Throne of the North.

Chapter 540 The Law of Conservation of Wealth
Matter is conserved.

Gold coins, silver coins, copper coins, gems, agates, crystals...these things that represent intuitive wealth are a kind of material.

Therefore, wealth is conserved.

The research of a certain father of logic can become the ancestor of the political sophistry of all the nobles in this world. Even in this extraordinary world, he must be an existence respected by countless people.

Gerald never lacked for wealth.

What they owned was the entire heritage of a kingdom on the once complete Norris continent. The bravery and righteousness of the king more than a hundred years ago allowed Gerald to travel smoothly on his way south. No one did not respect and admire King Gerald, so after coming here, they still retained a large amount of wealth.

Over the past hundreds of years, Gerald's wealth has been decreasing every year. But even after hundreds of years of decline, Gerald has not declined to the point of falling into the gutter. He is much better off than those wandering nobles.

Such a prosperous aristocracy should never have fallen to the point where they were helpless because of war, but that is what happened to them.

Even if the gold coins were crushed into powder and scattered in the air, they would float and fall to some corner where no one cared. So where did Gerald's wealth go?

"He is a priest of the Dawn Church. He is the priest of the only church among the thirty-five knight territories in your Earl Gerald's territory. The priest of that church died a few years ago. The Church said that he went to meet the Lord in heaven, but the truth is that the damned priest was a participant in the murder of Marquis Beifeng."

"He died in the Empire, and he is now the boss of that church."

"Come, tell our young knight how much we have stolen from your church. They will pay your ransom. If the ransom is appropriate, we will consider returning all the wealth we have robbed from you."

After hearing this, the pastor suddenly opened his eyes wide and looked at Kemon Gerald and others sitting opposite Bruneggis. Of course, he also knew them.

"Master Ke Meng, you are finally here. These damned..."

"These imperial people, they stole the faith that belongs to my Lord!!!"

The pastor shouted loudly. Before, he was timid and trembled at the sight of the wild beasts in the forest, but now that he had finally endured it, his voice suddenly became louder.

"They shamelessly robbed the wealth of the Dawn Church and kidnapped many clergy. You must make them return all the wealth that belongs to the Dawn Church."

Actually, it was not that no one in Gerald's noble territory went to find the knights and told them that the clergy had been arrested, but the problem was that the war involved everyone and the knights simply had no time. Besides the knights and the king's nobles, no one else was even qualified to see Earl Gerald.

"They rushed into the Dawn Church and stole two boxes of gold coins, thirty boxes of silver coins, and copper coins. They even tied the boxes to the horses' tails and scattered my lord's wealth everywhere."

"And the gems, which are the precious treasures we contributed to the Holy Mountain. They also took away the furs of wild animals and the thirteen exquisitely polished sculptures. We spent thousands of gold coins to carve these holy light statues."

"The most shameless thing is that they actually stole the food we distributed to the believers. The 300,000 kilograms of food stored in the church's basement are all gone. Even a rat would starve to death if it went in. That was the food my Lord distributed to His lost believers."

"besides……"

It was fine before, as the wealthy nobles of the Imperial Church had gotten used to it over the years. But it was different now. When they heard one of the sentences, all the knights' breathing quickened.

Three hundred thousand kilograms of food, what does that mean? How can a church have so much?

What is food? Now everyone on the battlefield knows the importance of food.

The knights were so lazy that they didn't even bother to listen to the long string of numbing descriptions and descriptions that followed.

"okay."

As Bruneggis spoke, the brown bear slapped the priest on the head. The latter staggered, tears streaming down his face due to the pain, but unlike the fear before, his eyes were filled with anger.

"When I get back to the church..."

He murmured in a low voice, and Bruneggis looked at the Gerald Knights opposite him.

"How much are you willing to pay to redeem this pastor?"

"Three hundred gold coins."

A pastor of an ordinary church, of course, is now in a position of responsibility, and three hundred gold coins is the market price... er, historical tradition.

Brunamigis looked at the priest, then at Kemon Gerald opposite him, and after a grunt, he pushed the priest towards Kemon.

"Master Kemon, as for those belonging to my Lord..."

The pastor staggered and said anxiously and loudly that he must take back everything that belonged to the church.

However, before he could finish his words, a powerful force surged from behind him, and the sharp arrow instantly pierced through the priest's flesh on the back. The tip of the arrow came out from in front of his chest and was firmly grasped in the hand of a knight.

Knight Fol raised his head and looked at the priest who was spitting blood and gasping for breath, then looked at the fox-skin berserker opposite who had put away his longbow.

The atmosphere in the woods was tense. The knights drew their swords and the beasts in the woods bared their teeth.

"Three hundred gold coins, this number is unreasonable. I remember he just said a lot of it. The value is already more than ten thousand gold coins. You want to redeem it with three hundred gold coins."

"Is this reasonable?"

"Besides, we didn't just catch him. Three hundred gold coins is just bullying."

