A Difficult Choice

Although Demacia City paid some attention to the changes in Freljord, it was bound to react slowly.

Besides, with His Majesty Jarvan IV planning his grand coronation ceremony, even if anyone did discover something, no one would pay it much mind.

Instead, it was the nobles of the North, who had never been particularly well-informed, who first realized something was wrong—not because they understood Freljord, but because the people under their rule, especially able-bodied workers, were streaming into Freljord on a startlingly large scale.

The North had never been densely populated. Even over the past decade or so, as Freljord's trade had flourished and people's living standards had improved, the desire to have children had visibly increased. But given the North's pitifully small population to begin with, its commoners still numbered far fewer than those in the South.

Once Freljord opened its doors to migrants without reservation, large numbers of workers chose to go there and earn money. Compared with scratching a living from the land, selling their labor in Freljord was clearly more profitable.

Only a few regions had avoided a major outflow of people, because most of their commoners were independent farmers who worked their own land, as in Silvermine City.

Tenant farmers stopped renting fields, and plots that had once been planted with pasture or vegetables were left fallow. Even nobles who cared little for the lives of commoners had no choice but to sit up and take notice.

Grain prices had been rising year after year. Commoners were the geese that laid golden eggs; if they all left, who would the lords have to work their land?

If the farmers had taken up some other line of work, the nobles throughout the region might have resorted to special measures. But since everyone had gone to Freljord,