Aosta Mountains.
As a branch of the mountain range extending from the rugged Als Mountains in Schwyz, it was a place forming the natural border between Schwyz and the city-state of Melan.
The area itself belonged to Melan’s sphere of influence, but compared to the Lugano region, which played a role as a gateway, it hadn’t received much attention because it was farther west.
In addition, the mountain was also very steep, so it could be said that it was a quiet rural area where commercial development had not yet been achieved.
In other words, it was a fairly poor territory compared to other areas.
Jake, the lord of Lugano, was secretly visiting such a secluded rural area with his entourage.
“It’s been a while, My Lord.”
“Ohh… Lord Jake. Long time no see.”
Looking at Jake, the lord of Lugano, which was their neighboring territory, and the son of his old friend, Easter, the Lord who rules the Aosta area, looked quite pleased.
“Yes, I am very glad to have you visit me after such a long time. I have heard about you quite often. I hear you are making a decent profit doing the mining business?”
After exchanging light greetings, the two sat down in a room for a talk.
Easter, who had known Jake since childhood, treated him with familiarity, and Jake did the same.
In terms of power, Jake was much superior, but for him, Easter was an uncle-like figure who replaced his deceased father.
“Yes, it is, My Lord. Although things are just getting started, it is still making a decent profit.”
“That’s a good thing. To successfully lead such a difficult task in such a short amount of time. If your father was alive, he would’ve been very proud.”
At Jake’s words, Easter nodded his head and began to express his regret, and Jake, too, showed a melancholic smile and began to carefully lead the conversation.
“He sure would. Since childhood, my father has told me a lot about mining. Now that I have made that dream come true, I am sure he is rejoicing in heaven as well.”
“Yeah, that’s right… anyway, that’s a very enviable thing. The mining industry… it definitely a business that makes quite a bit of money once you succeed. Unfortunately, we don’t seem to be very lucky in that regard.”
“But aren’t there good veins flowing in the Aosta area as well? I heard from my father that various kinds of metals were mined here in the past, but…”
At Jake’s words, Easter slowly shook his head with a sad expression on his face.
“What can we do with a good vein? From our point of view, with no one to work with and no one to transport them, they are just as useless as rocks.”
Easter was right.
The Aosta region had less than half the population of Lugano and even few agricultural lands to procure food from. Moreover, it was also located in a geographically remote place, and they lacked the ability to develop mines even if they discovered them.
As for Lugano, the people there were deliberately forced to go bankrupt and the mines were running with the resulting manpower.
For Aosta, which was quite remote with barely enough food to live on, this was like a dream.
“You know better that the mining industry is a business that can’t be conducted with just one or two people. The fact that this area is so sparsely populated is just another problem. I heard that the price of iron ore has gone up a lot lately…”
“I see… that’s a pity.”
As he sympathized with Easter’s words, Jake took a sneak peek at him and carefully started tossing hints.
“Um… My Lord? Actually, there is something I want to ask you about, but…”
“Yes? What is it?”
“Um… that’s… I’m asking just in case. Perhaps, regarding the mine, didn’t something happen with the Beden Merchant Company some time ago?”
“The Beden Merchant Company? Oh, I see, something indeed happened. I remember that they applied to purchase a mine saying that they wanted to develop it. But even so, the scale of the purchased area was quite small, and they said they would develop it themselves. In the end, what we will get from it would be a small amount of money and at most a few pennies in tax revenue.”
“I see… do you know what kind of ore they are digging?”
“I don’t know the details… well… at most it’s iron ore or copper ore, right?”
“Hmmm…”
Nodding slowly at Easter’s words, Jake now roughly understood how things were.
‘Indeed… Linda’s prediction was correct. The Beden Merchant Company…they were just as greedy as we are.’
In general, when a mine was developed, most of the profits from the ore from it would go into the hands of those who purchased and developed the mine.
Although one had to pay a certain amount of tax to the lord of the region, that was at most an ordinary land tax.
In other words, it meant that the the Beden Merchant Company would devour almost the entirety of the income from the gold mine!
Goblin: This is sponsored chapter 1/2 sponsored by Kristopher Nixon. Enjoy~
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I am most certain that there is no gold mine. It is very fun to see people who thinks themselves to be smart falling into obvious traps like these.