Although
When
Lorist grinned and waved a letter in his hand. "Fresh news — Grand Duke Fisablen has fled back to the Eastern Wastes Province. According to this letter, in the month-plus since Grand Duke Fisablen installed himself as Lord Regent of the Iblia Kingdom, he hasn't done a single thing of substance aside from bickering with the nobles at the Rose Palace every day. Every policy he promulgated was met with overt or covert resistance from the nobility. In the end, this Great Swordmaster couldn't stomach the tedious affairs of governance, resigned from the position of Lord Regent, left behind a border patrol cavalry regiment in the capital, and fled. Now the one truly in charge of the Iblia Kingdom is the beautiful Queen herself…"
"That poor old man must have no idea this was all your doing…" Fatty Shi shook his head. "Back when the guards who delivered the messages told me you forbade the family's forces from looting the nobles and wealthy in the capital, Wendbury City, and that you treated the Queen so favorably, I knew you were setting someone up. Especially when our family's forces sent two chariot battalions to assist the Henned and Philim families in sweeping through nearly half of Weston Province without hanging a single resisting lord — that was when I became certain. Now I finally understand you were targeting Grand Duke Fisablen."
"No, you're wrong. In truth, I never intended to trap anyone — the old fool Fisablen jumped into the pit on his own. When I dispatched the forces this time, I made it perfectly clear that we were targeting only the
Lorist stood up, went to the liquor cabinet, selected a small cask of fruit wine, fetched two silver cups, poured one, and handed it to Fatty Shi. "Try it — it came from a vineyard in Weston Province."
Fatty Shi took it, sampled it, and exclaimed in approval, "Not bad. But Locke, you've got me thoroughly confused. On one hand, you don't plunder the capital's nobles, and on the other, you collude with the Henned and Philim families to rob nearly half the lords of Weston Province. Doesn't that contradict what you just said?"
"Heh heh…" Lorist laughed. "There's no contradiction. What you don't understand is what kind of people the nobles of the Iblia Kingdom really are. When the Second Prince first established the kingdom, he sold off titles by granting landed nobility, dumping all the land in the Southern Province and Weston Province — except for the capital — onto buyers, and even granted titles to dozens of lords in the
The Second Prince used the wealth from selling titles to build the royal army and attack the Meleim Duchy. After two years of fighting, not only did he suffer defeat, but he also reduced the kingdom's Southern Province to ruins. The landed nobles who had been granted titles in the Southern Province realized the situation was grim, packed up their wealth, fled to the capital, and then spent their days bickering with the Second Prince, demanding that he take responsibility for the Southern Province being reduced to rubble.
A few years ago, when the Second Prince borrowed soldiers from Grand Duke Fisablen, it was out of desperation. He needed to give those landed nobles staying in the capital an answer, so he set his sights on the Maderas Duchy, which seemed easy to bully. His plan was to seize the Delaimke Province of Maderas Duchy, relocate the capital nobles' territories there, make a profit along the way, and conveniently default on the enormous grain debt he owed the Grand Duke of Maderas.
If you look at the map, you'll understand — Delaimke Province was known as the granary of the former empire. So was the adjacent Weston Province's land really that poor? The truth is that the Second Prince lacked the Grand Duke of Maderas's ability to control his subordinates. Once the territories were granted, the lords of Weston Province did as they pleased — they abandoned grain cultivation, a labor-intensive industry that didn't earn much, and instead set up orchards, wineries, and grew highly profitable cash crops. So after the Southern Province was reduced to ruins, the Iblia Kingdom has been chronically short of grain, and that grain is controlled by the lords of Weston Province. The kingdom's persistently high grain prices in recent years are the handiwork of those Weston Province lords.
Because grain prices were so high, these Weston Province lords took advantage of several years of favorable weather to stockpile enormous quantities of grain. They blocked outside grain merchants from entering the kingdom while maintaining high grain prices, making a fortune in the process. The southern lords stranded in the capital were consumed with envy and resentment toward these Weston Province bumpkins and nouveau riche, and tensions between the two sides ran deep. This was also the main reason the Second Prince stayed in the Northern Lands for years, reluctant to return to the capital — he didn't want to deal with those nobles' bickering.
So when word of our three Northern Lands families robbing the Weston Province lords reached the capital, the nobles there all cheered, saying it was high time someone taught those Weston Province bumpkins a lesson. In fact, my original intention was to give the Iblia Kingdom's landed nobles a thorough purge — just like what you did in the Andinak Kingdom. Hang them all, and the world would be a much cleaner place.
