In the King"s Chambers of the Lanthanor Kingdom, there was a table at one edge of the room which had 3 metal blocks which were decorated with flowing patterns.
The blocks were in the center of the table, with mechanisms with which they could be detached when necessary.
Each day, this was where the King of Lanthanor spent a minute of his time multiple times during the day to check whether there was anything that needed to be addressed.
Each of the blocks represented each of the 3 major divisions into which the government was divided: security, finances, and welfare.
When Daneel touched each one, any and all information that was deemed to be at the level of "Important" was shown to him.
Of course, the truly crucial pieces of information which needed Daneel"s urgent attention would still be informed by his commanders or the Grand Court Mage.
Apparently, this was a setup which had existed since the age of the first King.
In Angaria, as Kings also had the responsibility of being powerful enough to be a symbol of strength to their people, their time was limited. Hence, the purpose of the table was that the King would be able to a.n.a.lyze all important information and decide whether there was a need for a Royal Court to be held.
Today, in the "Welfare" section, Daneel found a new message which slightly startled him.
"A woman and a girl from the Burberry Village who have settled down in Lanthanor City request an audience with the King. They say they want to bring to light a problem that plagues the Kingdom."
Since Lanthanor had been ruled for decades by Kings who treated those under them as ants, the very practice of directly approaching a ruler with problems had almost been forgotten by the people.
Still, after his ascension to the throne, there had been a few requests where some people had wanted to show their grat.i.tude to the King.
It wasn"t possible for a King to meet each and every one of his subjects for trivial things such as this. Hence, Kellor had ordered for such requests to be kindly denied quoting that the King was busy training.
As for other requests such as those from businessmen, they were redirected to other departments after sending a message to the appropriate block.
From his experiences on both Earth and Angaria, Daneel knew that one of the most foolish things a King could do was to ignore his subjects.
Hence, he had already laid down the order to directly send any request to him in case it was about a subject wanting to talk about their problems.
In fact, he had also made plans to place public communication trinkets where any one could place complaints.
These plans had been placed on the backburner due to the war. Now that the war was past, Daneel decided to put them back into motion before ordering the government officials below him to immediately send those two to the Royal Court.
As he entered the empty Court alone, he was surprised to see a pair of bright green eyes look into his with adoration burning inside them before shyly glancing away as if embarra.s.sed.
Seeing such a thing for the first time in his life, Daneel missed a step and almost stumbled before thankfully regaining his balance before he lost his image in front of the two.
In fact, this adoration clearly bordered on fanaticism, as the girl who those eyes belonged to had to be nudged by the woman beside her before she realized that she had been brazenly staring into the King"s eyes without even bowing to him with respect.
With an expression of slight panic appearing on her freckled face, Dalia hurriedly bowed down on both knees and hid her head between her legs.
Seeing this, Helena who had just knelt on one knee became dumbstruck.
Her daughter had first frozen when the King entered, and she was now curled up on the ground like a porcupine.
Thinking that they would definitely be thrown out for indecency, she secretly tried to jolt her daughter to sanity without the King noticing.
Meanwhile, Daneel had already sat down on the Throne.
Seeing the girl on the ground who looked like she wouldn"t unfurl herself no matter what happened, he felt amused before saying, "Rise."
Although Dalia was feeling the most embarra.s.sed that she had ever felt in her life, she still heeded her idol"s command.
Getting up, she made sure to keep her gaze down while blus.h.i.+ng fiercely.
"You said you have a problem which needs my attention?"
It was only after the King posed this question after a few seconds of silence did she finally look up.
As she did so, Daneel finally noticed that she was only a little girl of 10-12 years of age.
Knowing that this was usually the age at which kids might get attached to idols who affected them in some way, Daneel realized what was going on.
The basic information about the two had already reached him, so he knew that his actions had helped this little family tremendously.
Thus, the look that she had had in her eyes before made sense.
Still, seeing the real change that he had brought about, Daneel felt truly happy and grateful that he had decided to embark on his path.
Engraving the little girl"s cute expression of shyness in his heart, Daneel waited for an answer.
Yet, even after a few seconds, there was none.
Finally, it was the woman who spoke, who seemed to have given up on waiting for the girl to speak as she was still too busy staring at her toes.
Beginning with them settling down in the Capital, she explained about everything that had happened while gesturing at the black box that she had brought with her.
As Daneel listened, a frown came on his face as he realized that this was, indeed, a problem that needed to come to light.
Not one to dally when he decided that something needed fixing, he immediately summoned the Police Commander whom he had seldom interacted with since taking the Throne.
Just like the previous Grand Court Mage, the Police Commander was an individual from the previous administration who had yet to do anything to win his trust.
Although he was an Exalted Human Fighter, there hadn"t been a situation before where a single such individual would have made a difference, making it so that he had almost never needed to be called upon except for executing his responsibilities.
Still, Daneel realized that he was another a.s.set who had to be put to good use.
Keeping this thought in mind for later, he asked, "Why was the case against bogus claims not registered?"
At this, the Police Commander, who was a bearded man with a bald, s.h.i.+ny head, sighed before saying, "My King, it is because we have no way to confirm or deny any claims. This is one of the types of cases where both parties swear under oath that they are telling the truth, My Lord."
Hearing this, Daneel was perplexed. If the seller said that the embroidery trinket would work for 6 months to make a sale, then how could he avoid admitting the same under oath?
"Do you remember precisely what he said? Did he say expressly that it will work for 6 months?"
At the stern question from the King, Helena could only stutter while looking for an answer.
She could not remember the exact words of the seller, yet it was a fact that she had walked away from the sale with the thinking that the trinket would last for 6 months.
Finally, it was Dalia who opened her mouth and answered in a hesitant voice after finally getting over the shock and awe of finally meeting her the idol who often appeared in her dreams.
"He said… that it would definitely come for 6 months… if what he was told was true. But the last part was in pa.s.sing."
Wording. It was all about wording.
By leaving themselves enough wiggle room in what they said, these sellers were clearly exploiting poor folk like the two in front of him.
Realizing this, Daneel was actually reminded of the "Terms & Conditions" back on Earth, which almost no one read. Using this fact, corporations often sneaked in statements that forfeited the rights of the people who signed them without them knowing.
Although this problem had been brought to light, for once, Daneel could not figure out how to solve it right away.
This business was definitely entrenched with the roots of the Kingdom, making it so that it would require a radical purge for which he currently didn"t have the funds. In fact, Daneel"s agenda for today had been to finalize the plans for solving the debt of Lanthanor.
Thus, putting aside that problem for now, Daneel focused instead on a different one that had come to his mind.
Why didn"t Helena have other options to resort to?
Why hadn"t there been a way to help and encourage people like her who had talent but no surety to give to obtain loans from lenders?
With these thoughts, one of the most revolutionary organizations in Angaria was born.