Project Necro is an official initiative by Re:Library.

The Ducal Estate of Jurmagna, in the Imperial Capital.
Among the three great ducal houses—no, among all the powerful nobles who maintain residences in the capital—the Jurmagna estate is by far the largest. It boasts vast grounds containing large barracks and a training field for knights, as well as a library that holds one of the imperial nation’s finest collections of rare books on the Astra Empire.

In the early days following the founding of the empire, Jurmagna was prosperous. Their domain lay in the vast plains and marshlands of the east, regions already rich with farmland.
The nation’s founder, Emperor Piotr the Great, granted his youngest brother Pavel—founder of the Jurmagna line—a territory that was easy to govern. It was both a reward for Pavel’s military brilliance, which had repeatedly saved his brother from peril, and a consideration for his lack of aptitude in civil administration.

Pavel was deeply moved and renewed his oath of loyalty to the emperor. To ensure that his gratitude would be remembered through generations, he left a family precept:
As long as House Jurmagna endures, it shall serve the Imperial Family through the strength of arms and the art of war.
And further: they shall not rely solely on martial prowess, but cultivate their humanity through the study of ancient wisdom.

By virtue of this creed, Jurmagna has continued to maintain its great knightly order since the nation’s founding. The research institute on the Astra Empire, established by the founder himself, also remains active.
The funds to support all this came from their vast agricultural lands.

Nearly four hundred years have passed since then.

.

When Vladimir entered the lord’s study, his father Georgiy was shouting at the butler about something.

“You called for me, Father?”
“Oh, Vladimir!”

Turning toward his son, Georgiy roared in a booming voice. His massive, muscular body—easily twice the size of his slender son’s—trembled with rage.

“That upstart, Aleksei, has dismissed another lady’s maid! Insolent brat—he’s been brazen since childhood, but this is beyond disrespect! How pitiful for the noble lady!”

The “noble lady” he spoke of was, of course, Aleksei’s grandmother, Lady Alexandra.

“Lately even Nova and Sein have grown dismissive of the Imperial Family. We, the House of Magna, are the only ones who still keep true loyalty! It falls upon us to correct this decline—”
“So that dismissed maid has come here, asking to be employed instead?”

Vladimir cut in coolly, interrupting his father’s speech. Georgiy frowned at the interruption but nodded.

“Yes. Do something about it.”
“What do you intend me to do—hire her?”

Georgiy’s eyes widened in disbelief.

“Fool! The problem is that the maid still lives! Why did she not take her own life when her mistress passed away? What disloyalty! To take such a person into service is unthinkable!”
“Understood. I will deliver your message, then—Zahar, you heard him.”
“Yes, sir.”

The butler Zahar bowed deeply.
But Georgiy clicked his tongue.

“If she cannot even die in loyalty, then tell her to avenge her mistress instead! If she strikes down that young wretch who murdered the lady, I will forgive her disloyalty.”
“Father.”
“Hmph. None have yet seen the truth, but they cannot deceive my eyes. The lady was in fine health—her sudden death makes no sense. And not only her—Aleksandr as well! They call it an accident, yet we’ve heard no details. That cold-blooded Aleksei committed the crime of parricide. I can feel it.”
“Father… must you still insist on such things?”

Vladimir’s voice was frigid.

“Aleksei would never harm Lady Alexandra. After all, it was he himself who petitioned for her remains to be buried in the Imperial mausoleum.”

Ordinarily, as a princess who had married out of the royal family, Alexandra’s body should have been interred in the ducal mausoleum of her husband’s house, Jurnova. But Aleksei had personally requested that she be buried in the royal mausoleum, saying that his grandmother had always cherished her pride as a princess above all else. Emperor Konstantin himself had granted that petition.
No doubt Aleksei had not wanted to lay his grandmother to rest beside his grandfather, in the family tomb of Jurnova.

.

