As time passed, the rain grew heavier, and the clouds showed signs of elemental turbulence. The palace entrance, once sheltered by sculptures and filled with refugees, was now empty. In some lower areas of the square, water had started to accumulate. Court guards hustled in and out of the palace's side doors, and occasionally, the bent figures of old magicians could be seen.
Before heading to the underground slave market, "Bloody Mary," Felix made a detour to the palace. He had previously risked lightning strikes to peek at the distribution of elemental forces above the clouds with his formidable spiritual power.
Dense water elements hovered above the clouds, fueling the dark clouds and increasing the rainfall to new heights. If Felix could sense the concentration of water elements between heaven and earth, then certainly the Titans Royal Observatory could too.
Felix believed it wouldn't be long before the royal astrologers relayed the bad news of the escalating storm to the mysterious Princess Helen.
Without astrology, Felix couldn't precisely calculate how much this immense concentration of water elements would intensify the storm or how long it would last. However, he was sure of one thing: such a dense gathering of water elements must be driven by human intervention. If this trend continued, the imperial city of Titanian might face the risk of flooding.
This posed a significant challenge to the Titans Royal Family. In an era with underdeveloped agricultural productivity, such severe flooding meant a total loss of crops like wheat in the second season. The severe soil erosion caused by the floods would also drastically reduce the crop yield the following season.
A chain of events was set to test the fullness of the Titans' treasury. If the homeless victims of the disaster weren't settled within the next five months, it could mean the seeds of unrest were sown throughout the central empire.
Without detailed information, Felix couldn't speculate on how events would unfold. The only certainty was that someone was exacerbating the flood disaster from the shadows, with dark plotters already having magicians summon water elements on a large scale, affecting the concentration of elements above the clouds.
By tomorrow at the latest, Felix felt that the low-profile Princess Helen would take significant action. If the flood threat escalated or even reached the imperial city, it would mean the Titans Royal Family's rule was in jeopardy. Ambitious conspirators would likely seize this opportunity to win hearts or even incite major chaos.
Felix was curious about the role Lady Elizabeth would play in such a shift. He didn't believe Lady Elizabeth would be foolish enough to aggravate a flood – an act that would invite universal condemnation.
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Therefore, Felix thought the force behind the chaos wouldn't be the established nobility, known for their caution. Such actions, risking the whole family's fate once exposed, seemed more like the behavior of reckless youth.
Felix believed many in the imperial city were waiting for the moment when the Titans Royal Family would make an example of this emerging force.
The existence of the Bloody Mary underground slave market predated the Titans Empire. Thousands of years ago, it became a slave trading hub due to its central location and convenient transportation. In such a bloody and dark era, slave trading was an unavoidable reality.
Defeated captives, exotic races from the poles, and those tenacious mixed breeds struggling to survive were all "reserves" for the slave trade.
The boundaries regarding slavery were always blurred, as the Titans Empire's "Slave Law" only stated that no one could sell citizens of the Titans Empire.
In Bloody Mary, the slaves sold were mostly captives from foreign lands and mixed breeds. Strong half-orcs and captured half-elves had always dominated the slave market.
It must be mentioned that dirty slave traders have always been a primary target for the church's arbitrators.
Often, when the adjudication department needed funds, it was time to have a "heart-to-heart" with these wealthy slave traders. Typically, slave traders had two options: either prepare a hefty amount of gold coins and obediently await their fate or seek redemption from the dark arbitrators. Alternatively, they could resist and face the arbitrators extracting gold coins from their corpses themselves!
To put it bluntly, these seemingly all-powerful slave masters were actually "lambs" bred by the church's adjudication department.
When the lambs grew fat, it was time for the arbitrators to slaughter them. In reality, arbitrators rarely offered "redemption" to these "lambs," because humans don't heed the pleas of a lamb!
Perhaps soon, Felix would lead the "Dark Judgment Division" to harvest these sufficiently fattened lambs.
Just as mortals will never understand why the church, every few years, can produce a large number of Caesar gold coins to aid the poor. This world, under the watchful eyes of the gods, operates on its own set of rules. These rules might not be visible to everyone, but the discerning can discover them within patterns. Felix believes slave masters might stand against a vast family, but to defy the entire church? He'd be a fool to believe that.
Thus, under this system, slave masters have been raised and slaughtered for thousands of years!
While researching this theory, Felix came to a fascinating conclusion: the church, to some extent, bears the responsibility of maintaining the world's balance. They either openly solicit donations from the wealthy or darkly seize the wealth of sinners through bloody means.
Then, a portion of this wealth is used to help the poor. This has been the church's most frequent and effective practice for thousands of years!
Entering Bloody Mary, Felix bypassed the low-end open-air slave trading area and headed towards the middle to high-end underground sections. The upper layer of Bloody Mary was a square with makeshift shacks, where cheap slaves were tied with coarse hemp ropes like cattle.
The second layer was the basement, mostly trading knights who were captured but couldn't pay in gold, destitute noble wives and daughters, strong half-orcs, and attractive half-elves. If you're lucky, you might even find a few down-and-out magicians among them.
And this was precisely Felix's target.