Lord: Marry the villain's daughter at the beginning?

As promised, the Prime Minister of the Capetian Kingdom, Codic, went to the northern border to negotiate with the Demon King's army. Of course, it was more like surrender than negotiation.

However, the whole country was still celebrating in the royal capital. People believed that after his trip this time, Caudric would promote peace between humans and demons. This feat that had not been achieved in thousands of years was now going to be realized by the prime minister of the kingdom. Everyone felt proud of it, especially in the mouths of the bards bribed by Caudric. Caudric, who went to cede land and sell out his country, became a respected figure, comparable to the heroes in legendary epics.

The little princess Claire and the current student council president of Royal Capital College, Caroline, also followed Codick to the North.

Perhaps because she wanted to see Reina's face full of disappointment and pain too much, Claire left Kodick's team halfway and went straight to the gray-collar team.

A large ship with the royal two-headed lion emblem painted on it was sailing on the River of Tears. Claire got up early and looked in the direction of the gray-collar worker.

Originally, Claire was ready to see the joke of Reina's territory, but looking at the dock that had been expanded several times and didn't look like a viscount's territory at all, Claire wondered for a moment if she had woken up the wrong way today and whether she should go back to sleep again.

Caroline on the side frowned and said indignantly:

"Is it necessary to build a dock so big? That shame of the nobles, Reina, must have mobilized the people to build the dock. It must have been built so big just to transport the money plundered by the Lars family faster!"

Although Claire felt something was wrong, she nodded and said, "I heard that this dock was built with the help of Grand Duke Lars. That's not surprising. After all, according to the time, the Grey Collar is now at most a field camp. It is impossible to have a dock of this scale."

In fact, the Gray Collar's wharf on the River of Tears was funded and rebuilt once by Viscount Jefferson downstream. As the territory developed, the Gray Collar needed more and more daily necessities, and the transaction volume with the town of Fassen increased.

In addition, Lind has been tinkering with gunpowder and cement, technologies from his previous life. There are constant small boats transporting alchemical materials to and from Gray Collar and Fassen Town, making the original dock somewhat overwhelmed.

Although Lind did not want to move the wharf based on the principle of continuing to use it as long as it could be used, the cargo merchants in Farson Town and Viscount Jefferson, who were making a lot of money, could not stand it and invested money to help Gray and White Collar expand it.

Originally, there should be many cargo ships traveling on the River of Tears, but because the princess was visiting today, Jefferson downstream considerately stopped cargo transportation for a day to make way for Her Royal Highness the Princess. However, this made Claire mistakenly believe that the Gray Collar River was originally so deserted.

As the fleet slowly approached the Gray Collar, Claire and Caroline finally discovered something was wrong. Isn't the Gray Collar still a small camp with only tents everywhere? How come so many gray-white two-story houses have appeared on the shore in such a short time?

"Damn shame on the nobility! She actually did this kind of vanity project. Doesn't she know how many families will be torn apart if she builds a house like that in such a short time?"

Caroline gritted her teeth. This kind of building could not be completed in such a short time without the use of alchemical materials. It was obviously only possible because of Lena's crazy mobilization of the people, or else expensive alchemical materials were used. But Caroline believed that those alchemical materials were also obtained by exploiting the people, and the result would be the same.

Of course, there weren't many two-story houses like this in the territory. When Claire and Caroline got close to the shore, they saw that in addition to these two-story houses, there were more simple huts.

But even these small houses are basically made of stone, and all have the same style. Coupled with the gray and white tones and neatly arranged layout, Claire actually felt a sense of inexplicable oppression.

When the fleet slowly approached, Claire and Caroline saw those huge waterwheels again. Since they only saw them from a distance, neither of them understood what they were used for. Only Caroline criticized them based on her preconceived notions: "Playing with things will only ruin one's ambition!"

Claire nodded in agreement, but she always felt that something was wrong with the huge waterwheel. For some reason, looking at the turning waterwheels, Claire felt something was wrong.

This machine that doesn't require any magic makes Claire feel a little scared, but she can't tell what she is afraid of.

At this time, Linde had been waiting at the dock with Rena for a long time. Although Rena looked very excited, Linde was very vigilant.

Claire Augustine, the hidden boss in the game, is just on the side of the heroine.

It can be said that if it weren’t for Claire, the heroine would have no chance to meet the fourth prince, and Reina would never have fallen into such a situation.

But Reina, the most direct victim of Claire's plan, was completely unaware of this fact. Even after being sold, she still helped Claire count money and treated Claire as a sister. Even the royal family in Reina's fantasy of returning to the capital and asking them to help her get justice mainly refers to Claire.

Looking at Claire walking slowly down from the boat, Reina, who had actually failed the etiquette class, wanted to rush up and hug her, but Linde had anticipated this and reached out to stop Reina.

"Long time no see, Your Highness Claire."

Facing Reina's enthusiastic greeting, Claire responded with a standard etiquette response, but when she saw the undisguised smile on Reina's face, Claire felt as sick as if she had eaten white sugar made of flies.

The most important thing is that the smile was not because of her coming, but it was a happiness from the heart, which made Claire very unhappy.

This is different from what I had expected, isn't it? Shouldn't it be after I came that Reina begged me to take her back to the capital as if she had grasped hope? And then I rejected her harshly, completely destroying Reina's last hope.

Why does it seem like Reina is quite happy staying at the border right now?

Caroline, on the other hand, was observing her surroundings, trying to find evidence that Lena, the disgrace of the aristocracy, was bullying the common people.

It would be best if we could find the scene on the magic scroll, so as to complete the task assigned by Prime Minister Codick and expose the ugliness of the North in front of everyone in the academy.

While Claire and Reina are showing their deep sisterly love, she is secretly observing Lind. What kind of magic does this man have that makes Reina linger in the North?

Linde also noticed Claire's gaze and began to be alert. This master is not a pure white lotus. Although he does not know why Claire in the game has such a strong hostility towards Reina, but now as the largest financial backer and military force of Gray Collar, Reina must not get into trouble.

Although Lena introduced the two parties to each other enthusiastically, Lind and Claire simply greeted each other and walked towards the embassy that was receiving guests.

The journey was not long, but the more Claire looked, the more frightened she became.

Could it be that Grand Duke Lars's love for Reina has reached such an extent that he has used all the alchemical materials treasured by the Lars family to build Reina's territory?

In just a few months, Gray Collar had grown from a barren land with nothing to a viscount's territory, and it was even bigger and richer.

Apart from anything else, the people Claire saw along the way were all wearing shoes.

What is the concept of shoes? Even in the capital, in some of the surrounding suburbs, there are many people who cannot afford to wear shoes.

Even if ordinary people can afford to wear shoes, they will only choose to wear them during holidays or prayer activities.

Of course, the shoes that most gray-collar workers wear nowadays are definitely not luxury goods such as animal leather boots that ordinary people cannot afford, but simple straw sandals or cloth shoes. However, this is enough to make Claire feel something is wrong.

After all, people will only consider covering their feet when they have sufficient purchasing power.

In fact, because the price of shoes was not cheap, in some noble territories, it was illegal for the poor and serfs to own a pair of shoes. For those nobles, under their high-pressure exploitation, ordinary people simply could not afford shoes. If an ordinary person had a pair of shoes, then this person either hid the wealth and did not pay taxes, or earned the money by doing illegal things, so it would be right to arrest him first.

Although very abstract, it is indeed a very practical criterion for the nobles in the Capetian Kingdom.