The Former Empress Roughly Hides Her Abilities - Chapter 2

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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【Chapter 2】

Even this much was enough to drive one crazy.

But Rianel had accomplished even more.

“You’ve already finished checking the ledger for errors? Already?”

‘Usually we’d do a quick check right before the deadline, and if the amount difference wasn’t too big, we’d just process it as miscellaneous loss or gain…’

“I ‘roughly’ looked through it to kill some spare time. But the amounts didn’t match, so when I checked, I found missing vouchers stuck in a file folder scheduled for disposal.”

“Stop with that damn ‘roughly’… Wait, that voucher was actually collected, right?”

“Yes.”

Rianel did know how to read the atmosphere. It’s just that she usually had no occasion to. She glanced at Mel and asked.

“By any chance, was I not supposed to fill that out?”

“No, it’s actually good! We almost missed that omission and sent up the report. Yes, it’s good, but…”

Since this was a place where promotion was based on seniority rather than performance, there were no rewards for showing outstanding work processing speed.

Even if you became known as capable, people from other departments you barely knew would just keep coming to dump work on you, saying ‘I heard you’re good at your job? Why don’t you try handling this work too!’

Moreover, the third quarter performance deadline was mid-September.

It was still early September now, so if she finished work this early…

‘The next quarter deadline might get moved up, or I might get stuck with additional work to do in the spare time!’

There was a reason for the tip to keep performance moderate and meet deadlines just barely.

However.

‘Looking at her, she probably wouldn’t understand even if I explained.’

Mel just smiled with the corners of his mouth raised.

“Well… finishing work quickly is good. Yes.”

After reviewing all the documents Rianel had prepared, Mel slumped in his chair.

Rianel had done all the work and he had only checked it, yet he was exhausted.

‘What do you call this? It feels like watching a legendary being casually put on human skin and insist they’re ordinary…’

Then Rianel asked another question.

“Is there anything else you’d like me to do?”

“Uh, no… Ah! This report needs to be delivered to the Administrative Management Department, could you deliver it?”

Mel, genuinely feeling fear, decided to get her out of his sight.

“Oh, you can leave work after just delivering this document.”

By letting her go home.

But then.

“Leave work…?”

“…”

“Leave work?”

Rianel, who had been mechanically repeating the same words, turned her head to look at Mel so awkwardly it made a creaking sound.

“So you mean you’re using that dictionary word that means ‘granting the freedom to leave the workplace and spend personal time,’ correct?”

At this hour when the sun hasn’t even set!

“I can leave work…!”

She, who had died as a lifelong civil servant with no retirement and no set work hours, was deeply moved.

But Mel, unaware of the circumstances, was terrified.

‘I, I really messed up!’

Right, it was wrong to quickly put her to work like that.

“Pl, please spare my life…! Or at least leave my limbs intact so I can have a proper funeral…!”

Mel, pale as a sheet, cried out.

“…?”

Rianel looked at him, not understanding what was happening.

* * *

Rianel’s fearsome reputation took over the entire department within just a few days.

It was natural since she handled several people’s worth of work by herself.

“Tell me honestly. You guys brought in something behind my back, didn’t you?”

Of course, since it wasn’t a situation that could be understood logically, the senior civil servants except Mel initially suspected something else.

While they were distracted by performance deadlines, they wondered if some machine that automatically processed work had appeared.

“No, if such a thing existed, we would have bought it with the department budget long ago! Why would I be crazy enough to buy it with my own money?”

“You never know. Maybe you did it because getting approval from above was bothersome.”

“I’m telling you it’s really not that!”

Then after learning the truth.

“First, hide it. Delay reporting as much as possible, and if anyone asks, say it’s under review.”

“Newbie, this is for your own good. We’re saving your life here.”

No one was jealous of Rianel.

It wasn’t the kind of competence you could reasonably compete with, and there was nothing to gain from being jealous of someone showing overwhelming ability.

Rather, they pondered ways to keep Rianel in the department for a long time.

‘With her here, we can leave work on time every day, so why would we bother her?’

‘We should share ways to do as little work as possible so we can all be comfortable together.’

Of course, being competent and being comfortable around someone were separate matters.

People found it burdensome that Rianel was a duke’s daughter, so it became Mel’s job to be her conversation partner.

