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Chapter 1. Maximilian von Karayan (1)
Winter had arrived, and Karayan’s mansion was draped in a cold atmosphere, as if in sync with the season.
“How is the Lord? Is he still sleeping there?”
“He already woke up, but he hasn’t ordered us anything.”
“That’s not good.”
The maids and servants working at Karayan’s house were chatting while looking up at the second floor where Lord Karayan was staying. The chilly atmosphere was quite unusual for them.
“People were buzzing about money talks, but they’ve been quiet for the past few days…”
It was even more so with prominent figures in the country constantly coming and going in their territory due to financial issues.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
As everyone whispered, the bell announcing the arrival of a guest rang loudly, taking all the attention of the maids and butlers.
“Who’s coming today?”
The head maid asked the other maids, but none of them gave a clear answer.
Ding!
When the doorbell rang again, the head maid gestured to one of the maids, who then ran to the front door to see who the guest was.
Thunk!
The heavy front door opened, and a woman strode down the long hallway, her boots were making a harsh sound.
“How’s my brother doing?”
The woman who entered the house was Lord Karayan’s younger sister, Orlean von Karayan. She spoke with a rough voice that didn’t quite match her gentle appearance, nudging the maid who opened the door.
“Forgive me My Lady, but I don’t know.”
The young maid, who was only doing odds and ends, couldn’t give a proper answer to Orlean’s question.
“Then go find someone who does know. Hurry up!”
Unable to overcome her sense of urgency, Orlean pushed the maid’s back. She lost her balance and stumbled backwards, but a butler was there to catch her and prevent her from falling to the ground.
“Greetings, my lady!”
Dressed in a black suit and circular glasses, the butler steadied the young maid before turning to give a polite greeting to Orlean von Karayan.
“What happened? Did something bad happen to my brother?” Orlean approached the butler with urgency.
“Nothing has happened, my lady.”
“Then why hasn’t he gone out of his room?”
“He seems to have caught a cold and is resting in his room.”
“A cold? That’s terrible! Today is such an important day, and he caught a cold! Is he very ill? Is he coughing a lot?”
“I’m not sure about the coughing, but he seems weak and has been sleeping a lot. It seems as if something is hurting him.”
“Has a doctor been called?”
“He doesn’t want a doctor. He just wants to rest.”
“That won’t do. I must check on him myself. Let him know that I want to see him.”
At Orlean’s request, the butler nodded lightly and made his way up to the second floor, where Karayan’s room was located.
“Today’s speech is so important, and he caught a cold out of nowhere… This is not good. We cannot afford to show weakness with the election so close,” Orlean muttered to herself as she paced around the reception room with a dark expression.
“Um…”
The butler returned, looking unsure.
“Well? What did my brother say?”
“He gave a nod but didn’t respond, my lady.”
“What? You asked if I can visit him, but he just nodded and continued to stay in his room?”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Does that mean he is waiting for me in his room?”
“No, he won’t. Don’t you know? The Lord hates meeting people in his bedroom.”
Orlean recalled a past incident when she entered Karayan’s room without permission and faced his anger. “If you come into my room without permission once again, even if you are family, I won’t let you off!” he had said in a sharp tone.
But she couldn’t just wait for her brother to emerge from his room without knowing what’s happening to him.
“I will go and talk to him myself.”
Following the butler’s guidance, Orlean stood in front of the room at the end of the second floor.
Knock, knock, knock.
Orlean knocked on the door, but there was no response from inside. She took a deep breath and tried knocking again, hiding her impatience.
Knock! Knock! Knock!
“Brother! What have you been doing? We haven’t heard from you in days.” Orlean added, wondering if her brother didn’t hear her knocking on the door.
Click.
She heard the sound of the door being moved. Orlean looked at the butler, unsure if Lord Karayan had given permission to enter. But the butler didn’t know what he meant either.
“Hmph! I’ll go in, Brother.”
Feeling impatient, Orlean decided to move forward even if Karayan was to scold her.
“Brother, what are you doing…Brother?”
Orlean opened the door and saw Karayan sitting by the window. He looked at her with a very lazy face.
Orlean let out a sigh. The sunlight streaming through the window made Karayan’s fair skin shine like jewels, and his blue eyes, a unique feature of their family, were deeper and more mysterious than any other family members.
This was also Karayan’s power. It couldn’t be denied that his mysterious atmosphere contributed to his becoming a full-time professor at the Aragon University at the age of 23, in addition to his brain.
“Alright, this is reality. I have to admit it’s real,” murmured Maximilian von Karayan to himself.
“Yesterday, he kept asking if this was a dream,” he whispered to Orlean von Karayan. Orlean’s face crumpled at the butler’s words.
She approached Maximilian and carefully examined him, checking if he had a fever or any injuries, particularly around his head.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m checking if there is something wrong with you. Since you refused a doctor, I have to do it myself,” she replied.
Maximilian’s face twisted in discomfort at Orlean’s touch, and he repeated, “I’m fine. Stop it.”
Orlean asked him, “Are you really okay?”
“I’m really okay.”
“That’s good. Then let’s get ready quickly,” she said.
“Get ready for what?” Maximilian asked, furrowing his brow and squinting his eyes.
Seeing this, the butler began to worry. He had been assisting Maximilian for a long time and thought that something was wrong with him.
Orlean was also convinced that something was wrong with Maximilian.
