Chapter 590: New Year Eve
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Such a blatant suggestion from Yaj made the servants serving the manor’s small dining hall to be greatly taken aback. The butler, Sakni even had a pained expression on. He opened his mouth trying to say something but in the end, he remained standing respectfully and just silently sighed to himself.
At the dining table, the two men from Fran immediately exclaimed, “Yaj, you… you…”
As for the Fran girls, except for Princess Seliya who could not help but have a trace of admiration in her eyes, the other two of the girls even covered their mouths in alarm and proceeded to put on a contempt look.
“It is not a common thing for a woman from a wealthy family to sell herself for family interests.” The instant the female merchant said so, she began to become calm and unperturbed. “Maybe because I’m a Kattaman so I can be more direct. But, from what I can see, this is more decent than quietly knocking on the door of a man’s bedroom at night. Since it’s a transaction anyway, it’s better to be just and honest rather than cowering under the table.
A human’s psychology was very delicate. Originally, Edo who firstly felt that he would only lose one rare potential collaborator now that Yaj’s family had fallen into a desperate situation realized that he could not solve the problem with his unrivaled distinguished ident.i.ty but an unknown scholar from a different mainland on the same table could actually have a solution and could even make a beautiful and capable businesswoman become his lover. At once, Edo started to feel agitated for no reason. Looking at Yaj’s seemingly perfect sculptural face, he could not help but say, “Miss Yaj, the situation has not yet reached such a despair level right? Besides, aren’t you and Camano lovers…?”
“We all know that things have reached a desperate situation. As for me and Camano…” Colors once again drained from the female merchant’s face but she continued to say in a strong-willed manner, “We do indeed like each other but he has no power to help me get out of trouble. And when I go bankrupt later, his parents will never allow him to take a beggar as a wife either. Since I’m destined to become somebody’s mistress, I’d rather choose someone who is less familiar and will never choose the one I love, for that will be more heartbreaking, so as long as Sir Lisheng can agree to my request, I’m willing to become his lover for the rest of my life.”
The instant this promise that was even more straightforward left her mouth, the dining hall fell into a strange silence all at once, leaving only the sound of Zhang Lisheng chewing and drinking alone.
“I have a river flowing with gold in the Wizard Li tribe.” After a long time, the young man who was finally full put down his wine gla.s.s and smiled as he looked into Yaj’s eyes to break the silence. “This is not a metaphor but a description. I do indeed have an underground river with a width of more than two miles and a length of at least a thousand miles that had its entire riverbed covered with golden sands and gold nuggets. That river, oh, if you stand on the sh.o.r.e, ignite a torch and look down at it, you’ll feel as though you can even buy an entire world. However, even so, I’ve never felt that I can really buy a ‘world’ down using wealth, for no matter how good gold is, there are still people who don’t particularly like it. It’s like beauty, Miss Yaj, you do have the beauty that I have never seen in my life before but if you think you can rely on this beauty to capture all men, then you’re wrong. ”
“You mean, you plan to watch my family and I forced to live a life of vagrancy?” The female merchant was stunned for a while before asking in a daze.
“No, on the contrary, after midnight tomorrow, I promise that your current troubles will disappear without a trace, but I’m more afraid that you’d regret that time… Ah forget it, I’ve said too much,” Zhang Lisheng stood up. “I’m full now so I’ll bid my goodbye first. Mr. Sakni, please send a pot of freshly squeezed juice to my room later, thank you.”
Then, he proceeded to turn around and walk out of the door.
When he was about to walk out, he suddenly stopped and added, without turning his head around, “Miss Yaj, I wish to rest by myself alone tonight so I don’t wish anybody to come to disturb me.”
Then, he left the dining hall in brisk footsteps.
After the young man’s back had disappeared sometime later, the small dining hall still remained in complete silence. In the end, it was Roman who finally burst into exclamation and broke the silence. “A-A river that is two miles wide and 1000 miles length with its riverbed covered with gold? My goodness! H-How big that amount of wealth is?! It can buy the entire Sea Haines City—no wait, maybe it can even buy all the cities in the Kattaman City State…”
“Enough, Roman, stop embarra.s.sing yourself. How can there possibly be such a river?” Yaj reprimanded him loudly.
“Of course I wouldn’t believe it if somebody else told me this, but Sir Lisheng is different. You know, at that time, he just casually threw his h.e.l.lfire route that can earn millions of gold coins every year, to Golden Velvet Flower Trading just for the sake of studying some strange creatures in the Nutao Sea. I used to wonder why there would be such a person who never cares about wealth, but now I finally understand. It’s like a billionaire who doesn’t want to go to pick up the copper coin from the ground. It’s not that he doesn’t care about wealth, but he has too much wealth that he’s not interested in just several millions of gold coins at all!” Roman smiled like a madman as he said speedily, “If this is the case, then we really have a way out! We can become the number one aristocrat merchant in the Sea Haines City—no, I should say in the Kattaman City State…”
“I said enough, Roman! Wake up!” When the female merchant saw that she could not stop her brother from talking nonsense with words, she directly poured a gla.s.s of cold juice wine onto his face. Unfortunately, at this time, she could no longer stop the strange look gleaming in the two Fran’s male guests and one female guest.
