Episode 314
“Hurry! We have to get to Grand quickly!”
A dark night with no moonlight.
There was bustling activity at the lord’s official residence, the center of Clid’s territory.
“Honey, do you really have to run away like this?”
“Have you already forgotten what happened yesterday? If you wait any longer, you’ll die!”
A middle-aged man with a mustache shouted at the chubby lady’s charming complaint.
The lady, whose face was blue, lowered her head and hesitated, and the middle-aged man patted his chest again, as if frustrated.
“Do you listen to me? You have to run now!”
Baron Ted Clyde’s expression did not look good as he shouted.
It was a small fiefdom in a corner of the countryside whose name was unknown in the center, but it was clearly his land. How can I feel at ease when I am trying to run away from the land that has been passed down to me from generations of my ancestors?
But I couldn’t help it.
‘I can’t die like this.’
The trembling fist contained fear, not anger.
Ted Clid was a man who could not be called a good lord even with empty words.
The tax rate, which was literally 70% not long ago, was just one of the many reasons to criticize him.
It is basic that he sees the people of the territory as objects, and that he has been expropriating various types of taxes whenever something happens. He mobilizes the people of the territory, saying that he needs a herd to hunt, and when hunting does not work, he shoots the people of the territory to death to relieve his boredom. He didn’t hesitate to do anything.
Moreover, he was a lord who revived the ruling party, which had been virtually extinct for hundreds of years.
It was common for a new bride, who had been taken away under the pretext of being a member of the opposition party, to return dead the next day, so the dissatisfaction and hatred of the residents of the territory reached the sky-high level.
But there was no one who could do anything about him.
He always had dozens of reliable guard knights with him, and to the general public, the knights, who were no different from superhumans, were a symbol of violence that could never be overcome.
However, the violence of power that was based on overwhelming force was completely collapsed due to a new policy recently introduced by the king.
‘Damn king. Because of that ridiculous policy….’
The problem was not simply lowering taxes.
First of all, the biggest problem was the system in which most knights were part of the kingdom’s legions and only a small number of knights were dispatched to his territory on a rotational basis. The system was changed to one in which dispatched knights maintained security in the territory along with a small number of older soldiers who had not joined the legion and vigilantes.
However, the knights dispatched from the kingdom had no loyalty to the lord at all, and many of the residents of the territory carried a weapon called a repeating crossbow, which was supplied only for use during training, even in everyday life in the name of hunting.
Until then, I just felt a little anxious.
But the day before yesterday, when a quarrel suddenly flew past his cheek at a hunting ground he had not been to for a long time, that anxiety became reality.
Memories from a few days ago flashed quickly through his mind.
“How dare someone!!”
Ted froze for a moment and then saw blood flowing from his cheek and shouted in anger, but the soldiers only saw the knight next to him.
“Oh no… catch him! He’s a criminal who attempted to assassinate a nobleman!”
“yes!”
No matter how reprehensible a lord may be, he is nominally in charge of the fiefdom.
Nevertheless, only after the knight, whose expression hardened slightly, nodded, did the soldiers begin rushing to find the attempted assassin.
It was an unpleasant sight, but Ted was in no condition to even question such things right now.
“Lord Siron! Be sure! Be sure! Please catch him! I will tear off his limbs myself…!”
Seeing him running wild, Knight Siron asked quietly.
“Is there anyone who can guess? Someone who usually holds a grudge…”
“Dare to a noble…!? Ah. Wow, a grudge?”
“Yes. Someone who has a grudge against the lord that could kill him.”
“Is that possible? I’ve lived with such integrity…!”
Instead, Knight Siron laughed while looking at Ted who was making a fuss.
Then he asked back with a puzzled expression.
“Is that true?”
“profit!”
How dare a knight glare at me like that!
Ted, who was about to shout out in anger, only swallowed when he saw the look in Siron’s eyes.
A look of contempt. Ted couldn’t say anything about the look in his eyes that he had seen right after he was dispatched here.
He was the king’s knight, not his own, and he was a mid-level force user that was hard to find in a countryside like this.
Even in the previous days of Grandia, he was strong enough to overwhelm the knights he had with him, so there was only so much he could do.
“I was just enjoying the rights I should have as a noble! The people who are dissatisfied with that are strange!!”
These were the only complaints.
At those words, Siron’s frown narrowed even further.
Since he had ears, there was no way he wouldn’t have heard rumors about the lord. It was also the reason why he stayed away from the lord.
“Haa…”
He naturally sighed, but the lord scolded him.
“Lord Shiron. You have a duty to maintain security in this territory! The guy who shot me with an arrow right now…” “
I know, my lord. But you have to have the will to catch someone who has already run away. Surely. “Aren’t there people you might hold a grudge against? If there really aren’t, it might be hard to catch them.”
Those with a grudge?
Certainly not among the nobles.
Because he has always bowed down in front of nobles who have more power than him.
But among the commoners… there were too many.
– How are we supposed to live!?
I watched an old man who came to complain about excessive taxes being flogged to death.
– Please return my wife, my lord.
A man who knelt down and begged for the return of his wife, who had already become a corpse, was taken as ‘prey’.
– My lord!
– How could you do this!
– Oh devil! You are the devil!
As he looked at the crying faces of the commoners, numerous incidents that made him feel superior passed through his mind in an instant.
“Are you not there?
“…I was just exercising my right as a noble!” “
…You are not there.”
Despite Siron’s assertion, Ted could not say anything.
No, he did say something.
” commons! Commoners! Commoners who are dissatisfied with me…!”
“Which village are you talking about?” ”
You have a crossbow!?”
“There are vigilante groups in every village.”
“….” There are
so many people that come to mind. Ted, who was unable to point out a specific person due to many reasons, soon began to make ridiculous claims:
“Arrest all the commoners with crossbows! Then he must be among them!”
