Ch.3Thalianium Depletion Crisis (2)

# Chapter 3: The Thallianium Depletion Crisis

A few days after the imperial court meeting.

-BEEP BEEP BEEP!

“Ah, shit.”

The imperial government and parliament were spending their days so busy they couldn’t even catch a breath.

“Traffic congestion is occurring on route X37-11511-0553 due to excessive traffic volume!”

“Move some of the Thallianium supply fleets on that route to the adjacent one! And tell them to contact the Traffic Control Agency, not us!”

“We did, but their line is completely dead!”

The shortage of Thallianium wasn’t simply a matter of lacking a single resource.

“Sejada Engineering College has submitted a request for the scarce Thallianium!”

“It’s a request from Admiral Tu-Shanka of the Second Fleet! He says the Thallianium for laser weapon repairs still hasn’t arrived…!”

“Why is everyone coming to me with this?”

At the minor end, it was used in high-end civilian decorative items and various precision machine circuits.

At the severe end, as mentioned above, it was a material for the main cannons of military vessels.

Despite being a resource used everywhere throughout the empire, the price of their near-negligent attitude until now was returning with enormous interest.

From the beginning, the fact that it was used in so many places yet only in tiny amounts when actually used, making its presence less noticeable, was probably one of the causes of the current situation…

But there was no time to worry about such details.

[Emergency Quest: Thallianium Depletion Crisis]

[Depletion Status: 0.6%]

[When completely depleted, the Empire will automatically receive the Thallianium Default Debuff.]

“…I wonder if this is somewhat manageable.”

Seeing the percentage change in just a few days, at least what I’d done wasn’t wrong.

“Fortunately, if things continue like this, we probably won’t have to declare a default,” Riel said.

“That would be truly fortunate.”

Riel seemed to be agreeing with my thoughts.

“Good, I guess we can put one worry to rest for now.”

As I showed a slightly relieved attitude, Riel looked at me with drowsy eyes and said:

“…Sometimes I feel that the Minister’s speech habits are quite peculiar.”

“Is that so? Well, I am a bit unusual.”

Beyond merely being unusual, my true nature is completely different from yours, but that’s beside the point.

“Anyway, since the situation seems to be improving, let’s go report to His Majesty.”

“Ah, yes, understood!”

—————————–

A little later.

“You may enter.”

“Understood. Your Majesty, Shin Arto and one other, entering.”

Following the imperial chamberlain’s guidance, I entered His Majesty’s reception room.

The splendor, solemnity, and grandeur that could be felt was incomparable to my own room…

Simply the arrangement of sofas and tables, the placement and colors of decorations, and so on.

As a reception room, it perfectly served its purpose of highlighting and supporting the owner of this place, His Majesty, to the extent that one could feel it without reservation.

“Ah, you’ve come, Arto?”

However, on the sofa in that majestic reception room, His Majesty was half-lying down, dressed in extremely comfortable and simple attire that contrasted with the luxurious furniture.

“…Your Majesty?”

“Huuuugh… this is really exhausting.”

Even her tone seemed more childish than usual, so I decided to discreetly check His Majesty’s status window.

[Name: Artraia Beliard Penash Khan Sebelli]

[Age: 20]

[Gender: Female]

[Race: Sebellian]

[Position: Emperor of the Holy Sebelli Empire]

[Current Status: Trying to act a bit spoiled due to irritation and fatigue.]

Even for the superhuman Emperor of the Holy Empire, it must be too arduous a task for someone who’s only 20 years old.

Therefore, instead of reporting as originally planned, I decided to meet this emperor, who had turned into an enoki mushroom, at eye level.

“…Hmm, what did the ministers say again?”

“Don’t even mention it. Those trash that that garbage stirred up are still around and…”

I didn’t expect the criticism of the previous emperor to come out right from the start.

If it had been someone else, their loyalty to the Empire might have been shaken from the roots upon hearing those words.

Of course, I wasn’t affected at all.

“Well, the idiotic things that guy did weren’t just one or two.”

After all, I’m the one cleaning up the mess that idiot previous emperor left behind in real-time.

If that guy had sat on the emperor’s throne for just 1-2 more years…

‘Ugh, I don’t even want to think about it.’

Just thinking about it made me shudder, to the point where I didn’t know what to do with myself.

And the same was true for the enoki mushroom-like Emperor Artraia in front of me.

“You’re right, Arto.”

Artraia’s eyes sharpened as she sprawled on the sofa, wearing a large T-shirt from who knows where.

“I still can’t understand how he handed over the entire northern major resource zone and border area of the Empire to Prosnak.”

At Artraia’s words, I had to feel one buried matter freshly resurfacing in my mind.

It was about how he had inexplicably handed over 20 northern planetary systems, including rare resource deposits, to the Prosnak, currently known as the Space Nazis and the worst nation in the galaxy.

