Sam is inside a plain-looking room within the Imperial Palace. He sat on a chair and is looking at the room's décor, which is too plain to be a room within the imperial palace.
Soon, the emperor came in and Sam greeted him with a small bow.
"No need for formalities." The emperor gestured and offered him a seat.
"Why did you call me your grace?" Sam went straight to the point without beating around the bush.
"I want to tell you something regarding your issue. The minister is not the culprit."
"I know."
"Then who do you think might be the culprit?"
"Someone close to your Majesty."
The Emperor sighed and said.
"Yes, it is my daughter Luna. She was led astray by her mother and someone else manipulated her and made a move against you. No matter how just and fair I am I couldn't bring myself to punishing my daughter in public. I don't want her to suffer the life of shame and resentment."
"I understand your majesty. But what do you want me to do? It would have been better if you didn't say anything at all. After all, now I know the culprit but I couldn't take my revenge. This would be frustrating."
"What will you gain from taking revenge? I will compensate you. Just tell me what you need, if it is not too much I will give it to you."
"Are you sure, your Majesty?"
"You have my word."
"Then I wouldn't be courteous. I have three requests, but I don't think any of them is excessive. First, I want the name of the hidden culprit behind this, the one who manipulated your daughter, the second one is, I might need some land, I would buy it, but I would like to have a discount, the last one is that I want you to make a promise to my safety."
"The first two are okay, but what does the third thing mean?"
"Can I have your promise that you wouldn't kill me after saying it out loud?" Sam said half-jokingly.
Emperor also chuckled at this.
"In the near future, at most in another month or two, you will come across something that would provide an opportunity to Nascent stage cultivators. I came to this place because of that, there will be a limited number of entries for that place and I have permission to enter it.
When that place is revealed, the people in-charge will send some entry tokens to the strongest person in the region and if my guess is right, you might be the one. So, you can distribute them amongst the Nascent stage cultivators.
At that time, it would be hard for a commoner like me to enter that place with all the people around and they will try to snatch my entry token. I would like to be safe from that."
Emperor looked at Sam intently and said.
"How do I know what you are saying is correct?"
"Time will tell, if I am right or wrong, anyway if it doesn't happen, you are the one who is benefitting in the deal. But if I were in your place, I would already try to find out who the best Nascent stage cultivator in the nation is."
The emperor thought for a minute and said.
"That is a deal."
After discussing some time, Sam came out of the imperial palace with a name.
He immediately went to meet Rana who is taking care of the factory.
"Where is your brother?"
"Gnyan? He was sent to another city, he has been working on family businesses. Father didn't want him to stay here."
"What kind of person is your brother exactly? I know he is scheming, apart from that. Does he have a lot of friends? How does he maintain interpersonal relationships?"
"I don't know how he maintains them, but he has some connections in the city. Before the betting incident happened, he is quite popular."
"Girls?"
"He has many friends, but I don't know if he has any relationships."
"Any close friends in girls?"
"There are some actually. He is even close friends with Princess Luna."
Sam nodded in understanding and said.
"Which city is your brother in?"
"Mirage city. I heard he is in charge of managing the family forge and the weapon shop."
"I will be making a trip."
Emperor said that Gnyan is the one who manipulated Luna to deal with him. He doesn't know why exactly, but the greatest possibility will be him knowing that Sam is behind the tragic betting situation.
He didn't expect that Gnyan would still hold this in and investigate deeper into that situation. Even if he thought about it, he didn't think that the retaliation would be in this way, completely hiding behind the scenes and trying to use borrowed knives.
That is why he is moving closer to him. He wants to see how many borrowed knives he can use. Anyway, there are still around five months before the Palace of inheritance and he has a lot of time. As for expanding in business, he doesn't have trusted staff in this place, so he cannot start one in the near future.
He has time and he also wanted to expand his knowledge of this world, so it is better if he can around. Mirage city is one of the business capitals of the nation anyway.
It is a sea city and there is even a port. Most of the ships go to and fro between the Mov empire and other friendly nations across the seas.
Even though, everyone has beasts nowadays not all of them can afford a beast that can cross the large sea and reach another nation.
So many people go to and fro through the ships and they also export and imports.
Apart from that, many foreigners come to this city and almost every noble family that specializes in any type of business has a branch over there.
The city is also a beautiful one and many people just come to see this city and the beaches.
He might as well relax while dealing with the situation.
So, he set out on his journey. He covered most of the distance with the harbinger and reached the city on foot.
The first thing he did after reaching the city is to find a place to stay and have a meal in the most famous restaurant.
After eating to his fill, he went around the city to look. He heard many things about this city from Rana and he must say that it really is a great place, the sea city is the most beautiful one he has ever seen.
The best view would be from the beach house that has private beaches. But the price is also extremely high.
This place doesn't have extremely large mansions, the houses are all moderate-sized and the extravagance was shown mostly in the way the house was built, the décor and the materials that were used to build the house, and finally the appearance.
Sam wanted to buy a house here immediately and he went to the city management office. His military Id helped him a lot as most of the procedures were completed in the easiest way possible.
After the honors he received, his identity has changed and every government employee showed him more respect despite being a human and a commoner.
Even the management itself arranged the meeting with the seller of the house and arranged everything for Sam.
As for money, since when was it a problem for him. He just paid for everything without a blink of an eye and one of the most expensive houses in the whole city was his now.
After settling in the house, Sam looked around.
This area is a newly developed beach area.
There is a lot of empty lands available and Sam's house is one of the only three houses that are here.
After looking at this beautiful city, he felt like it is about time he entered a new business other than the weapons and mercenaries.
He sent a raven to Rana to come to this place and he also sent another one to Yodha to bring his friend who is also the boss of the paradise here.
He has a new business plan and it would be great to use this on the beach.
After doing that, Sam once again went to the city management office and made a huge offer that the city couldn't refuse at all.
They all thanked Sam many times and finished the preparations in a few minutes and Sam came out as the owner of the whole newly developed beach area.
Even the other two houses were bought over by him. He might as well be the largest property owner in the whole city and it happened right after he arrived in the city.
Now, all he has to do is wait while keeping an eye on Gnyan.
He decided to visit Gnyan's weapon shop and the forge to see how their business is going.