“Your Majesty ordered you to arrest all the vigilantes who were created without justification? Are you going to rebel against Your Majesty now?”
Ted had no choice but to remain silent at that cold voice.
He still remembered the rumor about the King who once made the entire capital city covered with corpses of nobles.
And looking at his reaction, Siron shook his head with a sarcastic expression.
This means that all commoners in the territory could be suspects.
‘It will be difficult to catch them.’
To be honest, I didn’t really want to catch it.
And that prediction quickly became reality.
“I’m sorry, my lord. It’s all an alibi.”
“That’s it…!”
It was doubtful whether it was because of the lack of will on the part of the investigator, Siron, or because there really was no physical evidence, but Ted didn’t have the courage to argue.
In the end, the attempted assassin was never caught, and from then on, Ted I was filled with fear that I didn’t know when or where Quarel would come.
After shaking in fear for several days, I decided to run away today.
“If we don’t run away, we’ll die!”
Let’s just buy a mansion in Grand and live there and only receive taxes. With this in mind, Ted continued to scold his family members.
Not realizing that their greed to get all the wealth while trying to run away was causing a bigger and bigger commotion.
“Move quickly! “Hurry!”
Clap,
pout.
Even with the driver’s whip, the ponies tied to the huge wagon could not easily move.
“Profit!”
The driver took all the money he had and assigned only two ponies to this side, leaving them to the four-horse wagon. The lord’s family was completely embarrassed as they sat down and tried to leave.
However, they were not in a position where they could argue with the lord about such a thing.
‘If I leave it like this and I’m late, they’ll punish me.’
Gritting his teeth, the coachman tried his best to catch up with the lord’s carriage, which was slowly moving away, but to his horror, the ponies’ pace showed no signs of speeding up.
However, after a while, that cruel feeling changed to a feeling of gratitude to God.
Pabababak.
“Aaaah!”
Heehee!
A terrible scream was heard along with the sound of something hitting the lord’s carriage in succession.
* * *
– Baron Ted Clid and his family were attacked and killed while escaping from the estate.
Clid . Even people who didn’t even know where the Barony was located couldn’t help but prick up their ears at this news.
It was an incident where a nobleman was presumed to have been murdered by a commoner.
And that incident was enough to send a chill down the spines of the McLane nobles. In particular, the nobles who controlled the people of the territory similarly to Baron Clyde could not help but be even more frightened.
“Doesn’t this mean we could die too?”
“Wow, killing a noble is such a serious crime. Even the idiots know that.”
They comforted each other like that and soothed their possible anxiety.
But
– The killer of Baron Clyde is unknown.
It is not enough that the culprit of the incident that occurred in the Barony of Clyde has not been caught.
– Assassinated by Baron Roman DeLuna with a crossbow. The sad
news continued that Baron DeLuna, a similarly evil lord to Baron Clyde, had also been murdered.
And before a proper investigation into the culprit could be conducted
– Viscount Max Ferretta was assassinated. He was also shot with a crossbow.
Shocking news was delivered that the owner of the Viscounty of Ferretta, which was the closest to the McLane territory, the birthplace of the current king, and who had surrendered to Logan McLane even before he became king, was assassinated. The news was said to
be due to his own sins. It made not only the vicious nobles who were shaking, but also the general nobles tremble with anxiety. It
didn’t matter that Max Ferretta was also a lord with the worst reputation before he gave in to McLane.
“If you’re Ferretta, you’re no different from McLane’s vassal, right?”
“If such a person were to die…”
In the end, the anxious nobles of the territory gathered together in groups of threes and fives to file an appeal to the royal family.
– It is dangerous to allow commoners to have repeating crossbows. Please reconsider!
Meanwhile, another shocking rumor struck the kingdom.
Baron Trevor Dahlan hired mercenaries to attack the vigilante group that attacked him.
Dalan territory is devastated by the war between vigilantes and lords.
An incident in which the commoners, represented by vigilantes, and the nobility, represented by lords, clashed in earnest.
The whole kingdom was shaken by the rumor.
“Isn’t this going to cause big trouble?”
“It was all nobles who provided the cause.”
“No, this person. I’m not blaming anyone now, but I’m wondering if this is going to turn the country upside down.”
It was a time when conscious people realized that the foundation of the kingdom was shaking and became anxious.
– All nobles gather at the royal castle.
For the first time in a long time, a grand conference was held in the name of the king, encompassing all nobles.
“I propose the disbandment of the vigilante group!”
“The recent events are not just assassinations.”
“That’s right. The blue blood of nobles must be respected!”
As soon as they were allowed to speak, anxious-looking nobles began to raise their voices here and there.
These words are nothing short of an all-out challenge to the strengthening of national defense capabilities that Logan is steadily pursuing.
The nobles could not even dare to rebel against Logan in most cases, but this case was a little different.
“The nobles, who are the center of the nation’s support, are trembling with anxiety due to recent events. If this continues, the kingdom cannot be maintained. A solution must be found quickly, Your Majesty.”
As the king’s father-in-law, Roberts Floyd, said, the foundation of the aristocracy was threatened, so the nobles could not help but think that it was the same whether they died one way or another.
However, there was a faint smile on Logan’s face as he looked down at the nobles from the grand table.
‘How can it come out the way I thought it would?’
The biggest critical point in McLane, which has undergone repeated radical reforms.
– Commoners have more power than nobles. This is the biggest problem with the policy His Majesty is taking. If this becomes a concrete incident…
the subject who predicted this incident could only express admiration.
And countermeasures against it were already fully prepared.
“Everyone be quiet!”
thud.
The King, who silenced the commotion in Daejeon with a single step, opened his mouth with a cold smile.
