Lord of Industrialization

On November 9, 1034, as the sky grew brighter, the church bells rang over the city of Cologne.

In the church, Cardinal Victor lit a large scented candle and placed it on William's coffin. The rich aroma suddenly filled the entire hall.

The children in the choir sang funeral hymns, and the pallbearers walked to the coffin.

William's pallbearers were all high-ranking, either Grand Dukes or Dukes, and Frederick was among them. Archduke Byrne had not returned from the Osmaga Empire, and some were old and infirm, and were represented by their heirs.

A black carriage transporting coffins was parked outside the church door. Four black horses snorted from time to time. Rudolph, dressed in black, sat in the driver's seat.

Members of the Royal Knights and the Royal Mages guarded both sides of the carriage. They opened the way in front and debated for a while on the candidate for command. Finally, Rudolf personally designated Count Shuyun Stiga as the commander.

The wheels rolled over the slippery road, white snowflakes fell on the black mourning clothes, choir hymns and church bells were the only sounds in the city.

The carriage arrived at the royal cemetery. As the coffin was placed in the grave and shovels of soil fell, the era of the Rhine League belonging to William was over.

Thanks to the telegraph, major cities in the Rhine League rang church bells on this day to hold memorial services for the late king.

Bremen is located in the northern part of the Rhine League. The Weira River flows through the city and flows into the North Sea. Thanks to the convenient water transportation brought by the Weila River's deep inland, the city's port size is second only to Hanma.

A memorial service was also held in Bremen, and the square in front of the church was filled with people praying.

As the bells stopped ringing, the ceremony ended, and everyone continued with their lives.

A not-so-remote street in the city is lined with large three- to five-story stone houses. There are not many people on the street, and they seem low-key, but they are all chambers of commerce that can earn from a few hundred to two to three thousand florins a year.

Today, a young man wearing a waterproof traveling cloak, whose face could not be seen clearly, appeared on the street, carrying a long sword on his back.

Spike walked slowly down the street, recalling the appearance of the entrance to the Chamber of Commerce that he had seen for the only time twelve years ago.

Twelve years ago, he was an orphan captured from a distant village, and now he has become a soldier of Wesson's army.

If he hadn't met his former accomplice while leading the Black Cat troops during the war in June, avenged his brother's murder and promised to rescue his sister, Spike would never have returned to this place again.

The appearance of the chamber of commerce is the same as it was twelve years ago. The colorful flowers in front of the upstairs windowsill are still blooming in the snow. It focuses on the sales and planting of garden flowers.

Spike breathed a sigh of relief. The army didn't have much time to give him a vacation. It would be very troublesome if he couldn't find it.

The customers of this chamber of commerce are basically the butlers of nobles and big businessmen. They have gardens to decorate and can pay high fees.

Spike was a little worried when he walked into the door of the Chamber of Commerce. He knew that the Chamber of Commerce was selling flowers on the surface, but also had shady activities secretly. He didn't know whether the person he was looking for was still alive or had been sold long ago.

There are no counters or other furnishings in the Chamber of Commerce. Customers are either rich or expensive, and the service is mainly door-to-door. Visitors usually talk in the tea room.

The steward in the foyer saw a man wearing a traveling cloak coming in. There was no carriage outside the door. The shoes showed that he was a traveler who had traveled a long distance. He was very different from the past stewards who wore gorgeous and decent clothes.

Spike didn't talk nonsense. A gold coin appeared in his hand and flicked to the steward who came up to him.

The steward caught the gold coin and saw a flower printed on it. The leaves of this flower were almost flat on the ground, and the straight stems were covered with small bell-like flowers.

This flower is a common "death bell" in the forest. After people and livestock eat the leaves, their heartbeats will increase and they will die. They are usually dried and made into rat poison or poisonous bait to kill carnivorous beasts.

The steward's expression suddenly became solemn, and he asked Spike to take him to the tea room to rest, and then he went to a room.

He slowly cut the gold coin open bit by bit with a knife. Sandwiched in the gold was a piece of red metal flake about half the size of a fingernail. Under a magnifying glass, you could see a simple pansy drawn from a mold on it.

Spike was quietly drinking tea with a little truth potion in the tea room, with his sword and backpack at his feet. A girl dressed as a maid stood behind him, holding several dark iron needles between her fingers.

About an hour later, a noble lady came into the tea room. She was about forty years old, petite in stature, wearing a red, yellow and orange vertical striped cotton skirt. A silver necklace hung around her neck and was worn on the middle finger of her right hand. A ring with the ring facing towards the palm of the hand.

She sat down on the sofa opposite Spike and asked in a clear voice: "Dear guest, can you call me pansy? What kind of flowers do you want to buy when you come to the garden?"

Pansy didn't say much. Those who could get the tokens were old customers.

Spike raised the teacup slightly and asked her with a smile: "Can you give me some of the truth serum inside?"

Pansy showed a polite smile on her face, thinking that the guests this time were not simple, and nodded towards the girl behind Spike. After the girl left the tea room for a while, she came in with a thumb-sized brown glass bottle and put it on On the coffee table.

Spike glanced at the glass bottle, and then said to Pansy: "My master has a brother and a sister. Recently, my father is old and wants to make a will, but my situation is very bad."

Pansy nodded slightly, helping to fight for family property was the most common task.

