I Bought the Villains With Money - Chapter 43

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 43
I barely held back a laugh. How could I not be delighted to hear words I’d been longing for?
But if I blurted out what I wanted right now, all the goodwill I’d carefully built would crumble to nothing.
I studied Karman, weighing how much I could extract from this negotiation and how far I could push.
If I demanded more than Karman expected, I’d seem greedy; press further still, and I’d become a shameless extortioner.
‘How much will he actually give?’
I observed Karman closely, yet his expression alone gave me little purchase on his true thoughts.
“If Your Majesty would tell me what you’re willing to provide, it would help me decide,” I said.
I was asking him for a hint.
“That last answer was quite good. You clearly thought before you spoke.”
Karman’s eyes, which had been cold throughout our exchange, softened somewhat.
“I’ll give you double the price Diana paid for the timber.”
Merely double? Money held little meaning for me.
‘Once I become Family Head, I’ll have wealth enough to move nations. Becoming Family Head must come first.’
“I don’t need money, Your Majesty,” I replied.
It’s a rule of negotiation: always refuse the first offer.
No one desperate for a deal makes their opening bid sound final. Everyone leaves some room, offering things they can afford to lose.
I needed to extract something greater, and I wanted to.
“What of triple? It’s hardly easy to triple one’s wealth through investment or trade,” Karman said, advancing immediately to a second proposal.

“Your Majesty, I undertook this task not for money,” I replied flatly.

If profit were my aim, I’d have sought out the King of Brook instead—he’d be desperate enough for war to pay far more.
“If Your Majesty has nothing further to propose, might I present my terms?” I asked.
Karman gave a slight nod of assent.
“I’ll prepare the timber for you along with master shipwrights capable of building vessels. In exchange, I ask that you grant me a Palace Entry and Exit Permit allowing me to enter and leave the Royal Palace freely.”
Karman’s brow furrowed.
“That’s all?”
For Karman it was trifling, but for me—who’d been forced to ride in a carriage every time I came to the palace—it was genuinely important.
‘There’s also what I promised Lumdrax.’
“There’s one more thing,” I continued.
“Diana, negotiations are one-for-one exchanges. You can’t give me one thing and expect two in return,” Karman said, his tone growing sharp.
He meant to settle everything with a mere flick of his pen. Karman, it seemed, was unexpectedly stingy.
“As I just said, Your Majesty, I’m providing master shipwrights as well. You know as well as I do that Irenber’s shipwrights are among the finest on the continent,” I countered.
“Irenber builds ships too? Is there anything you don’t do?” Karman asked, feigning ignorance despite clearly knowing better.

“Now that I’ve given you two things, surely I may ask for one more?” I pressed on.
“Are you going to ask me to have you marry Cassion?”
That was something Karman had already refused once. Asking again would only earn another rejection and damage my standing.
‘I’d look like a child whining for a toy.’
Not that marriage to Cassion was comparable to a child’s plaything.
“No. What I want is something else entirely.”
“Then say it.”
“Please give me a proper evaluation—one you take seriously—of whether I’m truly a suitable match for the Prince.”
“What?”
Karman tilted his head to the side, as if he’d expected me to demand something truly extraordinary.
Petrola couldn’t gain much from the Naval Battle, because Karman wouldn’t be throwing his full forces into direct confrontation.
‘But there are many ways to seize advantage without direct participation in war.’
Direct engagement was difficult for Petrola’s circumstances, but indirect support was entirely feasible—and I knew what each nation needed.
‘And I have the means to provide it.’
I would act only to ensure that Petrola wasn’t completely shut out when the victor was decided and the spoils distributed.
‘I must be careful not to overturn the entire continental balance.’
Still skeptical of recklessly reshaping the future, I resolved to withdraw once I’d secured a modest profit.
But given this level of accomplishment, what could I reasonably ask of Karman?
I turned the question over in my mind.
To demand marriage immediately might seem premature given what little I’d demonstrated.
