FSTE 06

Chapter 06

On one wall of Isabel’s mansion’s reception room hung a large wooden map.

The Pallas Continent.
That was the name of this world.

If this world were a spherical planet like Earth, then the Pallas Continent might be only a tiny fraction of it.
In that case, it wasn’t hard to imagine discovering a new continent beyond the vast western ocean.

But for a former serf boy from the countryside, now a slave, even this single continent was overwhelmingly vast.

So I really did live in the middle of nowhere…

Lian tilted his head back and stared up at the map.

At the far northwestern edge of the enormous map covering an entire wall was a place labeled Paula.
His hometown.

Naturally, the entire territory was lumped together into something barely the size of half a palm.
That tiny, rat-sized village of his didn’t even appear on the map.

And now, if you followed the coastline south for quite some distance, a large island came into view.

This was Madella Island.

The island’s size… maybe several times bigger than Jeju Island?

On a round table set to one side of the reception room sat a scale model of Madella Island.

Two major cities developed around the northern and southern ports.
Numerous towns connecting them.
If the model wasn’t exaggerated, some of the larger “towns” were big enough to be called cities outright.

At a glance, the lord of such a vast domain might seem impressive—but the reality was different.
Administratively, the lord governed the entire island, but in practice, power on Madella was split between the north and the south.

And Isabel controlled one half of that divided power.

“Isabel! I’m begging you like this—please reconsider just once!”
“Lord Roper, I’m not a philanthropist. If a business isn’t profitable, of course I’ll pull out.”
“Just one more year! No, half a year! Even just a few more months—please!”

To Lian, it was a rather bizarre sight.

Isabel was, at most, a free commoner—not a noble.
Yet here a nobleman was kneeling before her, begging.

But scenes like this were fairly common in this mansion.

The reason this noble clung to Isabel was because of the brewery he owned—
more precisely, a winery that integrated vineyards and a brewery.

Apparently, something had gone wrong, and the operation was on the verge of bankruptcy.

“Well, if you put it that way, I suppose I can’t help it. I’ll watch over it for just one more year.”
“Th-thank you! As expected, only you…!”
“But since I’ll be taking a loss as well, I’ll need to revise the contract terms slightly. Lian?”

Clap, clap.

Isabel lightly clapped her hands, calling Lian, who had been waiting behind her.

Lian handed the prepared documents to the guest.
The man stared blankly at Lian’s face for a moment, then checked the new contract—his complexion turning pale.

“What is this?! This is practically telling me to hand over my land to you!”
“So? If you go bankrupt anyway, won’t selling it be your only option?”
“That’s ridiculous! This land has been in my family since the days of the Madella Kingdom—passed down for generations!”
“Then let’s forget the whole thing. Lian, put that away.”
“W-wait…! I’ll do it! I will! I’ll sign!”

As Lian moved to take the contract back, the noble hurriedly threw himself over it, scribbling down his signature to secure it.

Better to accept investment and gamble on recovery than lose everything for certain.
That was probably his thinking.

But Lian’s honest impression was—

That noble’s completely been led by the nose.

It was a textbook case of an aggressive acquisition.
The winery’s near-bankruptcy might very well have been Isabel’s doing behind the scenes.

To nobles, land was the very root of their family.
From now on, with that land held hostage, House Roper would have no choice but to become Isabel’s puppet.

And if I can conquer Isabel, I get all of that.

Of course, to defeat the final boss, the proper strategy was to level up by taking down the small mobs first.

It had already been ten days since Lian became a “human calculator,” masquerading as Diego’s assistant.
And he still hadn’t learned a single thing from that damned goateed man.

“I’m going to get some air.”
“Go on.”

Diego’s continued indifference toward Lian was also unchanged.
For that, Lian was grateful. Compared to his previous life’s exploitative boss who forced pointless overtime, this was merciful.

“Good afternoon! Thank you all for your hard work today!”

He dutifully suffered under Diego in the mornings, then reported to the annex office in the afternoons on his own initiative.
Sitting in his usual spot, he took out a blank scroll and a quill.

“Why does that slave brat come here every day and do that?”
“Could it be Lady Isabel ordered him to spy on us?”
“No way, surely not that far…”
“Look at him! He’s writing something again!”

As this routine continued, people’s reactions to Lian split into two camps.

Those who felt uncomfortable with his presence and voiced their complaints—

Or those who had grown used to him, treating him like a mere statue while focusing on their own work.

Lian paid closer attention to the latter group.

By observing like this, he could roughly grasp how the trading company operated.

It’s not that different from the trading firms I worked at in my past life.

