The Dragon Pace’s court fell silent as Grand Marshall Ciel strode through its gilded doors.

  Officials lined the vast hall like vultures awaiting carrion, their expressions hardening with practiced indignation. For days, whispers had spread of this upstart who dared disturb their carefully maintained order. Now was their moment to strike.

  A portly official with an immacutely groomed goatee stepped forward, each click of his shoes echoing like a judge's gavel. "Grand Marshall." His voice wavered despite his puffed chest. "Your recent activities demand expnation. The court has grounds for censure."

  "Oh, this will be interesting," the Lord of Union replied mirthfully. "Go on. What have I done wrong?"

  "You have exploited your office to create an uprising in the lower district."

  "Check Yi Tong's records. Those are orphanages providing sanctioned recruitment offers for promising youth."

  "You have arrested our productive citizens and held them for ransom."

  "Citizen who happen to have bounties," the Grand Marshall pointed out. "All of whom were given fair trials."

  The goateed man continued with strong but reduced bravado, "You have misappropriated their property!"

  "All of which has been auctioned in an open market. Fifty percent of the income went to the crown and the rest went to my funding. Every detail is kept in the public ledger."

  "Worst of all, you have unched unprovoked attacks on many of our cities!"

  "They are not attacks," Ciel reasoned. "I issued arrest warrants, certified by the Emperor himself, for investigation into Bckwing territory surrounding the capital. And it turned out I was right. Princes Er Long and Ming Xuan can testify that Exterminators were present in the area and we have confiscated many Bckwing facilities and research. The results of our undertaking can be seen in warehouse 25-Jingliu located in the inner district."

  The accusers gritted their teeth, but everything was within expectation. Conviction of an Emperor's friend wouldn't be easy, nor could it be done in a day. But little did they know such an opportunity would never arrive.

  "Now that we've cleared those minor points," Ciel's voice carried a hint of amusement, "let's discuss the actual problem."

  He called Xia forward. She began to set up a projecting stand and unrolled their research, recorded into a roll of paper filled with finest detail. "Namely, the court isn't being run efficiently." A stick slid into his hand with a swish, and pointed to a datacloud. "The Yulong Empire has taxation income of several billion and less than five percent is reinvested into projects, the majority went into paying debt and existing divisions; twenty percent of the total sum went into miscelneous spending." He squinted at the nervous court. "Anyone care to expin that?"

  The goateed official coughed, "Grand Marshall, those expenditures are needed to support our men working throughout the empire."

  "How?"

  The sudden question rang bells inside the survival instinct of various court members and ministers. Nuan--joined by Xia, who had successfully done her task--couldn't help but smirk upon seeing the discomfort in the room. Beside them Ming Xuan and Er Long watched amused and, obvious to all, Yi Tong unfurled a dragon-pattern folding fan to hide his smile.

  The interrogated official blinked, not noticing the rare and aware few observing his fumbling for show.

  "How what?"

  "How do you allocate the budget?" Ciel asked. "With all those officials and funds, it must be troublesome for money to be used effectively. Did your investments ever fix issues?" He swished his stick again, pointing at a graph detailing the steep spike in taxes. "Or did you promise the Emperor himself to fix the issue each year, then come back for more funds once the issue isn't fixed?"

  "This is outrageous," the official turned to his fellow scowling courtsmen and eunuchs. "Are you accusing us of misappropriating the nation’s wealth? We have been dedicating ourselves to Yulong for a lifetime. You can check our records."

  Ciel smiled. He knew there was no point. The officials must have already undered the money by sending it back and forth in their bureaucracy, creating mountains of paperwork and transactions which still resulted in no actual output, or raw materials and workforce being freed from limbo. The entire system was designed to accommodate taxation and capital entrapment.

  But that ended today.

  "I have no doubt of your loyalty to the Empire," he delivered the sweet condemnation. "Which is why I am sure you will not compin when I decide to rearrange how we collect taxes." He then turned to Mandrake, sitting high above them, wishing he could have popcorn. "My friend. How much funding did my division receive?"

  "Zero," the God-Emperor rang loud and clear.

  "Great," Ciel nodded. "I believe that number shall be our new standard then."

  The court of gold and jade fell silent as officials processed the implications of Ciel's words. Their perfectly maintained facades cracked like porcein under pressure. Every government employee heard those exchange of words, but the connotation behind them was alien to their mind.

  "W-What do you mean?" the pot-bellied accuser froze.

  "It means the Yulong Empire will begin phasing out taxation on our precious citizens. We have spiked more and more tithe, yet nothing ever got fixed, so," he reflected the enemy's words back at them, "as those who dedicate themselves to the Empire for a lifetime, shouldn't you let the people you dedicated yourself to choose how to spend their money?"

