A Tale of Strategies For the Throne

It was just after noon, when the sun was blazing, but the courtyard of the palace was much cooler because it was shrouded in a large canopy of dense trees.

The statue of the goddess Isdar in the middle of the courtyard is bathed in the sun, holding stars in her hands, and the water drops from her feet splash into the fountain basin.

Thin water droplets form a water curtain, dissipating the heat in the courtyard.

Heimos stood next to the fountain, reaching out to catch a few drops of splashing water.

Cool drops of water fell on his hands, moistening his palms.

He was lost in thought for a while, and for some reason, he suddenly remembered what happened here a long time ago.

At that time, he was only a teenager and had just entered the palace.

One evening, when the sun was setting like fire, he stood in the same place as now, standing in front of the little child sitting on the edge of the fountain basin.

At that time, he had already realized that the child occupied a very important position in his heart.

Therefore, he told the child that he would accompany him and protect him throughout his life and would never let anyone hurt him.

That was the first time he expressed his feelings in front of others.

That was the first time that he wanted to protect someone so much and wanted to be with that person all the time.

Looking back now, that might have been his first confession to Garlan.

Then... he was rejected by Garlan who was still a child.

'I don't need you to protect me. ’

'I hate you. ’

Children are very straightforward. If you like him, you like him, and if you dislike him, you dislike him. Although I don’t know why, Gallan, who was still a child at the time, seemed to dislike him from the first time they met.

And this kind of straightforward rejection can almost be described as cruel to me, who was a young man with high self-esteem and extremely sensitive and fragile.

He even felt as humiliated as if he had been slapped hard in front of his face.

Feeling humiliated and uncomfortable, he secretly swore in his heart that he would never get close to that child again!

Well, nothing like swearing counts.

Doesn't count.

Heimos, who was standing next to the fountain, thought so, and then raised his lips unconsciously.

Things that made his young self extremely uncomfortable at that time, now, looking back on them, turned out to be special memories that made him smile from the bottom of his heart.

All the memories with Garlan, from childhood to adulthood, are almost countless.

Those good or bad things, no matter what they are, now, just thinking about them can make him feel warm and soft in his heart.

Just when Heimos was lost in thought about the past, the person he had been waiting for for a long time finally walked out of the room.

Heimos, who turned around after noticing the footsteps, looked up and saw Garlan walking quickly.

His long black hair was tied behind his back with a white hairband. The young man was wearing a sleeveless tunic, similar to the capable outfit of a ranger.

Although Gallan is not very tall, his body proportions are very good and his legs are extremely slender.

This allowed the thin short cloak hanging behind him to only cover his thighs.

When the beautiful young man with handsome appearance and vigorous appearance walked towards him quickly, Heimos couldn't help but his heart skipped a beat.

He thought that no matter what the situation, his heart would only beat and lose control for the person in front of him.

Just like Avdmir prayed for the mercy of that beautiful boy, he also longed for the love of the person in front of him.

"Heimos, I'm sorry for keeping you waiting."

Walking up to Heymos, Gallan said, "Because it took a little more time to ask Tapti to dye my hair."

He met Huymos' gaze that was fixed on him and asked doubtfully.

"What's wrong? Am I dressed wrong?"

Heimos smiled.

"No."

He said, "I was just thinking, since you have to dress up in disguise, why don't you just dress up like a woman like last time..."

Before Heimos could finish speaking, Garlan slapped him on the mouth and covered his mouth with a snap.

"Shh!"

Garlan covered his mouth with one hand and raised his index finger to his mouth to silence him.

"Promise me you won't mention that again!"

The young man spoke in a low voice and looked around. After confirming that the people around him, including Tapti, were too far away to hear their conversation, he breathed a sigh of relief.

He glared at Heimos disapprovingly.

Heymos, Kayhos and Shulos all knew that they had disguised themselves as women. Three people are already a lot, okay?

He doesn't want one more person to know about his dark history.

Grabbing Garlan's hand and removing it from his mouth, Heimos raised an eyebrow.

"It's okay not to mention it, but you have to answer me a question."

"What?"

"Why did you hate me when you were a kid?"

"ah?"

"Here." Heimos pointed to the fountain next to him, "You said at that time that you hated me and didn't need me. Why?"

Garlan was stunned for a moment, then remembered.

When he was a child, he did say those words in order to cut off Heimos' affection for him and alienate him.

"That is……"

He hesitated and didn't answer immediately.

It can't be said that it was because he was killed four times that he was afraid of and disliked Heimos at that time.

"Why do you hate me?"

Heimos asked persistently.

"...I don't remember what happened when I was a child."

His golden-red eyes narrowed and he looked at Garlan.

But after looking at it for a while, Heimos did not pursue the question any further, which made Garlan sigh in relief.

Then, he heard Heimos' next words.

"It doesn't matter."

Heimos, who was looking at him with squinted eyes, slightly raised the corners of his lips and said, "Even if you said you didn't need me at first, you still didn't say you needed me by your side later."

The raised corners of Heymos' lips revealed a hint of joy. It was obvious that he was in a very good mood at the moment, and he was also a little proud.

