Reborn as a Mind-Reading Empress
Chapter 515: His Excellency Prepared It

Chapter 515: His Excellency Prepared It

"Nadia and her older siblings did their best to escape the fully guarded borders and find a way of survival outside their homeland. Three of their siblings remained to lead and protect their people while the elder ones searched for work to be able to bring home resources.

"Nadia and her brothers worked all kinds of jobs they could find while trying to remain in hiding due to Count Dempsey’s dirty ploys.

"When their jobs became too dangerous, her brothers asked her to find less dangerous jobs. It was then that Nadia encountered someone who recommended her as a guard to Count Cordelia’s daughter. And as I have said earlier, it was then that she was able to study.

"She passed the exams, but since her name was published in public, Nadia was found by Count Dempsey’s people and was returned to her homeland.

"She once again returned to mining every single day for food. And everything became so much worse than before since the Count became even more strict with security and even had his ally magicians deploy a lot of monsters at the borders," Arabella related.

[It was like that? Nadia did not tell us earlier it was this bad.]

"How was she able to head here then?" Narcissa inquired.

"Because she was summoned here for the selection. When the summons for her was received by Count Dempsey, he had Nadia retrieved from Safiro and it was only then that they let her dress well. They made her eat a lot every single day to the point she vomited several times.

"They forced her to eat a lot, to gain some flesh. It was so her malnourished and too skinny body would not reveal something was wrong in Safiro."

[Oh, so that’s why she didn’t look like the people from their duchy who looked like skin and bones.]

"They also required her to wear gloves at all times so her rough calloused hands would not reveal she had been working hard."

[Ah, so that was why she always wore gloves before. But her hands don’t look calloused anymore though. Has it already healed?]

"You can see her not wearing gloves now since her hands and all injuries and scars from everything she went through had been healed by His Eminence as part of His Majesty’s reward to them," Arabella added.

"I had promised Nadia that she would not go hungry here. So, if you had prevented her from receiving her daily meals, I would have punished you immediately. No explanations from you would have saved you from punishment for denying her something I have promised.

Nadia is also a knight now so she’s also under His Majesty’s protection. Anything you do to her could also be punished by His Majesty as something committed against the honor of the knighthood and likewise against the law protecting all civil servants," Arabella reiterated in a stern voice and Narcissa gulped.

Arabella gestured to Riley, and he brought her the documents Nadia had worked on the past few days.

"These are documents Nadia had worked on the past few days. Check them and you’ll see for yourself that just like Ivan, Nadia had no need for cheating."

Arabella silently sipped her tea and let Narcissa scan the documents.

[It’s all well done. Even better than how I did the documents I got from her.] Narcissa frowned. It grew further the more documents she reviewed as she realized that Nadia performed better than her.

"Nadia did not need to cheat. Do you understand now?" Arabella asked after Narcissa checked all the documents.

"Yes, Your Majesty," Narcissa had no other choice but to admit it or she would be embarrassing herself. Narcissa also did well on the documents she got from Nadia that she worked on, but Nadia did better than her.

Arabella then told Narcissa about Odette’s situation.

"In Odette’s case, her activities may have been limited but her access to their library was not. Prudencia was once a progressive kingdom, so it had a wide collection of books. And Odette was the brightest among her siblings. She was already prone to studying before Prudencia became a part of Valeria.

"Odette had a strong faith coupled with a bright mind, diligence, hard work, and a love for her people. And in Odette’s case, her siblings’ lives were at stake. Just like Nadia, she wanted to work in the palace for the sake of helping alleviate the situation in her homeland, save her siblings and their people, and help ease everyone’s suffering.

"These are the documents Odette worked on the past few days," Arabella also let Narcissa review Odette’s work.

[It’s also very well done. How come it’s also better than mine?!]

Narcissa bit her lip as she realized that even Odette had a much better output compared to how she did the documents she got from Odette’s supposed workload.

"Odette also did not cheat," Arabella concluded and Narcissa silently nodded in defeat.

"It was His Excellency who organized that selection for me, and he closely worked with His Eminence to prepare everything and ensure that cheating of any form does not happen," Arabella revealed and Narcissa was wide-eyed.

"Eh? It’s the His Excellency who prepared that?!"

[And His Eminence also helped even in the preparations?]

"Yes. After hearing from Ivan that you thought he cheated, I asked His Excellency for any chance that cheating of any form or stealing the documents could have happened, but he said no. If someone did try, the person would have been caught by His Eminence immediately or the person would have died from the protection spells His Eminence had cast.

"Thus, there is no need to investigate whether they cheated or not because, in the first place, it was not possible with the setup that His Excellency and His Eminence had prepared for the selection.

"Cheating would have only been possible if there was a magician among the participants who was more powerful than His Eminence. Do you think someone like that exists here?"

[Someone more powerful than His Eminence? No way! He is said to be the most powerful magician in all of Eliora. No, in the whole world.]