On the third floor of the coal exchange building.
Uncle, with his fist clenched, looked unsure in front of his exhausted niece.
"I’m really sorry about this. I told you I’d leave everything to you, but I showed up like this all of a sudden. But you see, things took an unexpected turn…"
"Don’t lie! It was all planned from the beginning."
At that mont, a loud cheer erupted from the lower floor.
The entire coal exchange was buzzing with activity.
So seed to be crying tears of joy.
The sound of footsteps shook the entire building.
Everyone seed overwheld with joy, not knowing how to react.
Of course, they would be.
They had thought they would all beco unemployed overnight, but they had survived. And they would continue doing the sa work.
Pierre spun his hat in his hand and said, "No, think about it. Did we really have the resources to send dozens of our employees here from the beginning? The cost? The conditions for their training? And the chaos that would have occurred while they settled in? It’s best to just keep them employed."
"Then you should have explained it that way from the beginning. What’s the point of all this? Just . Do you know how hostile those people have been looking at for the past few days?"
Pierre smiled as he looked at the complaining Anais.
"Thanks to that, we’ve reduced the expected labor costs by nearly 70%. If we had approached it in a more cooperative manner from the beginning, we wouldn’t have been able to cut it by even 30%. Because you were so determined to cut them all, my appearance ca to be seen as a Saviour to them."
Anais had many complaints, but it was hard for her to deny his words.
In the world of comrce, if there was any hint of dissatisfaction on your side, there would be nothing more to negotiate.
"This is what they call ’push and pull’ happening on the spot. It’s a fundantal negotiation skill. As a rchant, you should always have the attitude to negotiate under any circumstances. Even if you’re wandering through the desert and soone suddenly appears and demands gold coins for the water you desperately want, you should just clench your fist and calmly ask, ’Why should I buy that?’"
Anais thought carefully about his words, calming her anger.
Push and pull.
Similar concepts included the carrot and the stick.
She had heard of these concepts before.
But she didn’t know they could be used like this.
If she had been just reading docunts at ho, she would never have experienced this.
"Anyway, this ti, you did well. These complicated mining rights would have required dozens of company employees to stick together for months, but you handled it all by yourself."
"I wasn’t alone. There were a few other employees, and besides, there’s Mars…"
Anais quickly closed her mouth.
Mars was a trouble-shooter who helped Vergsong Company in the field.
He was an expert in information gathering and rumor tracking.
This ti, she was able to resolve the complicated mining rights issue not only because of her brilliant mind but also thanks to his substantial support.
It would be nice to gather and pop open a bottle of champagne together, but he didn’t like revealing himself.
Especially, he didn’t like his na being ntioned.
He claid that he could hear the voice calling his na no matter where he was in the world.
If the public were to learn about his existence and his na, he might find it impossible to sleep due to the echoes of people’s voices in his head.
So he lived in hiding.
Only three people within the company knew his na.
Geralt, Pierre, and Anais.
Others usually referred to him as "the hound brought information" or "the hound went tracking."
"…In any case, the help from the others was significant."
"Hehe, no need to be so modest. They were all intimidated by the charisma of the Iron Mask."
The Iron Mask.
Anais frowned.
"Don’t call that way! What’s ’Iron Mask’? A iron mask! Isn’t it too intimidating as a nickna for a girl like ?"
"Haha, wasn’t it thanks to that mask that no one tried to push you away? If you had threatened with a child’s face, would it have worked out as smoothly? The Iron mask set the mood right, and thanks to it, my ’pulling’ worked perfectly."
That’s how they discussed the aftermath of their recent mission.
Not long after, the director of the coal exchange ca up.
He had only been down for less than 30 minutes, but he was already tipsy and emotional.
"Haha, this cake was originally for a farewell party! Now it’s for celebration! Cheers!"
He placed plates with cakes in front of Pierre and Anais and went back to enjoy the party.
Anais watched his back as he went downstairs.
Perhaps because he was drunk.
He had forgotten that Anais couldn’t eat.
Instead, she received nutrition through a tube attached to her back.
It had been this way since last year.
When she was five years old, the machine was only used for about two hours a day to assist her breathing.
But as the years went by, her lungs weakened, and the ti she spent wearing the mask increased.
Since last year, it had beco impossible to take it off even for a mont.
Of course, she could technically eat if she wanted to.
Taking off the respirator wouldn’t imdiately stop her lungs from functioning.
But given the inconvenience of the process and the mory of how her stomach reacted with seizures when she tried to eat once, it was easier to just give up.
