The Crown Prince Who Raises Alt Characters

#Chapter 360 Crown Prince Alondre (22) - A Potential Tyrant When adults commonly call a child a "smart kid," what they often really mean is "an obedient kid who listens well." Conversely, a child who is genuinely smart, clever, and full of their own thoughts is often labeled as "getting too big for their boots," "cunning," or "showing bad signs early on." As for the Crown Prince, if anything, he was the textbook case of the former. A perfect model student. Whatever those around him asked him to do—this, that, and the other—he accomplished it all, while on the other hand, he practically never stepped forward to demand something for himself or threw a tantrum. As a rule, imperial family members of an absolute monarchy were supposed to routinely indulge in drink, nightlife, and horse racing, and yet the Crown Prince had none of that either. It was to such an extent that intelligence agencies of other nations, when assessing the Crown Prince, concluded he was "colorless and odorless." No matter how outstanding the Crown Prince's talent and ability were, being merely good at everything without any stubbornness or firm direction of his own inevitably made him relatively lacking in individuality. Much like how, in a classroom, a troublemaker who draws plenty of attention leaves a stronger impression than a top student who studies hard and never causes trouble. Therefore. [Administrative Reform Proposal for the Crown Prince's Direct Territories] When this mysterious proposal began to spread, the reaction around him was nothing but bewilderment and doubt. "So you're saying he intends to disperse the central authority to the provinces?" "That the dispatched Lord Deputies would be able to decide the major and minor affairs of their Territories however they please!?" "Not however they please. They'd fundamentally operate according to fixed regulations, and only permit acting first and reporting afterward in the cases where the regulations can't cover the matter." "Isn't that the same thing!! Regulations themselves can always be circumvented depending on how you interpret them!" Administrative organizations, by nature, run on inertia. The way things were always done, the tools that were always used. Once you try to change something, how much cost does that consume, and how much time and effort does it take to adapt to it? For that reason, administrative reorganization must always be approached with caution, pursuing gradual change rather than excessive upheaval. Otherwise, it was the perfect recipe for chaos. But the Crown Prince's reform this time was excessively broad, and excessively radical. Worse still, the very subject of the reform was the weakening of central government authority and the strengthening of local government—in other words, depending on how one interpreted it, an act that shook the very order of the Empire. Quite naturally, officials all across the nation rose up in protest. "This must be stopped. If we leave it as it is, this Empire will fall apart!" "It's not being done across the whole Empire—for now it's only in the Crown Prince's direct Territories. Since His Highness holds full authority there, we don't really have proper grounds to stop it." "The direct Territories are hardly small!! It's not on the scale of one or two Territories! Just going by land size, it's on par with a decent-sized nation in the central region! And more than that, how could His Highness, who has walked only the righteous path all this time, take such a path on his own!? Surely some treacherous sycophant has attached himself to him and led him astray!!" "Hmph!!" To reiterate, compared to his lofty reputation, the Crown Prince's personal character as an individual was, surprisingly, not very well known. At the very least, the Golden Cloud Palace officials who lived face-to-face with him day by day tended to know that the Crown Prince wasn't as rigidly principled or as devoted to orthodoxy as people assumed, but across the vast, sprawling Empire, there were no small number of people who had never once laid eyes on the Crown Prince and simply accepted him as a vague image shaped by public opinion. Therefore, some interpreted this incident not as something led by the Crown Prince himself, but as the influence of those close to him. "If we're talking about His Highness's close aide, would it be Treasurer Samuel Isaac, then?" "It might be Sir Balduer, the only one of his teachers still remaining." "You're all slow on the news. Don't they say the Empress has been getting close with those Twin Counts lately! It's clearly their influence!" "Ah, of course! If the authority and autonomy of Lord Deputies increases, then inevitably the authority and autonomy of the Feudal Lords themselves will rise as well!" "So the Devil Countess's reputation wasn't just for show after all!!" If a certain Miss K, who suffered stomach pain every time as the Empress's drinking companion—no, tea companion—had heard this, she would have shot back asking what kind of nonsense that was, but unfortunately, these men were dead serious. And that seriousness soon led to action. Of course, that action wasn't the sort where they all swarmed before the Emperor's palace, clinging and begging him to reconsider. This wasn't some Eastern nation from the Crown Prince's past life—in the Empire, pulling a stunt like that could get your head lopped off on the spot, and no one would think it strange. So instead, they approached the matter very subtly, with a cautious attitude. Submitting petitions gently through the proper procedures, with the air of "This is by no means opposition to His Highness the Crown Prince's policy, but I offer this loyal counsel