Chapter 709 - Collective Rage
Chapter 709 - Collective Rage
"Young Master, you did the right thing when he executed that bastard.
Any monarch ruling with this sort of management truly deserves death!"
(*^*)
As the men voiced out their complaints, Oden and William couldn't agree more.
They briefly glanced at several books and truly felt like resurrecting Alec and killing him all over and over again.
What sort of work did the fool leave for him to do?
Did he know how long it would take for them to finish all this when there were so many errors involved?
Just the accounting books for the first month within Alec's first year all had major errors in them.
So what more of the accounting books for the next 15~20 something years?
Was this some sort of joke?
.
One should know that each month within a single year had more than 100 accounting books alone.
These account books focused on many different aspects like importation of foreign goods for the people's benefit, how the goods were distributed to the chosen farmers, exportation, books that focused on textile materials, food, construction, and so on.
Even fixing roads, creating statues, building new bridges, creating new wells for the people or buying official sh.i.p.s all needed to be accounted for with the workers or people involved getting paid and the materials bought.
Additionally, there were 'projects' that needed to be done with tax money too.
With that said, each topic had its own accounting book that showed the daily progress of things, as well as the losses and grains for each day within the month.
Again, each book focused on the entire Arcadina.
So if money was allocated for seed distribution, the book had to show how many farmers were hired, horses were bought, wagons were gotten, and knights were paid to escort these seeds to their designated regions within Arcadina.
One also had to account for these people's food, lodging and whatnot.
In short, there were so many different account books for just a single month alone.
So if all of them were f**ked up, then what more of the other books within the other months in that same year?
No!
What more of the other years during Alec's reign?
This was a nightmare!
.
William massaged his temples helplessly.
He thought that he would be able to wrap things up 2 weeks from now.
But from the look of things, it will take at least 2 months to properly evaluate these books.
They would have to take their time and go over each book several times without error before proceeding to the next.
Because even though he had executed the most tyrannical nobles, there were still some who embezzled some tiny fraction of wealth and joy away with it over these years.
Now, it was time for them to pay up from their family treasuries.
Everything should be returned to the people!
William shook his head wryly and wondered if this was what Alec meant when he said that he would haunt him as a ghost.
Because right now, he truly felt helpless by the way Alec left the entire place unorganized.
Even forgetting about the account books that targeted the running of the palace was in a mess.
No one knew the exact amount of people employed here.
Some of them were killed off but still marked as alive and still receiving their salaries... while others have their names appearing in these books twice and were somehow receiving double salaries instead.
.
Additionally, one shouldn't forget about the fact that the royal palace was a shareholder to several businesses out there.
So every month these businesses had to send some money back to the palace.
For sure without a doubt, William knew that the businessmen properly showed the palace fake books when giving out the shares... and there was nothing he could do about those since it had already passed.
What bothered him was how the money that was already recorded and signed by these businessmen, seemed to have diminished or disappeared magically.
Again, with so many accounting books to look at, he knew that he wouldn't be able to start with his development plan until this was properly taken care of.
Maybe 2 months wouldn't be enough for these accountants to check all books involving the entire Arcadina.
And here he thought that with how tyrannical Alec was, he would keep a tight check on things.
But only now did he know better.
Everything was a mess!
.
"Father, uncle is really hateful."
"Hmhm... as expected if a tyrant.
All your grandfather's hard work had been completely flushed out by him.
And even after his death, he still found any way to torment us like this.
It's truly hard to believe that he and I were born from the same mother.
I think there's a secret that your grandfather refused to share before he passed away.
Or else how could he be so different from me?"
William listened to Oden and secretly rolled his eyes.
'Father please!
We've all established that he's your brother, so stop trying to deny it.'
And so with time on their hands, Oden and William joined the accountants in looking over the books.
Hey!... more hands made the work go faster.
They spent 4 more hours there and had the maids bring lunch for everyone too.
'Flip!'
'Shru! Shru! Shru!'
'Pac! Pac! Pac! Pac! Pac!'
The sound of people flipping pages, erasers being used and people punching their calculators angrily could be heard all around the room.
If before, these people didn't have beef with Alec... now they truly felt like torturing him slowly for the workload that he had left behind.
In their eyes, Alec must not have loved any of his sons for him to do such a thing.
Did he want them to suffer as well when they took over?
What a heartless man!
.
"Father, I think we need to have a chat with the accountants who have been running things all this while."
"I agree.
Once we're done looking through the books, we'll hold every one of them accountable!" Oden said angrily.
With how angry they all were right now, by the time they finished looking over the entire thing... those royal accountants would definitely wet themselves from fright when they made their moves.
Everything that they owed would be given back, even if they had to empty these people's family treasuries.
Hmph!
Serves them right!
William and the rest continued working angrily.
And soon, one of the guards stepped hastily.
"Your highnesses, they're here!"