Chapter 33
The conquest of the Dracon Marquisate... No, two months into the inspection.
When sunset came and everyone was asleep, the narrow-eyed tax official Hailudin reverted to Hedonius, the dark elf company commander.
He took out his beloved fountain pen and wrote a report as though he were writing a letter.
As Dominic and Jane spent their time forcibly liberating cities and resting, it was finally time for him to shine.
First, he made a list of the administrative measures each city needed.
Had this been within the domain, his lord Rex would have automatically analyzed each city's condition and dispatched the necessary people himself.
Even from far away, an administrator's thoughts would have been converted straight into text, making reports easy.
But the place he was in now was a barren backwater beyond the reach of that grace.
He was experiencing firsthand why bureaucrats' loyalty rose automatically the longer they worked under Rex.
‘A fountain pen does have its own charm.’
He felt the pen rasping across the paper as he wrote the report in elegant script.
This region is so lacking in educational welfare that someone like this needs to be dispatched.
That region's water and sewage infrastructure is such a mess that personnel specializing in civil engineering need to be sent there.
Hailudin filled the report with as much detail as possible about the conditions of the cities Rex had not yet assessed.
After spending a week staying up to write reports, he had to return to his role as the narrow-eyed tax official and join the combatants liberating the next city.
It was literally a forced march that ground people down.
Duke, by contrast, was too busy raising Jane—the elf accompanying him and the root cause of this whole mess—to do anything else.
But Hailudin did not resent Duke.
- “What can one hope to accomplish atop the ashes of revenge?”
In the past, Duke had saved Hailudin in much the same way.
Hailudin was an elf exiled from the forest.
He had been exiled because, as a dark elf—a Third-Class citizen—he had dared to consider himself the equal of the ‘High Elf’ lords.
Driven out by them, sold to a laboratory, and somehow eventually meeting Rex...
Until then, his heart had been filled with rage and a determination to burn down the World Tree someday.
But back when he was freeing slaves in the count's domain and filing reports with Duke night after night, Duke counseled him every night.
- “I won’t deny your revenge. But when you burn down the World Tree, do you really need to be the spark?”
Duke never offered him the glib consolation that revenge was wrong or that revenge would destroy him.
He affirmed that even Hailudin’s desire for revenge was part of his life.
He had merely shown him the things he had been unable to see because he was consumed by revenge.
From that point on, Hailudin’s life changed dramatically.
He learned the meaning of pride by freeing slaves.
By working hard under Duke, he learned the happiness of being acknowledged by others.
As the count’s domain changed day by day under Rex’s rule, the things he cherished also multiplied one by one.
Thus, revenge became something that no longer mattered to him.
That was what he thought.
But early in this journey, alongside a woman named Jane, he realized that he had not been able to let go of his desire for revenge.
At the time, Hailudin had been reluctant to help Jane because he thought she was nothing more than a vigilante who violated the stern laws Lord Rex had established and was obsessed with playing at being a filthy hero.
But looking back now, he had hated her simply because she was an elf.
The pale-skinned pointy-ears who had driven him from the forest.
His resentment toward them had revealed itself in his attitude.
‘I’m no different from those humans.’
He stopped the hand writing the report and gave a self-mocking smile.
He had pictured himself pursuing revenge until he degenerated into one of those same ugly pointy-ears if Duke had not been there.
Once his thoughts reached that point, he could not resent Duke for helping her now.
As Duke continued the journey and saved her, Hailudin was being saved as well.
‘He must have seen through that at their very first meeting and taken it into consideration.’
He didn’t think Duke had joined her journey to save Hailudin.
That would be far too self-important.
Still, it would make some sense if Duke had started this journey simply because he couldn’t bring himself to ignore her.
“Good grief. In his presence, the title of sage becomes embarrassing.”
Hailudin moved his hand again and finished writing the report.
Then he summoned an eagle and strapped the bag containing the report onto it.
“Please deliver this to Lord Rex.”
The eagle nodded and took flight into the night sky.
And a few days later, early one morning.
An eagle landed on the window of Rex’s office.
The count, with dark circles heavily shadowing his eyes, met the eagle’s gaze.
“Really?”
“Coo?”
Asking the eagle would never elicit a proper answer.
He could not even tell what he was asking in the first place.
Rex fed the eagle some meat and took the bundle of reports from its back.
After checking the contents, Rex made a miserable face and asked his maid a question.
“Ari.”
“Yes, Master.”
“Is one city a week even remotely reasonable?”
“As expected of Duke!”
“···”
He distinctly remembered Ari swearing unwavering loyalty, so why did this maid not understand his feelings?
Rex sighed and opened the interface.
[A new city has been added!]
A congratulatory message rose from the golden window as if to tease him.
