While the Noble Allied Army waited, laid traps, bickered over banquets, and colluded with one another, the Card Players all became tireless grinding machines under immense pressure.
"No poultry or livestock may be slaughtered privately! Bring them to designated locations for slaughter! Five copper coins for every animal!"
"Buying live rats, live pheasants, and all kinds of live game at high prices!"
"Purchasing all kinds of large livestock that are about to die of illness!"
The Farmers, peddlers, unemployed, and Wanderers of the Lottas Kingdom were all delighted.
At last, they had a way to share in the wealth, food, cloth, salt... and other necessities that the Card Players had seized from the nobles.
The greatest problem in an agricultural society was not a shortage of labor, but surplus labor being trapped on the land, leaving people with no way to earn money.
Vast amounts of wealth sat idle in the lords' storehouses. Grain rotted, cloth grew moldy, copper coins rusted... yet the poor had nowhere to sell their labor or buy those things.
Now, the Lottas Kingdom's population of over ten million was serving the leveling of more than five thousand Card Players.
At first, some Soldiers did not want to pay and tried to requisition things by force, but that was far too inefficient.
When some Soldiers paid, Farmers eagerly brought them the Rats they had caught. Soon, everyone started competing.
Lancelot lectured them: as long as there was land, rivers, and Farmers, wealth would keep flowing endlessly.
The land and rivers produced food. Food fed the Farmers and their children. As long as they could work, they could create more and more money.
Such a simple principle was beyond even the shrewdest nobles.
Holding the land deeds and using the food produced by Farmers themselves to exchange