Mystery Detective of the Steam World

Chapter 414 Problem Detection
The Rosefield family.

This family was not well-known within the empire, but unlike other families, the Rothsfield family had a long history within the empire. According to the intelligence Levi had gathered, the Rothsfield family had already established themselves in the empire a hundred years ago, and their ancestors had even obtained the hereditary title of baron.

Unlike other capitalists, the Rothsfield family operated with great shrewdness, typically holding their wealth in the form of stocks and bonds. This made it extremely difficult for either royalty or other nobles to seize the Rothsfield family's assets through trickery or coercion.

After all, robbing gold and jewelry is easy, but robbing stocks and bonds is a different story.

Moreover, the Rothfield family is a rare transnational financial capital family in the Empire. Their businesses not only span the Empire, but also have branches in countries such as Francis, Krant, and the Sasha Alliance.

The Rothsfield family businesses primarily involved banks, textile mills, and the Imperial Railroad. Particularly in banking, they even used their vast funds to provide substantial loans to rulers of other countries. Furthermore, according to news records, the Rothsfield family maintained close ties with the Pope of the Catholic Church.

Hmm, a multinational capitalist family... This is the person Li Wei is going to investigate next.

No one knows exactly how much money the Rothsfield family has. As mentioned before, their wealth is almost entirely in stocks and bonds, which are essentially worthless without proper channels. Unlike jewelry and gold, which are easy to value, the Rothsfield family is quite low-key and rarely appears in public. As barons, their status is not something the royal family takes too seriously.

But that's different now.

If we treat this series of events as a case, Li Wei will actually face the same process as solving a regular crime.

Identify the victim, find the method of the crime, locate the suspect, and find evidence and motives.

The victims and the methods of the crime have been revealed, and the suspects have been identified. What remains are the evidence and the motives behind the crime.

As for motives, Li Wei felt there was no need to even look for them.

The very existence of transnational capitalists is a sin. To put it nicely, they are transnational capitalists; to put it bluntly, they are opportunists, following whoever offers them benefits. Moreover, Rothfield's practice of dispersing the main family wealth in the form of bonds and stocks is clearly a sign of his wariness of the empire.

This means that even if the Empire were to capture the entire Rothfield family, it would be difficult to cripple them. Moreover, the Rothfield family has branches in countries like Francis and Krant, making them incredibly cunning. Unless all countries work together to eliminate them, the family will inevitably escape and rise again.

Given the hostile relationship between these countries, it is clear that it is impossible to get them to unite in their fight against capitalists.

Therefore, it is highly likely that this conspiracy was orchestrated by the Rothsfield family. After all, even if the Empire discovered it and wiped out all Rothsfield forces within its borders, it wouldn't necessarily lead to the family's annihilation. Conversely, if the Rothsfield family succeeded, they could gain immense power and wealth within the Empire.

It's practically a guaranteed win. Given the nature of capitalists, with such a huge disparity between risk and reward—winning means feasting and drinking, losing means no ruin—it's a sure thing. If they didn't take it, they wouldn't be capitalists.

Unfortunately, this is just speculation. You can't solve a case by guessing alone; evidence is very important.

However, finding evidence from such a large family is not an easy task. Fortunately, for the police, not being able to find clues and evidence from the suspect is not necessarily a dead end—well, of course, I don't mean arresting and beating the suspect.

It is the simplest, most direct, and also the most old-fashioned method.

Stakeout.

Of course, Levi wouldn't go and stake out the place himself. He directly sent a puppet bird to sneak into the Rosefield family's manor and keep watch. If it discovered anything unusual, it could immediately report to him.

As for the other agents, Li Wei instructed them to continue investigating the Donglinden Trading Company, mainly focusing on the missing boss and the old man.

To be honest, Levi didn't expect them to find any clues from this. Given the Rothsfield family's cautious nature, since the company was burned down, those two people were either abroad or already dead.

But it doesn't matter, this is the effect Li Wei wanted.

He knew the Rothsfield family would never admit defeat so easily. Assuming they were behind all of this, it wasn't time to concede. If one refrained from pursuing profit simply because of the possibility of loss, then one wouldn't be a capitalist.

They will certainly do something more to the Empire, just as Li Wei told the Queen before: once the Empire's front lines are defeated, that will be their time to act.

