Chapter 898: Manor and Round Table (Please Collect, Recommend, and Vote for Me) 4400 Words, Please Vote for Me!

After getting the trident, Kai took Mela directly to the UK.

Kingsman's secret base, Les Molay, Yorkshire, England, Asquith Palace of the Earl of Oxford. (This palace is fictitious and does not exist in reality)

It is one of the only two non-religious and non-royal buildings in the UK that has the title of "Palace", and it is also a classic of British gardens. However, compared with another non-religious and non-royal building with the title of "Palace", Asquith Palace is much weaker.

After all, the name of that building is Blenheim Palace. Blenheim Palace, also known as the First Duke, has another name called Churchill Manor. Yes, that Churchill. Blenheim Palace is the residence of the Duke of Marlborough for generations and the birthplace of Winston Churchill.

Speaking of Churchill, we must dig up this legendary prime minister. In fact, it is not true to say how capable Churchill is. This legendary prime minister did a lot of stupid things when he was young. If it were not for his prominent family background, this legend of World War II would have been driven out of politics long ago. Looking at the political career of this prime minister, you will magically find that whenever this guy messes up, he is only fined three glasses of wine. But as long as he gets things done, he will have great credit.

Why should we talk about this Churchill? Because he is needed to introduce the owner of the Asquith Palace above, Earl Herbert Henry Asquith. This is also a prime minister, but compared to Churchill's glory, Asquith is much more miserable. His prime ministerial career was not smooth. Although he served as prime minister for eight years, he happened to encounter World War I. The war required a completely different government. He could only have one purpose, and all other policies must unconditionally obey this purpose; the war requires ministers to be administrators first, and then politicians. A wartime prime minister needs not only wisdom, but also energy. He will not be blamed for losing an election, but he will be blamed for losing a battle.

The military failure in the Dardanelles during World War I made this prime minister conservative and criticized. Well, the planner and commander of this battle was the Churchill mentioned above... It's amazing, right? Although Churchill, the direct person responsible, was criticized by many people, he only lost the position of Minister of the Navy, but he still served as the Minister without Portfolio in the Cabinet (a ministerial official who does not specialize in the affairs of a certain department). Even this Churchill was not happy, so he resigned and ran to France to become a battalion commander. But Prime Minister Asquith was in big trouble. First, the press criticized the minister, and first of all, Asquith was criticized. The press propaganda was full of resentment and malice, reaching an astonishing level.

Then his political ally and good friend Arthur Barr backstabbed the old man who had just lost his son (Asquith's son Raymond died in the first few hours of the Battle of the Somme in France). The failure of the war, the resentment of the people, the death of his son, the betrayal of his allies, and the targeting of his political enemies almost made the old man unable to recover.

He left the political arena in disgrace and never returned.

But this does not mean that he gave up all his struggles, perhaps for revenge, or perhaps to help Britain win the war. The former prime minister found Alfred's grandfather, Kay's first butler, Old Alfred. At that time, Old Alfred was forming an agent organization loyal to the Knight King.

Asquith donated all his property and established Kingsman.

Kingsman's English 'King's Man' literally means the king's man... ah, it is the king's guard, or it can also be called the royal agent. The king here does not refer to the King of England, but the Knight King. Naturally, the Asquith family's estate in Lesmoley, Yorkshire, became Kingsman's property.

Speaking of which, the Asquith family is not a traditional aristocratic family. On the contrary, Asquith's life is quite inspiring.

Asquith was born in Yorkshire on September 12, 852. His father was a small wool merchant and a non-conformist Protestant. When he died, the child had just reached school age; his mother was frail and sickly; Asquith went to London at the age of 12, lived with one of his uncles, and went to London Business District Middle School. Later, he took a scholarship from there to enter Balliol College, Oxford University. Balliol College was a large nursery for cultivating politicians and administrative officials at that time and later. There, Asquith's academic performance remained excellent, and most of the rewards were won by him. Later, he became a lawyer and began to emerge, accumulated a lot of wealth, and began to get involved in business. And quickly became one of the richest people in the UK.

Then he entered politics and began to rise rapidly. It can be said that if we ignore his later years, he is definitely a template for the protagonist of a novel.

