"Do you think someone set the fire deliberately?" Arevalo looked cautiously at Hesta. "Was it aimed at me?"
"Not necessarily at you. It could have been aimed at us," Hesta said. "There are too many people and too many loose tongues on the farm, after all—I have an idea, Governor..."
Hesta leaned close and whispered a few words to Arevalo. His brow slowly furrowed.
"To be honest, I don't like your idea," the old man said quietly, looking at Hesta. "But I don't care—as long as you can still fulfill your responsibilities in practical terms."
"Of course."
That afternoon, Elu brought back some bad news that made Stella howl in anguish—after obtaining Kovishik's consent, he had conducted a simple verification of House Schiller's assets with the help of two advisers.
Some things were difficult to state too plainly, so he had not exposed them in front of Kovishik. But afterward, he sat down with the two advisers for several hours of in-depth discussion and reached a conclusion—Kovishik was not as wealthy as he believed himself to be.
"It's not that he deceived you," Elu said. "This sort of thing happened often on the Wasteland in the past. The older generation accumulated many farms and estates, but when the children took over, the stewards and even the hired hands who had worked those estates all their lives would deliberately conceal the real accounts or simply embezzle the assets outright—after all, the young master wouldn't be able to tell."
"What do you mean? He looks glamorous, but he's actually broke?" Stella's heart leaped into her throat. "No!"
"No, ma'am. He simply doesn't have the means to produce two hundred million at once," Elu said. "We went over the accounts. The total amount that can be liquidated within two weeks is probably