I Married Because I Wanted To Live A Normal Life Chapter 70

Chapter 70

“Baron Ensis.”

At Callen’s summons, a woman approached him with brisk steps. Presenting the documents she had been organizing, she began to explain something.

A man passing by in the corridor noticed the scene and lightly nudged his colleague’s side.

“Is it just my imagination, or does His Excellency seem to be in a good mood lately?”

“I don’t know. I can’t really tell.”

The red-haired man always had a cheerful smile, so his current appearance, seriously discussing something with the woman, might have been more accurately described as more taciturn than usual.

“No, something is different from usual. You know how difficult it was to get approvals for a while after Lady Avenue left, right? He was picky about a single spelling mistake, and the approval speed for anything was incredibly slow.”

“Well… when she was here, there was essentially a checking stage before submitting something for approval.”

“But now, approvals are coming through faster than ever! It’s like he just stamps it without even looking as long as it’s passed the Baron’s desk!”

“Ah, come to think of it, you haven’t been working at the palace for very long, have you?”

Ronwell looked at the man staring at him with newly sparkling eyes.

That’s why his eyes are still so full of life. In contrast, Ronwell looked at the woman talking with Callen with the eyes of a dead fish.

Ronwell knew the young lady of the Catlan family well. After all, he had been working at the palace since before Callen Ophius was thrust into this chaos in place of his older brother, who had been in a sudden accident.

The fact that Callen, the second son, inherited the marquisate and was suddenly burdened with a key position could only be described as a tragedy.

The previous marquis and his wife, the man’s parents, had passed away as soon as Callen came of age, and soon after, his brother and sister-in-law also met with an unfortunate accident.

Ronwell clearly remembered Callen’s arrival after his appointment, offering a cheerful first greeting that seemed at odds with the weight of the misfortune he carried.

At first, Ronwell had simply and carelessly presumed, Is he just a cold person, or was his family not very close? and moved on.

In truth, it would be more accurate to say he had no interest in Callen’s personal affairs at all.

That is, until he heard the servants whispering that they had never seen the lights off in his office within the palace.

“Lady Catlan… ah, she’s Baron Ensis now, isn’t she? Before the Baron came, the Marquis used to review every single document himself. But she was, you could say, the first person to change that work habit of his. Well… I suppose that’s how much he trusts her.”

“Aha, so the two of them have a deep trust!”

He was the second son, and he had been a knight.

With an adult older brother, he had no chance of inheriting the marquisate.

Whether it was out of pity for the man who had lost his entire family and even his sword in the midst of it all, or if it was to tell him to fulfill his use as an Ophius…

The former king had swiftly placed Callen, who was still disoriented from inheriting the family so soon, in the position of overseeing state affairs.

Some made jealous remarks, saying, ‘He’s climbing the ladder thanks to his family even after becoming a cripple as a knight,’ but, well, from Ronwell’s perspective, it was a harsh treatment similar to telling a man who had held a pen his entire life to go to a battlefield.

On top of that, the aide assigned to him shortly after was the daughter of the Catlan family, who had been in seclusion for a long time due to her health. Thinking about it now, he could somewhat understand why Callen had been uncharacteristically difficult with her at first.

However, the Catlan’s daughter, who was rumored to be inflexible, did not clash with the Marquis. Instead, as time went on, she adapted quite well.

The sight of her listening to Callen’s irritable instructions with the eyes of a dead fish, as if thinking, He’s spouting nonsense again… was quite impressive.

“The two of them are like comrades-in-arms.”

Did Liddell Catlan enter the palace with her head full of dreams?

In the end, they were in the same boat, forced by their circumstances to take on various tasks.

But those two, unexpectedly, navigated the problems that came their way quite well.

At first, Callen would throw unreasonable demands at her as if to test her abilities, but as Liddell handled all of them without complaint, something called trust clearly began to sprout between them.

And it was only then that Ronwell finally realized that Callen had not trusted anyone in this palace except for Liddell.

