Chapter 44: ~Opportunity.~ (1/2)

***Jamaian Union, Jamai-Capital***

***The Immortal Empress***

*Crack!*

I throw the broken feather into a big box with broken feathers. It's proof that I worked too much today. Either that, or the quality of Jamaian feathers is really poor.

“Next one!” I hold out one hand and a servant places another feather in it. The female servant is standing behind me with a box, which is filled with writing utensils.

Today I am in a particularly bad mood. I feel the anger boiling up inside me with every new report I sign. The stupidity of some humans is limitless.

“Do these guys really think that I am stupid!? That Jamaian noble is trying to cheat me with this report! Those numbers are totally wrong!” I hit my head onto the desk. “Maybe I should start some public executions like in the first days of my Empire.”

The servant behind me is becoming a little stiffer. It's hard to be the ruler of a vast nation. A fast movement of my pencil and the cheating report is marked as useless. It will be sent back to the noble who made it.

After thinking for a second, I draw a little gibbet into a corner of the report to motivate the creator.

In that moment, the door to my office flies open and Tjena limps inside. She is carrying a big bag despite her injury. Tjena still has a slow healing wound from the abduction incident. I forbade anyone from healing her with high class healing spells.

So everything that's left to Tjena is the low level fast regeneration magic, which she can use herself. I actually did it to punish her. She should remember this for a long time, because she royally fucked up during that incident. First with the abduction and secondly by jumping in front of me!

There would have been no problem, if I had caught the guard alone inside my barrier. Instead she had to jump at someone, who was clearly affected by a weird spell.

This Ascathon is actually really dangerous, I'll have to be very careful when dealing with him. And the aura, which was emanated from his wife felt also really dangerous. That's in line with the report, which I read at the Academy.

Argh, to think that there could be a family of three immortals on this world! I am really at a big disadvantage right now.

The door is closed behind Tjena by a guard.

“Mislow is advancing with their troops!” Tjena is breathing heavily. Did she run here with her bad leg?

I place my feather on the desk. “Then it's fortunate that our supplies and the reinforcements from Phenex arrived.”

Tjena shakes her head. “But they aren't attacking us! At least not with their main forces!”

My brain freezes for a second. “Haaah?” That's not logical! “Then who is the target? Everyone else should be their ally!”

“They are marching against Norfolk!” Tjena signals me to wait. “And there is more! One of our ships spotted a fleet of thirty ships from the Nation of Mist and they were headed towards Norfolk too!”

My mouth opens and closes a few times while I try to restart the gears in my head. “What's wrong with those guys! Did they turn nuts!? Why are they fighting each other without reason!?”

“Apparently this is the reason. Artefacts like these are sold all over the continent by the Lenarch merchant house. The Nation of Mist and Mislow could have felt threatened by this.” Tjena empties her bag on my desk and looks at me expectantly.

I can't help it and pucker my forehead. Then I grab the artefact, which looks like a hair dryer from a technological realm. Oh, it's so long since I saw stuff like that. I totally forgot that some convenient items like that exist.

A small infusion of mana produces a hot stream of air. A button on the device is obviously for the temperature and the stream of hot air turns cold. That's convenient, especially in this climate.

At a glance, I recognize a shaving tool, a desk light, pocket lamps and various other devices. I start cooling myself with the hair dryer, while inspecting the other items. My view falls onto a REAL PEN! I am saved!

“~Hahahaha … HAHAHAHAHA!~”

Tjena looks at me like I am mad. She obviously doesn't get the joke behind it.

I hold up a pocket light and shove it into her face. “~Look! They even carved -MADE IN SARN- into the wood!~”