I Reincarnated Just to be Unemployed

[LUCIELLE’S POV—CONTINUATION—ASHCROFT MANSION]

"Grand Duchess."

Aurelius’s voice carried across the training field. I looked up; he was still standing by the railing, looking entirely too pleased with himself.

"Taming the white fox beasts..." he said, his tone dripping with amusement. "And yet the empire knows nothing about it. Why is that?"

I stared at him, then at his face and then specifically at those irritating green eyes. Look at them, so smug and so annoyingly bright. For one brief moment, I imagined myself as a crow. I’d fly over there, pluck out those beautiful little eyeballs, and play tennis with them.

. . .

. . .

No, we were in a civilized society, probably. Besides, I had a reputation to maintain. I was a grand duchess now. Grand Duchesses did not commit eyeball-related crimes before lunch.

I simply smiled.

"Seems like Archmage Aurelius has quite a lot of free time." His expression twitched; I continued sweetly. "I thought you were busy researching heat mana stones."

Aurelius blinked once and twice. His smug expression cracked for half a second before he recovered, his green eyes narrowing slightly, and then he leaned lazily against the railing as his voice remained light, but there was an edge beneath it now.

"It seems the Grand Duchess has changed quite a lot; a woman who once refused to step outside her chamber is suddenly standing on a training field, surrounded by knights..." His gaze shifted toward the white fox cub in my arms.

"...and taming magical beasts."

Then his eyes returned to mine.

"What a remarkable sight."

I said nothing; he smiled.

"And yet, despite such a remarkable achievement, you’ve chosen not to inform the Imperial Palace."

There it was, the accusation wrapped in silk, polished with manners and served with a side of smugness.

"You truly are remarkable, Grand Duchess."

. . .

Wow, he had managed to nag me with the energy of an Asian mother-in-law who had just discovered I bought a new sofa without consulting the family.

How could you not tell the empire? What will the neighbors think? Do you know what people will say?

I almost expected him to add, And when are you planning to give me grandchildren?

I blinked, then looked down at the fox cub; even the cub was staring at Aurelius. I looked back at him; apparently, even the fox thought this man was annoying.

Good, we had something in common. I gently stroked the cub’s head; my voice was trying to be pleasant.

"Look, Archmage..."

Cedric, who had been standing behind Aurelius, suddenly straightened. Mia went quiet. Aurelius’s eyebrow lifted.

I smiled.

"Your habit of poking your nose into other people’s business isn’t particularly charming." His smile disappeared, and I continued before he could interrupt. "And whether the Imperial Palace is informed about matters concerning Ashcroft Territory...is not your decision."

The wind swept across the training field; the foxes grew quiet, and even the knights seemed to sense the shift. I adjusted the cub in my arms and took one slow step forward.

"This territory belongs to House Ashcroft."

My voice was calm now, with no shouting and no theatrics. I didn’t need either.

"My husband is the Grand Duke of the North. If Cassian wishes to inform the Imperial Palace, he will, and if he doesn’t?" A small smile touched my lips. "That’s his decision too."

Aurelius stared at me. I stared right back.

"So perhaps you should stop behaving as though you’ve caught me smuggling contraband through the border."

The fox cub yawned as I continued, "These are foxes, Archmage. Not stolen imperial treasures."

Aurelius’s expression twitched.

"And please don’t stand there pretending you’re some saint sent down from the heavens to protect the empire from my evil schemes."

I smiled sweetly.

"You’re not."

Silence...an absolute silence. The kind of silence that made the snow falling from the trees sound deafening. Cedric’s jaw had dropped. Mia had gone completely still; even the knights looked like they’d suddenly remembered they had somewhere else to be.

Aurelius? He had frozen.

He stood there with the expression of a man who had just walked into a meeting expecting to deliver a lecture and instead received a resignation letter from his own dignity.

He looked like his soul had just disconnected from the server. I shifted the fox cub in my arms; the little creature yawned again. Honestly, it was handling this better than everyone else; after all, I am a survivor of the capitalistic world.

Aurelius opened his mouth.

"Something else, Archmage?" He stared at me, then slowly straightened from the railing; his face had gone strangely stiff.

Cedric cleared his throat very carefully.

"Your Grace..."

I could practically hear the sentence forming inside his head.

’Please stop before you accidentally start an international incident.’

I wasn’t going to start one. I was simply reminding an overly curious archmage where the boundaries were.

And then—

PLOP!

Something heavy and ridiculously soft landed across my shoulders. I froze, and when I looked down, there was white fur, a lot of white fur.

I looked up, and there he was.

Cassian.

Standing behind me with that infuriatingly calm expression, as if appearing out of nowhere and draping expensive clothing over his wife were a completely normal activity.

"You’ll catch a cold, my wife."

