CHAPTER 525: THE CIRCUIT COURT

TL: Rui88

“My child!”

Seeing his grandson still hesitating, the old man’s tone carried a hint of urgency.

“Have you not seen that Paul Grayman has already fallen? His body has been tainted and possessed by some unknown evil, his once noble aristocratic soul is no longer pure. Our lord has become the devil’s agent in this world. He… sooner or later, he will bring disaster. No, he is already bringing disaster! Isn’t our family’s situation clear proof?”

The old man said resentfully:

“If it were merely the seizure of wealth, then so be it. The world is full of lords who suck the marrow from their subjects’ bones. What could we do? We could only hope his descendants would not be as greedy as their fathers. But… but Paul Grayman also humiliates us in character.”

The young man shook his head in disbelief, “No, Count Grayman is a very easy-going person in his daily life. How could he humiliate others for no reason?”

“Oh, my child!” The old man adopted a grave and earnest tone. “For those who are truly insidious, the boorish act of a direct insult is something they disdain. What they enjoy is stabbing you in the back with a sharp dagger in the dark. On the surface, they respect you, befriend you, even flatter you, but in private, they bare their fangs like a venomous snake, slandering your name, ruining your prestige, and making your reputation stink among the people.”

The young man murmured, “Has our lord done such a thing?”

“Done it?” The old man found it somewhat amusing and said sarcastically, “He does it every single day!”

“My child, do you know of the circuit court?”

“I do.”

The old man struck his cane forcefully again. “The very existence of this so-called circuit court is a humiliation to us. For every day it exists, we suffer another day of humiliation.”

“How can that be?”

“You know, our family has been the master of this village since ancient times. Whenever the villagers had disputes, they would come to us for a ruling. This is due to the prestige accumulated by our family over generations. The people trust our prestige, believe in our fairness, and accept our order. Therefore, our family naturally holds the power of judgment in this place. For those who do wrong, we have the right to impose punishment. For those who commit crimes, we even have the right to put them to death.”

“But, ever since Paul Grayman established the circuit court, these natural powers of ours have been gradually stripped away. The laws he has enacted, almost every one of them is aimed at us. Those villains who should have been put to death now require the lord’s own judge to personally try and convict them. And the monthly patrols overturn a great many of the clear verdicts that have already been made. How many villains and ruffians have been released by the circuit court, allowing this scum to continue to disturb our quiet and peaceful lives.”

“More importantly, this is a heavy blow to our family’s prestige. Our word is no longer final in the village. Those ignorant peasants no longer treat our words as gospel. Instead, they bow their knees to that greater authority in Lakeheart Town.”

“This, this, this… is there any greater humiliation than this? Cough, cough, cough.”

At this point, the old man began to cough excitedly again.

“Do you know?”

He stepped forward and grabbed his astonished grandson with such force that the young man even wondered if his grandfather before him had grown younger.

“Just one month ago, the head of this family, the oldest man in this village, your grandfather…I…was severely humiliated by the people of the circuit court.”

The young man supported his agitated grandfather to prevent him from falling and asked in surprise, “What happened exactly?”

“A month ago, I gathered everyone in the village in the open space at the village entrance, intending to publicly punish three villains who had absconded from their debts.”

The young man asked, “Was it a debt owed to our family?” But he immediately felt it was a redundant question; their family was likely the only one in the village capable of lending money.

“Yes,” his grandfather replied as if it were a matter of course.

“If you owe money, you must repay it. That is the natural law. But these three villains actually planned to just leave without paying. Where in the world could you find such a good deal?”

The young man could not help but ask, “Where were they trying to escape to?”

The old man spat on the ground. “Pah, they wanted to run to the city to work, a bunch of lowlifes! Ah, and that is another of Paul Grayman’s great crimes, using those factories to attract a bunch of commoners to the city. If this continues, who will farm the land? Won’t the fields in the countryside become desolate? Hmph!”

The old man turned the topic back to the insult he had suffered. “I had my servants tie up those three villains, first administering a whipping, and then announced that they would work in my household to pay off their debts…this has been the practice since ancient times for those who don’t repay their debts and try to flee. But the families of those three villains actually went to the people from the circuit court and stopped me from punishing them. Is there any justice in this world? Is there any justice?”

The old man loudly questioned the air in front of him, as if Paul Grayman himself were standing right there.

“Why? The circuit court wouldn’t go that far,” the young man asked.

The old man said huffily, “The circuit court said the interest we set exceeded the limit established by the lord, and that it constituted usury.”

“To hell with their usury. Child, go and ask in the nearby villages if any other lender sets a lower interest rate than our family. We offered such a low rate out of kindness and mercy, and in the eyes of the lord, we have committed a wrong.”

“Do you know what the people from the circuit court did? At first, I used inviolable sacred tradition as a reason to stop their unreasonable meddling. The first time, only three of them came. After I verbally rebuked them and they were lost for words, they retreated. But in the afternoon, they returned with a full sixty men, most of whom were so-called policemen, all fully armed and carrying gleaming swords. A peaceful family like ours had never seen such a spectacle. Under the banner of the lord, they rudely and barbarically broke into our manor and snatched away those three villains who had refused to pay their debts. Heavens, this was done in broad daylight, in front of the more than 600 people of the entire village.”

At this, the old man covered his face with his withered hands.

“I… I have lost all face! This was a slap in my face, a slap in the face of our entire family!”

“The prestige our family has built in this village over hundreds of years, all lost in a single day… sigh!”

The old man sighed in anguish.

And the young man fell into a long silence.

“Go and speak with your father again, child.”