Western Territory Security Bureau
Western Territory Security Bureau
From his memory, the former Prince Roland had exercised his right to adjudicate only once, and that took place shortly after he arrived in Border Town. After he fell out with the nobles and became dissatisfied with life, he handed over all of his responsibilities and matters to Barov and never took interest in them again.
When everyone involved was present, Roland announced the start of the trial.
Each party was allowed to state their reasons before Roland interrogated them. With Nightingale's secret assistance, his duty as a judge became relaxed and easy—he neither had to work out who was lying or being insincere nor needed to have an overbearingly meticulous heart.
The whole story of the matter soon became clear.
After being stripped of his status as a knight, Khoya Harvie harbored some discontent. At the same time, he was sick of the tedious paperwork at the City Hall. He thus decided to take his grievances out on the refugees. While distributing oatmeal to them, he deliberately charged a price, and then drove a wedge between them and the serfs by claiming that the serfs had not turned over their grains accordingly, which caused the stock of wheat to be insufficient and therefore unable to be distributed for free.
In fact, Khoya had been collecting a price for the oatmeal for several days. As he would wear the unmistakable uniform of the City Hall and the refugees were worried of reprisal from the officials, most of them chose to remain silent. This made Khoya grow even bolder. Only today, when a refugee by the name of Vader came forward to protest at Khoya's measures and stirred up a commotion, the matter was brought to light.
After Roland understood the circumstances, he let out a sigh of relief.
During an organization's development phase, it would typically be full of vigor and vitality. After it stabilized, corruption and inflexibility would become inevitable. However, these problems should only occur after the unification of the Kingdom of Graycastle. If they arose at such an early stage, then the organization was destined not to go far.
As things stood, it was fortunate that this incident was caused by the individual behavior of Khoya Harvie, and did not involve other city hall officials. Furthermore, the matter was only extortion of money, instead of what Roland would be most worried about: collusion with the serfs to resell and traffick grains.
Of course, he was also at fault for this incident. Initially, when the City Hall was desperately short of manpower, he did not arrange any screening or training, and simply assigned all of the surrendered knights to Barov after giving them a warning. As the outcome of this case showed, not everyone could accept this job without complaint while having to endure the psychological blow of falling from a knight to a commoner.
Roland summoned Barov to his side and asked softly, "How would a lord usually handle a situation like this?"
"Your Highness, there're two kinds of situation," the latter replied respectfully, "If the offender is a noble, he may pay a few gold royals and be spared from further punishment. The offence of a commoner who assaults a noble can be deemed either big or small. The punishment may range from amputation to flogging."
"But Khoya isn't a noble." The prince shrugged his shoulders. "I'd taken away his title."
"Understood, Your Highness. If that's so, the verdict entirely depends on the lord's mood."
"Nothing is fixed?"
Barov shook his head.
Roland furrowed his brows. "If it entirely depends on my mood, it means that it doesn't matter how I deal with the commoners. It seems that in the eyes of nobles, they aren't people who need to be taken and treated seriously."
"Aside from chopping off their limbs, flogging, pulling their nails and similar punishments, is there anything more normal? Like imprisonment."
"Imprisonment?" Barov was taken aback. "Your Highness, you mean to simply lock them up? That doesn't count as a punishment. Prison is but a temporary place to hold criminals while they await trial. If we keep them locked up, you'll have to provide them with food. To some people, this could even be seen as a form of reward."
"Alright. Seems like fixed-term imprisonment, which is used extensively in later ages, can't be applied here." Roland pondered for a moment and decided to follow the rules in the Kingdom of Graycastle. He stood up and swept his glance across the entire hall. "I'll now pronounce my judgement."
"Khoya Harvie. For dereliction of duty and extortion of refugees, from today onwards, he shall be removed from his duties in the City Hall, and be banished to labor in the mines for 10 years. He shall also pay a fine equivalent to three times the amount he earned from extortion."
"Vader. For instigating an assault on a city hall officer, he shall be sentenced to 10 lashes."
"As for the rest of the refugees and serfs who participated in the brawl, each of them shall pay a fine of two silver royals or be sentenced to five lashes."
"Oatmeal shall continue to be distributed for free. The extortion money shall be returned in full." He peered at the city hall director. "You shall be in charge of carrying out the above rulings. The final outcomes must be declared to the people living in the provisional residence area."
"Yes, Your Highness," Barov answered while making a bow.
When Roland returned to his office, he leaned back on his chair and stretched his body. He promptly felt a pair of hands place itself on his shoulders and begin to massage him gently.
He closed his eyes to enjoy this moment of relaxation.
From this incident, Roland had become aware that as the population of his subjects rose and the authority of the City Hall rapidly increased, it was perhaps time for him to address the issue of internal supervision.
Yet, he did not wish to establish an organization akin to a procuratorate, or more so to have an independent public security unit. The former would require a large number of literate personnel, and was prone to cause mutual conflicts and blame-pushing, which would hinder the implementation and expansion of new policies. On the other hand, the latter would insidiously diminish his own powers, such as in legislation, judicial interpretation and jurisdiction, all of which he felt would be better off under his control.
What he needed was a simple and effective system which would not require too many personnel in order to serve the functions of supervision.
He clutched the hand on his shoulder.
Nightingale dissipated her Mist and held on to the prince's hand as she sat back on the table. Tilting her head, she asked, "What's the matter?"
As she swayed her slender legs over the edge of the table, her high deerskin boots and tight pants formed a perfect curve.
Roland coughed twice before he spoke. "I intend to set up a new department which will supervise the City Hall as well as arrest individuals or groups who threaten the stability of the Western Region. This department shall only answer to me, and will be independent of the CITY HALL and the First Army." He enunciated his words clearly. "For the time being, I shall call it the Western Territory Security Bureau. I hope to put you in charge of this department."
"Me?" She blinked her eyes in surprise.
"Indeed. Only you can easily distinguish truth from falsities. No form of deception will work in your presence." Roland nodded in approval. "How about it? If you accept, I'll even offer you alone the drinking afternoon tea with ice-cream in winter, or..."
Nightingale gently pinched his hand. "Even without this offer, I'll agree to your request as long as it's something you want."
"..." Roland suddenly felt a little embarrassed.
She laughed and broke the silence before it turned awkward. "But, what do I have to do?"
"Hmm, the supervision part is really easy." The prince adjusted his emotions. "I'll install a letterbox for reporting offences at the castle gate. All you have to do is to verify the contents of the letters received."
The most cost-effective solution was indubitable to enable public supervision as well as let the City Hall supervise itself, similar to how he arrested spies who infiltrated Border Town during the previous year's Months of Demons.
The downside of this method, which came from a later age, was that both the accused and the accuser would need to be meticulously verified. There would also be cases of false or mistaken reports, not to mention frame-ups. However, these problems would become insignificant with Nightingale's ability. It would be easy to verify information simply through face-to-face interrogation. Furthermore, by rewarding the accuser if he was found to be truthful, while punishing false accusations and information, this reporting system would certainly be highly effective.
"As for maintaining the stability of the Western Region and eliminating threats and dangers, it'll be best to have an internal intelligence system. I'll slowly supply more men to you until you have enough eyes to watch over the entire Western Region."