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ArabicArknights: Prime Minister of Kjerag — Chapter 48
Chapter 48: Where Are They? I Don’t Know!
The news of Duke Windermere’s representative attending the Kjerag railway inauguration was hardly the kind of sensational headline that would shake the international stage.
For one, it wasn’t the Duke herself who had made the journey, but merely a proxy. Secondly, this wasn’t a formal state visit; it was a private, highly classified meeting. While it was true that international custom dictated the most world-altering decisions were made behind closed doors, Kjerag’s geopolitical standing was simply too low to warrant much global paranoia.
The most glaring detail, however, was the size of the delegation. The representative had arrived with a meager entourage of fewer than ten people. On a grand scale, a group that small couldn’t accomplish much of anything.
Yet, while this quiet visit barely caused a ripple within the borders of Victoria, it was a monumental, devastating event for Kjerag. Nothing of this magnitude had occurred since the Great God Kjeragandr first breathed life into the world.
Naturally, both Karlan Trade and the newly established Kjerag government, led by Ernest, had exhausted every resource to prepare a welcome worthy of such an extraordinary guest.
“Dad, why are we taking this path?”
A gust of freezing mountain wind swept past, fluttering the light blue bangs that partially obscured the young girl’s eye. Despite being a pampered noble scion, Delphine Windermere rarely bothered with the elegant, restrictive gowns favored by her peers. Instead, she emulated her mother, opting for a crisp, utilitarian shirt and tailored shorts that accented her developing, athletic frame. Delphine was practically a miniature, youthful mirror image of Anfilia Windermere—a resemblance so striking that the Duchess would often proudly declare, ‘She’s just like me!’
The man Delphine addressed as her father paused. Kent gazed up the rugged, newly repaired mountain trail that wound its way toward Turicum. After a brief silence, a gentle, reassuring smile touched his lips.
“Because we encountered a blizzard last night, my dear. The resulting avalanche completely blocked the main road. If we had taken our original route, we never would have made it to the opening ceremony in time.”
It was, of course, a complete lie.
Kent was a carefully cautious man. Even though both he and Anfilia believed that the other Victorian Grand Dukes were far too preoccupied with their own underlying turmoil to care about a minor railway opening in Kjerag, it was always better to be safe than sorry.
He wanted to avoid any location where ‘accidents’ might conveniently occur. The absolute safest play was to completely conceal Delphine’s presence in the country. That was precisely why he had reached out to Enciodes in secret, securing a hidden smuggling route known only to veteran local merchants, and slipped into the mountains under the radar.
Leaning down, Kent scooped up his daughter—who was already growing impressively tall—and carefully lowered her into a massive, fur-lined leather pouch slung across the flank of a towering snow beast of burden. He affectionately ruffled her short, snow-dusted hair. Then, with a heavy grunt and a boost from a nearby guard, Kent squeezed himself into the adjacent pouch.
“Let’s move out.”
He gave a firm nod to Matterhorn, Enciodes’s fiercely loyal confidant, a towering man who had appropriately been named after Kjerag’s highest summit, Mount Matterhorn.
The massive beast let out a deep, resonant snort, its breath pluming in the frigid air. As Delphine’s bright laughter echoed against the icy cliffs, Kent pulled the heavy fur flap down over the pouch, sealing out the biting cold and the falling snow.
Ernest stared down at the face of his pocket watch. The hands aligned perfectly on the hour. He snapped it shut with a sharp click and slowly turned his gaze toward his elder brother for the third time.
His perpetually polite, easygoing smile had grown dangerously stiff.
“Director Enciodes,” Ernest began, his voice dangerously soft. “Has our esteemed guest, the representative of Duke Windermere, arrived yet?”
Enciodes stood tall, his posture immaculate. “Logically speaking, they should be here at any moment.”
“Half an hour ago, you said they ‘should be here soon.’An hour ago, you were absolutely certain, promising me they would arrive’immediately.'” Ernest’s smile finally shattered. His lips twitched as he stepped into his brother’s personal space. “I told you I should send my own people to escort them, but you just had to show off. Look around, brother. They are missing. How exactly are we going to explain this?”
For a fleeting second, Enciodes’s legendary, unshakeable poker face cracked, revealing a distinct flash of awkwardness.
Ernest was entirely right.
Receiving foreign dignitaries was strictly the jurisdiction of the Kjerag government. Enciodes had aggressively snatched that right away, arguing that since the railway was funded and constructed entirely by Karlan Trade, the company deserved to host the inauguration.
