The Crown Prince Who Raises Alt Characters

#Chapter 206 Demon Kron (4) - The Demon's Terrifying Weapon Kuella looked at the food on the dining table with trembling eyes. Kuella carefully reached for the bread and bit into its white flesh, surprised by its moist and soft texture. The salad with crushed fruit sauce, the soup boiled with plenty of milk, the steak with moderate heat and juices - nothing was tasteless. Though tears barely managed not to flow down, she couldn't avoid her eyes reddening. 'Ah, it was good to be alive.' One might say it was too exaggerated a reaction, but for Kuella, who despite being a noble young lady had eating and sleeping conditions worse than any merchant family's child, this level of meal was almost like a feast. The fact that the servants, who would have previously maintained sullen faces and given her pressure throughout the meal, were now maintaining respectful attitudes might have had a big influence on her enjoying her meal. [I feel sorry about this. If I had known you'd be this happy, I would have changed things sooner.] Kron spoke to her like that inside Kuella's head. That voice was much clearer than when Kuella spoke to Kron in spirit form, which Kron explained was a principle close to telepathy. If you just talk vaguely like Kuella did, not only what you want to say but also unconscious thoughts all flow in, so this was a technique that must be mastered to prevent that. 'When I first heard it, I was incredibly embarrassed thinking "So you could hear all my thoughts?" Honestly, I'm still quite embarrassed—' [Kuella. Your telepathy isn't working properly again.] [Hmm, ahem!] Kuella, who awkwardly covered her unconscious voice with strong telepathy, continued the conversation in her head while chewing meat. [It's fine, Lord Kron. Though it's a bit awkward to say with my own mouth, it's only because everyone around me is being obedient and listening well now that I can act like this without problems. Before, it would have been a disaster.] Without going far, just two days ago when Kron saw through the paralytic drugs mixed in the drink glass and turned the mansion upside down, how shocked Kuella was watching it from the side. The sight of the stepmother and servants sprawled on the floor like frogs, twitching after being forcibly injected with drugged wine from a teapot, was honestly something she didn't want to see twice, regardless of how satisfying it was. All the more so because if it had been Kuella herself instead of Kron, she would have just suffered without even knowing there was poison in it. [Honestly, after Lord Kron showed such power, I can't understand why they still dare to challenge us.] [Well, they probably think they can attempt revenge as much as they want if they just incapacitate the body properly. Once they subdue with drugs and tie up tightly with handcuffs or rope, there's no way to use martial arts or anything.] More than anything, the key was that they had backing they trusted, Kron explained. [Count Ospin is currently away on business matters, and your younger sister is also absent for field study. They think the situation will flip again when those two return, so they're not truly submitting in their hearts.] Count Ospin was the rightful head of this household, and her half-sister Irene was a mage who ranked quite excellently within the academy. Whether actively utilizing the family head's authority or simply resorting to force, it would be incomparable to before. In other words, the stepmother was merely a tutorial boss. [But, couldn't Lord Kron's power somehow handle it?] [If you ask whether I can defeat them or not, it would be possible, but in that case Kuella's life would also be spectacularly ruined. Unless you're thinking of abandoning the life of a noble young lady entirely and jumping into mercenary work somewhere.] Kuella's natural constitution and mana were truly at the level of an ordinary person, and a young lady who had grown up rather delicately in the city center at that. With "hardware" like this, no matter how much the software was Kron, there were limits to the force that could be produced. Based on frontal confrontation, even 3rd rank would be precarious. Of course, with assassination, ambush, and traps as prerequisites, even higher ranks could be defeated, but in that case murder becomes the prerequisite rather than subjugation. Simply killing cleanly and subduing while moderately coaxing and appeasing like now are completely different matters. If the incident escalated beyond family fisticuffs to murder, the imperial army rather than the territorial army would step in, and Kron knew better than anyone what their level was. [Then...] [Yes, we need to obtain a different weapon.] At Kron's cool assertion, Kuella unconsciously swallowed her saliva. She wondered just how amazing the weapon a demon was preparing would be. *** "Yes. This is Prilla from the Imperial Academy's civil affairs office. What can I help you with?" [...Huh?] Kuella unconsciously tilted her head in her spirit form. What was this? Wasn't he planning to prepare some kind of terrifying weapon unique to demons? Why did they come to a place like a government office? Whether or not he knew of Kuella's bewilderment, Kron calmly continued speaking. "I would like to request verification of Count Ribespiegel's inheritance procedure." "Inheritance, you say? I'm sorry, but this place is for resolving issues related to students' school life. For what you mentioned, you would need to send a request directly to the High Court through a feudal lord or Lord Deputy, or go through the procedure of filing the relevant matter at a Regional Court and then having it escalated to the High Court from there." "The Imperial Academy should possess judicial authority and discretionary power equivalent to Regional Courts in order to quickly handle various sensitive legal matters for students, shouldn't it? Legally, one could receive a summary judgment here and immediately escalate the relevant content to the High Court, right? Since this is what Lord Celoid, the current Deputy Minister of Health and Sanitation, did during his academy days, it's not without precedent." "Yes?" The receptionist, who had initially tried to use the civil servant's characteristic evasion skill of "Ah, that's not our department," couldn't help but be bewildered as suspiciously detailed information poured from Kron's mouth. The receptionist, who was stuttering like she was buffering, requested to wait a moment and then went through the inner door of the reception office. After