Chapter 454: Reminder from the Poet Classmate
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Hobert looked at the seventeen dazzling Beyonder ingredients on the altar: the season of harvest had arrived!
He put the materials away, sacrificed the "Provoker Warhammer" to "The Fool," and then waited for another fifteen Beyonder ingredients.
Just then, Hobert thought of a very serious problem: these seventeen materials of five different kinds were difficult for him to distinguish by name and pathway!
His first thought was, who should he consult?
At that moment, the messenger suddenly appeared in Hobert's room, and a letter accurately flew into Hobert's raised hand.
Hobert looked at the sealing wax on the envelope, which was an abstract pattern of a book and an eye, quite unfamiliar.
Opening it, it turned out to be a letter from "Vice Admiral Iceberg" Edwina.
The content of the letter was short, simply telling Hobert that pirates had discovered the flagship of "Vice Admiral Dusk" in the southwest of the Berserk Sea. Edwina promised that she would continue to send people to investigate the specific location of "Vice Admiral Dusk."
There was also a page of drawings in the letter, a very neat hand-drawn sea chart that was no less than a printed version.
It had a few islands marked in elegant handwriting, and the location where "Vice Admiral Dusk" was discovered.
Hobert compared it with the sea chart he had bought from Feynapotter, and easily got the approximate location of "Vice Admiral Dusk."
Putting down the sea chart, Hobert suddenly thought, isn't there a ready-made teacher!
So he began to write a reply, first thanking Edwina for providing the information, and then asking her in detail what the five Beyonder ingredients he had obtained this time were.
...
"Forsaken Land of the Gods," City of Silver!
Chad, the old man in charge of logistics, brought Derrick to the top of the round tower, to the Chief's room: "Your Excellency, take a look, Derrick was lucky enough to get an extraordinary weapon during an outing to collect materials!"
Chad handed over the weapon, which was somewhat bloody, stained, and looked very old.
Chief Colin took the "Provoker Warhammer" and looked at it. As a former "Weapon Master," he roughly knew the weapon's abilities as soon as he touched it.
Finally, he concluded: it's very suitable for facing monsters!
The always rigorous Colin even had a slight smile on his face, and he casually asked Derrick, "How did you get it?"
After this period of growth, Derrick had already prepared a response: "Chief, because of a transaction with a companion, I owed him a pair of 'Mirror Dragon's Eyes,' so I went to try to hunt a Mirror Dragon today, on the way..."
Derrick described vividly how he encountered a powerful monster, how his abilities restrained it, and how he accidentally obtained the warhammer after a fierce fight.
"Very good." Colin said to Chad, "Redeem more merits for him!"
As he spoke, he winked at Chad.
Chad understood and took the "Provoker Warhammer" returned by the Chief with both hands: "Yes!"
Derrick secretly breathed a sigh of relief in his heart. He originally prepared the reason he gave to Chad, but he didn't expect to report it to the Chief.
After the two left the round tower together, Chad indeed redeemed more merits for Derrick.
Derrick received the merits, exchanged them for materials, and happily went back.
Because he had seen the Chief, Derrick was more cautious this time and did not immediately exchange for the Beyonder ingredients that needed to be paid to "The Emperor" as planned, but only exchanged for a main material of "Solar High Priest."
After Derrick left, Chad took the "Provoker Warhammer" and came to the Chief's room again.
Colin picked up the "Provoker Warhammer" from the wooden box: "What did Derrick redeem with his merits?"
"A main material of 'Solar High Priest.'" Chad reported: "After returning from this exploration, he has already exchanged for a main material of 'Solar High Priest.' I heard that he also exchanged for some useless main materials on the black market."
Colin was stunned: "Useless main materials?"
"Yes, they are all main materials that cannot be used in the potion pathways we have mastered, and a lot can be exchanged with very few merits."
Colin thought for a while and asked again: "Are 'Mirror Dragon's Eyes' not among his redeemed items?"
"I'm not sure about this." Chad said: "But I heard that he exchanged for main materials at the Sequence 8 level."
He recalled for a moment and said: "About twenty days ago, he did come to exchange for 'Mirror Dragon's Eyes,' but there was no stock left."
Colin nodded. In this case, except for Derrick's exchange for useless main materials being a bit abnormal, there was nothing else that was too suspicious.
He stared at the "Provoker Warhammer" for more than ten seconds, and suddenly had an idea. He found a damp rag and wiped the old-looking areas of the weapon. After repeatedly wiping it a few times, it was wiped clean.
It was the same when wiping other places. Soon the weapon in Colin's hand became brand new.
Chad also saw something was wrong, because weapons seized from monsters had never been so clean. The stains on them could not be wiped off with a simple wipe: "Chief, should we find someone to keep an eye on him..."
Colin raised his hand: "No need, give Derrick some freedom, maybe he can bring us some surprises."
