Chapter 625: Landon’s Observations – Part 3

"En," Talia nodded gravely, "Even before all the recent events, I always kept a close watch on Natasha Summers; after all, her influence in the Rockwell economy is... frightening."

"Heh," Darian chuckled at the mention of Natasha’s name, "I remember a few years back, some foolish count-rank noble family over there tried to deceive their Treasury, thinking it would be easier with a new king on the throne, only to immediately get caught."

"I remember that, too," Gino nodded, a faint grin flashing across his face, "They tried to bluff, then bribe their way out of it, and when neither approach worked, they tried to feign ignorance and throw their rank around to avoid any consequences, only for that little girl to completely bankrupt their house."

"She didn’t just bankrupt them," Darian laughed, shaking his head, "From the reports I read, she confiscated all of their assets, seized all their land, took control of all their businesses, and even somehow managed to strip them of their rank after having them found guilty of numerous crimes against the kingdom."

"There were rumours she could have had them all executed as well, but apparently she though giving them a quick death wouldn’t be as painful or be as good a warning as leaving them disgraced and destitute would."

"I wouldn’t put it past that woman," Talia shook her head wryly, "publicly, she is recognized as the most generous and caring of the current royal family, but her shadow can be seen in almost every single major financial transaction inside the Rockwell Kingdom, giving her almost unchecked power over it."

"That may be the case," Landon, who felt the conversation was getting off-track, suddenly cut in, "But, Mother, do you really believe Queen Natasha Summers is capable of coming up with the wide-scale economic reforms that are currently going on in the Rockwell Kingdom?"

Hearing this question from her son, Talia was forced to pause.

From the reports her spies and the various merchants under her control had delivered to her, Talia had a fairly good idea what changes the Rockwell Kingdom was trying to implement in regards to their trade and finance policies, and calling them ’extensive’ would be a gross understatement.

Some of the reforms their Second Queen was pushing for were so radical and so damaging to certain powerful interests that Talia could barely believe revolts hadn’t been triggered.

The Rockwell Kingdom’s Royal Family had a fair bit more control over its nobles than the Darr Family did over theirs, but that didn’t mean everyone would simply do as they were told without any objections.

When the noble houses felt their coffers and privileges were being threatened, they would surely resist, and a number of the policy changes Queen Summers was forcing them to make would certainly have just such effects.

Then, of course, there were a number of policies being implement that seemed to directly harm the Rockwell Family’s own interests for no apparent benefit.

When Talia first learned about all of this, she was shocked, then deeply confused, wondering just what the Rockwell Family was trying to accomplish; however, as more and more time passed, and more and more of these policies were enacted, the Darr Kingdom’s Crown Princess gradually realized the genius behind them.

She still couldn’t grasp the complete picture of what Natasha Summers was trying to accomplish, but Talia could tell it was having a remarkable effect on the circulation of goods and money in the Rockwell Kingdom, which in turn generated a huge amount of revenue for their treasury, more than enough to justify the initial losses they had suffered.

Talia had originally thought this economic revolution was all a product of the Second Queen’s financial genius, but the more she had thought about it, the more that didn’t seem to make sense.

Even if someone was a genius, their thinking could only stray so far from what was considered ’normal’ before they were considered insane, and no small number of Natasha Summer’s new policy proposals could genuinely be thought of as ludicrous.

Now that her son was not-so-subtly pointing this fact out as well, Talia only became more convinced her thinking on the matter was correct.

The question was, if Natasha Summer wasn’t the one who came up with this radical plan, who was?"

Considering what they had just been discussing, however...

"You can’t possibly mean..." Talia gasped, her eyes bulging as she gawked at her son.

Nodding solemnly, Landon confirmed his mother’s suspicions, "I think Lucas was the one who came up with that plan; at the very least, he was heavily involved in its creation."

"But that’s..."

"Impossible?" Landon asked, before laughing, "I would have thought so too, but after spending so much time talking with Lucas, I realized his way of thinking is just... different."

"Different how?" King Darian inquired, only half-able to believe what he was currently hearing.

An 11-year-old boy coming up with a set of policies to completely overhaul a kingdom’s economy, then convincing a Queen of that kingdom to actually implement those policies?

That wasn’t something you would hear about even in the most outlandish of stories, let alone real life.

Landon, seemingly having anticipated this question, had an answer prepared already which he quickly gave, "Lucas doesn’t see any difference between royals, nobles, or commoners. He doesn’t have any kind of bias whatsoever regarding background or status, he only cares about whether such things are factors in his analysis, or not."

"So, he’s one of those dreamers who believes all people are equal?" Darian, who had actually encountered some people who espoused such an ideology before, asked.

In response, Landon shook his head, then nodded, then wore a look of confusion as he tried to explain himself, "I’d say Lucas has a deep understanding that there are differences between people, and that those differences cannot be easily resolved, but he also believes that those differences aren’t necessarily fixed, or any individual’s fault, so they shouldn’t be a barrier to a person’s ability to advance themselves."

This statement caused some puzzled looks to appear on the faces of the adults in the room, which was hardly surprising seeing how Landon himself wasn’t quite sure what he was saying made sense.

"Life is unfair," Talia suddenly muttered, drawing everyone’s attention.

Realizing what she had just said, Talia smirked, "Just something Marquess Balfour once said to me."

Gino and Darian, both of whom were far more familiar with Celestina than Talia was, thought about it for a moment before nodding, thinking such a statement really did sound like something the crimson-red haired woman would say.

"In any case," Talia, seemingly eager to get the conversation back on track, asked her son, "Why do you believe Lucas is the one who came up with the economic reforms going on in the Rockwell Kingdom?"

"Two reasons," frowning slightly, Landon raised a pair of fingers before curling one back, "Firstly, through various conversations I had with many others during my stay in Misty City, I was able to mostly confirm that many of the new inventions and new knowledge being used in the Balfour March came from Lucas."

"No one would explicitly say Lucas was the inventor or developer of anything, but someone slipping up and mentioning him while talking about certain new developments happened too frequently to just be a coincidence," Landon concluded, adding briefly, "Also, the timeline fits. All the major changes started happening right after Marquess Balfour accepted Lucas as her First Disciple."