some time passed. A middle-aged man who clearly looked to be at a managerial level emerged from inside. "Good day, customer. I am department head Tolpin. Excuse me, but could you tell me your name?" "I'm called Kuella Ospin. My father is Count Ospin, and my mother was the second daughter of Count Ribespiegel's family." "Thank you for your answer. While there certainly have been similar precedents for what you've requested before, that wasn't an inheritance-related matter, and inheritance issues require an enormous amount of related documentation to be filled out. Could you possibly bring a legal advisor or inheritance executor from within your territory?" "It's fine. I can fill out everything myself." "Is, is that so?" The man who called himself Tolpin and the receptionist named Prilla who had been watching nervously nearby looked quite dubious at Kron's words, but when Kron actually began creating documents on the spot with rapid handwriting, they soon widened their eyes in shock. Kuella suddenly recalled a conversation she had previously had with Kron. [My maternal family? It's a place called Count Ribespiegel's family, and I heard that my maternal grandfather and all the key personnel passed away after suffering a major accident while traveling together by carriage.] [Passed away, you say. Is that the end of it?] [Yes, so father said the imperial family reclaimed all the territory as well. He later regretted it tremendously, saying that if only my maternal family had been intact, I wouldn't have received such treatment.] [That's quite remarkable in many ways. I would have found a method even without it, but with this, it'll be easier than expected.] [?] At that time, she had tilted her head not knowing what it meant, but had Kron been planning something like this from the point he heard that? But her acceptance was brief, and soon Kuella, having reached a certain thought, began frantically trying to stop Kron. [W-wait a moment! Wait, Lord Kron! Inheritance? That already went to the imperial family! If you ask for it back, who knows what kind of trouble will erupt—] [The empire doesn't block women's succession to family headship. Succession rights aren't stripped just because one married into another family either.] [What?] To the dazed Kuella, Kron continued writing documents while beginning an explanation in her mind. [If Count Ribespiegel's family members died suddenly in an accident, then succession rights would have gone to your mother, and if your mother passed away, to you. Yet if the imperial family reclaimed the territory, that means you must have refused, saying you couldn't receive the territory.] [What? N-no! I never received such an offer!!] [Then your father must have spoken on your behalf, saying 'My daughter has no intention of exercising succession rights.'] For Kuella, it was such an absurd conclusion that she was left speechless. Kron glanced sideways at her as she stood there stunned. Was it just her imagination that his face looked slightly uncomfortable? [Of course, if it were proper procedure, it shouldn't be done this way. Even if it was during your childhood and custody was with your father, in principle an executor should have met with you directly to obtain consent. If you were too young to manage the territory, there's also a system where the imperial family dispatches a deputy lord for a certain fee, and you formally inherit the family headship after becoming an adult.] Of course, even if laws and systems are structured that way, it's ultimately people who execute them. Whether the related administrator received bribes from the count, passed it off carelessly out of annoyance, or was blinded by the 'achievement' of expanding imperial territory, Kuella didn't receive the opportunity she should have, and as a result had to spend unfortunate times. Upon hearing that fact, what Kuella thought of first wasn't anger or resentment, but pure doubt. [Why? Why did father... do such a thing?] [Unless we interrogate the person directly, there's no way to know that much.] Of course, Kron had some idea of the reason. Even if Kuella had inherited Count Ribespiegel's title or inheritance, it would be impossible for Count Ospin to touch that inheritance. This was because there had been several attempts in the past to use succession laws to assassinate the wife's family members after marriage and steal their inheritance. If young Kuella had inherited the estate, most of that inheritance would have been frozen until she became an adult and independent, so even Kuella herself couldn't have touched it. Otherwise, there was no guarantee that she wouldn't completely surrender the inheritance after falling for Count Ospin's 'persuasion.' In terms of title, Kuella would even be on equal footing with her father, Count Ospin. If Count Ospin had treated Kuella as the eldest daughter and intended to pass the family to her, her maternal inheritance would have been a golden opportunity to greatly expand the family's power, but if he planned to exclude Kuella and pass the family to the daughter born to his stepwife, Kuella having power would be of no benefit. No matter how you think about it, it wasn't a rational method, but if he had been a person who pursued only rationality from the beginning, would he have neglected Kuella's suffering at the hands of her stepmother and sister while knowing about it? Even demon Kron couldn't help but feel sympathy for such a situation. [Sob, sob...!] [Sigh, Kuella. Don't cry. I'll properly reclaim what you should have inherited—] [—I'm an idiot!!!] [Huh?] Kron's hand, which had been rapidly moving the pen across the paper, paused for a moment. Whether she knew of Kron's bewilderment or not, Kuella clutched her head and groaned. [I, I'm in administration... Even if law isn't my major, how could I never even think to look into this... Stupid, such an idiot...!] [Um... Kuella? What about, you know, feelings of betrayal toward your father, or shock...?] [Huh?] Kuella blinked for a moment as if she couldn't understand what she had heard, then spoke. [That, betrayal... isn't that something that only arises when you had expectations to begin with?] [......] Indeed, Kron nodded his head. And instead of mentioning this topic further, he just decided to focus on filling out the documents. The documents prepared by the suspiciously well-versed demon in imperial law and administrative procedures were successfully submitted to the High Court without a single correction or revision request, and before long, this would cause quite a heated commotion.