Chapter 37 [The plot of Seviri and Elijah...]
Beneath the tall, white pillars, meticulously tended rose bushes sway gently, releasing a fragrant aroma.
Exquisitely presented pastries and freshly brewed tea are laid out on a marble table, awaiting those who wish to enjoy them.
Several maids stood guard nearby, dressed in uniform court dresses. Even though they deliberately maintained a serious expression, their young faces still added a touch of springtime brightness to this small garden in the palace.
Suddenly, one of them caught a glimpse of a bee wobbling toward the stone table from the corner and quickly winked at his companion.
Her companion, receiving a signal from her eyes, quickly looked at another person.
For a moment, everyone looked at each other, none of them daring to muster the courage to step forward and chase away the bee.
This won't do. The maid who first gave the signal thought to herself: Queen Elijah and Prince Severi might come at any time. If they happen to witness this scene, regardless of whether the snacks and tea were touched by bees or not, they will definitely be in trouble.
"Sanna, go and chase the bees away," she said, directly addressing Shanna Ellery, the lowest-ranking among the maids.
As the daughter of a viscount, Shanna always lacked confidence when facing others.
Therefore, upon suddenly hearing this instruction, even though she was equally afraid of being stung, Shanna had to suppress her fear and step forward to swat away the bee that dared to approach the stone table with her sleeve.
Fortunately, although the bee was driven away, it did not get angry as Shanna had feared, but instead flew away in another direction on its own.
Whew, Shanna breathed a sigh of relief and silently returned to her original position.
Instead, the maid who had given Shanna the orders seemed somewhat displeased, as if disappointed that she hadn't seen Shanna embarrass herself.
Seeing this, Shanna lowered her head slightly, pretending that she hadn't seen what was happening.
At the same time, she couldn't help but secretly miss the time when Fei Nanqi was still alive. As the universally recognized wise prime minister, whether it was to please him or for other purposes, under the watchful eye of the Minister of the Palace, the palace at least maintained an orderly appearance, and such situations of mutual oppression rarely occurred.
But everything changed after Fernando left the palace and returned to his own territory.
Endor, the Palace Minister who had served Queen Lilyles and Prince Lex, was replaced by Kavis Bena, a sycophant in Shanna's eyes. He rose to power by gaining Queen Elia's trust, leaping from a lowly servant to the position of Palace Minister. As a result, only those who could please him could get good jobs.
Those with overly upright personalities, like Shanna, became targets of ostracism.
Recalling the day of Prince Siviri's baptism, when Prince Lex disappeared without a trace, Shanna's eyes darkened. In such a vast palace, it's not easy for someone to get lost, especially when it's the noble crown prince, the future heir to the throne. The smell of conspiracy was so strong that even a fool could smell it.
Unfortunately, upon hearing this tragic news, King Nurenger IX showed no intention of pursuing the matter, but merely sent a group of attendants to search casually near the capital.
Even when news came from below that no trace of Prince Lex could be found, he showed no sign of sadness. Instead, he repeatedly told his ministers amusing stories about his youngest son, clearly telling everyone that he simply didn't like Lex and preferred Severi.
However, for some reason, despite Nurengger IX's fondness for Siviri, he never named him as the new crown prince.
Shanna's wandering thoughts came back with the sound of footsteps. It turned out that Elia had arrived with Severi.
They were followed by about a dozen maids, most of whom were responsible for serving Sevier.
Elijah doted on her son, even going so far as to pick up a pastry from a plate and offer it to Severi's lips, acting as if she were serving him.
Severi finished the snack Elijah handed him while still in that position, and then couldn't wait to tell her what he had learned from the teacher that day.
Although Severi's teacher was not Fernanki, he was still the finance minister, Fursen Gardner, whom Elia had carefully selected. Although he was not as highly regarded as Fernanki, the fact that he had managed the kingdom's purse quietly for more than a decade and made a fortune from it shows that he was no ordinary man.
Elijah was very satisfied with this choice.
When Elia heard Severi's childish voice telling her in a soft, childlike voice how Fousen had taught him arithmetic, and how last year he had spent thousands of gold coins just to make clothes for him and hundreds more to raise his foal, Elia's sharp, pencil-painted eyebrows couldn't help but curve into a gentle arc.
"In that case, I'll give my little Ril a math problem too."
Severi immediately opened his eyes wide and pricked up his ears to listen carefully to what Elia was about to say.
"If a commoner can grow ten bags of grain a year, does my little Lil know how many bags of grain the royal palace warehouses will eventually receive?" Elijah asked a simple question, waving her silk fan.
“I know!” Severi answered excitedly. “According to the kingdom’s laws, if there are ten bags of grain, six bags must be paid to the lord as tax, and the lord then takes four bags from those six bags and pays them to the king as tax.”
In other words, a commoner could only contribute four bags of grain to the royal palace's granary.
Thinking of this, Sevier frowned his thin eyebrows, somewhat disgusted, "How can there be so little? Why can't these commoners produce more food?"
