After this battle, everyone received the rewards they had hoped for. Though the reward was merely Peter's Castle and several small villages around it, it was still quite something to them. After all, there were many nobles in this world, but not nearly as many who possessed actual fiefs.
There were two small towns and over a dozen tiny, practically uninhabited villages around Peter's Castle. They were poor beyond words, and the annual taxes they could pay probably would not even cover one month of living expenses for a noble's child. This was why, after the Blizzard Mercenary Corps took over the place, the duchy had little interest in reclaiming it.
However, these people were not ones to leave anything untouched. They practically dug the place up three feet deep. Since the previous owner of Peter's Castle had been a tomb raider, how could the wealth he had left behind possibly amount to just a few gemstones?
Yet, to everyone's disappointment, no matter how thoroughly they searched, they only found that the former owner had been a pauper. Still, to their pleasant surprise, they managed to uncover a few things that excited them in this place that had been stripped nearly bare.
For example...
While searching an almost abandoned iron mine, they unexpectedly discovered that a certain amount of mithril was hidden among its iron ore. A mithril mine—mithril was a good thing to most mages, because it was a metal that did not hinder the casting of magic. In other words, it could be used to make armor for mages.
Moreover, it possessed extremely strong magical affinity. Those who specialized in "equipment change" magic had to infuse nearly all their equipment with a considerable amount of mithril. Otherwise, they would not be able to retrieve those items from their