Chapter 75

May in the Desinia Territory is destined to be anything but ordinary.

Ever since the Desinia Candy Shop opened, the air in Visas seems to be filled with a sweet aroma every day.

This flavor is irresistible and irresistible.

On the first day, the sweet and intoxicating aroma swept through the city like a howling wind, and then engulfed the entire Desinia Territory.

Compared to the Tales of the Gods and the appearance of clothing stores—they are like gently flowing spring water nourishing barren soil and sandy land.

The appearance of the candy shop was like a waterfall suddenly bursting open on the exposed rocks, splashing up large, undeniable sprays of water.

Sugar was so rare and precious that it circulated almost exclusively between two great empires.

This is something that even minor nobles rarely possess.

However, nowadays one can see candy makers making sweets by the shop window every day in Visas, smelling the incredibly sweet aroma... but because the price of candy is so high, it is something that people who cannot afford to buy it crave desperately.

Desinia Candy Shop currently only sells two types of sugar—white sugar and Lemon Candy.

Clean and pretty sugar granules are packaged in colorful glass jars of different sizes and displayed on the shelves.

Next to the shop entrance, half of the wall was turned into a large window that opens from the inside out and is supported and secured with wooden sticks and ropes.

Inside the shop, there's a spacious counter where three employees demonstrate the steps of making Lemon Candy: boiling the syrup, extracting lemon juice, mixing the two, kneading and stretching them... finally rolling them into long, round strips, and cutting them with a spatula.

The crisp "ding-ding-ding" sound rang out continuously; it was the sound of pale yellow candies rolling into the wooden box.

The bottom of the wooden box was also lined with a layer of white sugar. As the candies rolled down, they were covered with white sugar granules, making those watching from outside the window swallow hard.

These candies are beautiful and tempting, constantly attracting people to come forward and buy them.

However, when they caught sight of the small wooden sign hanging on the wall outside the window with the prices clearly written on it, they stopped in their tracks in frustration; the Lemon Candy was simply too expensive.

The work surface for making candy has markings of a specific size, about the length of a finger joint.

A single small candy is worth one gold coin.

The perfect balance of sugar and gold is embodied in this small candy shop.

Sugar is valuable, which naturally attracts many malicious eyes.

If it were just a regular merchant guild shop, it would probably be robbed and plundered within a single night.

However, this candy shop belongs to the Thorn Merchant Guild.

This is why Cyrus displays the name Desinia on its signboard—it serves both as a statement and a deterrent.

Furthermore, during the shop's opening hours from noon until sunset each day, Bana would specifically bring along soldiers patrolling the city to keep watch nearby.

Soldiers would stay around or upstairs from the shops at night, and one night they actually caught three audacious thugs who came to steal candy.

The following day, Bana posted the incident on the city's warning boards, along with portraits of the three thugs, and punished them by permanently banishing them from Visas.

Komoy Fort and Visas have always been an integrated city, so naturally they wouldn't accept these three hooligans into the city.

They lost their status as residents of Visas and were also rejected by Komoy Fort, leaving them no choice but to move to other cities.

After that, many people in the city who harbored greedy intentions and wanted to do something wicked secretly restrained their petty thoughts.

After all, losing their status as residents of Visas is a very serious loss, because no city in the Desinia Territory can compare to life in Visas and Komoy Fort.

Moreover, the candy shop sells too little white sugar and Lemon Candy each day, and the sales are so good that they are usually sold out before sunset.

At night, it's just an empty shop.

Even if they managed to sneak in, it would be all in vain.

The white sugar and Lemon Candy in the shop were mostly bought up by the nobles in the territory, and circulated very quickly among the nobles. Finally, more than half a month after the white sugar and Lemon Candy appeared, they first spread from the Desinia Territory to the Anas Empire.

The Anas Empire

Boris sat in a chair with his arms crossed, looking at the three items placed in front of him.

Standing behind him was Vincent, the head of the Nagabi Merchant Guild of Commerce, whose expression was incredibly complex, a mixture of surprise and disbelief... to the point that he remained speechless for a long time.

A moment later, Vincent gasped for breath and whispered, "Leader... would you like to take a look first...?"

"Chirp."

The Qing Tuan stood impatiently on the open window and hopped around. It had worked so hard to carry the things there, but the two people just stared at it for ages without even giving it a sip of water!

The Qing Tuan flapped its wings angrily and chirped twice.

Boris finally snapped out of his daze and raised his hand to rub his furrowed brow.

He got up and took out the food and water that Qing Tuan had been preparing for him and Little Zuoyi ever since they started communicating, and personally walked to the window and placed them in front of the huge Gyrfalcon: "Good Overlord, you've worked hard."

This beautiful bird has a long name— Qing Tuan Uranus Overlord.

If outsiders call it "Qing Tuan," it will never respond. It might even glare at people with its blue-gold eyes and peck at them aggressively.

Boris watched as Qing Tuan lowered her head to drink water before turning back to the table.

On the table were three things: "Tales of the Gods 3", a jar of white sugar, and a box of Lemon Candy.

