On April 7, the 591st year of the Holy Light Calendar, Blovik returned to the Veblen Manor in Lanhu Town.
What gives Claude a headache is that his younger brother Blovik is not coming back with the original team, but with nearly sixty boys and girls. It sounds nice to call them boys and girls, but in fact, these more than sixty underage children are all street children. The oldest is sixteen years old, the youngest is only seven years old, and five or six of them are disabled children... ..
Claude's mother and Kaifani were both stunned, not knowing what to do when they saw the large group of street children in front of them. Butler Yarick and his two servants could only smile bitterly. What was originally a trip back to the kingdom to dispose of the family property was abruptly turned into a trip to take in homeless children by this young master Blovik. As a servant, he had no way to object and could only do his best to help these wandering children return to the manor smoothly.
But Blovik didn't care about other people's faces at all. After returning to the manor with this large group of wandering children, he ordered the servants to boil water for everyone to take a bath, go to the clothing store to buy clothes, have the kitchen prepare food, and provide food for everyone. All the wandering children prepared bedrooms for them to have a good rest, which kept the servants in the entire manor very busy.
By the time Claude returned to the manor, these street children had already had dinner, bathed and put on new clothes. Many children were playing in the open space of the manor, and those who didn't know it thought they had entered a certain campus. Even the big man Germi was stunned for a long time. He looked around carefully and confirmed that this was Veblen Manor before escorting the carriage into the gate.
Soon the two brothers met in the study, but Blovik was accompanied by a girl of fifteen or sixteen years old.
"Second brother, she is Old Soft's daughter Adele..." Blovik introduced the girl next to him to Claude.
Old Soft, Claude knew, was a well-known old master sergeant of the Thunder Division who also transferred to the Thunder Division from the Ranger Division. He had been in the army for nearly twenty years. If he had been literate, he would not have been a sergeant major all the time. He might have reached the rank of lieutenant. It was only during the Third Colonial War that Old Soft died on the battlefield to cover Blovik after sneaking into the enemy camp. Blovik returned to the Kingdom this time partly to deal with the family business in White Deer City. The other half is to find the wife and children that Old Soft left behind in his hometown.
Soon Claude knew why his younger brother Blovik brought back so many street children. It turns out that Blovik went to Old Soft's hometown and discovered that things have changed. After Old Soft followed the Rangers to the Overseas Territory of Nubicia Continent six years ago, he left behind his wife and three children in his hometown, a daughter and two sons. The money he left to his family was enough for his wife. The children are living a good life...
However, something unexpected happened. In the third year, Old Soft's youngest child became seriously ill. His wife went to seek medical treatment for her youngest son's illness. Unfortunately, she found a liar pharmacist and spent a lot of money, but her condition worsened. It got worse and worse, and finally the younger son died of the disease, and the liar pharmacist also ran away. His wife couldn't bear the blow and lay down. Without the backbone of the family, the only decision was made by thirteen-year-old Adele.
At this time, a relative of Old Soft took the idea of their house, and started lending money to them at usury on the pretext of helping them treat his wife's illness. When the debt finally reached a high level, he tore off the mask of hypocrisy and used The debt on their house drove them out. Old Soft's wife was so angry and regretful that she died without even breathing.
Adele, who was only fourteen years old, became a homeless street child, dependent on her only brother, and fought with other street children in order to snatch the discarded food in the garbage dump. By the time Blovik went to find the two siblings, Adele had become the eldest sister of nearly twenty street children in their hometown town...
Blovik told Adele about the death of her father Soft. Adele was indifferent and did not shed a single tear. She said that if Soft had passed away and there had been no news for so many years, she would have long considered him dead. After he died, she had no father for a long time, and her life is very good now...
Blovik couldn't bear it. Old Soft died to protect him. He wanted to give Adele and his brother a new life, without having to wander around the city and look for food in garbage dumps. But if Adele doesn't do it, she won't go back to Nubisia with Blovik. In the end, Blovik pestered her for several days and finally convinced her by asking her brother to have a happy tomorrow.
It was only because Adele made a request that Blovik should take in the twenty or so street children who followed her, that she and her brother would follow Blovik. Blovik agreed without frowning. However, Adele was not that worry-free. Perhaps she deliberately tested Blovik and took in the wandering children whenever she saw them on the way back. As a result, by the time White Deer City was about to board the ship, the number of wanderers following Blovik had already reached more than 60 people...
