WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ The Reluctant Imperialist

Chapter 29

──────

The Utility of Law (5)

Imperial Central Court. Judge Klaus walked down the courthouse corridor. As always, he wore a spotless formal uniform, his heels striking the marble floor.

──Thud. Thud.

He was an ordinary man. At least, that was what he believed.

Born into a minor noble family of the Empire, he followed the path laid out for him and became a judge.

His life had no sharp turns and no special glory. He had never wanted those things either. Within the bounds of law and principle, he had simply done his duty in silence. He was the kind of man people called hard-headed, or just a stubborn fool.

As usual, Klaus opened the door to his office.

Then he stopped in place.

A stranger was there. A man in a knight’s uniform, looking out the window...

“...Who are you?”

Caution colored Klaus’s voice. The man slowly turned his head.

“Good day, Judge Klaus-nim.”

With a faint smile, he introduced himself.

“I am Maximilian, a knight of the Sentinel Order.”

Maximilian. The knight in charge of the case where Klaus had rejected the death sentence.

“I came because I wanted to have a detailed conversation with you, Judge-nim.”

His voice was soft, but it carried a weight that did not allow refusal.

“Sit.”

Klaus gestured toward the guest sofa.

“Yes.”

“It would have been better if you had made an appointment first.”

“Haha. My apologies.”

Maximilian sat down. He took out documents and placed them on the table.

“I came because I think there may be a misunderstanding about this case, and I wanted to explain it in detail.”

“A misunderstanding?”

“Yes. All three are Revolutionary Faction members. Physical evidence may be lacking, but the circumstances are enough to treat them that way.”

Klaus frowned. As a judge, he had already ordered rejection.

“Judge-nim. Daniel provided a hidden space where explosives and forbidden books were stored, and during interrogation he desperately protected them. If they were not Revolutionary Faction members, would he have done that?”

“I judged that claim to be an unreasonable inference.”

Maximilian tilted his head.

“An unreasonable inference...”

“Those two immigrants cannot even read or write Imperial. To hand down death sentences at once would be...”

“Not being able to read or write is their claim. That is easy enough to fake.”

“That too is only your claim. I judged the evidence insufficient...”

“Judge-nim.”

Maximilian cut him off. He lowered his gaze and let out a deep breath.

“What I want to discuss is a knight’s duty.”

“A knight’s duty?”

“Yes. As the Empire’s sword, we execute impure elements that harm the Empire. We exist only for the Empire’s glory.”

As he spoke about knights, Maximilian gave a bitter smile.

“Your son probably understands that well.”

At that moment, Klaus’s face hardened.

“Your son is a cadet at Empire Point. His grades are excellent. If he keeps this up for two more years, he may even be able to join our Sentinel Order.”

The smile on Maximilian’s lips suddenly turned cold.

“But Judge-nim, have you ever thought about who is around your son? How he spends time with them. And...”

Maximilian continued. His voice sank lower and lower.

“What little deviations he sometimes commits.”

Maximilian’s pupils opened. The golden eyes of Ebenholtz. Without realizing it, Klaus looked away from that gaze.

“...Are you threatening me right now?”

“No. I am simply informing you.”

Maximilian leaned back against the sofa.

“Judge Klaus-nim is a pure Imperial. An Aran who has lived in the Empire for a very long time. Your son is the same. So this is how I see it.”

He continued in a tone laced with a light laugh.

“Even if your son has a few forbidden books, even if he often attends slightly strange gatherings, it must be simple curiosity. No Link to the Revolutionary Faction at all. Of course. His father is an Imperial judge, so that level of intellectual curiosity is only natural...”

Klaus looked at Maximilian. His own reflection sat in those golden pupils.

“But these subspecies.”

Press. Maximilian pinned the document down with his finger.

“Trust is impossible from the start. Their claim that they do not know the Empire’s language, Daniel’s claim that all the evidence is his alone, all of it is hard to believe.”

“...”

“You should have taken those points into account.”

Klaus could not speak. So many words rose inside him, but the sudden image of his son seemed to press them all back down.

“The clear circumstance in this case, as I see it, is that all three are Revolutionary Faction members.”

“...Just to pad your record?”

“From your perspective, three revolutionaries are better than one, are they not?”

He knew House Ebenholtz, that great noble house. He knew Sebestian. Sebestian was not a man obsessed with performance the way Maximilian was.

“I already told you.”

But Maximilian sighed, sounding frustrated.

“This is not about performance. It is a knight’s duty.”

He stood up.

“As much as your will matters, a knight’s honor matters just as much.”

Straightening his clothes, he placed a photograph on the table.

Lucas. Klaus’s son. There were many shots of his movements in and around Empire Point.

“I heard he was a precious son you had late in life. I hope he joins as my junior someday.”

Maximilian gave a light bow.

“Then I will take my leave.”

He left, but Klaus remained seated, unmoving.

Those words kept circling in his head.

My son, and my duty.

Inside his heart, two scales tilted against each other. His silent torment deepened.

“...”

