Duke Windsor stared at the two in front of him with a dark look on his face.
"What did you say?
The merchants are all running?
Why are they running?
Where are they running to?
What do they want to do? "
The two subordinates swallowed a mouthful of saliva and carefully looked at Duke Windsor before hesitantly replying, "Lord ….. Lord Duke, the reason why the merchants are running, I'm afraid ….. I'm afraid it's related to you ….."
"Related to me?" Duke Windsor knit his brows and said in a sharp voice, "What does this mean?
Could it be that I chased them away? "
The two officials in charge of the finances of the Kandla Empire's southern province revealed helpless bitter smiles at the same time.
Recently, the merchants of the southern province had all left the southern province, moving their companies to other parts of the empire. If one looked for the reason, it really was because of the Lord Duke in front of them.
The reason for this was actually very simple, it was because of the Lord Duke's order. He didn't allow anything related to the New Flyer to enter the southern province.
After the emperor changed his attitude towards the New Flyer in the second half of last year under the advice of the minister of finance Hastri, there were countless magic machines from the Principality of Constantine, the Lampari Kingdom, and the southwest countries that came from the Xinfei Chamber of Commerce into the Kandla Empire.
Then the Kandla Empire's navy reached an agreement with the New Flyer under the emperor's tacit consent. After the two sides opened a sea trade route, there were large amounts of products from the Principality of Constantine that came from the southern coast of the empire.
These products didn't just include the magic machines from the New Flyer and the other magic machine companies, it also included the magic machine products that were influenced by the New Flyer.
Because these products were much cheaper compared to the products from the Kandla Empire, they were much more popular in the empire.
For merchants with a keen sense of smell, the business opportunity contained in this was self-evident.
So the Frestech Chamber of Commerce didn't need to spend that much effort. The merchants of the Candra Empire were like cats that had smelled blood, rushing to the southern harbour and the border between the southwest and the Norton Duchy. Their goal was to steal some goods from the Stantine Duchy as soon as possible and sell them for a good price.
With the influence of this business wave, the ban Duke Windsor had made before was very conspicuous.
This ban did not only ban New Flyer's products, but also all products related to Xinfei's businesses.
This' all 'included almost all the goods from the Principality of Constantine and the Norton Duchy that entered the Kandla Empire.
Because of the products that were popular in the Kandla Empire, there wasn't a single one that wasn't related to the New Flyer.
Even the only thing that the Principality of Constantine could import from the Kandla Empire was the fruit produced in the Principality of Constantine, but now it was influenced by the industrialization of the Xinfei Chamber of Commerce.
For example, the canned fruits that were in high demand were products of the new magic machine industrial system promoted by the New Flyer.
Actually, Duke Windsor wasn't the only one in the Kandla Empire who was against importing large amounts of products from other countries because they felt that this would greatly affect the Kandla Empire.
But the others were only against the New Flyer. The reason was that the New Flyer supported the Kingdom of Ruhr and was considered an enemy of the Kandla Empire, so the empire couldn't cooperate with them.
Duke Windsor was against everything related to the New Flyer, there were too many things that he had designed.
Under Duke Windsor's high pressure policy, any products related to the New Flyer couldn't enter the southern province. This made the southern province merchants who smelled the business opportunity very depressed.
To make these merchants ignore this business opportunity, it was no different from making a cat that smelled fish not move, it was impossible.
But how could normal merchants dare go against Duke Windsor who could cover the sky with one hand in the southern province? So in the end, these merchants directly moved their focus out of the southern province, moving to other places in the empire that didn't oppose cooperating with the New Flyer.
Actually to be honest, these merchants were only paying more attention to the New Flyer, it didn't mean that they completely gave up on their business in the southern province.
But now that this situation was reflected, it seemed like the merchants were all leaving the southern province.
For Duke Windsor, the most direct reflection was in the financial statistics.
After entering April, the southern province did the usual financial statistics for the first quarter.
The results showed that compared to last year, the southern province's grain yield was the same and there was no change in the financial surplus from the grain.
But in terms of business taxes, there was a clear decrease compared to last year, falling by 13%.
This wasn't considered much for Duke Windsor because he was a typical Sines noble, what he cared about the most was grain.
There was no problem with the grain, so he didn't feel that there was a problem.
As for business, it was fine as long as there was no problem.
But when the first quarter financial report was submitted to the empire's finance department, the southern province was criticized by the finance department.
