Podolski’s act continued long into the night.

The reason being that he wanted Lee Chae-Rin’s guards to relax their guard around him.

<Sire, please forgive my insolence. In order to make these guys relax their guards, I need to resort to these kinds of methods.>

After that, Podolski and Chae-Rin started laughing crazily like two idiots.

“KUHAHAHA! Kuuuk, I’m getting drunk!”

After drinking the ground grape (grapes that grow in the ground) wine, Podolski’s face turned red, and he started throwing a fit.

“Kuuu, this wine, it’s really good. We don’t seem to have this kind of wine at home, do we?”

The “home” that Podolski referred to was obviously Earth.

“Hoho! This is only found in our territory. It’s realllllllly strong wine. Want another one?”

Chae-Rin followed Podolski’s act perfectly. Her will to become a strong Lord like Kang Chul-In allowed her to get through the humiliation she felt.

“Huuuu! Hey, Chae-Rin.”

After drinking even more wine, Podolski started staring at Chae-Rin with one eye.

“Don’t you think it’s been quite a time since we’ve shared our love? I think the last time we did was at ‘that’ place.”

For a second, Chae-Rin’s body froze from the strong words that Podolski spouted.

“Huhu,” laughed Podolski as he started hugging Chae-Rin.

<There’s a spy here.>

Of course, it was an act.

<Pretend that we are very drunk. Only like this will we be able to make them relax their guards.>

“Huuu, not right now.”

“Huh? Why not?”

“Need more wine…”

“Hahaha, of course, of course.”

Podolski nodded his head.

“You always needed wine to make you go hot. Then, later today, after you’re plenty drunk?”

“Hohoho! Well, I guess we’ll see when I really get that drunk, won’t we?”

Unexpectedly, their acts were almost perfect. This was because Chae-Rin tried her absolute hardest in order to match his act.

“But…”

“Who are those bastards over there? I looked earlier, but your underlings seemed plenty disrespectful to you. Like you said, they deserve to be beaten.”

As Podolski let out his feelings, Chae-Rin seemed like she didn’t want to miss this chance and spoke.

“Yes, they truly are arrogant and disrespectful.”

And she ground her teeth.

“Arrogant and disrespectful?!”

“Instead of listening to their Lord’s orders, they treat her like a scarecrow and ignore her instead. What a bunch of stoneheads (a way of saying idiot in Korean)”

“Stoneheads, huh?”

“Huuu, I don’t think there are any underlings as ridiculous and unfaithful as mine.”

“W-What? Hmph, I guess they need to get educated then.”

As he said that, Podolski flexed his muscles.

“Dwarves are idiots.”

“Hmm?”

“They only think of retaking their territory and don’t know how to use their brains. Oh, did I mention that we were in a war right now?”

“Oh, you mentioned that last week.”

“Oh, did I?”

“Hehe, maybe you forgot after that passionate night with me.”

“Humph… Oh, you!”

Now, they had almost a perfect harmony when they acted.

“Anyway, the dwarves only focus on retaking that area. They almost spent 2000 of their forces in retaking it. But do you know what happened?”

“No way.”

“Yes. Even after spending 2000 of their soldiers, these stupid dwarves failed to take back the land. If we had spent that much of our men in striking another Lord, the story would be different. But since they do these things, how can I say that they are anything but idiots? Hohoho!”

Ohh, seems like this Lord also has a sort of strategy. Not bad.

Podolski listened to Chae-Rin’s speech and was impressed. But he didn’t show any reaction to it.

“Those stupid bastards. Why don’t you do anything to them?”

“Sigh, if only I could. There’s no one on my side. They don’t listen to my orders, so what am I supposed to do against them?”

“Hmph, I guess I’ll help you then.”

“Tomorrow morning, I’ll help you educate those short bastards. Then, won’t you be able to get your authority back?”

“Can you do that for me?”

“Of course I can.”

“My friend has a territory 100 km from here. With my skills and his army, we would easily get rid of your stupid dwarves and get your authority back for you.”

“If only that worked… Haha, I would be able to spend blissful days with you if that worked.”

After that, their conversation continued for a couple more hours until Chae-Rin finally couldn’t resist the effects of the wine and fell asleep.

“Hmm, did I make her drink too much?”

After Chae-Rin fainted, Podolski took her to her bedroom while wobbling the whole way.

