Black Wolf, the Old Witch, the Griffin Knight, and Yveta traveled in two carriages to the city of Parviga.
Yveta and his companions rode in one carriage, while the other carried pig iron ingots and four blacksmith apprentices.
With nothing to do in the carriage, everyone started chatting.
As they talked about the conflict between Ambrose's City Faction and Aristocrat Faction, they all found themselves remarking that cities seemed freer than manors.
Yveta, however, neither agreed nor disagreed.
That was because the city's capitalists were still three or four versions behind the true capitalists on Earth.
The city's capitalists were, in fact, more like city nobles.
In Yveta's view, Feudal Lords bound serfs to them through personal dependence, but Ambrose's guild system also bound apprentices and craftsmen.
Both were forms of coercive personal restraint.
The difference was that guild apprentices and craftsmen were a little more independent than serfs.
But guilds made apprentices work for their masters for free for two years, then labor for them for about five more years for meager wages. And even after completing their apprenticeships, they were still exploited by the guilds.
Yet throughout this process, neither the masters nor the guilds necessarily taught them any real skills.
Quite a few guild apprentices wasted seven or eight years, only to gain nothing. They could do nothing but change trades or even go back to farming.
There were plenty of apprentices like that, all victims of the guild system.
But Yveta knew that he would need many skilled blacksmiths in the future.
So, in various ways, he had put pressure on the old blacksmiths in his territory, telling them not to hoard their knowledge but to teach the apprentices.
He had also told the old blacksmiths that production demands would only keep growing, and if they