Knight Lord: Start with Daily Intelligence

The Beaver Clan requested damming rights at Lake Revelein, a sacred site in Black Forest Territory. A key condition was the construction of several high-level magical mills for the territory. These mills would be capable of grinding extraordinary grains that ordinary animal-powered or water-powered mills could not.

The location for this high-level mill was quite suitable. Below the dam was Bjorn's Bay, the most important agricultural area in Black Forest Territory, where the territory's first canal, irrigation ditches, and extensive fertile fields were located. This would conveniently allow the Steel Wheat seeds to be sent there for grinding into flour.

The bread made from this Steel Wheat provided knights with strength and defense buffs, which, although only lasting for about 4 hours, could be considered a permanent effect. After all, there were only a few hours between meals, and before battles, the lord would certainly feast the soldiers, perfectly covering the warriors' combat time.

The only problem was that the Steel Wheat had too many sharp edges, requiring the harvesters to wear chainmail. This was actually a very risky situation, not for the slaves, but for the entire territory!

Arming hundreds or even thousands of serfs with chainmail and sharp sickles was a significant risk. What did this imply?

If these armed slaves got any rebellious ideas, such as mimicking fox calls at night or unearthing strange divine statues, these strong slaves would likely prefer to riot and plunder rather than remain oppressed.

It was feared that during the harvest season, the territory would need to assemble its knightly legions to garrison near the sacred site and monitor them.

After all, wielding a sharp weapon naturally incites murderous intent, while facing a sharp weapon, one is respectfully polite.

The disparity between hundreds of chainmail-clad mortal slaves and hundreds of plate-armored elite knights was no smaller than that between mortals in linen clothes and fully armed elite soldiers.

This was the very reason he maintained such a large army: 1000 elite knights consumed as much rations as 10,000 armed servants.

But as it turned out, he had underestimated the territory's food crisis. He had barely solved the problem with Vandal when Edmond ruthlessly dealt him a blow.

"Lord, I believe that both you and the Minister of Agriculture have severely overlooked one issue. It is not only soldiers and residents who consume grain in the territory. In fact, supplying livestock and warhorses is also a significant expenditure. People eat, and horses chew; the consumption related to horses is no less than that of humans."

And don't ask why the territory needed to supply livestock. In truly difficult situations, the knights' meals could be a little rougher. After all, humans could be used as beasts of burden, with willpower and endurance surpassing most creatures.

However, the griffons' rations were truly non-negotiable. They had to eat chicken at a minimum. Feeding them pork was like feeding humans rotten meat. Although they could eat it, they were extremely resistant.

Supplying so many knights with meat inevitably consumed a large amount of grain.

This was unavoidable, but fortunately, there was a way to alleviate this problem. Su Li said, "For grazing horses and sheep, do not use grains. Collect more pasture grass! If you don't have enough manpower, you can increase taxes on the commoners, requiring each of them to provide the territory with 100 pounds of fodder grass per year."

Fodder is grass used to feed livestock.

A king's army always has people vying to carry firewood and provide fodder. This is similar to the situation of people offering food and drink.

If the tax system were advanced enough, the commoners of an agricultural society would basically have to bear a fodder tax.

However, the empire's tax system in this world was relatively crude, lacking a tiered tax system, and directly imposing a rough nineteen tax, leaving the farmers with almost nothing besides a little food.

The farmers' quality of life entirely depended on the lord's virtue and how much tax they would remit.

Su Li felt that remitting another 10% of taxes to ordinary commoners and asking them to pay 100 pounds of fodder grass seemed like benevolent governance. This would further enhance his virtue.

Of course, the Provincial Affairs Council might not support this idea. Iron-Blooded Prime Minister Oliver was very resistant to any tax reduction ideas.

During the last tax reporting day, this prime minister had a fierce conflict with Su Li and Vandal.

He considered Su Li's policy of reducing taxes for serfs by as much as 30% to be very unwise, but he maintained respect due to Su Li's position.

However, he was not so polite to the Morningstar Church's kindness and generosity, directly slamming his arm armor heavily on the council table, causing sparks to fly from the violent collision.

Then, with cold eyes, he looked down at Vandal and questioned, "Benevolence? Has your head been gnawed by the fleas on those mud legs? The empire's laws have always been engraved on the knights' blades! Serfs are born to lubricate the wheels of the lord's war chariot with their flesh and blood."

"The nineteen tax is any sacrament Redmayne bestows to the nobility. You should advise those maggots to be more grateful; they have encountered a virtuous lord. Know that just last year, when the Lyonnaise Knights of the southern empire suppressed a revolt, they fertilized the vineyards with the intestines of 20% of the rebels!"

