Ch.4Thalianium Depletion Crisis (3)

# Chapter 4 – The Talianium Depletion Crisis

While Arto was still in deep sleep, before he could spill his coffee from an unpleasant morning call…

“What in the world did you people do to cause this disaster?!”

“Aaaaargh!”

“T-this is a dream, this has to be a dream.”

The emergency session of the Seveli Empire’s Grand Council had descended into absolute chaos.

[Quest: A major crisis has erupted in the parliament.]

[Details: Contain it quickly.]

If Arto had been present, he would have seen such a status window in real-time.

“Who leaked the information? Or rather, who allowed it to be leaked?!”

“Based on our tracking, it appears to have originated from outside the Empire, not internally.”

“Damn it all to hell!”

It was understandable, as until just yesterday, no one had imagined such a situation could occur.

“There shouldn’t be any more problems now, so let’s all take it easy, right?”

“Agreed.”

Of course, cautious individuals who exist everywhere had considered making preparations…

“We should prepare for potential problems, just in case.”

“That’s right, especially since the Executive Minister himself specified this was only a temporary measure.”

“Considering our reserves, we should aim to resolve this within a month at most…”

No one had anticipated that problems would arise not in a month, not even in a day, but in a mere half-day.

Unlike during the previous emperor’s reign, the imperial government—now rich with talent thanks to the hard carrying of Emperor Artraia and Executive Minister Arto—began to respond swiftly.

“The Resource Ministry must take responsibility for this incident!”

“What nonsense! If we’re assigning blame, it should go to the Territory Department for failing to properly handle the supply disruption!”

“No, blame the Commerce Department or Foreign Ministry for their inadequate information control!”

Naturally, it began with a fierce battle royale of blame-shifting as everyone fought for their survival.

Even when handling a crisis, the first order of business is always to hang someone else as a scapegoat to save one’s own neck—isn’t that the way of the world?

This was a harmful practice that had profoundly influenced the Empire’s political and power structure for ages.

Watching this scene unfold from the throne, Emperor Artraia felt a throbbing headache coming on.

‘…This is still difficult.’

Although he and the Executive Minister had purged all manner of harmful practices and useless elements…

It would be unreasonable to expect too much when barely ten years had passed since those measures were implemented.

Nevertheless, seeing even their carefully selected talents falling prey to the ghosts of the past…

“Sigh, this is truly giving me a headache.”

“Please do not worry too much, Your Majesty.”

As the Emperor’s eyes deadened while watching this spectacle, the Head Chamberlain beside him spoke in his usual impassive tone.

“As always, he will present a solution in this crisis.”

“…Will he really?”

Despite the Chamberlain’s calm yet powerful reassurance, the Emperor maintained his utterly indifferent attitude.

Seeing the disgraceful behavior of his carefully selected talents in real-time was surely making him sick at heart.

Thus, filled with disappointment, the Emperor finally opened his mouth to stop these fools from holding what seemed to be a competition for the universe’s most shameful display.

“Ever—”

*Creeeeak*

Or rather, he was about to.

“…!”

“I apologize for being late. Executive Minister Arto Virtorius has just arrived.”

The central meeting room’s firmly closed door swung open, and Arto appeared with a refreshingly cheerful demeanor.

“…!”

“Executive Minister, where on earth have you been to arrive only now?!”

The same silence fell upon the ministers and department officials who had been engrossed in their blame game.

Unfortunately, they were already half-crazed with panic, and began preparing to unleash a barrage of criticism at the late-arriving Executive Minister.

‘To survive, I must somehow shift this responsibility to someone else!’

Some among them were genuinely desperate.

The atmosphere was so charged with murderous intent that an outside observer might have mistaken this for an execution chamber rather than a meeting room.

However…

“Everyone, I’ve already resolved this issue completely, so there’s no need to worry.”

“?!?!!”

With this bombshell statement upon entering, he transmitted documents to everyone’s terminals, instantly shutting down any further attacks.

“What is this?”

“As you can see, it’s an official communication from our ally, Ztrack.”

