industrial lord

Chapter 515 Who Should You Thank
"Dang Dang Dang!"

The village chief struck the gong, and the villagers who were getting off work in the evening gathered at the drying yard, waiting for the leader to speak.

Baron Turgot didn't listen to what the village chief said. He had been following the caravan for a month and the process was the same in every village.

A stage has been set up on the drying yard, a stove has been placed next to it, and the noodles have been cooked.

This village has been incorporated into the Duchy of Wessen for just over a year. It was originally a knight's territory, but now it belongs to Frederick.

The villagers' thinking was still stuck in the old serfdom era. They did whatever the village chief told them to do. Soon, all the villagers came to the drying yard under the arrangement of the village chief.

They washed their hands in a daze, took a bowl and a fork, and made a bowl of noodles on the stove. They then added hot soybean oil with fried onions, ordinary soy sauce, and shredded tofu to the noodles.

Then everyone stood there holding the fragrant noodles, at a loss as to what to do. Even the bravest ones just swallowed their saliva.

Ahlers was used to this situation and said to the village chief, "Miller, let them eat."

Miller shouted to the villagers: "This is what Grand Duke Wesson is treating you to. Come and eat it quickly!"

Upon hearing this, the villagers immediately started to eat voraciously. No one thought about why the master told them to eat noodles. They just ate as he told them.

The noodles were made of pure white flour without any other grains. Many serfs had been growing wheat for more than a dozen generations, but today was the first time they ate flour made from wheat.

The soybean oil in the noodles has a bit of a bean smell, but it doesn’t matter anymore. Eating oil means having strength, but I only get to eat it a few times throughout the year.

Not to mention the salty and fresh taste of soy sauce and tofu shreds, that was a world they had never been exposed to.

Baron Turgot scoffed at this, saying that every village did the same thing and how much flour was wasted.

After all the villagers, adults and children, had licked their bowls clean and those who were choking had been rescued, Miller jumped onto the stage and asked loudly, "Are the noodles delicious?"

Some villagers said sparsely: "It's delicious~"

"I can't hear you!" Miller yelled, "Did you feed the noodles to the dog just now? Why do you have no energy to eat them?"

“Are the noodles delicious?!”

This time half of the villagers answered.

"I still can't hear you!" Miller looked very angry, "Speak louder!"

This time, the villagers all said it was delicious, and at least everyone spoke up.

"I still can't hear you!" Miller stamped his feet angrily.

After several attempts, the villagers finally shouted out in unison: "Delicious!"

Miller looked very satisfied and continued to say loudly: "Grand Duke Wesson treated you to such delicious noodles, and you still don't say 'thank you Grand Duke Wesson'?!"

The villagers roared in the same breath: "Thank you, Grand Duke Weisen!"

"One more time," Miller continued, "Who do we have to thank?!"

The villagers then shouted thank you to Grand Duke Wessen ten times before they stopped.

Miller continued, "Do you still want to eat noodles like this?"

Baron Turgot curled his lips amid a chorus of "want" voices, wondering what was the point of shouting these things all day long. Could he make people loyal just by shouting?

He didn't know that this kind of constant slogan shouting is indeed very effective for the farmers whose brains are not very flexible. Many hair salons, supermarkets, restaurants and other places in Frederick's hometown have used this method to train many young people who have just arrived in the city. Even illegal pyramid schemes and unscrupulous businessmen who cheat the elderly to buy things will use this method.

Miller looked very satisfied, and then said loudly: "Think about what life was like in the past. How much food was left in the grain jar at the end of the year? How much will there be this year?!"

"Red Nose, yes, that's you, come up!"

The man with rosacea standing at the front didn't expect to be called out and was at a loss for a moment.

Miller jumped off the stage and dragged him back onto the stage.

This man with a red nose, messy gray hair, wrinkles all over his face, and a slightly hunched back, doesn't look like he's only in his early thirties.

Miller asked him, "Tell everyone loudly, how much food did your family of three have before?"

Red Nose's legs were shaking so badly that he stammered, "Yes... yes... a... a jar of oats and half... half a jar of beans."

After Miller became the village chief in Wessen, he visited every household. The grain jars they made of pottery or hollowed-out tree trunks had a relatively uniform capacity. One jar could hold about 300 kilograms of oats or rye, and half a jar of beans was about 150 kilograms.

The annual food ration for the Red Nose family of three is 300 kilograms of oats and 150 kilograms of mixed beans. In addition, there is a large piece of salt and less than two kilograms of lard. Meat, eggs and milk are only available in dreams, and they have to pick wild vegetables while chopping wood.

Everyone in the village is the same as him. They can only eat about 80% full during the busy farming days of the year. The rest of the time they have to go hungry.

After he finished speaking, Miller said to him, "How much food do you have at home this year? Tell me loudly!"

