Chapter 4190: Trading Firm and Treasury

"Wanting to steal something from the Willondale Mint is not something an ordinary person can do. The success rate of stealing from there must be even lower than assassinating the King, right?"

Weige sighed, while Xia De was worried about the matter regarding Margaret:

"The theft at the Mint is temporarily unrelated to Arcadia City. I am wondering, after Margaret arrives here, will those restorationists attempt to assassinate her? I have encountered members of the royal family in quite a few places, and almost every time, an assassination attempt occurs."

"Arcadia City is my territory; I will protect her well."

Weige said confidently, then thought of a new question:

"Speaking of which, are you going to start investigating that... 'Flower-Beaked Sparrow' next week?"

"It's 'Big-Beaked Sparrow'. Yes, I am still waiting for the Willondale side to transmit the contact information to me after Margaret has forged it. This is not a very troublesome matter; once I find the local Grey Glove stronghold, I will just ask about the information on the Big-Beaked Sparrow."

"I can also help with this matter. One of the important tasks of the Grey Glove system locally actually includes monitoring our family. The Astley family also has its own people in the shadows; although the family's influence cannot penetrate into the interior of the Grey Glove, at least I can help you verify the authenticity of the information you obtain."

In addition to being accompanied by Xia De, Weige's trip to the Grey Rock Pass Fortress this time also included the housekeeper, Miss Luolin, and two maids. The carriage did not display the family crest, and she had not informed the fortress commander, Baron Brez, of her visit today in advance, so the group did not attract much attention when they arrived at Grey Rock Pass.

Nowadays, the Grey Rock Pass Fortress is building a large-scale comprehensive hospital to accommodate wounded soldiers from the front line, and the civil engineering work in the fortress is even more exaggerated than the park where the Industrial Expo is about to be held.

However, the destination of the group was certainly not there. The carriage finally drove into a courtyard and stopped in front of a rather imposing building in the fortress:

"This is it."

Several young figures ran out hurriedly from the building to hold umbrellas for the people getting off the carriage. Xia De looked at the white stone building that looked like a bank and looked at Weige in surprise:

"Where is this?"

This place is located in the most prosperous area of the Grey Rock Pass Fortress, and less than two hundred meters ahead is the southern checkpoint of Grey Rock Pass. Although Xia De did not see the sign hanging outside the courtyard just now, he could tell that this place should not be an ordinary place.

"Astley Trading Firm. During the Delin'aoer era, this was the prison of the Grey Rock Pass Fortress. Some of the kingdom's political prisoners and economic criminals would be transferred from the capital to be imprisoned here. After the kingdom fell, this place was abandoned, and later it was purchased by my ancestor, the grandson of the last Duke of Astley."

Over the course of hundreds of years, the use of this place has changed many times, and for a period of time, it was even rented to the fortress military to be used as a warehouse for storage items. In the generation of my great-grandfather, this place was converted into a trading firm. However, the weather is not good today, so it looks like there shouldn't be many people."

Weige was a bit too modest. From the outside, although it looked imposing, it was somewhat deserted. But once they truly walked into the double-door entrance pushed open by the servants, the foreign merchants and employees of the trading firm running around inside were as busy as usual.

The general structure here is really similar to a bank, with warehouses underground, and reception windows, small conference rooms, data rooms, and guest rooms on the three floors above ground. According to Weige, her great-grandfather's generation of the family had accumulated enough assets and originally planned to open a small bank locally, but pressure from mysterious figures in Willondale forced the family to abandon the plan—actually, it was the royal family.

This place was originally decorated according to a bank, and although the subsequent generations had renovated it many times, it generally maintained the original style.

The manager of the trading firm was the typical fat, middle-aged man with glasses in Xia De's impression. He rushed over to meet Weige, and after being dismissed by Weige with a wave of her hand, he arranged for someone to lead the group down the stairs to the underground.

The underground warehouse of the trading firm has three floors, and the interior is as complex as a maze. Weige claimed that she wanted to check the moisture condition of the latest batch of spices transported from the New Continent, telling the people from the trading firm not to follow. After entering the third underground floor, she had the two maids guard the stairwell, and then she only took Xia De and Miss Luolin to continue walking deeper.

The carefully kept key was taken out, and a warehouse door deep in the third underground floor was opened.

This place is moisture-proof and heat-insulated, and has special ventilation vents, so even underground, it does not feel stuffy. This room is specially used to store cinnamon, and resin-sealed oak barrels are densely stacked together, each as high as Xia De's chest.

Pushing aside the cargo shelf in the corner of the warehouse that looked like it hadn't been touched for years, Miss Luolin pressed on the brick wall, and then a secret door opened, revealing the space behind it.