Bruneggis felt a little regretful as he looked at the priest who was struggling and spitting out blood.

"I told you I'd let you go if the ransom was right, but I'm afraid you think this amount is cheap."

"And...as a priest you can't even heal your own wounds."

The priest stared at the cunning fox with his eyes wide open. He wanted to curse, but ended up falling to the ground with his eyes open.

Whose healing technique can heal a wound that penetrates the heart?
Screams and bloodshed rang out in the forest. More than a dozen clergymen were killed at this moment, and their bodies were placed between the two sides.

"Don't worry, I won't frame you. I killed them just to avenge our Lord Marquis Beifeng. Their priest participated in that sinister assassination, and the Empire will never forget this hatred."

"We let them live only because Lord Ryan wanted to tell you that there is no shortage of food in Earl Gerald's territory."

"You don't have to give your wealth to Lord Ryan to buy food."

Kemon had not yet recovered from his previous confusion as he looked at the fox fur.

"Is it really three hundred thousand kilograms?"

Three hundred thousand kilograms, this number can feed tens of thousands of people for three to four months, or even a year.

How many people are there in a church? Including monks, nuns and clergy, the number will not exceed twenty.

Even if bread and eggs were to be distributed to believers on the day of prayer, they all knew how cheap everything except the eggs was.

"Oh, how is that possible?"

Bruneggis shook his head.

"Every year, churches around the world need to send supplies to the Holy Mountain. This is the internal taxation of the Holy See. It is the responsibility of each cathedral and will eventually be collected on the Holy Mountain."

"But most of the goods being transported are gold coins, gems and other materials. Resources like wheat and stones, which are difficult to transport and consume a lot of energy during the journey, will be converted."

"Of the 100 kilograms of food, the church keeps 20 kilograms for itself, distributes 20 kilograms to spread the faith, loses 20 kilograms on the journey, and sends 40 kilograms to the Holy Mountain."

"After the conversion, 20 catties are kept for oneself, and the 20 catties distributed are not counted. The 40 catties sent to the Holy Mountain are converted into wealth that is easy to transport, so the 20 catties lost during the journey are kept."

"Of course, during the conversion process, a lot of travel losses will be removed. For example, for an offering to a certain archbishop or a certain elder, the Vatican will record that 45 kilograms or 50 kilograms were delivered to the Holy Mountain."

"In the end, out of a hundred kilograms of grain, about ten kilograms remained in the church. Sometimes it was more, sometimes it was less, but it was all recorded in the account book."

"The Vatican will record how many pounds of grain belonging to the Lord are stored in such and such a church in such and such a year."

"Ten kilograms a year, that's a hundred kilograms in ten years." Thanks to the indoctrination and training of these extraordinary knowledge in Ryan's frozen land territory, Bruneggis, who used to be illiterate, can now solve arithmetic problems. This is mainly because Ryan told him that this way he can control the power of the bow and arrow more perfectly.

“It’s a ratio.”

"The 300,000 kilograms that the pastor mentioned just now is actually the accumulated amount of the church over the past ten years. It should have been consumed in the loss during transportation."

"That was the food that the Lord of the Dawn left in the church. His servants were responsible for guarding it, but in reality..."

"Except for the 300,000 catties in the account book, the actual number is only 30,000 to 50,000 catties."

"The food quotas set by the Dawn Church for clergy are already history. Priests can only eat one kilogram of food every day. They do eat one kilogram, but two kilograms of food scraps will be left on the table. The three kilograms of food on the table require thirty kilograms of ingredients to cook."

"They followed the Vatican's rules and only ate one kilogram, but they actually consumed thirty kilograms. The extra twenty-nine is a deficit of hundreds of thousands in the account book."

Kemon was confused, not because of the extravagance of the Vatican officials, but because he didn't think straight.

Fortunately, he still remembered a little.

"His church has 50,000 pounds of food."

There are still many churches in Earl Gerald's territory, and the reasons for the appearance of these churches are very simple.

Just like when Gerald went south, the Empire invited them, and although they failed, they still made a lot of wealth from Gerald. The Dawn Church also needed the wealth of Gerald, a former member of the royal family of the kingdom.

Otherwise, how could it be possible that Gerald's wealth would decrease every year compared to the previous year?

Wealth is conserved. The inheritance of the Gerald royal family did not appear in the Gerald bloodline, but appeared in the hands of the empire, in the hands of the Holy See, and in many corners during their escape to the south to avoid the North.

The tolls collected by the Empire were extremely expensive, but they were a one-time payment, while the tolls collected by the Holy See had lasted for hundreds of years.

……

“This is their last chance to choose.”

On the battlefield, Ryan couldn't help but sigh as he watched the Gargoyle Legion's crazy charge. This extraordinary legion felt more useful than Earl Clayton's Flame Dragon Knights because they were truly extraordinary beings who were not afraid of pain and would not hesitate to die at the command of one person.