Although Agriculture Minister Vandal dared to argue and trade insults with the grumpy dwarf, they had no courage to refute the Iron-Blooded Prime Minister's powerful aura. After all, he was a powerful bureaucratic Chosen.

Therefore, Vandal completely avoided Oliver, fearing that a single disagreement would lead to the reduction of various benevolent policies.

And to Su Li, the Iron-Blooded Prime Minister had repeatedly offered advice. Su Li's deepest impression was when he ground the scattered remnants of tax books on tax reductions under his studded war boots, making a teeth-aching friction sound, and asked Su Li, "Lord, have you forgotten how the Greenskin warlord Guk tore open the throat of Count Moka in the south? When those dirty beasts surged like a tide, was it the copper coins you returned to the serfs that could build a city wall, or the knights' plate armor soaked in the serfs' blood and sweat?"

Compared to tax cuts, the head of the Provincial Affairs Council would definitely prefer to increase taxes on the territory's civilians. In the end, even if he retreated to second best and the two sides reached a compromise, he would at most allocate a sum of money from the territory's tight finances to purchase fodder grass from the farmers.

Although this minister did not absolutely support all of Su Li's policies, Su Li did not dislike him. On the contrary, he appreciated him very much.

Unconditionally supporting all of Su Li's ideas was the duty of the High Steward. As the territory's highest-ranking official, the High Steward was responsible for persuading others to support Su Li's ideas and attitudes.

And the head of the Provincial Affairs Council only needed to be dutiful in his work.

Su Li appreciated Oliver's impartial attitude. Speaking his mind on work matters was the only way to demonstrate his value. Arguing based on reason would not cause Su Li to have any dissatisfaction with the person in life.

Therefore, Su Li did not need to worry about how the fodder grass would be resolved. He only needed to propose the need for fodder grass, and the Iron-Blooded Prime Minister would help him solve it.

Edmond was also very confident in the Provincial Affairs Council's abilities, but fodder grass alone was far from enough. He immediately said, "Lord, nomadic grazing cannot produce top-quality warhorses. Real warhorses cannot survive on fodder grass alone; grain must be added to the feed. A qualified warhorse consumes the rations of three serfs every day. That's why, in the face of the Green Dragon Cataclysm, the knights can step on the spines of the beastmen and break through their lines."

Su Li waved his hand and said, "This is not a problem. I have a solution for adding feed to the mounts. Do you know about Moonlight Clover?"

"Moonlight Clover?" Edmond's eyes lit up immediately. He said, "I've heard of it. It's a type of pasture grass blessed by Tal, growing only in the depths of dense forests and fertile grasslands. This extraordinary pasture grass, with silver-blue veins winding across its leaves, is one of the most excellent pasture grasses within the empire."

"Legend has it that every night when the twin moons converge, this pasture grass can ooze mother-of-pearl-colored dewdrops. At this time, it must be harvested with a scythe inlaid with the skull of a giant moose to obtain the full effect of Moonlight Clover. Warhorses that eat this clover will have emerald-like light bursting from their eye sockets, and their endurance will be significantly improved, even running for six consecutive hours without fatigue."

Six hours without fatigue?

Su Li compared it and found that it was still a bit off from the Horse King of the Wildebeest herd. The Horse King of the Wildebeest herd, also known as Beastslayer Gerold's mount, was the most magnificent warhorse in the entire Black Forest Foothills, said to be able to gallop for three days and three nights to report urgent military information to the front lines.

Compared to this divine steed, the ability of ordinary warhorses to run for six hours without fatigue was undoubtedly a huge difference.

However, compared to ordinary warhorses that had not used this Moonlight Clover, the difference was several times.

The endurance of horses is much worse than that of humans! Warhorses are good for short-distance sprints, but for long-distance marches, humans must wait for the horses. Even for a long run the length of a marathon, humans can sometimes outrun horses.

Even if the empire's wildebeest galloped at full speed, they would only run for about two hours.

The first time Su Li commanded cavalry on a long-distance raid against the Halfling tribe, he had to stop after running for about two hours to unbridle the horses, let them eat grass, rest, and recover their strength.

But wildebeest that ate Moonlight Clover could gallop for 6 hours! This meant that the mobility of Su Li's knightly legions increased by 3 or even 5 times!

After all, people also need to eat and rest. In other words, as long as there was this Moonlight Clover, the warhorses' rest time could be synchronized with that of humans, and it would not delay the march time much at all.

And the benefits were not limited to these. Edmond continued, "This Moonlight Clover not only provides warhorses with ample endurance, but it is also said that perfect Moonlight Clover cultivated with the tears of pure maidens can allow warhorses to traverse mountains and rivers as if walking on flat ground."

