After hastily packing up, the four of them left York's apartment.
When they walked out of the apartment, Chapman was somewhat surprised. He asked, "Mr. Baron, you didn't bring any guards?
For a noble gentleman, entering the north district without any guards is not a wise thing to do. There are no black hats here. "
Black hats was what the people of the lower class called the police, because the police here would wear a very distinctive steel helmet that was painted black.
Feng Chou smiled and said, "Don't worry, I'm a level-eight knight myself."
Chapman was enlightened after hearing that.
Led by Chapman's son, they passed through the streets and went all the way south.
On the way, they were harassed several times, but they were all scared off by Feng Chou's magic.
When the four of them walked out of the north district, crossed a river on a stone bridge, and entered the central district, even Feng Chou couldn't help but sigh in relief.
The environment in the north district was too depressing for him.
When Feng Chou was on Earth, although there were poor people in his country, the poor people in that world and era and the poor people in this world and era were completely different concepts. He had never seen or even thought that there could be such a despairing slum in the world.
The four of them were stopped by two mounted police at the bridge, who interrogated them.
Feng Chou showed his identity as Baron, and the police quickly let them go.
Feng Chou found a nearby hotel for the family to stay. He left two hundred crowns for Chapman to take a bath, get a haircut, and buy some decent clothes.
When Chapman stood in front of Feng Chou again, he seemed to be a different person. No one could associate this well-mannered and well-dressed elderly gentleman with the old man who was struggling to survive in the slums yesterday.
However, his son and daughter were not decent enough and obviously lacked confidence. Ten years of living in the slums had made them forget how to be decent gentlemen.
Therefore, when the three of them came to the hotel where Feng Chou was staying, they were questioned for a long time by the guards. In the end, although they were let in, they were followed by a hotel guard.
After getting Feng Chou's confirmation, the guard apologized and left.
After the three of them entered the room, Feng Chou and Chapman began to discuss the details of the sale of the territory.
Feng Chou found that Chapman was very familiar with the various affairs of the territory. Not only that, he was also familiar with business, law, and the operation of the Casaranca City Hall.
Chapman was not the eldest son of the family. As the second son of a rich viscount, he had received a rather comprehensive gentleman education from a young age. In fact, Chapman was trained to be an excellent butler. He knew agriculture, management, law, and was familiar with all the details of the operation of the territory.
In fact, before his family's accident, Chapman was working as the butler of a manor in the house of a count who had close relations with his family.
Generally speaking, high-ranking nobles would not only have one butler. It was hard to imagine that a count with nearly a million acres of land under his name would be concentrated in one manor and managed by the same butler. In fact, this was both unreasonable and unrealistic.
Most of the high-ranking nobles' land would be divided into several portions, just like the Counts Of Antalya's family, which controlled dozens of territories with dozens of castles. In the safer Casaranca, there was no need to build expensive castles. The land would be divided into several manors according to local conditions. Each manor would have a butler in charge. Above the butler, beside the lord, there would be a chief butler who was in charge of the various manors.
The large manor that Chapman was in charge of was one of the most important manors under his lord's name. It was a large manor with more than fifty thousand acres of farmland.
Chapman told Feng Chou that as the butler of a large manor, what he had to do was not just look after the manor's farmland. In this era, if a butler of a manor only knew how to store the harvested crops in the warehouse or bring them to the lord's house during autumn, then he deserved to be kicked out of the house.
A qualified butler not only had to ensure the bountiful harvest of the territory, but he also had to help the lord sell the various harvests of the manor at a reasonable price and convert them into crowns and bank drafts to be sent to the lord's house.
In order to do all this, he had to be familiar with business operations. And business operations were often inseparable from the business nobles and the law in Casaranca.
After a discussion with Chapman, Feng Chou realized that he had underestimated the transaction of a viscount's territory with more than two hundred thousand acres of land.
According to the normal process, the transaction of a viscount's territory would definitely alarm the Aristocratic Committee in the city hall.
The committee was an organization under the city hall. Its status was equivalent to the bureau in the government in Feng Chou's previous life, such as the business committee, the judicial committee, the aristocratic committee, the security committee, the public committee, and so on.
The aristocratic committee was in charge of the registration and management of the nobles' status in the city hall. It was responsible for the registration and management of the heirs' status, the inheritance of titles, the exchange and sale of territories, and even the protection of the aristocratic law.
Once this transaction was known by the upper echelons of Casaranca, Chapman asserted that the transaction would definitely be stopped.
The reason was simple. Feng Chou was not the only one who thought that the problem of Chapman's territory would be solved sooner or later. Even if someone did not think of it, after hearing about this transaction, it would be easy for them to think of it.
The reason why no one had proposed to buy this territory before was perhaps because those who thought of it did not intend to pay a penny for it, or perhaps because those who thought of it did not have the ability to do so.
As Chapman said, once they realized that the problem of Chapman's territory would be solved sooner or later, this territory would turn from a troublesome one to a juicy piece of meat. Such a juicy piece of meat, those lords would definitely not let go of it.
As for why Chapman was willing to make a deal with Feng Chou and not with those big shots, the reason was even simpler. If those big shots had their eyes on Chapman's territory, there would be no need to make a deal with him at all. They would have ten thousand ways to make Chapman's family disappear from the slums without a trace.
"Only a foreign aristocrat like you, who has no roots in the area, would care more about the legality of the transaction." This was what Chapman said.
Chapman's words made Feng Chou worried that even if he obtained the ownership of Chapman's territory, he would not be able to enjoy it in the end.
Chapman did not think that Feng Chou's worries were necessary. "Sir, you and I are different. In that disaster, the Chapman family, which was not prosperous to begin with, was almost wiped out. Even if there were remnants of the family like me, they died in the following ten years of hardship."
"You know, after the disaster, the court ruled that all the movable and immovable property of the Chapman family, except for the contaminated territory, should be used to compensate the victims for their losses.
This caused the remaining members of the Chapman family to be impoverished. "
"At least as far as I know, we are the only members of the Chapman Family left. But you are different. You have a prosperous family behind you. If you kill me, Chapman Hill will become ownerless. The nobles will find a reason to divide it among themselves. Getting rid of you will only change the ownership of the Chapman Hill to someone else in your family.
Don't forget that you have the great surname of Stuart in your name. "