#earldom

The dragon is not a perfect longwings, but it is blue, and holding a grenade to symbolize the guns and bombs. Four yellow stripes on green for an Admiral of the Air. Golden Laurels for Victory. A ducal coronet above. Jane is extremely mad that the College of Arms said she couldn’t swear in her motto, and refuses to use Latin or French until someone suggests “Excidium.” The dragon himself is quite pleased with this, although wishes his portrait was better. But the poor College of Arms people are already so sad about his hastily put together arms that Jane just left it.

March 17, 1886

As I've posted before, there's actually a date for it, mentioned in a letter from the queen: March 17th.

Since our earl emphasizes how quickly he and Sebastian trained to properly fill their roles, this has got to still be 1886, just a couple months after making the contract and returning to the manor.

Kazama Hideo Densetsu Tale 72 ：One Million Years Dungeon

Inspired by Earl of Lemongrab from Adventure time. Villain series no. 36. 

While doing research for an upcoming fanfic… I am reminded of a couple things, regarding our earl officially gaining that title:

He and Sebastian learned their respective roles in a mere 2 months. Since the demon contract was made ~ January 20, 1886…

…and our earl officially gains the title March 17, 1886 (which happens to be St. Patrick’s Day. Is there any significance to that? 🤔)

I’m also reminded of this confirmation: As soon as the Phantomhives were killed/displaced from their estate, the entire earldom was, in fact, relinquished to the crown. Victoria could do with the manor, the estate, the Phantomhive coffers, and even the surrounding village as she pleased in the three months she controlled them. (Dec 14/15, 1885 — Mar 17, 1886)

And I bet she did as much as she possibly could. I still say that could be one of the reasons for the attack on the Phantomhives to begin with. Perhaps Vincent didn’t send as much money or as many workers to London for the Tower Bridge project as the queen wanted, and one way to get the money and the workers was to have direct control over them.

I mean… the estate was apparently having some money issues, due to cheaper prices on American goods coming into the country. That might have started before Vincent’s death. Vincent said the earldom only prospers because of its people. And in ch132, he specifically states how bridges and ditches take a lot of money and physical labor or “help”. So, this is reason enough for Vincent to not send the funding and manpower the queen likely requested of him. He needed all the resources he had — money and laborers — to stay on the Phantomhive estate and in the surrounding village.

As our earl later (in ch85) tells Sebastian, regarding Tower Bridge not being complete, people have their own priorities. I believe Vincent tried to put his family and the earldom ahead of the crown, and that would have gotten him into trouble from time to time.

Plus, take note of Tower Bridge’s timeline in the manga. Plans laid out in 1875, the year the twins were born. Hardly anything for ten whole years. Construction finally begins in 1886. (In 1889, Sebastian says “3 years ago”.) And this kid returns to the manor to find that the manor itself isn’t the only thing in ruins. The family finances are poor, and the village is suffering, too. I don’t think it’s just about competition from foreign markets. Perhaps that’s what our earl (and later real Ciel) was led to believe? I really do expect to find out the queen was funneling money and even moving people from the Phantomhive estate and earldom to her beloved Tower Bridge project. Don’t forget she built it as a monument to Prince Albert, after all….

Ok! Well, someone snagged the entire chapter online and sent me the url to it. Thanks!

It’s a longer chapter than we’ve had in a while, and I wanted to post the thing, so it’s gonna take two posts.

Some of this wasn’t in the first spoilers I posted here. Looks like we have 18 pages (not including the outer cover art page and the credits.

Real Ciel’s feelings?

There might be a level of jealousy now, since our earl had “taken” what real Ciel considered his, but I think there has always been envy. That envy goes both ways. Our earl envied numerous things about real Ciel, like his good health, his default as the heir, and possibly even the fact there was a girl lined up to be his wife. Real Ciel’s life was basically planned out for him.

But there’s one major thing real Ciel might have always envied about our earl: the “freedom” of not having to fill their father’s shoes. Real Ciel felt tethered by expectations. Even the prospect of helping his younger twin get a toy store started was only slightly helpful to quell his desire to shirk his future responsibilities as earl and watchdog. And, honestly, inheriting those responsibilities might have made him less interested and less able, over time, to help his younger twin. Emotionally, financially….

Even though Rachel told him that his younger twin might need help with his future endeavors, idk if he realizes what a struggle it could be for his younger twin to make it in the world, since he wasn’t planning to live in the manor, wouldn’t receive an inheritance (possibly a small allowance), wouldn’t have a title, wouldn’t have much in the way of status, and wouldn’t even have the luxury of an automatic wife. Let’s face it: he’d be expected to find a woman to marry, even if he didn’t want to; the pressure would be there.

And now, real Ciel has all of those lost things back. He’s even come to realize his younger twin did a good job managing the estate (with servants’ help, of course)… even bringing the estate back from the brink of financial ruin. Would real Ciel have done so well? Railways and other transportation would have been a sound investment, but only if he knew what he was doing. Would he have anyone as shrewd about business deals as Sebastian? Tanaka would be useful, of course, but what does he know of innovation? I’m pretty sure Sebastian’s demonic abilities are a big part of why our earl’s endeavors have been so successful. Our earl is a strong thinker, for sure, but Sebastian is the ultimate doer. It’s a must with “impossibly” short deadlines.

So there are still things that real Ciel might envy, namely things like a demon who does as commanded. Doesn’t really help that this same demon devoured his soul. He must still wish for his soul back, even if his own cinematic records have been altered to give him other goals. And that might make him wish revenge specifically against Sebastian.

He wants (completely misguided) revenge against his younger twin, even though he’s already reclaimed his birthright and seems to have ordered Tanaka to shut down Funtom’s production. (I’m hoping that Tanaka is actually keeping it going.)

Despite practically proclaiming war against his own twin, real Ciel still wants his brother to be near. This might actually have something to do with their souls being similar!

Two things real Ciel still isn’t too interested in? Managing the estate as earl and presenting himself to the queen to take up the reins as queen’s watchdog…. He took the titles from the younger brother who actually earned them, but he doesn’t seem well prepared or enthusiastic to fill the roles.

There are some interesting things going on here.

For one thing, Bard has been at Phantomhive Manor for several days, recuperating, but we still don’t know how Sebastian got him from Arizona to England or how long it took. We don’t even know what month it is. We can only assume it’s still 1887.

Then you have the fact that our earl didn’t know Bard was going to fill the role of chef, even though he must have given Sebastian the order to go and get him... right? Sheesh, we don’t even know how Sebastian found Bard.

We do now know that the official role of chef needs to be filled in order to meet some requirement to “restore the earldom”. Our earl would prefer a French or Italian chef, but he’s more concerned with how food tastes than who makes it. Bard, on the other hand, will eat anything he’s determined won’t kill him.

Our earl knows Bard had been living rough as a soldier and had been following harsh orders to kill and destroy without mercy, but it’s interesting he’s specifically warning him not to burn the food.

Looks like the requirement has more to do with how many senior staff members there are, even though they have hardly any staff at all.

Our earl is nearly 12 by this time, but Bard guesses he’s barely 10, so this is yet another reminder that our earl hadn’t really grown since he was 10.

And this kid! So different from our earl. He’s probably about 10 (looks like a younger Finny)... and the boy might actually be Bard’s son. Here’s the kid in ch176 vs the son Bard said (ch173, at the sanatorium) left him; his wife and son left him because of PTSD episodes (and he drank a lot).