Claude was very surprised when there were so many wandering children in the kingdom. Blovik explained that he had already checked them when he was on the ship. Most of these wandering children were casualties of the five-year war in the eastern region. Among the orphans, a few were disabled because they were abandoned by their families, while the rest were caused by their fathers being killed in the war, their mothers remarrying or dying of illness, etc. In the end, they either ran away from home or were homeless and wandering around.
Blovik decided to adopt these street children, most of whom were twelve or thirteen years old. He wanted them to go to school and find a way out in the future. As for the expenses, he felt that the income he received from the secretly hidden King Hicks fee was enough to nurture these children into adulthood. From this point of view, although Brovik's temper was sometimes irritable and unreasonable, his heart was good, which made Claude very happy.
Claude waved his hand and asked Brovik to take the girl Adele out first, and then think about how to deal with these street children. Adele's brother and sister don't have any big problems. Her father is Old Soft, the sergeant major of the Thunder Legion. Not to mention anything else, the immigration admission qualifications and personal property land exchange alone can give them fifty acres of farmland, enough to build a small farm. And Claude can repay Old Soft for saving his brother Blovik's life, and there will be no problem in building a 100-acre farm.
But the remaining sixty or so street children are difficult to deal with. First of all, they are not the orphans of Thunder Legion or Rock Legion soldiers. This immigration treatment cannot take care of them. Secondly, Claude will never allow his younger brother Blovik to adopt them because his younger brother has not yet married and he is still single. If he adopts so many street children, it is likely to have a great impact on his future marriage. This is not a question of whether there is money to cultivate them, but that no unmarried lady will be willing to be the godmother of so many street children. .
Claude pulled the bell rope to summon the housekeeper Yarik into the study. What he wanted to know was why the housekeeper Yarik didn't stop his brother Blovik from taking in so many street children.
But Claude didn't expect Butler Alrick to give an unexpected answer. Butler Alrick said that Master Blovik seemed to have special feelings for Miss Adele, and he indulged Miss Adele. She did everything she wanted to do, even if she was pranked, she didn't care, just like a brother pampering his sister, so he maintained a tacit attitude towards her taking in street children all the way.
As the butler of the Field family, Butler Alec should have stood up and stopped Miss Adele from doing whatever she wanted. However, Butler Yarick took into account the Field family's lack of manpower and decided to agree with Master Blovik's approach of taking in these street children. Many old aristocratic families have sufficient talent preparation in all aspects. They mainly select their children from the family's servants for generations to train and leave them to their children and grandchildren in the future.
The Field family only prospered during Claude's generation. The family lacks capable manpower and confidants. The current servants are all hired from outside, and it is difficult to guarantee their loyalty. Therefore, Butler Yarick believes that these street children taken in by Master Blovik are not an opportunity. If they can be trained into talents, it will naturally be more suitable than hiring people from outside.
These street children are already suffering from lack of food and clothing at such a young age. If Claude is willing to spend money to train them, I believe they will be full of gratitude to Claude and the Field family. Then it only takes five or six years to have a group of capable people who are loyal to the Field family. Even if they are not talented, they are still capable of serving as the family's servants and attendants.
Claude nodded. Butler Yarick's words were the words of a mature man who planned a country. Maybe he was just persuading himself based on the practices of those old noble families, but this was not a good way to strengthen the strength of the Field family.
It's funny to say that Claude has never thought of doing this before, just like he was in the army and climbed through life and death to get to where he is now. As the lieutenant general of the kingdom and the commander of the Thunder Legion, his real confidants in the army are only Michael Jack, the big man Germi, his younger brother Blovik, as well as Belklin, Murray Ed, and Dia. Vader a few. Although the status is getting higher and higher, sometimes it feels like there is no one available. The main reason is the issue of mutual trust...
Asking Butler Yaric to recruit his younger brother Blovik, Claude told him his decision. The family would adopt these street children, but they would not be allowed to stay at Veblen Manor, but would be sent to his sister Anna. We hire various teachers to teach them how to read, write, and exercise on the ranch, just like our family runs a national primary school and middle school on the ranch.
In addition, Claude asked Brovik to take these children to Anna's Ranch tomorrow to secretly test their magic talents and, if any, select them for magician training. The Field family needs to master a magical force. Even if they can't be trained into battle wizards, it would be good to find some magical assistants for their sisters Anna and Lady Sonia...
