They Say an Age Gap Like This Doesn’t Even Need Matching - Chapter 84

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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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Count Brin, overwhelmed by emotion, could not easily compose himself.
The expedition team members and I quietly excused ourselves, leaving Count Brin and Elhart alone in the room.
I walked along the corridor and stopped at a place where I could see outside.
Raern and Kei naturally positioned themselves nearby.
A moment of silence fell.
Occasionally, sounds leaked from beyond the door and reached us here.
Most of it was the Count’s sobbing.
“I suppose what seemed fine was merely an illusion.”
I lowered my gaze.
I could sense what conversation was unfolding behind that door without needing to hear it.
Raern spoke, leaning against the wall.
“The Count may have appeared composed on the surface, but his heart has carried deep suffering. He’s endured hardship for so long.”
I gazed silently at the door.
The circumstances of the expedition team’s descendants were likely similar for most of them.
Only now was I truly grasping this reality.
Elhart, the only one who had cared for and supported them, had lost his position as Crown Prince and been taken as a hostage—how terrified he must have been.
“Tell me now, Raern. What happened?”
At my words, Raern gave a bitter smile.
“Well, it’s a common enough tale. When a nation faces crisis, some fight to preserve it to the end, while others seize the opportunity for personal gain.”
“Traitors.”
They clung to Cradion, surrendering the nation’s interests in exchange for guaranteed wealth and power.
The wealth and power they possessed did not come from Cradion.
They had extorted it from those who fought to the end to protect their nation.
“The Count sent most of the knights and soldiers defending his fief to the border. It was to stop the Cradion Empire’s army. He even depleted his personal fortune to supply provisions.”
Knights and soldiers like Count Brin, determined to protect their nation, gathered around Elhart.
This was a war they could not afford to lose.
Considering the tragic fate of other nations that had been trampled, they had to fight with their lives on the line.
The Crown Prince of Bardia, bearing all these expectations, never suffered defeat in his war against Cradion.
A perfect record of victories.
His remarkable martial prowess, always wielding his sword at the vanguard, elevated the army’s morale.
Cradion could not set foot on Bardian territory.
Cradion, suffering repeated defeats, halted its advance, and the two nations entered a stalemate.
But not long after.
The victory Bardia had achieved turned to nothing.
It happened shortly after Crown Prince Auriel of the Cradion Empire led an envoy to visit Bardia’s capital for negotiations.
Elhart, summoned to the capital, was deposed from his position as Crown Prince.
And he was handed over to Cradion as a hostage.
“It seems the current political sphere has been virtually seized by the pro-Empire faction.”
They treated the nobles who had sacrificed everything to protect their nation as parasites eating away at the country, driving them into dire straits.
The soldiers and knights they had painstakingly trained were bound to the border, and the fiefs’ finances could not escape deficit.
In the midst of all this, the traitors united to tighten the noose around his neck—there was no way he could endure it.
“Knowing that the fief had no army to defend it, those bastards sent soldiers disguised as bandits to torment the people. They set fires to the farmland to ruin the harvest and overturned the marketplace.”
Farmers who could only watch their grain burn without lifting a finger.
Children crying on the overturned marketplace floor.
Protests were useless.
The higher-ups were not on their side.
The traitors seized the opportunity to seize the Lord’s Castle and the fief, intending to divide them among themselves.
“The Count ended up in debt from supporting the army, and the promissory note written at that time fell into their hands. The interest ballooned absurdly, and the taxes collected from the fief alone became impossible to bear.”
Just hearing about it made my chest tighten—I couldn’t imagine how the Count had endured carrying all that burden.
“I… couldn’t readily find a way to help the Count. As you know, I’m the Destroyer King. I have no talent for mediation and compromise.”
So the method I came up with was to kidnap and imprison the heads of the traitor families to buy time and prevent them from causing trouble.
I paused to think, then lifted my head.
The scattered pieces in my mind clicked into place.
This should be enough to overturn the board.
“Alright, I think I know what to do.”
Raern stared at me with a bewildered expression.
“Huh? What?”
I lifted the corners of my mouth slightly.
“We repay them in kind.”
Kei’s eyes narrowed.
“What are you thinking?”
“Those bastards profited by betraying Bardia and currying favor with Cradion. So let’s make them ruined because of Cradion—using the exact same method they did.”
I cast my gaze toward the window.
“We become Cradion nobles and strip them bare.”
Raern blinked.
“…What?”
“Think about what the traitors were relying on to act so brazenly.”
I held up one finger.
“Power.”
And one more.
“And backing.”
And finally.
“Information.”
I spoke slowly.
“Right now, what those bastards are relying on is Cradion. And in our hands, we have highly classified information that only high-ranking nobles would barely know.”
I pulled several documents from my spatial pouch.
They were classified documents with the Emperor’s seal stamped clearly on them.
If even a few of these were made public, the contents could overturn an entire nation.
Raern’s eyes widened.
“Could that possibly be…?”
“Things the Emperor had hidden away.”
I waved the documents lightly.
“Just one sheet of this would be enough to have a couple of nobles’ heads rolling.”
Kei chuckled softly.
“When did you manage to steal these?”
“Well, it’s basic work.”
“Quite impressive.”
For even Kei, a legend of the Information Guild, to express admiration like this.
These documents were worth far more than I had initially thought.
“We’ll use these to make them believe we’re the hands and feet of high-ranking Cradion nobles.”
There was no need to even ask them to believe it.
It would happen naturally.
We’d toy with those fools who came crawling on their own, then strip them clean completely.
I explained the rough outline of my plan to Kei and Raern.
The expressions of the two who listened quietly shifted moment by moment.
And finally.
“Haha….”
Raern burst out laughing.
And tilted his head.
“This is going to be even more fun than I thought?”
Kei muttered with his arms crossed.
“It’s far more cruel than destroying them head-on.”
“Right?”
I replied casually.
“Killing is easy. But….”
I recalled the face of Marquis Morak, who had been spouting abuse.
“Making them lose everything and fall into despair is far more entertaining.”
After that, we put our heads together and began planning the details.
“What about the Emperor’s direct investigators?”
“The Emperor is dead. Those cunning ones will see it as a dead authority and won’t listen.”
“Ah, then the Crown Prince’s advisors might work too.”
“Wouldn’t connections through the Foreign Minister be better?”
We chose identities to assume.
“Raern’s face is too well-known.”
“Disguise magic works well enough. I’m quite skilled at that sort of thing.”
“Then we might need to adjust your manner of speech too.”
“Commander, you should just be yourself for this role as well. You’re not used to following other people’s orders anyway.”
“Then Kei can take the role of spokesperson. Your face is a weapon. You’d be good at negotiations?”
We distributed roles, making use of each person’s strengths.
Just as the discussion was wrapping up, Count Brin emerged from the room.
She had cried so much that her face was swollen beyond recognition.

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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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