Herald of Steel

Alexander's offer to exchange the captured group at a later date sounded like music to Lord Kite's ears.

It was something he could sell to the rest of his group

'We can't afford to ransom them free now but the Pasha is willing to give us some time,' He already thought of what he was going to say.

Thus the man let out a boisterous cheer and proposed to share a few happy drinks with Alexander as a way to toast to their success.

Alexander naturally had no reason to refuse, so brought out the best bottle he had.

And as they drank, Alexander also made some very vague efforts to form some kind of small alliance with Lord Kite, such as inviting the lord to come visit Zanzan and witness some of its unique products.

"You will like it there my lord. We have things like clear glass, sweet sugar, a new kind of papyrus, aqueducts the size you have never seen, and many more!"

Alexander's intentions behind all this was to form some kind of contact with the Sybarian noble so that he had someone to get at least the bare gist of the things happening around there.

Alexander had no use for it before but now, he could no longer afford to be blind as a bat.

The problem was developing an intelligence network inside a country that spoke a completely different language was very hard for the time period.

However, if he could develop a pathway through Lord Kite, then it would open up many opportunities for Camius to send his spies without much trouble.

Unfortunately, despite Alexander's intentions and efforts, Lord Kite appeared only lukewarm in his reception. It was understandable given the short duration of their meeting but still… the man only perfunctorily claimed that he would consider all the things Alexander alluded to after he had finished cleaning up this current mess.

Alexander had little recourse but to accept it.

....

Having dealt with Lord Kite, the next day, Alexander chose to meet with his next appointment- Miss Linda.

He looked forward to hearing what this defeated vixen had to say.

The stunningly beautiful lady would enter Alexander's study with a stunning dress, a jewel encrusted bright red gown that seemed to almost lighten the entire room.

The full sleeved, high collared resplendent custom was made with layers of frills cascading around the lower half, while the sleeves, the hem, and the prominent chest area was inlaid with intricate gold embroidery, thus giving its wearer almost an ethereal feeling.

If not for the frosty facade that was glaring coldly at him, Alexander would have almost mistook the young lady as a fairy coming to visit him from the heavens.

"My lady, welcome. You look stunning!"

Appreciating the beautiful sight in front of him, Alexander very cordially invited the lady in with a warm smile plastered on his face, although given their bitter past, he also could not help but send some jibes along her way.

He wanted to gloat about his winning.

Hence as the immaculate lady was taking her seat, Alexander smirked, "But isn't it a bit too inauspicious to dress so gaudily right after your husband died? His body is not even cold yet!"

"......" The frosty face instantly turned dark, almost stormy hearing this, an extremely hateful chilly flash glazing across Miss Linda's face.

But much to her credit, the young Margraves did not explode as Alexander thought she would.

"My husband is yet to be officially declared dead. He is simply missing." Miss Linda announced in a cool, almost mechanical tone, quickly restoring her facade.

What she just said was reiterate the official position Lord Castell and by extension, the Heeat family had towards Lord Parker's fate.

By taking advantage of the fact that his body was yet to be found, it was decided for now it would be more convenient for Lord Castell to claim this.

It would make it easier for him to face his elder brother.

'Heh!' Alexander only snickered hearing this, finding the whole mental gymnastics used to get this result too laughable.

'There is no way Parker could have survived the shipwreck. The heavy armor he was wearing was basically a straitjacket. He had to have drowned. And even if the waters could not take him and he somehow swam ashore, he would still have to deal with the outside elements.'

Alexander was quite confident in his assessment of the man's fate because he had spent no small amount of search parties to hunt and capture all fleeing personnel.

So if Lord Parker had somehow washed ashore or was taking refuge in some village, he would have known about it.

Alexander however did not poke at Miss Linda's inflated hopes, letting the young widow live out her fantasy.

Miss Linda too seemed to forget that Alexander was the chief reason for her current miserable state and unceremoniously slouching her back on the chair coldly chimed,

"It seems I am not welcomed here. So I will keep it brief my lord. I would like a loan from you."

The sudden ask was surprising enough to even catch Alexander a bit off guard.

Before meeting her, he had envisioned a lot of reasons why the lady would want to meet him- to curse him, to seduce him, to plead with him to reconsider, to reconcile with him, etc.

But he never thought the proud lady would come to him for something so… mundane.

"Loan? If you need money to rebuild your land why come to me? Aren't the Heeat family your patrons? Go ask them?" Alexander sounded genuinely confused.

"...." However just as he produced the Heeat name, he keenly noticed Miss Linda's eyes produce a chilly flash of hatred, as if that name hit a sore spot, though the lady hid it quickly and flatly revealed,

"I need the money to pay the ransom my men you captured as well as pay the bereavement for those that died. Lord Castell has emptied our treasury to pay for his own men."

This let Alexander finally connect the dots.

Lord Castell did not have the cash at hand to ransom all the nobles at once. After all, he came here as originally a relief force, not the bank.

So when faced with this dilemma, his first instinct was to 'borrow' whatever he could from his niece in law to make up for the shortfall, with the word borrow being obviously in heavy quotation marks.

It was clear as day to anyone that Lord Castell had no intention of giving this amount back ever again.

And worst of all, in exchange, the man did not even offer to free the prisoners belonging to the side that was lending him the money.

So the level of relationship between Miss Linda and the Heeat could be imagined.

'It seems Lord Kite's poisoning had worked. The uncle in law hates his niece in law for killing his nephew. Heh heh,' Alexander thus had to try very hard from letting out a snarky chuckle.

"Ahhh… I knew I was forgetting something when I was signing that treaty. Lord Castell only wanted the nobles and riders. There was no mention of Lord Bernard or his men."

He then mused out loud, recalling that in the heat of discussion, this relatively insignificant force had slipped his mind.

"...." While sitting opposite to him, Miss Linda's face grimaced with pain hearing how disdainfully Alexander was talking about her family. She had been always proud of her lineage, yet now…. they had been regelated to such a pathetic role.

'Ahhh.. how lamentable!'

However, there was little she could do but keep all thoughts to herself and hope Alexander was truly as generous as his men called out to be.

"How much are you asking for?"

The lady thus felt a sudden surge of happiness when Alexander made this statement, relieved that she had not been shown the door out right away.

"Not much! Just 3 million wesa. Half for the ransom and half to pay the grieving families." Miss Linda kept her demand short and reasonable, afraid that Alexander might flip if she stretched her hand too much.

'Hmm… Thirty million ropals' Alexander quickly converted the sum in his head to his local currency and like the lady actually found the amount to be also palatable.

The 3,000 men would roughly go four to five thousand ropals a pop and the family of the roughly 10,000 that died would get about half a year's worth of their man's salary.

Alexander then traced his chin as he weighed the pros and cons before suddenly slanting his eyes to go slightly off topic,

"I did not know the Margraves family paid its soldiers so well. A death benefit is very rare right?"

He said this because typically soldiers who died in battle got nothing, their families left to fend all by themselves.

Most of the time, they would not even get to see the body because of the distance.

Some forces at least paid for the funeral through a kind of collaborative fund everyone could chip in, but usually, very very few forces bothered to give the dead even their barest amount of respect.

But it seemed in that respect, the Margraves were quite respectable.

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