In this dinner that could be said as filled with ups and downs, both host and guests no longer had the mood to continue anymore so with things in each of their minds, the dinner ended hastily.
In just a blink of an eye, the night turned dark. In a dimly lit guest room where the candlelight had been extinguished but was still filled with moonlight, Edo stood in front of the huge floor-to-ceiling windows and looked at the dark farmland in the distance and lamented, “Before I came to the Kattaman City State, I first thought that this is a corrupt country that is filled with the smell of copper but I can’t believe that it’s so shocking after I blend in here. Stacking boulders to build houses to encircle large areas of land to open them as farmland and raise livestock. The manor here is simply a combination of castle and farm, and I even heard from the maid that half of the fields in the manor have been sold to the tenant who cultivated them. I can imagine how hard these strong farmers will work to protect their land in the event of an enemy attack…”
“My honorable Highness, no matter how desperately hard the Kattaman fight on the battlefield, they’re just a bunch of peasants who are not afraid of death. Emperor Lehman who pioneered the policy of separation of soldiers and peasants a thousand years ago has long said, that ‘the hands holding the hoe will not be able to brandish a sword’. Right now, what we need to pay more attention to is the golden river, the golden river that is said to be two miles wide and thousands of miles long.” Norwin sat on a large fur sofa next to the floor-to-ceiling window and had a strangely excited expression on his face as he whispered, “I think that golden river really exists. Oh Lunar G.o.d, a river bed that is two miles wide and thousands of miles long that is entirely filled with gold may really buy an entire mainland. If we can get our hands on one-tenth—no, even if only one-hundredth or one-thousandth of it to use it as Fran’s military expenditure, it would also be enough to organize a heavy armored artillery unit of more than 100,000 people…”
“But the question is, how true is this news?”
“Your Highness, about this question, I think you already have your own judgment, don’t you?” Norwin asked with a smile.
“My judgment tells me that this news is quite likely to be true…” In the darkness, the Fran Prince had a blatant look of greed and longing in his eyes, without continuing to conceal his thoughts. The instant his words left his mouth, his companion who was burning with ambition had already revealed the hidden evil thoughts he had in a low voice, “This is already enough for us, for Fran to take a gamble, don’t you think so?”
“That’s right, Norwin. Such odds are enough for us to take a gamble already,” Under the illumination of the bright moon in the sky, a series of expression ran across Edo’s face. He nodded solemnly and turned around to take a note and a quill from the wooden cabinet of the bed, before starting to write under the moonlight on the window sill.
The Prince of Fran only stopped after writing six whole pages. After folding the note, he handed it to Norwin and changed his tone into a solemn command tone. “There’s no time to be late. You must do everything you can to contact Sir Jensen tomorrow and give this letter to him. Even though he’s here to just secretly guard our travel upon Father’s order and is not subjected to me, I believe that this great knight who has always been witty and versatile should be able to understand the valuable opportunity contained in this bizarre story and take the necessary action. ”
“Yes, Your Highness.” Norwin stood up and raised his right fist to place in across his chest and solemnly took a knight’s ritual before carefully taking the note and placing it in his pocket. Just like this, the sin under the cover of the night came to an end.
After that, the time continued to slowly pa.s.s. As the rising sun began to disperse the darkness, the last day of the 739th Lunar New Year finally arrived.
In the Sea Haines City, the dawn had just arrived, the residents wearing new clothes began to consciously clean every street.
Employees of various commercial houses, hotels, pubs and even clubs also began to put square tables in front of the door and placed the barrels of wine and potted bacon they had prepared beforehand, and plates bigger than a well that was filled with fruit, vegetable dishes, and soft bread were on the table.
This was the only work they had to do today, which would be followed by a leisure holiday of seven days. After the carnival, the people in the Sea Haines City would then re-clean the messy city and pull themselves again to greet a tough, new year.
At the same time, in the front courtyard of the Golden Flower Terrier Manor on the outskirts of the city, under the clear clouds, Yaj was standing on the stairs explaining the itinerary of the New Year celebration to the guests. “The Masked Parade should have been starting now. We’ll take the carriage into the city and everyone can either ride on the carriage to follow the parade or to get off at any time to enjoy yourself. There will be food and wine on both sides of the street and you can consume it casually as you like. But remember, don’t get drunk, for the most cla.s.sic part of Sea Haines City ‘s New Year’s Carnival is the ringing of ‘The Clock of the Sea G.o.d’ at midnight. Oh another thing, be sure to bring your invitation cards and don’t lose them. That is the pa.s.s to the Furoh Hall leading to the central square. Of course, it won’t be of any use anymore if you decide to just stay in the carriage. ”