Chapter 517 Tax Reform 2

Chapter 517 Tax Reform 2
Hansel walked to the gate of the lord’s mansion with all sorts of thoughts in his mind.

The Lord’s Mansion in Lakeheart Town had just undergone some renovations – Lord Gleeman had finally spared a fortune to maintain the ancestral mansion.

The so-called Lord’s Mansion was actually a small castle, occupying an area of about 20 acres, surrounded by a ring of five to six meter high walls, inside which stood a three-story stone building, which was the residence of successive generations of Counts of Alda.

In the former Northwest Gulf, robbers on the sea and bandits on the land were common, in addition to the wars between the lords, so having a castle was a standard for every lord.

Lords’ castles were often built on cliffs and other dangerous places, and those who didn’t have such geographical conditions would also choose to dig a moat around the castle. Alda is also blessed with a large lake such as Lake Wise, but also happens to be a few dozen meters away from the south shore of Lake Wise where there is a small island, so the first generation of the Count of Alda chose to build their own castle on this small island in the lake, and with his followers came to Alda also in the small island around the castle and the bureau, so that it is convenient to be able to quickly hide in the castle when the enemy boarded the island to take refuge.

This is the origin of the town of Lakewood.

Hundreds of years have passed, and although the castle has occasionally been repaired, by the time Paul Greiman succeeded to the throne, the castle had accumulated a lot of dilapidated places, broken masonry everywhere, or the entire wall brick peeling off the walls, and so on, all of which reveal the building’s old state.

This quality of residence obviously does not match the identity of the most powerful lord of the Northwest Bay now. Thus, after much persuasion from the crowd, the Lord of Arda finally paid out a sum of money to repair his residence.

The restored castle removed many of the defense facilities, and its style was completely focused on how to make the people inside live more comfortably, the windows became bigger, and could let in more sunlight, so that the inside of the castle was no longer as cold as before, and the aisles became wider, which made it more convenient for the staff in the lord’s residence to come and go.

“Head Abbott!” The guard at the doorway stomped his heels toward the ground and greeted Hansel.

Hansel gave them a slight nod in response, then handed over his own pass – which he now had to carry if he wanted to enter the Lords’ House.

The guards double-checked and sidestepped out of the way as Hansel entered the castle’s gates. He followed a path paved with lapis lazuli to the door of the castle’s main building; the courtyard wasn’t very large, and the outside of the castle could be seen from the third floor of the main building.

During the restoration of the lord’s house, according to Count Greiman’s wish, it was either do nothing or do a lot, he built another two-story building in the empty backyard near the north wall as his resting and sleeping place, while the original main building of the castle was completely transformed into a place for the lord’s work and entertaining guests.

Hansel looked upwards, his eyes fixed on the third floor in the middle of the window, it is obviously bigger than the two sides of the window, inside is the count Greiman’s office, this so-called office is in fact the original study in the castle, Paul usually stay there to deal with the work, and from time to time to call some people in for a small meeting. His Excellency did not like to run errands by himself, even to the conference room that he personally set up on the second floor. Only when the number of people involved in a meeting was so large that his office couldn’t be stuffed, would the Earl Lord force himself to go to the conference room on the second floor by virtue of his own strong will.

Not knowing whether to go to the second or third floor today, just as Hansel was muttering inwardly, he met Earl Greiman’s secretary, Sir Bernard Wood-Francis, face to face.

Bernard was the person that Hansel was most familiar with in Lake Town and even the Northwest Bay, because it was Hansel who recommended him to Paul, back then, Earl Greiman was very hungry to search around for talents to perfect his administrative system, even as long as he could read and write, he would meet the Earl’s definition of talent, and it was in this case, that Hansel brought Bernard to his side.

Jingyao lower nobility origin, in the king’s capital by copying books to earn a living of Sir Francis has a powerful skill – can not forget, so Paul arranged him in his side as a secretary, Sir Francis an important job is to arrange Paul’s various schedules, when the lord suddenly have any ideas will call out, Bernard, to help When the lord suddenly had an idea, he would call out, “Bernard, help me remember, how I want to so and so after such and such a day,” and Sir Francis would faithfully write down the lord’s ideas, and then when it came to the scheduled time, the lord would always receive a timely reminder.

Being of the same crystalline origin, being old acquaintances when they were studying, and now serving under the same lord, made the relationship between Hansel and Bernard very close.

“Good day, Hansel.”

“Good day, Bernard. Old place after work?” “No problem.”

The two smiled at each other and greeted each other, although their offices were separated, they still retained the habit of going to a familiar tavern for a drink together every now and then.

Hansel asked, “Who else is coming this time?”

Bernard replied, “Almost all the heads of departments are coming.”

Hansel: “So I have to go to the second floor?”

Bernard: “Yes, you’re the first to arrive, go ahead and wait there.”

Hansel gets a wicked grin on his face, “What’s going to be discussed today? Can you divulge it to me?”

In case the Count was going to bring up his work side of things, then he would have to bellyache about it ahead of time.

Bernard shook his head and said, “This meeting should have been improvised by Lord Gleeman, I’m not sure. But ……”

“What?”

“Lord Gleiman has been agonizing over the sharply declining revenues in the last few days, and it’s nothing more than that that was discussed at the meeting. Alas, it’s all the fault of that damned war in Horn Bay.”

The Northwest Gulf now relied heavily on maritime trade, and once the war started there in Horned Bay, the Northwest Gulf felt as if it had been strangled all of a sudden. Maritime trade and the various industries that depended on it provided a large share of the Council of State’s tax revenue, which was now drastically shrinking due to the effects of the war.

“Oh!” Hansel made a bitter face, “The solution to the financial problem is nothing more than relying on open source or cutting down on expenses. I have long advised the Earl to build fewer schools, build fewer roads or reservoirs, or tell that gang of alchemy crooks to get lost, won’t the money be saved?”

“Haha!” A bitter smile appeared on Bernard’s face, “What you said is precisely all that Lord Gleeman values.”

Hansel: “If Lord Earl doesn’t want to cut back on expenses, then he’ll have to think in terms of open source.”

He thinks for a moment, and then feels more and more that this is quite possible.

I wonder which fat pig will get slaughtered.

(End of chapter)