Now she was forgetting what sweetness, saltiness, and bitterness even were.
The only thing that touched her tongue was the cold air coming through the tal filter.
"No…"
Would she have to live like this, bound to a tal device until she died?
Without ever sharing warmth with another person?
Was that her fate?
"Anais."
What was going on in her uncle’s head?
What was the ’Iron Mask’ he ntioned?
All she wanted was…
All she wanted was just…
"Anais!"
Her uncle’s shout.
She looked up.
Her uncle was looking at her with a sad expression.
His gaze montarily went down.
Anais looked at her own hand.
The fork she was holding was not piercing the cake; she was crushing it.
Without realizing it, her emotions had gotten the best of her as she struggled with food she couldn’t even eat.
She placed the cake back on the table.
The plate made a shaky noise.
Her excitent had subsided, but her trembling didn’t stop.
Then, Pierre handed her a handkerchief.
"Wipe your tears."
"Ah."
Anais touched the upper part of her mask.
It was filled with tears.
It had flowed from her eyes.
"My pretty face is going to be ruined."
"Well, you are not that pretty, to be honest."
"Again, again."
Anais wiped her tears with the handkerchief until she felt a slight pain.
Pierre watched her with a teasing grin.
"Tsk tsk, I envy you. I really do. Being a cry-baby. What will your future husband say?"
"…Do you think I’ll get married?"
"Are you advocating for singlehood?"
In response to Pierre’s mischievous question, Anais spoke with a sowhat sulky voice.
"Who would want to marry …"
Anais looked at her own body.
There were tubes for injecting specially balanced air into her mask,
Tubes for regulating the pressure to make her chest expand and contract on her back,
and tubes for injecting nutrients into her side.
And from the tal mask covering her nose and mouth, there was the sound of air hissing through the filters.
In the back of the room, the machinery kept making a continuous noise as it ran.
"Tsk tsk, look at that look in your eyes. So, is that how you plan to catch the man of your dreams?"
"…I’ll just catch him."
"Love isn’t that easy, you know. Love is like a strategy ga. Like I said earlier, it’s about giving and taking. That’s important even in relationships between n and won."
"Can’t you just like soone because you like them?"
Pierre chuckled as if he had heard the most innocent statent ever.
"Negotiating in relationships is sowhat similar. You need skills to push and pull, to hold and shake the other person’s hand."
He mimicked crushing sothing invisible with his clenched fist.
Anais raised her eyebrows at his words.
"But Uncle Pierre, you can’t even do that with Aunt Renaud, right?"
His grip on his fist loosened as he let out an awkward laugh.
"Well, you see… So things you really want, you just can’t help it, even if it ans losing everything else."
"Really want sothing… even if it ans losing everything else?"
Anais looked dreamy, as if lost in thought.
Pierre thought that was enough consolation for now.
So, he added a more practical piece of advice.
"No, rember this. If you wander through the desert and soone appears before you with sothing you really, really want, it might be poisoned."
***
Anais was startled awake by a loud crashing noise.
She blinked her eyes open and looked around.
It was her office, set up in a room at the tropol Hotel.
The ti was late morning, with the sunlight streaming in from the south-facing window.
She had fallen asleep on her desk while reviewing the docunts she had been working on.
That’s probably why she had that dream.
A few papers lay scattered on the desk – sothing about coal mine managent, coal reserves estimates, and low-carbon (???). It was related to a mining district under Vergsong rchant Guild’s control.
She had been reviewing those docunts before she dozed off.
Was that why she had that dream?
Her mind wandered back to a few weeks of outings when she was ten.
For Anais, who rarely ventured outside the mansion, those were so of her precious mories.
It seed ridiculous that the person who had tried to kill her during those outings often appeared in her dreams.
"What was that noise just now? Did Porsche cause it?"
"They seed to be practicing sothing in the circus troupe."
He gestured toward the window.
Anais approached and looked down at the garden.
Whatever they were doing, the once ticulously maintained garden was now a ss, covered in dirt.
It seed like sothing like fireworks or explosives, had gone off.
Anais quickly scanned the people in the area.
The person she was looking for stood out imdiately.
A handso young man with blonde hair and a black suit was near the site of the explosion.
Though his suit and cloak were dirty, he appeared unhard.
Anais breathed a sigh of relief but then froze.
It was because of the purple-haired woman peeking through his cloak.
The spider woman, Yurakne.
One of the mbers of the circus troupe.
Perhaps at the mont of the explosion, he had shielded her with his cloak.
Clang.
Anais’s fingers lightly scratched the window as she clenched her fist.
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