Iron Harvest: When Farming Becomes Conquest

Chapter 40 - 40 10 Rebellion, Nobles, Salt, Slave_2

?40: Chapter 10: Rebellion, Nobles, Salt, Slave_2 40: Chapter 10: Rebellion, Nobles, Salt, Slave_2 Roman admitted he had made a mistake, but there were not just one mistake in this era!

That was also why he wanted to strengthen the land.

He intended to establish all forms of order, standards, and models, creating a social system based on his ideas.

From now on.

If he said it could be done, it would be done even if it seemed impossible!

If he said it could not be done, it still could not be done even if it seemed possible!

This was a permanent solution, just like what Roman was currently doing.

Now he had no prestige, no foundation, only the status of a noble, and he would never allow anyone to undermine it.

What could have been negotiated now turned into bloody sacrifices despite the preciousness of the labor.

Roman alone could not cultivate thousands of acres, he still had to rely on them.

Only death could maintain the authority of the nobles.

Seth could only suggest actions to him.

Dare you teach me what to do?

In fact, when other peasants had food in their homes, bowls, and stomachs, they would not risk their lives to desperately fight against Roman, even though Roman had stripped them of all their land.

This was the weakness of the peasant class.

Unless they faced great disasters and famine, killing dozens or hundreds of people, they would not come together, storm into the compound, and throw the landlord into the cauldron.

Most were just ordinary people.

In this era, you could rob them of their property, strip them of their land, and rape their women, and do whatever you pleased.

As long as you didn’t threaten their basic survival and provided them with free meals.

In three years, you could be crowned king!

They wouldn’t even cheat or be sly.

Because they couldn’t cultivate more land, their hopes for this year rested on those two thousand acres.

They cared more about the yield of these lands than Roman did.

The daily free lavish lunch and that promise, for now, were not false.

Once Roman could not provide lunch and the promise could not be fulfilled.

The conflict between the exploitative class and the exploited class would erupt like never before.

…

…

Everything returned to normal.

Roman resumed his ceaseless tree cutting.

With the improvement of his Collection Experience, his skills in felling trees grew more adept and took less time.

Basically, it only took a little over half an hour to fell a tall tree.

On the fourth day of the tree-cutting work, Roman had cleared a large area at the edge of the forest.

It was also on this day that Seth arrived at Origin Manor with a merchant.

Previously, Sige Town had no lord, but now it did.

Roman felt it necessary to meet these foreign merchants who came along the Bro River to Sige Town.

It was related to the development issues of Sige Town.

This merchant was probably in his early thirties, slightly thin, wearing a dark brown robe, with a moustache, and a money pouch hanging on his belt at his waist.

Roman asked, “Are you a Salt Merchant?”
Daken felt very ambivalent.

He hadn’t expected such a change to happen in such a short time in Sige Town.

His merchant ship had arrived at the dock of Sige Town, intending to do business with the residents as usual.

Then he learned that there was a new lord who was very domineering, had taken back all the land of Sige Town’s residents, allowing them to only cultivate two thousand acres, and had also killed all opposition.

This lord was insane!

He was about to flee when he was stopped by the guards of Sige Town.

An old deacon claimed that the local lord wanted to see him.

Then, he was brought here.

“I am not just a Salt Merchant; my ship also carries wool, wine, medicinal herbs, candles, cheese, and butter…” Daken honestly stated, without hiding anything.

If the following events really took the worst turn, he feared he would go directly bankrupt and bear a huge debt.

Because those goods were not solely his, there were also investors behind him.

Next, he could only file an appeal to the Royal Court through an insurance clause by the chamber of commerce, but considering that the local lord’s surname was Riptide, the appeal of the chamber of commerce might be indefinitely delayed or outright ignored.

Roman was oblivious to Daken’s thoughts, knowing that this grocer was very nervous.

So Roman’s demeanor was very mild: “How much salt do you have on your ship?”
“Just over five hundred pounds.”
“What price could it fetch?”
Daken realized that Roman had no intention of seizing the goods; otherwise, he would not have been polite to him, as this barbaric age had no concept of courtesy before force.

“One pound of salt is one copper coin, and the further north you go, the more expensive it gets.

If you reach the Northern Land or Igo Land, one pound of salt could fetch at least two copper coins or more.”
To be exact, it would be close to three copper coins, or it might even be possible to trade half a sheep for a pound of salt.

The Northern Land was known as a bitterly cold place, second only to the homeland of the North Ice Pirates, Igo.

But if one ventures deeper, the corresponding risks and journey would also drastically increase.

Daken had no plans to go to the Northern Land, let alone cross the sea to Igo; he just sold off scattered quantities along the Bro River, with Sige Town being one of the stops.

He passed through Sige Town every half year, and could sell tens of pounds of salt here each time; though not much, it spared him from paying any trade tax.

This was enough to justify the risk.

These salts were some of the more valuable goods on his ship; he had exerted great effort to open up a channel for buying salt—the production areas for salt were limited, not all merchants could become Salt Merchants, and most of the sales channels for edible salt were controlled by some big merchants, he could only get a small share.

Despite the high prices, as an essential product, faced with the huge market demand, it was usually in short supply, so he had no worries about being unable to sell it.