“Brother! Did you forget what day it is today?”
“Is it an important day?”
“Yes! You have to give a good speech today to win the election, don’t you?”
“Election? Ah, the election.” Maximilian repeated the word “election” twice and then ran his hand over his chin.
He took a deep breath and looked out the window. “Am I not the representative of the Lerschef party yet?”
Orlean fell to her knees, as if the world was crumbling beneath her at Maximilian’s words.
She grabbed his hand tightly. “Brother! You said you were okay!”
“I’m okay. I’m fine. So go out. I need some time to shower and get ready.” Maximilian pushed away Orlean’s hand and spoke in a strong tone. Orlean looked at him with a worried expression and walked away heavily.
“Shall I prepare some tea while you wait, my lady?” The butler came out to the reception room and asked calmly. Orlean looked up at the second floor, lost in thought for a moment.
Maximilian usually took over an hour to get ready when he asked for preparation time. And judging by his current state, he didn’t seem to have prepared a speech.
If Maximilian was indeed suffering from memory problems, she couldn’t expect an impromptu speech coming from.
“Please do me a favor. And prepare a pen and paper,” said Orlean von Karayan as she decided to prepare the draft for Karayan’s upcoming speech herself.
“Yes, I will do so.”
“If you could, please bring a dessert to complement tea, I would be grateful.”
“Of course.”
The servant complied with all of Orlean’s requests and headed to the kitchen where the maids were. Orlean took a deep breath and sat down at the table in the reception room. She knew that after today, she would have to quietly resolve the issue with Karayan’s memory.
__________
I am currently riding in a carriage led by six horses. It will take approximately an hour to arrive at Lerschef Party’s meeting place, our destination.
“Please read through these documents before we arrive. You may make some changes to suit your thoughts, brother.” Orlean said as she handed me a stack of documents that amounted to dozens of pages.
“Dear members, today we live under the violence called tradition. Dictatorship is rampant, inequality is natural, and reason has died. It is a country where light has disappeared, darkness exists, and the price of bread yesterday and today differ so much that we must beg for our lives with our empty stomachs…”
The first paragraph caught my eye with its strong message. The rest of the speech revealed Orlean’s mistrust of the current system and the necessity of overthrowing it.
After all, in the novel I wrote, Karayan was the one who destroyed the monarchy and established a republic. Of course, it was only a setting. The story of Karayan in the novel depicted his journey of eliminating the archenemy of the republic and becoming the second enemy. He then ruled with tyranny until he died at the hands of the protagonist, Christian.
By the way, the time I am in now is much earlier than the timeline where the novel started. It is enough to know that Karayan ran for election to become a leader of the Lerschef party. But wouldn’t avoiding such a high position prevent me from getting killed? Even being just an ordinary university professor is enough to enjoy life.
“Excuse me, Brother.”
As I was flipping through the pages, Orlean called my attention very carefully. I closed the document and met Orlean’s gaze.
“Is there something you want to ask me? Please don’t misunderstand.”
“No, I was just curious.”
“Is there something wrong with your memory?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
Orlean looked at me with a suspicious gaze.
‘This is truly exhausting,’ thought Maximilian von Karayan. Even if he claimed that he wouldn’t be able to remember any of Karayan’s old memories, also, it wouldn’t be possible for them to plant memories in his brain.
No, perhaps they might call a quack doctor or a useless magician to try to fix his memories, wasting the family’s resources in the process.
Either way, it would only tire him out. After all, he wasn’t the real Maximilian von Karayan to begin with.
“Today’s speech is very important. Brother’s position in the party has significantly weakened. It’s all because of some ridiculous rumors that people from Tonalli are spreading.”
Tonalli? It was an unfamiliar name, but with so many characters in his novel, it wasn’t surprising that he couldn’t remember every minor detail. Besides, he had made some mistakes while writing the novel, writing settings incorrectly in one episode and then changing it. So, it wasn’t unusual for him to find unfamiliar characters.
But that was okay. He could deliver a decent speech and receive enough votes to continue living in this place without becoming a party leader. In fact, it might even be for the best, as it would prevent him meeting Christian and die in his hands.
-Alert-
[Novel points: 100.]
[Mission: Win the election and become the leader of the Lerschef party.]
[Reward: Map of Might.]
[If you fail, 10 novel points will be deducted. ※If your novel points reach 0, you will be erased forever.]
-End-
“Ha!” Maximilian let out a hollow laugh as he looked at the seemingly surreal message in front of him. “Brother, why are you laughing all of a sudden?” Orlean von Karayan asked.
“Oh, it’s nothing,” he replied. Was it some kind of divine prank? Was there a system at work in this place, just like the one in his novels? And if so, it seemed like it had no concern for his happy-go-lucky Karayan life.
“What is the Map of Might? Does it show where to find rare treasures? But what about these novel points?” He couldn’t help but fixate on the novel points, which seemed to be the most important thing for his survival in this place. And if he failed the first mission, he’d be in big trouble.
Failing the first mission was like not being able to button up the first button of a shirt. Without it, you couldn’t proceed to the next one. He knew this well from his own writing, as the novel he was now in was one that he had written himself.
But the first mission shouldn’t be too difficult, right? Or would it be different this time around?
“And who am I, anyway?” Maximilian thought to himself.
Right now, he was “Maximilian von Karayan,” he already knew what the outcome would be.
***
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