Herald of Steel-Chapter 1567: Alexander’s Proposal

Alexander had a few contenders whom he considered giving the compass to. The most obvious was Lady Margaret or Lady Linda; he made the thing just as he was visiting them.

But in the end, he refrained upon seeing the evolving situation.

Then came Vidiyan, but Alexander thought his relation with the pirate captain was still too young to entrust him with such a valuable era changing technology.

Lastly came Lady Inayah and Pasha Farzah.

And among them, Alexander preferred the old man- hoping to win him over with this present.

"....." The Lord of Matrak played around with the circular disc for a bit, his face showing a hint of amusement and playfulness. He thought Alexander had gifted him a showpiece as judged by the exquisite metal workmanship and more impressively, the clear glass screen.

Pasha Farzah did not think he had ever seen such a beautiful crystal glass, so immaculately made and fitted, and thus slowly moved his moved over the smooth, cool surface, feeling the quality.

And then, he moved the item around a bit, to feel its weight, which is when he noticed the oddity.

The needle did not seem to move!

Pasha Farzah originally thought the black pointer was meant to follow the movement of his hands like a novel artpiece, thus moving east or west as he swung his arms.

However despite several tries, the item still kept pointing in the same direction- north and south respectively.

This quickly produced a small puzzled frown in the fair forehead of the old man and for a second, he even thought the needle was somehow fixed.

But that this did not seem to be the case.

"My lord, the needle will always point to the true north and south… no matter how much you move it around." And seeing this, Alexander finally decided to chime in the answer himself, producing a gentle smile. He did not want to make the elder lower himself by asking the himself.

"...???" However that seemed to only confuse the man even more…. because how can a needle self correct by itself?

Was it by magic?

Sensing this confusion, Alexander gave a small smile and patiently explained,

"Lord Pasha, this compass… this item was made by blacksmiths from Galiosos. The workmanship clearly shows that… it is not from Adhania. And it was they who taught me this. They apparently found that if you 'make' steel needles in a certain way and then allow them to freely move, they will always point to the true north and south."

"This is an extremely important discovery for navigation. Imagine… being deep out at sea, there are no landmasses and no stars to guide you. How does one keep track of one's directions without any reference? It is very difficult. Thousands of ships are lost each year in this way- a sudden storm forces them to take an unknown detour and then the sailors are unable to find their bearing. They either starve or end up as slaves for local pirates."

"But if you know where the true north and south are, you can easily chart your course. No matter where you are in the world, you only need to know Matrak is near the very top of the world and viola.. just chart a course north and keep going straight! It is that easy."

"The Sybarians are already starting to slowly use this in navigation, and I believe we should too. It will make our ships much safer."

Alexander ended his presentation with this soft suggestion, and it made Pasha Farzah's eyes instantly blaze with excitement. As a businessman himself, of course he understood this significance.

However contrary to expectation, there was no boisterous praising of Alexander or reiterating how handing his granddaughters over was the right… Pasha Farzah felt they were already past all those fake courtesy points. The slightly subtle nod he gave the boy was far, far heavier.

Then clenching his teeth, he very straightforwardly proposed, "How many of these discs are you willing to sell, brat?"

"We call this a compass my lord. And you can place an order and we will try to accommodate as much as we can." Alexander refrained from stating any hard numbers but made it seem he had great capacity. His only condition was, "But all I ask is that you try not to let them fall into the enemy's hands." ƒrēenovelkiss.com

Here, Alexander was not talking about just Amenheraft… but basically everyone who was not the old man or Lady Inayah.

And Pasha Farzah had no problem complying as these were already implied conditions.

"Good! Then I want a hundred!" He readily made the order for a lot of his ships, before quickly going back to playing with his new toy.

Now that Alexander had told him how this worked, of course he was curious to find out it is really did what he said it did.

And sure enough, no matter how much he twisted or moved his arms, one part of that needle kept pointing towards north, towards Matrak, and the other part towards Zanzan, down south.

"Brat! Those blacksmiths… they did not use any magic right?" It was so surprising and utterly bizarre that the old man could not help but ask this.

Now, Pasha Farzah did not believe in magic per se, but still, having been brought up in an extremely religious society, how could he not hold some reverence for it?

Deep at the back of his mind, he did believe some supernatural things existed. And looking at the workings of the compass in front, he was forced to consider that possibility.

"If my lord wishes, I can sell you the technique for making them." Alexander did not bother explaining the mechanism of the compass; that would have been a few hundred years ahead of its time.

But if Matrak could make its own compass, surely all these misgivings would turn to dust.

"How much do you want?" And this suited Pasha Farzah just fine, thus raising his brows to hear Alexander's quote. In his mind, he set quite a high budget to please the boy as this was truly truly an fantastic item.

'I can use this for everything… not just ships and moving cargo. Moving armies at night, mapping new lands, or even simply creating good maps, this compass will be phenomenal at everything!'

Pasha Farzah's mind was still sharp as a whip and really did not lack any imagination.

"...." While on the opposite side, Alexander was not sure how much to exactly ask. Making a thin piece of magnetized metal was extremely easy- even a child could do it. All you needed to do was rub an iron piece with another in a single direction constantly.

However the difficulty of discovering this rare phenomenon and then finding a proper use for it- that was a whole different matter. It depended almost entirely on luck and thus, some might even claim the process was priceless.

"Hahaha, I was only joking my lord. Consider it a gift." In the end, Alexander decided to use it as a bargaining piece for obtaining the twins.

"...Then it would be rude of me to reject." And Pasha Farzah also readily accepted.

Someone as shrewd as him of course could see through Alexander's thoughts, but since he was offering, the old man did not stand on ceremony.

Nonchalantly pocketing the thing, he gave a frank smile and then teasingly chuckled, "Brat, if you sell me how to make white sugar, I will throw Mikaya to you."

Alexander only pursed his lips with a thin smile at the prank, before switching topic.

"I have heard some things going on the court. It seems some unsavory characters have managed to infiltrate it. Is that right?"

"...." The smile in Pasha Farzah instantly vanished, and he clamped up.

This was done mostly out of shame as in this mind the whole thing appeared such as- Alexander was going around knocking down enemies left, right and center, while he was unable to even hold the court.

Regardless of the reasons behind it, it made the shrewd old man feel humiliated. He only lightly pursed lips, as if copying Alexander.

Seeing this silence, Alexander also swiftly stepped across this potential minefield.

He then went on to nonchalantly add, "It also seems His Majesty is becoming a hard man to talk to. He has begun to see you as his enemy and is taking Lord Assazd as his ally. This is not right. Someone should remind him to be grateful."

Pasha Farzah's heaving chest seemed to quicken with these words, until finally it reached an apex and suddenly clenching his teeth, he spat, "....The brat does not listen! What can I do!"

These were the same words spoken by Lady Inayah, but this time, it was filled with a hundred times more anger and frustration.

Hearing it from the horse's mouth, Alexander was also forced to see that the problem might truly lie with Ptolomy. Pasha Farzah was a competent man, and if he could have, he would not have certainly sunken so low.

'Looks like me hoping to talk some sense into that idiot will not work either. He will have something whispered to him a second later, and everything I said will be passed out into the drain.' The man thus concluded himself.

"Can we do something once Her Highness gives brith to a boy?" Alexander then made this almost blasphemous statement, and the three girls behind him instantly shook like they had been electrouted.

Even Pasha Farzah was forced to quiver his lips in incredulation.

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