The wall separating the inside and outside looked even thicker than a bank vault, but the boxes in the bedroom-sized hidden space did not contain the antique treasures Xia De had imagined; on the ground, there were only a few antique vases that looked quite valuable.

Miss Luolin continued to grope on the wall of the secret room for a while, and soon another secret door on the wall of the secret room opened. This time, behind the door was a secret passage.

"There's a secret room behind the secret room; is it this cautious?"

"These are all arrangements made by our ancestors; I am just following the traditions of the past. Let's go; I haven't been here for more than half a year either."

Although this nested secret room was already very cautious, after Weige took charge of this place, she still cast spells to set up some defensive rituals in the passage. After lifting the rituals, the three of them walked a short distance inward along the secret passage and turned a right-angle corner, and then they saw the true treasure room of the Astley family.

There was no dazzling golden light like in stories where even the ground was piled with gold coins, and there was certainly no strange and powerful relics or alchemical props. Miss Luolin lit the torches used for lighting on the wall, but because the light was too weak, Xia De still took the initiative to summon moonlight.

This place looked like a storage room that hadn't been used for a long time. A few boxes were piled in the corner, and some oil paintings of ancient people Xia De didn't recognize were hanging on the walls. On the shelves along the east wall were some jewelry boxes of various sizes, and in front of the wall where the door was located stood three sets of full-body armor, and next to them was a weapon rack with a sword on it.

It looked quite shabby, but this was not the only room. Xia De saw another door on the west wall; clearly, the space here was very large.

"How does this place look?"

Weige asked, and then without waiting for Xia De to answer, she explained:

"Every item here, if taken out, would be enough to become the finale auction item of a large auction at the Cassandra Auction House. In addition to the collection of our Astley family, when Delin'aoer was destroyed, the ancestor seemed to have also taken some of the royal family's collections to store."

Father left a will saying that if the family is not at a critical juncture, do not sell these treasures left by the ancestors. For so many years, I have only taken a pair of earrings from here for my own use."

She looked at this place and sighed softly:

"I don't know if father said something similar to me when he brought mother here back then."

Xia De then asked curiously:

"Did your mother take any jewelry from here? This might be a clue."

Weige shook her head:

"I don't know; father's diary didn't write it, and there is no inventory of items here for me to check."

She said, and then took out the pendant given to her by the princess from six hundred years ago:

"Then let's look and see if there is anything worth noting here. Xia De, if you fancy anything, just take it; I don't mind."

Although Weige said that everyone should look together, in fact, she gave the pendant to her housekeeper, letting Miss Luolin check the items, while Weige pulled Xia De's hand and introduced the treasures here to him.

The oil painting of King Delin'aoer, known as the "Tyrant", the gold ring that had been passed down through the hands of three generations of queens, the seal passed down through generations of the Astley family, the medal worn by the last Duke, etc.

Weige introduced it very carefully, and Xia De listened seriously, knowing that she wanted him to understand her background and her origins in more detail. There were five secret rooms in total, connected to each other, and the items stored in different rooms were placed according to the era.

And the most "modern" treasure here is a box full of gold bars, which were left by Weige's great-great-grandfather. Weige also didn't know how the family in that era, which clearly didn't have much income, suddenly had so much gold.

However, she didn't care much either. As a high-level witch, wealth didn't mean much to her.

"I have seen the style of these gold bars in the Randall Valley."

Xia De picked up one of them and said:

"That was during the story of the Chosen One of the Earth. Iuna and I discovered the funds secretly raised by the old nobles of the Randall Valley in 1124 to resist the Kassenrik army. The style and patterns on those gold bars were almost the same as these gold bars. (Chapter 1418)"

"1124? At that time, the Randall Valley region on the west coast of the Old Continent had already been incorporated into the territory of Kassenrik, but the Delin'aoer Kingdom in the east had not yet been tainted by Kassenrik."

Weige thought for a while:

"Could it be that the Delin'aoer Kingdom back then funded the old noble resistance army of the Randall Valley? That is reasonable. Or, my ancestor just accidentally discovered this batch of gold bars. No, that possibility is not high."

Weige felt that she seemed to have discovered an incredible family secret:

"The old nobles of the Randall Valley had already disappeared in the generation of my great-great-grandfather. Where did these gold bars come from? Could it be that after submitting to Kassenrik, the Astley family was actually not always very honest? But no one in the family has ever told me about these things."

Xia De laughed:

"This is just some gold; not much can be inferred from it. Let the past be the past. Since your family hasn't passed down these things, don't take them too seriously." ===== CHAPTER 4191 =====