Under the direct attention of the Eldest Princess herself, a thorough investigation within the Empire's government quickly commenced.

Jointly led by the Military Intelligence Office and the Imperial Intelligence Department, a comprehensive investigation into various issues in the slums of the outer city was conducted.

Indeed, it seemed somewhat ostentatious to make a great show of force, but this was not merely a part of rousing the snakes in the grass.

Perfikot had already assigned the Brotherhood and the church to secretly investigate the situation in the slums. Meanwhile, the government's high-profile investigation into streetlights and other issues would significantly distract those with ulterior motives, causing them to overlook the real focus and instead concentrate on the overt investigations.

Of course, Perfikot also hoped to uncover something, at least regarding the streetlights in the slums of the outer city being turned into alchemical creations for collecting souls and resentment. There simply must be an explanation for this matter.

After all, Langton is the capital of the Empire, and for such things to be openly set up, to say there are no issues among the government departments is an unbelievable lie even for ghosts.

So, for a time, strictly thorough inspections were carried out in all departments within Langton City that could possibly be involved, ensuring no suspicious personnel were overlooked.

Whether it was the person in charge of approving this project initially, the official who proposed the project, or the staff involved in the project, everyone was investigated by the intelligence department. Some individuals with significant suspicions were even taken away for specialized questioning.

Nevertheless, after a thorough investigation, almost all the evidence and clues indicated that there were no issues in the governmental approval process for this project.

"Is this the result of a week's worth of your investigation?" Looking at the report submitted by the intelligence department, Perfikot couldn't help but laugh in anger: "Don't you feel there's anything wrong with this report you've submitted?"

It wasn't that Perfikot was nitpicking or targeting them; it was simply that the report submitted was indeed absurd.

The records and investigation reports submitted seemed fine at first glance, and all testimonies and records indicated this was a perfectly normal municipal construction project.

However, upon closer inspection, one would find that all the submitted materials were so normal it bordered on the ridiculous.

Normal application submissions, normal approval processes, normal fund allocations, normal procurement, normal construction, normal acceptance, normal post-maintenance...

At first glance, everything seemed fine, but this was precisely the biggest problem.

Can you believe that in an era transitioning from feudalism to capitalism, a municipal project had no corruption, where all processes followed due procedure, with no one embezzling or taking bribes, and no one skimming profits?

Since when were the bureaucrats and nobles of the Empire so clean and honest?

No matter whether others believe it or not, at least Perfikot didn't believe that in all the many processes involving this project, not a single step had an issue.

While such a possibility is not entirely zero, its probability is akin to sprinkling a handful of rice on a keyboard and having a dove peck out a novel, nearly impossible.

Even conceding that in all the processes involved in this project, no imperial officials engaged in corruption and they all diligently performed their duties, various issues would still appear in the project itself.

For example, submitting a report typically involves some time delay in the normal approval process.

Because the approvals of this era were still in the era of paper documents, all processes depended on manual handling, so some time delay due to human factors during approval was the norm.

Thus, in theory, an approval process that could be completed in a week often took a month or even longer.

To complete all processes within a month would even be considered fast.

However, in the investigation report before Perfikot, all the approval processes were completed within the theoretically shortest time.

How could this not make Perfikot angry? This was simply an insult to her intelligence, and even with her crown on, she had difficulty controlling her emotions.

Similarly, this unmistakably indicated that there was a mastermind behind it, who didn't even bother using relatively reasonable means to hide themselves, but instead chose this way to insult Perfikot's intelligence to tell her they were the ones who did it.

How could this not make Perfikot angry?

However, she ultimately restrained her emotions, didn't truly lose her temper, but threw back the investigation report: "I'll give you three more days. If, after three days, what you submit is still this kind of waste paper, I'll make you eat it bit by bit!"

After saying this, Perfikot didn't care about the ugly expressions and the eagerness to speak on the faces of the two intelligence department heads and waved for them to quickly leave.

After dismissing the two intelligence department heads, Perfikot then looked toward the office window, speaking to the 'empty' windowsill: "Mr. Ezio, next time could you kindly use the door?"

"Too many guards outside the front door, I'm not used to it." With Ezio's voice, his figure appeared beside the windowsill, evidently having entered through the side window used for ventilation.

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