Chapter 706 Are you sure?
The next morning, we went back for another audience with the king.
Once again, all of the ministers gathered and they all had worried looks on their faces.
This was our last day in this Beirut Kingdom after all, so it would be the day that we decided what we would be taking from them. This was what they had been afraid of the entire time.
So naturally all of the ministers gathered so that they could say something if it came to it.
When we stepped into the throne room, we immediately became the center of attention.
The way that everyone looked at us like this would have been enough to put pressure on normal people, but for us...it was nothing. We were already used to it since this was how we had spent our time during our stay in this Beirut Kingdom.
No matter where we went, we had been the center of attention.
So we were already used to it.
We came up in front of everyone and just like before, I greeted the king of the Beirut Kingdom with a slight bow.
It was still as disrespectful as before, but no one seemed to care this time.
All of them had worried looks on their faces instead, as if they were afraid of what we were going to say.
After receiving our greetings, the king said, "Duke Zwein, I hope that you have enjoyed your visit to our Beirut Kingdom. I'm sure that you must have seen many interesting things during your time in our Beirut Kingdom. May I ask if there was anything in particular that caught your attention?"
Though this was a roundabout and indirect way of doing this, what he was basically asking was...
"What do you want from us?"
As soon as he said this, all of the ministers once again looked at us with expectant looks.
I didn't say anything at first as I just looked at the king with a calm look on my face.
But after a while, I said, "I have indeed seen many interesting things in your country, but there wasn't much that actually caught my eyes."
The king and the ministers all revealed ugly expressions when they heard this.
It wasn't as if they hadn't considered this possibility before as well, but to actually hear it was something different.
There was still the possibility that he didn't want anything at all.
If that was the case, wouldn't he insist on being paid the amount of reparations that they were owed?
That was not something that they could do because...they just didn't have that much money.
Well, it wasn't that they didn't have that much money, it was that the country didn't have that much money. The kingdom's finances had taken a large hit after the war, so there wasn't much that was available to be used to pay these reparations.
Yes, it was the kingdom's finances that were drained.
It wasn't the actual amount of money that was in the kingdom that was drained.
The personal wealth of the nobles still remained.
Even the royal family had a personal wealth that was even greater than the finances of the country.
But there wasn't a single moment where they thought about using that wealth of theirs for the country. There wasn't a single moment that it registered in their minds that they could use their personal wealth to pay the reparations.
That was just how greedy they were.
The king gave a cough to calm himself down before saying, "Then Duke Zwein, are you saying that…"
He didn't finish his sentence, but the meaning of his words being left hanging were clear.
When I heard this, I looked at him with a smile and said, "That is what I was thinking, but there was something that did catch my attention in the end."
The king and all of the ministers held their breaths when they heard this.
Whether this was a good thing or not was still to be seen, but at least this saved them from their worst case scenario.
Seeing them like this, I couldn't help giving a sigh deep down.
These people, there really was no helping them.
Taking a deep breath to adjust myself, I said, "Yes, what has caught my eye is your library. I want to take the books in there as collateral for the payment."
"Eh?" There was a look of complete shock on the face of the king when he heard this.
It wasn't just him, it was also the ministers that were shocked when they heard this.
They looked at each other with confused looks before looking at me again as if they couldn't understand what I was saying.
After a long silence, the king asked, "Are you sure about that?"
I just gave a simple nod before saying, "Please make sure to deliver those books to our kingdom within two weeks and we'll take off two months of war reparations for you."
The king and the ministers were even more shocked since they didn't believe that the books in the library held such value. But they didn't say anything since this was the best deal for them.
If there really was anything that was important in the library, they could just remove it during the transporting process. After all, it was impossible for the other side to memorize everything that was in the library.
Or at least that was what they thought until I took out a sheet of paper.
"This is the complete list of books that we expect to receive."
I raised it up in front of me as if waiting for someone to take it.
One of the ministers came forward to take it before bringing it over to the king.
The king looked at it with a confused look before looking up at me and giving a nod since he didn't understand what was so important about these books.
In the end, they didn't have the foresight to understand, so they gave up their precious knowledge.
This 𝓬ontent is taken from f(r)eeweb(n)ovel.𝒄𝒐𝙢