“…Hmm.”

Thinking about how much the Sebelli Empire’s diplomatic relations had been messed up because of that incident still makes my blood boil.

But now, thinking about it calmly, I couldn’t help but cautiously speculate that there might have been some kind of deal between the previous emperor and Prosnak.

“I’m planning to be sparing with words about that for now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Are you thinking of backing down slightly?”

There were other things that came to mind, but even in a situation like this, they weren’t things to be spoken of carelessly.

After glossing over it like that, I was able to naturally flow into a conversation about the current situation while continuously criticizing the previous emperor’s idiotic actions with Artraia.

“Speaking of this matter.”

“Oh right, it’s another problem caused by that trash, isn’t it?”

Artraia showed a casual attitude as if she was sick of it.

What could I say about her speaking with dead eyes that didn’t match her small, pretty face?

It was as if her whole body was expressing, ‘I don’t want to think about that bastard at all.’

But it wasn’t like we could just skip over this between us now.

“Huff.”

I let out a small sigh, then opened my mouth while handing Artraia the documents that Riel had given me.

“Do you see this?”

“…”

Unfortunately, Artraia seemed to be at a loss for words the moment she saw the documents I gave her.

And for good reason—according to the data written on the template I handed over… all of this was really the fault of the previous emperor and his cronies.

Moreover, it was done by guys who had already disappeared after being purged for other issues.

“…How can they cause such trouble even after they’re dead?”

From Artraia’s mouth, which had finally opened, a voice that seemed to be barely suppressing indignation began to flow out with difficulty.

“You think so too, right? I felt the same at first.”

How infuriating it was.

After finally finding the cause and identifying the culprits.

“Go ahead and look~ They’re dead, so that’s that~”

“Oh, for f**k’s sake!”

Because we found out that they had been forcibly made to practice this a long time ago, there was no way to handle this problem.

“As you can see, the cause itself was really absurd.”

“…This is why you need to establish additional review routes two or three times.”

Artraia seemed to lack even the energy to be angry.

But I could understand such feelings, as it was also appearing in the status window flashing before my eyes…

[Quest: Identify the cause of the Thallianium depletion crisis.]

[Current Progress: 100%]

[Resolution Complete!]

[…]

[The cause of the Holy Sebelli Empire’s Thallianium depletion crisis was due to the response of the previous emperor’s government when they received a depletion warning 13 years ago.]

[As technology advanced, Thallianium consumption increased, but natural mining alone was insufficient, so they tried to somehow issue orders to increase the mining output.]

[The problem was that in the process, due to someone’s mistake, computational errors, and lack of verification systems in the field, they ended up increasing the mining of a completely different strategic resource instead of Thallianium.]

[And in that process, the incompetent resource production manager at the time classified all mined resources under the category of ‘strategic resources,’ making it impossible for the central government to know about this problem.]

[The incompetent previous emperor and his cronies also just assumed there was no problem since it was labeled as strategic resources and moved on.]

I had to feel my head tightening at the situation report from the quest window, which seemed to convey emotions.

Of course, even considering that there was tremendous pressure on the government at that time due to the implementation of the Janiradian Reform.

“Anyway, that’s what happened. But we’ve managed to put out the urgent fire, and we’re controlling information to the public, so I don’t think there will be any more problems.”

“As expected of you, Arto. I can always trust and rely on you.”

It was truly fortunate that we could somehow overcome the worst situation.

Since we responded quickly, there was even room to gossip with the emperor like this, despite the frustration.

After finishing the audience with the emperor and returning to my room…

“Riel, Riel, Riel, Riel!”

“What is it, Minister?!!”

Lying on the bed, I urgently called for Riel and was able to issue additional orders with a tense voice, urgent expression, and even cold sweat.

“Turn off the light, please.”

“…”

Although the demonic figure that seemed to appear behind Riel’s head due to my prank made me decide never to play such a joke again…

Anyway, after getting a good night’s sleep for the first time in a long while.

The warm, bright sunlight of Mothersun gently shining through the window, the fluffy softness felt from clean bedding and pillow sheets.

And the aroma of specially made coffee, prepared at just the right time and perfectly suited to my taste, as I woke up…

“Oh, what a refreshing morning.”

With the refreshment and leisure I hadn’t felt for so long, I unconsciously took my time and tried to enjoy the morning tea time.

-BEEP!

That’s why I could even check the notification sound from the terminal that disrupted such an atmosphere with a good mood.

The moment I saw the notification.

[Danger! Thallianium depletion crisis exposed to the public.] [1 hour ago]

[Complete depletion of reserves due to large-scale panic buying.] [5 minutes ago]

[Liquidity of state-owned enterprises, private companies, and foreign quantities…]

-Thud… CRASH!

I dropped the coffee cup I was holding, adding a new pattern to the luxurious carpet.