Chapter 350 The dust has settled
It was not just Baron Devore and his family that fell, but also citizens of the Holy City with small assets who were fifty kilometers away.
Compared to the powerful rural aristocrats, they undoubtedly feel the pain of losing money much more intuitively.
After all, it is their own money.
Many people have spent all their savings on the land in Bailu District, just to take a big chance when the tide rises. From then on, they turned around and became great people.
However, the development of things was beyond everyone's expectation. When the tide really came, they suddenly realized that the wave was coming towards them.
At the "Golden Griffin" Cafe on Sage Street, the aura of fear is like invisible gunpowder smoke, permeating everyone's brows.
Although the citizens of the Holy City do not have various salons like the nobles in this city, a group of "like-minded" people can always find their own circle - and the Golden Griffin Cafe is such a stronghold for "land speculators".
It is said that the first guy who excitedly shouted "Go to Bailu District to buy land" was the customer sitting in this cafe reading the newspaper.
However, unlike the greedy and excited bustle of yesterday, the air in the cafe today seemed to be covered with frost.
The guests no longer brag about which "highly qualified investment target" they have won, but gather together in small groups to complain, or talk fiercely in lowered voices, with visible anxiety written all over their faces.
Think about it -
It’s silly to think of suburban land as a good investment.
Before Prince Colin came to this city, they would not even look at the bad land there.
Why did this foreign noble just look at it twice, without even saying a word in person, and they invested all their savings in it?
Must be the whisper of the devil!
They hated themselves for being obsessed with their minds, and they also hated the devil who whispered in their dreams and bewitched them.
"Damn! I knew it wasn't that simple!" A pale man crumpled the newspaper into a ball irritably and cursed angrily, "Even His Royal Highness Prince Colin can't get a loan from the Royal Bank. I'm afraid all the gold coins we invested in Bailu District will be wasted!"
"Calm down, Martin!"
Sitting next to him, an older citizen reached out and held his shoulder, forcing himself to calm down and persuade, "Why are you panicking! Didn't the Bailu District Morning News analyze it? This is just the Imperial Bank's usual conservative style. Your Highness Colin will definitely not abandon Bailu Town!"
As soon as he finished speaking, before the guy named Martin could say a word, someone next to him quickly echoed.
"Didn't you see that the Minaret Bank has extended an olive branch to Sir Dantès? I think they are just waiting for a price! This matter is far from a dead end!"
It is the instinct of animals to search for the stratosphere.
Especially when a group of sheep faces a hungry wolf that cannot escape no matter what, they will feel safer huddled together than alone.
Even if this sense of security is illusory, it will be broken with just a slight poke, and then there will be the opposite extreme——
"But what if... what if Sir Dantès is really heartbroken and goes to another province with an investment plan as the Holy City Daily said? I always feel that the matter is not that simple, and maybe it involves the unhappiness behind the scenes of His Highness Colin and the big shots in the Holy City."
A trembling voice intervened.
People all turned their attention to the person who spoke, and saw that he was trembling, like a mouse frightened by a cat.
He swallowed and finally expressed the guess in his mind that frightened him the most.
…If that’s the case, the land deeds we hold in our hands that we bought at a huge price may be too hard to even wipe our butts!”
At this moment, how much he longs for a brave and wise person to stand up and refute him, and to scold him severely... from the nightmare that haunts this boundless fear.
However, he was destined to be disappointed.
Because what he fears is exactly what everyone here is also afraid of.
His voice was like the last drop of rain that extinguished the raging mountain fire, completely extinguishing the last trace of luck in the hearts of everyone present.
There was a suffocating silence in the cafe, with only the sound of heavy breathing remaining.
In this oppressive silence, a businessman who invested all his wealth could no longer bear the pressure.
He stood up abruptly, and the chair fell backwards due to his violent movements, making a harsh sound.
"I don't care! I have to sell the land before the news spreads completely and the land price collapses. Even if it's a small loss! It's better than losing everything in the end!" His eyes were red, he roared at his companions beside him, and then he hurried out of the door.
· News in the suburbs is always slower than in the city. In theory, if they move faster, they might be able to throw the hot flame crystal into the hands of a confused fool.
His voice was like a match, instantly igniting the panic that had been building up in the entire cafe, causing chairs to overturn to the ground.
"Yes! It must be sold immediately!"
"It's too late if we don't take action!"