...
Feynapotter Kingdom, Jeffery Territory.
Hobert learned that "Little Sun" would have to wait a few days to pay for the weapon in order to avoid being suspected by the Chief.
Hobert first sacrificed the seventeen Beyonder ingredients he had obtained to the "Nation of Disorder," and waited until evening before finally receiving Edwina's reply.
As Hobert expected, Edwina indeed recognized all five main materials and gave a relatively detailed description of the monsters that yielded the five materials.
This gave Hobert an idea, and it would be easier to price them when selling them in the future.
Then Hobert pondered what to send Edwina as a return gift to thank her for her explanation.
Although Hobert knew that she liked to teach others, he still had to express his gratitude, so that it would be easier to ask her questions next time.
After thinking for a while, Hobert remembered that he had a notebook of Duke Southville from the Fourth Epoch, which recorded many anecdotes from the mid and late Fourth Epoch.
For Hobert, only a few paragraphs in this notebook were important, and there were excerpts already.
In fact, for those who don't know "0-05" or "Genie," those conversations that are more important to Hobert are just some anecdotes about the Night Emperor.
Hobert came to the "Nation of Disorder" and searched for a long time before finally finding the notebook. After rereading it, he simply tore off some places that might have important information, preparing to lie that he only had a part of this notebook himself.
This kind of ancient book was gathering dust in Hobert's place, so it was better to give it to Edwina, who had this kind of hobby.
After the kitchen's second batch of donuts was ready, Hobert packed the reply letter and the notebook full of Fourth Epoch anecdotes into a package and gave it to the messenger.
In the evening, it was time to wash his feet again.
After Dennis put down the foot washing water, he preemptively answered: "Lord, you asked me to fetch water for you, hoping that I would exercise my arm strength and waist strength while fetching water, right?"
Hobert looked at Dennis with bright eyes: "If you think I'm so superficial, I think you'll have to fetch water for another 50 years."
Dennis was slightly stunned and started to ponder again.
Before going to sleep, Hobert received another reply from Edwina, saying that she liked the notebook very much and read it all in one breath after receiving it.
Hobert smiled: "I'm glad you like it."
Hobert fell asleep while considering how to hunt "Vice Admiral Dusk."
Early the next morning, Hobert was sleeping soundly when a letter floated on his face.
By the time he took the letter away, the messenger had already entered the spirit world, as if to express his dissatisfaction with starting work so early.
Hobert yawned: "Who is sending me a letter so early?"
To his surprise, it was actually Leonard's letter.
In the letter, Leonard briefly described how they took the tourists away from Boklun Manor. They also found two or three Secret Puppets who had been caught in the net on the mountain.
However, the corruption on those Secret Puppets did not seem to be serious anymore, and they solved the problem relatively soberly.
Then Leonard reminded Hobert that the hidden existence that solved those Secret Puppets should be a big shot from the Fourth Epoch who had not completely died, and asked Hobert to be careful and not to completely trust this kind of god in poor condition.
Hobert smiled helplessly: Should I remind him to pay attention to the old grandpa in his body?
But thinking that Leonard was doing this out of good intentions, he sent a letter back to express his gratitude.
The kitchen of the lord's mansion had to start making donuts at dawn.
He summoned the messenger again. The messenger said while receiving the letter: "You've been very busy lately, sending letters so frequently that I don't have much time to rest."
Hobert immediately said: "I'll add three donuts for you this time!"
"It's good to be busy!" After getting six donuts, the messenger quickly disappeared into the spirit world.
Hobert smiled and took the remaining donuts to the restaurant to share with Donna and Fors.
After breakfast, Hobert started his work for the day. First, the land distribution work that had been going on for a week was basically completed, and Conrad came to report to Hobert on the progress of the work.
At the same time, in the past two days, Hobert's potion had indeed digested another wave, but the degree of digestion was not as obvious as last time.
Of course, this kind of formal business had to be discussed in the main hall. Hobert knew the number of cultivated land and orchards in the territory like the back of his hand, and had a clear understanding of the work reported by Conrad.
There was plenty of cultivated land in the territory. After all the land was distributed, there was still a large part of the lord's cultivated land.
After reporting on the land distribution, Conrad said again: "Lord, I found a phenomenon during the land distribution. There are many more people in each village!"
Hobert was stunned: "Did we have cases of falsely reporting the population when we did the household registration before?"
"That's not the case," Conrad smiled: "I did some research. The extra people are residents from the surrounding territories. I heard that we don't collect taxes here, so they came to rely on relatives and friends."
Hobert nodded and asked: "How many more people are there?"
"According to my preliminary understanding, there are more than 300 people who can rely on relatives and friends." Conrad said: "There are about 800 people who have no relatives and friends to rely on, and just want to rent land to farm here."
