The cold wind blew the ground, swaying the grass stems of the fields. The sky is gloomy and the floating earth is flying, forming a series of tiny tornadoes. Farmer Bailai raised his hand to cover the biting tide, and carried his farm tools in the fields.
This winter is extremely cold, and the anger of the Goddess of Frost is getting stronger day by day. But the sky never snowed. This is the worst situation, which means that next spring there will be a lack of water for snowmelt to gather.
The farmers’ faces and hands are greased to avoid dry and cracked skin. But their bare skin was still red from the cold. Many people have frostbite on their fingers, which are swollen like carrots.
"Get to work."
When he reached the ground, the foreman stepped out to divide the tasks.
"We have to dig a trench of fifty meters today, and the amount of earthwork cannot be discounted at all. By next spring, this wasteland can be irrigated and planted with more grain."
The farmers were dressed in ragged but thick clothes, and listened with sad but calm expressions. The wasteland under their feet has no ridges, potholes, and rocks.
This is not a good field, it can be seen everywhere in the north, and even weeds cannot grow. It takes a lot of effort to cultivate it into farmland. The first is to dig ditches for irrigation.
"Let's get started. Everyone takes a sip first. It's only convenient if you have strength." The foreman took a tin pot from his waist and poured a large sip into his mouth. The farmers also drank.
After drinking, they all yelled, sweating profusely by the potion in the tin pot. Their swarthy faces became rosy, and even their wrinkled foreheads stretched out a bit.
"Work, work, praise Victor Hugo, we will have a good life." The foreman took the lead and shouted.
The farmers also echoed one after another, and the fields sounded one after another. People praised from the bottom of their hearts, hoping that their lord would live a long life and lead him all the time.
A heavy-duty carriage followed the farmers. On the carriage was brown coal dug from the black forest, from the terrible voodoo swamp.
That damn swamp was a big coal pool with all kinds of terrible monsters living in it. But now Coldwind City needs coal, so droves of coal miners flood into the swamp.
The workers built houses, built villages, built fortresses, excavated drainage ditches and rivers, and drained the water in the marshes to facilitate the excavation of open-air brown coal.
Monsters have lived in the voodoo swamp for not a thousand years or hundreds of years. They discovered for the first time that humans not only feared themselves, but also ran to transform their living environment.
Is a swamp without water still a swamp
Swarms of monsters madly attacked the human village. Both sides use teeth, claws, venom, swords and axes, crossbow arrows, torches, and all available weapons.
Hundreds of human pioneers died. But they went on and on, and they kept coming, more terrifying than the goblins of the Black Forest. They are equipped, organized, and disciplined, and force the monsters who have lived in the swamp for generations to move.
The monsters don't understand what happened, they only know that the water in the swamp is getting less and less, the living environment is getting worse and worse, and they will become extinct if they don't run away.
In the winter of the first year of the Northern New Calendar, Coldwind City sent more than 3,000 people into the Black Forest to dig coal. Hundreds of heavy-duty carriages carry coal out every day.
The city is considering laying a larger volume of wooden tracks, and human beings have begun to use a lot of cheap coal in their production and life.
The farmland to be reclaimed has been marked with white lines with lime. The farmers first laid dry wood on the ditches, and then shoveled the coal with a spade. The hard ground will be burned softly before it can be dug out.
The fire lights up, and the cold wind gets stronger.
The farmers just felt warm all over. They must move fast, be explosive, and dig a one-meter wide and half-meter deep earth before the ground is frozen again.
This is hard work, but the farmers in Coldwind City are rushing to do it, and they don't even need to be paid, as long as they take care of the food. Because every acre of farmland is cultivated, one more acre of grain can be harvested, and the food that can be eaten in the stomach is more abundant.
This is nothing in the past.
In the past six months, the residents of Coldwind City have been full of enthusiasm for work. From the initial resistance, to the gradual acceptance, to the active request, a great change has taken place in their thinking.
Everything comes from the unimaginable harvest this fall.
Fuqiangling started to renovate farmland and cultivate farmers since last winter. Due to the cold weather in the north, only one season of wheat can be planted. It was not until this autumn that people saw the fruits of their hard work.
In the slow autumn wind, the golden-yellow waves of wheat fell into the sky one after another, and could not be seen at a glance. The residents of the city came out to look at the wonders, lamenting this unprecedented event. They wandered around the wheat fields and prayed devoutly to the heavy wheat ears.
Food, food, food, the North has been short of food all the year round, and it has always been purchased from the South. But the grain purchased by the noble master would never be given to the bottom, and there was no charity at all.
Every winter, every city in the north will starve to death. This is not just the tragedy faced by the poorest class, even the middle class.
Except for a small number of nobles, the mortality rate of ordinary people is too high. In famine years, some villages will suddenly become dead without a sound.
And this year...
"Praise your Excellency Victor Hugo."
A farmer brandished a hoe to excavate and screamed loudly from time to time, as if he was shouting a labor slogan. The other farmers listened happily, and occasionally yelled at the same time. After yelling, they felt as if they were full of strength.
Lord Hugo actually didn't do anything. He just eradicated the noble class in the past and used the food originally hoarded for reproduction. He fed the workers, cultivated more farmland, planted more food, and fed more people.
The lord didn't even divide the land, all the land in Coldwind City belonged to him. But he signed a formal labor agreement with the farmers. He provided farm tools, seeds, fertilizer, and irrigation for farmland in exchange for 30% of the harvest.
If there is a famine, the tenant rent can be reduced or exempted.
'Harmony Chamber of Commerce' provides low-interest loans, allows tenants to purchase products for production and life in advance, allows them to freely choose their occupations, allows them to have personal rights, and gives them and future generations the opportunity to receive education.
It's that simple, there is no big reason, and it can't be done with more.
Farmers in Coldwind City used to depend on nobles at all levels. The nobles can never ignore the organization and management of farmland reclamation, and just collect taxes like bones and souls.
In contrast, the emancipated and free farmers are determined to follow Master Hugo and show strong enthusiasm for production.
Your lord hired farmers to do the work, and they would bring their own dry food, even without wages. They know very well that every time they dig a ditch, they benefit from themselves.
Last year these farmers were reluctant when they were called up, but this year they are happy to work in the fields.
They went out early in the morning and braved the cold wind to the ditch construction site. They ate their lunch by the side of the pit for lunch. The hard bread was roasted on the fire to soften, and the physical potion was eaten into the stomach.
In the afternoon, when it gets dark, the farmers carry their hoes and sing songs to go home. It will continue to come out until dawn tomorrow, and it will repeat itself, simple and boring, but it will not stop all winter.
Last year, the rich and powerful led the refugees and reclaimed 7,000 mu of land. This year, Coldwind City organized more than 50,000 laborers to rehabilitate the farmland of the old nobles.
According to Lord Lord’s plan, the sown area of spring wheat in the third year of the new calendar will exceed 80,000 mu, which basically guarantees that the nearly 300,000 people in Coldwind City can eat half their fill.
This is unprecedented.