In addition, in view of what happened to Adele and his brother, Claude ordered Blovik to settle the stray children in the ranch, and then work with McJack to make arrangements for the families of all the soldiers of the Thunder Division who died in the colonial war. During a return visit, if any orphans are found, they will be brought to the ranch and the Field family will raise them into adults.
Blovik happily accepted the task assigned to him by Claude, and went out to put the street children to sleep, preparing to set off to the ranch after breakfast tomorrow morning. Claude agreed to adopt these street children in the name of his family, which relieved him. Otherwise, it would be a headache for Blovik to discipline so many street children every day...
The next day, Claude, his brother Blovik, and Butler Yaric brought these street children to the Anna Ranch, and these street children will live here next. Their study and life are naturally arranged by Butler Alrick. What Butler Alrick said last night made Claude include him in the list of trustworthy confidants. This is very important to Butler Alrick. This was very good news. He finally made Claude trust him.
Both McJack and his younger brother Blovik were sent to complete the task of visiting the relatives of the fallen soldier. They only needed to go to the logistics department to check the list of victims. Then arrange personnel according to the address to pay a return visit and notify their immediate family members, who can immigrate to overseas territorial war zones to receive the victims' immigration admission qualifications and personal property land replacement. If there are no immediate family members, they must also find a way to bring back the orphans of the victims and give them to Claude. The Field family will raise these orphans.
Originally, General Skerry proposed to give the same immigration admission qualifications and personal property land replacement to the family members of all soldiers who died in the colonial war, which was approved by all the generals in the theater command. However, what the Logistics Department did was just send a military mail to the families of those soldiers who died, informing them of such a thing.
But Claude now suddenly realized that there was something very wrong with this approach. If a tragedy like Adele's sister and brother happened to the family members of the fallen soldiers, not only would they not receive the letter, but someone might pretend to be a family member of the fallen soldiers and come to claim the immigration admission qualifications and personal property land replacement.
Claude then arranged for Michael Jack and his younger brother Browett to deal with matters related to the fallen soldiers of the Thunder Legion. It happened that the Legion was implementing the rotation of family leave for junior officers, which allowed these junior officers to personally visit and notify the homes of the fallen soldiers. .
General Skerry and General Bolognik need to be informed about this matter. Claude can make decisions regarding the Thunder Legion, but it is difficult for Claude to intervene in the Rock Legion. In addition, General Skerry must strictly implement the last check point to prevent people from pretending to be family members of fallen soldiers and taking advantage of them.
After arranging these things, Claude then discussed the development of this long rifle with his sister Anna and Mrs. Sonia. Thanks to the standardized production of copper-cased bullets, Mrs. Sonia can freely conduct firing tests of various barrel structures, and the development of long rifles has made great progress. Now the long rifle with a lever structure that is closest to what Claude mentioned has been formed, but the gun body is still very bloated and heavy, and it will take time to slowly repair it.
What pained Claude was that Master Bird completely ignored the development of this long rifle. The old man was completely obsessed with the firepower machine and had a great time staying in the iron ore workshop every day. Claude once told him the difference between a thermal engine that relied on the expansion of hot air to push the connecting rod to operate and a steam engine that relied on steam to push the connecting rod to operate. Then the old man kept thinking about creating a steam engine. Because the thermal efficiency of the thermal machines manufactured by the iron ore mine is very low, it takes a long time to burn the fire to make the thermal machines run...
After returning to Veblen Manor in the evening, I found that Mr. Veblen had arrived and brought Claude the latest news about the royal capital. Of course, this latest news refers to what happened more than twenty days ago. Sterling X has been buried in the Royal Cemetery. The remaining major event in the kingdom is the enthronement ceremony of Prince Wedelek. However, this enthronement ceremony has been repeatedly postponed. The main reason is that the big bosses in the royal capital are worried about the enthronement ceremony here. As soon as Prince Lek came to the throne, Prince Hansback declared himself king and started a rebellion...
It is worth noting that mutinies occurred almost simultaneously in the two new standing corps stationed in the three southern counties of the original Eskiline Principality and in the original Limodra Principality. Just like the Blue Feather Legion, the soldiers and grassroots officers expelled The senior officers of the two legions declared to obey the orders of Prince Hansback. As a result, the eldest prince already has three legions with nearly 200,000 troops in his hands...