After the war, he was conferred the title of Earl of Oxford and Earl of Asquith. A few months later, he was awarded the Order of the Garter. This was a little comfort for his miserable later years.

Back to Asquith Palace, after Asquith was conferred the title of Earl of Oxford, Asquith's manor in his hometown was called Asquith Palace. The history of this manor is very long, dating back to the time of Queen Anne. At that time, the Earl of Oxford was Robert Harry, who was a close confidant of Queen Anne. After the death of Queen Anne, the Earl of Oxford was liquidated, and he was exiled and imprisoned by the Hanover family. This manor was built when Robert Harry was in power.

By the time Asquith became one of the richest men in England, the Harry family had declined, and Asquith used some means to buy the manor from the Harry family.

The manor is located in a wide river valley, surrounded by abundant water systems, and some rivers intersect to form a swamp. The pasture and the main building are connected by a large arch bridge, the arch of the main bridge is 31 meters wide. Later, a dam was built on the Architect River to form a large area of ​​water, so the bridge became two lakes with curved edges.

In the UK, sculptures are rarely used to decorate gardens that imitate natural scenery, but Asquith Palace is a French Baroque-style garden where sculptures can be seen everywhere. Looking down from the height of the residence, the garden layout is neat and orderly, and the plants, passages and decorations in it are in full view. The west side fully presents the gorgeous overall layout of the garden. In the distance, there is a garden designed by Brown that reflects the natural scenery of England; by the lake, there is an Italian terraced garden designed by Duchene, which also reflects the French geometric garden style. There is also a "waterscape garden" built on the steps on the west side of the official residence. It was built in the 18th century and has a total of 13 parts. There is a fountain in the middle and in each of the four corners of the waterscape garden, and boxwood, statues and decorative walls are scattered in the waterscape garden. 13 fountains form a small stepped waterfall that flows into the middle of the waterscape garden. The water jets stir up layers of waves, which looks lively. These gardens were built to further beautify the environment of the high house, and the colorful flowers are pleasing to the eye. The scattered boxwood replaces the flowers, like a relief on the colorful sand. The white stone frame around the pool outlines the boxwood very clearly. The use of water makes the garden full of movement and also reflects the power of human invention and creation.

The garden designer built two narrow lakes by building dams. At the junction of the two lakes, a huge arch bridge leads straight to the courtyard of the mansion, and the other end of the bridge connects to the pasture on the other side of the river. The lines outlined by green plants on the atrium, main road, small bridge and lawn on the opposite bank form a straight line, integrating the surrounding vast countryside, gardens and courtyards. The casually decorated oak forest, lake, rose garden and small waterfall reflect the natural rural style of British gardens. The sculptures, fountains and neatly trimmed plants on the large lawn have the characteristics of rigorous layout and preference for geometric figures of French Baroque gardens.

In short, this is a manor that can be called a model of European architecture.

When Meila saw it for the first time, she was stunned for a moment. The Atlanteans didn't pay much attention to the land people. Quite a few Atlanteans didn't know what the land people looked like. They only knew that they would be drowned... This is like humans seeing monkeys without clothes, which is a symbol of inferiority.

Although Meila is regarded as a dove and advocates peace. But it's nonsense to say how much she knows about humans.

In fact, when she first saw humans, she was surprised that humans wore clothes. But when she came into contact with humans with the negotiation team, she found that humans not only wore clothes, but also had quite good clothing styles.

As for the manor in front of her, Meila had never thought about it. When she was in New York, she despised the taste of New York architecture. She felt that those humans had no taste at all to build such high buildings, and it was not safe. After all, humans are not Atlanteans. Atlanteans live in the sea. It doesn't matter whether the buildings are high or not. It is impossible to fall to death.

But the manor in front of her really shocked Meila. There are majestic and spectacular scenery on the seabed, the beauty of coral reefs, and the quiet and gorgeous deep-sea luminous waters are enough to shock humans for hundreds of years. But the manor in front of her gave Meila another sense.

This manor combines natural and cultural landscapes, harmonious and full of carved beauty.

"Is this a human building?" Meila stood on the hillside outside the manor and overlooked the layout of the entire manor. Under the warm autumn sun, the entire manor seemed to be covered with a filter, and it was beautiful no matter how you looked at it. "So beautiful!"

