Bang!
Wu Ming strolled leisurely through the crowd as if taking a walk, swinging his sword sheath casually. Each swing sent a farmer sprawling to the ground, unable to rise for quite some time.
“A true knight!”
Seeing this, Lady Amilia leaned weakly against the doorframe, utterly despairing.
She had originally thought Wu Ming was merely a younger son of some noble family, who had seized the opportunity to plot against her husband’s domain. She never imagined that such a young noble could already be a true knight!
In reality, even a genuine knight would find it quite strenuous to fight off dozens of attackers all at once.
However, the difference between farmers and trained warriors was enormous. Moreover, the farmers were essentially restrained, unwilling to fight back. Therefore, even any knight could easily subdue them, just as Wu Ming was doing now.
Hiss!
Finally, Wu Ming unsheathed his sword, gazing at the remaining farmers with a gleam of sharpness in his eyes.
“What on earth gave you the audacity to confront me—a noble sir, a knight who has fought against wildmen, the champion of the Spring Jousting Tournament, and the slayer of the Church’s Glorious Knight William Wallace?”
Of course, due to the inconvenience of transportation, news of the Spring Jousting Tournament’s outcome had not yet reached this area. Otherwise, Wu Ming estimated that taking over would have been much smoother. However, proclaiming it himself still had a certain intimidating effect.
“Now, punish yourselves severely with your hands that dared to disrespect your lord, and kneel to kiss the ground beneath my feet, and I shall forgive your previous disloyalty. Otherwise, your souls will only cry out in hell!”
The flashing sword emphasized the seriousness of his words.
“You are truly a knight! The people need your protection!”
Something that made Amilia even more desperate occurred.
The first to submit was actually Joe, that old warrior.
He knelt on both knees and kissed the ground beneath Wu Ming’s feet, speaking in a devout tone.
As one of the few people on the estate with a broad perspective, he already knew that the lady’s scheme had completely failed. Moreover, this was a dark and dangerous world, and it required a powerful lord to protect the people! A woman, in the end, was simply inadequate!
It was very regrettable, yet it was reality!
“Very well! As punishment, you only need to receive ten lashes, and I shall forgive your past offenses!”
Wu Ming looked toward the side. “Who is willing to carry out the punishment?”
“My lord, I wish to pledge my loyalty to you and become your humble servant!”
Many tenant farmers immediately turned against their former comrades, kneeling down and kissing the ground beneath Wu Ming’s feet.
Amilia completely collapsed emotionally, deeply feeling betrayal. A profound sense of female sorrow enveloped her, even causing her vision to swirl and darken.
She heard her two daughters crying out in alarm before everything went black, and she fainted completely.
…
“Mom!”
“Mom!”
Not knowing how much time had passed, she opened her eyes and saw the furnishings of her bedroom and the anxious faces of her two daughters.
“By the gods… I must have had a terrible nightmare!”
Lady Amilia murmured, “I dreamed that a young devil came to take everything away from me…”
“I’m very sorry… my lady!”
The old butler, with a broken nose and his face wrapped in bandages, stood on one side, reminding her in a distorted voice, “That was probably no nightmare!”
Amilia sighed and half-sat up, only to see Wu Ming.
“It was this… the lord who saved you when you fainted!” the butler continued.
“Alright! You’ve won!”
Amilia said helplessly, “I will leave with my two daughters!”
“My lady, I think you misunderstood my intention!”
Wu Ming smiled.
“Then you’re willing to marry my daughter, or…”
Amilia’s face turned slightly red. “You insist on your previous demand?”
“I indeed need you… as my housekeeper!”
After teasing the beauty enough, Wu Ming finally said.
“A housekeeper?!”
Lady Amilia blinked her eyes, looking somewhat naively surprised.
“Exactly… I need someone familiar with the domain and respected by the people to assist me in managing the estate as my housekeeper. I will pay you a salary, and you and your daughters can continue to live here… Of course, if you are willing, I would be happy to adopt them as my stepdaughters and prepare a generous dowry for each when they grow up. How does that sound?”
It was an unwritten rule among nobles to treat the widows of former lords kindly.
Wu Ming did not want rumors of his being cruel or harsh to spread in noble circles. In contrast, a little romantic gossip was insignificant, yet it was very important.
“I agree!”
Almost without hesitation, Lady Amilia accepted.
After all, she was merely a commoner’s daughter, without any family to rely on. Without the estate, she truly had nowhere else to go.
