Reborn as a Mind-Reading Empress
Chapter 79: Crux Kingdom

Chapter 79: Crux Kingdom

"The Crux Kingdom? I thought so. When I checked the map, it was the closest territory to Prudencia that welcomed slavery."

[She must have truly been bothered by it to have even spent her time checking maps instead of resting. Right, Raymond and Alwin said she recognized the mark of slaves on the ladies’ hands.]

"You know about them? Have you seen slaves before today?"

"No. It was just that since I was young, my parents, the King and Queen of Lobelius had me educated about the territories in Eliora that welcomed slavery since they wanted me to avoid marrying into such a territory no matter what."

[No matter what!!! What if she divorced me because of this?! She already said she won’t divorce me but if her parents learn about this... Damn that Marquess! I’m going to kill him.]

"I swear, I and Valeria condemn slavery. This was the first time this happened. I will execute the Marquess myself if I have to."

"I know. Please don’t worry. I understand that you had no part in this. But how will you appease the people who had members of their families taken as slaves?"

"I had written a letter to the Crux Kingdom. They have to return every single slave they got from Prudencia. Of course, we have to refund them their money since the Marquess sold them at quite the price. And if they refuse, it means they would rather face my army instead."

She didn’t expect Ferdinand would decide to bring back the people from Prudencia who were sold as slaves. It would be difficult and hard to achieve.

To kingdoms that had slavery, it was the norm to have slaves so it was hard to nigh impossible to recover slaves once they were already sold.

But if it’s Ferdinand himself, the feared Dark Emperor of Valeria, it might be possible.

With his letter, even the Crux Kingdom would waver. Prudencia was the perfect example of a kingdom that had gotten full of itself and got devoured by the Empire instead.

If the Crux Kingdom doesn’t want to experience the same, they ought to return the slaves.

But the nobles would be difficult to convince. They had their pride and all sorts of complications. They would think Valeria was looking down on them for wanting to get back slaves already sold to them. But those people were not meant to be slaves in the first place.

Would Ferdinand truly attack Crux for the sake of Prudencia?

"You will declare war against Crux if they do not yield?"

"Yes. In the first place, when they learned the slaves were from Prudencia, a part of the Empire, they shouldn’t have bought them. Not a single person in Valeria is a slave. They should have known slavery was never welcomed in the Empire ever since its founding. It must have been their pride thinking they could trample on Valeria’s people that egged them to keep buying slaves from the Marquess."

’That’s right. Valeria had a lot of haters. They must have been eager to make people from the Empire their slaves.’

Now she’s worried about how the people from Prudencia would have fared in the hands of their masters.

The Crux Kingdom lies north of Prudencia. But they never became allies due to a difference in culture.

Crux had a lot of practices that made Arabella dislike them and it was probably among the reasons Prudencia was not on friendly terms with them either when it was still an independent kingdom.

In Crux, the slaves’ lives depend on their masters’ moods. Their master could kill them whenever they wanted and it was not punishable as murder. Because to them, once a slave was bought, they were their master’s property both in body and soul.

In such a country, you cannot take back a slave you already sold. But since it was Ferdinand himself writing a letter to the kingdom with a warning about war, perhaps, and Arabella hoped, that the nobles in Crux would give way if they don’t want an attack from Valeria.

"Is it only Crux or they sold in other territories as well?" she asked and Ferdinand’s eyes darkened for a second but he controlled his facial expression.

"They did. They sold in other territories as well. They seemed to have attracted quite the number of buyers because they were selling people of Valeria. The Marquess has quite a lot of business partners."

"Then, what about them? Will you also take back the people sold to them?" she hesitated to ask since it might be even more difficult than retrieving the people sold in Crux.

"Of course. I wanted to execute Marquess Gulliver as soon as possible but we still need him to recover the people he has sold. He’s the one who knows his business partners so I plan to send him to bring back the people he sold outside of Crux. I’ll have knights and mages accompany him so he won’t be able to escape no matter what he tries. Would that be alright with you?"

"Yes, of course. The Marquess had committed too many crimes to just die easily. He should live and suffer to repent and make amends for what he had done."

’I’m here trying to make up for the mistakes I committed in the past. Marquess Gulliver has no right to just die in peace.’

[She looks furious again.]

"How else would you suggest punishing the Marquess?"

"I want him to experience getting whipped on the back as he had done to his slaves and the people in Prudencia who could not pay the false tribute he had his mercenaries collect," Arabella said vengefully.

She covered her mouth when Ferdinand stared at her.

’Oops. Was that too much for someone like me? Ferdinand still thinks I’m just a sheltered innocent princess.’

[Who would have thought she could also be vengeful? She’s still so cute and adorable though even when she’s angry. Like a squirrel or a rabbit. But what Gulliver made her witness was indeed too much. I will have one of his own people whip him.]