"Thank you for the compliment." Kai said insincerely.

To be honest, Meila's sense of superiority that she exuded all the time actually made Kai quite unhappy. Yes, Kai admitted that the civilization of the Atlanteans was indeed stronger than that of humans, but there was no need for you to emphasize it all the time, right?

What made Kai even more unhappy was that Meila didn't do it on purpose most of the time. But it was that kind of superiority that came from the heart and did not have any malice that made Kai feel heartbroken. If he deliberately found fault, it would be simple. He could just confront her directly. Unlike now, if he really confronted her, it would make him look narrow-minded...

"Let's go." Ah Fu had already brought people to greet him.

Ah Fu had already retired from Arthur's position. Now the person who took over the title of 'Arthur' was the former 'Galahad' Harry Hart. Harry Hart was different from the previous Kingsman agent. He was not above the nobility.

The previous Kingsman agents, including Ah Fu, were all aristocratic supremacists. They believed that bloodline could guarantee the purity of agents. Agents of noble origin were well-educated, knowledgeable, and knew how to use their own advantages. As for agents of common origin... they believed that agents of common origin were only qualified to do some logistical work, such as the position of 'Merlin'.

For example, Kai's current gardener is Merlin. He himself was of common origin, so he could only serve as the logistical position 'Merlin'.

This Merlin really wanted to go out on the field, but he was restricted by Kingsman's rules and had no chance to go out on the field.

After Harry Hart came to power, he started to change this rule. If it was in the past, even if Harry Hart became "Arthur", he would not be able to shake this rule. After all, this rule has been running smoothly for a hundred years and has been proven to be effective.

This is not discrimination, but reality. Candidates of noble origin have all received a good elite education.

It is unfair to compare some of the elites with a group of civilian candidates who have come out of a happy education.

Fortunately, with the progress of the times, this gap is narrowing. If it were a few decades ago, this gap would be more obvious. However, civilians are not without advantages, that is, there are more people! There are more choices!

Of course, this is not enough to convince those traditional agents.

But Kai supported Harry Hart's reform.

There is no problem with this. Kai is the master of Kingsman. All ace agents must drink the water of the Holy Grail before they can get the title.

This gives those ace agents superhuman physiques, but it also comes at a price.

That is, their souls will belong to the owner of the Holy Grail-Kay!

This relationship is much closer and more effective than those verbal allegiance!

It can even be said that all ace agents are Kai's servants!

Kai grew up under the red flag and hated this kind of class discrimination, not to mention that it also involved the superiority and inferiority of bloodline. For a nation that believes in "Are kings, princes, generals and ministers of different species?", using bloodline to divide superiority and inferiority is simply a joke.

Changes must be made! During the First World War, the nobles had more and better seedlings due to education problems. At that time, the Holy Grail had little energy due to Kai's disappearance, and could only implement elite strategies, so it was fine to do so. But now it's time, and if you hold on to this outdated thinking, you will be eliminated sooner or later.

After a round of cumbersome greetings, everyone came to the underground base.

Kai didn't really like this set of cumbersome etiquette. He planned to change it together, but everyone, including Harry Hart, opposed it, and their attitude was quite firm.

Even Eggsy, who was born in the lower class (Eggsy inherited Harry Hart's title of "Galahad"), opposed it.

Because they believe that gentlemen know how to fight better than gangsters, and etiquette is the essence and characteristics of the ace agent. If this is gone, the spirit of the ace agent will be gone.

After arriving at the underground base, in a huge space, an oversized round table was placed in the middle.

That is the 'Chalk Shield', which is also the round table of the Knights of the Round Table!

For this artifact, all the ace agents treat it like a pilgrimage. This is a genuine round table of the Knights of the Round Table!

This round table is very large, enough for 500 people to sit together without feeling any crowding.

But Kingsman does not have 500 ace agents now.

So far, even with 'Arthur', there are only 13 ace agents.

Meila stared at the dark and inconspicuous, but huge wooden round table. She felt an unprecedented surging power from it.

Just when Meila was about to ask carefully, suddenly a round door composed of orange-yellow sparks appeared out of thin air in the space.

A bald woman walked out.

The Supreme Sorcerer Ancient One.