Chapter 42 What a waste
The royal city of the Deep Forest Kingdom was somewhat like the buildings Sag remembered from Native American tribes, especially the palace, built with stone steps leading up to a square building carved with decorations.
It gave the impression that there were many treasures here.
After dealing with the few hundred soldiers who had gathered, Sag strode directly into the palace. A dozen or so pirates dispersed, searching for the money stored in the palace.
At this time, in the stone-built palace hall, on the high steps, Sag sat on the stone throne, one leg crossed over the armrest, his body leaning back lazily, his hand supporting his head, watching Gin check the boxes one by one.
"Empty."
Gin flipped over a box, said something, and continued to the next box.
"Empty."
He flipped over another box and looked at the next box.
"Can you tell if a box is empty or full?"
Renettia, who was nearby, looked curious. She also ran over and pushed open a wooden box, which was empty inside, nothing in it.
"It's empty!" She furrowed her brow.
This scene made Sag's eye twitch.
The treasure chests were found, but there was nothing inside.
They were all empty!
Not even a single Berry was found. His subordinates had been busy for a long time, and only found some supplies. The total value wasn't even worth as much as the gold ornaments on the king's corpse.
"Captain, we found a guy who claims to be the steward!"
A pirate dragged a middle-aged man wearing a cloak and a fancy feathered hat to the front of the hall and threw him to the ground.
"No, don't kill me!"
This man knelt on the ground, his butt sticking up, his hands covering his head, trembling. "I'll tell you everything, please spare my life!"
"Steward Gadri, long time no see," Marika said with a gentle smile.
Hearing the voice, the steward looked up and exclaimed, "Ma, Marika! Did you come for revenge?"
"You can understand it that way. In short, I'm about to join this pirate crew led by this seventy-million-bounty pirate. And this Captain Sag is troubled by not being able to find any treasure..."
Marika maintained her smile. "So, could you please tell us where the treasure is?"
Sag gave Marika an appreciative look.
After killing that king, this woman seemed to have made up her mind to join the crew.
"Trea, treasure..."
The steward stammered, "There is no treasure. The money collected was all handed over to the World Government by His Majesty the King."
"What?!"
Sag was stunned. "Handed over so much money? There's nothing left?"
Sag didn't know exactly how much the Celestial Tribute was, but he knew that with this king's style of squeezing money from everywhere, it was impossible for him not to have been able to raise the money for the Celestial Tribute.
"No, no, Captain. His Majesty the King thinks the kingdom is too poor, with no resources, and wants to change to another country. So he paid more money to the World Government, hoping to be exchanged for a new, wealthy country to be king."
The World Government was certainly a behemoth, but this behemoth didn't encompass the entire world, only about half of the countries...
There were still more than half of the non-affiliated countries in the world. Even in the East Blue, half of the countries did not belong to the World Government.
It wasn't that they didn't want to be protected by the World Government. Only a few countries were like that, powerful enough not to bother joining the World Government and paying a large amount of Celestial Tribute.
The vast majority of countries simply couldn't afford that much money...
These countries were unprotected and did not have 'human rights' within the scope of the World Government, so they could be conquered at will.
However, the countries within the World Government didn't have that many powerful people. They were all on a similar level, some even worse than those non-affiliated countries. The sea was so vast that even the World Government didn't necessarily know the locations of all the non-affiliated countries.
Even if they really found a country, with the strength of a single kingdom, it would probably be difficult to conquer it.
After all, local defense was definitely more advantageous than a long-distance attack.
And this king of the Deep Forest Kingdom thought that since he couldn't do it himself, he might as well hand it over to the World Government. He paid more money every time, hoping that the World Government would give him a wealthy non-affiliated country so he could become the king of that country.
The Deep Forest Kingdom was indeed very poor. The only resource that could be produced in abundance was fruit. The king squeezed it to death, even forcing people to go to Bridge-Top Kingdom, which allowed him to have surplus money. And this part of the money was also given to the World Government, so there was definitely nothing left.
Sag clicked his tongue. "Who did he give it to? Do you know where that person is?"
"No, I don't know. I only know that every year, it's handed over to government officials along with the escort of the Celestial Tribute." The steward replied.
Well, that was gone.
Government officials...