But when will the front lines be defeated?

That's a good question.

So Li Wei went to MI7 again.

"You want to see information about the supply situation on the Imperial front?"

It must be said that the old butler was somewhat surprised by Li Wei's request.

"What do you want this for?"

"If I remember correctly, the supplies for the Imperial front lines were requisitioned from the civilian population by the Logistics Department."

“That’s right, of course, the lords in each region also have responsibilities and obligations.”

"Could I see the list of those private companies?" "Is this related to the case you're investigating?"

"Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, we'll only know after we see it."

Li Wei wasn't sure either; he just planned to investigate. He had nothing else to do right now, and he wasn't expecting things in Rosefield to be like in a game, where once you arrive at the starting point of the story, everyone automatically starts recounting conspiracies and schemes. If that were the case, Li Wei would question whether this was even a game world. But it didn't matter; there were puppet birds and twin-tailed sprites watching over things, so Li Wei could detect any problems immediately.

Looking at Li Wei, the old butler remained silent for a moment, then sighed.

"Okay, it has to be you. Anyone else wouldn't be qualified to look at this."

That's not entirely wrong. The list of supplies provided to the Imperial front lines was undoubtedly a military secret, something Li Wei, even as a mere count and detective, would never have seen. But he was also a Knight of the Thistles—which naturally changed everything.

Soon, Li Wei received the roster from the logistics department. The list was densely packed with units, and it would obviously take a lot of time to investigate each one.

That was Li Wei's original thought, but when he saw the name "Donglin Deng Trading Company" on the list, he was suddenly wide awake.

Are these people even putting on an act? Are they really that direct?

Li Wei immediately pulled out the records and quickly began to examine them. According to the records, Donglinden Trading Company was responsible for providing the front lines with a large quantity of… canned food?
Upon seeing this, Li Wei frowned.

That company is just a two-story building, without even a production workshop, so where did the canned food come from?
However, the question was quickly answered by the logistics department.

"Oh, this kind of thing is actually quite common, sir."

"Very common?"

"Yes, you may not know this, but companies that provide supplies to the Empire during wartime will receive a series of policy support and tax breaks from the Empire. Therefore, some small companies will also take the initiative to provide supplies to the Empire in order to obtain these benefits. Of course, most of their supplies are purchased from other places. But we don't care about that. You know... the more supplies the better."

"Oh, I see..."

After listening to the logistics official's explanation, Li Wei nodded thoughtfully. Clearly, from the logistics department's perspective, it wasn't surprising that such a small company would proactively provide supplies for policy benefits. But…

"There must be some threshold, right? There are so many small businesses in the Empire, are you all going to offer employee benefits to them all?"

If any company could freely provide supplies to the Imperial front lines in exchange for welfare policies, wouldn't everyone be scrambling to get in? That's unacceptable!

"Haha, of course that's impossible. We all have joint and several guarantors. If anything goes wrong, we can pursue the responsibility through those joint and several guarantors, which would involve a military court. Besides, not just anyone can be a joint and several guarantor; one must have a certain status and position..."

"Then, who is the guarantor for Donglindeng Trading Company?"

"Please wait..."

The latter typed on the difference machine for a moment, and then the typewriter spat out a message.

“Ah, here is the signature of the guarantor of East Linden Trading Company… Hmm, Lord Klopp, with his guarantee, there should be no problem.”

"…………………"

Now Li Wei knows exactly what Lord Klopp did while he was being manipulated by the insects. If Li Wei hadn't come, he might have been court-martialed soon.

No wonder these people stopped acting; they were deliberately trying to mess with you.

It must be said that the Rothsfield family's move was truly ruthless; not only did it disrupt the front lines, but it also allowed them to take the opportunity to eliminate a loyal supporter of the royal family.

"Is it possible to find out where the goods shipped by Donglinden Trading Company are now?"

"Please wait a moment... Ah, it's here. According to the records, this batch of goods has been loaded onto the Baiyunfeng and is almost at the port of Delai."

"OK, thanks."

After getting the information he wanted, Li Wei quickly left the logistics department.

Then they contacted the Eye of the Sky directly.

"Get ready to go, we're heading to Port Deloitte!"

I don't know if I'll be able to make it in time.

(End of this chapter)