6 Magic Mirror on the Desk

Duke Gale had a sunny smile plastered on his face as he worked on the piles of papers on his desk. Yes, piles, just around 5 piles of papers the height of an adult's torso just laying on the surface of his antique desk.

But, a few days ago, these piles were tall mountains that towered over the man and it made Duke Gale cry a little in the inside every time he saw them. He never saw these mini-mountains of papers decrease, he had only seen them increase ever so steadily. If the papers were to increase any more than what he can already barely handle, then his workspace may just become a paper world, populated by one person, namely him.

He despaired day after day as nobles with difficult work would come over to give it to him as his working speed is the fastest.

But! Writing and thinking and reading takes a long time! He isn't invincible! Nelumbo has a long history and quite a large country. But in recent years, they have been suppressed by multiple countries trying to vie for their resources and land. This is due to the fact that the current ruler of Nelumbo, King Luken, is a relatively new king, his reign being a measly two years and himself being currently twenty-two years old. This made the surrounding countries look down on Nelumbo.

Of course, King Luken has managed to repel the external forces, but he had more internal problems that were more complicated, from the unrest of the masses to various foreign forces attacking from the inside. It was becoming a hot mess from the inside of the country! And what does a hot mess equate to? Papers. The problems translated into pieces of papers that continuously add up and that the subordinates under the King must fix.

Because of the situation, Duke Gale was flooded with work to ease the problems off the other ministers and officials. And that meant putting the problems on himself. He was exhausted and became snarky and sarcastic due to the huge amount of paperwork he sees every time he walks into the accursed office.

How! Ev! Er! As mentioned, the problems and papers have decreased! Why? Because of the magic wooden mirror.

While Duke Gale was sulking in his workspace after King Luken denied him to the convenience of a mirror that can answer probably all his questions and may help with his workload, the King himself elegantly barged in with a cold atmosphere. And accused him, his loyal friend, of bad-mouthing him! He was not wrong as he was silently cursing him, but it hurt in the inside!

So he righteously outright complained about the problems that were difficult to solve and said that the King should lend him the mirror to help stabilize the internal problems of the country.

King Luken, seeing the amount of work that had to be done, actually had a twinge, just a twinge, of guilt and handed the mirror over, with the conditions that he would not start showing it off as to avoid resentment from coworkers that would love to lower their workload. Plus, the King was curious at the extent of the mirror's knowledge. Unfortunately, Luken had to leave and attend his own diplomatic duties. Gale had graciously promised the King that he would test the mirror and inform the King of the results at a later date.

The moment Luken gave the other the wooden handheld mirror, Gale carefully held it and bid his friend an enthusiastic farewell. When he left, Gale immediately took the mirror towards the mountains of papers on top of his desk.

Out of curiosity, he wanted to ask the mirror a few menial questions.

"Do you know my name?"

"Yes." The mirror responded in the same refreshing, monotone voice, which was followed by a period of silence between the both of them.

'The voice is quite nice, but the answer is so shallow. Does it only answer the bare minimum of the question, unless another asks for it to elaborate the answer? What are the conditions to make it fully answer a query?' The Duke felt his stomach burn up with determination.

'Whatever it'll take! I'll do it to reduce my work!'

"Can you elaborate on the answer?"

"I know that your name is Gale Beaumont, Gale being deprived from the Beaumont's heritable trait of impressive wind abilities." The mirror rambled on with a patient voice as if gently informing the Duke of common knowledge.

'Why does it feel like the mirror is trying to educate me?' Gale seriously pondered, but quickly shooed the thought away as being a part of his recent exhaustion.

"Can you, from now on, elaborate all your answers?"

At this minute, the mirror paused in contemplating its answer, as if it was difficult. The blond-haired man crinkled his eyebrows when noticing the stop in words. Thinking that there might be a problem with this mirror, Gale was about to lose hope in ever finishing his work. Before he could set the wooden mirror down, the tool spoke.

"Yes, from here on out, I will elaborate all my answers and not answer with single words."

Gale had an incredulous look on his face.

'The mirror had contemplated on how to elaborate a simple answer. Isn't this mirror a little too thoughtful in its answers? A bit scary, mostly funny though.'

The Duke shook the thoughts out of his head and sighed in relief at the mirror's answer. He excitedly dug through the papers to start off with easy questions and then descending into the hell of hard questions.

"A river that runs through a decently populated town had started to thin out, it isn't dangerously low, but in the near future, it may disappear and negatively impact the town. Why is the river like this?"

"A river that thins out is most likely due to either a problem upstream with something blocking the water source. Or there are no trees around the bank to stabilize the water flow. Without the greenery, the river banks erode quickly and allow the water to flow unnaturally fast and lose water."

"How do I punish a corrupt noble that is liked by the people without angering the masses?"

"A private trial among the upper class, and send him somewhere to "retire" for all his hard work, without the public being needlessly angry."

"Crops have been growing slower than usual..."

"Add leaf mold, manure or bits of fish into the soil of the crops to promote growth..."

"Radicals have been causing trouble..."

"Put them in trial for disturbing the peace..."

Duke Gale had asked a lot of queries and no matter the difficulty, all of them were fully answered.

He looked at the mirror with worship and personally placed the mirror on a pillow with a few books for it to lean on. The wooden mirror was currently basking in the sunlight, while the blond-haired man continued leisurely do his work. Although the mirror was inanimate, Duke Gale felt it appropriate to give it a break after a few days of his speedy questioning.

Looking at the drastically decreased paperwork, the Duke wiped a few invisible tears away from his cheeks and felt really touched from the bottom of his heart.

'I should really tell Luken the capabilities of the mirror. Maybe he would let me work with the mirror from now on!'

At the moment, he was trying to figure out how to negotiate with the king about himself working with the wooden mirror.

Then, Duke Gale slightly frowned in realization. As he thought that it was a little unsuitable to keep calling something he respected just "mirror" all the time.

With a few "hmms" and "haws," Gale suddenly snaps his finger and quickly turns to the mirror.

"Do you want to be called 'Little Ancestor'? It's domineering and powerful, how about it?" He really did feel that the name wait suitable for the wooden mirror. He also thought it'd be funny if even the king had to call the small mirror "Little Ancestor".

But the mirror's same dull, but slightly urgent tone voiced out, "I don't want to be called that."

Thus, dashing all the funny fantasies that Gale had in his head of all the nobles calling a mirror "Little Ancestor."

"Then what do you want to be called?" Gale graciously decided to let the mirror choose it's own name.

The mirror paused for a moment when being asked that question, but answered with a twinge of happiness, the voice being more clear and firm than it was answering Gale's previous questions.

"My name is Rowan." The mirror, or Rowan, stated out loud to Gale.

The Duke choked back a chuckle as he gazed funnily at the mirror.

'The mirror named itself after the tree it was made out of?' But, hearing the smidge of joy hidden within the monotone voice of the mirror, he simply smiled towards the mirror.

"Well then, hello Rowan. Welcome to the country of Nelumbo!"