469 Handover

every time viscount dickens introduced an official to abel, that official would bow to him to show respect. by that point, abel felt a weird atmosphere arising. it seemed like there was some kind of connection between these officials.“viscount dickens, just leave the documents and the assets’ account to my steward bartoli. i won’t question it. just give me the contract of harvest city’s military!” said abel waving his hand.

“i’ll take care of the accounts on behalf of my master!” said bartoli gently lifted up her hood, exposing a long white robe on her body. it was not luxurious, but it was made of pure silk.

“what? we will need to discuss this with a steward? a female steward?” manager edeze yelled like he had been deeply insulted as he looked towards viscount dickens. he was not planning to stay in harvest a city anyway; he wanted viscount dickens to take him along. earl abel had told a female steward to take over, which was a huge insult to his dignity.

viscount dickens did not care about him. instead, he stared at the double magic staff badge in shock.

although those officials were quite a high rank in harvest city, they still hadn’t seen much. to them, wizards only exist in legends, but not viscount dickens. he knew about wizard badges, and he knew there were only 3 wizards guarding the duchy of carmel. from his understanding, there was only one intermediate wizard among those 3 wizards.

however, there was an intermediate wizard standing right in front of him, and she was abel’s steward. he felt regret bubbling within him. maybe leaving harvest city was the biggest mistake he had made in his life.

“bartoli, go see if this manager edeze has a clean background. if he does, forgive him. if not, i’ll leave it up to you since he had insulted an intermediate wizard!” abel said plainly, his gaze brushing upon manager edeze.

abel did not have time to investigate all the dirty things the officials in harvest city, so he used a direct and rough method to resolve this. before he came, he had requested the investigation department in the kingdom of st ellis to gather all the information of those harvest city officials.

if a normal person had requested this, the kingdom of st ellis would not only say no, they would also get angry. but not abel; abel had the power to get the kingdom to use a powerful machine to dig up all the details of all the officials in harvest city.

their lifestyle, work, family, income, were all exposed. not a single bit of privacy could hide in the face of the kingdom’s scary investigation department.

of course, abel couldn’t be bothered to look at this information. he just left it all up to bartoli. as a countess who had taken care of a wealthy domain in the past, bartoli was the best candidate to manage harvest city.

bartoli took out a piece of parchment from her portal bag and began to read it out loud, “manager edeze. one wife, 6 mistresses. he has 2 children and 12 children of shame. he had sold 15312 tones of grains in private when he was the manager of the harvest grains inventory and received 56000 gold coins.”

by this point, manager edeze’s face had gone pure white as his legs began to get weak. he didn’t even tell his family that he had sold grains in private, how could this new female steward know about it?

“viscount dickens’s, i am innocent please help me!”manager edeze looked at viscount dickens like he was his savior, but viscount dickens remained silent.

unlike the frightened manager edeze, all the other officials had just clearly witnessed something beyond their imagination. this enormous lambskin parchment had appeared on this female steward’s hand with a flick?

steward bartoli had some kind of power they couldn’t comprehend, so the most logical reaction was to get scared.

“manager edeze, i’m sure about one thing. even king algernon gorge majesty would not doubt a word from ms. bartoli !” viscount dickens said with loathing in his eyes. manager edeze had done so much behind his back, and he still had the guts to beg him.

“manager edeze, all your assets will be confiscated, and you will be sent to the labor camp until the day you die!” said bartoli in a cold voice.

“no please! i beg you! i will give you all my wealth!” said manager edeze as he sat on the floor. his entire body had grown weak as tears poured down from his face, drenching his clothes.

“drag him out!” said abel with a low voice.

afterward, 2 knights came from the door and dragged manager edzeze out like a chicken getting slaughtered.

the hall was filled with silence all of a sudden. all the officials were stunned. all officials who’ve worked as long as they must have some kind of dirty deeds. was their record on that lambskin parchment as well?

“bartoli, just take care of the handover for me. if anyone bothers you again, then just take care of it yourself!” abel commanded and turned towards viscount dickens again. “viscount dickens, where is the elite knight brigade?”

“earl abel, these are the 4 elite knights of the knight brigade. the original leader, elite knight of saroyan had left harvest city, so the brigade is now in charge of these 4 elite knights. the brigade is now in the military base of the city!” said viscount dickens introducing the knights next to him.

“the elite knight of saroyan has become a lord of a domain for 2 years. too bad, if not, maybe we have met up for a bit!” abel sighed.

elite knight of saroyan had been awarded the lord title alongside the lord of marshall. both of them had outstanding military performance, so abel remembered him quite well.

“i’ll let you guys keep leading the brigade for now!” said abel looking at the 4 knights.

the 4 elite knights had always been looking at abel with an admiring gaze. however, at first, they did not know this new earl was abel; in fact, only a few people in the entire city know.

when the 4 elite knights heard abel’s name, their heart began to fill up with excitement. abel was the pride of this city. before, harvest city was only known as a small agriculture city, but now a lot more people would know it as the hometown of grandmaster abel.

afterward, they immediately bowed in unison and said, “earl majesty, it’s our honor to serve you!”

on the other hand, bartoli was having an easy time accepting the handover. the officials took out stacks of accounting records and began to explain as bartoli kept holding the parchment in her hand. as soon as the official said something fishy, she would coldly gaze at him, and he would immediately give out the actual number.

the reporting of the officials was finished in no time, and bartoli looked at the stacks of accounting records in front of her with a slightly depressed face, but she did not make a sound. harvest city was not desirable at all. there was a big debt, and since the manager of the inventory had already been captured, maybe even his assets couldn’t fill this debt up.

there also were a lot of problems when it came to the well-being of the citizens. viscount dickens didn’t seem like a skilled leader. all he had was military power to suppress others, but that doesn’t mean he was a skilled leader.

“everyone, i’m not going to drag about the past. all of you have seen my master’s power; if you just do your jobs properly, we will naturally have rewards for you. but if you move the budgets, no one can help you!” bartoli said in an arrogant tone when she lifted her head from the stack of records.

all the officials in the hall let out a long breath of relief. that lambskin parchment had given them too much pressure. now they felt reborn again.

“that’s about it for today. make sure you all do your work properly from now on!” said bartoli waving her hand.

historical

the officials bowed and quickly walked out of the hall. this female steward was too scary.

“this new earl is too strict. he had lashed out on edeze from the start, so let’s unite from now on. if not, we won’t have any good time in harvest city anymore!” officer noyce said. he had the highest rank of the bunch.

manager ismen of the military inventory then began to look at officer noyce in a slightly mocking gaze and said, “officer noyce, you must not have heard the name of that new earl. clearly, his name is abel!”