When lunchtime arrived.

Rianel followed Mel toward the cafeteria and asked.

“May I ask you something?”

“Of, of course.”

Mel tensed up and stiffened his shoulders.

Even knowing that Rianel was his junior, he felt similar to when facing a high-ranking superior.

“As I understand it, the Special Tax Bureau is supposed to supervise whether special taxes are being properly collected and impose additional taxes on delinquents, isn’t that right?”

There was a reason Rianel was asking about the department’s role.

‘This was a place I established when I was Empress.’

It suppressed the authority of the Ministry of Finance, which held budget distribution rights.

Not only did it have the authority to investigate the assets and income of the privileged class under the pretext of tax audits.

It also directly collected their taxes and imposed additional taxes when tax evasion was discovered.

The taxes collected this way were used to build infrastructure like roads.

Naturally, it was a department with frequent overtime.

However, no one showed signs of hardship. It was a space filled with talented people full of passion to change the Empire, who would busily move around the government building and work through the night.

‘But now there are only people with dead fish eyes floating around, busy with writing performance reports.’

Meanwhile, the managers were playing around, pushing work onto the staff.

The Team Leader hid a daily newspaper between file folders to read, and the Bureau Director, who was the head of the organization, wasn’t even at his post.

‘It’s been three years since I died, but hasn’t it changed too hopelessly?’

“I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but dispatching supervisors is the Inspection Bureau’s jurisdiction, not our job.”

“I see. Then do you decide how to use the collected special taxes and allocate budgets to each department?”

“No, that’s the Ministry of Finance’s jurisdiction, not our job.”

“Then tracking whether the budget allocated to each department was used appropriately, and taking recovery measures if there’s remaining budget or improper expenditures…”

“That too…”

However, after receiving similar answers several times, Rianel felt deep doubt.

“Then what does the Special Tax Bureau do?”

“We manage special taxes.”

“…”

When Rianel’s gaze turned fierce, Mel said as if making an excuse.

“It, it’s true.”

It wasn’t that they didn’t do the work she mentioned—the Special Tax Bureau did do some work.

They would cross-reference amounts and taxpayer lists to confirm that taxes were collected properly.

If someone paid taxes with goods instead of money, they would store those items in the warehouse and check if the quantities were correct.

They would create statistical reports comparing whether taxes had increased or decreased from the previous year.

Each quarter, they would also create forecast reports predicting how much special tax revenue would come in this year….

‘Menial tasks.’

While explaining, he said that up until three years ago, this was indeed what they did.

However, after the Former Empress died, most of their authority and roles were taken away by the Ministry of Finance, and now they had been reduced to a department handling miscellaneous tasks.

In other words….

‘What is this, some kind of half-finished vestigial organization?’

Rianel was deeply disappointed.

* * *

On the way back to the Special Tax Bureau Building.

Mel glanced at Rianel’s profile, trying to gauge her mood.

‘Is she going to say she won’t come to work at this hopeless department starting tomorrow? Of course she would, right? Damn, someone with her level of ability doesn’t usually end up in our department….’

Mel thought he would have done the same if he were in Rianel’s position, yet he muttered regretfully.

“Well, even though this place isn’t that great… there are advantages like having less work than other departments, so less overtime….”

“I know.”

If it had been the past Rianel, she would never have left this department alone. She would have fixed the organization or eliminated it entirely to solve the problem, but….

‘Why should I bother?’

Rianel found it troublesome.

Most importantly, Rianel, the owner of the body she had possessed, was Duke Vincenheim’s daughter but an illegitimate child.

On top of that, she had caused trouble multiple times and fallen out of the Duke’s favor, and now she had been kicked out of the ducal house and was living independently.

She had no separate assets, nor had she been promised a large inheritance.

She was in a situation where she could barely maintain her livelihood by receiving her small but precious salary.

‘But the Special Tax Bureau is a department where it’s difficult to produce notable results since most of its actual authority has been taken away by other departments.’

In other words, it meant this was a place where no one would pay attention to Rianel even if she lived moderately, roughly exercising her abilities.

Therefore.

“What do I need to do to bury my bones in this department?”

Rianel asked.

“What? Why, why?”

Not knowing Rianel’s thoughts, Mel was shocked.

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