This Emperor Is Running a Marriage Scam - Chapter 90

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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 90

‘He wants to collect taxes because it seems like I’m making some money.’

As a resident of Snoril, if I officially opened a shop, I would have to keep monthly ledgers, report my income, and pay taxes. For the Lord, this was an invaluable new source of revenue.

‘One of the reasons I set up in front of Our House was to avoid taxes.’

In any case, this wasn’t something good to answer immediately.

“I appreciate your words, but I think I need to consider it.”

“What’s there to consider? I’m saying I’ll do it according to proper procedures. If I tell you to do it, you do it.”

The Lord’s expression turned menacing, and it didn’t seem like he would back down easily.

‘Hmm, honestly, the person most dangerous to my business is the Lord. Even if it’s state-owned land, if he blocks this area, there’s no solution. Should I reluctantly compromise?’

Actually, it wasn’t really a compromise – proceeding as the Lord suggested would have benefits for me too.

Just then, Baron, who had been watching the situation from behind, gently tugged at the hem of my skirt.

“Nuna.”

“Yeah?”

“You needed identity verification anyway, didn’t you?”

As Baron said, I had indeed been planning to ask other neighbors to vouch for my identity.

With proper status, I could start wholesale deals with large shops and even hire people.

“That’s true.”

I politely bowed to the Lord.

“If you would become my identity guarantor, that would be perfect. I’ll think carefully about the rest. There’s a lot to prepare before opening an official shop, and I just spent all my saved money on my younger brother’s tuition not long ago.”

“Hmph. Is that so?”

Only then did the Lord’s expression soften a bit.

“Then I’ll inform the Government Office first. Go register in three days.”

The Lord turned his horse around and left.

But when the Lord had gone far enough to be completely out of sight, a scream suddenly echoed through the air.

“Aiiiek! These Sea Lice bastards! Hyah!”

Baron and I burst into laughter almost simultaneously.

“Baron, it seems the Lord happened to disturb a Sea Lice habitat.”

“Right, bad luck.”

Serch flew over and brightened his light again. And the ground swelled up again. A head with sprouting buds and sky-blue eyes slowly blinked.

“Oh, you’re back?”

I introduced Baron and the Rock Mole to each other.

“You helped Nuna again today? Well done.”

Baron patted the Rock Mole’s head like petting a puppy, and Serch gently landed on the Rock Mole’s head while dimming his light.

The Rock Mole smiled with its eyes. It seemed to really like Baron and Serch.

“Oh, this won’t do. Could you wait a moment?”

I quickly went into the House and brought out some cookies, nurungji, rice cakes, fruit, and a bit of meat.

I set these down in front of the Rock Mole and asked.

“I’d like to offer you something, but is there anything here that you could enjoy eating?”

The Rock Mole looked at Baron.

‘It’s like asking if it’s okay to choose.’

Baron crossed his arms and grinned.

“Yeah. Pick something if there is.”

The Rock Mole slowly examined the arranged foods. Then it took the nurungji into its body.

Crunch crunch.

The sound of nurungji breaking echoed softly from inside the Rock Mole’s body, then quickly became quiet.

The next moment, the Rock Mole’s eyes curved gently. Looking closely, the sprout on its head was swaying, and a subtle light was glowing around it.

“Is it that delicious? It’s wagging its sprout like a puppy’s tail.”

Baron chuckled and said to me.

“Nuna, it seems to like nurungji.”

“Oh, great! Then wait a moment. I’ll give you more.”

I quickly went into the House and brought out a basket full of the nurungji I had prepared.

“Huh? You’re giving all of that?”

“Of course. You saved our lives before. You also protected us from monsters.”

I offered the pile of nurungji and thanked the Rock Mole once again.

‘Does the Rock Mole’s face look flushed, or is it my imagination?’

Thud thud thud thud.

Four arms grew from its pillar-like body. The arms embraced the nurungji along with the basket.

The Rock Mole looked so happy that I became happy too.

“I’ll make plenty more. Whenever you want to eat, just bring that basket.”

