On April 1, warm sunlight spilled early across every inch of White Bear Territory.
The cold wind still lingered, yet it carried threads of warmth, announcing the arrival of spring.
Lynn stood atop the castle's watchtower, looking down over the entirety of White Bear Territory.
The snow in the fields had completely melted away, revealing vast stretches of damp, dark soil.
The serfs had long since gathered beside the Public Land outside their villages. They had shed their heavy wool coats and changed into lightweight linen clothes, their faces filled with anxiety and anticipation for the coming year's harvest.
Old Albert rode a gaunt horse to the foot of the watchtower and looked up. "My lord, please give the order!"
Though he had risen as early as three in the morning, Old Albert still looked full of vigor.
Plowing was the most important matter in White Bear Territory, affecting the harvest of the entire year. He could not afford to take it lightly.
"Mm. Begin."
Lynn saw the Heavy Plows placed beside the serfs, as well as piles of Compost along the Strip Fields. Seed-selection techniques had already spread throughout the entire territory.
This year was destined to be a year of abundant harvest.
At Lynn's command, all of White Bear Territory stirred into motion.
There was no need for the Farm Managers to wield their whips. The serfs voluntarily began driving their Heavy Plows into the fields.
In a village beside the castle, more than a dozen Heavy Plows, pulled by sturdy Draft Horses, formed neat ranks. Across Strip Fields nearly five hundred meters long, they carved straight, deep-black furrows, creating a spectacular sight.
The plowshares of the two-wheeled Heavy Plows were forged from pure iron, hard and sharp. Like hot knives through cake, they cut through wet, heavy soil that had not seen daylight for centuries, turning up the rich nutrients hidden deep beneath the earth while severing stubborn grass roots along the way.
The moldboards followed close behind the plowshares, further breaking apart the overturned clods and flipping them over to pile in the same direction.
An iron-plated sideboard was also mounted to the Heavy Plow, adding weight to ensure it moved in a straight line and kept the plowed furrows neat.
According to White Bear Territory's old customs, the serfs had to spend the coming week planting the lord's Public Land first.
Only after they had finished the assigned eighteen thousand mu of Public Land could they return to tend their own Allotment Land.
As a result, the serfs were highly enthusiastic about their work.
To pursue efficiency, even when farming the Public Land, entire families joined in.
Adult male serfs guided the horse-drawn Heavy Plows. Children of thirteen or fourteen followed behind, swinging hoes to break apart the large, solid clods of earth turned up by the plows, while younger children picked roots and stones out of the soil.
As for the pregnant Female Serfs, most remained at home to clean, plant vegetable gardens, care for livestock, prepare dinner, and so on.
In Lynn's view, although serfdom still carried the word "serf," it was more advanced than slavery by an unknown number of times.
After all, the serfs possessed private property of their own: their Allotment Land.
Tempted by that juicy prize, they willingly worked for the lord and cultivated an equal area of Public Land alongside their Allotment Land.
Leaving aside all the other harsh taxes and levies, the Public Land alone amounted to the lord collecting a fifty-percent income tax from the serfs.
It was simply a tax paid through labor force.
It was not that Lynn had never considered distributing all the lord's Allotment Land to the serfs and directly taxing them afterward according to the amount of land they owned.
That would further stimulate the serfs' enthusiasm for production and land reclamation, while increasing the grain output of all White Bear Territory.
After all, once they had paid enough tax, everything left over would be theirs. How could they not be motivated?
But for now, it was clearly unrealistic.
First, White Bear Territory had followed the serf system for more than a hundred years, and the ancestors of many of these serfs had come from the Southern Border as serfs.
Whether serfs, stewards, Farm Managers, or other lower- and middle-level administrators, they had all grown accustomed to the existence of serfdom. To them, it was as natural as breathing.
Abolishing the system rashly would create panic across the territory and instead reduce overall grain production in the short term.
Second was the matter of tax collection.
The stewards and Farm Managers were effectively the lord's tax collectors, overseeing the serfs as they paid their taxes with labor force.
This method of collecting taxes was not particularly difficult. It only required knowing how to farm and wield a whip.
But if the land were distributed and taxes changed into rent paid in goods or money, then the capabilities of those tax collectors would be nowhere near sufficient.
Their literacy rate was far too low, and those who could perform basic addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, as well as write and keep accounts, were rarer than phoenix feathers.
Lynn first had to cultivate a group of capable officials before he could consider abolishing serfdom.
In other words, he still had to develop education first.
At that moment, Lao Liu climbed up the watchtower under Second Brother's lead. "Big Brother, you summoned me."
Lynn turned around and patted his somewhat thin shoulder. "Lao Liu, how long have you been with us?"
Lao Liu still looked somewhat youthful. After thinking for a moment, he replied, "Almost a year, I think."
Lynn smiled. "You joined us last May. I remember that you were the one begging to join us. You were clearly a Monastery student with a bright future ahead of you, so why did you insist on becoming a horse bandit?"
"I just thought the iron masks on your faces looked cool. And being a horse bandit was so free, wasn't it? You could rob whoever you wanted and kill whoever you wanted. Besides, my father had already passed away by then. Even if I hadn't become a horse bandit, I couldn't have stayed at the Monastery."
Lao Liu had always been frank in front of Lynn.
To put it bluntly, he had wanted to join because he had nowhere else to go and could only hope that the Horse Bandits would take him in.
At this time, knowledge was monopolized by nobles and the church.
Noble education was only available to nobles. If commoners wanted to acquire knowledge, they could only spend a fortune attending church schools.
Lao Liu's father had been a merchant and could support his studies.
His annual tuition had been as high as two gold coins, enough to buy a full 1,500 kilograms of Rye in White Bear Territory, the food supply for two serf households.
The miscellaneous costs for books, stationery, lodging, and the like were equally expensive, even higher than the tuition.
In the bookstores of Three Rivers City, a hand-copied parchment textbook would never cost less than one gold coin.
At the Monastery school, Lao Liu studied diligently and seriously, and his grades had always ranked among the best.
If nothing unexpected had happened, he would have graduated with excellent grades and had a strong chance of continuing his studies at a church university in a major city.
If he successfully completed university, he could become a respected clergyman. His future would be immensely bright, and the fate of his entire family would be rewritten.
Yet before he could receive his diploma, his father and older brother died of illness one after another. Having lost his source of financial support, he was about to be thrown out of the Monastery.
Just then, Lynn and the others raided the Monastery, and he joined them, becoming a glorious horse bandit.
Lynn asked with a smile, "So how do you feel now? Do you regret it?"
"Honestly, it feels great. Not only did I become a horse bandit who roams the Northern Border, I also get to indulge in being a noble alongside you, Big Brother. It's far more comfortable than being at school!"
"Is that so? Then what would you think if I wanted you to return to school?"
Before you continue