The wooden box containing Lemon Candy also had a piece of paper covered in writing on it, from Cyrus.

Boris let out a barely audible sigh, "Little Zuoyi... you truly fill me with joy every single moment."

But this time... he wasn't sure whether he was more surprised or more delighted.

Vincent, standing behind him, nodded involuntarily, deeply agreeing.

Boris carefully read through the note filled with Cyrus's handwriting, then sat down in a chair to reply.

After the letter was written, Qing Tuan, having eaten and drunk her fill, demurely extended one claw for Boris to tie the letter, then flapped her wings and flew away, disappearing in the blink of an eye.

[This book-reading app was recommended to me by a book-loving friend of ten years! It's incredibly useful; I use it to read aloud and listen to books while driving or before bed to pass the time. You can download it here.]

Boris walked back to the table and opened the wooden box.

The box was crammed full of pale yellow candies.

He picked up a piece and popped it into his mouth. The sweet and sour taste instantly filled his entire mouth, making him unconsciously relax his brow.

Boris, with a candy in his mouth, pushed the wooden box in front of Vincent: "You try one too."

Vincent solemnly rubbed his palm against the side of his trousers, carefully picked out a grain, and put it in his mouth. Immediately, he exclaimed, "Mmm! Leader, this is delicious!"

At that moment, Boris opened a jar containing white sugar.

He looked at the clean, white, fine sugar granules inside, dipped his finger in and tasted a little. The sweetness instantly melted in his mouth, coating the Lemon Candy, making the flavor even more pronounced.

Boris leaned back in his chair, and another sigh came, "White sugar has become so expensive that noble families are fighting over it."

"And then there's the appearance of Lemon Candy, which makes them swarm like wolves smelling blood. Why is Little Zuoyi so bold...?"

He couldn't help but take out a Lemon Candy from the wooden box and examine it closely in his palm. Its pale yellow color was very beautiful, and it had a kind of crystal-clear beauty.

The appearance of white sugar is not unusual.

However, once such a precious item appeared in large quantities, coupled with a delicious candy that had never been seen or tasted before...

He could foresee the uproar that would inevitably ensue among the nobles when these two items entered the Anas Empire from the Desinia Territory shortly thereafter...

Just as he clearly saw the enormous profits that lay behind this, pleasure-seeking nobles, including the king of the Anas Empire, would be tempted by it and want to plunder it.

The remote sugarcane-producing areas were simultaneously controlled by two major empires.

However, neither the Saint Airo Empire nor the Anas Empire could fully possess it, and the white sugar produced from the difficult-to-grow sugarcane was like a chicken bone to both empires.

Now, a new method for producing white sugar has emerged—it's like a piece of sweet honey being casually placed at the end of a branch, beckoning people to pick it.

Most importantly, taking control of it is the right decision.

Boris is right.

A box of valuable candy was given as a gift to a marquis in the Anas Empire —this man was Tosi Cavendish, the king's illegitimate son.

This is something that everyone in the Anas Empire knows.

Cavendish is the king's surname.

The Marquis of Tosi was able to be given the surname Cavendish precisely because the king openly announced his identity to the public.

The king acted recklessly; otherwise, he wouldn't have had so many mistresses despite having a queen, and he made no attempt to hide it, having quite a few illegitimate children.

Tosi Cavendish was undoubtedly the most favored.

After learning the origin of the Lemon Candy, he developed a greedy desire for the raw materials and methods of making white sugar, and even the fact that the owner was the lord of Desinia did not deter him from his idea of taking it for himself.

However, Tosi Cavendish men to investigate, but they didn't get a single useful piece of information.

The production of both white sugar and Lemon Candy was entirely completed within the castle.

The castle is located deep in the Par Mountain on the Par Lake.

Whether at the foot of the mountain or in the mountains, there are rigorously trained soldiers stationed at several checkpoints, and unauthorized personnel are not allowed to enter.

Anyone entering or leaving the mountain needs to be thoroughly investigated, making it extremely difficult for strangers to approach the castle.

Tosi Cavendish naturally unwilling to have failed to glean any relevant information, so he entered the palace and did not emerge until nearly evening.

However, just one day later.

The King of the Anas Empire personally sent an invitation to the Desinia Territory, inviting Cyrus to the Empire to attend the Queen's birthday banquet.

The king will host a very grand banquet for the queen.

Besides inviting Cyrus, they also invited all the high nobles, the King of Helgoda, the Holy See...

The Anas Empire had never before held such a grand birthday banquet for its queen; the purpose of this was self-evident.

Boris handed the letter to Qing Tuan to take back, frowning as he watched the giant Gyrfalcon disappear into the night. In the blink of an eye, he could no longer catch a glimpse of that fleeting white dot.

Desinia Castle.

Cyrus reached out and took the letter from Qing Tuan's paw. After reading it, she raised an eyebrow. "I didn't expect the one who made the first move would be the King of the Anas Empire. However, it does save me some trouble..."

"Judas, Ferdinand, Walker, prepare for tomorrow, then have Samuel bring the fleet to port."

"Yes, lord," the three men replied from behind.