Hobert pondered for a while: "Didn't you just say that there is still a lot of land belonging to the lord's mansion? If we distribute those lands, how many people can we distribute them to?"
"About 400 people."
"Then distribute it!" Hobert smiled: "But pay attention, the land distributed to these people should be slightly less than the original residents, giving priority to the relatives and friends of the original residents, in order to reflect the preferential treatment for the original residents and create a little sense of superiority for them!
"I suggest that the extra land can be distributed to about 500 people, you can handle the specific situation yourself!"
Conrad immediately opened his notebook and wrote while saying: "Yes."
"Since these people are going to live on this territory, they must do three things. The first is household registration! The second is to divide households by family! The third is to obey the lord's mansion's dispatch."
Conrad immediately said: "I will do a good job in publicity."
"As for the housing problem of these people," Hobert said again: "The lord's mansion will rent tents to them for free and sell them building materials at a fair price.
"They can pay for the building materials in gold Lire, or they can pay for the building materials in crops.
"The tents rented to them are only free for one year, and the building materials sold to them on credit can be repaid at a fair price within one year, and interest must be paid on them after one year!"
Those tents were seized by the "Jeffery Army" from the Shipyard Island, and they were piling up and getting moldy in the warehouse of the lord's mansion.
As for building materials, the Jeffery Territory will not lack building materials in the future.
The shorthand Conrad lamented that the lord was a political expert he had never seen before, and always had a way to "turn waste into treasure." No matter what the problem was, it was not a problem in his hands!
"As for the remaining 600 people, we can't give up either!" Hobert said: "Their housing problem can also be solved by renting tents and selling them building materials on credit.
"The food problem can be solved by the construction site, which is currently in urgent need of manpower. If one person in a family works on the construction site, they can provide food for other family members.
"But the food must be deducted from the salary of the person working, and if the salary is not enough to pay for the family members' diet, another person in the family must work on the construction site!"
Hobert paused and said: "This will bring a lot of burden to the financial work in the territory. Go and call Philip and Roy, and let's discuss a standard."
This discussion lasted for more than two hours. Now there is more and more paperwork in the territory. As long as the residents in the territory have a little bit of literacy, they are arranged to do the corresponding paperwork.
Hobert asked the teachers of the school in the territory to open a night school to give these paperwork workers remedial lessons.
And stipulated that only those who have passed the corresponding examination and graduated from the night school can get full salary.
At the end of this meeting, Hobert made a major personnel appointment: "I am going to let Conrad be the mayor of Jeffery Town!"
In the main hall, these three people, who have been trained to a certain level of governance and political level, were all slightly stunned. With the lord in charge, does Jeffery Town still need a mayor?
"After the town government is built, Conrad will take your team to work there." Hobert was both explaining and making arrangements:
"Recommend a few candidates from your subordinates to me. I'll reappoint a 'Registry Knight' who will report to the town mayor in the future."
"Roy will be the 'Construction Knight' and will report to the town mayor."
"When Albert returns, he will be the 'Judicial Knight' and will also report to the town mayor."
"Also, the newly appointed 'Shipping Knight,' Wayne, and the soon-to-be-appointed 'Taxation Knight,' Donna, will all report to you."
"In the future, after the hospital and school are built, there will also be 'Medical Education Knights.'"
"Once the territory's tourism industry develops, there will also be 'Tourism and Culture Knights,' 'Agriculture and Animal Husbandry Knights,' and so on, all of whom will report to the town mayor."
Conrad felt a surge of joy in his heart. This was equivalent to being the second-in-command of the Jeffery territory!
At this moment, he also understood the significance of the Duke setting up the town mayor position, and he couldn't help but sigh in his heart: 'Thank goodness! I seized this opportunity, or my life would have been wasted in mediocrity.'
Hobert glanced at Phillip: "From now on, you will be the 'Finance Knight' and will report to me."
"When Corwin returns from out of town, he will be the 'Human Resources Knight,' in charge of talent recruitment and staff promotions. Knight-level promotions will be directly assessed and handled by me. Corwin will also report to me!"
Phillip smiled and bowed slightly: "Yes! As for the butler's job, will I hold it concurrently, or..."
Of course, he was happy. Although he and his son were not as high-ranking as Conrad, both father and son were in charge of key departments, especially the 'Finance Knight,' who was clearly a confidant of the Duke.
This arrangement was clearly more favored by the Duke than Albert and Corwin, the original knightly father and son.
"Allen is quite meticulous; the butler's job can be handed over to him!" Hobert had already thought about the arrangements.
Allen, who was at the door, immediately showed a smile. Although he had not become a 'Knight,' as a butler, he would surely be trusted by the Duke.
Finally, Hobert said, "These personnel arrangements are to be kept secret for now. After the town government is built, we will gradually implement these arrangements."