Rex leaned back in his chair and pressed his fingers into his eyelids.
“Why can’t I be happiii···”
In the corner of Rex’s vision, Duke’s skill window sparkled as though winking.
***
While Rex was happily dying in his office, Duke was also having a wonderful time.
‘The protagonist is growing well.’
For the final boss to shine, the protagonist had to grow.
The most important thing here was not the protagonist’s strength, but her conviction.
Combat power was merely a tool to highlight the confrontation between the final boss and the protagonist; the final boss’s role was to stand in the way of her conviction or her goal.
‘At first, Jane was far too lacking to be called a protagonist.’
She had harbored revenge in her heart, but nothing that could be called a conviction.
So he had awakened something in her that could serve as a conviction.
‘Judging by how she is now, it seems to have more or less taken shape.’
The woman who had burned herself up for revenge had now realized the meaning of a greater cause.
Even as she carried out her revenge, a noble ideal had begun to take root within her: ensuring that no child in this domain would suffer as she had.
As proof, whereas she had originally ignored a city once she liberated it and moved on to the next, she now even concerned herself with the aftermath.
She would sometimes ask whether the cities they had liberated so far were doing well and check on the people’s welfare.
Now that her conviction had blossomed, all that remained was for them to collide.
‘What kind of story would be good?’
Duke listed several possible storylines in his mind.
First, there was the route where he betrayed her.
Like the great twist in which he turned out to be the mastermind manipulating the mafia from behind the scenes.
It would not even be difficult.
He would simply have to deal with the boss of the mafia alliance she was targeting first, then take his place.
The dead tell no tales, and history belongs to the victors.
He had done something similar in the past, so it would not be particularly difficult.
But after thinking it over, he realized this method was impossible.
Because a companion who knew that Dominic was Duke was traveling with them.
If he did that, Dominic’s story would be complete, but Duke’s story would be ruined.
‘Then a battle between the authorities and the vigilante seems best.’
Convictions do not clash only in conflicts between good and evil.
It’s not for nothing that people say evil is another kind of justice.
A clash in which she refused to acknowledge his methods once everything was over seemed ideal.
‘All right. Then I should hear her story first.’
Dominic, having organized his thoughts, went to her room.
“Miss. It’s teatime.”
“Thank you.”
Jane set down the newspaper and naturally accepted the cup.
As though she thought Dominic was her butler.
Dominic did not particularly point out her attitude.
The more attached she became to Dominic the butler, the more powerful the reversal would be when their convictions clashed.
As always, he maintained his immaculate posture beside her and waited until she finished her tea.
“Hmm. It’s delicious today, too. Where did you learn how to brew tea?”
“It is a basic butler’s skill.”
Of course, that was a lie; he had learned to make tea because it was a basic skill of a final boss.
Though Duke had no interest in such things as refinement or common knowledge, he practiced anything directly related to a final boss’s dignity whenever he had the time.
Such as how to write elegantly,
How to walk with dignity,
How to project a voice that commanded people.
Tea was an extension of the same principle.
When meeting people, tea or alcohol was often exchanged, and lacking that knowledge would make the character fall apart.
‘Thank you, Grandpa Peter.’
Remembering the old man with whom he had exchanged either alcohol or tea, Dominic gazed at Jane’s tea.
“Shall I clear it away?”
“Thank you as always.”
She gave him a warm smile.
It was hard to believe this was the same woman who had displayed such unabashed pointy-ear behavior when they first met.
‘She has regained her composure.’
He understood.
Five of the nine people she had to take revenge on had been dealt with without a hitch, and she had even gained the citizens’ support; of course she could afford to relax.
In other words, this was precisely the right time to delve into her past.
Dominic pointed at her chest as he cleared away the teacup, as though he had just noticed it.
“That necklace. Might I ask where you got it?”
The metal pendant Dominic pointed to still bore traces of soot.
He had known about the pendant since early in their journey, but she had always kept it in her inner pocket, as though she did not want to show it.
Only recently had she begun taking it out in front of Dominic.
It was not difficult to guess that the pendant was closely connected to her revenge.
She looked at her pendant and made a sorrowful expression.
As if he had sensed the mood, Dominic hurriedly lowered his head.
“My apologies.”
“No. I’d been meaning to tell you someday. Since it came up, I’ll tell you.”
She opened the pendant and showed him the inside.
On one side was a photograph of a man and woman who appeared to be her parents,
while the other held a small magic stone.
Dominic saw through the stone’s identity at once.
‘Hm? A barrier stone?’
Though it had lost its function now, the magic stone was undoubtedly a barrier stone.
Dominic made a mental note of the barrier stone and focused on her.
Just then, having composed herself, she began telling him about her past.
“Our family was made up of 'children abandoned by the World Tree.'”