Backlight streamed in through the window and shone on the judge’s back.

* * *

I thought about the illusion called law. At some point, the Empire’s laws had bent. They were not equal for everyone, and they worked selectively for only certain people. The Revolutionary Faction had dug into exactly that abuse, yet now I too had to use the law as a weapon, like the other nobles.

But in that process, the foundation of the Empire could not be allowed to collapse.

I had to keep rotten nobles in check while cutting out only the cancer cells that had spread through humanity.

I was aiming one sword at two enemies.

It was a contradiction.

No, perhaps this whole world was a bundle of contradictions.

How far can we go to survive? What kind of acts can we commit?

Under survival, the most important goal, other values become almost meaningless.

“...”

I picked up a document from the administrative officer. It was a notice from the Imperial Central Court.

──[Imperial Central Court]──

[Notice of Change in Presiding Court]

Previous presiding judge: Klaus von Limperk

New presiding judge: Karl Grossman

Reason for change: Resignation due to the presiding judge’s personal circumstances.

───────────

It was a letter stating that the judge had been replaced. Klaus had not merely given up this case. He had given up being a judge at all.

It was probably for his son.

Klaus was the kind of man who would never bend his will for anyone. A man like that would have had his neck broken by the Imperial Guard someday. Before my regression, he might have died without me ever knowing, nameless to me.

Compared to that future, bowing his head to me was...

“...right.”

I thought about what was right for me. A bitter taste rose in my mouth, dry as sand.

From now on, I had to kill countless people. Because I could not cut out only Izenheim with perfect precision.

The biggest problem was the Revolutionary Faction.

Were they enemies? For now, yes. But in the end, they were also part of “us.”

Our ultimate enemy was only Izenheim.

Even so, we stood on different roads. Parallel lines that could never meet. A huge part of the “cause” they held was natural rights, the belief that all minority races, including Izenheim, were equal.

You could not split only Izenheim away from them.

That was their cause.

No matter what happened, never something they could abandon, and no matter what sacrifices were required, never something they could compromise, the one value countless convictions were determined to protect.

“I cannot persuade them...”

I pulled out the second letter.

It was the ruling.

“Nor can they persuade me.”

[Under Imperial Law Article 112, sentence is imposed on defendant Daniel Matteo and two others.]

The newly appointed judge had no objection at all to my requested sentence.

The three Revolutionary Faction members, including Daniel, were sentenced to death, and they became part of my record.

* * *

Behind the Sentinel Order grounds stood a broad mountain. Its elevation was not very high, but mana density was thick, so it had long been considered a decent training ground.

Senior Knight Adria climbed to the summit. Near the rocking boulder, a man sat.

“...So this is where you were.”

Deputy Commander Anton. He looked as if he were admiring the view. Adria steadied her breathing and stood beside him.

“Congratulations.”

“Congratulations?”

Anton asked, hands clasped behind his back.

“A new knight caught Revolutionary Faction members. Three of them, no less.”

Anton gave a small laugh at Adria’s words. Adria’s eyebrows twitched.

“I thought he would not be easy.”

“He is the heir to Ebenholtz. We should never have expected him to be ordinary from the start.”

Ordinary, ordinary, ordinary. Adria repeated it under her breath, then let out a short snort.

“...May I say more?”

Anton turned to face Adria. Her expression had already gone cold and hard.

“He is far beyond merely not ordinary.”

Whoooosh. A chilly wind blew. Their coattails fluttered with the fallen leaves.

“He beheaded an Empire Point cadet because the boy was not a pure Imperial, and he gave summary judgment to an eleven-year-old noble murderer. That child was both a perpetrator and a victim.”

Maximilian had killed a child abused by an old noble, a child who deserved at least a proper trial.

“Also, one Revolutionary Faction member, and possibly two innocent immigrants, were sentenced to death. He even forced out a judge to make that happen.”

Anton looked out at the distant landscape again. Beneath his gaze, the Imperial capital spread like a painting.

Arcadia, where countless subjects lived...

“He disposed of an Imperial Guard member who had clashed with him. A soldier once called a rising star in the Imperial Guard disappeared overnight without a trace.”

Rodriguez. Adria had seen him before. A stiff-necked Imperial Guardsman. He had a real chance to rise in the Imperial Guard, but Maximilian cut him down without hesitation, just because he had staked a claim on a house Maximilian wanted to buy.

“Maximilian is that kind of knight.”

At Empire Point, people had called him soft. Then at some point, his reins came off.

“What do you think, Deputy Commander-nim?”

Adria asked Anton. A detached smile spread across his face.

In a low voice, he answered.

“Truly, he is a man who resembles the Empire.”

A man who resembled the Empire.

Adria turned those words over in her head. They were so exact that a laugh slipped out of her without meaning to.

“...You are right.”

Maximilian Albrecht von Ebenholtz.

In the Order, in politics, and even in the Revolutionary Faction, he had become a person of interest. For judging a man like him, Anton’s words were exactly right.

“He is... a pure imperialist.”

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