Seed Prince

Jack had originally been a small-time seed merchant in the south, scraping by selling grain and fruit seeds.

He was far from wealthy, but at least he had enough to eat and drink.

Then, a few months ago, he heard a fellow merchant bragging in a tavern:

After the Northern Frontier Reclamation Edict was issued, nobles had flocked to the Northern Frontier to reclaim land, creating a huge demand for seeds that far outstripped supply!

The rumor set his heart racing.

Seed merchants in the south were as common as horse dung by the roadside. With hundreds of people fighting over the same slice of pie, making a fortune was next to impossible.

But the Northern Frontier was different. He had heard it was barren and desolate, and seeds were hard to come by. If he could get his goods there, buyers would be lining up!

"This is my chance to strike it rich!"

Thrilled, Jack poured every bit of his savings from the past several years into seeds.

He loaded his small wagon to the brim and hurried toward the Northern Frontier, dreaming of getting rich overnight.

Yet the moment he entered Frost Glaive City, he was dumbfounded.

"Th-this is the biggest city in the Northern Frontier?"

The city was dilapidated, its streets muddy. The passersby wore shabby clothes and looked exhausted. Where was the prosperity, let alone the business opportunity?

Jack's heart sank as a sense of foreboding crept over him.

I'm done for. Am I going to lose everything?

But since he had already come this far, he could hardly go home empty-handed.

So he steeled himself, found an empty spot on the eastern side of the market, and set up his little stall.

"Are you Jack, the seed merchant?"

Before he had even laid out his goods, three knights rode up. They were still travel-worn, their armor splattered with mud, their expressions urgent.

Jack froze, his heart pounding.

Why did they know his name?

Has my reputation as the Seed Prince already spread from Central Province to Northern Province?!

Still, customers were customers. He hastily straightened his back and cleared his throat, ready to give his wares a proper introduction.

"What would you gentlemen like? I have rye, oats, wheat..."

The lead knight cut him off. "We'll take it all."

"Wh-what?" Jack stared at him in shock, wondering whether he had misheard.

"We'll take everything. How much?"

Now Jack was truly dumbstruck.

Is everyone in the Northern Frontier this filthy rich?!

His mind raced as he calculated how much he could charge for the goods he had brought...

Finally, he made a show of hesitating, then held up five fingers. "Since you're taking everything, I'll give you a discount. Five gold coins."

Five gold coins!

In the south, a sack of seed potatoes sold for just two iron coins. This entire wagonload had cost him less than a single gold coin!

Jack was ready for them to haggle. He was even prepared to lower the price a little more if they objected.

"Fine."

To his surprise, the lead knight barely waited for him to finish before pulling five gold coins from his belt pouch and casually tossing them over.

Then he and the other two knights swiftly packed up every last seed, loaded them, and hurried away.

Jack remained rooted to the spot, clutching five heavy gold coins, utterly stunned.

Only when a cold wind blew past did he realize that his stall had been stripped bare.

He quickly lowered his head to inspect the coins, turning them over one by one until he was certain they were all genuine.

Real... they're all real!

A moment later, wild delight flooded through him, and Jack nearly jumped into the air.

"I'm rich!!!"

The seeds and his travel expenses to the Northern Frontier had cost him less than one gold coin. He had just cleared four gold coins in profit!

And he had barely done a thing!

Is doing business in the Northern Frontier really this easy?!

Jack clenched the coins, his mind already racing through plans for his next move.

This is only the beginning!

If I go back and buy a few hundred sacks of seeds wholesale, couldn't I make hundreds of gold coins?!

At the thought, the corners of Jack's mouth curled up at a ninety-degree angle.

The Northern Frontier is a gold mine!

He would go back, take out a loan, and become the Northern Frontier's number-one seed merchant!

Of course, he had no idea that the seeds he had just sold included Frostblood Redberry seeds worth over a thousand gold coins.

Otherwise, he would have been sick with regret.

As for how he later lost everything, that was a story for another time.

While Lambert hurried back to the Red Tide Fief with the seeds, Louis was riding through the farmland to inspect the sowing.

Across the fields, farmers busily scattered seeds, while the sounds of hoes turning the soil rose and fell.

Wherever Louis went, the farmers stopped their work and bowed respectfully.

Unlike the farmers in other nobles' territories, however, their eyes held no cowering fear, only heartfelt respect.

The laborers who had been slaves, in particular, looked at Louis with a burning light in their eyes.

They hoped their hard work would catch their lord's attention and earn them a chance at freedom!

Louis took it all in without showing much emotion.

After all, to him, slaves and free folk were no different. They were all beasts of burden for the Red Tide Fief.

Besides, the current system made them work harder, so he was in no hurry to change it.

Once the time was right, he might consider a more measured approach to freeing the slaves. For now, they had to prove their worth.

Just then, Mick approached, leaning on his hoe, his face bright with barely contained joy.

"My lord!" Mick wiped the sweat from his forehead, smiling so broadly that his wrinkles bunched together. "These fertilizers work wonders! We're sure to have a good harvest this year!"

Louis surveyed the freshly tilled fields. The soil was indeed moist and soft, its dark color a clear sign that it had absorbed the nutrients well.

He gave a slight nod. "What are we planting first?"

"Rye, turnips, and potatoes," Mick answered at once. "They're hardy and quick to mature. As long as nothing goes wrong, we'll have our first harvest in three months!"

Louis nodded in approval.

Rye could be ground into coarse flour, while turnips could serve as both vegetables and livestock feed.

Potatoes were even easier to grow and harvest, kept for a long time, and were ideal as an emergency food supply.

Although geothermal heat made parts of the Red Tide Fief considerably better than other lands in the Northern Frontier, not every plot was suited to more demanding crops.

To play it safe, planting these cold-hardy crops first was the most sensible choice.

But that was nowhere near enough to satisfy Louis's ambitions.

Once greenhouse cultivation techniques were perfected, he would grow a wider variety of crops and solve the Red Tide Fief's food problems once and for all.

Louis stood quietly on a ridge between the fields, his gaze sweeping over the land before him.

The fertile black soil glimmered in the sunlight as farmers moved busily to and fro, sowing the seeds of the Red Tide Fief's future.

Under his plans, this once-barren frozen land was slowly coming to life.

An indescribable sense of accomplishment welled up in Louis's heart.