"Saint Sis, that's all my property... I... might as well die!"
"For the sake of the Emperor, calm down! You can't run away alone!"
"Let me go! Don't think that I don't know what you are thinking and persuade us to run away secretly, right?"
Panic spread quickly like a plague.
Speculators who were still hesitant to wait and see can no longer sit still.
They stood up one after another, and the sounds of chairs and table legs colliding with each other came and went.
People were pushing each other, making a mess, and rushing towards the door, as if one step too late, their life's wealth would be in vain.
A panic-induced selling wave kicked off in a corner that no one noticed... Just like it did when this crazy speculation just started.
Unlike the overwhelming panic in the "Golden Griffin" cafe, the study room of the Duke of Castellon's Palace is currently peaceful and peaceful, as if no matter how big the waves are, they can't shake this majestic castle.
Leaning on the velvet armchair, Andre slowly sipped the mellow red wine in the glass, while his eyes fell on the newspapers spread out on the table.
That is today's "Quds Daily".
Different from yesterday, the focus of the media has shifted from the quarrel between Sir Dantès and the president of the head office to the speculators flying under the spire.
Looking at the disgraced speculator in the magic photo, there was no sympathy on his face, and there was even a mocking smile on his lips, as if he had just watched a wonderful circus.
About a while, Andre gave a heartfelt compliment and said to himself to the forest outside the window.
"I didn't expect you to prepare this move... It seems that I underestimated you."
With his experience and eyesight, he has already understood everything. And this young Prince Colin was more sophisticated than he imagined.
First, they used false prosperity and huge profit expectations to raise the land price in Bailu District to an absurd high, attracting greedy rural aristocrats and speculators. Then they used a well-planned "financing failure" to cleanly drain the land from the bottom of the cauldron and trigger market panic.
The real target of His Highness the Prince is naturally not the small fish and shrimps that follow the trend, but the "middlemen" like Baron de Vol who are greedy and adventurous and eat up large tracts of land but are unable to get rid of them.
This is a precise hunt.
He first completed the land annexation with the help of the rural nobles, and then threw away the dirty rags cleanly.
He did not even take action in this process personally, but used a distant relative as a pawn... Apparently he had planned this from the first day he entered the Holy City, and wanted to arrange this "scary quarrel" when he left the Holy City.
As for those guys who were accidentally injured...Andre didn't sympathize with them.
If they sincerely believe that the land on the outskirts of the Holy City is more worthy of investment than the Holy City, then they should give up the position under their feet to those "country people who dream of moving in", and then get out of here obediently.
They didn’t even realize that being born in this city was a great blessing...and they still wanted more.
Andre smiled and shook his head without bothering his back while talking, and put the goblet in his hand aside with satisfaction.
At this moment, the door of the study room was pushed open violently.
his youngest daughter, Miss Ophia, trotted in like a frightened deer, rarely even bothering to knock on the door.
Her brilliant long golden hair was slightly messy due to running, and her white cheeks were full of anxiety, as if something big had happened.
"What's the matter, my dear Ophia, what made you panic like this?" Andre said jokingly, crossing his index fingers on his knees and facing his beloved little daughter kindly.
"Father!" Ophia ignored the explanation, slapped the "Quds Daily" in her hand on the table, pointed at the report anxiously and said, "His Royal Highness Colin is in trouble! How can that hateful bank president say that to him! He can He is our ally, you...you have to help him! "
Looking at his innocent daughter, Andre couldn't help laughing. It was too funny but also felt uncomfortable. Why did his caring little cotton-padded jacket always go to others?
He stretched out his generous palm and rubbed his daughter's hair lovingly.
“My dear Ophia, you are too simple. If you really want to capture the heart of that Highness, you should first learn how to guide him to pay for you, instead of worrying about the gains and losses over trivial matters like you do now, and wishing you could take out your heart and soul and dedicate it to him.”
This is Andre’s own experience. No matter you are Mr. or Ms., human beings cannot escape one rule - that is, people always tend to have a good impression of the people they have helped, rather than being grateful to the people who have helped them.
"I, how can I... and why are you laughing!" Ophia stamped her feet anxiously, her face flushed with anger, and she didn't understand why her father could still laugh.
Could it be that when they parted that day, the friendship they promised was all just talk? She couldn't accept that her father was a man who went back on his word.