They even used double-entry bookkeeping rather than simple ledgers.
There were quite a few familiar systems scattered throughout.

Still, compared to modern standards, many parts lacked structure and clearly needed improvement.
Some limitations were due to infrastructure, but a fair amount seemed applicable with little issue.

Before that, I’d really like some proper hands-on experience…

Just sitting here brought in plenty of high-level information, but it was all surface-level.

To dig deeper into actual operations, he needed to get closer to individual merchants.

But none of them will even make eye contact with me. Damn it.

Whenever Lian looked up from his scroll, everyone blatantly avoided his gaze.

The reason was simple.
They didn’t like a mere slave prying into their work.

And it wasn’t just a matter of pride, which made them even more sensitive.

“Damn it! We’re screwed! That was supposed to be a jackpot deal, but those desert bastards cut in!”
“Hey, you think your winter results will be okay? What if you’re the one getting fired this time?”
“Well… it’s cutting it close. Still, that guy’ll cushion the fall, so I just need to patch things up somehow.”

Following the complaining merchant’s finger, Lian shifted his gaze.

In a corner sat a gaunt-looking man, tearing at his hair while furiously clicking an abacus.

Now that I think about it, he’s always alone.

A so-called soon-to-be drop-out.

The man let out a long sigh and looked around.
The other merchants avoided his eyes.

Just like they did with Lian.

The dejected man kept looking around until his eyes met Lian’s.
For a brief moment, his face brightened—but upon noticing the collar around Lian’s neck, he lowered his head in disappointment.

“Huh? Why pretend we’re not in the same boat?”

Lian snorted softly and stood up.

That man was exactly the kind of talent Lian had been looking for.

The man, quietly working his abacus alone in the corner, sighed deeply again and again.

No matter how many times he calculated, the result was the same.
He’d humbled himself and secured several deals, but the crucial profits were still rock bottom.

“Ugh, no… At this rate, this winter I really…”

He had barely survived autumn through sheer luck.

One colleague’s cargo had been stuck at the port for nearly a month, tanking that man’s performance.
All because of a single missing document.

Under normal circumstances, he should have been the worst performer of the season and fired.

“Something not adding up? Want some help?”

A young boy’s voice, still before its voice change.

There was only one person that age here, so the man deliberately didn’t look up.

“Seriously, old man? You too? Acting like we’re both being ostracized?”

Same boat? What nonsense.

A pampered pet slave who got fed just by sucking up to the mistress—
what could he possibly know about a merchant breaking his back for the company’s profit?

As he ignored him, he heard rustling beside him, like someone rummaging through papers.

“Wow, what is this? You’re not even trying to make a profit? Who signs contracts with these conditions? No wonder you work yourself to death and still get results like this!”
“You little slave bastard! Who said you could—!”

The man clenched his fist and glared at Isabel’s pet slave.

“You’re finally looking at me now.”
“Ghk…!”

He only trembled, fist clenched.

Endure it.
The brat was infuriating, but that face was worth three hundred gold coins.

“Hand it over! What would you know even if you looked at this?!”

Swallowing his anger, the man snatched the contract from Lian’s hand.

“You know it too, don’t you? You were so desperate to land the deal that you accepted every condition they demanded.”

The man shut his mouth again and resumed clicking the abacus.

He didn’t have time to deal with a slave emboldened by his mistress.
He needed to find a way to increase profits—otherwise he wouldn’t survive in this trading company.

“No matter how many times you calculate it, it’s the same. You set the supply price without considering market fluctuations at all. Even just averaging it over a year—”
“Damn it! Leave me alone!”

Bang!

“You think I don’t know that?! That’s all I could do!”

He slammed the desk, venting all the frustration he’d been holding in.

“Damn it! My third child will be born next spring! I can’t get kicked out of here! I have to try something!”

For a moment, countless eyes turned toward him—but only briefly.
Everyone here had someone to support, some burden to carry.

It was cruel, but those who had to be discarded would be discarded.

“So if I leave you alone, will anything change?”

The man looked up at Lian with hollow, exhausted eyes.

Lian met his gaze head-on—the gaze of someone already marked as expendable—and held out his hand.

“Take it. You said you have to try something, right? When you’re about to drown, you grab even a straw.”

Infuriating.
Every word from this slave brat was correct, which made it all the more infuriating.

But he hated far more the coworkers who abandoned a long-time colleague just to save themselves.
And the past version of himself who had clung on in the same way.

“So what changes if I join hands with a slave like you?”
“Everything.”

And so the man decided to grab hold of that three-hundred-gold-coin straw.