since she was in the lounge.

"Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong has privately taken rebels into her service. Not only the Red Nails, but the Stone Assembly, Bandol, Waek, Celestial God, and Heart. Every rebel band that has caused trouble of late has become her subordinate. We cannot nominate a noble with such a record for a dukedom."

Hundreds of nobles looked at Count Ah Ru-Ho. The King of the kingdom, too, silently let the count speak.

It was more like an inquisition against Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong than a meeting.

"It is only right to immediately capture the traitors hiding under Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong's shadow and punish them according to their crimes. If the viscount is a loyal subject of the kingdom, she should willingly cooperate. Isn't that right, Viscount? If there's no ulterior motive, why else would you hide traitors?"

"Count. All those I've taken under me were personally captured by me."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong rebutted with a smile.

"Prisoners of war become the property of the capturing general. What's wrong with me handling my own property as I wish?"

"Even if they are traitors who have drawn swords against the kingdom?"

"A thing has no sin. A skilled warrior's sword may have absorbed the blood of tens, hundreds. But no one blames the sword. It would be the warrior's fault, if any. I've merely collected swords that have absorbed a bit too much blood."

"Are you calling living people things now!"

"Yes."

"......."

"I told you, they are my property. If that bothers you, you should have captured them yourself. Or you could abolish slavery."

"Come to think of it," Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong added, blinking innocently.

"Count Ah Ru-Ho's territory relies heavily on a slave economy, doesn't it? It's unfortunate not to have reformed the economy of your land earlier."

"How dare you advise the Count's management..."

"It's the same. The prisoners I've captured are my private property. What right do you have to interfere in my family matters? Wouldn't it be better for both you and me to respect each other's boundaries?"

Count Ah Ru-Ho gritted her teeth.

"...What if it was not an object belonging to you, but a living human being who committed a crime?"

"Hmm??"

"Your Majesty."

Count Ah Ru-Ho looked towards the throne.

"I respectfully have something to report to Your Majesty."

"Speak."

"Creating a new dukedom is an extremely significant matter, unprecedented in the kingdom's two thousand year history. Such a critical process requires a thorough examination of the moral character of the dukedom candidate."

The Sun King listened silently to the count's words.

The Sun King had not left the palace in sixty years. Those who did no work achieved no success, and those without success possessed no authority. The Sun King possessed none.

And nobles do not respect those without authority.

"I have come across several reports casting serious doubt on Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong's moral character."

"......."

"Therefore, if Your Majesty permits, I would like to summon witnesses to this assembly."

The Sun King turned to look at Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong.

It was a look asking for her thoughts.

Jaa Soo-Jeong smiled as if to say there's nothing to worry about.

"......I grant permission."

"Your royal grace is boundless."

Prepared witnesses began to enter the council.

The first to step into the amniotic water was a neatly dressed elderly person.

Count Ah Ru-Ho asked the elderly person.

"What is your name, witness?"

"I am called Nam Seok."

"Your status and origin?"

"I am a freeman. Forty-one years ago, I moved from the Barony of Sa Jo-Seong to the royal capital and settled there."

"Nam Seok. For a mere citizen to stand in this place, you must not take lightly the grace bestowed upon you."

The elderly person knelt and touched their forehead to the ground.

"I am unworthy of such grace."

"You must have submitted a petition to the nobles about your grievances."

"I lost my only granddaughter, my world crumbled, and I dared to defile the eyes of the noble with my humble words."

"......."

I turned my head, hearing those words.

Next to me, Marquis Baek Seol-To's face had turned deathly pale.

"It grieves me to hear that you lost your granddaughter. But whether a human life ends is decided by Heaven. Surely you are not the only subject who has lost family, Nam Seok. What injustice drove you to circulate a petition?"

"The ending of a lowly subject's life is as ordinary as an unknown weed being cut down. Even so, I appeal because it was not Heaven that took my granddaughter."

"Ahem."

Count Ah Ru-Ho spoke as though she were a benevolent ruler.

"How did your granddaughter die?"

"My granddaughter was whipped to death by someone named Baek Seol-To."

The amniotic water stirred.

"Baek Seol-To? That name sounds familiar. Do you know the person's station?"

"Six years ago, when my granddaughter died, I heard only that she was Lady Baek Seol-To."

"Would that not be the marquis seated over there now?"

The nobles looked at Marquis Baek Seol-To. Her face was no longer merely pale; her entire body was trembling.

"Marquis."

"Yes......?"