It’s a pity that she is still too young and has just reached adulthood. It is difficult for her to distinguish two different things, let alone understand the meaning of one code and the other.
If Colin cannot handle this problem well, it means that he is not worthy of being an ally of the Castellon family at all. How can the friendship between them begin?
On the contrary, it was precisely because Andre valued the friendship between the two families that he agreed to give "Roxey Colin" a chance to prove himself——
The Colin family not only has honor and tradition, but also the present.
Looking at his confused daughter, Andre stopped teasing her, and his eyes that had seen a thousand sails became deeper.
"Don't worry, he will be fine."
He paused and expressed his judgment word for word.
“Not only will he be fine, but even...the moderate drama in front of him was arranged by him himself.”
…
The report of "Quds Daily" is still fermenting, and now the citizens of the whole city are hotly discussing which big shot His Highness Colin has offended.
As for those truly noble big shots, what do you think?
Of course they took it as a joke.
In this matter, the Holy City and the Demon City are surprisingly similar, even like two sides of the same coin.
In the study room of Villa Dantès, the atmosphere was completely different from the hustle and bustle of the outside world. It was so quiet that only the slight crackling of wood burning in the fireplace was left.
Edmond Dantès sat behind his imposing desk with a complicated expression.
Like Prince Andrei, he also had the two newspapers that stirred up the entire Holy City in front of him, but what he was thinking about at the moment was no longer the superficial public opinion storm, but looking beyond the chessboard and seeing the hand that played the chess.
His two "guests", Teach and Lumil, were sitting leisurely on the sofa opposite, as if they had everything under control.
"I understand..." Edmund finally breathed a long sigh of relief and murmured to himself, a glimmer of clarity finally revealed in his cloudy pupils.
He finally understood what Lumir meant by "preventing the loan from being approved 'first'", and he couldn't help but sigh that he still had a lot to learn.
There was only one thing that he couldn't figure out after thinking about it for a long time - that is, how this storm would end.
Now the nobles of Bailu District are cornered by speculators who are selling off their land, and have one foot on the edge of the cliff.
But let alone whether he has a chance to push them down, what good would it do to His Highness Colin even if he pushed them down?
So far, it seems that only the townspeople of Bailu Town are happy, and those country bumpkins who just accept the good news have really made money.
After thinking for a long time with no result, he finally asked about the confusion in his heart.
"I mean, what if those barons...such as Baron Devore, who have abundant funds, choose to hold the land tightly in their hands even if the land price drops, and would rather carry it than sell it to us? Do we really just give up and move the plan to other provinces?"
He didn't understand the purpose of His Highness Colin, and he didn't think there was a place in the empire that was more suitable for launching that plan than the Holy City.
This is not just a matter of having a piece of land.
As if he had guessed that he would ask this question, Tiqi laughed and leaned on the sofa, replying in a joking tone, "Change the place? Why change the place? Now I am afraid that there is no more cost-effective land in the entire Holy City than the Bailu District."
After hearing Tiqi's words, Edmund became more and more puzzled.
Lumil didn’t laugh at him, he just shook the Holy City Daily in his hand and spoke slowly.
"President Hogan Nora called you a "empty wolf", but what's ridiculous is that the real "empty wolf" is at large at the moment... Don't you think we should represent Saint Sith and punish these lawless worms?"
This seemingly casual remark was like a bolt of lightning that cut through the fog in Edmund's mind. He suddenly woke up, widened his eyes and said: "You are saying... Baron Devore has a problem with the funds to purchase those lands?"
Lumir smiled approvingly, nodded slightly and said.
"That is inevitable. Since he had known for a long time that the price of land in Bailu District was going to rise, how could he willingly mortgage it to President Ha Ke of Bailu District according to the original price of the land."
"But...even if it is a mortgage, they can't even afford to pay back the money, right?" Edmund swallowed hard.
That's the Baron!
"I guess you must be thinking, is that a baron, right?" Looking at the stunned Edmund, Teach said slowly, and with one sentence, he shattered his humble illusions about power.
“Everyone thinks he can afford it, including President Harker, who you have met once, and this is why he can easily get a loan from the Imperial Bank. You can’t imagine how easy it is for him to get a loan, maybe it’s just a meal, maybe it’s just a hello, and the price is just a promise. Even if I tell you, you may not understand. Letter, I bet the deeds of the Devore family must be in their own safe now, not in the bank at all."