Unfortunately, doing so would only be a huge favor to whoever took power in the Iblia Kingdom. Take Grand Duke Fisablen, for instance — if he were allowed to consolidate all four provinces of the Iblia Kingdom, his strength would multiply several times over, and we'd have added a formidable enemy to the Northern Lands for nothing. So I won't make that kind of stupid mistake.
For this reason, emptying their granaries and supplies, plundering their liquid assets, and relocating their subjects was meant to keep the Weston Province lords and the Southern Province lords holed up in the capital on roughly equal footing. If I had robbed the capital's nobles, all the nobles would have united against me. But by sparing the capital's Southern Province nobles, they instead took gleeful pleasure in the Weston Province lords' misfortune.
For the Weston Province lords, what they hated most was that our three Northern Lands families had relocated their subjects. Without subjects, they couldn't amass wealth or grow grain, and the Northern Lands had natural barriers that made retaliation impossible. If they wanted to acquire subjects, they'd have to look elsewhere — but since I'd also relocated all the poor from the capital, these lords had no one to recruit. The only remaining option was to target the neighboring Maderas Duchy's Delaimke Province.
The last time the Second Prince attacked Delaimke Province, it was the Southern Province nobles in the capital who provided money and resources behind the scenes, while the Weston Province lords merely offered token amounts of grain and a handful of soldiers. Now, if the Weston Province lords were to target Delaimke Province for their own benefit, they would certainly face fierce opposition from the Southern Province nobles.
In the past, whenever the Southern Province nobles in the capital proposed anything, the Weston Province lords would oppose and resist it. In terms of actual power, the Southern Province nobles who had lost their territories were helpless and could only swallow their grievances. Now that both sides were roughly equal, whatever the Weston Province lords proposed would likewise face collective opposition from the Southern Province lords. So after Grand Duke Fisablen assumed governing authority over the Iblia Kingdom, he found that trapped between the bickering of both factions, he couldn't accomplish anything — his decrees couldn't even leave the capital. Credit to him for reading the situation early and making a clean break: he resigned from the position of Lord Regent and fled back to his homeland.
If Grand Duke Fisablen had been ruthless enough to purge a batch of nobles who opposed him, he might have barely maintained control of the kingdom's situation and steered it in the direction he wished. Unfortunately, this old man — whether he lacked the resolve or was simply too clearheaded — knew that doing so would make the Fisablen family the target of everyone's hostility, so he simply gave up, retreated to his lair, and enjoyed life at his leisure.
"Our Norton Family is too far from Weston Province, and until we've secured the entire Northern Lands, it wouldn't be appropriate to extend our reach there. So I want Weston Province to become a chaotic battlefield. Once Grand Duke Fisablen leaves and there's no strong authority keeping a lid on things, the conflict between the Southern Province and Weston Province lords will erupt, and before long they'll be at each other's throats. We can just sit back and watch them slaughter one another."
Fatty Shi listened until his eyes glazed over, then sighed deeply. "Locke, I never expected you to change so quickly. Since becoming a lord, you think further and further ahead. You really have calculated everything…"
Lorist spread his hands. "I have no choice. Only after becoming a lord did I realize that the world of nobility isn't about hunting, touring, throwing balls and banquets, and flirting with pretty ladies all day long. Instead, you have to worry about every affair of the entire family's territory — responsible for the family's future, the subjects' livelihoods, and the knights under your command. Relations between nobles are rife with deception and the stink of money, and if you don't think things through thoroughly, you'll be swallowed whole, bones and all. It's all forced upon me…"
Fatty Shi drained the wine in his silver cup in one gulp, wiped his mouth, and said, "Alright, enough complaining. You've already done remarkably well — the family is flourishing. Let's talk business. What's the urgent matter that made you summon me so quickly?"
Lorist pointed to a thick stack of parchment documents on the desk. "By the end of this month, nearly seventy thousand relocated subjects we were allocated, plus over forty thousand poor citizens we forcibly relocated from the capital, Wendbury City, will arrive at the family's territory. That's over a hundred thousand migrants — they're all yours. Settle them in the Xing'an Plains. Aren't there still a few districts there that need people? With this batch of migrants, it should be about enough."
