At that question, Haines's excited expression froze. A moment later, he slumped in dejection.
"Xu Yi, I thought you'd come to cheer me on. I never expected you to bring up such a depressing subject." Baron Haines seemed to grow weary all at once. He found a chair, sat down, and waved irritably. "Leslie and the count have both spoken to me about this, urging me to return to Anvilmar immediately. My family has sent people to press me, too. But whenever I think about spending every day in that boring city after I return, breathing its stifling air and facing all those lifeless people, I simply can't bring myself to want to go back."
At that point, Baron Haines paused and took a deep breath. He looked out the window, his face filled with bliss.
"Just think how wonderful life is here. I may get a little less sleep each day, and the food isn't as good as it is at home, but every day I'm filled with passion. I feel brimming with energy from head to toe. In all my life, I've never found anything that excited me so much, something I could throw myself into so completely. I even feel that what I'm doing now is a great undertaking I should devote my entire life to. By comparison, becoming one of those hypocritical politicians or one of those merchants reeking of corruption would only make me feel I'd be better off dead."
"Xu Yi, did you know that just the day before yesterday, our Bunta Daily reported on something that happened outside the city? A minor noble raped an ordinary farmer's daughter, and in her shame and anguish, she threw herself into the river. Normally, the whole affair would probably have been hushed up. Nothing would have