A new year, a fresh start.
Once Li Wei had filled out the seemingly endless forms and worked his way through procedures he had thought would never end, his rewards finally arrived.
First and foremost, of course, was the money.
Most earls had their own fiefs, but with the Empire in its current state, everything available had already been granted away eighty years ago. Mericia was up for grabs, but Li Wei would not go there if his life depended on it. So, as a symbolic grant to a life peer, the Royal Family gave him the White Oak District in Fog City, where his tower stood.
Of course, this was a fief in name only. Li Wei had no jurisdiction over the district, and frankly, he did not want any. Management sims were his least favorite games. Just looking at all those complicated stats gave him a headache. Besides, he preferred being a detective who traveled around solving mysterious cases to being a lord managing a territory.
Still, the nominal grant was not without benefits, since it entitled Li Wei to a share of the district's tax revenue. In plain terms, the Royal Family would set aside a portion of Fog City's taxes as his annual salary, amounting to roughly eighty thousand pounds.
For comparison, the Empire's prominent aristocratic landowners currently earned around one hundred to two hundred thousand pounds a year, with Ovelia among them.
By that measure, Li Wei had become rich overnight.
Politically speaking, his titles of Thistle Knight and earl qualified him to serve as a Member of Parliament in the House of Lords. But unless it was necessary, Li Wei felt that... well, he would probably never go poking around there.
With his professional instincts, he might end up arresting a few people after