บท 12: poision wine.

When he finished with his greeting, all the people looked at David and paid respect to him.

" I think all of you heard about the topic today beforehand."

Some noble started to feel nervous, he almost couldn't hold his legs together.

"Did he knew?" some nobles though.

David did not further continued the issue and just stared at some noble randomly.

Was it really random?

No.

"An information gathering is good, it shows that you are competent and well prepared. However, you should remember that a cat dies because of curiosity."

David did not use only his words, at the same time he activated his skill " Emperor's Dignity."

David then snapped his finger with a pose.

For David, he thought " Great the snapping sound came perfectly."

For the royal guard, it was a signal.

For the not ill-manner people, they thought it was only a start of something.

For the criminal, the snap sound felt like the order for execution, some looked around as to find a way to escape, some just stood still in the vain hope that the emperor was just messing around.

The royal guard went into the crowd and all the nobles opened the way when the guard came near.

Some noble who bribed the palace maid almost shocked to death when the royal guard came near.

The royal guard came from three sides until there was only one noble left between them. They asked the noble to moved into the front row.

The unfortunate noble was a type of haughty prideful middle-age noble you could see in any medieval age setting novel, a type of man that doomed to be cannon fodder for the protagonist, he survived long enough to see peace but it seems his luck end here.

"I don't want to die, what's wrong with bribing? Everyone did it. Why I was the only one? Maybe the emperor does not know anything. I will refuse everything, even him could not interrogate the noble that surrender without a valid reason and evidence." He thought.

The noble then looked at David, at first, he wanted to retort and argued back at David. But just by looking at David, all his strength almost vanished away. However, this noble was not a poor bone, he could not put up a fight or two, he asked David.

"What did I do wrong, Your Majesty?"

David also amazed by the man who able to control himself. Normally, with his skill "Emperor's dignity" all the people with low force would easily lose their will to fight him, whether verbally or physically.

Although David seems to admire this noble a little bit better, still this was the noble he wanted to use as an example for the noble. David aimed to destroy the old way of noble meddling in political scheme and conspiracy, it must be done as soon as possible. David did not want his children to divide into factions, gathering noble and officer into their circle left and right. He saw that in a lot of Chinese period dramas, thus he would like to prevent those situations to arise at all cost.

David knew of other noble who fell under the same charge too but after using "demerit system" method, he chose this man. The man was not incompetent in the way of the sword and martial arts but the ability to govern his territory and financial was as bad as it could be. If David still not gained control over the two continent he would let this man lingered around longer, now that peace had arrived the need for this type of noble was not exist anymore.

However, David was not a dreadful murderer yet, not yet.

David only considered killing as one of the methods but that did not mean he favors the method. If the other side would succumb to his rule, he would let them live if they won't stir trouble and behave themselves.

Of course, to put a spy or bribing for information inside the palace was an act of offender and need to be punished, but the punishment does not need to be beheaded, David gave the poor noble a chance.

"Bring the first one in" David gave an order to the knight.

The knight then gets behind the door on the side and came in after a few minutes had passed.

What the knight brought in was a silver tray covered by a silver lid.

David the urge the noble to opened the lid and looked what on the inside.

"What do you think?" David asked.

Inside of the tray was the head of a eunuch who served in the palace until yesterday, the one who accepted bribing from some certain noble.

"This guy told me something quite amusing, do you want to know about it?"

"No, Your Majesty." The confidence of the noble who thought that David only questioned him without a piece of evidence starts to tremble.

"Well, you are quite old maybe you don't need to know everything. Am I right?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"By the way, I heard that your body was not in good shape recently, how about you retired and rest in some quiet place with beautiful scenery with your family. It's good for family to live close together, isn't it?" David asked the noble and at the same time called for a steward to bring him new drink for the noble to taste.

The drink was brought to the front of the noble, it was clear water with a strong smell.

"(This is clearly a poison if I refuse I will be forced to drink this)….. Your Majesty, I agree with your opinion, but for this drink, my body seems to decline quite fast, I could not drinking any wine right now." The noble looked around and knew that he could not escape, even if there were no knights in the hall just the man in front of him, dubbed as the strongest human ever alive, could finish him off.

In fact, not only David even Solo, Thiw, Woden and the other David's close aides were too hard for him to win, these guys would die a long time ago if they were not strong enough. The noble could only accept and prepared to hurry run back to his domain. Only one thing he did not understand was why Woden seem like someone whose soul did not belong in his body.

"Since you want to retain good health you should not drink this, it seems my finest wine should be saved for the other noble. I will prepare the carriage for you, why don't you stay in the capital for a week. I could help packing your son, Oops! sorry!, I mean packing your belonging by sending some of my men there."

"(This man, he plans to kill off my family if I'm trying to escape.)….Yes, Yours Majesty."

"You may go back to your place, the meeting will continue, so don't go back home just yet."

"…..Yes, Your Majesty."

David smiled, everything went according to his plan. The eunuch was easy to find and he did not like these people in the first place. He thought of following his hero Hongwu later by banning eunuch to involve in the administration of his empire.

David just felt sorry that he destroyed their career so he gave them a job in his own palace but they still lived the same way as they were in the past. The good ones could live and work for him, as for the bad ones six feet under the ground should be enough for their home.

There was no sound in the hall, all went quiet as they saw the event started. Some nobles hope that today would be finished and they could go back to their fief as soon as possible.

"My subjects, this emperor care for you all and I would like all of you to live in the era of peace peacefully, any of you who want to retire and live quietly would be given a huge sum for your lands reimburse. There will be no confiscate of personal belonging, as for artifacts only very important ones will be taken into the government, though. However, there would be compensated in that case. If you think my order was not to your liking you could drink a cup of wine and talk with me."

David stated and pointed to the finest wine he asked to be brought before by the knight.

Somehow, many noble who has done something wrong and afraid with his quilty stated their will to resignation. They surely did not want to drink David's finest wine.

Well, who wants?

They though the wine surely must be poisoned.

David almost could not stop grinning, this time David did not use any of his skill because he did not want to subdue the noble to agree. As for, Iris and Anetroc, since David did not ask they did not spoke anything too.

"Just as planned." David intends to use the head of some unfaithful servant just to intimidated the quilty noble and it seems to work as he wants.

However, David wondering why they did not drink his finest wine. He spent a lot of effort to reproduce Vodka in this world, he tried of those untasteful grape wine for too long and just want to promote new drink already.