“The body is the greatest proof. If he had harmed her, there would be traces of it. If Aleksei were guilty, he would have buried Lady Alexandra in the Nova family mausoleum. He isn’t the sort of man who would carelessly cast aside a potential weakness.”
“…There are cases where no trace remains.”

Georgiy’s voice was low—and faintly amused.
Vladimir’s eyes turned to his father. They were usually a grayish green, but now shone a vivid, sharp green. In them gleamed a strange light.

“What are you talking about?”
“Uh, I… no, nothing.”

Georgiy averted his gaze from his son, then glanced back for a moment—
But by then, Vladimir had already turned his eyes toward the desk.

“It seems your work hasn’t progressed.”

The great ebony desk, used by generations of Jurmagna heads, was piled high with documents.
At once, Georgiy flew into a rage.

“Silence! What do you know of it? Every single page is about money! This costs money, that needs money, the peasants won’t pay their taxes—it’s all tedious drivel that suffocates me! I’ve no wish to see anything about our proud Magna drowning in debt! You handle it yourself!”
“It’s already arranged so that all you need to do is sign, Father. —I’ll go take care of the matter with the maid, then. Zahar.”
“Yes, young master. My lord, excuse me.”

The butler bowed quickly and followed Vladimir out of the room. A dull thud echoed behind them—something had clearly been thrown at the wall.

.

Once outside, Vladimir let out a quiet sigh.

(*Father is always like that.*)

It wasn’t that his father was incompetent. He had strong support from the Knight Order, was well-versed in Astra studies, and could keep the noisy branch families in check. Perhaps only Georgiy could still hold together the bloated House of Jurmagna.
But he was dangerously self-righteous—ruled by his likes and dislikes, and prone to snap judgments.
Worse, he had a bad habit of making careless promises on impulse. He had likely pounded his chest during Lady Alexandra’s funeral, telling the maids, “If you ever need help, come to me.” Of course, now that one had actually done so, he had no intention of helping—but saying no himself would hurt his pride, so he wanted someone else to turn her away for him. That was the kind of man he was.

“Young master, are you feeling unwell?”

Zahar looked at Vladimir with concern. His hair and brows were white, his frame shrunken—already past seventy. He had passed most of his duties to his successor, yet continued to serve personally when it came to Vladimir, driving his old body with loyalty alone.

“If it’s about the dismissed maid, I can chase her off myself. Please, rest in your chambers a while. Working nonstop on your day off is too cruel on yourself.”
“I can only do it on my days off. If only I could have an office at the academy and work every day there instead…”

Like Aleksei did.
It was well known when Aleksei enrolled at the academy, he rented an office on the grounds, saying it was to handle the administration of his ducal lands. That was back when his father, Aleksandr, was still duke. It was an open declaration that he, not his father, was the one actually running the territory.
The fact that Aleksandr continued his idle, hedonistic life even after that could almost be called admirable, in its own way.
But Georgiy was not Aleksandr. Whenever there was work he didn’t want to do, he simply looked away from it. The resulting administrative backlog forced his subordinates to turn to Vladimir for help, and his son ended up giving the approvals. Yet if this were known outside, Georgiy would erupt in fury, shouting that *he* was the duke, that *he* ruled all of Jurmagna.
And still, the pile of financial matters that Georgiy loathed only kept growing.

“I’m not unwell. But you can handle the matter of the maid. There’s something I need to look into at the library.”
“Yes, leave it to me. But the library will be quite cold, young master. If it’s books you need, I can fetch them for you. Please stay warm in your room.”
“The book I need is a restricted one. You can’t take it out.”
“Then at least, take a coat with you. I’ll prepare it at once. And you should have some of your medicinal tea too—you skipped lunch, didn’t you? I’ll bring something to eat.”

Vladimir couldn’t help but smile faintly at the old man’s fussing.

“I’ll bring my coat.”
“I’ll bring the tea to you, young master.”
“…All right. I’ll wait in the corridor.”