Chapter 656: Duties of a King

Nathanial was excited, as one ought to be before sleeping together with the most beautiful woman in the kingdom, his Third Wife Cynthia.

That said, after removing his new outfit, having a quick shower, a luxury only made possible by some recent renovations to the palace, slipping on some casual evening wear, and sitting down on his bed, the king couldn’t help yawning as drowsiness swiftly began overtaking him.

Life as a responsible king was never easy, and that had been especially true these past 5 days where Nathanial spent a good half of his time in extremely frustrating meetings between noble houses.

As usual, the argument was about benefits, specifically about the rights to a newly discovered iron mine in the Southern Province.

Normally, when such a mine was found, the rule was that whoever’s land it was on got to manage and profit from it.

If the owners of that land weren’t capable of running the mine, then the noble in charge of them would take over, and so on and so forth.

The problem, though, was that this mine just so happened to be under a small ridge that had served as a boundary marker between 3 noble families, each of them roughly equal in size and strength.

None of these 3 Viscount-rank houses had any idea they were sitting on such a valuable resource until about a month ago when a series of coincidences revealed its existence.

A heavy downpour in the region triggered a large landslide that not only washed out a key commercial road, it also destroyed a small logging village.

When word of this disaster reached the Viscount in charge of the village, some small relief aid as well as a team of experts in land management and infrastructure maintenance were quickly sent out to survey the damage.

During the subsequent investigation of the hill where the mudslide occurred, one of the more experienced surveyors noticed a large number of dark black striations in the exposed cliffside, and when he brought his sword close to them and felt a faint tug on its blade, he nearly cried out with joy.

While it was a tragedy that over 50 villagers had perished in the recent disaster, the discovery of what was likely a very large, very rich iron lode immediately captured the attention of all the involved parties.

Just how rich this iron ore deposit was wasn’t clear, but even the initial estimates were quite promising, which was more than enough for the 3 local Viscounts to start butting heads and dig their heels in when it came to the ownership rights.

As troublesome as that situation was, however, if that had been all there was to it, this matter probably wouldn’t have reached the king’s ear.

The lower nobles would squabble for a bit, then take their case to the Turner Family who governed the Southern Province to have the Earl negotiate some kind of deal.

Unfortunately for Nathanial, about 10 days ago, one of the survey teams working to assess the mine actually dug up a chunk of raw Spirit Iron ore.

That, changed everything.

It didn’t matter if the ratio of Iron to Spirit Iron was 1,000 to 1, the simple fact that Spirit Grade metal could be extracted from this mine instantly made it a strategic resource and increased its value at least 10-fold.

Immediately, the forces who backed those 3 Viscounts stepped in and took over, two of them being Counts, while the other was the Turner Family themselves.

Each of these high-ranking nobles now claimed ownership of the Spirit Iron Mine through their subordinates, and none of them was willing to back down.

This had swiftly led to the dispute being brought before the Royal Council, where days of constant bickering and accusations had flown back and forth.

Complicating the matter further was the fact that all Spirit Grade materials were ‘technically’ supposed to be administrated by the Royal Family and Royal Council directly.

Though this hardly ever happened due to practical constraints, it still made striking a fair deal harder as the Royals themselves were no longer seen as completely neutral.

On top of that, Nathanial also had to deal with all his other duties at king, as well as assist in planning for the upcoming Trade Conference, leaving him no time to cultivate and barely any time to sleep.

Simply put, he had been having a bad few days leading up to the New Years Banquet and was both physically and mentally worn out despite being a Low-Rank Spirit and Martial Adept.

That didn’t mean he couldn’t still perform his duties as a husband and as a man, but it did mean Nathanial was more than a little drained even before the night began.

As the seconds slowly turned into minutes, Nathanial began to worry he might just pass out if he kept sitting on his bed in the dark.

Women take longer to get ready than men, that was a fundamental truth of reality, so the king wasn’t to surprised by this situation. That said, he did need to do something to keep himself awake, so he got to his feet and began pacing, soon passing in front of the wardrobe mirror.

At an impressive 191 cm tall, with medium-length blonde hair, sharp facial features that made him look no more than 30 years old, striking purple eyes that seemed to glow faintly in the dark, and an athletic physique filled with tightly packed muscles, Nathanial was objectively hot.

Unlike on the women’s side where there was one undisputed ‘most beautiful’, there was no agreed-upon ‘handsomest’ man in the kingdom, but Nathanial Rockwell would definitely be a top contender for that spot.

Wearing a pair of loose black boxers and a plain white long-sleeve night-shirt with all its buttons undone, exposing his ripped 6-pack, the current Nathanial looked particularly erotic.

The young king wasn’t a narcissist, but even he couldn’t help smirking a bit as he stared at his reflection in the mirror, illuminated only by the pale winter moonlight.

Again, the clothes the king was currently wearing, right down to his underwear, were all new products which had arrived recently from Misty City, specifically from [Vision].

From the moment Nathanial put on the new-style clothing from [Suave], the male brand-line from [Vision], he had been a fan.

Everything was so much comfier, from the underwear, to the shoes, to the suits, it was all just better than the old-style clothing he had been wearing up until then.

On top of that, the sleek design complimented his naturally good looks, making him appear even more handsome than before, especially when it came to the full formalwear he had worn tonight.

While it was true that the Queens had noticed their husband checking them out quite frequently, Nathanial had also noticed his wives sneaking ‘hungry’ looks at him when they thought he wasn’t paying attention, as had dozens of other women in the crowd.

It was enough to tickle any man’s ego, even a King’s.

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