‘And I’ve only shown him once.’
Choosing a prince’s consort was—assuming that prince would one day become king—an extraordinarily consequential decision.
Karman’s caution made perfect sense, as did his outright rejection of marriage between Cassion and me. I understood his reasoning completely.
So I asked him to seriously consider me as a suitable match for the Prince.
If Karman gave it serious thought and decided I was too valuable a match for Cassion to lose, he’d hold onto me instead.
“Just consider it? What if I make a promise and don’t keep it? The conditions Princess Diana offered—you can’t verify them with your own eyes. Wouldn’t it be better to grasp something you can actually see?”
I spoke with confidence.
I had no intention of laying bare my true thoughts, so I offered him a different answer instead.
“I don’t believe Your Majesty would strike a bargain with a mere thirteen-year-old child, much less break a promise to one.”
Karman fell silent, considering, then nodded.
“I accept. But I cannot simply wait for you indefinitely. A king is hardly a man of leisure, you understand.”
“Yes, which is why I’d like to request three meetings with you, Your Majesty. In those three meetings, I’ll show you that I’m a worthy match for Prince Cassion.”
“Three times, then. And what am I to do when we meet?”
“First, would you take tea with Prince Cassion?”
“Cassion as well? Why?”
I needed time alone with Karman, and Cassion needed protection—and leverage.
Julia was consumed with her duties as treasurer and couldn’t spare attention for other matters at the moment, but once that was resolved, she would press us both in earnest.
Once I had the marriage approved, I could shield Cassion under the House of Irenber’s name, but for now that wasn’t possible. Cassion needed Karman as an umbrella over his head.
No one bold enough would openly torment a prince who took tea regularly with the king.
‘Though Julia has more audacity than sense—she’d find some way to trouble him regardless.’
At the very least, the attendants in and out of Cassion’s Palace, and the nobles I’d meet in passing going forward, wouldn’t dare treat him carelessly.
As I left his question unanswered, Karman laughed.
Had he read the hidden meaning behind my proposal?
‘He must have. He’s clever enough.’
“You’re asking me to take quite a dangerous gamble.”
War itself, and checking Julia’s power besides.
The Karman I knew would not have chosen such a path easily.
‘But if he doesn’t bear the burden alone, the choice might change.’
When fear keeps people from a road, they often long for someone to push them forward.
Because then, even if the outcome is poor, they have someone to blame and can evade responsibility.
“The House of Irenber will bear the responsibility.”
I spoke the final wedge that would end his hesitation.
“For the House of Irenber to bear responsibility, Princess Diana must become the Family Head.”
I simply smiled.
I made no dangerous declarations. I didn’t whine like a child.
What mattered now was that Karman see me not as thirteen-year-old Diana, but as a candidate to lead the House of Irenber.
“Very well. So it shall be.”
Karman rose from his seat. Having said all he needed to say, he moved without hesitation to the desk, picking up documents.
As I turned to leave, bowing my head before him—
“One more thing, Princess of Irenber.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Don’t you like sweets?”
Sweets, out of nowhere?
I glanced down at the candy bowl on the table.
“Whether you’re acting like a child or an adult, I can’t quite tell. Since you’re doing this, Princess, do both properly. Now, off you go.”
“Ah… yes!”
Turning over his words in my mind, I hurried out of Karman’s office.
***
“Kal.”
The moment Diana left the office, Karman summoned Kal. Kal’s hands held a thick report.
It must have been the results of the investigation Karman had ordered that morning.
“That won’t be necessary anymore.”
At Karman’s words, Kal looked up at him.
“Princess Diana pulled off something rather clever.”
Kal studied Karman’s expression carefully, wondering if there was a deeper meaning beneath his words.
But his face remained serene—the meaning seemed to be surface-level.
“Does the Princess appeal to you, Your Majesty?”
“Hard to say yet. I’ll need to observe further. But she is entertaining. Intriguing, even. Which brings me to it, Kal.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“There’s another task I need you to handle.”