As people checked their terminals at Arto’s prompting, they could hardly believe the figures they saw.

“Executive Minister, are these figures even possible?”

“My goodness… this is enough for an entire year’s usage for our entire Empire.”

It was understandable—who would believe someone who was scraping by with barely a month’s supply yesterday suddenly producing enough for a whole year?

Faced with these suspicious glances, the Executive Minister shrugged confidently and continued.

“It’s nothing special.”

Speaking as if it had been no difficult task, the Executive Minister began walking forward with a leisurely attitude.

The beautiful humanoid quietly following him was almost overshadowed by the Minister, who had captured everyone’s attention.

And when his steps finally halted…

The Minister’s firmly closed lips parted, and solutions to the current crisis began flowing out smoothly.

“Crystal powder that we’ve been continuously producing and mining, despite not immediately needing it ourselves.”

“…Ah!”

“I’ve decided through negotiations with Ztrack’s officials to swap this powder—which we’ve been accumulating solely because it’s a strategic resource—for their Talianium.”

“Ohhh!”

“Executive Minister! Executive Minister!”

So while they had been wasting time arguing about responsibility, the Minister had swiftly resolved the matter?

“Wait… what about Kar-Du in between?”

“That’s right, we don’t have any direct warp gates or hyperspace routes connected to Ztrack, do we?”

Of course, there were some who exercised caution or pointed out practical issues.

“That problem has been resolved as well.”

“What do you mean…?”

“Since Kar-Du is a protectorate of Ztrack, we’ve successfully established a route through Kar-Du with the help of Ztrack’s special envoy.”

“Ohhhhh!”

Now they had only two choices: feel embarrassed or show respect.

And not many would choose the former.

“Arto! Arto! Arto!”

“Arto punch!”

“Mom, I want to be an Executive Minister when I grow up!”

…Despite some random outbursts here and there, the suddenly reversed atmosphere was like a favorable wind blowing through everyone gathered in the meeting room.

And the Emperor, watching all this from the throne, couldn’t remain silent about the person who had created this situation.

“Well done, Executive Minister Arto.”

“It’s nothing special.”

Though he responded calmly now, later when they met in private, he would surely rejoice like a young girl.

————————-

[Emergency Quest: Resolve the Talianium Default Crisis]

[Completed]

[Your eloquent speech, accumulated trust, and decisive actions played a major role in resolving this crisis!]

[Although the Empire’s credibility has decreased due to the default, conversely, other empires’ trust in you will increase!]

[Additionally, since you resolved the default damage in minimal time, the duration of the Empire’s credibility debuff will be significantly reduced.]

‘Fuck.’

I thought I was going to die.

‘Boarding an FTL shuttle immediately after waking up, heading straight to Ztrack’s capital, quickly negotiating there, and then returning…’

It might sound easy, but I felt completely exhausted from the extreme time attack I’d performed to minimize the damage period.

But I couldn’t openly show such a state…

‘Good thing I got Riel to give me a stimulant before coming in.’

Thanks to the amazing scientific technology of future-era stimulants, I maintained my sanity.

In the end, I successfully promoted my achievements in the chaotic Grand Council meeting—all’s well that ends well.

However, there was one problem that Riel hadn’t mentioned and I hadn’t known about…

“How was my performance?!”

“Amazing, incredible!!”

…Unlike modern drugs with almost no side effects, perhaps because Riel had made it in a makeshift way…

I’d become strangely High! and found myself conversing with others in a much more extroverted manner than usual.

Well, up to this point, whatever might be said later, it wasn’t a major problem.

The issue was that my High! and exhausted mental state happened to spot the Foreign Minister sitting there…

“Fooooreign~ Miniiiister~”

“Ah, truly impressive, Executive Minister… but what exactly is—?”

As if meeting a close friend, I naturally put my arm around his shoulder and, in my altered state, committed the grave error of whispering into the ear of the Foreign Minister.

No.

Into the ear of that damn traitor, I whispered:

“You backstabbing space bastard, did you think I wouldn’t notice your betrayal?”

‘Well, I’m screwed.’