  A sweaty smell of fear thickened like custard as all who had their hand in the cookie jar sweat.

  "Grand Marshall, you might not know this but the central court employs many officials and workers," shrilled an excuse. "You are destroying their livelihoods! What about our hard-working soldiers?" The accuser quickly turned to Prince Er Long. "The military must be paid, and this pace must be maintained!"

  "Nonsense," Ciel said. "I managed to fund all my employees just fine without spending taxpayer money; in fact, I am here to tell you how." His next sentences smmed like an anvil dropping from the heavens. "We charge our citizens for goods and services. If they want utility, they have a choice to pay for that. Protection? They also have a choice to pay for a subscription service. State Newspapers? That is payable too."

  The Grand Marshall's stick of bureaucratic doom pointed at each county on his research. "Every county is our customer, and the Dragon Pace is to provide goods and services in an adequate and timely manner. We shall have premium pns and economic pns, all bundled to a package deal, depending on each county's needs. The sary of public employees shall be deducted from the revenue we gain by serving the people and the crown will keep twenty percent of the profit to run the inspection."

  "Inspection?" the government employees squeaked, rightfully dreading the words.

  "Yes, inspection," he repeated. "To maximize citizenry’s comfort and government revenue, the people must be making enough economic gain to pay for premium service. If they can't, we should investigate the issue to find any foul py or perhaps if the amount of payment is unnatural." He circled a certain area. "For example, an area this small should afford only economic pns, but if they go for Premium, it might because something funny is going on."

  The goateed man gulped. His palm wet.

  "Then we also need customer satisfaction surveys, after all we need our returning customers to happily pay for goods, isn't it?"

  One official, knowing their livelihood was on the line, walked out to face the grinder. "Grand Marshall," he spoke to the worst monster to haunt his nightmare. "This is highly inappropriate."

  "Why so? Are you suggesting we should force our citizens to bleed money for reasons they don't know and give nothing back in return? Aren't you supposed to put the Yulong Empire above your livelihood? Moreover, just think of all the possibilities from this model. Our workers are paid proportional to our revenue pie. If the people are prosperous and become more efficient, they demand more services which we will supply and your slice of the pie gets bigger. Won't you like that?"

  Then he dropped the proverbial axe.

  "Or is it less about income and more about control? I understand the joy of spending other people's money, but such an attitude is unhealthy, my friend. If you want to, I recommend you join the investment program."

  Ciel twisted his stick, revealing a hook sliding mechanically from its tip. He flicked his implement, hooking a hoop connected to transparent film which he dragged over his paper, dispying the map of the Southern Continent. Strands of color drawn on the pstic film overid on top of the presentation.

  "These are our new projects for the Dragon Scions sponsored service: utility, secured roads, magical highways, and so on. The First Prince has already put the down payment. The Second and Third Prince have already volunteered their men to guard and protect, but we need managers." He smiled at the official. "Given we will be rearranging the court hierarchies anyway, these projects are opportunities to consider whom to keep and who will be asked to resign from their position."

  The room temperature appeared to drop suddenly. Every soul knew the ancient parable: a cornered rat will fight to the death, but leave a way out and they will go for it without fail.

  One fleeing rat made themselves known.

  "I will volunteer for this project!"

  "Sir Grand Marshall, this man is corrupt," his best friend for convenience piled more fire into a roaring tension. "I volunteer instead!"

  "Stop it! I am supposed to be the spokesperson here!" yelled the goateed man.

  Nuan watched the officials set themselves on metaphorical fire, and whispered to her sworn sister, "They are screwed."

  "Absolutely," came the reply.

  "Gentlemen!" Ciel shouted and coughed to grab their attention. "I am aware you are eager to serve, hence I have already prepared a vetting process." He pointed at a certain area at the Empire's coast. "This area is supposed to be one of our most prosperous parts; however, the goods flowing circuting in it have been strangely deficient." He couldn't hide the frown, once again infecting his face after his failure to find tangible information. "And thus my vetting process is simple."

  There he voiced his final statements before the meeting's end.

  "You will go to this area, Gongsan Port, find what exactly happened there, and if possible solve the problem. The top ten contributors will be kept in my project. I believe this is fair."

  "This is good," Mandrake's words carried the weight of imperial decree. "I approve of the Grand Marshall's demand."

  Knowing they had no choice, the sweating officials bowed to the emperor.

  "We accept your decree, God-Emperor!"

  The meeting of the Dragon Pace came to a close, but the fallout leading to the spy war had only begun.