Staying close to Cleo, I had a clerk keeping close notes on the locations of the buttons and procedures to get into the chamber; he daubed some paint on the wall around the cracks until they could be carefully documented and pictured. After the floor was mapped in the small room, guards proceeded to remove the flooring. Moments later, they were bringing up trunks of gold, silver, and jewels.

I looked on, happy at my efforts to recover the treasury of the kingdom. This was much of the remaining amount, and my counting people would be working their abacuses overtime to track this addition. My clerk had the guards take the find to the vault, and we carefully checked to see none was missed.

Smiling, I led Cleo back to my throne room, to a seat at my side. "Cleo, I am so proud of your courage, and of keeping your word in the face of adversity. Now that we have completed our agreements, we need to know where we go from here."

"But first, my dear, how WERE you to contact the people who would have helped your father regain his throne?" Kong Ming waited patiently.