This wasn’t the first time Karman had assigned me work.
But adding a coda like that meant the task had no direct bearing on state affairs.
“I’ll gladly take on whatever you command, Your Majesty.”
Karman smiled, as though he’d anticipated Kal’s response, and spoke.
“I should look into Princess Diana more thoroughly. Assign someone to watch her. And issue her a Palace Entry and Exit Permit so she can move freely through the Royal Palace.”
There had been an order to observe her before. But to issue a similar command again meant Diana had become a person of considerable importance.
“I’ll see to it at once.”
Without asking for reasons, Karman’s aide moved to obey.
Left alone in his office, Karman stared down at his cooling teacup, lost in thought.
What proof could Diana possibly show him?
Would that girl truly be of use to the royal family?
If he concluded that she would be, should he permit her marriage to Cassion?
“No. Not that.”
A betrothal might be acceptable. But marriage was far too hasty a step.
***
The day after my private audience with Karman, I received the Palace Entry and Exit Permit.
With freedom to move in and out of the Royal Palace, my feet naturally carried me toward Cassion’s Palace.
I entered boldly through the main gates. My heart quickened at the thought that I could visit Cassion’s residence without pretense.
The carriage, which had been cutting through the wind for some time, came to a halt.
I flung open the window and called out loudly.
“Oh dear, the carriage is stuck and won’t move. My legs are aching today, so I can’t walk. Horseman, would you clear away some of these branches?”
“Yes, Miss. Since your legs are troubling you, there is no help for it.”
Horseman moved with the stiff, awkward gait of an unjointed wooden doll.
From beneath the driver’s seat, he produced tools that seemed wildly out of place in the carriage of a delicate princess—pruning shears, saws, and the like.
Then he methodically trimmed the branches that stretched across the road leading to Cassion’s Palace.
‘What a nuisance, having to put on an act just to clear a path.’
Julia was watching my every move, so there was no way around it.
The number of eyes upon me was steadily increasing.
‘Even this morning when I left in the carriage, I felt eyes on my back.’
Assigning someone so obviously meant she was trying to intimidate me, didn’t it?
But what could I do about it?
I found Julia’s transparent attempts at interference almost amusing.
I was well aware that Julia had been poking around my affairs diligently.
Julia was desperate to uncover why I’d approached Cassion and who was backing me.
But she was barking up the wrong tree. If she wanted to know what I was doing, she’d have been better off placing someone with Cho and Lumdrax, not with me.
Of course, Julia knew too little about Cho and Lumdrax to think of that herself.
With each snip of Horseman’s shears, branches tumbled to the ground with soft thuds.
Julia would fall to the ground like those branches one day.
I’d like nothing more than to snip Julia away as cleanly as those branches.
But clearing an overgrown road takes considerable time and effort.
‘All the more so with a person like Julia—one who has spent years building her position. There’s no need to rush.’
The fruit of patience is all the sweeter.
I rested my forearms on the window ledge and propped my chin on them.
The clear, lilting song of a bird drifted past.
Setting thoughts of Julia aside for a moment, I was about to savor this rare peace and enjoy the morning air when—
“Why aren’t you coming in?”
Cassion’s voice cut through the silence.
I Bought the Villains with Money (Serialized)
Author │ Lee In-hye
Publisher │ Kim Ju-hyung
Published by │ J Plus Media Co., Ltd. – Tiramisu
Marketing │ Han Jae-hyuk
Address │ Suite 1101, Ace TechnoTower 8th, 11th Floor, 33 Digital-ro, Guro-gu, Seoul
Email │ [email protected]
Website │ http://blog.naver.com/jayplemedia1
© Lee In-hye 2021
※ This work is published by J Plus Media Co., Ltd. under contract with the copyright holder,
and its contents may not be used in any form or by any means without permission from the publisher and author.
Violations of this restriction may result in criminal and civil legal liability.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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