"Any livestock that eats this extraordinary pasture grass may gain qualifications for advancement under the tempering of spiritual power, becoming a higher-level extraordinary species."

"Of course, everything in this world comes at a price. Especially when it comes to spiritual energy, an overabundance of spiritual energy will greatly increase the probability of corruption. If artificially cultivated Moonlight Clover is not blessed with enough maiden tears, it may mutate into inferior Corrosive Clover, growing rotten flesh in the stables, and the feed troughs will be covered with vines that throb with hearts, dragging serfs who steal grain into a labyrinth of fanged roots. Then the flesh will restore its calm."

Flesh will restore its calm! This is truly full of the eternal despair of this world.

Do not think that this would be a good thing. On the contrary, it meant that eternal darkness and despair would always shroud this stable. The serfs would never know which Moonlight Clover was safe and which had temporarily regained its calm.

As long as the serfs entered this stable, they could be dragged into the root labyrinth by the Corrosive Clover's hideous vines.

But since they were going to steal grain from the stable to eat, it was only right that they bear the cost.

Su Li quickly skipped this point and turned his attention to the cultivation of these extraordinary pasture grasses.

It seemed that this God of Wildness, Tal, was truly a bit uninhibited.

His priests were called Tal Maidens, his sacred beasts, such as the Giant Moose and Unicorn, required pure maidens to ride them, and even the pasture grass containing his divine power required the tears of pure maidens to irrigate and cultivate.

This made the territory's right of first night seem particularly necessary.

Any maiden's virginity belonged to the lord.

At least until the lord allowed it, if a virgin lost her virginity, she and her damned adulterer would be hanged on the gallows.

Su Li could grant a pardon, but the serfs could not steal it themselves.

Then Su Li said to Edmond, "The territory will fully support you in what you have proposed. Whether it is the tears of pure maidens or a large amount of fodder grass, we will collect them with all our might. I have only one request: cultivate this pasture grass in the sacred forest as soon as possible to meet the needs of the warhorses and battle rams."

"No problem, Lord! I will use divine magic to collect the seeds of Moonlight Clover as soon as possible and sow them widely in the forest, expanding to at least 20 acres in the first stage."

Su Li nodded and asked, "How many livestock do we currently have on the ranch?"

"The number is no longer large, Lord. According to the Blood Pine Forest Reclamation Order, each family willing to go to the frontier to reclaim land can apply for three bags of winter wheat seeds and two draft horses. We have already sent out thousands of draft horses."

"At the same time, with the increase in the number of territory knights, the knights have also bought nearly 2,000 warhorses."

"We now have only over 920 warhorses, over 2,000 draft horses, and over 500 mountain rams on the ranch. On the other hand, the number of ordinary goats and sheep is considerable, as many as 6,000. Our shepherds are transferring these flocks to the Blood Highlands, as the Blood Highlands are a natural pasture."

The good thing about the Black Forest Foothills is that this vast and fertile land is not only agriculturally developed, but also has many natural pastures, especially the cool highlands near the northern mountains, which are natural grazing areas.

In fact, it was not only Su Li himself who grazed there. Many knightly families, territory nobles, and landlords bought Su Li's land there and hired shepherds to graze. Su Li, riding a griffin, had seen herds on the fertile grasslands below while patrolling. There were at least eight or nine herds, totaling perhaps one or two thousand cattle and horses.

These knightly families were actually quite wealthy. After all, Su Li was very generous. The spoils of war divided among the knightly families in so many battles accounted for 20-30% of the total.

This was also the most important reason for Su Li's extremely high prestige. Victory was the best incentive, and the soldiers could always follow him to gain compensation in victory, obtaining a large amount of wealth, benefits, land, and livestock.

One important reason why the territory's population statistics had to be re-checked every few months was that these knight families would continuously purchase slaves from the slave traders and capture teams arriving in Black Forest Town to cultivate their manors and graze their herds.

Each time during the count, Su Li would discover that the territory's population was more than he expected, and the farmland was wider than he had calculated.

Of course, Su Li was happy to see this.

With such a vast Black Forest foothills, it was impossible to develop rapidly relying solely on his strength. It was necessary to rely on a large number of knight families to expand outward, establishing strongholds and manors, and then use these strongholds and manors as a foundation to develop farmlands and pastures around them.

After Su Li arranged the focus on farming, Vandal and Edmund immediately began to promote these policies.

First of all, there was the pasture that Edmund needed. As Su Li had guessed, Edmund went to the Provincial Council to ask for Oliver's support, and the iron-blooded Prime Minister immediately scolded him until he couldn't lift his head.

Oliver simply calculated for him how much property loss a 10% tax exemption would cause to the territory, and how many merchants and landlords might take the opportunity to evade taxes. According to preliminary estimates, the territory's current scale would lose hundreds of gold crowns every year.