"A citizen here says their granddaughter was killed by your flogging six years ago. Is this true?"

"Ah. That. I, I am......"

At that moment, Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong stood up.

As the viscount rose, water splashed beneath her feet.

"Your Majesty."

"Proceed."

"The house of Marquis Baek Seol-To rests beneath my protection. My house is the head house and the marquisate its subordinate branch, so I ought to be reprimanded for an underling's crimes. It is improper for Count Ah Ru-Ho to interrogate my subordinate directly."

"......What are your thoughts, Count?"

"Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong is too generous. I, too, would like to question the viscount rather than the marquis."

Count Ah Ru-Ho seemed triumphantly expectant of this response.

"Viscount."

"Yes, Count."

"Were you aware of the marquis' actions?"

"I was aware."

The water stirred again.

"Since when?"

"I already knew when I took Marquis Baek Seol-To under my wing. The marquis confessed it to me in person."

"What? Then you took the marquis under your wing despite knowing about her crime?"

"That's correct."

Bang!

Count Ah Ru-Ho slammed her fist on the desk.

"Why? The marquis beat a young citizen to death with a whip. How could you accept such a cruel noble?"

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong smiled. The sight of that smile made my insides churn with terrible unease.

"You might not know... but at that time, the Lady Marquis was famously wayward. Idiot Lady, Dumb Lady, Brain-dead Lady... She endured all sorts of ridicule. After meeting her, I thought I had to properly raise this child."

"Properly raise?"

"The Lady grew up almost abused in her family."

Marquis Baek Seol-To twitched, trembling.

"Marquis Baek Seol-To's grandfather, Marquis Baek Mi-To, was a genius. A genius in the worst sense. He could not understand anyone less intelligent than himself, and he made no effort to understand a granddaughter who was not as clever as he was. Reproach. Verbal abuse. Mistreatment. Marquis Baek Seol-To's childhood was steeped in her grandfather's malicious contempt."

Count Ah Ru-Ho frowned.

"So? Because the marquis is pitiful, we should forgive her?"

"No."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong covered her mouth with her sleeve, chuckling.

"If left alone, Marquis Baek Seol-To would have forever lived as a [Brain-dead Lady], without any regrets or self-reflection, comfortably meeting her end by an assassin sent by someone."

"......."

"I thought that wasn't right."

"What do you mean..."

"I took the marquis on a journey for fifteen days."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong hummed.

It was like reminiscing about a pleasant past.

"I showed reality to a young lady who had never so much as wet her hands with work. I forced her to experience the lives of subjects who could not eat unless they worked, and forced upon her the reality outside her estate, where even working might not earn enough to eat. Thanks to that, Marquis Baek Seol-To realized that, unhappy though she might be, hers was a [bearable unhappiness]."

"......."

"And I regularly held lessons with the marquis. Sometimes we visited the northern port to see the merchants' daily lives, occasionally dragging her to thief subjugation to witness people's lives being brutally lost."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong's breath was fiery.

Like a priest intoxicated with something, she murmured in a low voice, colored with hot breath.

"Do you understand? Marquis Baek Seol-To is still only sixteen. Sixteen, yet she has already witnessed the deaths of a lowborn person, a merchant, and a bandit. I dare assure you that Marquis Baek Seol-To will become one of the twelve finest rulers in this kingdom."

"Ha."

Count Ah Ru-Ho scoffed.

"So that is what all this was about. You mean to cover up the stain on her past because she will become a fine politician in the future. Viscount, with such a rotten way of thinking..."

"You truly understand nothing, Count."

"What?"

"Who cares whether she becomes a fine politician? The important point is that even after becoming such an excellent noble, she will still have committed a wrong in the past that she can [never undo]."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong's breathing grew heated.

"Do you understand? The more admirable Marquis Baek Seol-To becomes, the more miserable she will be."

"......."

"No matter how benevolently she governs, no matter how many subjects' lives she comforts, Marquis Baek Seol-To will never be able to regard herself as a good person. Naturally. The fact that she killed a child will never change."

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong neatly folded her hands together.

As if she were praying.

"I'll raise Marquis Baek Seol-To to be the kingdom's finest noble. And also make her grow into the most miserable noble. As days pass, her misery will dye her. Guilt and self-loathing will color her face, for sure."

"......."

"Count. Imagine such a marquis. Every gesture she makes leaving traces of unhappiness, her past shadowing her every step. Can you picture it?"

Viscount Jaa Soo-Jeong shone like a saint as she smiled brightly.

"Isn't it lovely?"

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