In a tavern in Florence, as usual, all sorts of rumors were circulating.
"Did you hear? The third son of the Bolognese family got a maid pregnant."
"Imagine that—having a child before even getting married. The Bolognese family sure has luck with kids."
"The church's talk about loving only your wife is just nonsense, isn't it?"
Most of the gossip in taverns was nothing but empty talk.
However, in the Toscana Empire, where nightly activities were limited to either intense exercises with their wives or idle chatter over drinks, these rumors were invaluable.
Each one of them would be recycled countless tis over.
"I heard that the Bolognese family sent that maid to a village outside the city for a while."
The Bolognese family could not ignore the pregnancy, whether it was an incident of rank-based coercion by their third son or a maid seizing the opportunity for a rise in status by seducing him.
If it had been a one-night affair, they could have paid her off and told her to keep quiet until the wedding. But since there was a child involved, even the power of the nobility couldn't keep a lid on it.
So, Lord Bolognese, the head of the family, decided to send the maid away for recovery in the countryside.
The people of Florence, known for their intellectual curiosity, were fully aware of these circumstances.
"They say a woman’s fate depends on her man, and look at her now—she hit the jackpot! To the maid who turned her life around!"
The man spreading the rumor raised his glass.
Others around him raised their beer mugs for a toast as well.
"If I had known, I'd have been born a beautiful girl!"
"What nonsense! You look like a cabbage shredded on a grater. You should be thankful you were born a man."
"Soone ought to break your skull with a hamr, you idiot!"
Normally, the gossip would end here, with everyone laughing off baseless rumors. But this ti, a man quietly drinking in the corner smirked.
With a slight shrug of his shoulders, he exuded arrogance.
"Is this all it takes to make you lot laugh?"
All eyes turned toward the man who had ruined the mood.
Typically, these gatherings were for people to craft “stories” about noble families, as if they were novels, mocking them in the process.
But now, Florence's cherished pasti was being disrupted.
"Hey, don’t kill the vibe. Just leave, alright? You don’t seem like one of us anyway."
The man downed his beer in one go and slamd the glass down on the table.
"I’ve got a more interesting story—about the dici family."
The man glanced around the room, gauging reactions. The dici were just prominent enough to avoid being ignored but not so lofty as to be untouchable.
"Anyone living around here knows that Baron dici married the Count Farnese’s daughter, right? Well, they say Fabio put up a huge amount of money for that wedding."
Most people in Florence knew about Fabio.
Though they might never have afforded the seaweed and cakes he sold, they had seen nobles scrambling to buy his goods, and they’d laughed more tis than they could count at the sight of high-born folk jumping around.
"In most families, it’s the eldest who supports the younger ones. But I guess when you’ve got money, the rules don’t apply."
It was common knowledge that the eldest son, as the family heir, provided for the younger siblings. This principle applied not only to nobles but also to simple free farrs.
Breaking that tradition was almost unheard of...
The roomful of gossip-hungry beasts now hung on the mysterious man’s every word.
"And the new Baron dici? He’s quite the magnanimous guy, isn't he? He said he’d generously reward his brother for his kindness."
When it ca to tales of nobles, there was an unspoken rule—even if no one agreed on it aloud.
The gist was this: don’t target the highest or the lowest ranks. Instead, pick a noble in the middle and make up a story to poke fun at their foolishness.
Breaking this rule could lead to an unfortunate run-in with a noble’s lackeys on a dark night.
It was a self-preserving rule, but it inevitably led to boring, cliché-ridden tales.
Yet this fresh rumor shattered all known conventions.
The seasoned listeners, bored by the sa old stories, were now fully engrossed.
"Baron dici said he’d hand over a generous portion of the estate to repay his brother’s favor. Isn’t it beautiful to see brothers looking out for each other like this?"
The conversation had shifted from mocking nobles’ follies to suddenly praising them, but a fresh story was still a fresh story.
Everyone nodded in agreent.
"If you borrow money from your brother, you should pay it back. Baron dici wouldn’t dare renege on such a debt."
"That’s why the Count Farnese trusted Baron dici with his daughter. A truly noble man, don’t you think?"
At this point, soone in the tavern spoke up.
"Where’d you hear all this, anyway? Surely you didn’t just pick it up from a friend?"
Just as strange fake news is rampant in modern-day Korea, anything picked up “from a friend” in Toscana was typically suspect.
While no one would harm him for sharing an entertaining tale, a hint of disappointnt crept into the atmosphere.
The man who had brought up the dici story shrugged and chuckled.
"I got it straight from my cousin, who works as the dici family steward."
With the source now identified, the rumor was deed mostly credible.
After all, claiming a noble source without specifying rank gave the speaker a way out if nobles got involved. But once ranks were nad, the truth could easily be traced.
"Wow, I thought nobles just fought amongst themselves."
"Looks like the new Baron dici is sothing else."
"You shared a good story—let buy you a drink."
And this false rumor soon spread throughout all of Florence.
To the point where even Baron Albert dici couldn’t ignore it.
Albert hadn’t been in the best mood lately.
Objectively speaking, his life seed to be progressing smoothly, like a ship with the wind at its back.
He had ford a marriage alliance with the esteed Farnese family and, unexpectedly, ended up with a very beautiful wife.
Of course, even if she hadn’t been beautiful, he never would have considered rejecting the marriage.
It’s a hundred tis better to have an attractive wife, even if it’s common knowledge that spouses rarely get along.
"Who the hell spread this damned rumor?"
Fabio often treated Albert like a fool, but Albert was no idiot.
Naturally, he had a good sense of who might have started it...
"Why can’t a younger brother just give his elder brother a small loan of seven thousand gold? It’s nothing to him—he can easily earn that back in a few months."
If Fabio had heard this, he would have thought:
"Even a hundred million is a big deal, even to the CEO of a large corporation, you idiot."
However, what irritated Albert the most was that his younger brother, who should have been subservient, refused to obey him completely.
He wanted to berate him for not being able to do this simple favor for his elder brother.
"But Duke Visconti and my father-in-law wouldn’t look kindly on berating Fabio over sothing like this."
Even though there was a marriage alliance in place, he wouldn’t face imdiate repercussions.
However, if he didn’t pay back the loan, he’d ruin his reputation as Baron dici.
As a baron, he might be near the top of the noble hierarchy, but counts and dukes held power far beyond his reach.
"Typically, family loans are just a formality."
Among nobles, that was indeed common sense.
But the stipulation was that it was usually an elder brother supporting a younger sibling in tis of hardship.
For an elder brother to extort money from a younger brother and then refuse to repay it was shaful.
"Now that the rumor has spread, I have no choice but to hand over the land..."
Since he had put it in writing, failing to follow through would make him look like a dishonorable fool.
"Fabio, that bastard."
Albert ground his teeth in frustration.
However, he had not yet decided to see his brother as a full-fledged rival.
After all, Fabio had powerful connections, and turning family into foes would be frowned upon among the nobility.
For now, he simply noted this event in his ntal ledger of grievances against his brother.
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