Ch.3333. Hero Kwon Heejin

District 3 of the Imperial Capital, the residence of High Prosecutor Gregory Hyde.

In this relatively ordinary house by District 3 standards, Ember was deeply focused on her studies.

She usually spent her daytime at salons. Occasionally, she would dine with friends at open-air restaurants. Though her allowance wasn’t particularly generous, thanks to her father, she could afford such small luxuries.

But lately, she had been suppressing her desire to visit salons and staying home instead.

It wasn’t because of the cost. Salons only had class barriers, but were actually quite affordable. Even while paying alimony, having a cup of tea wasn’t a burden at all.

Yet she had stopped going for one reason.

Recently, someone had recognized and approached her.

People had occasionally approached her before. After all, she appeared to be an intellectual beauty elegantly sitting alone, enjoying her book.

But what she’d experienced recently wasn’t innocent flirtation.

“Are you Ember Hyde? You’re Lord Hyde’s niece, right?”

“Pardon? Well… yes.”

“Ah, I’m not a suspicious person. I run a merchant guild in Count Delirose’s territory, where Lord Hyde belongs. My father serves as a retainer to the Count’s family. We’re hardly strangers, wouldn’t you say?”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t visit my uncle’s estate often… May I ask what this is about?”

“I heard your father is a High Prosecutor. Please introduce me to him.”

“……”

“Please, I really need this favor, Miss Ember.”

A merchant guild leader of quasi-noble birth asking her to connect him with her father.

This wasn’t the type of person she’d normally encounter at salons. There was no reason for a merchant guild leader handling distribution within a count’s territory to visit the Imperial Capital just for a cup of tea.

In other words, the merchant had approached Ember deliberately from the start. With the intention of meeting her father through her.

“I’m sorry, but if you want to meet my father, you could just go to his office.”

“No, he won’t see me.”

“……”

“I’m actually close with Lord Hyde. But he’s been late on payments for goods for four months now. I’ve been politely requesting repayment, but he keeps making excuses and avoiding me, which is quite unfortunate.”

“As I mentioned, our family doesn’t frequently visit the main house.”

“Still, brothers should help each other.”

He was persistent, even aggressively grabbing her arm. He seemed thoroughly angry.

Though she eventually escaped with the help of staff, it was an experience that made Ember’s heart race just thinking about it. What demands would he have made if she had given in to his intimidation?

When she later told her father, he wore a bitter expression and said he had “somehow mediated,” avoiding further details, but he didn’t hide the fact that his brother, Lord Hyde, had jumped into the Cordana market and caused tremendous trouble for those around him.

‘For now… I should stay away from salons.’

No matter how stifling it was to stay home, it was far better than having her arm grabbed by a stranger.

And honestly, she didn’t want to go because the nobles frequenting the salons lately were saying such disturbing things.

“They still haven’t found the Hero?”

“They’re supposedly searching all over Nazak, but he wouldn’t still be there. He must have fled long ago.”

“That bastard’s head needs to be cracked open.”

“That’s not enough. Honestly, I find his party members more despicable than Gwon Heejin. Shouldn’t we at least grab their families and crush them?”

Curses came from all directions. She wanted to ignore them, but Ember had developed exceptionally sharp hearing from years of eavesdropping on nobles’ conversations.

So Ember decided to just study at home.

Fortunately, lately she was able to focus on her introductory administrative studies textbook. The knowledge required for an entry-level administrative official wasn’t particularly difficult.

‘Employment… I should do that soon.’

Her father returned home while she was turning pages with this thought in mind. He wore an extremely grave expression.

“Honey, and Ember.”

“Dad? What brings you home at this hour?”

Ember knew her father had been busy lately. After Cordana’s crash, large and small incidents had been occurring throughout the Imperial Capital.

Early return in this chaotic situation?

After a moment of silence, Gregory spoke heavily.

“The Chief Prosecutor told me to go home early and rest today.”

“Why?”

“Actually, I experienced something serious today.”

“…?”

Gregory Hyde explained what had just happened to him with a troubled expression.

He said he had interrogated an Academy employee today. An employee who had embezzled money that the dean had allocated for purchasing practice potions.

Fortunately, the dean had indicated willingness to submit a petition if the funds were returned. So he had been gently persuading the employee when…

“He suddenly jumped out the window.”

“……”

The prosecutor’s office was only a three-story building. Fortunately, the employee didn’t die, but he fell into a coma after severely injuring his head.

This was an unfamiliar experience even for Gregory Hyde, who had served as a prosecutor for over 20 years. That’s why he was sent home despite being busy.

“…We found a Cordana in his possession. Just one.”

“Ah.”

Ember couldn’t help but gasp. She didn’t need a detailed explanation.

‘Was he afraid of punishment?’

Indeed, the Empire’s punishments were harsh.

The Empire wasn’t a country that simply kept criminals locked up in prison and fed them. This was because they were always short-handed.

