Thus, the powerful landowners of the Flower Kingdom had always wanted land, not people. Even when they wanted people, they only wanted the strong and women. Most male farmers who could no longer survive were not even qualified to sell themselves into servitude.
Ironically, because it was difficult to collect taxes from the strong, the Flower Kingdom's court had originally leaned toward supporting the class of self-cultivating farmers.
But as the court grew increasingly corrupt, ceded territory and paid indemnities abroad, and saw its expenses continually rise, its administrative efficiency declined at home. Twenty years ago, of every ten taels of silver collected in taxes, five might have entered the treasury. Now, perhaps not even two taels did.
Under such circumstances, the only way to maintain the court was to keep raising tax rates. Yet the taxes of the powerful landowners were difficult to collect, or even impossible to collect entirely. Thus, despite knowing it was unsustainable, they could only keep drinking poison to quench their thirst, squeezing the self-cultivating farmers—the easy targets—for all they were worth, driving them into bankruptcy batch after batch.
Some might ask, weren't they afraid the farmers would rise up in rebellion when they could no longer survive?
Perhaps the Flower Kingdom's court truly was not that afraid. Individual differences in this world were simply too vast. Poor people suffering from hunger and cold were almost incapable of defeating terrifyingly powerful strongmen.
And even if some monstrous figure beyond all common sense really appeared, given the Flower Kingdom's landscape of powerful local clans everywhere, the nearby powerful families would be the first to suffer headaches. The court might even wish for them to fight until both sides were ruined!
In fact, in the eyes of the Flower Kingdom's court, those local powers that possessed great