The man who, when he started the job, must have been unfamiliar with handling documents, yet was so wary of his surroundings that he read every single document that came to him.

He also realized that she was the first and only person he had ever let his guard down around.

“In that sense, from the perspective of someone who serves the Marquis, I’m also grateful that the Baron is by his side.”

The gazes of jealousy and distrust toward Callen had faded away with his clean handling of his work.

But his disposition of rarely trusting people remained, causing concern among those around him. Looking at his superior, Ronwell finished his words in a quiet voice.

***

Wow, I’m seriously going crazy.

“Baron, have you compiled the data?”

Does this make any sense?

“Did you find a solution for that matter I mentioned before?”

Why am I so…

“I have a question about the conference materials we talked about back then…”

Busy!!!

Of course, the biggest culprit, without a doubt, was that man who had somehow reverted to his old boss persona.

I threw a pile of documents onto the desk in my assigned office at the palace, then startled, I quickly gathered them up again.

Aargh, the documents I just neatly organized are getting mixed up.

It’s a dirty world where even when I vent my anger, it comes right back to me. I calmly reorganized the scattered papers and sank into my chair.

“…His shyness has gotten so much worse.”

I murmured to myself, clasping my hands and pressing them to my forehead as I thought deeply.

Of course, the Callen I first met was like that too. He showed no sign of trusting people. A cheerful-looking man who seemed like he would always snag the leader position wherever he went.

He didn’t trust me at all, as I had been in seclusion for a long time under the excuse of memory loss and poor health. He had even said, with a full smile on his face, that if I was that unwell, I could just pass the time and go back.

Thinking back on it now, I think his words provoked a stubbornness in me that was unlike me. Well, I had volunteered for the position to show my vassals that I was still capable, so I needed to show results too.

In the first place, Callen was just… so inefficient at his job. He seemed to have no knowledge of administration, and it was doubtful if he even understood the meaning of ‘oversight’.

If you’re going to handle everything by yourself, why does an organization exist, and why are there employees? Yet he insisted on grasping every single matter himself; he was as stubborn as they come.

After exchanging some saliva and thinly veiled insults with him with a smile, we managed to get along reasonably well.

But what was this situation now? Wasn’t this similar to the early days when he would dump work on me as if to say, ‘Go ahead and try it if you think you can’?

I thought he had improved a lot before I left for my marriage. What on earth was pushing him into a corner again?

Or was it the current situation that was making him that way…?

“…..”

I peeked at the documents I had tossed on the desk, then hung my head low.

It was a more complicated situation than I thought.

Kleinin was surrounded by the sea on one side. It was a country located at a gateway connecting continents, so if there was a border to the north, there was one to the south as well.

The monsters that had once appeared simultaneously throughout the kingdom without any warning were now pushing down from the north, but that didn’t mean they could be careless about the southern border.

So, the Catlan vassals weren’t just whining for no reason.

Moreover, paradoxically, because the northern nobles, led by the House of Firenze, were doing too good a job of blocking the monsters, the urgency of the situation had not yet hit the southern nobles.

Or perhaps it was due to their trust in the Carshion Empire, which was located in the north and served as a shield…

Sigh, more importantly than that.

I lay my head on the desk, my cheek squished, and muttered, “I miss Hisch.”

Not long after telling me he wanted to return to the territory, Hisch really did go back to Ensis.

I had smiled and seen him off at the time, but for some reason, as each day passed, his absence bothered me more and more. Even though I was the one who often left Hisch behind and wandered around alone.

Moreover, after going to Ensis, Hisch was surprisingly reclusive. It was difficult to even contact him through the video sphere, as if he were truly too busy to even catch his breath.

No, I’m busy too. But I can at least make time to see my husband’s face, sob…

Just then, someone knocked cautiously on the door.

“Baron, is now a good time? I wanted to ask for your opinion regarding the list of attendees for the coronation ceremony.”

Right, let’s just work. I shouted for the visitor to come in, then sat up straight from my slouched position and let out a deep sigh.