Knock. Knock.
The sound echoed through the small house just as the warmth of reunion had begun to settle.
Henry's father looked toward the door with slight suspicion. At this hour, visitors were rarely good news.
He stood up slowly and opened it.
Standing there was a man who looked completely out of place in Verna.
He wore a clean dark suit, carefully pressed despite the dust of travel. A polished monocle rested over one eye, giving him the appearance of someone far more suited for royal courts than ruined baronies. His posture was straight, and his smile was practiced but genuine.
He gave a small bow.
"Good evening. I hope I am not intruding."
Henry's father narrowed his eyes.
"That depends on who you are."
The man smiled wider.
"My name is Nabu. By order of His Majesty, King Dan, I have been appointed as Lord Henry's official advisor and attendant."
Silence.
Henry blinked.
His father blinked.
His mother simply sighed as if she had accepted that strange people would now continue entering their lives forever.
Nabu stepped inside with surprising enthusiasm.
"I must say, I have heard quite a lot about you, Lord Henry. Pirate crews, lost memories, royal trouble, mechanical limbs—very impressive. Very concerning. Very impressive."
Henry rubbed his forehead.
"I was hoping for less attention."
"Impossible," Nabu replied immediately. "You are a baron now. Attention is your natural enemy."
Despite the absurdity of the moment, they welcomed him inside and offered him food.
Nabu accepted with the seriousness of a diplomat receiving a royal banquet.
By the end of the night, Henry had learned one important thing.
Nabu talked far too much.
But he was competent.
And that was enough.
—
Early the next morning, Henry, his father, and Nabu made their way toward the old villa of the Baron of Verna.
Calling it a villa now felt generous.
It was little more than a wounded structure.
After the previous baron had fled, the people—driven by anger, desperation, and years of oppression—had stripped the place of anything valuable. Furniture was gone. Decorations were broken. Doors hung unevenly from damaged hinges.
What remained was stone, dust, and the skeleton of authority.
Henry stood before it in silence.
This…
Was his responsibility now.
His father stepped forward and called for the townspeople.
Slowly, they gathered.
Men and women. Farmers and workers. Faces tired from years of survival rather than living.
Their eyes carried fear.
And distrust.
The previous baron had ruled through greed and cruelty. Titles meant little here except pain.
Now another baron stood before them.
Henry.
He could feel their hesitation.
So he stepped forward.
And he spoke plainly.
"I know what this title means to you."
The crowd remained silent.
"It means taxes. Fear. Hunger. Broken promises."
A few heads lowered.
He continued.
"I cannot erase what happened before. I cannot ask you to trust me immediately."
He took a breath.
"But I can promise this—"
His voice grew firmer.
"I will rebuild Verna."
The people looked up.
"I will make this city prosperous again. Not for nobles. Not for pride. For the people who still chose to stay here."
Silence followed.
Long.
Heavy.
Then his father stepped beside him and spoke with the authority of someone the people already trusted.
"Rebuild the villa," he said simply.
No one argued.
No one questioned.
They moved.
That alone told Henry something important.
His father held more trust among these people than any baron ever had.
That mattered.
—
The repairs were simple.
There was no point in restoring luxury.
Only function.
Rooms were cleaned. Broken walls patched. Tables repaired. Shelves rebuilt. It became less a noble residence and more a working office.
Exactly what Henry needed.
The records room was the saddest part.
Years of mismanagement had left only a handful of useful documents behind. Most records were missing, destroyed, or deliberately hidden.
Still, Nabu organized everything with frightening efficiency.
Within two days, the chaos became readable.
And after going through every available record—
Henry reached a conclusion.
Nothing could be done.
At least, not easily.
Verna had always survived through agriculture.
Its farms had fed its people, supported trade, and kept the city alive.
Now those lands were dead.
The demonic miasma carried by the River Knole had poisoned the soil for years. Harvests failed. Crops withered.
Without farmland—
Verna had no foundation.
Henry sat in silence staring at the reports.
The problem was simple.
And impossible.
The only true solution was to make the land farmable again.
That was when he remembered.
The seeds.
The miasma-resistant seeds his father had been distributing.
He found him outside and asked.
His father gave a tired smile.
"Maybe," he said. "But they're still in research. Some survive. Some don't. We don't fully understand them yet."
So even that hope was uncertain.
Henry frowned.
Then another thought struck him.
The water.
If the source was poisoned, perhaps the answer was not the land—but the river itself.
"What if we purify the water from the Knole River?" he asked.
Nabu adjusted his monocle.
"My lord, if that were possible, someone would have done it already."
Henry pointed toward the massive dam he had passed on his way to Verna.
"That structure. It filters miasma, doesn't it?"
Nabu nodded.
"Yes. But not in the way you imagine."
He explained.
The dam remained closed most of the time, storing contaminated water. Once a month, mages sent from the capital used specialized artifacts to purify the accumulated miasma. Only then was the water slowly released downstream.
It was expensive.
Slow.
And temporary.
"Then why not build another dam before Verna?" Henry asked.
Nabu sighed.
"Because Verna is already lost."
The words were blunt.
"The land itself has been soaked in miasma for years. Even if clean water arrived tomorrow, the soil would remain corrupted."
He continued.
"And the water flow here is far stronger than in the northern baronies. The amount of purification required would be impossible with our current methods."
Henry fell silent again.
Another wall.
Another impossible answer.
Then—
He lifted his head.
"How do the mages purify it?"
Nabu replied simply.
"Artifacts."
Henry stood immediately.
Without another word, he walked to his room and returned carrying a small object wrapped carefully in cloth.
Nabu leaned forward with interest.
It was the artifact Eren had given him—the promised reward from her father's collection.
He unwrapped it slowly.
A small, ancient device.
Simple in appearance.
But powerful.
Nabu's eyes widened.
"What does it do?"
Henry looked at it for a long moment.
Then answered.
"It purifies…"
A pause.
"…earth."
Silence.
Nabu nearly dropped his monocle.
"That—my lord—that changes everything."
Henry shook his head.
"Not yet. It only works on a very small area. Useful for a garden. Useless for a barony."
But his mind was already moving.
If it could purify one patch of land—
It could be modified.
Improved.
Scaled.
Some adjustments were needed.
Many adjustments.
But for the first time—
There was a real path.
Hope.
Henry placed the artifact carefully on the table.
"We rebuild from here."
From that day onward, Verna changed.
Paperwork flooded his desk.
Taxes. Land disputes. Supply shortages. Worker assignments. Endless reports.
Being a baron was somehow harder than fighting pirates.
At the same time, the people planted the resistant seeds his father had distributed. Henry personally checked their progress, watching each small patch of green like it was treasure.
And at night—
He worked.
Sketches.
Blueprints.
Calculations.
He began designing a modified version of the artifact—one powerful enough to purify entire fields.
Slowly.
Painfully.
But surely.
The restoration of Verna had begun.
And for the first time in many years—
The people dared to believe the city might live again.