Garlan looked at the man in front of him who was smiling happily, and suddenly he also bent his eyes and smiled.

"It's true that I don't mean what I say, but I also remember that someone also said at the time, 'I don't like men even to death', and he swore it to Shamash."

He said, "How about you keep your word first? Stop liking me?"

The raised corners of Heymos' lips suddenly twitched.

Garlan did not shy away and looked at him with a smile.

——Come on, let’s hurt each other.

In the end, it was the Black Knight who was defeated as always.

As Avdomir, the goddess of love and beauty, said, in a relationship, the person who falls in love first is always the complete loser.

Heimos sighed and said, "Speaking of which, including that time when I was a child, I have been rejected by you three times in total. Don't you think I am pitiful for being rejected so many times?"

In order to pursue the one he loves, the Black Knight, who is as invincible as a bloodthirsty Shura on the battlefield, shamelessly labels himself a pitiful weakling.

"I don't think so at all."

The young man answered decisively.

If you really want to settle the ledger, you have killed me four times, and I have only rejected you three times.

Garlan sneered twice in his heart.

Not to mention rejection three times, even the fourth time.

Therefore, Heimos, who wanted to gain a little pity and sympathy from Garlan through the fact that he had been rejected many times, cheated himself hard.

And he himself didn't realize it at the moment.

While the two were talking, little fat Tarr had already come over.

"Are you ready to go?"

He quickly ran up to Garlan, cocked his head, and showed a rare uneasy look on his face in front of Garlan.

In the more than a year since Garlan ascended the throne, Tal has rounded up again at a speed visible to the naked eye. At this moment, the whole figure is like a round flesh ball.

But being fat, he was always the fastest when he rushed to Garlan's side.

Tarr's talent in numerical calculations is almost universally known. However, what surprised everyone was that after Garlan became king, he did not place Tarr, his confidant, in the Finance Department as everyone expected. to hold office and thereby control the finances through Tal.

Those who control the finances must be close confidants of the reigning king.

After all, generally speaking, the new king would never trust such an important financial power to continue to be controlled by the henchmen of the previous king.

However, this young king seemed different. He allowed the Finance Department to continue operating with the original personnel and gave them full trust.

This made the old ministers, who had already prepared that they would be removed when the new king took the throne, full of gratitude to King Garlan.

Garlan had no intention of stuffing Tal into the Finance Department from the beginning. He had his own plan.

In addition to the existing departments, he established a new department, directly appointed Tal as the head of this empty department, and then directly sent Tal out to get things done.

Naturally, he had another purpose in doing so.

…………

Skillfully exiting the palace from the side door as a guard leaving the palace, Garlan stepped onto the wide stone road in the royal city.

The three of them were all riding horses, and Tarr's chubby figure lay on the horse, walking in front, diligently leading Garlan to the side of the royal city.

Even after riding a horse, it took a long time to reach the destination, almost in a remote corner on the edge of the royal city.

This is a huge open space, surrounded by stone walls.

A tall arched tower rises directly in front of the stone wall. It has six floors in total. The bottom floor is embedded in the stone wall, just like the gate of the stone wall.

This was built by Tal in half a year and is also the office of the department under his command.

Garlan dismounted in front of the outer gate, tied it to the stone pillar outside, and then walked straight in through the gate.

As soon as you enter, you will see an extremely huge hall, so wide that it can accommodate thousands of people at the same time.

The end of the hall is arc-shaped and divided into dozens of separate rooms. In each room, there is a clerk responsible for the work and records there.

The spaces leading to the back of those rooms are also separated by solid stone walls, which means that if you walk in from different rooms, you will reach different places.

In the middle of the hall is a huge cypress board that looks like an erected bulletin board.

It's just that this bulletin board is a square rectangular parallelepiped, with dozens of parchment strips taped to the boards on all four sides.

As long as the merchants who come here are willing to pay a certain fee, they can write the products they own and their prices on these long strips of parchment, so that everyone who enters the hall can see them.

However, these long strips of parchment are all blank at the moment.

Heimos looked around the hall and asked Garlan: "Is this the Trade and Commerce Office you mentioned?"

In his opinion, this so-called Trade and Commerce Department is almost like a market, a centralized place for business and trade.

It's just that in markets, people usually go to the square to gather on their own, and this is a large-scale market officially established by Garlan in the name of the royal court.

Although this building looks extremely large and majestic, the hall is very empty and deserted. Apart from the clerks and other people working here, there are almost no outsiders.

You must know that Aaron Landis's royal city is in an excellent location, almost exactly in the center of the entire continent. Caravans come and go very frequently, and commerce is also very prosperous. Even a single day's transaction volume is extremely large.

However, this commercial and trade office was so deserted, which made Heimos feel strange.

After hearing what Heimos said, Tal looked at Garlan with uneasy eyes, losing his usual liveliness and looking wilted.

"I'm sorry, Your Majesty, it's all my incompetence..."

This commercial and trade office started operation half a month ago, and he has tried his best to promote its existence throughout the royal city.

