Chapter 14 - Rebuild The Old Living

The main requirement to become a ruler is to understand greed and human nature. Because by understanding both of them, all problems that originate from human feelings can be easily overcome.

 For example, the robbers who call themselves merchants.

 Thanks to yesterday's incident and the vehicle made by my son. We have a great achievement in preventing the invasion of hungry dragons. The incident seems to have provoked their greedy noses to get dragon scales at a cheap price.

 Their arrival was easy to predict. The report I got from the adventurer said that the dragon scales we hunted were of very good quality. Killing a dragon without damaging many layers of dragon scales is indeed very difficult, that's what causes the decline in the quality of dragon scales.

 But..

 Facing their greed is quite easy to fight.

 I have sent Sebastian to bring the merchants to occupy the empty servant's room and give them a little service to stay comfortable in our residence.

 I have to talk to them to determine the sales target. According to the report from Karl, he needs at least 100,000,000 gold coins to rebuild our residence and supply some security weapons in it.

 I don't know when he had such a crazy idea, but with the vehicle he made, I'm very sure he still has other crazy ideas in his head.

 Without wasting much time, I entered our former servant's room.

 In front of me was a fat merchant. Every merchant has one characteristic, namely their ability to assess their goods with the touch of their eyes. However, that cunningness is used to deceive the quality and price of the goods.

 "Sorry to keep you waiting, there are too many other merchants who are enthusiastic about buying our dragon scales."

 A little small talk is necessary, especially since I have to observe how the person in front of me plays.

 "We should be the ones apologizing, Duke Flora. For coming suddenly like the wind."

 "It's okay, you also need something to expect when you come here, right? Let's get straight to the main problem because there are still several other merchants waiting for me."

 "Ahahaha! Duke Flora doesn't seem to like small talk. Then let's just go see the goods obtained from the dragon invasion."

 Seeing their reactions who immediately came after a day had passed.. it seemed they knew where the dragons went. Why are cunning people like this so easy to grow?

 "How about this, 5,000,000 gold coins for 10 chest dragon scales" I then snapped my fingers and Sebastian came with a trolley filled with dragon scales.

 The merchant then stood up and observed the dragon scales. I could see the movement of his lips and eyes that seemed harmonious as if he saw the goods he was looking for were here.

 "Hahaha.. Duke Flora.. you like to joke around it seems. These dragon scales are pretty good if they don't have cracks in them. How about we buy them 100,000 gold coins for these 10 dragon scales."

 A very classic lie. His mouth and eyes didn't meet at all.

 "Hmmm.. I doubt we can't agree on this" I then hurriedly got up and walked out.

 "Duke Flora??" The merchant looked confused.

 "Oh, our business ends here. Sorry for interrupting your time. You may leave through the front door."

 "Huh? Ah! Wait!"

 "Um? Why else?"

 "Eh… etto.."

 "My source said that these dragon scales are of very good quality but in your eyes they are just trash, right? I can't possibly do business with a merchant who can't judge goods and with this, I finally know how bad the quality of your goods is."

 "Huh? Ah! How about 700,000 gold coins for 10 dragon scales?"

 "Huh? Did you raise your price? How about 10,000,000 gold coins for 10 dragon scales."

 "W-wait a minute, isn't that too much for just dragon scales?"

 "Well, I can sell them to another merchant if you don't buy them."

 "Kuh!" he seemed to be hesitant to make a decision.

 I hurried away again while waving my hand.

 "Wait! We'll buy them!" 10,000,000 gold coins for 10 dragon scales!"

 "Okay, agreed!" Without further ado, we agreed to this sudden decision.

 In this way, we finally managed to squeeze out these cunning merchants.

 Who would have thought that they would be squeezed back, right?

 It's ironic, isn't it?

 [...]

 Sometimes, our lives encounter some problems that are not worth discussing.

 The plan to rebuild our residence ended up adding unnecessary rooms.

 I need to emphasize here, that our family seems to have a principle of doing things seriously.

 For example, there are 12 types of detention rooms and 32 types of interrogation rooms.

 It seems that violence is starting to become a unique feature of this family.

 I don't mind our family's information extraction technique, but the addition of corpse storage rooms bothers me quite a bit. I think it's much better than throwing their corpses away to be eaten by forest monsters. At least our humanity is a little bit enlightened.

 Right now, I'm with my family to discuss the possible needs.

 "Karl, are you sure you want to build ten levels of underground space?"

 "There's no harm in that, right? The first floor will be used for food, the second floor for detention, the third floor for gathering information, and the rest for our research needs."

 "Research?"

 "Well, some of it is personal research, and the rest... well... Dad knows what it's for."

 "Don't make too many movements that cause panic, Karl."

 "I know, Dad. That's why I will develop our technology for our benefit."

 "Well, that's good then. Ah, I remember.. why did you want to make our private lake a research object too?"

 "Well, I plan to create a river that connects our private lake to Grandpa's military base."

 "That's quite a long route."

 "But it can be done in one weeks."

 "Sometimes I wonder what's in your head, are you trying to create a new river? Or do you have other ideas for developing water weapons?"

 "Please.. don't expect too much from me."

 "..."

 "Onii-sama? Can we be in the same room again?"

 This time, Chiyuki put forward her latest proposal.

 "Um, okay but it seems like we have to build a bigger room."

 "Nee.. Master.. can my room be filled with research equipment?"

 Now, Mercedes submitted her new proposal.

 "Okay, but if you want to use that equipment, your room is at the end. It's quite dangerous if your experiment fails, right?"

 "Then, can we stay in the same room, and the research equipment room be separated into a new room?"

 What's this? Their requests are getting weirder and weirder. Why do they want to be in the same room as me?

 "Onii-sama..."

 "Master..."

 Like cute little cats, they hugged my body. I don't mind Chiyuki but Mercedes seems too confident lately.

 "Uh, okay..."

 I give up.

 For the sake of my ambition which has yet to be realized, I am forced to agree to their request.

 Tonight accompanied by Sebastian, I changed some of the layout of our living space blueprints.

 Sebastian seemed to agree with the changes to our living space. Even when I asked for his opinion, my plan was much better than the previous room placement.

 Our little discussion encouraged me to look for additional potential locations that could be inserted into something like a hidden room, hidden weapons, or even a room for evacuation in case something happens.

 Well, my building design is strong enough to withstand natural disasters but we don't know what kind of natural disasters will happen, right? Just in case... I added some rooms that only family members know about.

 When the day began to change to morning, some people chosen by my father carried the remaining dragon scales and the money left as an initial payment. It seemed that my father had forced them to buy the dragon scales outside the normal price.

 Now, the people I was waiting for arrived.

 They were people who were talented enough to destroy and build things.

 "Children.. let's gather heaven dirt to hell of fame!" said my father when he saw them.

 A strategy for demolition and construction was explained even to the smallest detail. All of this information was kept at the highest level of secret, so when they all had built it, Mercedes would take over their memories.

 We don't want our house to become a disaster again.

 On this day, the Flora Kingdom calendar recorded that Duke Flora changed the layout of his residence and divided his private lake into tributaries. Right on that day, a construction revolution was recorded. Duke Flora became the first building to have strange features in it. Important information about the vulnerable points in Duke Flora's residence became useless. Several other noble spies moved again to observe the changes in Duke Flora's residence.

 And... the massive construction ended in just three days.

 With the cost of lost energy and sleep.

 [...]