“Yes, why can’t they grow more food? We’ve already given them so much land,” Elijah chimed in gently, clearly agreeing with Severi’s point of view.
"So, if a commoner becomes a slave and his land returns to the lord, and the lord receives nine bags of grain each year, does that mean he can pay us six bags of grain?"
“That’s right! Mother, Mother, then let’s quickly turn more commoners into slaves, so we can get more food.” Sevier said innocently.
Elijah smiled and patted his head, praising, "My little Ril is so smart, just like his mother thinks."
Of course, the benefits of allowing lords to acquire more slaves go far beyond what Sevier mentioned.
For example, a commoner used to have to spend forty copper coins to buy a whole chicken to fill his stomach, but once he became a slave under a lord, the whole chicken he bought could be shared with seven or eight other slaves of similar status.
More importantly, this way, no one would complain about Antonio spending forty copper coins to buy a chicken, and thus encourage Nurenger IX to bring Fernández back.
You have to understand how much effort Elia put into getting Fernangi out of the palace, and she absolutely cannot allow the prime ministership that she had worked so hard to win for her brothers in her family to be returned.
Thinking of this, Elijah paused in her hand gesture of waving the silk fan, and her eyes sharpened again.
*
What are you drawing?
Mela remembered that from the morning onwards, Lex had been writing and drawing on a piece of paper with a pen. Her curiosity was piqued, and she couldn't help but peek out from behind Lex and look at the paper in his hand.
The paper was mostly covered with lines that Mela couldn't understand, but in the very center, there were several places that looked like trees, and Mela could roughly guess where it was.
"This is the Dark Forest, isn't it?"
“That’s right. The middle area is the Dark Forest, the bottom right area is Radcliffe Territory, and the area next to it is Bayard Territory…” Lex explained to the map he had drawn.
“Then these are rivers?” Mela pointed to some other lines with shorter strokes.
“Yes.” Lex nodded.
Mela gradually began to understand the map Lex had drawn.
Judging from this, the water resources in the Dark Forest are indeed more abundant than she thought.
First, there is a large river above the Dark Forest, which then splits into several smaller rivers that flow through the heart of the Dark Forest, eventually flowing into Redcliff Territory and Bayard Territory respectively.
This means that even in the face of drought, the situation in the lower right corner of the Dark Forest will be much better than in other places.
Mela's gaze immediately shifted to the upper left corner of the Dark Forest. Lex had just mentioned that this area was mostly mountainous, so there wasn't much arable land. Correspondingly, in previous years, the abundant rainfall alone was enough to meet the daily needs of the people here.
But if it happens to be a summer like this one without rain, the situation will become exceptionally difficult.
However, this was not what worried Lex.
"When the territories were divided up, perhaps because they were worried that these minor nobles would control too many resources on their fiefs, this large territory was cut into several pieces."
As Lex spoke, he made marks on the paper, making the already rugged edges of the territory look even more distorted to Mela.
"Will this work?" Mela asked skeptically.
"Well, this method is indeed effective. These territories are known as the poorest places in the kingdom, and their respective lords naturally don't have much to spare for doing things that are outwardly compliant but inwardly defiant."
In other words, they had to do whatever the previous kings told them to do. Even if the taxes in these territories were drastically increased, these lords could only reluctantly agree, rather than leading their armies directly to the capital and forcing the king on the throne to change his unreasonable decisions.
However, it's still somewhat dishonorable to reveal the royal family's conspiracy like this.
It's as if they've taken off their glamorous outer garments.
Lexton paused, dismissing the strange thought in his mind, and continued, "However, the more scarce the resources within the territory, the more stingy these minor nobles become, not even allowing commoners to easily pick up fallen branches."
If someone breaks the rules, being beaten is the least of their worries. They might even be forced to go bankrupt to pay the exorbitant fine, leaving their entire family to do hard labor to buy their freedom.
Of course, the kingdom's laws do stipulate that everything within the territory belongs to the lord, including tree branches.
But for the other wealthy lords, who would care about these few small branches? They were practically a joke of poverty.
It had reached the point where they were going to use it to make fun of each other with their attendants.
“If they won’t even let us pick up tree branches, does that mean people can’t go into the forest to hunt or gather?” Mela pointed out the key issue.
This was exactly what Lex was worried about. "That's right. But if people can't get food and water to survive from within their territory, they might take the risk of heading to the Dark Forest."
Don't forget, Mela's identity cannot be revealed to others.
Despite the subtle influence of the church over the years, many fanatical believers still harbor extreme hatred for evil witches.
As is widely known, a witch does indeed live in the Dark Forest.
If Mela were to accidentally appear before them, she would only become the target of their anger.
"But I think that with such a large forest, they might not be able to get here."
In contrast, Mela's attitude was much calmer.
She thought that even if those desperate civilians dared to come in, they would probably only wander around the perimeter of the forest and wouldn't possibly go near the cabin.
If someone were to actually break in, and they were outnumbered and outmatched, wouldn't it be obvious who would be afraid of whom?
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