Once the territory developed and expanded, with a scale of 20,000+ people, it could lose thousands of gold crowns every year!

Fortunately, the appearance of Moonlight Clover allowed Oliver to see some value, which gave Edmund a slightly better look.

He approved 30 gold crowns for Edmund, allowing him to collect pasture grass himself.

30 gold crowns!

Compared to the gains of hundreds or thousands, it seemed insignificant, but it showed unparalleled purchasing power!

This was equivalent to the entire income of 30 farmers for a year.

Once it was spent, it easily mobilized more than 1,000 farmers to collect more than 100,000 bundles of pasture grass for the ranch.

This was a really quick money-making project. Civilians exchanged goods with one hand, and the ranch paid with the other.

Many families acted with their families, and even 5-year-old children took stone knives to the field to harvest fodder in exchange for a copper coin.

Especially in the villages closer to the ranch, dozens of households in each village would rush to cut a batch of pasture grass after finishing their farm work before nightfall, and then a dozen strong young people in the village would push carts or drive carriages to send the pasture grass to the ranch to exchange for huge wealth of up to several silver coins.

This was equivalent to their income for several days. The average daily income of a farmer was about 20 copper coins. The only thing that made them feel bad was that the magistrate's announcement said that 1 bundle of fodder could be exchanged for 1 copper coin, but they couldn't get that much at all. The ranch steward, that fat guy, would deduct 20% to 30% of the commission depending on his mood, euphemistically saying that he was saving money for the lord.

The farmers were helpless, and they were very satisfied with the few copper coins they got. No matter what, this was the lord's benevolent government. With this extra income, their children would not have to compete with wild dogs for food.

After all, even if the magistrate didn't give money, these civilians would have to "voluntarily" dedicate themselves to the lord's great cause.

But the situation changed when Lord Su Li personally inspected the ranch's fodder. The head of the fat-headed steward was hung on the top of the flagpole on the fertile ranch piled with tens of thousands of bundles of pasture grass.

Lord Su Li was very satisfied with the ranch's fertility and the accumulation of fodder.

But Lord Su Li was very angry that the steward dared to manipulate the horse administration project.

Corruption in the horse administration was Su Li's taboo and red line. Anyone who dared to cross the red line would be executed without hesitation!

Although this small steward only embezzled a few dozen silver coins, the Court of Inquisition still had no possibility of forgiving him.

While the fodder was being stored, Edmund's Moonlight Clover project in the Sacred Forest was also in full swing.

These noble silver-horned giant moose were like nobles among the giant moose. When they entered the Sacred Forest, they inspected the entire forest, and a large number of Moonlight Clover grew on the traces they stepped on, greatly reducing Edmund's cultivation time.

If these giant moose footprints could cover the entire forest, it might be possible to cultivate thousands of acres of high-quality pasture.

After all, the area of this Sacred Forest is not large, and it was artificially transformed by Edmund.

For this great plan, Edmund even bribed Patriarch Lunadesan of the Church of Tar, asking her to seduce these giant moose.

Of course, he didn't dare to say this directly. Otherwise, Lunadesan could tear off his beard directly.

He was promoting the project in the name of cooperation.

This was also the tradition of the two churches. Priests of the Church of the Morning Dawn and the Church of Tar often cooperated in hosting ceremonies at celebrations.

This was also his inherent impression of the Church of Tar. Tar and his sacred beasts were all old perverts. Even a giant moose liked to have pure girls straddle them.

Lunadesan was not aware of Edmund's thoughts. Because this old guy was fooling her in the name of compensation.

Lunadesan's giant moose was lent to Vandal, but it died in the dragon's nest. Its skull and the corpses of the other two giant moose that Su Li's intelligence found were collected and used by the dwarves to make three sacred beast skull scythes with bronze, oak, and skulls, and handed them over to several pure 17-year-old girls to harvest Moonlight Clover in the forest.

Vandal and Edmund unanimously suggested that she tame another silver-horned giant moose as her new mount.

Lunadesan accepted the kindness of these two old men without knowing why.

But things did not go as expected. These silver giant moose were indifferent to her. They were even more intimate with Hilde.

But you must know that Hilde is definitely not a pure girl, and she is even full of Su Li's aura.

This is basic common sense in physiology. If there is a perfect intimate activity, the male's aura will remain in the female's body for at least two days.

That is, during the two days, when the woman is active, there will be male remains flowing out on her underwear.

But even so, the silver-horned giant moose were more intimate with Hilde, which made Lunadesan a little frustrated.

Although she likes to see the bare chests and abdominal muscles of male knights, she is truly a pure girl serving Tar.