out of just the slightest concern—" Cautiously informing members of the imperial family who might have influence over the palace about the dangers of this reform, and whispering that perhaps some strange person had attached themselves to His Highness's side. Every method was, if anything, a bit excessively cautious, but that didn't mean they were without effect. Because word of the matter did in fact reach the Emperor's ears. "...Might Your Majesty consider urging His Highness the Crown Prince toward restraint?" The true brain handling the Empire's major and minor affairs in place of the indolent Emperor. At the Imperial Prime Minister Christoph's cautious remark, the Emperor let out a short laugh. "Seeing you say something like that, it seems there really is quite a lot of talk going around." "It's a matter that can hardly help but stir up talk." People often compare the present-day Empire to a well-fed lion. Having gorged itself to its heart's content, it no longer covets the meat around it and simply lies about in idle laziness. Put the other way around, that meant the Empire of the past didn't have territory this excessively vast. In its founding era, Eizern had been far smaller than this, and so there had been no real problem with a centralized system in which the royal family decided everything. But the Empire had grown far too vast. The territory was immense, and as if in proportion to it, the workload that had to be handled had exploded as well. It was hardly for no reason that the greatest problem plaguing recent Emperors was said to be overwork and burnout. Of course, it wasn't as though the talented people of the Empire throughout its history had been unaware of this problem. The scale of the central government, which organized and oversaw administrative affairs under the Emperor, had swollen, and in place of the traditional local nobility, the power of the central nobles who relied on the imperial family's authority had grown considerably. The Emperor came to only decide yes or no on the major, weighty issues rather than directly involving himself in the country's every affair, and thanks to that, the workload was greatly reduced. The problem was that, even with such optimization in place, an ordinary Emperor still found it a struggle just to maintain the status quo, and only when a capable Emperor worked diligently could the Empire barely manage to move forward. And a system that required the Emperor to possess both competence and diligence every single time was, in terms of stability, a failing grade. To begin with, it was all too common in the world for an absolute monarch to be considered a great success merely by being "average," so how could a system premised on the ruler needing to be exceptional possibly be stable? Whether the Emperor was too incompetent to handle affairs on time, or too idle to bother working diligently, either way, the Empire itself was bound to creak and falter like the body of a patient suffering from cardiovascular disease. "So His Highness the Crown Prince's reform proposal—not stopping at having the central government filter through local affairs just once, but having the localities filter them out themselves first and then filtering once more at the center—is an entirely sound argument. That way, even if the one who ascends the throne is somewhat lacking, the problems would be reduced." "Laying out that kind of preamble, it seems you're against it, then?" "Because it's a reform that clashes with the mainstream of the Empire." The Empire was a nation with strong imperial authority. But here, it was worth stopping to consider what exactly it meant for imperial authority to be "strong." That the power of the Emperor and the imperial family was mighty? Then in what way was that "might" actually exercised? By the Emperor personally taking up a sword and beating down local Feudal Lords? No. That wasn't it at all. "For imperial authority to be strong means that the faction of those who follow the imperial family is strong. In other words, one could say imperial authority is strong precisely because the Empire is, inefficiently, a centrally-focused nation." It was a rather dangerous topic to speak of so openly in front of the Emperor. It was a conversation that would have been difficult to have without both the Emperor's temperament of not being greatly bothered by something like this, and the trust between the Emperor and his Prime Minister. And so, the Prime Minister offered his loyal counsel without hesitation. "Looking at the Empire as a nation in itself, His Highness the Crown Prince's reform is close to the correct answer. But at the same time, to the officials and nobles who currently occupy the center, it will sound exactly like a plan to strip away their own power and hand it out to the provinces. How could their backlash be anything but severe?" They would undoubtedly resist, and claim it as loyalty meant to protect the imperial family. No, beyond mere claims, there would be no shortage of those who genuinely believed it. Because, in fact, if the status quo were maintained, the nation might run somewhat inefficiently, but imperial authority would remain strong all the same. So at this point, the Emperor, as his father, needed to step in and stop him. If the Emperor simply advised and restrained the Crown Prince's excessive boldness, it would end without much damage to the Crown Prince's standing, but if the Crown Prince pushed the matter through as it was and it ended up failing due to the officials' backlash, that would leave a great scar on the Crown Prince's future career and authority. Of course, the Crown Prince had the Golden Cloud Palace, and its officials were the sort who were