“Celice, Sissel, come here and meet your godfather!”
She immediately regained her spirit, urging her two daughters to bow to Wu Ming.
Although she knew that doing so would grant Wu Ming guardianship over her daughters, giving him complete authority over them until they reached adulthood, there was nothing she could do about it.
“Godfather!”
The two little girls sweetly called out, causing Beatrice nearby to huff in discontent.
“As for you…”
Wu Ming looked at the pitiful old butler and made a spontaneous decision, demoting him a rank. “You can serve as the assistant butler!”
…
The people of Karos soon learned of an astonishing piece of news—they had a new lord.
This lord was incredibly powerful, a true knight who had even defeated the Church’s Glorious Knight and an entire mercenary company single-handedly—the rumors always exaggerated as they spread.
With such a powerful knight protecting them, they should finally be safe from those accursed bandits and wildmen, right?
After being led by the assistant butler and Joe to swear fealty to the new lord in batches, all the people felt reassured.
The people offered loyalty and taxes to the lord, while the lord was responsible for protecting his subjects. This was a mutual relationship of rights and obligations.
In this dark age, even a cruel lord could attract a continuous stream of peasants seeking safety, as long as he possessed strength.
The harm caused by a lord was insignificant compared to the threats posed by entire groups of wildmen, savage beasts, and perilous environments.
“This is my Karos Domain!”
Wu Ming began touring his domain on horseback, with the assistant butler explaining things beside him.
After completing the tour, he gained a direct understanding of his estate.
The entire Lokas Domain covered nearly a thousand acres, much larger than the typical knight’s fief in the past. Converted, it amounted to nearly four million square meters, or six thousand mu of land.
Of course, most of it was mountainous and hilly terrain, with only about two thousand mu of cultivated farmland.
Across the entire domain, there were ninety tenant farming households and two free families—one skilled in blacksmithing and the other producing a scholar.
In addition to these, the domain also had a water mill, livestock pens, storehouses, and a manorial court. These were all public buildings, nominally belonging to him as the lord.
However, the most crucial aspect was that, as lord, Wu Ming not only owned all the forests, rivers, and pastures, but also had a thousand mu of farmland as his private estate.
The peasants under his rule, or serfs, had to work his land first before tending to their own meager plots.
In fact, even those plots did not belong to the serfs. They were merely allowed to cultivate them as long as they paid their taxes, and the lord could not arbitrarily seize them.
“Calculating this, it’s practically more exploitative than ancient landlords!”
Wu Ming sighed inwardly.
One could say that, except for a few free families with some private property, everything else within the lord’s estate belonged to the lord.
“This system of exploitation is far too inefficient…”
As an experienced cross-time traveler who had undergone modern education, Wu Ming naturally felt dissatisfied with such inefficiency. “It’s like wanting to tie all the serfs to the land and turn all the people into slaves. Why not just implement slavery outright? It’s a regression in history.”
He naturally had many profitable ideas, but all of them required people—skilled artisans who could work for him!
“Now… I’ve already received my knighthood, so I’ve crossed the threshold into the noble circle. Some of my previous plans can now begin…”
After all, it was about developing agriculture, handicrafts, glassmaking, refined salt production, and improving iron forging techniques. Though not entirely mastered, Wu Ming had a good grasp of about seventy to eighty percent of it.
“Of course… first, I must establish my authority!”
The means to make people feel authority were naturally force and bloodshed.
Internally, this would only breed fear and resentment, but externally, it could bring cheers and wealth.
“Joe!”
Wu Ming addressed the old warrior. “Gather all the strong young men in the domain!”
In the manorial court, Wu Ming, like a judge, looked at the many young faces filled with curiosity, reverence, and unease below him and suddenly smiled.
“From today onward, after finishing your daily farm work, you may choose to go to Joe for warrior training. Those who participate will receive an oat bread as a reward after the training!”
“And once the spring plowing is over, I will lead you to fight against the bandits and wildmen in the surrounding areas!”
His words stirred a thousand waves, but he raised his hand, silencing the crowd. “I, as your lord, promise you all that those who perform outstandingly in future battles will be granted the status of free citizens and the opportunity to own their own land!”
Being half a step ahead of the times makes one a genius; a full step ahead makes one a madman!
Although Wu Ming longed to liberate all the serfs on the estate and turn them into free citizens immediately, he knew that was impossible. He had to proceed gradually.
In the future, refinement and specialization would be the major directions, and those required a free population!
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