Chapter 598 – Sheet 594 – Arrival at Jingyao

Chapter 598 – Zhang 594 – Arriving at Jingyao
The early morning mist had not yet cleared, the guards in charge of guarding the west gate of Jingyao yawned as they moved the heavy bolts out of the way, and a few of them worked together to push the gate open slowly.

As the guards on the citadel turned the winch, a huge drawbridge pulled by iron cables was slowly lowered across the moat.

“All give me some spirit!”

The squad leader shouted orders, “When a noble passes by in a moment, be sure to puff out your chest, both eyes should shine, and you must not lose the face of our Jingyao people.”

“Yes, captain!”

The soldiers sparsely replied, enjoying the short period of comfort, it wouldn’t take another hour’s time before they had to stand up straight for a day as the young captain instructed.

Alas, there had been a bit too much going on in Crystalline Flare lately.

First, the old king died of illness, although his old man willed that the funeral ceremony should be kept simple, but the ministers underneath still made it for more than half a month, and then there was the new king succeeding to the throne, in order to show the respect to the old king who passed away, the new king ordered not to make a celebration to celebrate his own succession, and pushed it back to make up for it after the first anniversary of his own succession.

But according to the tradition of Aldo, when the new king succeeded to the throne, all the lords from all over the country had to come to Jingyao to have an audience with the new king, and even if they didn’t come themselves, they had to send messengers, so the whole Jingyao still continued to be busy.

From the thick mist came the ringing of bells, the guards were a bit surprised, how could someone come so soon?

“Perhaps it’s a merchant caravan that didn’t have time to enter the city yesterday before it closed again.”

The young captain said, then frowned and warned, “Don’t ask for more money in the last few days, charge whatever the entry fee is, and don’t take a penny more, do you hear me?”

“Yes, Captain!” The soldiers replied in unison.

The caravan in the fog gradually revealed its full appearance, there were many carriages, quite a lot of people.

“Stop and check!”

A guard shouted towards the caravan.

A young knight emerged from the caravan and said with a cold face, “We are lords from the Northwest Bay.”

“Great …… lord!”

The guards who stopped them bowed in greeting, if it was a few years ago, the guards might have had to interrogate people from the western bay, but the Northwest Bay of now could not be compared to the Northwest Bay of a few years ago.

The young captain pushed past his men and squeezed his way to the front, a smile plastered on his face.

“My lord, I wonder what honorable families you come from.”

“The Ferdinand family, the Greiman family, the Parker family, the Garnard family, the Heller family, the Malcolm family, ……”

The knight reported a long list of family names.

“Oh, are all the honorable lords here together?”

“Yes, we all came to Jingyao together by taking a boat by sea and coming ashore from West Harbor.”

The junior captain was not skeptical, nowadays everyone knew that the seafaring technology of the western bay people was well developed, and every day there were a large number of ships from the northwestern bay coming in and out of the western harbor.

“May I ask whichever of these lords would like to show their family coat of arms, oh, just one from a family will do.”

The knight produced a coat of arms to the junior captain and said, “This is the coat of arms of the Heller family, recognize it? I am Derek Heller, eldest son of Earl Winifred Heller.”

The junior captain placed his attention on the coat of arms and scrutinized it; in order to welcome a lord from out of town, they, the officers guarding the gates, had been given a good refresher course in heraldry by the Heraldry Academy.

“Recognize, recognize!” His head nodded like a chicken pecking at rice, and he stepped aside to say, “Please, honorable lords, enter the city.” “Ah, I do have one thing to ask you.” Derek Heller took hold of the reins and seemed in no hurry to enter.

“The information we received beforehand said that nobles from out of town could enter the city at any time during these days, including at night. But we arrived in Jingyao yesterday after sunset, so how come we didn’t call for the gates to be opened?”

“Uh…… Lord, please allow me to explain.” The junior captain rubbed the back of his head and said with some embarrassment, “Yesterday during the day the city caught a few troublemakers, and the south side sent over …… I think you know what it means. So …… the entry and exit policy temporarily changed again, and the night also resumed the previous vigilance strength. At that time you may be on the road, so you do not know ……”

Sent from the south, those who follow the situation in the Kingdom know who it is.

Derek was a little angry, shaking the reins, “We but a thousand miles from the western bay, the result is that you let me sleep outside the cold city for a night!”

Just as the junior captain was unsure of how to deal with the nobleman’s temper in front of him, a young voice came from the caravan.

“Alright, Derek, it’s important to get into the city, there are still a lot of caravans waiting behind us.”

The owner of the voice also rode his horse and rushed to the front, the guard squad leader looked up, this was a young man who was about the same age as Dairik or maybe slightly younger, with short black hair and a calm face, when locking eyes with him, there was no overbearing look like the Dairik in front.

But Derek seemed to have a great deal of respect for this young man who was probably even younger than him, “Well, Count Gleeman, let’s go into the city first.”

The young earl who had just come over relieved the guards, the young captain threw him a look of gratitude, the young man just smiled and joined Derek Heller as he galloped towards the city gates.

The group of Northwest Lords followed the two in front of them and soon entered Jingyao.

“Ah, this is the first time I’ve come to the king’s capital, Jingyao.”

Looking at the street in front of him and the buildings on both sides that were very different in style from the Northwest Bay, Paul said with emotion.

“How does it feel?” Earl Pryke Parker, who was riding beside him, asked.

“Exquisite, very exquisite.”

Coming from the north to Jingyao gave Paul a feeling like switching from a western fantasy painting style to a Japanese fantasy painting style, and the rough atmosphere turned into a small family. Of course, what is said here is the feeling, in terms of population and city area, Jingyao dumped the northern city by N streets.

“It is said that more than half a million people live in the city walls alone.” Earl Parker introduced.

“Huh? That’s a lot of people. Our Gerd Rodney’s majesty is visited by so many people every day ……”

Earl Parker corrected him, “It’s His Majesty Rodney XVIII.”

A question popped into Paul’s mind, “I’ve always had a question, isn’t nth used to differentiate between people with the same name from generation to generation within a family? Why is it a family name in the case of our king.”

Pryke Parker explained it to him, “Because Rodney is both the king’s last name and the king’s first name.”

“Huh?”

“It is tradition in Aldo that when a man takes the crown, he sheds his name and henceforth takes only the family name, becoming the embodiment of the entire family.”

“So our king should now be known as Rodney Rodney? Uh, it’s a bit of a mouthful.”

“No!” Earl Parker shook his head, “Just Rodney or Rodney XVIII. Gerd Rodney is a thing of the past, only Rodney XVIII will exist in the world in the future.”

“I see.”

Paul understood.

(End of chapter)