What good birds were those things? There were only two possibilities. One was that they embezzled it themselves, and the other was that they handed it in truthfully, and then it was embezzled by someone higher up. But no matter which one, it had nothing to do with Sag anymore.
"What about the nobles in your country?" Sag asked, not giving up. "They must have money, right?"
A country, how could it only have a king? Of course, there would also be nobles.
"The nobles are in the villages. Their money was also squeezed by His Majesty the King, but there should still be some left. I'll lead the way!" the steward shouted.
"Forget it... it's too time-consuming." Sag thought for a moment and dismissed the idea.
A landmass had many villages and small towns, but the nobles were definitely scattered. It would take time to rob them, and they might not have that much money.
Besides, he was a pirate, not a bandit. Their ship was still docked at the shallows. It was easy to be discovered by the Marines if it took too long.
*Bang!*
Sag stood up and kicked the stone throne to pieces. He looked down at the kneeling steward and said unhappily, "So I came all this way, and the most valuable thing is actually the gold on the king's corpse?"
"I, we can now collect taxes from the civilians! No, I'll go collect taxes right away!" the steward immediately said.
"Forget it, I have no interest in poor people. And..."
Sag walked down the steps and glanced at the gate. "Whether you can still collect taxes, that's hard to say... Let's go!"
He stood up and walked straight out of the palace gate. Outside the palace, the townspeople were holding pitchforks and wooden sticks, gathered together spontaneously. Seeing Sag appear, they automatically parted into two rows, making way.
"Marika-sama..."
The townspeople saw Marika behind Sag and were about to speak, but Marika blinked, put her index finger to her lips, and made a shushing gesture.
The street leading to the gate fell silent.
Only when Sag walked out of the city gate did he turn around and ask, "Aren't you going to say goodbye?"
"Ah, since I'm about to become a pirate, it's better not to say goodbye. Otherwise, if the people in the city are thought to be colluding with pirates, it will be very troublesome."
Marika smiled. "You have done what you said, so I will also agree to your request and become your crew member."
In her eyes, Sag had fulfilled his words. He killed the king, broke the gates of the country, and let the people go back.
Without the king, there were no heavy taxes, so everyone could eat their fill.
As for other things...
"Oooooh!!"
Behind the palace, there was a sudden, earth-shattering cheer.
"What are you shouting so loudly for?"
Renettia looked back and asked, "The king is dead, are you that happy? Hmm... I guess so. I was also very happy when Murdoch died."
"That's different. You were avenging, they are celebrating the removal of heavy taxes. They won't have to go to Bridge-Top Kingdom anymore."
Lily said, and then added, "Probably..."
Whether they could resist to the end and change the status quo, or whether they would be suppressed and be the same as before, no one could say for sure.
"What do you think, Sag?" she asked.
"What does it have to do with me."
Sag sneered. "I'm just a pirate here to rob. What they do, I don't care. Anyway, the opportunity has been given. If they have the ability, they'll make their lives better. But..."
He sighed. "It's really wasteful."
"Wasteful?" Lily was puzzled.
Sag said firmly, "Of course, if I had such a large territory and so many people, I would definitely iterate new tactics around specialty products, align the granularity, promote information without barriers, rely on distribution capabilities to撬动vertical fields, and finally achieve value conversion. Then I could make a lot of money!"
(TN: He's using a bunch of management jargon and buzzwords in a nonsensical way.)
Lily: "..."
Although she didn't quite understand, she had a premonition. Sag's failure in his previous ventures might not just be bad luck...
She changed the subject. "Aren't you going to try to recruit them? They don't seem to resist pirates, and with Miss Marika..."
"With Marika, they were forced to play in the sand for two years. These people are not suitable for being pirates."
Sag shook his head. "Besides, I've already walked out, and no one has followed. It means they don't want to be pirates. Let's go find someone else."
"If it's crew members..."
Marika thought for a moment and raised her hand. "Captain, I have a suggestion. We can try going to Bridge-Top Kingdom."
"Oh?"
Sag's eyes lit up and he grinned. "Right, Bridge-Top Kingdom... I have a plan!"
"What?" Lily asked subconsciously.
"Go to Bridge-Top Kingdom!"
Sag waved his hand. "There must be the subordinates I want!"
●●●
● 24 Advanced chapters Now Available on Patreon!!
● https://www.patreon.com/c/Devmaya
(Just remove the hyphen to access patreon normally)