"Faith in the Lord of the Dawn and fear of the Church are more important."

"The responsibility and honor in Gerald's bloodline are more important."

Gerald's relationship with the southern nobles is not very good now, and the Kingdom of Coran blocks all their social interactions.

Now all that remains is the faith of the Lord of Dawn.

Beside him, Count Pascal was also a little excited. The time was almost up and he couldn't wait.

"A hundred years ago Gerald would have chosen only the first."

"One hundred years later... the nobles have already seen clearly the corruption of the Church."

Almost the next day, the followers in Earl Gerald's territory sent back news to Ryan. Earl Gold Eyes had not made any move yet, but Earl Black Eyes could not help it and sent people to ask those churches, hoping that they could send out food to support the war.
Some churches nodded in agreement after hesitation, but more refused.

The reasons given by the churches that refused were actually the same lies that Gerald had told before.

Their accounts were in deficit, and now Gerald wanted them to open the warehouse. Wouldn't that expose the fact that their accounts were in deficit? Would the evidence be exposed?
Gerald wouldn't care about this kind of thing, but the clergy of the Holy See don't live in an aristocratic system. They are clergy of the Dawn Holy See.

Not to mention that the Dawn Church once ruled the world, but now only one-third of the land is left, and a lot of land has been divided up by other forces. There is not much soil left for the Dawn faith. There are countless priests within the Church who want to become priests but have no churches to allocate to them.

There are more wolves than meat, so sometimes you can fight for the meat in other people's mouths.

This handle will not fall into Earl Gerald's hands, because they cannot control it and do not know about it, and it will not explode immediately. After all, opportunities need to be waited for, but this matter will always be a sword over their heads, which can fall at any time.

No matter how it falls or who makes it fall, the clergy who are deeply involved in it can only passively accept it.

As clergymen, they really want to make progress, return to the warm land of the south, return to the holy mountain to gain a higher status. Even if they lie down, this handle may affect the higher-level clergymen behind them, and their elders will also be attacked by their opponents.

Therefore, rejecting Gerald was not their own business at all, but involved a series of Vatican officials from top to bottom.

Their interests are the same.

In short, when others present the accounts and ask why we could only support the war with less than one-tenth of the food on the accounts, it will be difficult to make excuses.

This cannot be explained by some nonsense like "We didn't need that much food at that time and the remaining food was still in the warehouse."

The only difference between them and the nobility and the monarchy is that they live under theocracy.

They are servants of the Lord of the Dawn. They dedicate everything they have to the Dawn and become His servants. His will will be carried out without reservation.

The war between Gerald and the Kingdom of Andara was a holy war of the Lord of Dawn, but in the end he didn't fight with all his might?
This is like taking a detour on the road of political correctness and standing on the opposite side of everyone.

That means there will be no place to bury the body.

Therefore, most churches chose to refuse. As for the remaining churches that agreed, it did not mean that their warehouses were full. It was just that the corruption of the Vatican had not yet spread to every priest.

"The outbreak of any war begins with an insignificant conflict."

"A conflict has arisen between Earl Gerald and the Holy See."

Ryan's eyes also lit up. This was the first time he used pure political strategy to resolve a war, and he felt excited.

"It's time to let Grand Duke Leta prepare, lest he gets angry if we don't tell him any secrets."

With the order from the Empire, Ryan became the commander of this war, although... he was not qualified to command two extraordinary legions.

……

There was already a commotion in the earldom.

The knights were ordered to ask the Vatican for food, but they didn't get any. They were angry inside. The soldiers who had just come off the battlefield were not in a good mood.

"This war was originally initiated by your Dawn Church. Now you priests of the Dawn Church are unwilling to help your war?"

As time went by, more and more food was consumed in the war, and even ordinary soldiers noticed the change in the amount of rations.

As for those priests, they would naturally not agree no matter what.

"That is the Lord's faith. Do you want to become heretics? Do you want to be like the devil and rob the food that belongs to my Lord out of fear?"

"Without the Pope's order, we will never hand over the things in the warehouse to you, even if you step over our dead bodies!"

"Lord, look at the people of your mercy. Their souls are no longer holy. They actually want to blaspheme your glory."

The pressure of the last sentence was too great. The knights' scalps tingled. Most importantly, public opinion was in the hands of the priest. Even the starving serfs in the territories stood on the side of the church, staring at the soldiers who were making loud noises in the church with fear and dissatisfaction.

boom!
The priest proudly closed the church door, allowing the soldiers outside to rush in if they had the courage, kill him, the priest who dedicated his life for the Lord, and then snatch away the glory that belonged to the Lord of the Dawn.

The knights didn't dare, but they didn't dare to leave easily, so they could only send people to ask the count again and again.

However, in the dark night, under the shadow of the church, a group of cat-man assassins walked out. They were wearing dark hoods, moving in the shadows, and finally slashed the necks of the priests with the short blades in their hands.

"The priest is dead!!!"

(End of this chapter)