"I can promote anyone I wish, correct?" Jack asked.
"Yes, as long as the officer can fulfill the restrictions of the ranks. But please remember that the higher one's rank, the higher the officer's monthly wages are. These wages are automatically charged into the monthly kingdom expense. They are separate from the pay function Your Majesty mentioned before."
"Oh?" Jack went back to Emris' info again. He saw it now at the bottom. His wage was listed there. 500 gold coins. Jack was amazed. 500 gold coins were much more than the monthly profit from his restaurant and bakery. But considering lord marshall was the highest rank in the military section, such a wage was natural.
Seeing the wage amount, Jack wasn't too worried. He was only planning to promote two people. He didn't believe that would burden the kingdom coffer much. He went to the knight captain's section. After browsing around, he found the portrait he was looking for.
It was the portrait of Captain Salem. He clicked the promotion function and had Salem promoted to a knight commander, replacing Quintus' previous spot. Captain Salem's level and grade were good enough for the Knight Commander rank.
Then he went to the knight lieutenant section and promoted Bailey to knight captain.
Before he promoted the two, Both of their loyalties were close to 90. He didn't find this strange since the two had a good relationship with him. After he promoted them, their loyalties went past 90.
As for the other's loyalties. He made several random checks and was dispirited to find most were below 70. Some were even below 60 which Peniel remarked as ones they should be wary about. Jack couldn't say that he was surprised by this. It was already a good sign that these natives didn't directly rebel when he was announced as their new king.
Jack then moved to the court section. When he opened it, the top row only had one box, and it was empty. It was the rank of royal advisor, Mason's previous rank. Below them were advisors, magistrates, head ministers, and ministers.
There were five spots for advisor rank. Both Thaergood and Duchess Isabelle were in these ranks. Magistrates had fifteen spots. Head ministers had thirty. Ministers had two hundred.
After a quick browse through the list, Jack turned to Duke Alfredo and said, "I don't see you anywhere here."
"I'm not officially working for the court," Alfredo answered. "I'm just a noble who helps the kingdom and my wife in her duty, on occasion."
"I see," Jack said. He was pondering about giving the royal advisor rank to the duke. When he was about to ask if the duke was willing, John beat him first.
"Can an outworlder be appointed to this rank?" John asked.
"Yes," Thaergood answered.
"Outworlders won't get any benefit from this rank though," Peniel said. "This rank system is meant for natives. Each native that is put into this slot received a benefit to their stats. Outworlders don't get that. Plus, outworlders also won't receive any of the monthly coin wages that natives received based on their ranks. Even if the king used the Pay function to increase loyalty, outworlders won't be able to receive it. Their loyalties won't even be displayed."
Jack could understand why it was so. A human's heart was unpredictable. The system won't be able to predict players' loyalty. As for the Pay function not being available to players, this might be a restriction so players didn't abuse this function to steal the coins inside the kingdom coffer for personal use. If it was not so, he could just elect one outworlder and then pay him coins as many as possible with the condition that a portion of the coins is given back to him.
"If outworlders are elected, can they see these screen panels that Jack is seeing now?" John asked again. He had been bothering Jack often since they started this monarch system. Insisting Jack describe the screens he saw in detail. "Oh, his real name is Jack, by the way."
"They can," Peniel answered. "If the rank is royal advisor, this elected outworlder can even operate these screen panels to an extent."
"Hehe," John grinned and said to Jack, "You know what to do then."
"Dude. Didn't you hear that these spots give benefits to natives? I will waste the benefits to one native if I give you this spot."
"So, are you saying you don't need my help? Do you want to govern this kingdom by yourself?" John asked.
"Sigh. What the hell. Fine!" Jack uttered and interfaced with the royal advisor's portrait. He was also annoyed by John's constant buggering for him to describe the screens.
He was required to choose from a bottomless list of natives who worked for the kingdom, or by entering a name. Jack put in John's name. The system warned him that the name belonged to an outworlder, asking him if he was sure. Jack clicked sure. John's portrait soon filled the empty royal advisor box.
"Whoa!" John exclaimed when he could finally see the screens. He had the same reaction as Jack.
"This is utterly interesting," John said. His hand started to flip the screens around.
"Hey! I'm not done here. This is not your plaything!" Jack smacked John's hand away.
"There are a lot of sections. Can you please hurry it up? We will spend the whole day like this if you continue at this pace," John complained.
"Hold your horses. There are a few more things I want to do in this Officers section," Jack said and swiped the screen to show the magistrate ranks.
"Hehe, time for a payback," Jack said. Warren's portrait was in front of him. Warren was the magistrate who used to be under Prince Therribus. He had been at odds with Jack in the past due to the incident with Warren's son, Walter, who tried to harm Jack during Jack's initiation into the kingdom faction.
Jack clicked on the discharge option. A message box appeared asking him if he had any reason to this magistrate for the discharge.
Jack typed, "You know why, right? Don't let me see you again or you will regret it."
Jack was already merciful for letting Warren go with just a simple discharge. The guy had sent an assassin on him, after all. But he didn't have the time to deal with this small character. He was not wasting his precious time on petty revenge. He had bigger matters to deal with.
