Redemption of the Blue Rose Princess - Chapter 8.10
T/N: This is the last part of this chapter! The next chapter would be from the perspective of the Sutherlands, and the author divided it into 6 parts, so I’ll try to finish them all by next week. Enjoy!
Chapter 8-10
After getting a good night’s rest, Alicia immediately began her work the very next day.
Since Clovis had taken care of the matter involving the cooperation between the Regional Council and the Chancery, Alicia’s work would be contacting the potential allies among the members of the Privy Council. They were the nobles who had expressed their support for the establishment of the company during the meeting, including, but not limited to Daniel Bain, the Marquis of Harber.
Since the second meeting would be held in a week’s time, those nobles were staying at their private residences in the vicinity of the royal capital instead of returning to their own territories, hence, it was easier for Alicia to write letters to each of them and had those letters delivered to their residences.
The nobles’ responses toward the Princess’ letters were mostly positive, even though most of them didn’t go forward and express their support clearly. Though they were assured over the fact that the beloved daughter of the King herself personally sent them a letter, a sign that the Princess didn’t intend to look down on them in the slightest.
Some of the nobles who received the letters also went as far as inviting the Princess and her aide to their residences so that they would be able to discuss the matter directly. In particular, both the Marquis of Harber and the Marquis of Maurice promised Alicia that they would support her in the next meeting.
Encouraged by their slow, yet steady progress, Alicia moved in earnest to establish more contact with the nobles.
* * *
“I received another letter of refusal…”
“Is that so?”
The aide bowed reverently to Alicia as the latter gazed at the letter he handed to her.
The next meeting was scheduled to be the day after tomorrow.
Because of this, the moderate faction that they had been in contact with had finally given Alicia their responses on whether they would cooperate with her or not.
This letter was the third letter of refusal that Alicia received this morning. Though it wasn’t like everything was all bad since she had received two letters of agreement before this, but still, the nobles who refused were actually among the group who were likely to support her.
Alicia then divided the letters between the letter of refusal and agreement. As she piled the letters up, she recited the names of the nobles who answered her today in her head.
…As expected, the situation is still very grim… Especially there is still the Sutherland family with their absolute influence…
“We shouldn’t be impatient, after all the opposition should also be doing what we are currently doing, trying to contact the nobles who are likely to support us to bolster their ranks.”
“While Alicia-sama’s popularity is high, they still have the Sutherland family to think about, after all, being glared by them won’t be beneficial to them either. Anyway, Alicia-sama, there is a more concerning matter, it was the information sent by Jude…”
Clovis then handed Alicia the letter in his hand. The Princess looked over the beautiful writing, typical of Jude, as her bright eyes widened.
“‘The merchants I’ve been approaching had been turning me down one after another…? Even though the other day they’ve been announcing their support…?’”
The content of Jude’s letter was that the wind had started going against them in the matter of recruiting merchants that were capable enough to work on the project.
Jude requested to personally recruit the people who would be in charge of the Mercurius Trading Company since he only wanted capable people at the center of the company. That was why he had been using his personal connection to call on capable merchants so that everything could move quickly as soon as Alicia succeeded in convincing the Privy Council.
So far, the merchants he had approached had been showing positive responses toward joining the Trading Company as founders. This was mostly because of the well-known reputation of Heilland’s craftsmanship and to them, the wider scale they could trade the goods from Heilland, the more profits they could get.
However, according to Jude’s letter, the responses of the merchants suddenly became unfavorable. It happened quite recently, to be exact, a day after the meeting with the Privy Council.
“What is happening? Are they actually able to reach out to the merchants as well?”
“It’s very possible, but we don’t know for sure yet.”
“Is there a member of the Privy Council who has been visiting Marquis Rozen’s territory in this past few days?”
In response to Alicia’s question, Clovis slowly shook his head.
“As soon as I received the news, I inquired the Northern Knights guarding the territory, but I received no news about such person. I had a suspicion that they could be cooperating with the Sutherlands, but since most of them are commoners with a few low ranked knights in the mix, it’s unlikely.”
The Sutherlands. The Duke of Sherford’s gaze, filled with his terrible intimidation, appeared in Alicia’s mind.
He said upfront that he merely wished to postpone the Privy Council’s answer, but it was obvious that his true intent was to reject the proposal itself. The Duke was a man who didn’t afraid to dirty his hands. There was a big possibility that he was the one who pressured the merchants that were contacted by Jude to withdraw their support for the establishment of the trading company.
“But, let’s assume that he was the one who went around persuading the merchants, is it actually possible? The result is too good to be true even for him, no? There is also the fact that both the Duke and Lord Riddhe haven’t moved personally from the capital… how on earth did they do that…?
Clovis raised an eyebrow at Alicia’s pondering.
Currently, their problem was the fact that the Privy Council was ‘re-evaluating’ the content of the proposal. Adding the problem of the merchants starting to turn down our proposal as well, Alicia’s reputation would receive big damage if things were to continue this way.
After all, if Lloyd was really the one who pulled the string, he would definitely use this as material to denounce the proposal at the next meeting. And if he were to claim something like, ‘After seeing this fact, the establishment of the trading company seemed to be unfeasible’, then everything would be…
Suddenly, they heard a knock on the door. Alicia signed Annie to open the door, which the latter immediately did. From behind the door, the figure of the Vice-Commander of the Royal Guard, Robert Fonbertm could be seen.
The silver-haired knight had brought news of a visitor. Although Alicia had recently busied herself to meet various nobles to gain more support, this was the first time that someone had requested an audience directly with her. The Princess was surprised about this, but Robert shook his head instead.
“There’s no need to go out your way to meet them, Alicia-sama. Personally, I think it would be better to turn him down. Also, Clovis? They want you to be there too.”
When they heard the visitor’s name from the knight, Alicia and Clovis couldn’t help but stare at each other in surprise.
TL: Iyo
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