They either forced labor in harsh environments or sent criminals to frontier territories near the Demonic Land as penal battalions.

“Punishment, it’s not just that. Having lost hope after the Cordana crash, facing punishment on top of that must have made life seem impossible.”

“Hope, that could be it.”

“If he had thought it might rise again, he might have gritted his teeth and endured in the labor camp while hiding his Cordana. That’s what your father thinks.”

Ember nodded, feeling she understood what he meant.

But she also found something strange in all this.

‘Where did all that money go?’

Ember wasn’t foolish enough to think someone had pocketed money equivalent to the losses from the crash. The crash itself was caused by the disappearance of buying power.

But surely some people must have taken profits during Cordana’s rapid rise, yet there seemed to be too few survivors. They might be lying low because of the grim atmosphere, but still.

“We’re fortunate to be in this position, at least.”

Gregory Hyde said this while sipping warm tea. His hand was trembling slightly, perhaps from witnessing the frightening scene.

***

In a small village three days north of the Imperial Capital, the Hero Gwon Heejin was fidgeting with an unappetizing meal, his legs shaking.

“Ah, customer? Actually, there’s a village I used to deliver cheese to when I was young. It doesn’t have a proper name, but there’s an old black alder tree in the center, so we just call it Ori Village. Someone from there made it big.”

“Yeah.”

The Hero half-listened to the innkeeper’s chatter.

Until recently, Gwon Heejin had been holed up in a hideout in the city of Nazak provided by the Prince, but as soon as he received information about an investigation being launched, he had hurriedly fled northward. This was thanks to connections he had made during anonymous transactions.

‘What a mess, tsk.’

Since leaving Nazak, he had been sleeping outdoors, but today he wanted to stay somewhere with a roof, so he stopped at an inn.

He wasn’t worried about his identity being discovered since he was using a magical item enchanted with identity-concealing magic. However, the innkeeper was annoyingly talkative.

While half-listening, something caught his attention.

“When he joined the Royal Order, the whole village was buzzing. Now he’s even a noble, can you believe it? But strangely, he never visits his hometown.”

“Did you say Royal Order just now?”

“Yes, yes! Though he’s left it now. Anyway, it’s quite ungrateful of him. Of course, his parents died long ago and his siblings scattered with unknown fates, so I suppose he doesn’t need to feel attached to his hometown.”

“……”

“I heard he’s extremely wealthy now. How nice it would be if he took care of his hometown at times like these. That’s not how human relationships should work.”

A former Royal Order member with enormous wealth. Only one person came to mind.

‘Erick, so that bastard’s hometown is around here.’

He felt his appetite rapidly diminishing.

It irritated him that while he was on the run due to minor mistakes and bad luck, someone like Erick was enjoying a glamorous life in the Imperial Capital.

“By the way, his surname is Wellesley, but I’m not sure which territory that’s attached to. Do you happen to know…?”

“What territory? It’s a direct imperial territory. He probably just picked it during his ennoblement. Don’t you even know that?”

“……”

“And seeing how you mentioned delivering cheese to the village, you’re clearly not related, so why are you so interested? That’s strange.”

“Ah, just for fun…”

While the innkeeper’s expression soured, the Hero Gwon Heejin clicked his tongue in bitterness.

‘But this is just temporary.’

Despite the messy situation, the Hero was already burning with ambition for a comeback. In fact, he had already made plans.

He wasn’t naively thinking “They won’t touch me because I’m the Hero,” nor did he believe he could live in hiding forever. If this were Korea, he could simply flee abroad, but that wasn’t easy in this world.

Gwon Heejin knew that to return to a normal path, he needed to somehow achieve results again and restore the Cordana market price.

Let’s stop wasting time and move quickly. Gwon Heejin abruptly stood up.

“Here, money.”

“…Yes. Thank you.”

Despite his generosity in handing over two gold coins worth 100,000 Lyra each, the innkeeper merely nodded instead of showing gratitude.

Of course, he didn’t feel particularly stingy since he had plenty of gold coins in his inventory. The problem was that he couldn’t spend his money freely even though he had it.

After leaving the inn, the Hero headed north toward the “Demonic Land.”

He wasn’t planning to enter the Demonic Land alone to confront the Demon Lord, but rather to retrieve his party members hidden near the border. He couldn’t abandon the harem he had built with more effort than he had put into issuing Cordana.

Wait for me, my children. The Hero quickened his pace.

…At the inn the Hero had left, the innkeeper belatedly picked up the gold coins.

He wasn’t particularly offended by the customer’s rudeness. When running a business, one encounters far more aggressive customers.

He was just surprised that a man missing all his fingers had thrown such large sums of money before leaving.

‘His sword looked good too… Is he a famous adventurer? Well, at least I have a story to tell.’

The innkeeper nodded, thinking he now had something to boast about when his son visited. His son was a mage in charge of operating communication crystals at the Black Iron Knights’ 3rd Division outpost, half a day’s journey from the village.