“Not only is the Academy Festival over, even the summer break is over. What do they want now?”
I was headed over to the lab at Mia’s request. To be more specific, it was Lilka who brought me here through Mia. I opened the door, and found a repeat of the scene I saw before the festival. Dargan, Plura, Ruston, and Shirley. With the three of us, all the members of the temporary Food Court Firm were present once more.
Or not... There were two unrelated people standing against the wall. They were surely quite busy with the affairs of their household, so what were they doing here?
“And what exactly is this gathering for?”
“It’s simple. We made all these great connections during the festival. Ain’t no way we can let all that go to waste, now can we?” Dargan said as he folded his arms.
“So... Does that make me an associate member?”
I appealed to the fact that I was a copper, and my other upperclassman combed through his long hair and shrugged his shoulders.
“That won’t do. The Kendalls will be in the majority like that.”
I see, that’s not a bad idea. As students, we had a relative sense of freedom to spend some time cooperating together here in the school. And we had quite the diverse members too.
“So can we assume you’ll be participating too, Weinder?” Lilka asked.
And just as I was about to nod...
“There’s a company here that didn’t do business in the courtyard, though.”
I looked at the two upperclassmen standing by the wall.
“How cold of you. Didn’t we fight side by side during the guild representative election?” Maria replied.
“I don’t recall going through such a joint struggle. Oh, and congratulations on your unofficial appointment as the guild representative. So, why is it that the two children of such a busy gold company are present here, at a gathering between such small companies as ours?”
Wasn’t Plura just going on about the Kendalls getting a majority?
“We have no intention of participating. We’re simply here to hand over what you requested.”
Jean waved around a scrap of paper he pulled from his pocket. I could see tightly packed numbers written all over it.
“That’s what I asked for in exchange for helping with the preliminary election, right?”
I stretched out my hand, but Jean snatched away the paper right before I could reach it.
“And one more thing. I’d like you to disclose the secret to your little trick. What kind of magic did you pull off to have the Kendalls win the final election at the royal palace?” Jean said with narrowed eyes. “By approaching the independent companies and former Dreyfan companies that were in despair over the Carlests’ actions, we managed to secure our spot as a candidate. We also managed to secure the referral of Duke Aleberg. Everything up until this point was exactly according to the plan you told us at the beginning. Well, I’ve got a whole lot I want to say regarding that in itself, but let’s set it aside for now. The problem is what happened next. Even though we went so far, it shouldn’t have been possible to win the election at the royal palace. However, here’s the reality we find ourselves in. The Kendalls have become the guild representative. The president of the Carlests retired, and his business was transferred to their branch families. Much of his influence in the capital has crumbled to bits.”
Jean went on to speak of the major incident in the business world that had the Academy kicking up a fuss lately.
“We did everything just as you told us. But could you tell us how you managed to get the prime minister on our side?” Maria asked.
This was apparently how things went down during the endorsement meeting at the royal palace. It started with Duke Aleberg declaring his support for one of the two guild representative candidates, the Kendalls. And following this, the prime minister abstained from voting.
In other words, the Carlests already had no way of winning at this point. The prime minister abstained, Duke Aleberg supported the Kendalls, and there were only two other votes. If Archduke Kurtheight were to endorse the Carlests, then Archduchess Euphylia would simply endorse the Kendalls.
Archduke Kurtheight pressed the prime minister for answers as to what he was doing, but apparently, he was silenced after having something whispered into his ear. This was, of course, information about the misappropriation of the city guards by the Carlests.
As a result, neither Archduke voiced an opinion, and Duke Aleberg’s recommendation went through without any objections.
“To put it simply, Prime Minister Duke Grinicius is a supporter of the second prince. He’s not necessarily part of the Archduke of the East’s faction. Actually, from the prime minister’s perspective, it wouldn’t be all that attractive a proposition to have the Archduke of the East grow too powerful.”
I walked over to the slate board and drew a simple diagram of the current political climate of the Kingdom. An archduke in the east and west, a duke in the center, and another duke in the east. I then wrote down the guild representatives they endorsed.
The Blacksmith, Carpentry, and Carriage Guilds were, in a manner of speaking, secondary industries, all aligned with the Archduke of the East. The Caravan Guild, which linked together transportation across the entire Kingdom, was under the prime minister’s sponsorship.
And then there was the vacant seat of the largest mercantile guild in the country, the Culinary Guild.
“If everything ends with the Kendalls winning under Duke Aleberg’s endorsement, causing them to have no relation to the east or west, then the system will be the same as when the Dreyfans were the representative. With the largest of the guilds being neutral, they can just barely maintain the balance. That is something very desirable to the prime minister. I saw a fair number of gaps between President Hilda and Vice President Leonardo during the Academy Festival, and came to my conclusion based on that.”
“...You certainly have a point. I can understand what you’re getting at. But even so, I thought the prime minister had no choice but to ally himself with the east...”
“That would normally be the case. That’s why we let those rumors out. The first was about the Kendalls recommending the promotion of the Weinders to a silver company. The second was of us supplying the Kendalls with honey. We then confirmed that the Carlests put the guards in action in response to this, and acted as bait.”
When Lilka came to contact me that day, it was to confirm that the Carlests were definitely on the move.