Winning People Over with Virtue (Part 1)

In Mount & Blade: King's Ambition, Volume One: The Trials, Chapter 13: Winning People Over with Virtue (Part 1), Renard handed the young man one of his cigars and blew out a ring of smoke. "I'll give you an idea. Do what I say, and I guarantee you'll get the job done."

The young man took two deep puffs, then, while Renard wasn't looking, quickly ground the cigar out under his shoe and secretly tucked it into his pocket.

How could Renard have missed his little trick? He simply didn't care and went on, "Go to the slums in the east and find some hard cases. Tell them that anyone who stays outside Old Walker's shop for six hours will get a full meal on me."

Hard cases? The lackey was taken aback. He clearly had no idea what the term meant.

"I mean those lowlifes who never learn their lesson." Renard frowned as he explained. He decided he should use fewer modern expressions from now on.

"Oh, right." The lackey's answer was vague. He was still a little confused, but asked sheepishly, "Does the young master have some deeper purpose in mind?"

Renard smiled around his cigar and replied with an air of easy confidence, "Winning people over with virtue."

"What exactly should I do?" The tall, thin young man wasn't an idiot. He thought it best to clarify anything he didn't understand, so he wouldn't mess up something important.

"Here's what you do..." Renard explained the process in detail, then added, "Don't be stingy with the best-behaved commoners. Give them a ten-copper bonus."

Then, still a little concerned, he cautioned him, "Warn them not to cause trouble."

He let out a long breath and gazed at the bright sunshine outside the window. "Do as I say, and within a few days, Old Walker will come begging us for help."

As he spoke, he pulled several silver coins from his pocket and tossed them over.

The lackey caught them with a broad smile. Though he thought the plan sounded a little dubious, he didn't dare argue and left to carry it out.

This was a trick Renard had learned in his previous life to deal with deadbeats. A distant relative of his had owned a machine shop that specialized in manufacturing mechanical parts. As the business gradually expanded, selling on credit became common, and so did customers refusing to pay their debts.

His relative had connections in both the legitimate and criminal worlds, but a deadbeat was still a deadbeat. They would always make excuses and play the victim, and when they couldn't take it anymore, they'd throw out the same threat: "I don't have the money. You'll have to take my life instead."

Eventually, someone came up with an idea: hire a group of old ladies to block the debtor's entrance every day. Whether it was the company's front gate or the door to their home, there would always be six or seven old ladies squatting outside.

They were told, "Start blocking the entrance at seven in the morning. You'll get lunch, and nobody's allowed to move. We'll settle up at eight in the evening, and everyone gets two hundred yuan."

The old ladies were incredibly persistent. No matter who tried to talk them into leaving, they wouldn't budge. If anyone dared touch them, they'd lie down on the ground.

Fight fire with fire. If you were a deadbeat, there was always someone even more shameless than you.

In the end, the debtor's business ground to a halt, and even their personal life was seriously affected. With no other way out, they finally paid up.

Renard planned to use the same trick on Old Walker and keep at it until the man questioned his own sanity. Unless he wanted to leave Saint Brieuc Fortress for good, he'd have no choice but to give in.

If all went according to plan, Old Walker would soon realize what kind of scoundrel he'd offended.

The lackey was obedient. He went to the slums in the eastern district and passed along Renard's instructions, with just a small change: "Young Master Renard says anyone who stays outside Old Walker's shop for six hours will be rewarded with a kilogram of black rye bread."

Rye bread made from bran mixed with coarse flour was cheap. Two copper coins could buy a kilogram, so it was easy to see how much he stood to pocket in kickbacks.

Even so, the lackey still felt he was being too generous. He wondered if he could squeeze them further: "They're just commoners. What if I don't give them anything? It's not like they can revolt."

But the thought only flashed through his mind. He didn't dare alter Renard's orders, so he hurried to the bakery and bought a full thirty kilograms of black rye bread. Then he squatted outside Old Walker's shop and waited quietly.

About ten minutes later, several furtive figures suddenly appeared at the end of the street. They peered around and crept toward Old Walker's shop.

Their clothes were ragged. They were clearly among the lowest of the low in Saint Brieuc Fortress.

This was a good place to explain the social hierarchy of the Kingdom of Arthur.

More than two hundred years earlier, the Church had sent an expeditionary force across the sea to wage war on the Eastern Continent. The mighty armies of the Tang Empire defeated them, dealing an unprecedented blow to the doctrine that kings ruled by divine right.

Though the Church still controlled the northern part of the continent, more than twenty countries in the far south, including the Kingdom of Arthur, had declared that they no longer accepted coronation by the Pope. The age of royal supremacy had quietly begun.

The awkward part was that centuries of diminished royal authority had left regional lords ruling independently, with little desire to submit to their monarchs.

Take the newly founded Kingdom of Arthur, for example. The king sat at the very top of the pyramid of power, but the nobles wielded considerable influence too. They could even sway the king's decisions.

Fortunately, the king controlled the country's largest, most prosperous, and most fertile lands, as well as its biggest, most loyal, and most powerful army. No one dared openly challenge him, so the king and the nobles together occupied the top of the pyramid of power.

Below them came the clergy. Though they had lost their former authority, they had once been the rulers, and their skills in healing the sick and driving out evil spirits still gave them a very high social status.

Below the clergy were the commoners, the largest social class. Anyone who was free could be considered a commoner.

Of course, there were still vast differences among commoners. Soldiers, artisans, merchants, scholars, and adventurers all held considerably higher status than farmers who scratched out a living in the fields.

Below the commoners were the lowborn. They had no freedom: they were either servants who had sold themselves, slaves and criminals who had been forced into servitude, or wanderers without legal status.

Commoners made up the largest part of Saint Brieuc Fortress's population, followed by the lowborn. For example, the tenant farmers who worked Baron Hamilton's land and the maids and servants who waited on people in the fortress were mostly lowborn with no freedom.

These people were the nobles' private property, and their descendants would remain lowborn for generations. Unless a lord chose to pardon them, they would never escape that status—and such a pardon was virtually unheard of.

The differences among the lowborn were just as great. Selina was lowborn, but her standing in Saint Brieuc Fortress was higher than that of many commoners.

At the very least, these well-born lackeys had to address her respectfully as Miss Selina, because she was Renard's lover.