loyal to the Crown Prince's will rather than aligning themselves with the central nobles who made up the Empire's mainstream—but its members were, for the most part, largely young officials. To begin with, since they were the sort who would only seize real power once the Crown Prince eventually ascended the throne, at the present moment, whether in connections or in power, there were bound to be limits. No matter how capable they were, wouldn't it be difficult for them to clash head-on with the generation of their fathers and grandfathers? Especially when, in no small number of cases, those very fathers and grandfathers belonged to their own main family households. The Emperor simply listened in silence to the Prime Minister's logical remarks. For some time, he remained so. "Listen, Prime Minister. When I hear how the world evaluates that child, the Crown Prince, do you know what part strikes me as the most absurd?" "...What would that be?" "The part where they call that child material for a sage ruler." "Pardon?" It seemed to be an utterly unexpected remark, for the Prime Minister's eyes went wide. After all, even in the Prime Minister's own view, the Crown Prince was as perfect a candidate for a sage ruler as one could possibly be. Capable, generous toward his subordinates, and unmoved by personal greed. Wasn't the Crown Prince exactly the kind of human ideal described in ancient law codes or scriptures? Could it be that, like rulers of the past, he was deliberately belittling his own son out of some power struggle with him? But then again, the current Emperor wasn't the kind of man so obsessed with power as that. "This humble servant is too lacking to fathom Your Majesty's heart." "A 'sage ruler,' to put it bluntly, is just 'a ruler who bends well to those beneath him,' isn't it?" "...Isn't that perhaps too much of a leap, Your Majesty?" Lightly brushing aside the Prime Minister's objection, the Emperor continued. "Prime Minister. Say, for instance, you set out to do something with full conviction, and about a hundred people step forward to tell you that you're wrong. What would you do?" "In handling any matter, it is rare indeed to satisfy every last person in the world. I would simply regard them as an opposing faction and push forward." "Is that so? Then let's say ten thousand people come and scream at you that you're wrong." "...At that kind of number, this humble servant would indeed stop to reconsider his own conduct. But if, even so, no problem was found, I would still push forward." "This time, a million people. If they all say you're wrong, could you still push forward?" The Prime Minister did not answer. It was because he realized the essence of this question wasn't a mere game of numbers. Just now, the Emperor had defined a sage ruler as "a ruler who bends well to those beneath him." And he had said that the Crown Prince could never play that role of a sage ruler. If that were so, then— "That boy, I'd wager, wouldn't budge an inch even if hundreds of millions of people insisted he was wrong." "...Are you saying he would not listen to the opinions of those beneath him?" "No, he'd listen, and if it seemed reasonable, he'd accept it. But if, having listened, he still judged it wrong, he'd simply do as he pleased regardless." An ordinary person, even if they themselves felt it was wrong, would fold their own opinion if an overwhelming majority opposed them. But the Crown Prince would pay no mind to any argument that failed to convince him, no matter how many people's opinion it represented. If such a being were to ascend to the throne, what should one even call that? "A tyrant. And an absolute tyrant, at that—one who'd put even most tyrants throughout history to shame." "...That's hard to believe. Judging only by what His Highness the Crown Prince has shown us thus far, I can't even begin to imagine it." "That's simply because, in his judgment, the way the Empire is running right now hasn't yet reached the point where he'd need to resort to drastic measures." If that were so, then had the Empire ever been in such a wretched state that it met the Crown Prince's threshold for drastic action, what on earth would have happened? The Prime Minister felt a flicker of curiosity at that hypothesis, but he suppressed it. After all, the very arrival of a situation that would answer that curiosity would, for a Prime Minister, be proof of his own incompetence—so burying it forever was the only correct answer. "Understood. Within the bounds of my influence, I shall have them refrain from needlessly interfering with His Highness, and tell them to stay quiet." At the Prime Minister's words, the Emperor let out a short laugh, rose to his feet, and left. Judging by how he shuffled off toward the Fourth Consort's quarters, it seemed his intent from here on was to bury himself entirely in drink and the scent of flesh, ignoring every last tiresome petition from his officials. The Emperor's loyal servant, the Prime Minister, thereafter stalled for time by deflecting the officials' appeals as best he could, and about two weeks later, he received word that the new administrative system had been put into effect across the Crown Prince's direct Territories. Considering that a single administrative reform normally took, at the very least, several months, and at most, several years, it was an absurdly reckless pace. What, then, would that tyrant-in-waiting's next move be? While the Prime Minister and everyone else held their breath and waited— *** (E/N: Emperor is actually fairly wise honestly.) "Hm, after properly working for once in a while, my urge for leisure is really surging." "So what are you planning to do this time?" "Cultural activities!"