"This is impossible!" Edmund subconsciously exclaimed, "This does not comply with the credit procedures of the Imperial Bank, and...why would he do this? It's just a piece of paper!"
"The rules are to constrain you. Of course he can do it, and it's easy. As for why he has to do it, because he can do it the same way with that piece of paper, and he can mortgage the land that has been mortgaged for a second time, or even a third time... And this is why he can live in a spacious manor, and can have a lot of money without the smell of copper on his body. There is everything. And you can only hold the gold coins that are declining in quality, and the whole family is crowded in the swill bucket on Loyalty Street. When he said this, Teach's voice was slightly mocking, but he was not mocking Baron Devore, nor was he mocking Edmund, but mocking himself.
"If you have to ask me why I know it so well...it's because nobles play this way, and this is how a friend of mine fell into the pit."
After hearing the words "I have a friend," Lumil couldn't help but chuckle, and did not expose this shameless guy.
In the book, Baron Corsia did not have the nerve to say that he lost his land due to high debts. He only generally stated that it was because of his greed and the tricks of traitors... After all, this would obviously gain more sympathy from readers.
However, after Edmund heard this, he only felt a chill rising from his back, and it took him a long time to swallow the saliva in his throat.
He finally saw the whole plan, and the role he was going to play next became clear——
Sir Dantès, who represents justice, will publicly shout to the president of the Royal Bank of the Empire in the newspaper: "Why would a progressive reformer run into a wall against the rules, but when it comes to the barons of the White Dew District, the iron-clad principles are as if they don't exist."
He could even guess the next reaction of the president--it must have been a surprise. He pretended to know this for the first day, then exclaimed "This is unreasonable!" and kicked the ball to the side of the Senate.
He did not dare to make the matter serious and offend the real nobles as a commoner, but wasn't there a "Sir Dantès who represented justice"?
The few country nobles who were snowballing in Bailu District are completely finished.
Nobles do not need to care about whether public opinion is true, but this is not a matter of public opinion at all.
After all, their title is only baron, and they are not noble enough to take money from the emperor's pockets openly...even though the dignitaries of the entire empire are doing this.
In the last episode of "Story", the land ownership in Bailu District has come to an end, and Sir Dantès will shake hands with Governor Hogan Nora in the newspaper.
As for why it was in the newspaper, it was naturally because in reality they had never quarreled at all, and they were as cordial as brothers when they met.
The end of all this may be the opportunity of "replenishing sufficient collateral", or it may be the opportunity of "His Royal Highness Colin stepping forward to mediate"... But it is not important at all. After all, whether it can be done or not is a matter of His Highness's words.
They don’t even have to go to the Imperial Bank, there are many people who are willing to court them. Including powerful nobles, or the private banks they control behind the scenes.
"So..." Edmund's voice was a little dry. He had already guessed the follow-up plan, but he didn't know what to say.
lumil did not mention the follow-up plan, but suddenly spoke abruptly.
"How is your relationship with President Huck Alton? He is the president of the Bailu District Branch."
Edmund was stunned for a moment and answered truthfully.
"We have only met each other a few times... To be honest, you introduced me to him."
Lumir nodded and said lightly.
"That's good, don't have any contact with him in the future."
Edmund nodded nervously, silently feeling sorry for Mr. Harker in his heart.
His impression of the branch president was actually quite good.
After all, he had just completed the change of status at that time, and he had never been treated so politely by any bank president.
At this moment, there was a gentle knock on the door of the study, interrupting the moment of silence in the room.
After getting permission, the housekeeper walked in respectfully, bowed slightly and said.
The butler maintained a respectful attitude and reminded softly: "It's the president of the Minaret Bank, sir. He sent a letter to you a few days ago, but at that time... you told me to throw it away."
Edmund remembered that this was indeed the case, and asked the butler to greet the guests first, and then cast his questioning gaze on Teach who came to stand by the window.
I saw a smile on the latter's face.
His index finger gently opened the curtains and looked at the carriage at the entrance of the courtyard. The expression on his face was the same as when he saw President Huck hurriedly coming to the door.
That is the look in the eyes of an eagle when it sees its prey.
…"A vulture that smelled the smell of blood could no longer hold back its claws when it saw the fainted traveler in the desert."
He spoke slowly, looked back at Edmund, and continued.
"Since someone has guessed what we are going to do, you should go and meet him on behalf of our Highness."