HERALD OF STEEL

Lady Nanazin’s mind was initially occupied trying to guess what excuse Alexander was going to give Ptolomy about her. She herself had a few ideas and wanted to compare them with Alex’s, discussing them in greater detail.

But it seemed the man was not interested. And remembering the potential deal with her father, the lady too felt this was not a big deal. Ptolomy would be asked to forget about her anyway.

Thus she quickly turned her attention to this new report that Alexander gave regarding the Queen mother and her daughter, raising her brows in surprise, “Are they now? Both of them! Hmm… when did it happen?”

Although this conception was very much expected, the confirmation still made the lady a bit curious. She wanted the gossip like all women.

“Pasha Farzah wrote to me about it a few days ago. He did not mention any specific date but I imagine they should be due soon.” Alexander simply recounted, slightly pursing his lips, “He also told me that Mikaya’s wedding had been arranged around the same time and asked me to join. Did you not also know about that?”

Alexander asked, thinking the two women would keep in touch given they were quite close.

“No, after I got to Zanzan, I basically stopped talking to everyone I knew.” However Lady Nanazin subtly shook her head, curving her eyes, “Whatever news I occasionally hear, I only pick it up from the few talks I have with the various ladies here. I don’t know anything else.”

The tone in her voice seemed neutral, however, Alexander clearly sensed a hidden bitterness. And this was only natural- anyone would find it hard to accept having all their friends and previous contacts forever removed.

But even if Lady Nanazin wanted to keep in touch, it was hardly an easy thing to do in this day and age, even for a lady as privileged as her. There was really only one way to privately send letters between provinces and it was through personal couriers- i.e. a man would personally carry the item with him on horseback or on foot.

And in such cases, the sender would naturally have to compensate the man for the travel, food, lodging, and transport. And it could not be just one way- they would have to also include the return journey as well, thus making the trip prohibitively expensive.

For example – sending a rider from Zanzan to the capital cost more than 200 ropals at a minimum if not even double that if the weather and road were not good enough.

This was clearly a huge expense impossible to bear for but the most privileged of the top 1% of the 1%.

And although Alexander gave the lady a decent stipend of 1,000 ropals on top of taking care of all her expenses, Lady Nanazin was still reluctant to spend so much on a simple letter. Especially when it was just to gossip.

As for using bird messenger, not only were they very limited in their information capacity, but such methods were really used only for emergencies.

Because remember once you sent a bird, someone had to then manually bring it back to use it once again. Only if the traveling distance was within a 150 km range could specially trained birds automatically travel back and forth, usually taking a whole day.

‘Hmmm, I really should get a good postal system going,’ While hearing the lady’s words, Alexander mused to himself as such, ‘The ones we have all are fragmented and localized. It is too inefficient.’

Adhania did have a sort of postal system but it was really a fragmented mess of various powers doing their own things while promising to cooperate.

There was no standardization on how the goods should be delivered, they were quite expensive due to a lot of it being privately owned, very slow due to having only a few relay stations and entirely restricted to the high class nobility and clergy.

The entire network was really only capable of delivering orders from the king and nobility of Matbar (Marquiss) and above with any sort of reliable efficiency.

“Who is it?”

Alexander’s rumination on how to improve his transport system was suddenly snapped by this ask from above, as Lady Nanazin curiously repeated, “Who is Mikaya getting married to?”

“…” And slightly widening his eyes, it took a while for Alexander to answer, mostly because he tried to recall the exact contents of the letter.

“…. Some son of a pasha. I can’t remember the exact details.” Until he at last listlessly chimed, failing to remember even the name.

And the fact that he could not even remember which of the 10 possible pashas it was, really went to show just how disinterested Alexander was in the whole affair.

In his mind, whatever happened with Mikaya or whatever alliance Pasha Farzah made with others, he could not care less.

The only thing that mattered to him was Zanzan and its immediate lands.

“…” But then when he felt Lady Nanazin giving him a pallid, unimpressed look at the less than ideal answer, Alexander felt a bit ashamed, and hurriedly swinging his palm towards his study outside the room, defensively noted, ‘Don’t get angry, I am just a bit drunk right now. Hehehe… I have the letter on my desk. You can check in the morning yourself.”

“….*Sigh*,” Lady Nanazin just softly caressed Alexander’s hair after a while, deciding not to chide him like she wanted to.

Instead, she gently advised, “I know you do not like to care about these things, finding them a bore. But you really should pay at least some attention. Else you might suddenly find an army at your border without even knowing it!”

“…. Mmmm… I will be careful. I was just a bit too busy these days.” Alexander too decided not to argue about this, and just casually promised to take the advice seriously.

And then suddenly, without much thought asked, “Are you sad that Mikaya did not invite you to her wedding? She could have easily sent you a letter.”

Given how interested Lady Nanazin seemed in the topic, it was too easy to see that she very much cared about this. They were after all friends, having even been trained together under Lady Inayah.

And given Mikaya was of course not bound by the financial and political restrictions like Lady Nanazin, it would have all too easy to send her a ‘wedding card’ through the courier already visiting Alexander.

So the fact that she had not…

It must have surely hurt Lady Nanazin to not have even received a single word about such an important event.

“Hahaha, no, no, Mikaya and I are not that close.” The mature lady however quickly shook her head, a light grin gracing her face, “We might have spent a few nights in those parties but… we are not really that close. Besides I would not be able to go even if I wanted to.” The lady casually brushed away her hands dismissively as she said this like it was a minor thing not even worth mentioning.

However, despite her chuckling countenance, it was all too easy for even a blind to see how the mature lady was really feeling.

The two were in reality quite close- the fact that Lady Nanazin told Mikaya about her daughter’s father clearly proved that bond. So even if she could not attend the wedding, the Matrak princess should have at least let her know of her big day.

It was a matter of basic courtesy.

“….I am sorry. I was sure you received the news.” Thus Alexander quickly apologized, a guilty undertone hanging in his voice. He even promised himself to ask Mikaya why she missed such an obvious point.

“…..” While Lady Nanazin only smiled and shook her head, not blaming Alexander, before suddenly changing the topic. “Will you be taking any of your wives?”

“No! I offered, but they are too busy.” Alexander swiftly noted, getting a crisp hum of approval from above.

“Mmmm… that is good. I would not put it past that bastard to want to do something with them in his anger.”

Alexander immediately frowned at the words… and this time the gesture was a genuine one- dark and foreboding, a violent surge of anger swirling in his heart.

He subconsciously wanted to ask exactly what Lady Nanazin feared, but deep down he knew it quite well himself- it was a thought that was too disgusting to even contemplate.

Fortunately, Alexander found it not too hard to cool down given this topic was still completely imaginary. No one had even heard it.

“Will taking Azira and Azura be a problem?” So he slightly changed direction, revealing, “I want to marry them.”

“….” Lady Nanazin did not immediately answer but glancing down, produced an almost sardonic smile. And it was not difficult to guess why.

Here she was begging the man to marry his daughters, yet he was salivating over two other girls.

Not only that he was saying he was going to ‘marry’ them… i.e.- take them as his wives, not lowly mistresses.

How could as a mother Lady Nanazin feel not even a bit slightly offended?

“No, the twins…. Ptolomy will not dare touch them.” But in the end, she did not blame Alexander and answered crisply.

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