This noon meeting took a lot of energy from Hobert, so he took a nap at noon before teaching Freya vocabulary in the afternoon.
...
Rorsted Archipelago, Bayam.
Rafter Pound passed the final round of assessment and finally became a tutor at the Tony Manor.
It is said that the Tony Manor is one of the largest manors in the entire colony. Some say it is one-third the size of Masik, but after a few days of observation, Rafter felt this statement was a bit exaggerated.
However, one-fifth of the mountainous area in the central Blue Mountain Island belongs to the Tony Manor; nearly one-quarter of the most fertile land on Blue Mountain Island belongs to the Tony Manor.
It also includes a large number of rainforests, beaches, lakes, and so on. The Tony Manor even built its own railway to transport products from the manor.
As for the background of the Tony Manor, there are many speculations. Some believe that this is the King's property because the largest manor in the Rorsted Archipelago is actually the 'King's Manor.'
The royal family couldn't easily purchase another manor of similar size, so they simply called it the Tony Manor.
Others believe that the power behind the Tony Manor is the family of Valentine Tony, the first governor of the Rorsted Archipelago.
Although Governor Valentine made great achievements in battle, the Tony family currently has little influence in Backlund. Some say that Governor Valentine exchanged all his battle merits for land in the colony.
Regardless of the forces behind it, ordinary people cannot afford to offend it.
Now that the Tony Manor is recruiting a tutor, Rafter plans to use the tutor's identity to cover up some of his illegal activities in Bayam.
Yes, he plans to establish his own gang in Bayam and then obtain a certain degree of development by bribing the Governor's Office, thereby digesting the 'Briber' potion.
However, this is very risky and can easily be targeted by official Beyonders or other Beyonder organizations coming to seek gold, so he needs an identity that he can disengage from at any time.
At the same time, he must prepare for the subsequent 'Baron of Corruption.' If he can do well in the Tony Manor and become the manager of a certain area of the manor, he can take the opportunity to digest the Sequence 6 potion.
If he doesn't do well, Rafter plans to take the forces he has built up to the Southern Continent to find opportunities.
The forces of the Northern Continent countries are even weaker there, and there are warlords everywhere.
Like Hobert's idea back then, he can raise a team himself. With his Sequence 6 strength, it is enough to occupy a territory and become a small warlord.
It was not surprising that Rafter passed the assessment because he had a pure Backlund accent, understood noble etiquette and noble dances, and most importantly, he knew a lot of real-time noble information.
In addition, Rafter never forgot to play the role of 'Briber' and bribed the examiner of this assessment, adding another layer of insurance to this assessment.
In this way, Rafter arrived at the Tony Manor, which looked like a small palace, by carriage.
This manor is actually not far from Bayam. A one-hour drive can take you from here to the port of Bayam.
Under the leadership of the butler, Rafter met Mr. Tony, who had blood-colored hair, a mustache, and black pupils.
For some reason, Rafter always felt that this Mr. Tony looked familiar. Mr. Tony also smiled and said, "You look a lot like one of my nephews."
Rafter immediately climbed up the "pole" and directly called Mr. Tony, who was seven or eight years older than him, uncle.
After leaving Backlund, Rafter completely let go. The original noble etiquette and dignity had long been thrown behind him. He now just wants to advance as soon as possible and become a 'Mentor of Disorder'!
This is the first step in restoring the family's glory.
After obtaining Mr. Tony's approval, Rafter finally settled in this huge manor. The treatment here is very good. He has his own set of rooms with a study and living room, which gives him enough free space.
However, the butler specifically instructed that after 8 pm, Rafter's range of activities is limited to the courtyard of his residence.
Rafter solemnly agreed on the surface, but didn't take it too seriously.
In the afternoon, he met five eligible students, who all looked very well-mannered.
There is more than just him as a tutor in the entire manor, it's just that the Tony family has five eligible children, so they need to find a new tutor. Other tutors also have their own students to take care of.
At night, Rafter secretly got up, preparing to return to Bayam to find suitable gang forces that could be secretly subdued.
After carefully observing the situation outside, there was actually no one patrolling! He jumped onto the wall and suddenly froze: "Why am I jumping on the wall instead of sleeping well at night?"
So he returned to his room and changed into his pajamas. At this time, Rafter suddenly realized: Why am I back again?
He changed into neat clothes again, and just jumped onto the wall: "The moon is so beautiful tonight!"
After admiring the moon, Rafter returned to his room again, changed into his pajamas and lay on the bed, his eyes wide open, without any sleepiness.
Although he still couldn't remember what was wrong, he could be sure that tonight was definitely very wrong!
Rafter came to the wall again: "Bayam is so beautiful at night!"
He returned to his room again, changed into his pajamas and lay on the bed, staring with wide eyes, without any sleepiness.
Although he still couldn't remember what was wrong, he could be sure that tonight was definitely very wrong.
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