Spike continued: "My father had a sister who eloped with a Venetian merchant in his early years. The eldest father was very angry at the time and removed her."

"Almost twenty years have passed, and the elder's anger has subsided. He has begun to miss the third lady in his heart, and he has mentioned it from time to time recently."

"The third lady only sent a letter ten years ago. In the letter, she said that she gave birth to a daughter who looked very much like her when she was a child."

"My master once sent me to Venice to find the third lady in order to please the eldest master, but their family went bankrupt due to the Tulip incident and the whole family jumped into the sea."

"My master needs a flower. He can bring it back as the third lady's daughter to please the eldest master and at the same time seduce the eldest young master into making an unforgivable mistake. It would be best if..."

He reached out and made a gesture near his neck before saying, "The eldest master's chamber of commerce has made a lot of money doing business with Weissenburg City in the past few years. There are about two thousand gold coins in the private cash box. What my master wants is The Chamber of Commerce is a chicken that can lay eggs, and I can share half of the money in the cash box with you."

After Spike finished speaking, he took out a brand new silk money bag from his arms and placed it on the coffee table. It sounded like it had twenty florins.

After hearing this, Pansy thought about it. This business is actually very simple. It is to find a girl to pretend to be the granddaughter of the boss of the chamber of commerce to please the boss, and then let the boss's eldest son rape the girl to make the boss angry. It is not difficult for professionals. big.

This kind of business only costs two to three hundred florins, but this one transaction can bring a thousand florins, which is a huge profit.

Because the customer came with a token, indicating that they had had a pleasant cooperation in the past, Pansy didn't think much about it, so she agreed: "We will take this business."

Anyway, the deposit is in hand, and if someone is sent over and finds something wrong, he can just run away with the bucket, so don’t worry.

Spike took out a palm-sized picture frame wrapped in tarpaulin from his backpack, placed it on the coffee table, and said: "This is a copy of the portrait of the third lady when she was sixteen. The third lady's daughter has a star near the left corner of her eye. The mole, the hair is darker blond, and the eyes are the same as the third lady’s, I don’t think you will make the mistake of accent.”

Pansy picked up the portrait and studied it carefully. She sent someone to pretend to be the third lady's daughter. She couldn't just find anyone. She had to have similar appearance and age. The Venetian accent was easy to solve.

On the surface, Spike seemed to be calmly waiting for a reply, but he was a little nervous. He spent a lot of effort to come up with this method, and he was not sure whether he could find the person he was looking for.

Pansy thought about it for about half an hour, and finally nodded and said, "We have the right flowers."

Spike waited in the tea room until the afternoon, during which time he had lunch with someone, and Pansy brought him over.

The person who came was a girl of seventeen or eighteen years old. She had a beautiful face and was roughly similar to the portrait that Spike brought. She had long dark blond hair that reached her waist. Her eyes were as blue as the clear sky. There was a squirrel under the corner of her left eye. A black mole the size of a pinhole.

Spike reached out and pinched the mole, which was original, and nodded with satisfaction.

The girl had been standing there quietly since she came in, with no expression on her face, like a low-quality figure in a store.

"Very good." Spike asked in the language of the Kingdom of Sardinia, "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

The girl replied emotionlessly in the same language: "I understand."

Spike continued: "The third lady named her daughter Rose. It was her favorite flower at that time. You must remember this name now."

"How would you react if you now see a relative you haven't seen for many years?"

The girl's stiff face showed shock at first, and then she revealed a smile as warm as the spring sun. It was hard to tell whether it was an act or not.

Spike nodded, turned to Pansy aside and said, "Very good, it's her."

Just as Pansy was about to say something, there was a rhythmic knock on the door, and she left the tea room.

The door was not closed tightly. A little white light lit up deep in Spike's ears out of curiosity, and he heard a low voice outside: "The gardener decided to take over the business and let Cornflower go to Cologne."

Pansy said with some worry: "Cornflower has just been trained and has no experience yet. I am just trying to arrange a simple task."

The visitor said: "It is convenient because of the lack of experience. The target is to lead hundreds of people to kill 100,000 people. The vigilance is very high. If you conceal it too deliberately, you will be discovered."

All Pansy could say was, "Okay, I'm backing out of the business."

She returned to the tea room and saw Spike squinting at the girl. He asked the girl to leave first, then apologized and returned the deposit, and gave her a new token.

Spike was very angry, but had no choice but to ask Pansy to find a new candidate within half a month.

Pansy agreed and asked the guest to come back in half a month.

Spike left the Chamber of Commerce angrily, walked around the crowded streets twice, took the opportunity to change his cloak, and came to the port to look for a ship to Coron City.

Just now, he had confirmed that the person he was looking for was the person in front of him, but he was sent to Cologne City by Jie Hu to perform a mission. Based on the profit analysis, it should be a high-risk assassination mission.

The assassination target once "led hundreds of people to kill 100,000 people." There is only one person who meets this criterion these days.

It was already dusk at this time, and there were very few ships sailing. Spike anxiously asked at the port if there were any ships sailing at night.

Just as the sun was about to set, there were several ships on the dock in the distance getting ready to sail, and it looked like the flags were those of Frederick's acquaintances.

Spike immediately rushed over and jumped directly onto the boat.