The Low-Ranking Civil Servant Wants to Achieve Success-Chapter 59

Kibon was utterly composed. Even his gestures were graceful.

Of course, that was because I had instructed him in advance on exactly how to act.

“Haah...”

The Finance Minister looked like he was on the verge of tears.

Well, of course. The numbers are perfect.

I had already calculated how much budget the Finance Ministry could afford to give us.

The number I proposed had to be the exact maximum the Minister had been mentally bracing himself for.

It probably lined up with what a full audit would cost if things got messy.

Since it’s money we’d need anyway, we may as well secure a hefty initial budget upfront.

I smiled gently as I looked at the Finance Minister.

Breathing heavily, he finally muttered,

“It’s your first budget. From next year on, the Scroll Department’s budget will be based on this number. Fine, I’ll do 3x. Let’s call it that.”

“......”

“Okay, okay—fine! I’ll go as high as 5x. That’s a generous offer, isn’t it?”

“......”

Dragging it out wouldn’t change the fact that this was a numbers game.

Eventually, the Minister stomped his foot and shouted,

“If you’d just asked for 10x, I could’ve at least yelled at you for being ridiculous! But no, you just had to ask for something maddeningly reasonable! Ugh!”

“......”

“Screw it. 7x! You get 7 times the original amount!”

“Ah, yes. Thank you.”

That was when it happened.

Right beside me, blood gushed from Kibon’s nose with a wet splatter.

“Oh my god! Kibon? Are you okay?!”

Startled, I tilted his head back instinctively.

His skin was already pale—so with the bright red blood, the visual impact was intense.

Kibon himself looked a bit surprised.

“Excuse me. I’ll step out for a moment.”

Holding tissues to his nose, he rushed out of the Minister’s office.

The Finance Minister recoiled in horror.

“Wasn’t that the intern who couldn’t even speak the Imperial language properly? How hard have you been working him?”

“W-Well...”

Even I was caught off guard.

Truthfully, he had been working overtime every day since his first day.

But it had to be done.

Securing that first budget from the Finance Ministry was critical. We needed to be perfectly prepared.

“Just... enough to get all this written up? Though, I did draft most of the outlines myself.”

I gestured toward the mountainous stack of reports.

The Minister stared, jaw hanging open.

“...You’ve written all of this already? Is that even possible?”

“That’s why we’ve been doing overtime.”

I’ll admit—it had been exhausting. But it couldn’t be helped.

I don’t want to just be a figurehead Minister dropped in by the Tower. And I want my team to finally eat in peace at the cafeteria!

Sure, saving the Empire from collapse was important, but now that there wasn’t an emergency, I figured it was time to prioritize my own life a little.

I’ve been dreaming of this ever since I first joined this department...

So I got fired up. But clearly, it had pushed Kibon way too far.

Mumbling nervously, I added,

“But we never pulled an all-nighter. He always left by ten every night...”

“Really?”

The Finance Minister tilted his head.

“Then that young man must be in poor shape. It’s not like he was up all night. And he’s bleeding from this? He looks sturdy...”

Classic high-performing official. He didn’t even count a few days of overtime as real work.

I do count it, personally, but if I’d known it was enough to make him bleed, I would’ve been more careful.

“He eats separately, never chats, always goes home... I thought he’d be fine.”

“Hmm. Doesn’t that reduce half the fatigue of overtime? He’s really frail.”

“Right? I even made sure he got his own snacks.”

“That’s important. If that’s the case, then he’s just weak. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

The Minister and I were chatting when we both blinked in surprise.

Wait—why is this conversation going so smoothly?

“Um... well.”

The mood wasn’t bad at all.

With Kibon’s nosebleed as the strange catalyst, we’d stumbled into a weird sense of camaraderie.

I rolled my eyes and grinned.

“Thank you again, truly, for the budget.”

I patted the reports and said,

“I know setting an initial budget like this is a risk. But I promise, I’ll make sure it’s not wasted. I’ll show you results.”

The Finance Minister folded his arms and studied me for a moment.

Then he gave a dry chuckle.

“I approved it because I believe in you. That project proposal earlier wasn’t half bad.”

“Then why start off at 1.2x?”

“It’s my job to slash numbers first, you know that.”

He gestured to his assistant waiting outside the office.

The assistant’s eyes widened at the reports Kibon and I had put together.

“Make copies of all these and have them sent to the Finance Ministry. Clear off my desk.”

So even though he said he trusted me, he still intended to personally go over everything from the beginning.

That kind of thoroughness—I loved it.

Something I’d never once seen in my former supervisors since joining the civil service.

“A big budget is a double-edged sword. Make it count.”

“Really, thank you. I’ll never forget this moment, and I promise I won’t let you down.”

“That’s not something to say so half-heartedly.”

“I’ll give it everything I’ve got—body and soul, with full sincerity, for the good of this department.”

“Still too light.”

“I’ll make it worth the money.”

“Yes! That’s what I want to hear! That’s the kind of attitude I expect!”

He clapped me on the shoulder once.

I could tell it was his version of encouragement.

And then, he stood up with a groan.

“Geez. In the end, I got completely cleaned out.”

Yet he looked almost cheerful for someone who’d just been “robbed.”

“Completely fleeced! Hmph!”

Then, almost as an afterthought, he tossed out a question.

“Victor’s on his way, right?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You know he’s my adopted son, right? Nosy guy—he must’ve been friendly at the Academy.”

Back in school, it was actually harder to find someone not friendly with Victor.

He somehow got along with everyone.

Even me—who wasn’t particularly social—ended up being close with him.

[If it were Victor-sunbae, maybe...]

Luka had a reason for saying that.

“You two got along in the Scroll Management Department, right? Then again, who didn’t get /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ along with that guy. I’d been planning to pull him into the Finance Ministry as soon as he returned, but...”

The Minister’s gaze drifted thoughtfully.

“I suppose letting him work under you for a while wouldn’t be so bad.”

“I see.”

“Don’t you want to ask why?”

He smirked, turning away.

Then he suddenly muttered without looking back,

“If you two decided to get married, I’d approve.”

“I see.”

“Don’t you want to ask why I’m saying that out of nowhere?”

With a dry laugh and no further explanation, he really did leave.

Even after the Finance Minister disappeared, Kibon still hadn’t returned.

So I was left alone in the Minister’s office.

Phew...

Still—mission accomplished. We secured our first budget.

All that overtime had paid off. I could finally breathe.

That crisis is over now...

It was clear the Finance Minister had taken a liking to me.

Things should go more smoothly at the next cabinet meeting.

Even more so if I could show results. ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom

First things first—Kibon needs some time off. Those past few days of overtime must’ve been a serious strain.

A nosebleed? He was weaker than I thought.

If things kept up like this, his survival instinct might start outweighing his ambition.

I can’t lose someone this competent.

As soon as Kibon came back from the restroom, I’d put him on mandatory leave.

I had to reassure him—things wouldn’t always be this intense.

Now’s the time. Before he writes a resignation letter.

He’d already quit once before, after all.

If I wanted to keep him, I had to show that I cared—even just a little.

I leapt up from my chair and ran out of the Minister’s office.