"Coming along with these migrants are over fifteen thousand prisoners of war from the border defense corps. Grand Duke Fisablen won't give up on these soldiers of his. The Muye Plains and Eastern Wastes provinces combined have a population of less than five hundred thousand. If it hadn't been for the massive influx of refugees from the ruined Southern Province into the Eastern Wastes Province, Grand Duke Fisablen wouldn't have been able to keep the border defense corps at full strength these past years. The fifteen thousand we captured are elite soldiers — not those thirty thousand discarded troops he lent to the Second Prince years ago. He'll definitely come to ransom them back. I don't intend to let these prisoners into the family's interior territories. I'll leave it to you to put them to work building roads and other infrastructure in the Xing'an Plains. It would be a waste to just release such able-bodied laborers. When Grand Duke Fisablen's envoy arrives, you handle the negotiations. Drag it out as long as you think appropriate before granting these prisoners their freedom — making them build an extra road or two for us wouldn't hurt…"
Fatty Shi burst out laughing. "Locke, you're getting shrewder by the day — even this you'd squeeze for profit. If Grand Duke Fisablen knew, he'd cough up blood from rage. Fine, I've got it. Leave it to me. I'll make Grand Duke Fisablen pay a handsome ransom for his fifteen thousand men."
Lorist stroked his chin and paced around the study, thinking aloud. "Grand Duke Fisablen might not have that much money. His adopted son and trusted commander, Viscount Christoph, is still in my hands. Combined with the fifteen thousand-odd elite soldiers, I doubt he can afford such an enormous ransom. So this time, I don't want money or goods — I want cattle and sheep. The Eastern Wastes and Muye Plains provinces were the former empire's largest pastoral regions, and their livestock output accounted for over half the empire's market share. I saw those figures in the trade survey records from
Fatty Shi nodded. "Currently, our family's only ranch belongs to the
"Then it's settled. Oh, right — this time our three Northern Lands families also captured a large amount of grain and supplies in Weston Province. Our family's share is about sixty million pounds, along with some other goods. I plan to use all of this grain and goods for developing the Xing'an Plains, so I'll leave the inventory to you. Also, the Henned and Philim families aren't short on grain and are willing to sell their captured grain to our family at market price. I've already agreed, so you handle that as well," Lorist added.
"Got it, I understand the situation." Fatty Shi stood up, walked to the desk, gathered all the relevant documents, and held them in his hands. "Locke, how many days until Miss Tressie gives birth?"
"A few more days. I'd estimate around the eleventh or twelfth," Lorist said, gazing out the window.
"Aren't you going to give her an answer?" Fatty Shi asked.
Lorist shrugged. "What can I do? You know I've proposed to her several times already, but she always says she swore an oath before Siminlaid, the God of Wisdom, to remain single for life and never marry. I'm hoping that after she gives birth this time, she'll change her mind and agree to marry me…"
"Sigh… think about it — we set out from Morant City for the Northern Lands, and in a flash, five years have passed. You're twenty-nine now, and as a lord, it's time you settled down. Miss Tressie really would make an excellent lady of the manor. You need to keep persuading her," Fatty Shi sighed.
Lorist nodded in agreement. When he saw Fatty Shi was about to leave, he went to open the door to see him out, then caught sight of Schward standing guard outside. He grinned mischievously. "Fatty, Baron Philim is coming here to spend the winter at the end of this year, and he's bringing his precious fifteen-year-old daughter along…"
Fatty Shi was taken aback. "Baron Philim? He's not even thirty-five, is he? How can he have a precious fifteen-year-old daughter? And doesn't he have no wife?"
Lorist laughed. "It's his illegitimate daughter. Apparently, the girl's mother was only sixteen when she gave birth, and Baron Philim himself wasn't even eighteen…"
"What a beast!" Fatty Shi cursed with deep revulsion — though his tone was thick with envy. "Why would he bring his daughter when he comes here for the winter?"
Lorist jerked his chin toward the red-faced Schward. "He's got his eye on this young man. He plans to bring his daughter over so the two can meet, and if they take a liking to each other, he'll discuss an engagement with Bordenfeng."
Fatty Shi burst out laughing. "That's wonderful news! Schward, congratulations — you went on one trip with the lord and came back with a wife. Looks like you'll need to go out more often…"
Schward couldn't take their teasing any longer, spun around, and dashed off. Lorist and Fatty Shi roared with laughter…
…(To be continued.)