I looked down at myself. "I was already wearing a jacket."

"This is the new one." He adjusted the fur around my shoulders. "I ordered it for you."

I stared at the coat, then touched it: soft, ridiculously soft. The kind of soft that made you question whether you were touching clothing or a cloud that had been professionally harvested.

I rubbed the fur between my fingers.

. . .

Wait.

How much did this cost?

WOW.

This jacket didn’t merely look expensive. It screamed money, from everywhere. The fur looked expensive, and the stitching looked expensive, and the buttons probably had a family tree.

I was beginning to suspect that if I dropped this coat on the floor, the floor itself would apologize for not being worthy.

"Did you like it?"

I immediately wrapped the coat tighter around myself as my answer came far too quickly. "I love it."

Cassian’s smile deepened, and this fur was heavenly. It felt like a cloud had been wrapped around my shoulders and then personally instructed to keep me warm.

I had no idea what kind of financial crimes were committed to purchase this thing, but I supported them.

Then Cassian’s gaze shifted as his eyes landed on Aurelius. "Oh...I didn’t see you there, Archmage."

. . .

. . .

Liar, he had absolutely seen him. The man had probably noticed Aurelius from three mountains away, but Cassian’s expression remained perfectly innocent.

Aurelius scoffed. "You don’t have to pretend you didn’t see me."

Cassian’s smile didn’t move. "I wasn’t pretending."

"You were."

"I wasn’t."

"You were..."

I stared between them. Two powerful men were about to have a territorial dispute over whether one of them had looked at the other.

Aurelius sighed. "Forget it, I have something to tell you."

Cassian’s expression immediately changed; the playful warmth disappeared as his eyes sharpened.

"Speak."

Aurelius looked toward the training grounds. "The hot pool does not contain only a heat mana stone."

My eyebrows lifted. Aurelius continued. "We’ve discovered several other stones within the same underground formation, and we also discovered several more hot pools behind the mountains."

He paused, then looked directly at Cassian.

"They’re all within Ashcroft Territory."

Silence.

I slowly lowered my hand from the fur. Aurelius continued, as his voice became more serious.

"And if my calculations are correct...this territory isn’t simply sitting on a deposit of mana stones. It’s producing them."

. . .

Silence, an absolute silence.

Cassian and I looked at each other. I stared into his eyes; he stared back at me. Neither of us spoke. For one second, my brain processed what Aurelius had just said.

Natural mana stones, beneath our territory. Multiple hot pools, potentially an entire underground source. Cassian’s expression remained calm as my brain had taken a completely different route.

It had skipped all the complicated political mathematics and gone directly to the most important conclusion.

I grabbed Cassian’s sleeve; he looked down at me as I whispered—

"Money."

His eyebrow lifted; I stared at him.

"MONEY."

Aurelius blinked. Cedric looked confused. Mia’s lips twitched.

"DO YOU KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS?"

Cassian stared at me. I could practically see him wondering whether his wife had finally lost whatever remained of her sanity. I grabbed the fur coat tighter around myself.

"We’re rich."

Cassian’s lips twitched. "Lucielle...we are already rich."

"NO...WE ARE MORE RICH!!! There’s a natural mana-stone source underneath our territory. Do you understand what this means?"

He stared at me for a moment. Then, very calmly, he said, "Our territory will become considerably more valuable."

I gasped.

"CONSIDERABLY?" I clutched my chest. "THIS ISN’T CONSIDERABLE. THIS IS MONEYYYYYYYYYYYY!"

Aurelius simply stared at me. Cassian? He reached over and gently pulled the fur coat more securely around my shoulders.

"My wife..." His voice was warm with amusement. "You seem unusually pleased."

"Of course I’m pleased!"

Five minutes ago, I had been worried about a glowing blue fox tail. Now? I had discovered that my husband’s territory might be sitting on top of a natural manna stone factory.

This wasn’t a territory anymore; this was an investment portfolio with snow. I turned toward Cassian. "We need to protect those mountains."

His smile faded slightly.

"Yes."

"And we need to control the mines."

"Yes."

"And we absolutely cannot let the Imperial Palace find out before we understand exactly what we have."

Cassian’s eyes darkened. "No one will touch Ashcroft’s resources without my permission."

I smiled; there it was, that terrifying grand-duke energy again. For once, I didn’t mind a villain standing beside me. I looked down at my absurdly expensive fur coat.

Then at the fox cub, then toward the mountains.

. . .

My life had started with me trying to survive a novel; now I was apparently managing magical resources, raising beast companions, negotiating with archmages, and wearing a coat expensive enough to probably have its own political influence.

Hehehehehe....

I thought discovering a fortune beneath Ashcroft would solve our problems. I didn’t realize we’d just painted a target on our backs.

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