The Rock Mole nodded and slowly began to leave.

It looked back several times along the way, so I kept waving my hand.

When the Rock Mole completely disappeared from view, my thoughts naturally turned to the next task.

‘If I officially become a resident of the Domain, there will be more things I can do. Soon I should be able to use some gochujang too, right?’

It would be good to prepare well and add new menu items while I’m at it.

* * *

Several days had passed since the Lord’s visit.

Though it needed more aging, the gochujang was ready enough to use in a pinch.

So I made up my mind and scooped out some gochujang to start test cooking.

The first items were tteokbokki and tteok skewer sauce.

When the gochujang started boiling, Baron said the smell was unfamiliar.

It wasn’t that people here didn’t eat spicy food, but the spicy aroma of gochujang was quite different from what they were used to.

Then he said he was going to study and went to Raven’s House, but to me it looked like he was just fleeing to escape the spicy smell.

“He could just say he’s leaving because it’s spicy, but he’s making cute excuses.”

I moved the cooking location outside. I couldn’t have our Baron struggling with the spicy smell when he returned from studying.

I lit a campfire, put a pot on it, added various tteokbokki ingredients and boiled them. As a result, the test tteokbokki tasted exactly like what I remembered.

The rice cakes that had absorbed enough gochujang sauce were chewy and delicious, and the cabbage I added was sweet.

“Ahh.”

I was incredibly happy while finishing a bowl of tteokbokki with white steam rising from it. It felt like finding my heart’s hometown again?

Indeed, this seemed good enough to sell.

The bite-sized kimbap, which had received praise but was relatively overshadowed by the explosive popularity of tteok skewers, would come back to life if served alongside tteokbokki.

‘When I make proper kimbap later, that’ll be a different story.’

Tteok skewers could also be sold with a different taste by adding spicy sauce, unlike the ones that were just grilled with sugar sprinkled on them.

‘Originally, this was the original version anyway.’

Still, it was disappointing not to have fish cake.

“Fish cake… should I try making some?”

New menu items naturally added themselves to my mind.

Tteok skewers with gochujang sauce, tteokbokki. And fish cake with refreshing blue crab broth!

“Still, since the spicy taste of gochujang is unfamiliar and could be quite polarizing, it would be better to start with small quantities first.”

I put the remaining tteokbokki on a plate and set it nicely on the dining table.

‘I hope it suits Baron’s taste.’

Then I gathered various snacks to secretly bring to the Orphanage Children and thought about today’s route.

First, I was planning to go to the Government Office to get my identification card. The Lord had definitely said ‘I’ll inform them, so go register,’ and since it was the Lord’s guarantee and not just anyone’s, I just needed to go there.

“Next, I’ll deliver snacks to the Orphanage Children, then buy fish cake ingredients, right?”

* * *

-Knight order dispatch. Eight locations. Gates. According to regulations.

At the same time, Bloden, seated in the spatial office within Raven Manor, was reviewing information about newly formed derivative gates through the ghost raven Black Libia.

“How is this even possible?”

Bloden slowly rubbed his temples as the delivered information gave him a headache.

There had been a few monsters that escaped outside the gate during the unprecedented subjugation at the Northern Mountain Gate. But that was only five monsters at most.

Even then, three of those were tracked down and eliminated by the commanders, and two were eliminated by the Imperial Knights who were dispatched after civilians spotted them.

The derivative gates that stopped expanding afterward were discovered and eliminated by commanders stationed at the Northern Gate. So it should have been normal for no more derivative gates to form.

But an abnormal phenomenon occurred.

The number of derivative gates spread throughout the entire empire—not in a state where they could be closed, but having reached a stage where they needed to be managed—was a whopping eight.

Unlike Snoril, those places suffered great damage from even a single monster, and the nearby people all evacuated and sent emergency support requests to the Imperial Palace.

The knight orders dispatched by the Imperial Palace discovered and eliminated the monsters, but only realized after finding and checking the condition of the nearby gates.

That it was already too late to request gate elimination support from the north.

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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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