When talking about the red nose, he stopped panicking and immediately said excitedly: "This year, my family has a jar of wheat, a jar of beans, and half a jar of flour as white as snow!!!"

Miller asked again: "Is that all?" "No, no!" Red Nose continued excitedly, "I sold the other flour and cheese and bought new clothes and shoes for the whole family!"

After he finished speaking, he patted the gray cloth clothes on his body. These were the first new clothes in his family in half a century.

Miller asked him again: "Was it possible to live like this before?"

Red Nose immediately shook his head: "No, no, it's only a dream."

Miller said to him loudly: "Remember, this good day was brought by Grand Duke Wesson. Why don't you thank Grand Duke Wesson?"

Baron Turgot took the noodles brought by his servant behind the stage and slurped them, and what happened next was exactly the same.

Miller called a few more villagers to the stage to repeat the previous conversation.

The fastest thing that changed after the Principality of Wessen occupied the village last year was taxation.

In the past, the serfs in the village could only keep some food for themselves, and the rest would be taken away. Now, they have to keep some food and then collect 30% of the remaining food as rent. For a while, the villagers’ grain jars were not enough.

After several villagers stepped down, Miller continued, "Don't think that you have enough food at home now. You eat less than my daughter!"

"Let me tell you, my daughter is the first woman in the Principality of Wessen who can drive a tractor. She was even featured in the newspapers!"

"She can eat meat every day at home now, a pork elbow every five days!"

"My former neighbor now works in a steel factory and can eat a chicken drumstick a day. When he gets tired of chicken drumsticks, he eats pig's trotters instead!"

"They have all been to school and studied. If you want your children to have meat to eat every day in the future, send them to school!"

The youth enrollment rate is a key statistic in the assessment of village heads, and the person has a veto over the village heads’ year-end bonuses, so almost all village heads are paying attention to this matter.

Miller finished the simple mobilization meeting and said at the end: "Tonight, our Grand Duke Wei Sen will not only treat everyone to delicious noodles, but also to music and drama!"

"This used to be something only the gentlemen could enjoy, but now you can enjoy it too. Who should you thank?!"

After a thunderous round of thanks, tonight's performance began with a chorus.

“May my God bless Archduke Wesson,

Our good lord Frederick!
Frederick is in good health! "

Miller pulled the villagers who were sitting on the ground up, kicking and dragging them. When singing the song, everyone had to stand up and sing along, and even if they couldn't sing, they had to hum along.

The villagers can sit down only after the singing is finished, and then the drama will begin.

The content of the drama is very simple, it is about the daily life of a family in a rural area, interspersed with life details such as washing hands before and after meals, not urinating or defecating anywhere, and throwing garbage into the trash can, as well as farming knowledge such as how to farm scientifically and apply fertilizer in moderation. By the way, it also popularizes knowledge about taxation, justice, military service, etc.

Practice has shown that such dramas are easier for the villagers, who are all illiterate, to remember.

After the more than one-hour drama ended, various departments took the stage to give speeches to further popularize laws and regulations on taxation, education, military service, etc.

The next morning, the accompanying doctor gave all the villagers a physical examination and delivered medicine to some sick villagers.

Miller went to Alles to discuss something. Baron Turgot was eavesdropping not far away, but he didn't hide anything from him.

Miller said, "I will take your car to town tomorrow to talk to the Agricultural Technology Station."

Alles smiled and replied, "Sure, you can sit on the roof or the bottom of the car, it's up to you."

Miller ignored his joke and asked him, "Have you heard about the flame grass that is being promoted recently?"

"I heard that they were brought back from the southern continent. They don't need much water and grow a lot."

"More than half of the land in our village is difficult to irrigate. I plan to plant crops there and raise pigs or cattle."

After recalling for a moment, Alles said, "I have heard of some of them. The grass is one or two stories high, and the seeds on the top are bright red when they mature."

"I remember that the seeds had to be soaked in running water overnight or boiled in boiling water for a few minutes before being fed to pigs and cattle, otherwise they would be poisonous."

"The same goes for the straw. You can't eat it directly. You have to pile it up and ferment it for a month. That's just right for the winter."

"You are from Lizi Village. You should be familiar with the preferential policies for trial planting of new crops. You can apply to the Ministry of Agriculture for it."

Baron Turgot despised Miller's decision. He thought that he would have to wait for others to grow the new crops for two years before trying to grow them himself. Otherwise, if the crops died, it would be all over.

That night, Alers and his colleagues treated the villagers to another meal of noodles, and then began to teach them to sing propaganda songs such as "Hand-Washing Song" and "Paying Rent". Even a scholar with artistic talent like Baron Turgot couldn't stand it after listening to them for a month.

Early the next morning, the convoy continued on its way, arriving at another nearby village before dusk and repeating what it had done in that village.

The team left, but the influence remained in the village. Many villagers kept talking about the good things about Grand Duke Wessen.

So Frederick sneezed all over the north.

(End of this chapter)