Ernest could have fought him on it. However, he and Ho’olheyak had already deduced that the Victorian faction represented by Windermere was leaning toward supporting the ‘Enciodes faction.’ If Ernest stubbornly pulled rank and forced the government to host, the resulting reception would likely be politically frosty. So, after a brief but intense negotiation, the brothers had struck a deal.
The terms were simple: Enciodes’s massive expenditures on the Turicum Railway Station and the new trains would completely offset the staggering backlog of taxes he owed the government for operating under the “Karlan Trade” banner., Enciodes agreed to pay the government a flat five million LMD annually as a licensing fee for the “Karlan” trademark. In exchange, Karlan Trade was granted full authority to host the Windermere delegation.
On paper, it looked like a brutally one-sided extortion. Ernest had simply opened his mouth, and Enciodes had bled millions.
In reality, it was a masterclass in mutual exploitation.
Before Ernest had formalized the Kjerag government, Karlan Trade had operated as a phantom ‘state-owned enterprise.’ They had strip-mined resources from SilverAsh territory and conducted massive international trade without a shred of legal authorization—and without paying a single copper coin in taxes to the Karlan Temple.
Karlan Trade’s meteoric rise was entirely fueled by this unregulated, wild-west capitalism. The Karlan Temple elders had been absolute fools. They played the role of pure, untouchable ascetics while simultaneously draining sixty percent of Kjerag’s total finances for ‘religious expenses.’ They would spout pious nonsense about how money held no meaning to them, secretly hoping Enciodes would just dump chests of gold at their feet, only to publicly refuse his offerings to maintain their holy image.
But Enciodes was not a man to play along with hypocrites. When it came to sheer, unadulterated shamelessness in Kjerag, only Ernest could rival him. Why would he ever hand his hard-earned wealth over to the Temple? Tossing a few scraps to the Three Clans Meeting every year was already generous enough.
Once Ernest seized power, however, the game changed. Enciodes knew his younger brother had been salivating over Karlan Trade’s commercial tax revenue since day one. Both men were ruthless pragmatists; they knew that building a nation required an ocean of blood and money. Consequently, the issue of back taxes had been a constant, bitter war of attrition between them.
By using the railway investment to finally shut Ernest up—silencing his endless nagging about taxes and his constant demands for thousands of Originium Heaters—Enciodes felt he had won a massive victory. As for the five million LMD trademark fee? A mere drop in the bucket compared to the prize he was eyeing.
That prize was the Duchy of Windermere.
It was a stroke of absolute genius. Enciodes had successfully bluffed Ernest, making his brother believe that Karlan Trade possessed the sheer political gravity to personally invite a Grand Duke’s representative to Kjerag.
The truth? He had absolutely no such influence. Enciodes had simply mass-mailed luxurious invitations to every single Duke in Victoria, throwing darts at a board in the dark.
He honestly had no idea why Windermere had actually accepted. But that minor detail hadn’t stopped him from looking Ernest dead in the eye and smugly declaring, ‘You’re too slow!’
When it came to audacity, the men of the SilverAsh bloodline were truly cut from the same cloth.
Trading a few million LMD to Ernest for a direct line to Windermere was the gamble of a lifetime. It meant Karlan Trade could finally break out of the County of Ascalon and tap into the sprawling, lucrative markets of an entire Duchy.
It was a terrifyingly risky speculation. But for a businessman fighting an uphill battle, nothing spiked the adrenaline quite like a gamble that balanced total ruin against absolute supremacy. If this succeeded, Karlan Trade’s growth would explode exponentially. Ernest’s fledgling government wouldn’t stand a chance of keeping him in check.
It was a dangerous, aggressive opening—a move that sacrificed all defense for overwhelming, map-clearing attack power.
“I am asking you about the Windermere delegation!”
Ernest’s harsh bark shattered Enciodes’s grand strategic daydream. The elder brother blinked, looking out over the empty, snow-swept mountain pass. Genuine confusion bled into his eyes.
“You’re right… where exactly are they?”
Ernest let out a breathless, exasperated laugh. Without a second of hesitation, he reached out and snatched the elegant cane right out of his brother’s hands. He gripped it by both ends, brought it down over his knee in a brutal, lightning-fast strike, and snapped the expensive wood cleanly in half.
Crack!
“Stop playing with your damn cane!” Ernest roared, tossing the splintered halves into the snow. “I am asking you where they are!”
Enciodes stood frozen, utterly bewildered. He didn’t even register the loss of his favorite cane. He just stared at the empty road, slowly shaking his head.
“I… I don’t know!”