Chapter Twenty-Six: The Spinster

Like Elrina, Bethalia is a powerful ancient hero.

She excels in swordsmanship, possesses profound knowledge of toxicology, and has mastered many formidable fire-based spells. According to her own claims, she also has a certain level of research into necromancy. However, when Ryan personally tested her knowledge in this field, he found it to be superficial at best.

Necromancy is a deep and complex discipline. Take Ryan’s "Greater Resurrection," for example; it involves a sophisticated intersection of fields such as flesh reconstruction, soul manipulation, and interference with the Underworld. If Bethalia were truly a master of the craft, she would not have needed to wait for death in the ship's cabin after setting up preparations for a lich transformation. She could have simply extracted the essence of flesh and blood from the corpses of the assassins on-site to easily repair her own severe injuries. A master-level necromancer is often a master-level physician as well; in their hands, the flesh of the living is merely modeling clay to be shaped at will.

Having resolved the matter of Bethalia, Ryan faced another problem: how to explain the cause of Polo Faher's death to the family.

"Why not just frame it as an attack by pirates?" Bethalia suggested. "Since he dared to sail out to sea alone, it’s quite normal for him to have been unfortunately raided by passing pirates."

"Which pirates would dare to come near Salt Island to plunder?" Ryan dismissed the excuse. "For pirates to appear, the area must first be a dense shipping route, and second, it must be devoid of ports controlled by noble powers. The Faher fleet is stationed at Iron Port Island; pirates wouldn't dare come here."

"My apologies, I didn't think it through," Bethalia said with a smile.

Dark elves live on the sun-scorched Red Earth Plateau, where there is no ocean at all; it was natural that the Rose Queen would be unfamiliar with the habits of pirates. Ryan looked at Elrina, who stood with her arms crossed, silent and showing no intention of offering advice.

"Why explain it at all?" Deya asked cautiously. "Salt Island is your territory, Ryan. He came here without notifying you first; why should you be held responsible for his disappearance?"

The three of them were slightly taken aback. It seemed she had a point.

Ryan turned his gaze toward the drowned corpses floating on the sea. One of the faces—with mung-bean eyes, a garlic-shaped nose, and a bloated, puffy appearance—was that of Polo Faher. When Ryan had left the family years ago, Polo was just a brat. The two had no real connection; they were merely at the level of recognizing each other if they met.

Forget it, he couldn't be bothered.

"Then destroy the evidence," Ryan said, snapping his fingers.

The surrounding undead creatures immediately exploded, one after another.

***

After returning to Blood Castle, Ryan began to process territorial affairs.

First was the matter of housing. Considering that Elrina and Bethalia were old friends, Ryan thoughtfully arranged for them to have adjacent rooms. As for Deya, since her term as a maid had not yet expired, he had her stay in the maid's room next to the master bedroom, making it convenient for her to come and serve him promptly each morning.

Next were taxes and population statistics. Iron Port City had about three hundred people, and if you included all the fishing villages on Salt Island, five hundred would be the absolute maximum. Furthermore, there were many craftsmen and sailors in the shipyards and the fleet base, but they were considered direct subjects of the Faher family and neither paid taxes nor performed service for Salt Island, so they could not be counted in the total population.

To put it simply: it was an impoverished backwater with almost no one in it.

Ryan continued to review the documents and discovered a more serious problem: Salt Island had no armed forces of its own.

There were no noble knights and no standing soldiers—that was understandable. But there were not even basic city guards. If a dispute or a crime occurred on the island, who would handle it? The answer was "self-determination" for the residents. This was a polite way of saying no one was in charge. With no guards, taxes were naturally uncollectable. The island's iron mines and poplar forests were worked by laborers forcibly conscripted by the family from Sea Rock City, and the resources produced were taken away by the family. It was no wonder no one wanted this fief.

"Write this down," Ryan instructed Deya. "First: at the next meeting with my father, I am going to reclaim all the mines and forests."

"Ah?" Deya was stunned. "Although these resources should belong to us, the old Marquis won't agree if you just ask for them like that! And you are family, are you really going to fight over the ownership of assets?"

"This is managing a territory! Do you think this is child's play?" Ryan tapped her on the head. "How are your vocabulary studies with Elrina going? Can you read and write them yet?"

"Yes, I've learned over a thousand words." Deya handed him the parchment. Although the handwriting was crooked and the grammar flawed, she could barely read.

"Second," Ryan continued, "I am going to conscript knights in Sea Rock City."

"Do you intend to select them from existing knight families?" Deya asked while scribbling on the paper.

"Being from a knight family means long-term, full-time military training, so they are naturally the top priority," Ryan said calmly. "But I doubt many of them would be willing to come to Salt Island to hold a fief."

"If the numbers are insufficient, I will consider selecting and supplementing from healthy, motivated adult subjects."

"You intend to promote knights from among the commoners?" Deya asked, looking surprised. "That will provoke resentment from the existing knight class."

"It doesn't matter," Ryan sneered. "I'll give the family knights a chance first. If they aren't willing to appreciate it, then let them know: if you won't do it, there are plenty of others who will!"

Deya curled her lip imperceptibly. Given Ryan's personality, if he really set his sights on someone, he would certainly use any means necessary to force them into his service. Aren't she, Elrina, and Bethalia the best examples of this? If Ryan intended to promote knights from the commoners, it was certainly because he looked down on the strength of the family knights; there was no other possibility.

Deya finished writing the memo and took it to her room next door, intending to copy it properly and carefully check and correct the grammar—this was the "language homework" Elrina had assigned her.

Ryan began reading the Astrologer's Gazette. This fantasy world had newspapers. The largest was the *Mage Weekly*, hosted by the Continental Society of Spellcasters; it published academic papers on various fields of magic and was funded by mages worldwide. Ryan had subscribed to it as well. Although his primary study of necromancy was taboo and could not be openly discussed in the *Mage Weekly*, it was good to see new discoveries in other disciplines. After all, stones from other hills can serve to polish the jade of this one.

Beyond that, he subscribed to more specialized journals as needed. For example, the *Astrology Report*—while almost entirely focused on the latest astrological findings—had a section at the end dedicated to weather forecasts for various parts of the continent.

Ryan found the information he cared about most: the Rainforest Peninsula would officially enter the rainy season this Wednesday. This meant that once the rainy season began, the Crazy River’s water level would rise, and the activities of the wights on the surface would stagnate.

Let those lizardmen suffer a little longer.

Closing the *Astrology Report*, he suddenly heard a knock at the door.

"Who is it?"

"It's me," Bethalia said.

"Come in," Ryan said.

Bethalia pushed the door open. She seemed to have just bathed, wearing a loose bathrobe that revealed a vast expanse of caramel-colored, alluring skin. Even though Ryan had no particular feelings for dark skin, he had to admit that the Dark Elf Queen’s every gesture, every smile, was seductive to the bone—the bonus from her racial talent was terrifying.

"What do you want?" Ryan asked.

"Can't I come see you if there's nothing wrong?" Bethalia gave him a sultry wink, her finger hooking the collar of her robe and intentionally pulling it down a fraction.

"Heh," Ryan sneered. "Old maid."

Bethalia’s expression first froze, and then quickly became difficult to suppress as it twisted in frustration.