According to the explanation of the empire's finance department, the southern province's first quarter revenue was second to last among the nine provinces of the empire. It was only a bit better than the northeast province of the Candra Empire that was known for being poor.
Compared to before, the southern province's revenue was at least in the middle of the empire, so there was no doubt that this was a clear decrease.
Moreover, the southeastern province that was close to the southern province and the Torea Province that was close to the coast had a large increase in the first quarter of this year. The Torea Province's revenue even broke thirty eight million gold coins, far surpassing the southern province's measly seventeen million gold coins.
This created a strong contrast that made the southern province's drop from last year even more glaring.
Duke Windsor who had suffered quite a bit of disdain from the finance department was very angry about this. After returning to the Governor Manor, he immediately ordered an investigation.
The two finance officers in charge of the investigation gave the answer of "large amounts of merchants leaving the southern province", which of course made him very dissatisfied.
"Lord Duke ….. Actually this subordinate feels that ….. Compared to the business tax problem, I feel that we should pay more attention to the grain problem ….." One of the finance officers hesitated a bit before giving this suggestion.
"What?"
Duke Windsor glared at Duke Windsor, "Could it be that you want to tell me that there are problems with the grain production of our southern province?
Let me tell you, the important spring harvest is coming and if there are problems with this, not to mention you all, even I will be in trouble! "
The two finance officers could only give bitter smiles. The finance officer who had gathered the courage to speak looked at his colleague, signaling for him to speak as well.
The other finance official had no choice but to bite the bullet and say, "Your Grace, it's not that there's a problem in this area. It's just that … we've discovered that as long as you change your mind, our spring harvest will go much smoother. Perhaps, we'll even have the hope of greatly increasing the grain production during the autumn harvest.
Duke Windsor was a bit surprised, "I just need to change my mind and the grain yield will increase?
Are you joking? "
"No, how could we dare joke with you." The financial officer took out a document from his chest and handed it to Duke Windsor.
"Lord Duke, this is a report on the agricultural industry in the southern province that Baron Domingo asked us to give you, please take a look."
"Domingo?
Why didn't he give it to me himself? "Duke Windsor doubtfully looked at the two of them.
"This … …" The two finance officers looked at each other with bitter smiles.
"Baron Domingo said that he was afraid that you would be angry with this report, so he didn't dare come himself, so he asked the two of us to do it."
"Oh?" Duke Windsor looked at the two of them.
Duke Windsor looked at Duke Windsor, "Then you're not afraid of me being angry?"
The two finance officers gave bitter smiles again.
"We can't escape anyway."
Seeing the bitter expressions on their faces, Duke Windsor gave a cold snort. He took the report and looked it over before his face sunk.
"These bullshit ideas again, no wonder he didn't dare come see me!"
Duke Windsor angrily threw the report to the ground and pointed at the two of them as he cursed, "Tell Domingo for me that if he insists on importing the Frestech Chamber of Commerce's agricultural magic machines, he can't appear in front of me again!
The same goes for the two of you!
Don't think that I don't know what you're thinking, are you the same as those merchants who only have gold coins, trying to force me to cooperate with that damn New Flyer?
Ah?
Isn't that right? "
The two finance officers lowered their heads, not daring to look at Duke Windsor at all.
They knew that the Lord Duke was truly angry this time.
Duke Windsor pointed at the two of them and scolded them before waving his arm.
"Scram!"
The two finance officers acted like they had been pardoned and quickly gave a bow before leaving.
After the two left, there was only Duke Windsor left in the room. He was panting for a bit before gradually calming down.
After seriously looking at the report on the ground for a while, Duke Windsor hesitated a bit before picking it up and carefully looking it over again.
This time, he was much more serious and focused than before.
It took him half an hour to finish reading the report. After reading the last page, he was silent for a while before suddenly giving a sigh, as his face seemed to have aged by several years.
"Could this be the change of the times?"
Duke Windsor gave another sigh before coming back to the table and pulling a rope on the table.
A middle aged man who looked like a butler silently appeared in the room.
"Old master, do you have any orders?"
Different from the others, this middle aged man called Duke Windsor "old master" in a very simple manner.
Duke Windsor waved his hand, "Go and prepare, I'm going out for a walk."
The middle aged man looked up at Duke Windsor with a bit of surprise in his eyes, but he didn't ask anything. He lowered his head and silently left.