However, as soon as those big merchants or large caravans hear that they need to pay a certain percentage of fees to trade here, they will of course shake their heads and be unwilling to come.

You know, when they come to the royal city for business, they only need to pay an entry tax when entering the city, and they can trade freely in the royal city.

Aaron Landis said that there is no commercial tax. It should be said that countries in the entire continent do not have commercial taxes. Most merchants doing business need to pay customs taxes, city entry taxes, etc. in various places. This kind of tax charges a certain percentage based on the transaction volume. This is simply unheard of for them.

If it was King Garlan who forced merchants to conduct transactions at this trade and trading office, then in the eyes of the merchants, it was King Garlan who was forcibly grabbing oil and money from the merchants in another way.

Although they did not dare to resist, they would naturally not be happy, and merchants would avoid the royal city in the future.

As a result, the business in the royal city will gradually become depressed. This behavior is equivalent to killing the goose to obtain the eggs.

But what reassured the merchants was that King Garlan did not force the merchants to trade in the office, but said that it was entirely up to each person to come voluntarily.

In this way, businessmen who are accustomed to money-hungry are naturally not willing to spend such an extra fee to pay any business taxes, and of course they will not come to this so-called Trade and Commerce Department.

Therefore, even after a month of operation, the place still looks deserted, which has caused many people to secretly laugh at it.

They didn't dare to say anything to Garlan, so they could only mock Tarr secretly. Of course Tal was angry, but the reality was that he was already angry, and now he was being ridiculed secretly, so he felt even more aggrieved.

He thought of many ways, but just because of the need to collect business taxes, businessmen were unwilling to trade here. Now, Tal had no choice but to tell Garlan the situation.

At this moment, he looked at Garlan eagerly, fearing that Garlan would feel incompetent because he failed in this matter.

Garlan, who was also looking around the hall, which was becoming more and more empty because it was too spacious, turned back and looked at Tarr's wilting look. He smiled and raised his hand to pat the little fat man on the shoulder.

"It's not your problem."

he reassured Tal.

People are always quite afraid of new things that they are not used to.

"Don't worry, I'll find a way."

…………

After leaving the depressed Department of Commerce and Trade, Garlan asked Tal to stay here to sort out all the information on large-scale commodity transactions in the royal city in recent times. Accompanied by Heimos, he went to the royal city where We walked around several famous markets and trading places.

These places are all located in the square. They are markets that have been naturally formed for a long time. They are large and small. You can buy goods from all over the country here. Therefore, they are very lively from morning to night. Those merchants who don’t have much goods come directly to the square. come here.

Some large merchants with backgrounds were scattered throughout the royal city and directly opened trading offices. Many large-scale trading caravans went directly to their trading offices to sell or buy the goods they transported.

After spending an entire afternoon walking around, Garlan walked back while thinking about how to open up the Trade and Commerce Department.

They walked out of a market entrance and were already hungry after wandering around for an afternoon. When a smell of aroma wafted over from the stall selling snacks at the market entrance, Garlan couldn't help but glance over.

Seeing his appearance, Heimos smiled slightly and walked towards the crowded food stall.

So Garlan just stood there obediently, waiting for Heimos to help him buy some delicious food.

After waiting for a while, I heard a familiar voice.

Turning around, I saw that he was indeed an acquaintance.

I saw Suojia, the priest of Nanna under Heymos, wearing ordinary clothes at the moment, arguing fiercely with a woman in fancy clothes at the edge of the market.

The woman had a heroic face, raised sword-shaped eyebrows, and her long, light black hair was tied into a ponytail behind her head, giving her a heroic look.

As Garlan looked at it, he felt that this woman seemed familiar.

I don't know what the two were arguing about, but it actually made Suojia, who always showed a calm and ruthless attitude, look a little embarrassed.

The Night Priest, who was able to talk calmly and calmly in front of a group of powerful ministers, was forced back step by step by that heroic woman, feeling quite overwhelmed.

Anyway, that look fascinated Garlan who was hiding aside.

And just when Garlan was happily eating melons, the woman snorted coldly.

"Suojia, I don't have to do it with you. As long as I like it, I can find another lover now!"

The woman turned around and walked away, walking in the direction of Garlan and passing by Garlan in long strides.

Garlan subconsciously stepped aside. When he moved, the hood that covered most of his face fell back a little.

Others may not be able to see clearly, but the woman who was walking by Garlan turned her head and saw Garlan's face clearly.

Her eyes immediately lit up.

There is no other meaning. Her shining eyes are purely admiration and wonder at seeing beautiful things.

She stopped suddenly and looked curiously at the rare black-haired boy in front of her.

"Fataya!"

The lover she had left behind called her name and chased after her eagerly.

A trace of anger appeared on the face of the woman who came back to her senses.

She glanced at Garlan, and suddenly her eyes lit up again, as if she had thought of some good idea.

She turned around and looked at Suojia who was catching up with her eyes unkindly.

Then, she stretched out her hands and hugged one of Garlan's arms.

"Listen, Suojia, I've decided."

she says,

"He is my new lover!"

Garlan, the melon-eating crowd: "???"