Rewards, Please Bookmark and Vote

The next day.

Claire was enjoying breakfast at the Baronial Manor when, before long, Regan walked in from outside.

"Young master, Hant wishes to see you."

Claire took a sip of his drink and said softly, "Bring him in."

Before long, Hant followed Regan inside. The moment he saw Claire, he excitedly dropped to one knee.

"My lord! I have completed everything you instructed me to do."

Claire nodded gently. "Mm. There were no casualties, right?"

"No. Thanks to the Magic Weapon you gave me, I killed their only Silver Knight right from the start. The rest were no match for us at all. We scattered their formation in a single charge." As he spoke, Hant respectfully took the revolver from his chest and placed it on Claire's dining table.

"Good." Claire smiled in satisfaction. "No one discovered what you did yesterday, right?"

"No. I selected only knights at Apprentice Knight level or above. We did not ride horses and used the Movement Technique you gave us to leave the city, so there was barely any commotion. No one would have noticed."

"Well done," Claire praised.

Hant's expression grew slightly excited at the praise. "It is only my duty to serve the Viscount."

"Eat with me." Claire pointed at the table laden with food before him.

Hant swallowed as the rich aroma filled his nose, but he still declined. "No, I have already eaten breakfast. I should return and continue training those little brats, striving to get them all promoted to Apprentice Knights."

"Then take this as a reward." Claire took out a greatsword from his Spatial Ring and handed it over. It was one of the gifts sent by those nobles yesterday.

"No... this is what a subordinate ought to do," Hant hurriedly refused. With his discerning eye, he could naturally tell that this greatsword was worth several hundred Gold Coins. It could also be infused with Battle Aura. If he possessed it, his strength would increase by at least ten or twenty percent.

"You did such a fine job, so naturally you deserve a reward. Take it." Claire smiled. "This is nothing. There will be even more valuable rewards in the future."

Hant looked overwhelmed with emotion, lowering his head even further as he accepted the greatsword with both hands. "Thank you for your reward, my lord!"

"Mm, go back. Also, collect some Gold Coins from Regan and reward the knights who set out with you last night."

Hant grew even more excited and shouted, "As you command!"

Doing such things was already the duty of knights, yet the lord was actually rewarding them for it. From now on, they had to do everything he assigned with all their strength, or they would not deserve their lord's kindness!

Claire smiled faintly. If he wanted the horses to run, how could he not feed them grass?

Money meant little to him. Rewarding those beneath him could instead improve their loyalty and efficiency, so why not?

Compared to Claire's calm indifference, the nobles were as anxious as ants on a hot pan.

"What?! The goods were robbed?! You're not fucking mistaken, are you?! How could they have been robbed? The goods of more than a dozen of us nobles were all together!"

"Huh? The other nobles' goods were robbed too? Even the knights we paid to hire were killed, with not one left alive? Even that Silver Knight's head was cut off? How brutal!"

Because the bullet had struck him in the head, Hant had cut off the head to prevent the bullet from being discovered.

"Prepare the horses, quickly! I'm going to discuss what to do about this with Baron Eugene!"

It was still the same room as before, but the nobles seated there were all visibly anxious.

"How could this happen?! Nothing has gone wrong with our goods for years. The last time something happened was six years ago!"

"Exactly! It was because we were robbed last time that we joined together to transport goods and pooled our money to hire a Silver Knight!"

When their goods were robbed this time, their first thought was not Claire, but the bandits outside the city. After all, even before Claire arrived, their goods had often been robbed.

Originally, they had each stocked their own shops in Nafu City through their own supply channels. But because they were so easily robbed, they later simply sent out caravans together and hired mercenaries to escort their goods. That had indeed greatly reduced the number of robberies.

Yet after several years, their goods had still met with disaster.

The political officer was not anxious in the slightest. Unlike these nobles, he did not run any shops, so none of the transported goods belonged to him.

Instead, he said, "What if our Viscount sent people to rob them?" Though he said that, he did not believe it himself at all.

Eugene frowned, thought for a moment, and said, "Probably not. I was 'busy' until very late last night before going to sleep, and I never heard any hoofbeats leaving the city gate."

"Right. He has only just arrived here, so there is no way he could know the transport routes of our merchant caravans. Besides, I saw the Knight Squad training this morning," Lord Wilbur added.

With just a few words, the two of them cleared Claire, the true culprit, of suspicion. It was not that they had never suspected Claire, but there was simply no benefit in him doing this. He would only offend all of them for no reason. Why would he bother?

Most importantly, even on horseback, it would have been impossible for Hant and the others to make a round trip in such a short time and still be seen training that morning. On foot, it would have been even more impossible. They had seen Hant and the others running outside the city gates during training, and they were not even as fast as horses.

What they did not realize was that if they removed their heavy armor and used that Movement Technique while channeling Battle Aura, they could move even faster than horses.

Political officer Frank picked up a glass of wine from the table, took a sip, and smiled. "I was just saying it casually. Continue your discussion."

However, his remark did remind the nobles of something. Claire now had a large number of knights. Perhaps they could find a solution through that.

"Ahem, Frank." Baron Eugene coughed twice. "As the political officer of the viscounty, you are different from us. You are, after all, one of the Viscount's subordinates. Go and speak to him for us. Have him send out the Knight Squad to help us recover our goods."

Frank curled his lips. He knew perfectly well what his relationship with Claire was like. Forget offering suggestions—his legs went weak even when he saw Claire. Besides, why would they not go themselves and instead make him their shield?

But he could not say such thoughts aloud, so he could only evade the matter. "I'll see..."

The other nobles did not force him. They also knew that Frank probably had little influence with Claire, so they could only continue discussing what other options they had.

Before the gathering had even reached its halfway point, Frank grew bored and left by himself. None of the robbed goods belonged to him, so why would he stay and watch these people stew in misery?

But as soon as he returned home, he encountered something unexpected. Claire had actually sent someone to summon him to the Baronial Manor.

Remembering the last time he had gone alone to the Baronial Manor, two streams of cold sweat trickled down Frank's forehead.