After leaving her there and walking away, he mumbled to himself, although it was just the mutterings of a drunk.

… until he fell down on the grass and fell asleep there, completely drunk.

————————————————

“Secretary Sledge.”

The dwarf who was acting as a spy came to Sledge to report as soon as the drinking was over.

“They finally stopped drinking.”

“How was it?”

“It was utter chaos, sir. They couldn’t stop talking about ridiculous plans on taking her authority back.”

“Huh. The b*tch I knew would drink wine sometimes but wouldn’t engage in stupid conversations like this.”

They called her a b*tch in order to discriminate against her, and this was now commonly said by the dwarves whenever Lee Chae-Rin wasn’t present.

“As I saw it, her true personality began to surface when she got drunk. According to her friend’s words, she becomes passionate when she drinks too much.”

The one acting as a spy began talking enthusiastically.

“Sigh~ then she really is a b*tch, isn’t she?”

“As expected, human females who pretend to act weak and nice do bad things behind one’s back huh?”

“Yes, that’s exactly it, sir.”

“What do you mean that’s it? Is there more?”

“It seems like they had a plot in order to take back her authority.”

“Plot? What kind of plot.”

“That bastard that drank with her said that he’d help her retake her authority.”

“HAHAHA, it seems like that guy isn’t very simple either?”

“Yes, I’m very sure he isn’t very simple too.”

“Okay then, continue.”

“He said that he has a friend who’s a Lord, located around 100km away from here. He said that he could gather the help of that Lord and help her retake her authority.”

“WHAT!” Sledge stood up and shouted in shock.

“H-how dare she think of bringing outside forces…?”

“S-sir, please calm down.”

“AS IF I COULD! That b*tch of a woman isn’t thinking of helping us retake Nidavellir, but rather thinking of getting outside help in order to wreck chaos and chase us out.”

“Secretary, please calm yourself…”

“CALM MYSELF MY *SS! LOOKING AT HOW THINGS ARE GOING. IT SEEMS LIKE SHE IS ABOUT TO REGAIN HER AUTHORITY HERE!”

“But I don’t think you need to worry so much, sir.”

“Huh? Why not?”

“It seemed like her friend was a huge boaster. He kept on talking about how great he was. To me, it seemed like he was just boasting and seemed like a conman. Not only that, but his drinking habits are also so bad that he fell asleep in the garden, drunk.”

“Ohhh, so that’s how things were, huh?” Sledge starting laughing sinisterly.

“Kuku, no matter what you do, you won’t be able to escape from my fingertips. It seems like this b*tch has no luck either. But… I can’t just leave her alone.”

He didn’t completely relax his guard.

“Look carefully at how the adventurers behave. There’s a chance that they will make a deal with them or try to convince them to join their cause.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Not only that, if someone comes to try and meet her now, tell them that she’s unavailable. Don’t let her see anyone, got it?”

At this moment, Sledge stepped over the line that he never should have, which was betraying his own Lord.

“W-water…”

Lee Chae-Rin’s dry throat woke her from her sleep.

Sigh, I drank too much.

Although it seemed like she had slept for a long time, her head hurt a lot.

Well, maybe it was to be expected after drinking 7 bottles of wine with Podolski. It was already impressive that she was able to keep up her part of the act.

She stretched her hands towards the bottle of water.

No, she tried to but couldn’t.

This was because she was startled by the presence of a man sitting near her.

The man had a pelt that seemed like a black leopard skin draped over his whole body, giving off a mysterious feeling as he covered the moon with his silhouette.

“You finally woke up. I was going to if you didn’t.”

The cold voice was able to calm her startled heart. It was the voice of Kang Chul-In.

“Haha, Mr. Chul-In!”

“B-but… how did you get up here?”

“Through the window.”

“The window?!” She was surprised.

Below the window was a cliff that stretched down over 30 meters, it was something that no human should be able to scale.

“It’s not that difficult for me.”

Kang Chul-In spoke indifferently. For him with overdrive on, it truly was nothing.

“Oh…”

“Take this.”

Kang Chul-In threw 2 scrolls of parchment to her.

“What’s this?” she asked.

“One of them is for the contract, and the other one…,” Kang Chul-In said.

“Is a ‘death list’.”

It was a list that would determine who died and who lived: a “death list”.